Jefferson in Office

Section 3

Thomas Jefferson Takes Office

• Jefferson referred to his election as “Revolution of 1800”

• Believed Washington and Adams acted like royalty

• He tried to create a less formal style for presidency– Rode horseback instead of in carriages– More intimate dinners instead of formal dinners• Round tables to show everyone equal

Cont.

• Didn’t overturn all Federalists policies• Integrate Republican ideas into Federalists

policies• Believer in small government and wanted to limit

federal power– Paying off federal debt– Cut government spending– Did away with the hated whiskey tax– Instead of a standing army, he planned to rely on

local militia

Cont.

• Federalists worried with Jefferson’s economic plan

• Feared he would get rid of the national bank• Jefferson appointed Albert Gallatin as

secretary of treasury• Gallatin was a supporter of Hamilton’s system

Rise of the Supreme Court

• Federalist majority in Congress passed the Judiciary Act of 1801 before term expired– Created 16 new federal judges

• President Adams appointed Federalists to these positions– “Midnight Judges” – Adams supposedly signed appointments until

midnight on his last day in office• Only 3 were actually signed on the last day• Keeping Federalists in control of Judicial branch

Impeaching Judges

• Jefferson nor Republicans were happy with Adams and his midnight appointments

• One of Jefferson’s first acts of Congress was to repeal the Judiciary Act of 1801– Doing away with midnight judges

• Republicans then tried to remove other Federalists from judiciary by impeachment

• Judges could only be removed for criminal behavior, not simply because Congress disagreed with them or their decisions

Marbury v. Madison

• Read this section (Take notes)– John Marshall– Judicial review

The Louisiana Purchase

• Jefferson’s strongest beliefs was that a republic could only survive if most of the people owned land

• 1800 Napoleon Bonaparte convinced Spain to give Louisiana back to France in exchange for helping Spain take control of part of Italy

• France now had control of the lower Mississippi, Jefferson was worried

• Jefferson feared that since France was back in N. Am. the U.S. would be forced to have an alliance with Great Britain, whom Jefferson despised

Cont.

• Jefferson ordered ambassador to France, Robert Livingston, in 1801

• Wanted to block deal• Accomplished little until 1803• 1803 Napoleon making plans to conquer

Europe• France didn’t need U.S. to form alliance with

Great Britain

Cont.

• More importantly France was low on funds because of war

• Napoleon offered to sell all of Louisiana Territory to U.S. including New Orleans

• Livingston accepts deal immediately• April 30, 1803 U.S. buys Louisiana Purchase for

$15 million• U.S. more than doubles its size and gained

control of entire Mississippi River

• By a treaty signed on Apr. 30, 1803, the United States purchased from France the Louisiana Territory, more than 2 million sq km (800,000 sq mi) of land extending from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains. The price was 60 million francs, about $15 million; $11,250,000 was to be paid directly, with the balance to be covered by the assumption by the United States of French debts to American citizens.

• In 1762, France had ceded Louisiana to Spain, but by the secret Treaty of San Ildefonso (1800) the French had regained the area. Napoleon Bonaparte (the future Emperor Napoleon I) envisioned a great French empire in the New World, and he hoped to use the Mississippi Valley as a food and trade center to supply the island of Hispaniola, which was to be the heart of this empire. First, however, he had to restore French control of Hispaniola, where Haitian slaves under TOUSSAINT L'OUVERTURE had seized power (1801; see HAITI). In 1802 a large army sent by Napoleon under his brother-in-law, Charles Leclerc, arrived on the island to suppress the Haitian rebellion. Despite some military success, the French lost thousands of soldiers, mainly to yellow fever, and Napoleon soon realized that Hispaniola must be abandoned. Without that island he had little use for Louisiana. Facing renewed war with Great Britain, he could not spare troops to defend the territory; he needed funds, moreover, to support his military ventures in Europe. Accordingly, in April 1803 he offered to sell Louisiana to the United States.

http://www.gatewayno.com/history/LaPurchase.html

The Lewis and Clark Expedition

• Read this section– Meriwether Lewis– William Clark– Sacagawea

• Read the rest of the section and take notes as you go.

• Be sure to understand all the vocabulary words