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Chapter 12: Jeffersonian Revolution (1800–1820)
Important Keywords
Marbury v. Madison (1803): Critical Supreme Court decision established the principle of judicial review, stating that the Supreme Court has the right to review all federal laws and decisions and declare whether or not they are constitutional.
Louisiana Purchase (1803): Massive land purchase from Emperor Napoleon of France that virtually doubled the size of the United States.
Lewis and Clark Expedition (1804): Expedition that discovered much about the western part of the North American continent and the economic possibilities there.
War of 1812: War between the British and the Americans over the British seizure of American ships, connections between the British and Native American tribes, and other tensions.
American System: Plan proposed by Senator Henry Clay and others to make America economically independent by increasing industrial production in the United States and by the creation of a Second National Bank.
Missouri Compromise (1820): Political solution devised to keep the number of slave states and free states equal; Missouri entered the Union as a slave state and Maine entered as a free state.
Key Timeline
1800: Thomas Jefferson elected president in “Revolution of 1800”
1801: John Marshall named chief justice of the Supreme Court
Alien and Sedition Acts not renewed
1803: Louisiana Purchase Marbury v. Madison established federal judicial review
1804: Alexander Hamilton killed in duel with Aaron Burr
Thomas Jefferson reelected
Twelfth Amendment ratified
Beginning of Lewis and Clark expedition
1807: Embargo Act greatly harms foreign trade
1808: James Madison elected president
Further importation of slaves into the United States made illegal
1812: Beginning of the War of 1812
1814: British army sacks Washington
Treaty of Ghent formally ends the War of 1812
Native American removal from Southern territories begins in earnest
1814–1815: Hartford Convention (meeting of Federalists)
1815: Victory of Andrew Jackson at the Battle of New Orleans
Henry Clay proposes the American System
1816: James Monroe elected president
1816–1823: Era of Good Feelings
1820: Missouri Compromise
Election of 1800
John Adams decided to run for a second term as president in 1800.
Charles Pinckney of South Carolina ran as the Federalist candidate for vice president.
Thomas Jefferson was again the Republican candidate for president.
Aaron Burr of New York was the Republican running for the vice presidency.
Jefferson edged out Adams in the Electoral College with 73 votes to Adams’s 65.
Aaron Burr received 73 votes in the Electoral College, sending the election to the House of Representatives.
Burr, a ruthless politician, refused to concede to Jefferson.
After 35 ballots, the House of Representatives election was a nail-biter.
Ironically, Jefferson won the thirty-sixth ballot.
In 1804, the Twelfth Amendment allowed Electoral College members to vote separately for the president and vice president during this political crisis.
The election of 1800 is often known as the Revolution of 1800.
Jefferson was a gifted and experienced president.
He was a talented writer and Enlightenment thinker.
He was a successful political leader and former diplomat and secretary of state.
Jefferson wanted to roll back Federalist policies and shrink the federal government.
He and his treasury secretary, Albert Gallatin, cut whiskey taxes.
He allowed the hated Alien and Sedition Acts to lapse.
Jefferson did not undo all Washington and Adams legislative accomplishments.
At his inaugural, he declared, "We are all Republicans; we are all Federalists."
Jefferson opposed Hamilton's national bank, but once in office, he recognized its economic value and left it alone.
An Assertive Supreme Court
In 1801, the Federalists passed the Judiciary Act, creating many new federal circuit and district courts.
Outgoing president Adams appointed Federalist judges to these courts.
Midnight appointments: Appointing someone to a political office in the last hours of their term.
Jefferson and his supporters were outraged by this attempt to pack the federal bench with Federalists.
The Republican Congress immediately repealed the Judiciary Act and impeached two Federalist judges.
John Marshall was one of John Adams's last-minute judicial appointments.
Marshall was Adams's secretary of state in his final year.
From 1801 to 1835, Marshall was the Court's longest-serving and most influential chief justice.
His judicial rulings profoundly shaped American law.
He believed in federal supremacy over state law.
Marshall also elevated the Supreme Court's political importance.
One of Marshall’s most important rulings in 1803 was the Marbury v. Madison decision.
John Adams appointed Federalist William Marbury as a District of Columbia Justice of the Peace.
James Madison, Jefferson's secretary of state, refused to deliver Marbury's appointment letter. Marbury sued for his letter.
Marshall disliked Madison's action but ruled against Marbury, arguing that the Judiciary Act of 1789 provision that allowed Marbury to sue was unconstitutional.
Judicial review allows courts to determine legislation's constitutionality.
Marshall's judicial prerogative established the Supreme Court's political power.
A New Frontier
Jefferson envisioned an independent farmer republic.
He believed only self-sufficient, property-owning citizens could resist corruption and tyranny.
To ensure such a future for the United States, Jefferson needed land.
He became fascinated with the west.
Settlers were arriving west of the Appalachians.
By 1800, one million Americans lived there.
An $80 down payment gave a buyer 160 acres of land during the Jefferson administration.
The Native Americans who hunted in these western lands clashed with this massive influx of settlers.
Jefferson believed American civilization would eventually replace Native American culture.
He hoped Native Americans would assimilate and become farmers, but he doubted it would happen soon.
Jefferson believed that the best thing for the Native Americans would be to remove them to a more distant territory, where they could eventually adapt to American ways.
Jefferson laid the groundwork for Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren's Native American removal policies.
Many Native Americans opposed American expansionism, including Shawnee diplomat and soldier Tecumseh and his brother Tenskwatawa, the "Prophet" of the Americans.
The Louisiana Purchase
In 1800, Napoleon Bonaparte forced Spain to secretly cede Louisiana to France. Napoleon wanted a French empire in America.
In 1801, the French planned to return to Louisiana.
Jefferson worried about a militarily powerful and aggressive neighbor bordering the US.
He sent William Livingstone to France to offer to buy New Orleans.
Livingston was later joined by James Monroe.
Napoleon's hopes of recapturing Haiti were dashed by disease.
In 1803, Napoleon offered $15 million for the entire Louisiana Territory
The Louisiana Purchase was a financial bargain for the United States.
The Americans offered $10 million for New Orleans and 3 cents per acre for the entire territory.
Louisiana Territory's purchase doubled the US's size.
Jefferson was curious about North America's flora, fauna, people, and economic potential.
He considered westward mapping expeditions before the Louisiana Purchase.
Jefferson funded the Lewis and Clark Expedition to explore the newly acquired Louisiana.
In 1804, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark left St. Louis with almost 50 men.
They crossed the Pacific Ocean and back in two years.
Lewis and Clark's extensive journals gave Americans a taste for western exploration and settlement.
Burr’s Conspiracy
The Essex Junto, a New England Federalist extremist group, denounced Jefferson's "decline in public virtue."
Senator Thomas Pickering of Massachusetts called the president a "Parisian revolutionary monster."
In 1804, the Federalists nominated Charles C. Pinckney to run against Jefferson, but he only won 14 electoral votes.
Aaron Burr realized he could no longer influence the Jefferson administration after his disloyalty during the 1800 electoral crisis.
Burr allegedly negotiated with secessionist Federalists.
Alexander Hamilton believed the charge and criticized Burr in a letter.
Learning of this, Burr challenged Hamilton to a duel.
Hamilton accepted the meeting, and Burr shot and killed him on July 11, 1804.
Burr served as vice president and traveled west while under indictment for murder in New York and New Jersey.
He plotted a Mexican uprising with the unscrupulous general James Wilkinson and others.
Burr wanted to seize southwest lands to revive his fortunes.
Wilkinson betrayed Burr's plan to Spain and America.
Jefferson arrested Burr for treason.
Jefferson wanted Burr convicted, but Chief Justice John Marshall, who presided over the trial, was unconvinced.
Renewal of War in Europe
Napoleon's Continental System banned British trade.
The French Navy captured American ships doing business with the British.
The British Navy instituted the practice of impressment.
British warships wreaked havoc on American shipping and impressed sailors.
In 1807, a British warship fired on the U.S.S. Chesapeake, forcing it to strike its colors before capturing four of its crew.
Jefferson believed a US economic boycott could change British and French policy.
He convinced the Republican-controlled Congress to pass the 1807 Embargo Act, which banned American exports.
However, this Act became a disaster in America’s economy.
In 1808, James Madison was elected president by the Democratic-Republican Party.
Madison knew the Embargo Act had to go to restore American prosperity.
He supported the Non-Intercourse Act, which allowed Americans to trade with all nations except Britain and France.
Through 1810, Congress passed bills to put economic pressure on Great Britain and France to stop interfering with American trade.
The War of 1812
Henry Clay of Kentucky was one of the leaders of these “War Hawks.”
He believed the US could not honorably claim independence if it did not resist British policies.
Tecumseh and the Prophet rallied trans-Appalachian Native Americans against American settlement.
Tecumseh wanted to form a powerful tribes confederacy to fight the Americans.
Americans believed Tecumseh was allied with the British in Canada.
In 1811, Indiana Governor William Henry Harrison led 1,000 men against Prophetstown, built by Tecumseh and his brother.
While Tecumseh was away, the Prophet foolishly attacked the Americans, who defeated him at Tippecanoe.
Harrison's army burned Prophetstown and dispersed its residents, crippling Tecumseh's cause.
War Hawks believed a war with Britain would break Tecumseh's power.
They also hoped to conquer new lands in Canada
In June 1812, President Madison asked for war.
The War Hawks' zeal was not shared nationwide.
Federalists hated Napoleonic France and thought a diplomatic deal with Great Britain would be economically beneficial.
Federalist New England traded with the British in Canada and opposed the war.
Despite their bellicosity, the War Hawks had not prepared the US for war with Great Britain.
The army was tiny and untried, and the navy possessed just 17 ships.
The failed invasion of Canada revealed the American army's weaknesses.
The navy fared better in ship-to-ship combats, but the British soon trapped most American warships in their harbors.
In 1813, William Henry Harrison defeated British and Native Americans at the Battle of the Thames near Detroit after an American naval victory on Lake Erie.
The most significant result of the battle was the death of Tecumseh.
British-allied Creeks attacked American settlers in the south.
Andrew Jackson's Tennessee militia defeated the Creeks in a series of bloody battles.
The End of the War
Napoleon’s enemies forced him to abdicate in 1814.
This released many British troops for America.
The United States had to withstand major British attacks.
American naval victory on Lake Champlain stopped a British invasion from Canada.
Another British army invaded Washington from Chesapeake Bay and burned the Presidential Mansion and Capitol.
"The Star-Spangled Banner" was inspired by a Baltimore retaliation.
In January 1815, Andrew Jackson defeated a British army trying to seize New Orleans.
Jackson won after the US-UK peace treaty was signed.
In late 1814, negotiators gathered in Ghent, in what is now Belgium.
Napoleon's defeat ended the British blockade and impressment, and both sides were exhausted.
The status quo ante ended the war in the Treaty of Ghent.
The war did nothing for the US except weaken Native Americans east of the Mississippi. British forces had fought evenly.
But the final victory at New Orleans and the fact that the US held its own against Great Britain made the war a success, a second war of American independence.
A Federalist Debacle and the Era of Good Feelings
During the war, many Federalists remained outspoken in their opposition to the conflict.
New England Federalists met at the Hartford Convention while American diplomats negotiated in Ghent.
They denounced the war and discussed nullifying unconstitutional laws like the embargo.
Some delegates wanted New England to secede, but the convention did not.
The timing of these Federalists was bad.
They looked foolish and unpatriotic after the war and Jackson's victory at New Orleans.
The Federalist party faded after this embarrassment.
The victorious Democratic-Republicans ruled a united nation without significant political opposition.
In 1816, James Monroe was easily elected president and served two terms.
1816–1823 was the Era of Good Feelings.
Henry Clay and the American System
Henry Clay promoted the American System during the postwar boom.
Clay encouraged American industry in the renewed nationalist spirit of the time to make the US economically independent of Europe.
President Madison and then President Monroe supported the plan.
After the War of 1812's failures, many Republicans adopted Alexander Hamilton's economic vision.
In 1816, Congress established the Second National Bank to facilitate credit and financial transactions nationwide.
The Tariff of 1816 raised foreign goods tariffs to 22% to encourage domestic manufacturers.
The tariff revenue went to roads and other internal improvements to help American farmers, industrialists, and merchants sell their goods.
These policies boosted the postwar economy until 1819.
Missouri Compromise
Slavery became a major political issue for the first time in 1819 when Missouri asked to enter the Union as a slave state.
At this time, the number of free and slave states was equal at 11 each.
In earlier years, slavery had seemed to be a declining institution.
The Northwest Ordinance barred slavery from the Northwest Territory.
In 1808, the importation of slaves from overseas was outlawed.
But Eli Whitney’s invention of the cotton gin had made cotton a lucrative cash crop.
The demand for slave labor increased, making slaves much more valuable to their masters.
Western slavery expansion became a hot topic. The slave-free balance became politically urgent.
Missouri's potential to tilt this balance in favor of the slave states incensed many in the north, sparking bitter political debate.
Henry Clay, the speaker of the house, resolved the issue in 1820 with the Missouri Compromise.
Clay joined Missouri to the Union with Maine's freedom.
He divided Louisiana Territory into slave and free states at 36 degrees, 30 minutes to avoid further disputes.
Clay and others hoped the Missouri Compromise ended slavery.
Chapter 13: Rise of Manufacturing and the Age of Jackson (1820–1845)