When Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote “Hamilton,” Obama was in the White House, and immigration was less visible as an issue than it is today. As a result, Miranda’s decision to employ an all minority cast was less a political statement than an attempt to provide some context and contemporary relevance to Hamilton’s life. It mostly succeeds. You can’t realistically argue that the Founding Fathers who were planters were parvenus, except in the eyes of the people who mattered in London, but you certainly can say that Hamilton himself fit the bill. It is, in fact, hard to avoid the conclusion that Hamilton joined the Patriot cause largely because it gave him his best, and possibly only, chance of being a major figure in American society.
In 2018, things are very different. “Hamilton” has become an icon of the resistance as the result of a changed and charged climate on immigration and racial issues. I imagine that Miranda both embraces that and regrets it.