The Jeffersonian Era , 1800–1816

Agenda of Powerpoint• Based on Newman Chapter 7• Focus: Louisiana Purchase/ War of 1812 • What is added…. – “Revolution of 1800” – Haitian Revolution

• What is not included…. – “John Marshall and the Supreme Court” (next ppt)– Aarron Burr & Duel with Hamilton

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1800 Jefferson wins… barely (pg224-226) – Jefferson’s victory was dampened by an unexpected

Democratic- Republican deadlock:• Jefferson, the presidential candidate, and Burr, the vice-

presidential candidate, received the same number of electoral votes for the presidency

• Under the Constitution the tie could be broken only by the House of Representatives

• Tie broken by Hamilton who saw Jefferson as lesser of two evils

• Controversy causes 12th Amendment: Changes Electoral College procedure to elect a specific candidate for both the president and vice president (rather than top 2nd highest vote becoming VP)

The Jeffersonian “Revolution of 1800” – It was no revolution in the sense of the word– What was “revolutionary” was the peaceful and

orderly transfer of power despite the acrimony• This was a remarkable achievement for a raw young nation

– Jefferson’s mission:• to restore the republican experience• To check the growth of government power• To halt the decay of virtue

– “We are all Federalists…. We are all Democratic Republicans.”

Jefferson as 1st Democratic President

– Remakes the presidency as the “common man”• Contrasted to the elegant atmosphere of Federalist

Philadelphia, the former temporary capital• He spurned a horse-drawn coach and strode by foot

to the Capitol from his boardinghouse• He extended democratic principles to etiquette

– Established the rule of pell-mell at official dinners—that is, seating without regard to rank.

• He was shockingly unconventional in receiving guests• He started the precedent of sending messages to

Congress to be read by a clerk

Jefferson as 1st Democratic President

• At the outset Jefferson was determined to undo the Federalist abuses:– The hated Alien and Sedition Acts had expired– Pardoned the “martyrs” who were serving

sentences under the Sedition Act • and the government remitted many fines

– Jeffersonians enacted the new naturalization law of 1802:

– It reduced the requirement of 14 years of residence back to the requirement of 5 years.

HOWEVER .. Jefferson faces realities office– He cherished his image as the scholarly,

scientific private citizen, who philosophized in his study faced the harsh realities of office

– International affairs called on him to take actions more aligned with the Federalists and more “loose” construction of the Constitution

– The open-minded Virginian was therefore consistently inconsistent; it is easy to quote one Jefferson to refute the other.

Louisiana Purchase: (pg 234-237)

• European War backdrop…• Napoleon Bonaparte induced the king of Spain to cede to

France the immense trans-Mississippi region of Louisiana, including New Orleans area

• The Spaniards at New Orleans withdrew the right to deposit guaranteed America by Pinckney’s Treaty of 1795 (see p. 193)

• This cause great concern in the American west believing this was first step towards a French takeover of area west of the Mississippi River.

• Hoping to quiet the clamor of the West, Jefferson in 1803 sent James Monroe to Paris to join with Robert R. Livingstone, the regular minister there

Louisiana Purchase

– They were instructed to buy New Orleans and as much land as possible for $10 million

– Napoleon suddenly decided to sell all Louisiana and abandon his dream of a New World empire

– He failed in his efforts to reconquer the sugar-rich island of Santo Domingo (Haiti) Rebellious enslaved Africans

– This soured Napoleon’s view on expanding his Empire in the Americas

– To French it was the Louisiana garage sale– Uses $ from sale to fight his European War

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Jefferson’s Constitutional Dilemma• US reps sign treaties on April 30, 1803, ceding

Louisiana to the United States for about $15 million (WITHOUT APPROVAL)– BUT this and additional treaties opened up an

immeasurable tract entirely to the west— doubling the size of the United States.

– This forces Jefferson to go against his constitutional principles of “strict construction”

– Jefferson submitted the treaties to the Senate, while admitting privately to his aides that he believed the purchase was in fact unconstitutional.

Practical benefits vastly outweigh Jefferson’s philosophical concerns

• America secured the western half of the richest river valley in the world• And laid the foundation of a future major power• The transfer established valuable precedents for

future expansion on the basis of equal membership• This was imperialism with a new and democratic face• It also contributed to making operational the

isolationist principles of Washington’s Farewell Address.

Map 11-3 p215

Louisiana in the Long View

• The Lewis and Clark’s Corps of Discovery:• 1804 Jefferson sent his personal secretary,

Meriwether Lewis, and army officer William Clark to explore the northern part of the Louisiana Purchase• The exploration took 2 ½ years and yielded a rich

harvest of scientific observation, maps, knowledge of the Indians in the region, and hair-raising wilderness adventure stories• The explorers demonstrated the viability of an

overland trail to the Pacific

Jefferson as a Reluctant “Commander and Chief” (pg. 233-34)

• First action of Jefferson was to reduce the military establishment:

• A mere police force of 25,000 officers and men• War across the Atlantic was not part of Jefferson’s

vision of a separate agrarians society. • BUT the REALITY was Pirates of the North African

Barbary States (see Map 11.2) made a national industry of blackmailing and plundering merchant ships that ventured into the Mediterranean.

Jefferson as a Reluctant “Commander and Chief”

• The showdown came in 1801-1805, the Tripolitan War:

• He sent the infant army to the “shores of Tripoli”• Four years of intermittent fighting• He succeeded in extorting a treaty of peace from

Tripoli in 1805; bargain price of $60,000—a sum representing ransom payment for captured Americans• He advocated a large number of little coastal craft• Also 200 tiny gunboats were constructed

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Meanwhile in Europe….(pg. 238-240)

• After selling Louisiana, Napoleon deliberately provoked a renewal of his war with Britain

• This war would continue an awesome conflict that raged on for eleven long years.

• The first two years of war a maritime United States enjoyed great success in supplying commercial trade with both sides

• This would not last for long

A Precarious Neutrality (pg238-240)

• 1806 London issued a series of Orders in Council closing European ports under French control to foreign shipping, including American, unless the vessels stopped at a British port

• Napoleon struck back, ordering the seizure of all merchant ships, including American, that entered British ports

• American vessels caught in the middle

A Precarious Neutrality

• Impressment—– the forcible enlistment of sailors:– Crude form of conscription by the British– Had been employed for centuries– Some 6,000 bona fide U.S. citizens were

impressed by the “piratical man-stealers” of Britain from 1808 to 1811

– Much more significant than in 1794 war

A Precarious Neutrality• The Chesapeake affair:

• A royal frigate overhauled a U.S. frigate, the Chesapeake, ten miles of the coast of Virginia

• The British captain bluntly demanded the surrender of four alleged deserters

• The American commander, though totally unprepared to fight, refused the request

• The British warship fired three devastating broadsides at close range: 3 Americans were killed and 18 wounded

• Four deserters were dragged away,• Britain was clearly in the wrong, as the London Foreign Office

admitted• But London’s contrition availed little

The Embargo Act of 1807 (pg. 240 to 242) • “National honor would not permit a slavish

submission to British and French mistreatment.”• The warring European nations depended heavily on

United States for raw materials and foodstuffs• Jefferson thought that if America voluntarily cut off

its exports, the offending powers would have to bow• Congress issued the Embargo Act late in 1807: The

law forbade the export of all goods from the United States, whether in American or foreign ships• This embargo embodied Jefferson’s idea of “peaceful

coercions”

The Hated Embargo Act of 1807– Why the embargo act failed after 15 months:

• Jefferson underestimated the determination of the British.• He overestimated the dependence of both belligerents on America’s

trade.• He miscalculated the unpopularity of such a self-crucifying weapon

and the difficulty of enforcing it.– An enormous illicit trade mushroomed in 1808, especially along the Canadian

border– The embargo had the effect of reviving the moribund Federalist party

• The Embargo Act was repealed and the Non-Intercourse Act formally opened trade with all nations, except Britain and France

– New England plucked a new prosperity from the ugly jaws of the embargo.

A silver lining of the Embargo Act:

• The resourceful Yankees reopened old factories and erected new ones:

• The real foundations of modern America’s industrial might were laid behind the protective wall of the embargo• Followed by nonintercourse and the War of 1812• Jefferson, the avowed critic of factories, may have

unwittingly done more for American manufacturing than Alexander Hamilton, industry’s outspoken friend.

Madison’s Gamble over Macon’s Bill #2• Madison took the presidential oath on March 4, 1809 as

Non-Intercourse acts go into place :

• Macon’s Bill No. 2: • A dangle—if either Britain or France repealed its

commercial restrictions, America would restore its embargo against the nonrepealing nations

• Napoleon’s issue a vague decree that he would stop seizing US ships if Britain also lifted it Orders in Council

• Madison gambles and repeals French Non-intercourse Act

• Napoleon has no interest in actually stopping• Incident shows American weakness

Arrival of the War Hawks

• Twelfth Congress met late 1811– The older “submission men” had been replaced

with young hotheads, many from the South and West:• Dubbed war hawks by their Federalist opponents,

the newcomers were on fire for a new war • They also wanted to wipe out the renewed Indian

threat for pioneer settlers coming into the trans-Allegheny wilderness

Tecumseh and the Prophet• Two Shawnee brothers, Tecumseh and Tenskwatawa,

known to non-Indians as “the Prophet,” concluded the time had come to stem this onrushing tide• They began to weld together a confederacy of all the

tribes west of the Mississippi• Frontiersmen and their war-hawk spokesmen

became convinced that the British “scalp buyers” in Canada were nourishing the Indians’ growing strength• In the fall of 1811, William Henry Harrison gathered

an army and advanced on Tecumseh’s headquarters.• The Battle of Tippecanoe made Harrison a national

hero

War of 1812• War Hawks Win Call for War– The only way to gain respect was to declare war– Success against Indians gain western vote for

war; NE wants war to end impressment – By no means a clear call for war ….

The War of 1812:

– Was a small war, involving 6000 Americans killed or wounded

– If the American conflict was globally unimportant, it had huge consequences for the United States:• Other nations developed a new respect for America’s

fighting prowess

War of 1812– Attack on Canada ill-conceived and poorly carried out

• Highly reliant on militias which were poorly trained • Americas’ offensive strategy was poorly conceived• The trio of invading forces that set out for Detroit, Niagara, and

Lake Champlain were all beaten back after crossing the Canadian border.

– Americans had unexpected success on the water:• Navy was virtually non-existence compared to most powerful navy

in the world• But the few American ships better than British ships• The American frigates, notably the Constitution• For most of war British navy heavily engaged with France

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Washington Burned

• Success in Europe leds to a second British force of 4000 landed in the Chesapeake Bay area in August 1814:– Onward to Washington some 6000 militiamen

were dispersed at Bladensburg– They set on fire public buildings, the Capitol and

the White House– While the White House burned– British abandoned Washington after freak

hurricane hits

The Defense of Baltimore• British fleet attacks Baltimore• Francis Scott Key, a detained American, was

inspired to write “The Star-Spangled Banner”• A third British blow of 1814, aimed at New

Orleans, menaced the entire Mississippi Valley:

• Andrew Jackson, fresh from victory at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend, was placed in command (see Map 12.5 on p. 241)

• His forces were about 7000 various soldiers

New Orleans Defended

• The 8000 British soldiers blundered badly:– They mistakenly launched a frontal assault on

January 8, 1815• The attackers suffered the most devastating defeat of

the entire war• Losing over 2000, killed and wounded in ½ hour• It was an astonishing victory for Jackson and his men.

• News of the American victory in the Battle of New Orleans was great encouragement.

• Makes Andrew Jackson war hero.

IV. Federalist Grievances and the Hartford Convention

• Some New England extremists proposed secession from the Union:– Or at least a separate peace with Britain– Hartford Convention:• The states of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode

Island dispatched full delegations• New Hampshire and Vermont sent partial

representatives• 26 men met in secrecy for 3 weeks—Dec. 15, 1814 to

Jan. 5, 1815—to discuss their grievances.

IV. Federalist Grievances and the Hartford Convention (cont.)

• The Hartford Convention was not radical:– The convention’s final report was moderate• It demanded financial assistance from Washington to

compensate for lost trade• And proposed constitutional amendments requiring a

2/3 vote in Congress before an embargo could be imposed, new states admitted, or war declared• Most demands reflected Federalist fears• Delegates sought to abolish the 3/5 clause • To limit presidents to a single term

IV. Federalist Grievances and the Hartford Convention (cont.)• To prohibit the election of two successive presidents

from the same state– this was aimed at Virginia and the “Virginia dynasty”

– Three special envoys from Massachusetts carried these demands to Washington:• The Harford Convention was the death of the

Federalist party• The Federalists were never again to mount a

successful presidential campaign (see Map 12.2)

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