From: jeffreydanielrubard@gmail.com   
      
   From The New Nation, 1783–1815   
   By Alan Taylor (Gilder Lehrman Institute)   
      
   In the election of 1800, the Republicans prevailed because the Sedition Act   
   and federal taxes proved so unpopular. After a heated race Jefferson won the   
   presidency by seventy-three electoral votes to sixty-five for the Federalist   
   John Adams. The    
   Republicans captured control of Congress as well. In subsequent elections, the   
   Republicans would build their majority, as the Federalists faded. The Friends   
   of the People had triumphed over the Fathers of the People. But their people   
   were white:    
   Jefferson’s new postmaster general fired all the free blacks working in his   
   department.   
   Because the election of 1800 swept the Federalists from power, Jefferson   
   called his victory the “Revolution of 1800.” His victory vindicated the   
   principle that the republic’s rulers should attend carefully to public   
   opinion and should avoid    
   preaching deference to the common people. The Sedition Act expired and   
   Jefferson pardoned prisoners convicted under that law. Congress also appealed   
   to immigrants by reducing the period of naturalization from fourteen years   
   back to just five. In practice,   
    however, Jefferson and his fellow Republicans proved inconsistent as civil   
   libertarians. In 1804 the new president explained, “While we deny that   
   Congress have a right to control the freedom of the press, we have ever   
   asserted the right of the states,    
   and their exclusive right to do so.” Indeed, Jefferson urged Republican   
   governors to prosecute the Federalist editors in their state courts.   
      
   Jefferson also rejected the more regal style of the Federalist presidents,   
   Washington and Adams, who had staged elaborate rituals, worn expensive   
   clothes, and held fancy receptions. The Federalists believed that shows of   
   power helped to build public    
   respect for the government. Of course, the Republicans insisted that these   
   displays sought to dazzle the people into gradually accepting a monarchy and   
   an aristocracy.   
      
   As president, Jefferson eliminated most of the rituals and receptions. He sold   
   the presidential coaches, horses, and silver harnesses. On public occasions,   
   he walked to Congress, and he often wore drab, simple clothing. The British   
   ambassador felt    
   insulted when the President received him wearing a bathrobe and slippers.   
   Although quite wealthy, Jefferson made a show of his common touch, setting a   
   tone followed by later presidents.   
   Jefferson’s symbolic reform benefitted from the relocation of the national   
   capital, just before his election, from the cosmopolitan city of Philadelphia   
   to a woody new town on the Potomac—Washington, DC. Jefferson regarded this   
   rustic setting as    
   perfect for the weak federal government that he desired, for he sought to   
   decentralize power by reducing the power of the federal government to give a   
   greater share to the states, which he saw as more democratic because they were   
   closer to the people.    
   Jefferson rejected the Federalist vision of a powerful and centralized nation,   
   like those in Europe.   
      
   To weaken the federal government, Jefferson sought to pay off and eliminate   
   the national debt, which Hamilton had regarded as an essential bond of the   
   union. The Republicans cut the national debt in half, from $80 million in 1800   
   to $40 million in 1810.    
   At the same time, Jefferson reduced taxes and eliminated the hated whiskey   
   tax. Jefferson accomplished this goal, in part, by reducing federal government   
   to a bare minimum, and by cutting back on the Army and the Navy. He limited   
   the American Foreign    
   Service to just three countries: the ambassadors to France, Spain, and Great   
   Britain. But he primarily reduced the debt thanks to a great increase in   
   federal revenue from two sources: a surge in imports increased the funds   
   generated by the tariff, and an    
   acceleration of western migration enhanced the sale of federal lands.   
      
   Jefferson sought to provide frontier farms for a growing American population   
   that doubled every twenty-five years. He insisted that a republic needed a   
   broad distribution of property in the hands of many small farmers. Only by   
   taking more land from    
   American Indians could the Republicans prolong America’s relatively   
   egalitarian social structure (save, of course, for slavery).   
      
   Jefferson expected American migration to overwhelm the Spanish empire, which   
   claimed Florida and the immense territory west of the Mississippi known as   
   Louisiana, but the Spanish threatened that vision by selling Louisiana to the   
   French in 1800. A    
   ruthless general, Napoleon Bonaparte, had seized power in France, and he meant   
   to build a global empire.   
   Fortunately for Jefferson, military setbacks persuaded Napoleon to sell   
   Louisiana to the United States in 1803 for the bargain price of $15 million.   
   Although the Louisiana Purchase nearly doubled the size of the United States   
   and averted war, it    
   contradicted Jefferson’s commitments to reduce the federal government   
   through frugality. The purchase added to the national debt that he had vowed   
   to reduce. It also violated his very strict and literal construction of the   
   federal Constitution, which    
   did not explicitly authorize the purchase of new territory. You can imagine   
   Jefferson’s outrage if a Federalist president had made such a deal. Rather   
   than lose the prize, Jefferson set aside his constitutional scruples and, with   
   the support of the    
   Senate, ratified the purchase treaty.   
      
   To pay down the national debt, the Jefferson administration relied on a great   
   surge in American overseas commerce, which enhanced the tariff revenue.   
   Between 1793 and 1805, trade increased as American merchant ships exploited   
   their neutral status to take    
   trade away from the two great belligerents, France and Britain. American   
   seaports and shipyards boomed. The tonnage of American shipping tripled and   
   the value of trade soared from $43 million in 1790 to $246 million in 1807.   
      
      
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