For Mr. Walling, the unprecedented ability of the United States to combined great power and liberty owes much to the strategic sobriety of Alexander Hamilton. Contrary to the utopian vision of Thomas Jefferson and many of his allies, Hamilton understood that war was a fact of international life, and that the survival of the infant republic depended on developing and maintaining the potential to make war. He was, in other words, a strategist before the word was coined. But Hamilton was not a mere militaristic state-builder along the lines of Frederick the Great or Bismarck. He was an 18th century liberal and therefore always understood the necessity of remaining within the bounds established by the Constitution.
Energy is a very different thing from violence.
Nonetheless he recognized that war is the great destroyer of free government and that liberty is endangered by too little as well as too much power. His goal was to establish a republican regime both fit for war and safe for liberty. The prevailing political tradition held that republics and empires were incompatible. Republics were free but short-lived because of instability arising from the presence of factions. Empires were secure, but security was achieved at the cost of freedom.