United States History Test Three

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What was the goal of the Lewis and Clark Expedition? 8.2.3

In the midst of the Louisiana controversy, Jefferson dispatched a secret message to Congress requesting $2,500 to explore the far west (January 1803). How closely this decision was connected to the Paris negotiations is not clear. Whatever the case, the president asked his private secretary and military veteran, Meriwether Lewis, to discover whether the Missouri River "may offer the most direct & practicable water communication across this continent for the purposes of commerce." The expedition, also known as the Corps of Discovery Expedition, had military as well as scientific goals. Soldiers carried newly designed weapons that were intended to impress on the Native Americans they encountered the power of the United States. The president also regarded the expedition as an opportunity to collect data about plants and animals. He personally instructed Lewis in the latest techniques of scientific observation. While preparing for this adventure, Lewis's second in command, William Clark, assumed such a prominent role that it became known as the Lewis and Clark Expedition. The effort owed much of its success to a young Shoshoni woman known as Sacagawea. She served as a translator and helped persuade suspicious Native Americans that the explorers meant no harm. As Clark explained, "A woman with a party of men is a token of peace." The expedition set out from St. Louis up the Missouri River in May 1804. They barely survived crossing the snow-covered Rocky Mountains, and then proceeded down the Columbia River. With their food supply running low, the Americans reached the Pacific Ocean in November 1805. The group returned safely the following September. The expedition apparently fulfilled Jefferson's scientific expectations. The explorers recorded hundreds of new plants and animals. The story of their journey also encouraged businessmen such as John Jacob Astor, who launched a fur-trading company that in 1811 established Astoria, the first white settlement on the Columbia River.

What undermined the presidency of Martin Van Buren? 10.3.3

President Van Buren immediately faced a catastrophic depression, known as the Panic of 1837. This was not exclusively, or even primarily, the result of government policies. It was international and reflected complex changes in the world economy that American policymakers could not control. But the Whigs blamed the state of the economy on Jacksonian finance, and the administration had to respond. Since Van Buren and his party were committed to a policy of laissez-faire on the federal level, they could do little or nothing to relieve economic distress through subsidies or relief measures. But Van Buren could try to salvage the federal funds deposited in shaky state banks and devise a new system of public finance that would not contribute to future panics by fueling speculation and credit expansion. The economy doomed Van Buren's chances for reelection in 1840. The Whigs had the chance to offer alternative policies that promised to restore prosperity. They passed over the true leader of their party, Henry Clay, and nominated William Henry Harrison, an old military hero who was associated in the public mind with the Battle of Tippecanoe and the winning of the West. To increase the ticket's appeal in the South, they chose John Tyler of Virginia, a states' rights Democrat, as Harrison's running mate. Using the slogan "Tippecanoe and Tyler, too," the Whigs pulled out all the stops. They organized rallies and parades, complete with posters, placards, campaign hats and emblems, special songs, and even log cabins filled with coonskin caps and barrels of cider for the faithful. Imitating the Jacksonian propaganda against Adams in 1828, they portrayed Van Buren as a luxury-loving aristocrat and compared him with their own homespun candidate. There was an enormous turnout on election day—78 percent of those eligible to vote. When it was over, Harrison had parlayed a narrow edge in the popular vote into a landslide in the Electoral College (see Map 10.3). The Whigs also won control of both houses of Congress.

What were the final terms of the Missouri Compromise of 1820? 9.3.1

A statehood petition from the people of Maine, who were seeking to separate from Massachusetts, suggested a way out of the impasse. In February 1820, the Senate passed the Missouri Compromise, voting to couple the admission of Missouri as a slave state with the admission of Maine as a free state. An amendment prohibited slavery in the rest of the Louisiana Purchase north of the southern border of Missouri, or above the latitude of 36°30', but allowed it below that line. The Senate's compromise then went to the House, where it was initially rejected. Through the adroit maneuvering of Henry Clay—who broke the proposal into three separate bills—it won House approval. The measure authorizing Missouri to frame a constitution and apply for admission as a slave state passed by the razor-thin margin of 90 to 87, with most northern representatives opposed. A major sectional crisis had been resolved. But the Missouri affair was ominous for the future of North-South relations. Jefferson described the controversy as "a fire bell in the night," threatening the Union. In 1821, he wrote prophetically: "All, I fear, do not see the speck on our horizon which is to burst on us as a tornado, sooner or later. The line of division lately marked out between the different portions of our confederacy is such as will never, I fear, be obliterated." The congressional furor had shown that when slavery or its extension came directly before the people's representatives, regional loyalties took precedence over party or other considerations. Both sides used an emotional rhetoric of morality and fundamental rights, and votes followed sectional lines much more closely than on any other issue. If the United States were to acquire any new territories in which Congress had to determine the status of slavery, renewed sectional strife would be unavoidable.

How did Thomas Jefferson's republican ideology affect his ideas about the national budget? 8.2.1

A top priority of the new government was cutting the national debt. Throughout American history, presidents have advocated such reductions, but their rhetoric has seldom yielded tangible results. Jefferson succeeded. He and Gallatin regarded a large federal deficit as dangerous. Both men associated debt with Alexander Hamilton's Federalist financial programs, measures they considered harmful to republicanism. Jefferson claimed that legislators elected by the current generation did not have the right to mortgage the future of unborn Americans. Jefferson also wanted to diminish the activities of the federal government. He urged Congress to repeal all direct taxes, including the tax that had sparked the Whiskey Rebellion in 1794. Secretary Gallatin calculated that customs receipts could fund the entire cost of the national government. As long as commerce flourished, revenues were sufficient. When war closed foreign markets, however, the funds dried up. To help pay the debt inherited from the Adams administration, Jefferson cut the national budget. He closed several American diplomatic missions in Europe and slashed military spending. In his first term, Jefferson reduced the size of the U.S. Army by 50 percent. Only 3,000 soldiers were left to guard the entire frontier. He also retired most of the navy's warships. When New Englanders claimed these cuts left the country defenseless, Jefferson countered with a glib argument. As ships of the U.S. Navy sailed the oceans, he claimed, they were liable to provoke hostilities, even war; by reducing the size of the fleet, he promoted peace. More than budgetary considerations prompted Jefferson's military reductions. He was suspicious of standing armies. The militia could defend the republic if it were attacked. No doubt, his experiences during the Revolution influenced his thinking on military affairs, for in 1776, an aroused populace had taken up arms against the British. To ensure that the citizen soldiers would receive professional leadership, Jefferson created the Army Corps of Engineers and the military academy at West Point in 1802.

Why was President John Quincy Adams' nationalist ideas frustrated? 10.2.1

Adams had a frustrating presidency. The political winds were blowing against nationalistic programs, partly because the country was just recovering from a depression that many thought federal banking and tariff policies had caused or made worse. But Adams refused to bow to public opinion and called for expanding federal activity. He had a special interest in government support for science and wanted a national university in Washington. Advocates of states' rights and a strict construction of the Constitution were aghast, and congressional opponents turned the administration's domestic program into a pipe dream.

On what issue did party conflict in Congress center during the 1840s? 10.4

America's second-party system came of age in the election of 1840. Unlike the earlier competition between Federalists and Jeffersonian Republicans, the rivalry between Democrats and Whigs made the two-party pattern a normal feature of electoral politics. During the 1840s, the two national parties competed on fairly equal terms for the support of the electorate. Allegiance to one party or the other became a source of personal identity for many Americans and increased their interest and participation in politics......Nevertheless, party conflict in Congress centered on national economic policy. Whigs stood for a loose construction of the Constitution and federal support for business and economic development. Democrats defended strict construction, states' rights, and laissez-faire. Debates over tariffs, banking, and internal improvements remained vital during the 1840s. True believers within both parties saw deep ideological or moral meaning in the clash over economic issues. Whigs and Democrats had conflicting views of the good society, and their policies reflected these differences. The Democrats were the party of white male equality and personal liberty. They perceived the American people as a collection of independent and self-sufficient white men. Government's job was to ensure that the individual was not interfered with—in his economic activity, his personal habits, or his religion (or lack of it). Democrats were ambivalent about the market economy because it threatened individual independence. The Whigs, on the other hand, were the party of orderly progress under the guidance of an enlightened elite. They believed that the propertied, the well educated, and the pious should guide the masses toward the common good. Believing that a market economy would benefit everyone in the long run, they had no qualms about the rise of a commercial and industrial capitalism.

Native Americans most affected by the Indian Removal Act tended to live in what part of the nation? 10.5.1

American settlers moving west encroached upon the lands of Indians, forcing Indian nations to sign treaties "removing" them to lands further west, and uprooting them in violent battles. The defeat of the British-Indian alliance west of the Appalachians in the War of 1812 cleared a significant obstacle for U.S. western expansion. In the North, the proliferation of canals stimulated the growth of commercial farming, whereas in the South the rapid expansion of cotton cultivation created hunger for new lands. By 1830, Jacksonian Democrats had enacted the Indian Removal Act, which targeted the remaining Indian nations east of the Mississippi for forced migration to Indian Territories west of the Mississippi. The Indian peoples of the Southeast were key targets of the act. Often referred to as the Five Civilized Tribes for their partial adoption of Euro-American cultures and diplomatic relations with the United States, the Seminole, Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Creek Indians of the Southeast constituted significant obstacles for the western expansion of slaveholding southerners.

What was the main function of cities in the early 1800s and why were they limited to the eastern part of the U.S.? 8.1.3

Before 1820, the prosperity of the United States depended primarily on agriculture and trade. Jeffersonian America was by no stretch of the imagination an industrial economy. Most of the population—84 percent in 1810—was directly involved in agriculture. Southerners concentrated on the staple crops of tobacco, rice, and cotton, which they sold on the European market. In the North, people generally produced livestock and grain. The cities of Jeffersonian America functioned chiefly as depots for international trade. Only about 7 percent of the nation's population lived in urban centers. Most of these people owed their livelihoods either directly or indirectly to the carrying trade. Major port cities of the early republic—New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore, for example—had some of the highest population densities ever recorded in this country's history. In 1800, more than 40,000 New Yorkers crowded into only one and a half square miles; in Philadelphia, some 46,000 people were packed into less than one square mile. As is common today, many city dwellers rented living space. Since the demand for housing exceeded the supply, the rents were high. American cities exercised only a marginal influence on the nation's vast hinterland. Because of the high cost of land transportation, urban merchants seldom purchased goods for export—flour, for example—from a distance of more than 150 miles. The separation between rural and urban Americans was far more pronounced during Jefferson's presidency than it was after the development of canals and railroads a few decades later (see Chapter 9). There was some technological advancement. Samuel Slater, an English-born designer of textile machinery, established cotton-spinning mills in New England; but until the 1820s, these plants employed few workers. In fact, during this period households produced far more cloth than factories did. Another far-sighted inventor, Robert Fulton, sailed the first American steamship up the Hudson River in 1807. In time, this marvelous innovation opened new markets for domestic manufacturers, especially in the West. At the end of the War of 1812, however, few people anticipated how power generated by fossil fuel would transform the American economy. Ordinary workers often felt threatened by the new machines. Skilled artisans who had spent years mastering a trade and took pride in producing an object that expressed their own personalities found the industrial workplace alienating. Moreover, they rightly feared that innovative technology designed to improve efficiency might throw traditional craftspeople out of work or transform independent entrepreneurs into dependent wage laborers.

How did the United States respond to a new round of warfare between Britain and France in 1803? 8.4

During Jefferson's second term (1805-1809), the United States once again found itself in the midst of a world at war. A brief peace in Europe ended abruptly in 1803. The two military giants of the age, France and Great Britain, then fought for supremacy on land and sea. This was a kind of total war unknown in the eighteenth century. Napoleon's armies carried the ideology of the French Revolution across the Continent. The emperor—as Napoleon Bonaparte called himself after December 1804—transformed conquered nations into French satellites. Only Britain offered effective resistance. Just as Washington and Adams before him, President Jefferson sought to steer clear of these European imperial rivalries while still protecting the rights of the United States as a neutral nation. And just as Washington and Adams had, Jefferson—and his successor as president, James Madison—quickly discovered the difficulty of such a policy.

What did Alexis de Tocqueville believe was the most radical feature of democracy in the United States? 10.1

During the 1820s and 1830s, democracy first became a generally accepted term to describe how American institutions were supposed to work. Although the Founders had defined democracy as direct rule by the people, most of them rejected this approach to government because it conflicted with their concept of a well-balanced republic led by a "natural aristocracy." For champions of popular government in the Jacksonian period, however, the people were sovereign and could do no wrong: "The voice of the people is the voice of God." Conservatives were less certain of the wisdom of the common folk. But even they were recognizing that they had to win over public opinion before making major decisions. Besides evoking "popular sovereignty," the democratic impulse seemed to stimulate social leveling. Earlier Americans had usually assumed that the rich and wellborn were the natural leaders of the community and guardians of its culture and values. But by the 1830s, the disappearance of inherited social ranks and clearly defined aristocracies or privileged groups struck European visitors such as Alexis de Tocqueville as the most radical feature of democracy in America. Historians have described this development as a decline of the spirit of "deference." The decline of deference meant that "self-made men" of lowly origins could more readily acquire power and influence, and that exclusiveness and aristocratic pretensions were likely to provoke hostility or scorn. But economic equality—an equitable sharing of wealth—was not part of the mainstream agenda of the Jacksonian period. This was a competitive capitalist society. The watchword was equality of opportunity, not equality of reward. Life was a race. So long as all white males appeared to have an equal start, there could be no reason for complaint if some were winners and others losers. Historians now generally agree that economic inequality—the gap between rich and poor—actually increased during this period.

How did the doctrine of nullification challenge the principle of federal government superiority? 10.2.4

During the 1820s, southerners became increasingly fearful of federal encroachment on states' rights. Behind this concern, in South Carolina at least, was a strengthened commitment to slavery and anxiety about the use of federal power to strike at the "peculiar institution." Hoping to keep slavery itself out of the political limelight, South Carolinians seized on another grievance—the protective tariff—as the issue on which to take their stand in favor of states' power to veto federal actions they viewed as contrary to their interests. Tariffs that increased the prices that southern agriculturists paid for manufactured goods and that threatened to undermine their foreign markets by inciting other countries to erect their own protective tariffs hurt the staple-producing and exporting South. Vice President Calhoun emerged as the leader of the states' rights insurgency in South Carolina, abandoning his earlier support of nationalism and the American System. After the Tariff of Abominations passed in 1828, the South Carolina legislature declared the new duties unconstitutional and endorsed a lengthy affirmation—written anonymously by Calhoun—of nullification, or an individual state's right to set aside federal laws. Calhoun supported Jackson in 1828 and planned to serve amicably as his vice president, expecting Jackson to support his native region on the tariff and states' rights. He also hoped to succeed Jackson as president. In the meantime, however, a bitter personal feud developed between Jackson and Calhoun. The vice president and his wife were prime movers in ostracizing Peggy Eaton. Evidence also came to light that Calhoun, as secretary of war in Monroe's cabinet in 1818, had advocated punishing Jackson for his incursion into Spanish-ruled Florida. As Calhoun lost favor, it became clear that Van Buren rather than the vice president would be Jackson's designated successor. The personal breach between Jackson and Calhoun colored and intensified their confrontation over nullification and the tariff. The two men also differed on matters of principle. Although generally a defender of states' rights and strict construction of the Constitution, Jackson opposed nullification as a threat to the Union. In his view, federal power should be held in check, but the states were not truly sovereign. His nationalism was that of a soldier who had fought for the United States against foreign enemies. He was not about to let dissidents break up the nation. The differences between Jackson and Calhoun surfaced at the Jefferson Day dinner in 1830, when Jackson offered the toast "Our Union: It must be preserved," to which Calhoun responded, "The Union. Next to Liberty, the most dear. May we always remember that it can only be preserved by distributing equally the benefits and the burdens of the Union." In 1830 and 1831, the movement against the tariff grew in South Carolina. Calhoun openly took the lead, arguing that states could set aside federal laws. In 1832, a new tariff lowered the rates slightly but retained the principle of protection. Supporters of nullification argued that the new law simply demonstrated that they could expect no relief from Washington. The South Carolina legislature then called a special convention. In November 1832, its members voted to nullify the tariffs of 1828 and 1832 and forbid the collection of customs duties within the state. Jackson reacted with characteristic decisiveness. He alerted the secretary of war to prepare for military action, denounced nullification as treasonous, and asked Congress for authority to use the army to enforce the tariff. He also sought to pacify the nullifiers by recommending a lower tariff. Congress responded by enacting the Force Bill—which gave the president the military powers he sought—and the Compromise Tariff of 1833. The latter was primarily the work of Jackson's enemy Henry Clay, but the president signed it anyway. Faced with Jackson's intention to use force and appeased by the lower tariff, South Carolina suspended the nullification ordinance in January 1833 and rescinded it in March, after the new tariff had been enacted. To demonstrate that they had not conceded their constitutional position, however, the convention delegates also nullified the Force Bill. The nullification crisis revealed that South Carolinians would not tolerate federal acts that seemed contrary to their interests or interfered with slavery. The nullifiers' philosophy implied the right of secession and the right to declare laws of Congress null and void. As events would show, a fear of northern meddling with slavery was the main spur to the growth of a militant doctrine of state sovereignty in the South. At the time of the nullification crisis, the other slave states were less anxious about the future of the "peculiar institution" and did not embrace South Carolina's radical conception of state sovereignty. Jackson was himself a southerner, a slaveholder, and in general, a proslavery president. But the Unionist doctrines that Jackson propounded in his proclamation against nullification alarmed farsighted southern loyalists. More strongly than any previous president, Jackson had asserted that the federal government was supreme over the states and that the Union was indivisible. He had also justified using force against states that denied federal authority.

What accounted for the sharp population increase as reflected in the 1810 census? 8.1

During the early nineteenth century, the population of the United States grew substantially. The 1810 census counted 7,240,000 Americans, a jump of almost 2 million in ten years. Of this total, approximately 20 percent were black slaves, most of whom lived in the South. The large population increase was the result primarily of natural reproduction rather than immigration. The largest single group in society was children under the age of 16, boys and girls who were born after Washington's election and who defined their own futures at a time when the nation's boundaries were rapidly expanding. For white Americans, it was a time of optimism. Many people with entrepreneurial skills or engineering capabilities aggressively advanced in a society that seemed to rate personal merit higher than family background.

To what political party did small farmers and workers tend to belong during the 1840s? 10.4

How did voters benefit from the two-party system of the 1840s? 10.4

Economic issues helped determine each party's base of support. In the Whig camp were industrialists who wanted tariff protection, merchants who favored internal improvements to stimulate commerce, and farmers and planters who had adapted to a market economy. Democrats appealed mainly to smaller farmers, workers, declining gentry, and emerging entrepreneurs who were excluded from the established commercial groups that would benefit most from Whig programs. Democratic rhetoric about monopoly and privilege appealed to those who had mixed or negative feelings about a national market economy. This division also pitted richer, more privileged Americans against those who were poorer and less economically or socially secure. But it did not follow class lines in any simple or direct way. Many businessmen were Democrats; many wage earners voted Whig. Merchants in the import trade hated Whiggish high tariffs, whereas workers in industries clamoring for protection often concluded that such duties protected their jobs. Lifestyles and ethnic or religious identity influenced party loyalties. In the northern states, one way to tell the typical Whig from the typical Democrat was to see what each did on Sunday. A person who went to an evangelical Protestant church was likely to be a Whig. The person who attended a ritualized service—Catholic, Lutheran, or Episcopalian—or did not go to church at all was probably a Democrat. The Democrats were the favored party of immigrants, Catholics, freethinkers, backwoods farmers, and all those who enjoyed traditional amusements that the new breed of moral reformers condemned. One thing all these groups had in common was a desire to be left alone, free to think and behave as they liked. The Whigs enjoyed strong support among old-stock Protestants in smaller cities, towns, and prosperous rural areas devoted to market farming. In general, the Whigs welcomed a market economy but wanted to restrain the individualism and disorder it created by enforcing cultural and moral values derived from the Puritan tradition. Nevertheless, party conflict in Congress centered on national economic policy. Whigs stood for a loose construction of the Constitution and federal support for business and economic development. Democrats defended strict construction, states' rights, and laissez-faire. Debates over tariffs, banking, and internal improvements remained vital during the 1840s. True believers within both parties saw deep ideological or moral meaning in the clash over economic issues. Whigs and Democrats had conflicting views of the good society, and their policies reflected these differences. The Democrats were the party of white male equality and personal liberty. They perceived the American people as a collection of independent and self-sufficient white men. Government's job was to ensure that the individual was not interfered with—in his economic activity, his personal habits, or his religion (or lack of it). Democrats were ambivalent about the market economy because it threatened individual independence. The Whigs, on the other hand, were the party of orderly progress under the guidance of an enlightened elite. They believed that the propertied, the well educated, and the pious should guide the masses toward the common good. Believing that a market economy would benefit everyone in the long run, they had no qualms about the rise of a commercial and industrial capitalism.

What issue dominated political debate in the 1820s and 1830s? 10.1.3

Economic questions dominated politics in the 1820s and 1830s. The Panic of 1819 and the subsequent depression heightened popular interest in government economic policy. No one really knew how to solve the problems of a market economy that went through cycles of boom-and-bust, but many still thought they had the answer. Some, especially small farmers, favored a return to a simpler and more "honest" economy without banks, paper money, and the easy credit that encouraged speculation. Others, particularly emerging entrepreneurs, saw salvation in government aid and protection for venture capital. Entrepreneurs appealed to state governments for charters that granted special privileges to banks, transportation enterprises, and manufacturing corporations. The economic distress of the early 1820s fostered the rapid growth of state-level political activity and organizations that foreshadowed the rise of national parties organized around economic programs. Party disputes involved more than the direct economic concerns of particular interest groups. They also reflected the republican ideology that feared conspiracy against American liberty and equality. Whenever any group appeared to be exerting decisive influence over public policy, its opponents were quick to charge that group's members with corruption and the unscrupulous pursuit of power. The notion that the American experiment was fragile, constantly threatened by power-hungry conspirators, took two principal forms. Jacksonians believed that "the money power" endangered the survival of republicanism; their opponents feared that populist politicians like Jackson himself were rabble-rousers who would gull the electorate into ratifying high-handed and tyrannical actions contrary to the nation's true interests. The role of the federal government concerned both sides. Should it foster economic growth, as the National Republicans and later the Whigs contended, or should it simply attempt to destroy what Jacksonians decried as "special privilege" and "corporate monopoly"? Almost everyone favored equality of opportunity. The question was whether the government should actively support commerce and industry, or stay out of the economy in the name of laissez-faire (the idea that the government should keep its hands off the economy) and free competition. These economic issues became political ones during the Jacksonian era because of an unprecedented level of popular participation in politics.

Why did the British oppose re-colonization in the Americas by European powers? 9.3.3

Foreign affairs also reflected the new spirit of nationalism. The main diplomatic challenge facing Monroe after his reelection in 1820 was how to respond to the successful revolt of most of Spain's and Portugal's Latin American colonies after the Napoleonic Wars. In Congress, Henry Clay called for immediate recognition of the new states. In doing so, he expressed the belief of many Americans that their neighbors to the south were simply following the example of the United States in its own struggle for independence. Before 1822, the administration stuck to a policy of neutrality. Monroe and Secretary of State Adams feared that recognizing the revolutionary governments would antagonize Spain and impede negotiations to acquire Florida. But pressure for recognition grew in Congress; in 1821, the House of Representatives, responding to Clay's impassioned oratory, passed a resolution of sympathy for Latin American revolutionaries and made it clear that the president would have the support of Congress if and when he decided to accord recognition. After the Adams-Onís Treaty ceding Florida to the United States had been formally ratified in 1821, Monroe agreed to recognition and diplomatic ties with the Latin American states. The United States recognized Mexico and Colombia in 1822, Chile and Argentina in 1823, Brazil (which had separated from Portugal) and the Federation of Central American States in 1824, and Peru in 1826. Recognizing the Latin American states put the United States on a possible collision course with the major European powers. Austria, Russia, and Prussia were committed to rolling back the tides of liberalism, self-government, and national self-determination that had arisen during the French Revolution and its Napoleonic aftermath. After Napoleon's first defeat in 1814, the monarchs of Europe had joined in a "Grand Alliance" to protect "legitimate" authoritarian governments from democratic challenges. Great Britain was originally a member of this concert of nations but withdrew when its own interests conflicted with those of the other members. In 1822, the remaining alliance members, joined now by the restored French monarchy, authorized France to invade Spain and restore a Bourbon regime that might be disposed to reconquer the empire. This prospect alarmed both Great Britain and the United States. Particularly troubling to American policymakers was the role of Czar Alexander I of Russia. Not only was the czar an outspoken and active opponent of Latin American independence, but he was also attempting to extend Russian claims on the Pacific coast of North America south to the 51st parallel—into the Oregon Country, which the United States wanted for itself. The threat from the Grand Alliance pointed to a need for American cooperation with Great Britain, which had its own reasons for wanting to prevent a restoration of Spanish, Portuguese, and French power in the New World. Independent nations offered better and more open markets for British manufactured goods than the colonies of other nations, and the spokesmen for burgeoning British industrial capitalism anticipated a profitable economic dominance over Latin America. In early 1823, the British foreign secretary George Canning tried to exact from the French a pledge that they would not try to acquire territories in Spanish America. When that venture failed, he sought to involve the United States in a policy to prevent the Grand Alliance from intervening in Latin America.

What was the plan of the American Colonization Society? 9.4.3

Free African Americans actively debated establishing their own communities in Canada or even in Haiti, but most rejected the white American Colonization Society's plans to send free blacks to Africa. Several thousand former American slaves had already settled first in Nova Scotia and then in Sierra Leone and had not been received hospitably. Despite Allen's early enthusiasm for a Canadian free black community, he and most free blacks eventually concluded that they needed to stay and fight for rights in the United States.

How did partisan politics change after 1815? 9.3

Geographic expansion, economic growth, and the changes in American life that accompanied them were bound to generate political controversy. Farmers, merchants, manufacturers, and laborers were affected by the changes in different ways. So were northerners, southerners, and westerners. Federal and state policies that were meant to encourage or control growth and expansion did not benefit all these groups or sections equally, and unavoidable conflicts of interest and ideology occurred. But, for a time, the national political arena did not prominently reflect these conflicts. A myth of national harmony prevailed, culminating in the Era of Good Feeling during James Monroe's two terms as president. Behind this facade, individuals and groups fought for advantage, as always, but without the public accountability and need for broad popular approval that a party system would have required. As a result, popular interest in national politics fell. The absence of party discipline and programs did not immobilize the federal government. The president took important initiatives in foreign policy; Congress legislated on matters of national concern; and the Supreme Court made far-reaching decisions. The common theme of the public policies that emerged between the War of 1812 and the age of Andrew Jackson, which began in 1829, was an awakening nationalism—a sense of American pride and purpose that reflected the expansionism and material progress of the period.

What was the message in the Monroe Doctrine and what role did John Quincy Adams play in developing the doctrine? 9.3.3

In August 1823, Canning broached the possibility of joint Anglo-American action against the Alliance to Richard Rush, U.S. minister to Great Britain. Rush referred the suggestion to the president. Monroe welcomed the British initiative because he believed the United States should take an active role in transatlantic affairs by playing one European power against another. However, Secretary of State Adams favored a different approach. Adams distrusted the British and believed that avoiding entanglements in European politics while also discouraging European intervention in the Americas would best serve the national interest. Political ambition also predisposed Adams against joint action with Great Britain; he hoped to be the next president and did not want to give his rivals the chance to label him as pro-British. He therefore advocated unilateral action by the United States rather than a joint declaration with the British. As he told the cabinet in November, "It would be more candid, as well as more dignified, to avow our principles explicitly to Russia and France, than to come in as a cock-boat of the British man-of-war." Adams managed to swing Monroe and the cabinet around to his viewpoint. In his annual message to Congress on December 2, 1823, Monroe included a far-reaching statement on foreign policy that was actually written mainly by Adams, who was elected president in 1824. What came to be known as the Monroe Doctrine solemnly declared that the United States opposed further colonization in the Americas or any effort by European nations to extend their political systems outside their own hemisphere. In return, the United States pledged not to involve itself in the internal affairs of Europe or to take part in European wars. The statement envisioned a North and South America composed entirely of independent states—with the United States preeminent among them. Although the Monroe Doctrine made little impression on the great powers of Europe when it was proclaimed, it signified the rise of a new sense of independence and self-confidence in American attitudes toward the Old World. The United States would now go its own way, free of involvement in European conflicts, and would protect its own sphere of influence from European interference.

What principle was upheld in the Supreme Court case Dartmouth College v. Woodward? 9.3.2

In Dartmouth College v. Woodward (1819), the Court was asked to rule whether the New Hampshire legislature could meddle in the governance of Dartmouth College, a private institution. Daniel Webster, arguing for the college and against the state, contended that Dartmouth's original charter of 1769 was a valid and irrevocable contract between the state and the trustees of the college. The Court accepted his argument. Speaking for all the justices, Marshall made the far-reaching determination that the Constitution's Contracts Clause fully protected any charter a state granted to a private corporation. In practical terms, the Court's ruling in the Dartmouth case meant that the kinds of business enterprises state governments were incorporating—such as turnpike or canal companies and textile manufacturers—could hold on indefinitely to any privileges or favors that their original charters had granted. The decision therefore increased the power and independence of business corporations by weakening states' ability to regulate them or withdraw their privileges. The ruling fostered the growth of the modern corporation as a profit-making enterprise with only limited public responsibilities.

What authority was responsible for processing African slave smuggling cases after 1807 when importation of Africans for the purpose of slavery was banned? 8.3.3

In December 1806, Jefferson urged Congress to prepare legislation outlawing the slave trade. In early 1807, legislators debated how to end the embarrassing commerce. The issue cut across party lines. Northern representatives generally favored a strong bill; some even wanted to make smuggling slaves into the country a capital offense. But the northerners could not figure out what to do with black people captured by the customs agents who would enforce the legislation. To sell these Africans would involve the federal government in slavery, which many northerners found morally repugnant. Nor was there much sympathy for freeing them. Ignorant of the English language and lacking personal possessions, these blacks seemed unlikely to long survive free in the South. Southern congressmen responded with threats and ridicule. They told their northern colleagues that no one in the South regarded slavery as evil. It was naive, therefore, to expect planters to enforce a ban on the slave trade or inform federal agents when they spotted a smuggler. The notion that these culprits deserved capital punishment seemed viciously inappropriate. The bill that Jefferson finally signed in March 1807 probably pleased no one. The law prohibited importing slaves into the United States after January 1, 1808. When customs officials captured a smuggler, the slaves were to be turned over to state authorities and disposed of according to local custom. Southerners did not cooperate. African slaves continued to pour into southern ports. Even more blacks would have been imported had Britain not also outlawed the slave trade in 1807. The Royal Navy then captured American slave smugglers off the coast of Africa. When anyone complained, the British explained that they were merely enforcing the laws of the United States.

Why were abolitionists and planters alike unhappy with the 1807 law that banned importation of Africans for the purpose of slavery? 8.3.3

During the debate over Missouri statehood, what did the Tallmadge amendment propose? 9.3.1

In February 1819, Congressman James Tallmadge of New York introduced an amendment to the statehood bill, banning further introduction of slaves into Missouri and requiring the gradual elimination of slavery within the state. The House approved his amendment by a narrow margin. The Senate, however, voted it down. The issue remained unresolved until a new Congress convened in December. In the great debate that ensued in the Senate, Federalist leader Rufus King of New York argued that Congress was within its rights to require restricting slavery before Missouri could become a state. Southern senators protested that denying Missouri's freedom in this matter attacked the principle of equality among the states and showed that northerners were conspiring to upset the balance of power between the sections. They were also concerned about the future of African American slavery and the white racial privilege that went with it.

What were the terms of the Adams-Onis Treaty of 1819 and why did the Spanish agree to the treaty? 9.1.1

In November 1818, Secretary Adams informed Spain that the United States had acted in self-defense and that further conflict would be avoided only if it ceded East Florida to the United States. The Madrid government, weakened by Latin American revolutions and the breaking up of its empire, was in no position to resist American bullying. As part of the Adams-Onís Treaty, signed on February 22, 1819, Spain relinquished Florida. In return, the United States assumed $5 million of the financial claims of American citizens against Spain. A strong believer that the United States had a continental destiny, Adams pressured Spain to give up its claim to the Pacific coast north of California, thus opening a path for future American expansion. Adams and Spanish minister Luis de Onís reached an agreement whereby Spain kept title to Texas—part of which the United States had claimed in the Louisiana Purchase—and the new boundary between American and Spanish territory ran north of Texas but extended to the Pacific. Great Britain and Russia still had competing claims to the Pacific Northwest, but the United States was now in a better position to acquire a Pacific coastline.

What was the main discussion point for the New England delegates to the Hartford Convention during the War of 1812? 8.5.2

In late 1814, leading New England politicians, most of them moderate Federalists, gathered in Hartford, Connecticut, to discuss relations between their region and the federal government in what became known as the Hartford Convention. Delegates were angry and hurt by the Madison administration's seeming insensitivity to the economic interests of the New England states. The embargo had soured New Englanders on Republican foreign policy. The War of 1812 added insult to injury. When British troops occupied the coastal villages of Maine, then part of Massachusetts, the president did nothing to drive them out.

What was at the root of Andrew Jackson's anxieties about banks? 10.3.1

Jackson had strong reservations about banking and paper money in general—in part because of his own brushes with bankruptcy after accepting promissory notes that depreciated in value. He also harbored suspicions that branches of the Bank of the United States had illicitly supported Adams in 1828. In 1829 and 1830, Jackson called on Congress to curb the bank's power. Nicholas Biddle, the president of the bank, began to worry about its charter, which was to come up for renewal in 1836. Jackson was also listening to his "Kitchen Cabinet," especially Amos Kendall and Francis P. Blair, who thought an attack on the bank would be a good party issue for the election of 1832. Biddle then made a fateful blunder. He sought recharter by Congress in 1832, four years ahead of schedule. Senator Henry Clay, leader of the anti-Jackson administration forces on Capitol Hill, encouraged this move because he was convinced that Jackson had chosen the unpopular side of the issue and that a congressional endorsement of the bank would embarrass or even discredit the president. The bill to recharter was introduced in early 1832. Despite Jackson's opposition, it easily passed. But Jackson vetoed the bill with ringing statements of principle. After repeating his opinion that the bank was unconstitutional, notwithstanding a ruling by the Supreme Court, he argued that it violated the fundamental rights of the people in a democratic society. Jackson thus called on the common people to fight the "monster" corporation. His veto message was the first to use more than strictly constitutional arguments and deal directly with social and economic issues. Attempts to override the veto failed, and Jackson resolved to take the issue to the people in the upcoming presidential election. The 1832 election, the first in which national nominating conventions chose the candidates, pitted Jackson against Henry Clay, standard-bearer of the National Republicans. Although the Democrats did not adopt a formal platform, the party firmly opposed rechartering the bank. Clay and the National Republicans attempted to marshal the pro-bank sentiment that was strong in many parts of the country. But Jackson won a personal triumph over Clay (see Table 10.2). His share of the popular vote was not as high as in 1828, but he still interpreted it as a mandate for continuing the war against the bank.

Why did Whig leader Henry Clay encourage Nicholas Biddle, president of the Bank of the United States, to seek a new charter in 1832 instead of 1836? 10.3.1

How did President Jackson "kill" the National Bank? 10.3.2

Jackson now resolved to attack the bank directly by removing federal deposits from Biddle's vaults. The bank had used all the political influence it could muster to prevent Jackson's reelection, and Old Hickory regarded Biddle as a personal enemy. To remove the deposits from the bank, Jackson had to overcome resistance in his own cabinet. When one secretary of the treasury refused to support the policy, he was shifted to another cabinet post. When a second also balked, Roger B. Taney, a Jackson loyalist and opponent of the bank, replaced him. In September 1833, Taney, as acting secretary of the treasury, ceased depositing government money in the bank and began to withdraw the funds already there. Although Jackson had suggested that the government keep its money in some kind of public bank, he had never worked out the details or made a specific proposal to Congress. Instead, the funds were placed in 23 state banks. Opponents charged that these banks had been selected for political rather than fiscal reasons and dubbed them Jackson's "pet banks." Since Congress refused to regulate the credit policies of these banks, the way the state banks used the new deposits nullified Jackson's efforts to shift to a hard-money economy. They extended credit recklessly and increased the paper money in circulation. The Bank of the United States counterattacked by calling in outstanding loans and instituting a policy of credit contraction that helped bring on a recession. Biddle hoped to show that weakening the bank would hurt the economy. With justification, Jacksonians accused Biddle of deliberately and unnecessarily causing distress out of personal resentment and a desire to maintain his unchecked powers and privileges. The bank never regained its charter. Opposition to Jackson's fiscal policies grew in Congress. Clay and his supporters contended that the president had violated the bank's charter and exceeded his constitutional authority when he removed the deposits. The Senate approved a motion of censure. Jacksonians in the House blocked similar action, but the president was further humiliated when the Senate refused to confirm Taney as secretary of the treasury. (Jackson later named him chief justice of the Supreme Court.) Congressmen who had defended Jackson's veto now thought he had abused the powers of his office.

When it came to choosing his cabinet, how did Thomas Jefferson draw on his experience as a member of Washington's cabinet? 8.2

Jefferson carefully selected the members of his cabinet. During Washington's administration, he had witnessed—even provoked—severe infighting; as president, he nominated only those who enthusiastically supported his programs. James Madison, the leading figure at the Constitutional Convention, became secretary of state. For the Treasury, Jefferson chose Albert Gallatin, a Swiss-born financier who understood the complexities of the federal budget. "If I had the universe to choose from," the president announced, "I could not change one of my associates to my better satisfaction."

How did Republicans fare in the election of 1804? 8.3

Jefferson concluded his first term on a wave of popularity. He had maintained the peace, reduced taxes, and expanded the United States. He overwhelmed his Federalist opponent Charles Cotesworth Pinckney in the presidential election of 1804 (see Table 8.1). Republicans also controlled Congress. John Randolph, the most articulate member of the House of Representatives, exclaimed, "Never was there an administration more brilliant than that of Mr. Jefferson up to this period. We were indeed in the full tide of successful experiment!" But a perceptive observer might have seen signs of serious division within the Republican Party and the country. The president's heavy-handed attempts to reform the federal courts had stirred deep animosities. Republicans had begun sniping at other Republicans. Congressional debates over the slave trade revealed powerful sectional loyalties and profound disagreement. Candidate- Jefferson Party- Republican Electoral Vote- 162 Candidate- C. Pinckney Party- Federalist Electoral Vote- 14

Why didn't the 1807 Embargo Act have the effect it was intended to have? 8.4.2

Jefferson found what he regarded as a satisfactory way to deal with European predators with a policy he called "peaceable coercion." If Britain and France refused to respect the rights of neutral carriers, then the United States would keep its ships at home. This protected them from seizure and deprived the European powers of needed American goods, especially food. The president predicted that a total embargo of American commerce would soon force Britain and France to negotiate with the United States in good faith: "Our commerce is so valuable to them that they will be glad to purchase it when the only price we ask is to do us justice." The Embargo Act became law on December 22, 1807. But peaceable coercion became a Jeffersonian nightmare. The president naively believed the American people would enthusiastically support the embargo. Instead, compliance required enforcement acts that became increasingly harsh. By mid-1808, Jefferson and Gallatin were regulating the smallest details of American economic life. The federal government supervised the coastal trade, lest a ship sailing between two states slip away to Europe or the West Indies. Overland trade with Canada was proscribed. When violations still occurred, Congress gave customs collectors the right to seize a vessel merely on suspicion of wrongdoing. A final desperate act in January 1809 prohibited the loading of any U.S. vessel, regardless of size, without authorization from a customs officer who was supported by the army, navy, and local militia. Northerners hated the embargo. Persons near Lake Champlain in upper New York State simply ignored the regulations and roughed up customs officers who interfered with the Canadian trade. The administration was determined to stop the smugglers. Jefferson urged the governor of New York to call out the militia and sent federal troops to overawe the citizens of New York. New Englanders considered the embargo lunacy. New England merchants were willing to take their chances on the high seas, but for reasons that few people understood, the president insisted that it was better to preserve ships from possible seizure than to make profits. Sailors and artisans were thrown out of work. The popular press maintained a constant howl of protest. Not surprisingly, the Federalist Party revived in New England. Extremists suggested that state assemblies nullify federal law. By 1809, Jefferson's foreign policy was bankrupt. The embargo never seriously damaged the British economy. In fact, British merchants took over lucrative markets that the Americans had been forced to abandon. Napoleon liked the embargo, since it seemed to harm Britain more than France. Faced with growing opposition, the Republicans in Congress panicked. One representative declared that peaceful coercion was a "miserable and mischievous failure" and joined his colleagues in repealing the embargo a few days before James Madison's inauguration. Relations between the United States and the great European powers were worse in 1809 than they had been in 1805. During his second term, the pressures of office weighed heavily on Jefferson. After so many years of public service, he welcomed retirement to Monticello.

When New England textile mills developed in the early 1800s, what group was most likely to make up the labor pool? 9.2.3

Lowell, Massachusetts, became America's model industrial town in the first half of the nineteenth century. In this painting of the town in 1814 (when it was still called East Chelmsford), a multistory brick mill is prominent on the river (top). Textile mills sprang up throughout Lowell in the 1820s and 1830s, employing thousands of workers, mostly women. At bottom, a photograph from c. 1848 shows a Lowell mill worker operating a loom.

What was peculiar about the timing of President James Madison's request for a declaration of war against Britain in 1812? 8.4.4

Madison surrendered to the War Hawks. On June 1, 1812, he sent Congress a declaration of war against Britain. The timing was peculiar. Over the preceding months, tensions between the two nations had relaxed. No new attacks had occurred. Indeed, at the very moment Madison called for war, the British government was suspending the Orders in Council, a conciliatory gesture that probably would have preserved the peace.

What was the Tariff of Abominations? 10.2.1

Men hostile to the administration and favorable to Jackson controlled the Congress elected in 1826. The tariff issue was the main business on their agenda. Pressure for greater protection from foreign imports came not only from manufacturers but also from farmers, especially wool and hemp growers, who would supply critical votes in the presidential election of 1828. The cotton-growing South—the only section where tariffs of all kinds were unpopular—was assumed to be safely in Jackson's camp regardless of his stand on the tariff. Therefore, his supporters felt safe in promoting a high tariff to swing critical votes his way. Jackson himself had never categorically opposed protective tariffs so long as they were "judicious." As it turned out, the resulting tariff law was anything but judicious. Congress tried to provide something for everybody. Those favoring protection for farmers agreed to protect manufacturers and vice versa. This across-the-board increase in duties, however, angered southern free traders and became known as the Tariff of Abominations.

What situation in Washington, DC, was the subject of abolitionists' petitions to the federal government? 9.4.2

Runaway slave ads were common features of southern newspapers; Thomas Jefferson placed an ad for one of his runaways in 1769, and George Washington went to great lengths to recover an enslaved woman who freed herself from his plantation. In sharp contrast to slave-owning founding fathers like Jefferson, George Washington, and James Madison were their Virginia planter peers like Robert Carter III, who began to manumit his slaves in 1791, and William Ludwell Lee, who freed his slaves upon his death in 1802 and deeded them land to farm. Thousands of slaves passed through the streets of Washington, D.C., on their way to the plantations of the Deep South in the first half of the nineteenth century. Despite countless petitions from abolitionists, slave trading was not banned in the capital until 1850. Slave trading was one of the biggest businesses in cities like Richmond, Virginia, Charleston, South Carolina, and New Orleans, Louisiana.

What did the Shawnee leaders Tecumseh and the Prophet try to persuade other Indians to do with regard to whites? 8.1.2

Such fraudulent transactions disgusted the Shawnee leaders Tenskwatawa (known as the Prophet) and his brother Tecumseh. Tecumseh rejected classification as a Shawnee and may have been the first Native leader to identify himself self-consciously as "Indian." These men attempted to revitalize Native cultures. Against overwhelming odds, they briefly persuaded Native Americans living in the Indiana Territory to avoid contact with whites, resist alcohol, and, most important, hold on to their land. White intruders saw Tecumseh as a threat to progress. During the War of 1812, they shattered the Indians' dream of cultural renaissance. The populous Creek nation, located in the modern states of Alabama and Mississippi, also resisted the settlers' advance, but its warriors were crushed by Andrew Jackson's Tennessee militia at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend (March 1814).

What were the dominant roles of men and women in a traditional Cherokee society? 9.1.2

The Cherokee were the largest of the five nations. Traditional Cherokee society had combined hunting by men and subsistence farming by women. In the early nineteenth century, the shift to a more agrarian, market-based economy eroded the traditional matrilineal kinship system, in which a person belonged to his or her mother's clan. The new order replaced matrilineal inheritance with the U.S. system of patriarchy, in which fathers headed the household and property passed from father to son. Emphasis on the nuclear family with the husband as producer and the wife as domestic caretaker diminished the clan's role.

How did Seminole organization of African slavery within their society represent a significant departure from the way whites organized slavery? 9.1.2

The Seminole Nation in Florida, which formed after the European conquest of America, was an amalgam of many different peoples with roots in Africa and the New World. Disparate groups of Creek Indians migrating from Georgia and Alabama in the wake of war and disease mingled with the remnants of native Floridians to form the new tribe known as the Seminole. Spain had also granted asylum to runaway African American slaves from the Carolinas, who created autonomous "maroon communities" in Florida, allying with the Seminole to ward off slave catchers. African Americans and Native Americans intermingled, and by the late eighteenth century, some African Americans were already known as "Seminole Negroes" or estelusti. The word Seminole itself meant "wild" or "runaway" in the Creek language. Although the Seminoles adopted African slavery in the early nineteenth century, it was different from slavery as it existed among whites, or even among the Cherokee and Creek. Seminole "slaves" lived in separate towns, planted and cultivated fields in common, owned large herds of livestock, and paid their "owners" only an annual tribute, similar to what Seminole towns paid to the micco, or chief. During the 1820s and 1830s, the estelusti and the Seminoles were allies in wars against the Americans; however, their alliance came under increasing strain. In 1823, six Seminole leaders, including one of some African ancestry known as Mulatto King, signed the Treaty of Moultrie Creek, removing the tribe from their fertile lands in northern Florida to swampland south of Tampa. The signers took bribes and believed unfulfilled promises that they would be allowed to stay on their lands. The treaty also required the Seminoles to return runaway slaves and turn away future runaways. During the 1830s, black Seminoles were some of the staunchest opponents of Indian Removal, and they played a major role in the Second Seminole War, which was fought to resist removal from 1835 to 1842. General Thomas W. Jesup, the leader of the U.S. Army, claimed, "This, you may be assured is a negro and not an Indian war."

How were War Hawks hopes about conquering Canada dashed in 1813? 8.5.1

The campaigns of 1813 revealed that conquering Canada would be more difficult than the War Hawks ever imagined. Both sides recognized that whoever controlled the Great Lakes controlled the West. On Lake Erie, the Americans won the race for naval superiority. On September 10, 1813, Oliver Hazard Perry destroyed a British fleet at Put-in-Bay. In a much-quoted letter written after the battle, Perry exclaimed, "We have met the enemy; and they are ours." On October 5, General Harrison overran British troops and Indian warriors at the Battle of Thames River. During this engagement, Tecumseh was killed. On the other fronts, however, the war went badly for the Americans. General Wilkinson suffered an embarrassing defeat near Montreal (Battle of Chrysler's Farm, November 11), and the British navy held its own on Lake Ontario. Throughout 1814, British warships harassed the Chesapeake coast. To their surprise, the British found the region almost totally undefended. On August 24, 1814, in retaliation for the Americans' destruction of the capital of Upper Canada (York, Ontario), a small British force burned the American capital, a victory more symbolic than strategic. Encouraged by their easy success and contemptuous of America's ragtag soldiers, the British launched a full-scale attack on Baltimore (September 13-14). To everyone's surprise, the fort guarding the harbor held out against a heavy naval bombardment, and the British gave up the operation. The survival of Fort McHenry inspired Francis Scott Key to write "The Star-Spangled Banner." The Battle of New Orleans should never have occurred. The British landed a large assault force under General Edward Pakenham just when diplomats in Europe were preparing the final drafts of a peace treaty. The combatants, of course, knew nothing of these distant developments. On January 8, 1815, Pakenham ordered a frontal attack against General Andrew Jackson's well-defended positions. Pakenham was killed, and the British lost over 2,000 killed and wounded. The Americans suffered only light casualties. The victory not only made Jackson a national folk hero, but it also gave the people of the United States a much needed source of pride. Even in military terms, the battle was significant. If the British had managed to occupy New Orleans, the key to the trade of the Mississippi River Valley, they would have been difficult to dislodge regardless of the peace treaty. Even more significant, Jackson's victory removed permanently the possibility that a British-Native American alliance would continue to hinder the spread of American settlement in the Southwest. After the War of 1812, the British retreated to Canada, and thereby not only left the Indians in the United States to deal with the aggressive Americans as best they could, but also opened a huge new territory for the expansion of slavery. Indeed, the Battle of New Orleans represented only a single event in a long imperial campaign from 1810 to 1819 to seize territory claimed by others—events often involving Jackson that led to the annexation of West Florida (1810 and 1813), the seizure of Indian lands in what became Alabama (the Creek War in 1813-1814), and military incursions into Spanish Florida (1814-1818) that forced Spain to cede that territory to the United States in 1819.

What was the primary reason for the development of the Whig Party and what did it mean by the phrase "executive usurpation"? 10.3.3

The coalition that passed the censure resolution in the Senate provided the nucleus for a new national party—the Whigs. Its leadership and most of its support came from National Republicans associated with Clay and New England ex-Federalists led by Senator Daniel Webster of Massachusetts. Southern proponents of states' rights who had been upset by Jackson's stand on nullification and saw his withdrawal of federal deposits from the bank as an unconstitutional abuse of power also supported the Whigs. Even Calhoun and his nullifiers occasionally cooperated with the Whig camp. The rallying cry for this diverse anti-Jackson coalition was "executive usurpation." The Whig label was chosen because of its associations with British and American revolutionary opposition to royal power and prerogatives. In their propaganda, the Whigs attacked the tyrannical designs of "King Andrew and his court." Whigs opposed the Indian Removal Act and Jackson's high-handed rebuff of the Supreme Court in pursuing his Indian policies. The Whigs also gradually absorbed the Anti-Masonic Party, a surprisingly strong political movement that had arisen in the Northeast in the late 1820s and early 1830s. Capitalizing on the hysteria aroused by the 1826 disappearance and apparent murder of a New Yorker who had threatened to reveal the secrets of the Masonic order, the Anti-Masons exploited traditional American fears of secret societies and conspiracies. They also appealed to the moral concerns of the northern middle class under the sway of an emerging evangelical Protestantism. Anti-Masons detested Jacksonianism mainly because it tolerated diverse lifestyles. They believed that the government should restrict such "sinful" behavior as drinking, gambling, and breaking the Sabbath. But this diverse Whig coalition could not agree on a single candidate and lost the 1836 presidential election to Jackson's designated successor, Martin Van Buren. Nevertheless, the Whigs ran even with the Democrats in the South.

How did the belief in equal opportunity give rise to the "self-made man" of the early 19th century? 10.1

The decline of deference meant that "self-made men" of lowly origins could more readily acquire power and influence, and that exclusiveness and aristocratic pretensions were likely to provoke hostility or scorn. But economic equality—an equitable sharing of wealth—was not part of the mainstream agenda of the Jacksonian period. This was a competitive capitalist society. The watchword was equality of opportunity, not equality of reward. Life was a race. So long as all white males appeared to have an equal start, there could be no reason for complaint if some were winners and others losers. Historians now generally agree that economic inequality—the gap between rich and poor—actually increased during this period.

What did the decline of deferential behavior in the early 19th century mean for people of lowly origins and means? 10.1

In the early 19th century, did the typical farmer practice subsistence farming or commercial farming? 9.2.2

The desire to reduce the cost and increase the speed of shipping heavy freight over great distances laid the groundwork for a new economic system. Canals made it less expensive and more profitable for western farmers to ship wheat and flour to New York and Philadelphia and also gave manufacturers in the East ready access to an interior market. Steamboats reduced shipping costs on the Ohio and Mississippi and put farmers in the enviable position of receiving more for their crops and paying less for the goods they needed to import. Hence, improved transport increased farm income and stimulated commercial agriculture. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the typical farming household consumed most of what it produced and sold only a small surplus in nearby markets. Most manufactured articles were produced at home. Easier and cheaper access to distant markets decisively changed this pattern. Between 1800 and 1840, agricultural output increased at an annual rate of approximately 3 percent, and a rapidly growing portion of this production consisted of commodities grown for sale rather than for home consumption. The rise in productivity was partly due to technological advances. Iron or steel plows proved better than wooden ones; the grain cradle displaced the scythe for harvesting; and better varieties or strains of crops, grasses, and livestock were introduced. But the availability of good land and the revolution in marketing were the most important spurs to profitable commercial farming. Good land made for high yields, at least for a time, and when excessive planting wore out the soil, a farmer could migrate to more fertile lands farther west. Transportation facilities made distant markets available and plugged farmers into a commercial network that provided credit and relieved them of the need to do their own selling.

Why was improved transportation such a dominant issue in post-War of 1812 America? 9.2

The dispossession of Indian lands was the first step in the enormous expansion of the U.S. economy that took place in the first half of the nineteenth century. With Indians out of the way, white settlers moved in and cleared lands for agriculture. Yet it took more than the spread of settlements to bring prosperity to new areas and bring them into a national market. Land transportation was so primitive that in 1813 it took 75 days for one wagon of goods drawn by four horses to travel about 1,000 miles from Worcester, Massachusetts, to Charleston, South Carolina. Coastal shipping eased the problem to some extent in the East and stimulated the growth of port cities. Traveling west over the mountains, however, meant months on the trail. After the War of 1812, political leaders realized that national security, economic progress, and political unity more or less depended on an improved transportation network. Accordingly, in 1815 President Madison called for a federally supported program of "internal improvements." In the ensuing decades, the nationalists realized their vision of a transportation revolution to a considerable extent, although the direct role of the federal government proved to be less important than anticipated.

What was the most common type of transportation resource in post-War of 1812 America? 9.2.1

The first great federal transportation project was building the National Road between Cumberland, Maryland, on the Potomac and Wheeling, Virginia, on the Ohio (1811-1818). This impressive gravel-surfaced toll road was extended to Vandalia, Illinois, in 1838. By about 1825, thousands of miles of turnpikes—privately owned toll roads chartered by the states—crisscrossed southern New England, upstate New York, Pennsylvania, and northern New Jersey. The toll roads, however, failed to meet the demand for low-cost transportation over long distances. Travelers benefited more than transporters of bulky freight, for whom the turnpikes proved expensive. Even the National Road could not offer the low freight costs required for the long-distance hauling of wheat, flour, and the other bulky agricultural products of the Ohio Valley. These commodities needed water transportation. The United States' natural system of river transportation was one of the most significant reasons for its rapid economic development. The Ohio-Mississippi system in particular provided ready access to the rich agricultural interior and a natural outlet for its products. By 1815, flatboats loaded with wheat, flour, and salt pork were making part of the 2,000-mile trip from Pittsburgh to New Orleans. Even after the coming of the steamboat, flatboats still carried much of the downriver trade. The flatboat trade, however, was necessarily one-way. A farmer from Ohio or Illinois, or someone hired to do the job, could float down to New Orleans easily enough, but to get back, he usually had to walk overland through rough country. Until the problem of upriver navigation was solved, the Ohio-Mississippi could not carry the manufactured goods that farmers desired in exchange for their crops. Fortunately, a solution was readily at hand: steam power. Late in the eighteenth century, American inventors had experimented with steam-driven riverboats. John Fitch even exhibited an early model to delegates at the Constitutional Convention in 1788. But making a commercially successful craft required further refinement. In 1807, Robert Fulton, backed by Robert R. Livingston—a prominent wealthy New Yorker—demonstrated the potential of the steamboat by propelling the Clermont 150 miles from New York City up the Hudson River. The first steamboat launched in the west was the New Orleans, which made the long trip from Pittsburgh to New Orleans in 1811-1812. Besides becoming a principal means of passenger travel on the inland waterways of the East, the river steamboat revolutionized western commerce. In 1815, the Enterprise made the first return trip from New Orleans to Pittsburgh. By 1820, 69 steamboats with a total capacity of 13,890 tons were plying western waters. Steam transport reduced costs, moved goods and people faster, and allowed two-way commerce on the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers. The steamboat captured the American imagination. Great paddle wheelers became luxurious floating hotels—the natural habitats of gamblers, confidence men, and mysterious women. For the pleasure of passengers and onlookers, steamboats sometimes raced against each other, and their more skillful pilots became folk heroes. But the boats also had a lamentable safety record, frequently running aground, colliding, or blowing up. The most publicized disasters of antebellum America were spectacular boiler explosions that killed hundreds of passengers. As a result, the federal government began in 1838 to attempt to regulate steamboats and monitor their construction and operation. The legislation, which failed to create an agency capable of enforcing minimum safety standards, was virtually the only federal effort before the Civil War to regulate domestic transportation. A transportation system based solely on rivers and roads had one enormous gap—it did not provide an economical way to ship western farm produce directly east to ports engaged in transatlantic trade or to the growing urban market of the seaboard states. The solution the politicians and merchants of the Middle Atlantic and midwestern states offered was to build a system of canals that linked seaboard cities directly to the Great Lakes, the Ohio River, and ultimately the Mississippi River. At 364 miles long, 40 feet wide, and 4 feet deep, and containing 84 locks, the Erie Canal, which opened in 1825 and linked Lake Erie to Buffalo, New York, was the most spectacular engineering achievement of the young republic. Furthermore, it was a great economic success and inspired numerous other canal projects in other states. The canal boom ended when it became apparent that most of the waterways were unprofitable. State credit had been overextended, and the panic and depression of the late 1830s and early 1840s forced retrenchment. Moreover, railroads were now competing for the same traffic, and a new phase in the transportation revolution was beginning. However, canals, while they failed to turn a profit for most investors, provided a vital service to those who used them, and contributed to the new nation's economic development.

What part of the nation was most likely to support Indian removal during the Age of Jackson? 10.2.3

The first major policy question facing the Jackson administration concerned the fate of Native Americans. Jackson had long favored removing eastern Indians to lands beyond the Mississippi. In his military service on the southern frontier, he had already persuaded and coerced tribal groups to emigrate. Jackson's support of removal was no different from the policy of previous administrations. The only real issues were how rapidly and thoroughly it should be carried out and by what means. Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi were clamoring for action. Immediately after Jackson's election, Georgia extended its state laws over the Cherokee within its borders. Georgia declared that all Cherokee laws and customs were null and void, made all white people living in the Cherokee Nation subject to Georgia's laws, declared the Cherokee mere tenants at will on their land, and made it a crime for any Cherokee to try to influence another Cherokee to stay in Georgia. State officials also authorized the Georgia militia to use violence against the Cherokee to pressure them to give up their land and move west. Before Jackson's inauguration, Alabama and Mississippi also abolished the sovereignty of the Creeks and Choctaw, and declared state control of the tribes. This legislation defied both the constitutional provisions giving the federal government exclusive jurisdiction over Indian affairs and specific treaties. But Jackson endorsed the state actions. He regarded Indians as children when they did the white man's bidding and savage beasts when they resisted. He was also aware of his political debt to the land-hungry states of the South. Consequently, in December 1829, he advocated a new and more coercive removal policy. Denying Cherokee autonomy, he asserted the primacy of states' rights over Indian rights and called for the speedy and thorough removal of all eastern Indians to designated areas beyond the Mississippi. Chief John Ross warned his people that "the object of the President is ... to create divisions among ourselves." President Jackson rejected Ross's appeal against Georgia's violation of federal treaty, and in 1830, the president's congressional supporters introduced a bill to implement the removal policy. Despite heated debate, the Indian Removal Act passed with strong support from the South and western border states.

What was a significant economic development in the fifteen years following the War of 1812? 9.2.3

The growth of a market economy also created new opportunities for industrialists. In 1815, most manufacturing in the United States was carried on in households, in the workshops of skilled artisans, or in small mills that used waterpower to turn wheat into flour or timber into boards. The factory form of production, in which supervised workers tended or operated machines under one roof, was rare. It was found mainly in southern New England, where small spinning mills, relying heavily on the labor of women and children, accomplished one step in the manufacture of cotton textiles. But women working at home still spun most thread and wove, cut, and sewed most cloth. As late as 1820, about two-thirds of the clothing Americans wore was made entirely in households by female family members—wives and daughters. However, they were producing a growing proportion of it for market rather than direct home consumption. Under the putting-out system of manufacturing, merchant capitalists provided raw material to people in their own homes, picked up finished or semifinished products, paid the workers, and took charge of distribution. Items such as simple shoes and hats were also made under the putting-out system. Home manufacturing of this type was centered in the Northeast, often done by farm families making profitable use of their slack seasons. It did not usually challenge the economic preeminence of agriculture or seriously disrupt rural life. Artisans in small shops in towns made most articles that required greater skill—such as high-quality shoes and boots, carriages and wagons, mill wheels, and barrels and kegs. But after 1815, shops grew bigger; masters tended to become entrepreneurs rather than working artisans; and journeymen often became wage earners rather than aspiring masters. The growing market for low-priced goods also emphasized speed, quantity, and standardization in production. Even where no substantial mechanization was involved, shops dealing in handmade goods for a local clientele tended to become small factories turning out cheaper items for a wider public. A fully developed factory system emerged first in textile manufacturing. The first cotton mills utilizing the power loom and spinning machinery—thus making it possible to turn fiber into cloth in a single factory—resulted from the efforts of three Boston merchants: Francis Cabot Lowell, Nathan Appleton, and Patrick Tracy Jackson. On a visit to England in 1810-1811, Lowell memorized the closely guarded industrial secret of how to construct a power loom. In Boston, he joined with Appleton and Jackson to acquire a site with water power at nearby Waltham and obtain a corporate charter for textile manufacturing on a new and expanded scale. Under the name of the Boston Manufacturing Company, the associates began their Waltham operation in 1813. Its phenomenal success led to the erection of a larger and even more profitable mill at Lowell, Massachusetts, in 1822 and another at Chicopee in 1823. Lowell became the great showplace for early American industrialization. Its large and seemingly contented workforce of unmarried young women residing in supervised dormitories, its unprecedented scale of operation, its successful mechanization of almost every stage of the production process—all captured the American middle-class imagination in the 1820s and 1830s. But in the late 1830s and 1840s, conditions in the mills changed for the worse as the owners began to require more work for lower pay, and some of the mill women became militant labor activists. One of them, Sarah Bagley, helped found the Lowell Female Labor Reform Association in 1844. She led protests against long hours and changes that required more work from each operative. Other mills using similar labor systems sprang up throughout New England, which became the first important manufacturing area in the United States. The shift in textile manufacture from domestic to factory production also shifted the locus of women's economic activity. As the New England textile industry grew, the putting-out system declined. Between 1824 and 1832, household production of textiles dropped from 90 to 50 percent in most parts of New England. The shift to factory production changed capitalist activity in the region. Before the 1820s, New England merchants concentrated mainly on international trade, and Boston mercantile houses made great profits. A major source of capital was the lucrative China trade carried on by fast, well-built New England vessels. When the success of Waltham and Lowell became clear, many merchants shifted their capital from oceanic trade to manufacturing. This had important political consequences, as leading politicians such as Daniel Webster no longer advocated a low tariff that favored importers over exporters. Many politicians now supported a high duty to protect manufacturers from foreign competition. The development of other "infant industries" after the War of 1812 was less dramatic and would not come to fruition until the 1840s and 1850s. Technology to improve rolling and refining iron was imported from England; it gradually encouraged a domestic iron industry centered in Pennsylvania. The use of interchangeable parts in manufacturing small arms, pioneered by Eli Whitney and Simeon North, helped modernize the weapons industry and contribute to the growth of new forms of mass production. One should not assume, however, that America had already experienced an industrial revolution by 1840. In that year, 63.4 percent of the nation's labor force was still employed in agriculture. Only 8.8 percent of workers were directly involved in factory production (others worked in trade, transportation, and the professions). Although this represented a significant shift since 1810, when the figures were 83.7 and 3.2 percent, the numbers would have to change much more before it could be said that industrialization had really arrived. The revolution that did occur during these years was essentially one of distribution rather than production. The growth of a market economy of national scope—still based mainly on agriculture but involving a rapid flow of capital, commodities, and services from region to region—was the major economic development of this period. And it had vast repercussions for American life. For those who benefited from it most directly, the market economy provided firm evidence of progress and improvement. But many of those who suffered from its periodic panics and depressions regretted the loss of the individual independence and security that a localized economy of small producers had provided. In 1819, the nation experienced its first major financial crisis, the Panic of 1819, which marked the end of the post-War of 1812 economic expansion, and led to two years of depression. Although the crisis was caused primarily by world economic developments, including falling prices for American agricultural products on world markets, it was exacerbated by American land speculation and the steady issuing of paper money, which increased inflation and speculation. President Monroe handled the crisis in a very cautious way, primarily by cutting government budgets and suspending paper-money payments to bank depositors; this set a precedent for government economic policy in future periods of economic depression. Many farmers lost their land and workers lost jobs. These victims of boom-and-bust were receptive to politicians and reformers who attacked corporations and "the money power."

How did Martin Van Buren aid Andrew Jackson in Jackson's quest for the presidency? 10.2.1

The most significant of these were Vice President John Calhoun of South Carolina, who spoke for the militant states' rights sentiment of the South; Senator Van Buren, who dominated New York politics through the political machine known as the Albany Regency; and two Kentucky editors, Francis P. Blair and Amos Kendall, who mobilized opposition in the West to Henry Clay and his "American System," which advocated government encouragement of economic development through protective tariffs and federally funded internal improvements. As they prepared for 1828, these leaders and their local followers laid the foundations for the first modern American political party—the Democrats. That the Democratic Party was founded to promote the cause of a particular presidential candidate revealed a central characteristic of the emerging two-party system. From this time on, according to historian Richard P. McCormick, national parties existed primarily "to engage in a contest for the presidency." Without this great prize, there would have been less incentive to create national organizations out of the parties and factions developing in several states.

As a group, what distinguished Americans who migrated to the Old Northwest Territory? 8.1.1

The most striking changes occurred in the West. Before the end of the American Revolution, only Indian traders and a few hardy settlers had ventured across the Appalachians. After 1790, however, a flood of people rushed west to stake out farms on the rich soil. Many settlers followed the so-called northern route across Pennsylvania or New York into the Northwest Territory. Pittsburgh and Cincinnati, both strategically located on the Ohio River, became important commercial ports. In 1803, Ohio joined the Union. Territorial governments were formed in Indiana (1800), Louisiana (1805), Michigan (1805), Illinois (1809), and Missouri (1812). Southerners poured into the new states of Kentucky (1792) and Tennessee (1796). Wherever they located, westerners depended on water transportation. Because of the extraordinarily high cost of hauling goods overland, riverboats represented the only economical means of carrying agricultural products to distant markets. The Mississippi River was the crucial commercial link for the entire region. Westerners did not feel secure as long as Spain controlled New Orleans, the southern gate of the Mississippi. Families that moved west attempted to transplant familiar eastern customs to the frontier. In areas such as the Western Reserve, a narrow strip of land along Lake Erie in northern Ohio, the influence of New England remained strong. In general, however, a creative mixing of peoples of different backgrounds in a strange environment generated distinctive folkways. Westerners developed their own heroes, such as Mike Fink, the legendary keelboatman of the Mississippi River; Daniel Boone, the famed trapper and Indian fighter; and the eye-gouging "alligatormen" of Kentucky and Tennessee. Americans who crossed the mountains were ambitious and self-confident, excited by the challenge of almost unlimited geographic mobility.

What was the purpose of high tariff rates in the early 19th century? 9.2.3

The shift in textile manufacture from domestic to factory production also shifted the locus of women's economic activity. As the New England textile industry grew, the putting-out system declined. Between 1824 and 1832, household production of textiles dropped from 90 to 50 percent in most parts of New England. The shift to factory production changed capitalist activity in the region. Before the 1820s, New England merchants concentrated mainly on international trade, and Boston mercantile houses made great profits. A major source of capital was the lucrative China trade carried on by fast, well-built New England vessels. When the success of Waltham and Lowell became clear, many merchants shifted their capital from oceanic trade to manufacturing. This had important political consequences, as leading politicians such as Daniel Webster no longer advocated a low tariff that favored importers over exporters. Many politicians now supported a high duty to protect manufacturers from foreign competition.

How did voting requirements change by the 1820s? 10.1.2

The supremacy of democracy was most obvious in the new politics of universal white manhood suffrage and mass political parties. By the 1820s, most states had removed the last barriers to voting for all white males. This change was not as radical or controversial as it would be later in nineteenth-century Europe; so many Americans owned land that most voters were still men of property. The proportion of public officials who were elected rather than appointed also increased. "The people" increasingly chose judges, as well as legislators and executive officers. A new style of politicking developed. Politicians had to get out and campaign, demonstrating in their speeches on the stump that they could mirror voters' fears and concerns. Electoral politics became more festive and dramatic. Skillful and farsighted politicians—such as Martin Van Buren in New York—began in the 1820s to build stable statewide political organizations out of what had been loosely organized factions. Before the rise of effective national parties, politicians created true party organizations on the state level by dispensing government jobs to friends and supporters and attacking rivals as enemies of popular aspirations. Earlier politicians had regarded parties as a threat to republican virtue and had embraced them only as a temporary expedient, but Van Buren regarded a permanent two-party system as essential to democratic government. In his opinion, parties restricted the temptation to abuse power, a tendency deeply planted in the human heart. The major breakthrough in American political thought during the 1820s and 1830s was the idea of a "loyal opposition"—ready to capitalize politically on the mistakes or excesses of the "ins" without denying their right to act the same way when they became the "outs." Changes in the method of nominating and electing a president fostered the growth of a national two-party system. By 1828, voters rather than state legislatures were choosing presidential electors in all but two of the 24 states. The new need to mobilize grassroots voters behind particular candidates required national organization. Coalitions of state parties that could agree on a single standard-bearer evolved into the great national parties of the Jacksonian era—the Democrats and the Whigs. When national nominating conventions appeared in 1831, representative party assemblies, not congressional caucuses or ad hoc political alliances, selected presidential candidates. New political institutions and practices encouraged popular interest and participation. In the presidential election of 1824, less than 27 percent of adult white males voted. From 1828 to 1836, 55 percent did. Then it shot up to 78 percent in 1840—the first election in which two fully organized national parties each nominated a single candidate and campaigned in every state in the Union.

Why did Federalists pass the 1801 Judiciary Act? 8.3.1

Throughout the history of the United States, presidents have frequently expressed irritation about court decisions that seem to undermine executive policy. Although Jefferson accepted the separation of powers as laid out in the Constitution, he conducted a running battle with judges who he believed supported the interests of the Federalist Party. His controversy with the federal bench commenced the moment he became president. The Federalists, realizing they would soon lose control over the executive branch, had passed the Judiciary Act of 1801. This law created circuit courts and 16 new judgeships. Through his "midnight" appointments, Adams had filled these positions with Federalist stalwarts. Such blatant partisan behavior angered Jefferson. In the courts, he explained, the Federalists hoped to preserve their political influence, and "from that battery all the works of Republicanism are to be beaten down and erased." Even more infuriating was Adams's appointment of John Marshall as the new chief justice. This shrewd, largely self-educated Virginian of Federalist background could hold his own against the new president.

Why did the French leader Napoleon agree to the U.S. purchase of Louisiana? 8.2.2

When Jefferson took office, he was confident that Louisiana and Florida would eventually become part of the United States. Spain owned these territories, and Jefferson assumed he could persuade the rulers of that notoriously weak nation to sell their colonies. If that peaceful strategy failed, the president was prepared to threaten forcible occupation. In May 1801, however, prospects for the easy or inevitable acquisition of Louisiana darkened. Jefferson learned that Spain had transferred title to the entire region to France, its powerful northern neighbor. To make matters worse, the French leader Napoleon seemed intent on reestablishing an empire in North America. Even as Jefferson sought more information about the transfer, Napoleon was dispatching an army to suppress a rebellion in France's sugar-rich Caribbean colony, Haiti. From that island stronghold, French troops could occupy New Orleans and close the Mississippi River to American trade. A sense of crisis enveloped Washington. Congressmen urged Jefferson to prepare for war against France. Tensions increased when the Spanish officials who still governed New Orleans announced the closing of that port to American commerce (October 1802). Jefferson assumed that the Spanish had acted on orders from France. Despite this provocation, the president preferred negotiations to war. In January 1803, he asked James Monroe, a loyal Republican from Virginia, to join the American minister, Robert Livingston, in Paris and explore the possibility of purchasing New Orleans. By the time Monroe joined Livingston in France, Napoleon had lost interest in an American empire. The army he sent to Haiti succumbed to tropical diseases. By the end of 1802, more than 30,000 veteran troops had died there. The diplomats from the United States knew nothing of these developments. They were surprised, therefore, in April 1803 when Talleyrand, the French foreign minister, offered to sell the entire Louisiana Territory for only $15 million. The Louisiana Purchase doubled the size of the United States. The American people responded enthusiastically to the news. Only a few disgruntled New England Federalists thought the United States was already too large. Jefferson was relieved. The nation had avoided war with France. Nevertheless, he worried that the purchase might be unconstitutional. The president pointed out that the Constitution did not specifically authorize acquiring vast new territories and thousands of foreign citizens. To escape this apparent legal dilemma, Jefferson proposed amending the Constitution. Few persons, even his closest advisers, shared the president's scruples. Events in France soon forced Jefferson to adopt a more pragmatic course. When he heard that Napoleon had become impatient for his money, Jefferson rushed the treaty to a Senate eager to ratify it. Nothing more was said about amending the Constitution.

During the debate over Missouri statehood, what did southerners determine to do? 9.3.1

When the question came before Congress in early 1819, sectional fears and anxieties bubbled to the surface. Many northerners resented southern control of the presidency and the fact that the Three-Fifths Clause of the Constitution, by which every five slaves were counted as three persons in figuring the state's population, gave the South's free population added weight in the House of Representatives and the Electoral College. The South, on the other hand, feared for the future of what it regarded as a necessary balance of power between the sections. Until 1819, a strict equality had been maintained by alternately admitting slave and free states; in that year, there were eleven of each. But the northern population was growing more rapidly than the southern, and the North had a decisive majority in the House. Hence the South saw its equal vote in the Senate as essential for preserving the balance. In February 1819, Congressman James Tallmadge of New York introduced an amendment to the statehood bill, banning further introduction of slaves into Missouri and requiring the gradual elimination of slavery within the state. The House approved his amendment by a narrow margin. The Senate, however, voted it down. The issue remained unresolved until a new Congress convened in December. In the great debate that ensued in the Senate, Federalist leader Rufus King of New York argued that Congress was within its rights to require restricting slavery before Missouri could become a state. Southern senators protested that denying Missouri's freedom in this matter attacked the principle of equality among the states and showed that northerners were conspiring to upset the balance of power between the sections. They were also concerned about the future of African American slavery and the white racial privilege that went with it.

What precedent was set in the Supreme Court case Marbury v. Madison? 8.3.1

While Congress debated the Judiciary Act, another battle erupted. One of Adams's "midnight" appointees, William Marbury, complained that the new administration would not give him his commission for the office of justice of the peace for the District of Columbia. He sought redress before the Supreme Court, demanding that the justices compel James Madison, the secretary of state, to deliver the necessary papers. The Republicans were furious when Marshall agreed to hear the case. Apparently the chief justice wanted to provoke a confrontation with the executive branch. Marshall was too clever to jeopardize the independence of the Supreme Court over such a relatively minor issue. In his celebrated Marbury v. Madison decision (February 1803), Marshall berated the secretary of state for withholding Marbury's commission. Nevertheless, he concluded that the Supreme Court did not possess jurisdiction over such matters. Marbury was out of luck. The Republicans were so pleased with the outcome that they failed to examine the logic of Marshall's decision. He had ruled that part of the earlier act of Congress, the one on which Marbury based his appeal, was unconstitutional. This was the first time the Supreme Court asserted its right to judge the constitutionality of congressional acts. While contemporaries did not fully appreciate the significance of Marshall's doctrine, Marbury v. Madison later served as an important precedent for judicial review, the Supreme Court's authority to determine the constitutionality of federal statutes. Neither Marbury's defeat nor repeal of the Judiciary Act placated extreme Republicans. They insisted that federal judges be made more responsive to the will of the people. One solution, short of electing federal judges, was impeachment. This clumsy device enabled the legislature to remove particularly offensive officeholders. In 1803, John Pickering, an incompetent judge from New Hampshire, presented the Republicans with a curious test case. This Federalist appointee was an insane alcoholic. While his outrageous behavior on the bench embarrassed everyone, Pickering had not committed any high crimes against the U.S. government. Ignoring such legal niceties, Jefferson's congressional allies pushed for impeachment. Although the Senate convicted Pickering (March 1804), many senators refused to compromise the letter of the Constitution and were conspicuously absent for the final vote.

From whom did planters in the Deep South purchase slaves after the 1807 embargo against importation of Africans for the purpose of slavery? 9.4.2

With the expansion of U.S. territory came the expansion of slavery in the South. The territory that would become western Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana had favorable climatic and soil conditions for growing cotton. Slaveholding Southerners, seeking to expand their land holdings to grow cotton and other staple crops, pushed Indian tribes out of the Southeast, at times with violence and at times with law. As cotton grew more lucrative, slaveholders in the Deep South purchased ever greater numbers of slaves from the Upper South. At the same time, many Northern legislatures began introducing gradual emancipation plans that decreased the enslaved population of those states. To the west, the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 stipulated that that territory would be free, but the status of slavery in the lands acquired under the Louisiana Purchase was open to debate. In 1820, Congress passed the Missouri Compromise, allowing for the admission of Missouri as a slave state balanced by the admission of Maine (formerly a district of Massachusetts) as a free state, maintaining a balance of representation in the Senate. The compromise also excluded slavery from federal territories north of the 36°30′ parallel. South of that line, slavery could expand west unimpeded.

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