tomserveaux:

“[For Hamilton] to call Burr ‘Catiline’ or ‘Savius’ was more than name-calling; these were unabashed verbal ‘cuts’ at his character. The two Roman generals were depraved men, their careers stained by unspeakable acts of treason, murder, incest, and sodomy…Savius, Catiline, and Burr all shared the same personal and sexual vices, according to Hamilton. In one of his harshest rebukes, Hamilton wrote in a letter to John Rutledge, Jr., in 1801, calling Burr a ‘dangerous man’, ‘profligate,’ ‘with the cunning of Catiline,’ who was devoid of integrity and motivated by inordinate ambition. Like his Roman predecessor, Burr was ‘the haughtiest of men,’ aiming at nothing less than to establish ‘Supreme power in his own person.’ One of the most devastating insults contained in this letter was Hamilton’s accusation that Burr’s Catalinian cunning, like that of Savius, was based on his sexual power in ‘courting the young.’ This reference to Burr’s power over young men would prove to be a recurring refrain. More importantly, labeling Burr a bisexual seducer made his hypermasculinity dangerous in a distinctive sense: he had the power not only to captivate women, but he could entice (secure the personal devotion of) young, impressionable, vulnerable men.”

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Nancy Isenburg, The ‘Little Emperor’: Aaron Burr, Dandyism, and the Sexual Politics of Treason

they were a hot sweaty mess and i live for it