Due to the American Revolutionary War, instruction was suspended from 1776 until 1784, but by the beginning of the war, the college had already educated some of the nation's foremost political leaders, such as Alexander Hamilton, who served as military aide to General George Washington, initiated and authored most of The Federalist Papers, and served as the first Secretary of the Treasury; John Jay, author of several of the Federalist Papers and the first Chief Justice of the United States; Robert Livingston, one of the Committee of Five who drafted the Declaration of Independence; and Gouverneur Morris, one of the Committee of Detail who finished the last draft of the United States Constitution.

Along with Nicholas Fish, Robert Troup, and a group of other students from King's College, he joined a volunteer militia company called the "Hearts of Oak" and achieved the rank of Lieutenant.

They adopted distinctive uniforms, complete with the words "Liberty or Death" on their hatbands, and drilled under the watchful eye of a former British officer in the graveyard of the nearby St. Paul's Chapel.

The college was briefly chartered as a state institution, lasting only until 1787, when due to a lack of public financial support the school was permitted to incorporate under a private board of trustees.

[citation needed] Columbia was located at its Park Place campus near New York City Hall for nearly a century, from approximately 1760 to 1857, at which point the college moved to 49th Street and Madison Avenue in Manhattan.

During the 1960s, Columbia College, like many others across the United States, experienced unrest and turmoil due to the ongoing civil rights movement and opposition to the Vietnam War.

After five days, the functions of the university were brought to a halt, and early on the morning of April 30 the students were forcibly removed by the New York City Police Department.

As a result of the student protests, the university president Grayson L. Kirk retired, classified research projects on campus were abruptly ended, long-standing ROTC programs were expelled, and the proposed expansion plans were canceled.

The university experienced financial difficulties[2] throughout the 1970s and early 1980s, and admissions standards in the college slightly relaxed to hasten the diversification of the student body following the 1968 protests.

[7] In the 1980s and 1990s, the college experienced a drastic increase in gifts and endowment growth, propelling it from the periphery to the forefront of a university historically dominated by its graduate & professional schools.

Most of the college's facilities are located on Columbia University's Morningside Heights campus, especially in Hamilton Hall, which houses its administrative and admissions offices, as well as the directors of the Core Curriculum.

The facility recently underwent an extensive four-year renovation, including the creation of a new wing, named Philip L. Milstein Family College Library in honor of its donor.

Included is a specialized collection of approximately 100,000 volumes containing subject matter in history, literature, philosophy, and the social sciences specifically intended to complement the Columbia College curriculum.

Residence halls, which also house undergraduate students of Columbia's engineering school, are either located on the Morningside Heights main campus or within 10 blocks of the 116th Street entrance.

Among those College alumni categorized as "remarkable" by the university during its 250th anniversary celebrations in 2004[18] were Founding Fathers of the United States Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and Gouverneur Morris (author of Preamble to the U.S. Constitution, "We, The People").

[19] Other political figures in this group include statesman and educator Nicholas Murray Butler, New York Governor DeWitt Clinton, U.S. Secretary of State Hamilton Fish, South African anti-apartheid leader Pixley ka Isaka Seme, Chinese diplomat Wellington Koo, many New York City mayors, including Seth Low and John Purroy Mitchel, as well as spymaster William Joseph Donovan.

Public intellectuals and journalists, including broadcaster Roone Arledge, social critic Randolph Bourne, environmentalist Barry Commoner, and writers like Henry Demarest Lloyd and Norman Podhoretz are also prominent on the list.

Columbia College graduates recognized in the arts include pianist Emanuel Ax, actor James Cagney, musician Art Garfunkel, composers Richard Rodgers and John Corigliano, lyricists Oscar Hammerstein II and Lorenz Hart, playwrights Samuel Spewack, Tony Kushner and Terrence McNally, writers Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, Herman Wouk, John Berryman, Thomas Merton, Clement Clarke Moore, Ben Coes, and Clifton Fadiman, screenwriter Herman Mankiewicz, filmmaker Joseph Mankiewicz, sculptor Isamu Noguchi, and violinist Gil Shaham.

Additionally, highly visible former Columbia College students in recent years include former President Barack Obama, former United States Attorney General William Barr, and former Attorneys General Michael Mukasey and Eric Holder, New York Governor David Paterson, New Hampshire Senator Judd Gregg, former New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevey, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, Texas Congressman Beto O'Rourke, New York Congressman Jerry Nadler, Estonian president Toomas Hendrik Ilves, political advisor and commentator George Stephanopoulos, actors Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jake Gyllenhaal, Anna Paquin, Casey Affleck, Amanda Peet, Matthew Fox, Timothée Chalamet, George Segal, Julia Stiles, Cinta Laura, and Kate McKinnon, radio personality Max Kellerman, directors Jim Jarmusch, Brian De Palma and Bill Condon, television showrunners Jenji Kohan and Beau Willimon, writer Paul Auster, historian Eric Foner, and the chart-topping alt-rock band Vampire Weekend.