Right as the song starts, we can see Burr's anger towards Hamilton favoring Jefferson over him, even though Hamilton and Jefferson are long time political enemies. All Burr ever wanted was to "be in the room where it happened", or be a part of the major plans for the country's future, but no matter how he changed himself, he was never able to, he places it on Hamilton for preventing him from achieving political success.
The Room Where It Happens in the musical Hamilton (notice how he's portrayed like a villain)
Ever since they met for the first time in Aaron Burr, Sir, they seemed to keep meeting. From Washington's appointment of a right-hand man to working together as lawyers to the election of 1800s, their paths seemed to keep clashing.
But did Hamilton really try to prevent Burr from succeeding? We know that Hamilton certainly doesn't like Burr nor his methods of doing things. In numerous instances, Hamilton succeeds where Burr fails, but throughout the entire musical the only place where Hamilton purposely tries to make Burr fail is during The Election of 1800s. Hamilton's success can mostly be attributed to his hard-working ethic and bold nature, but it is also that nature that led him to doom. He admits that "[he] is not the reason no one trusts [Burr]", but he also "won't apologize for doing what's right". If he apologized, Burr might've let it go, but specifically because of Hamilton's nature, he firmly believes that he is right and won't say so otherwise, which provokes Burr and leads to the proposal of a duel, which Hamilton accepts. This leads us to the conclusion of the musical.
Fun fact: while ending such a threatening letter with "I have the honor of being your obedient servant" sounds crazy, it was actually how Burr ended this letter in actual history, and it was also a common way to end formal letters at that time.
Comments