Aaron Burr

Aaron Burr was an American lawyer, Revolutionary War veteran and politician who served as the third vice president of the United States from 1801 to 1805. A prominent figure in the early republic, he built a political base in New York and became one of the leading Democratic-Republican rivals of Alexander Hamilton and the Federalists.

Before the vice-presidency Burr served in the New York State Assembly, as attorney general of New York and as a United States senator. His career was permanently altered after he killed Hamilton in their 1804 duel. Burr later became involved in an opaque western enterprise that led to his 1807 trial for treason; he was acquitted, but his national political career never recovered.

Hourly History’s Alexander Hamilton examines the Federalist Papers, the creation of the national financial system and Hamilton’s conflicts with Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr. In Anya Seton’s My Theodosia, beginning in 1800, the novel follows Theodosia Burr as her father Aaron Burr’s political career reaches the vice-presidency and then collapses after his duel with Alexander Hamilton. Aaron Burr is treated fictionally in W. Michael Gear’s The River: A Novel of the American West.