Growing Pains: The New Republic, 1790–1820
Growing Pains: The New Republic, 17901820
Reading document attached
Describe the growth of the first party system in the United States. How did these parties come to develop? How did they define themselves, both independently and in opposition to one another? Where did they find themselves in agreement?
300 words, APA format and a minimum of 3 references
CHAPTER 8
Growing Pains: The New Republic,
17901820
Figure 8.1 The happy Effects of the Grand Systom [sic] of shutting Ports against the English!! appeared in 1808.
Less than a year earlier, Thomas Jefferson had recommended (and Congress had passed) the Embargo Act of 1807,
which barred American ships from leaving their ports.
Chapter Outline
8.1 Competing Visions: Federalists and Democratic-Republicans
8.2 The New American Republic
8.3 Partisan Politics
8.4 The United States Goes Back to War
Introduction
The partisan political cartoon above (Figure 8.1) lampoons Thomas Jeffersons 1807 Embargo Act, a
move that had a devastating effect on American commerce. American farmers and merchants complain to
President Jefferson, while the French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte whispers to him, You shall be King
hereafter. This image illustrates one of many political struggles in the years after the fight for ratification
of the Constitution. In the nations first few years, no organized political parties existed. This began to
change as U.S. citizens argued bitterly about the proper size and scope of the new national government.
As a result, the 1790s witnessed the rise of opposing political parties: the Federalists and the Democratic-
Republicans. Federalists saw unchecked democracy as a dire threat to the republic, and they pointed to
the excesses of the French Revolution as proof of what awaited. Democratic-Republicans opposed the
Federalists notion that only the wellborn and well educated were able to oversee the republic; they saw it
as a pathway to oppression by an aristocracy.
Chapter 8 | Growing Pains: The New Republic, 17901820 211
8.1 Competing Visions: Federalists and Democratic-Republicans
By the end of this section, you will be able to:
Describe the competing visions of the Federalists and the Democratic-Republicans
Identify the protections granted to citizens under the Bill of Rights
Explain Alexander Hamiltons financial programs as secretary of the treasury
In June 1788, New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify the federal Constitution, and the new plan
for a strong central government went into effect. Elections for the first U.S. Congress were held in 1788
and 1789, and members took their seats in March 1789. In a reflection of the trust placed in him as the
personification of republican virtue, George Washington became the first president in April 1789. John
Adams served as his vice president; the pairing of a representative from Virginia (Washington) with one
from Massachusetts (Adams) symbolized national unity. Nonetheless, political divisions quickly became
apparent. Washington and Adams represented the Federalist Party, which generated a backlash among
those who resisted the new governments assertions of federal power.
FEDERALISTS IN POWER
Though the Revolution had overthrown British rule in the United States, supporters of the 1787 federal
constitution, known as Federalists, adhered to a decidedly British notion of social hierarchy. The
Federalists did not, at first, compose a political party. Instead, Federalists held certain shared assumptions.
For them, political participation continued to be linked to property rights, which barred many citizens
from voting or holding office. Federalists did not believe the Revolution had changed the traditional social
roles between women and men, or between whites and other races. They did believe in clear distinctions
in rank and intelligence. To these supporters of the Constitution, the idea that all were equal appeared
ludicrous. Women, blacks, and native peoples, they argued, had to know their place as secondary to white
male citizens. Attempts to impose equality, they feared, would destroy the republic. The United States was
not created to be a democracy.
The architects of the Constitution committed themselves to leading the new republic, and they held a
majority among the members of the new national government. Indeed, as expected, many assumed the
Figure 8.2
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new executive posts the first Congress created. Washington appointed Alexander Hamilton, a leading
Federalist, as secretary of the treasury. For secretary of state, he chose Thomas Jefferson. For secretary
of war, he appointed Henry Knox, who had served with him during the Revolutionary War. Edmond
Randolph, a Virginia delegate to the Constitutional Convention, was named attorney general. In July 1789,
Congress also passed the Judiciary Act, creating a Supreme Court of six justices headed by those who were
committed to the new national government.
Congress passed its first major piece of legislation by placing a duty on imports under the 1789 Tariff
Act. Intended to raise revenue to address the countrys economic problems, the act was a victory for
nationalists, who favored a robust, powerful federal government and had worked unsuccessfully for
similar measures during the Confederation Congress in the 1780s. Congress also placed a fifty-cent-per-
ton duty (based on materials transported, not the weight of a ship) on foreign ships coming into American
ports, a move designed to give the commercial advantage to American ships and goods.
THE BILL OF RIGHTS
Many Americans opposed the 1787 Constitution because it seemed a dangerous concentration of
centralized power that threatened the rights and liberties of ordinary U.S. citizens. These opponents,
known collectively as Anti-Federalists, did not constitute a political party, but they united in demanding
protection for individual rights, and several states made the passing of a bill of rights a condition of their
acceptance of the Constitution. Rhode Island and North Carolina rejected the Constitution because it did
not already have this specific bill of rights.
Federalists followed through on their promise to add such a bill in 1789, when Virginia Representative
James Madison introduced and Congress approved the Bill of Rights (Table 8.1). Adopted in 1791, the bill
consisted of the first ten amendments to the Constitution and outlined many of the personal rights state
constitutions already guaranteed.
Table 8.1 Rights Protected by the First Ten Amendments
Amendment 1 Right to freedoms of religion and speech; right to assemble and to petition the
government for redress of grievances
Amendment 2 Right to keep and bear arms to maintain a well-regulated militia
Amendment 3 Right not to house soldiers during time of war
Amendment 4 Right to be secure from unreasonable search and seizure
Amendment 5 Rights in criminal cases, including to due process and indictment by grand jury for
capital crimes, as well as the right not to testify against oneself
Amendment 6 Right to a speedy trial by an impartial jury
Amendment 7 Right to a jury trial in civil cases
Amendment 8 Right not to face excessive bail or fines, or cruel and unusual punishment
Amendment 9 Rights retained by the people, even if they are not specifically enumerated by the
Constitution
Amendment 10 States rights to powers not specifically delegated to the federal government
Chapter 8 | Growing Pains: The New Republic, 17901820 213
The adoption of the Bill of Rights softened the Anti-Federalists opposition to the Constitution and gave
the new federal government greater legitimacy among those who otherwise distrusted the new centralized
power created by men of property during the secret 1787 Philadelphia Constitutional Convention.
Visit the National Archives (http://openstaxcollege.org/l/BillRights) to consider the
first ten amendments to the Constitution as an expression of the fears many citizens
harbored about the powers of the new federal government. What were these fears?
How did the Bill of Rights calm them?
ALEXANDER HAMILTONS PROGRAM
Alexander Hamilton, Washingtons secretary of the treasury, was an ardent nationalist who believed a
strong federal government could solve many of the new countrys financial ills. Born in the West Indies,
Hamilton had worked on a St. Croix plantation as a teenager and was in charge of the accounts at a young
age. He knew the Atlantic trade very well and used that knowledge in setting policy for the United States.
In the early 1790s, he created the foundation for the U.S. financial system. He understood that a robust
federal government would provide a solid financial foundation for the country.
The United States began mired in debt. In 1789, when Hamilton took up his post, the federal debt was
over $53 million. The states had a combined debt of around $25 million, and the United States had been
unable to pay its debts in the 1780s and was therefore considered a credit risk by European countries.
Hamilton wrote three reports offering solutions to the economic crisis brought on by these problems. The
first addressed public credit, the second addressed banking, and the third addressed raising revenue.
The Report on Public Credit
For the national government to be effective, Hamilton deemed it essential to have the support of those to
whom it owed money: the wealthy, domestic creditor class as well as foreign creditors. In January 1790, he
delivered his Report on Public Credit (Figure 8.3), addressing the pressing need of the new republic to
become creditworthy. He recommended that the new federal government honor all its debts, including all
paper money issued by the Confederation and the states during the war, at face value. Hamilton especially
wanted wealthy American creditors who held large amounts of paper money to be invested, literally, in
the future and welfare of the new national government. He also understood the importance of making the
new United States financially stable for creditors abroad. To pay these debts, Hamilton proposed that the
federal government sell bondsfederal interest-bearing notesto the public. These bonds would have the
backing of the government and yield interest payments. Creditors could exchange their old notes for the
new government bonds. Hamilton wanted to give the paper money that states had issued during the war
the same status as government bonds; these federal notes would begin to yield interest payments in 1792.
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Figure 8.3 As the first secretary of the treasury, Alexander Hamilton (a), shown here in a 1792 portrait by John
Trumbull, released the Report on Public Credit (b) in January 1790.
Hamilton designed his Report on Public Credit (later called First Report on Public Credit) to ensure
the survival of the new and shaky American republic. He knew the importance of making the United States
financially reliable, secure, and strong, and his plan provided a blueprint to achieve that goal. He argued
that his plan would satisfy creditors, citing the goal of doing justice to the creditors of the nation. At
the same time, the plan would work to promote the increasing respectability of the American name; to
answer the calls for justice; to restore landed property to its due value; to furnish new resources both to
agriculture and commerce; to cement more closely the union of the states; to add to their security against
foreign attack; to establish public order on the basis of upright and liberal policy.
Hamiltons program ignited a heated debate in Congress. A great many of both Confederation and state
notes had found their way into the hands of speculators, who had bought them from hard-pressed
veterans in the 1780s and paid a fraction of their face value in anticipation of redeeming them at full value
at a later date. Because these speculators held so many notes, many in Congress objected that Hamiltons
plan would benefit them at the expense of the original note-holders. One of those who opposed Hamiltons
1790 report was James Madison, who questioned the fairness of a plan that seemed to cheat poor soldiers.
Not surprisingly, states with a large debt, like South Carolina, supported Hamiltons plan, while states
with less debt, like North Carolina, did not. To gain acceptance of his plan, Hamilton worked out a
compromise with Virginians Madison and Jefferson, whereby in return for their support he would give up
New York City as the nations capital and agree on a more southern location, which they preferred. In July
1790, a site along the Potomac River was selected as the new federal city, which became the District of
Columbia.
Hamiltons plan to convert notes to bonds worked extremely well to restore European confidence in the
U.S. economy. It also proved a windfall for creditors, especially those who had bought up state and
Confederation notes at far less than face value. But it immediately generated controversy about the size
and scope of the government. Some saw the plan as an unjust use of federal power, while Hamilton argued
that Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution granted the government implied powers that gave the green
light to his program.
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The Report on a National Bank
As secretary of the treasury, Hamilton hoped to stabilize the American economy further by establishing a
national bank. The United States operated with a flurry of different notes from multiple state banks and
no coherent regulation. By proposing that the new national bank buy up large volumes of state bank notes
and demanding their conversion into gold, Hamilton especially wanted to discipline those state banks that
issued paper money irresponsibly. To that end, he delivered his Report on a National Bank in December
1790, proposing a Bank of the United States, an institution modeled on the Bank of England. The bank
would issue loans to American merchants and bills of credit (federal bank notes that would circulate as
money) while serving as a repository of government revenue from the sale of land. Stockholders would
own the bank, along with the federal government.
Like the recommendations in his Report on Public Credit, Hamiltons bank proposal generated
opposition. Jefferson, in particular, argued that the Constitution did not permit the creation of a national
bank. In response, Hamilton again invoked the Constitutions implied powers. President Washington
backed Hamiltons position and signed legislation creating the bank in 1791.
The Report on Manufactures
The third report Hamilton delivered to Congress, known as the Report on Manufactures, addressed
the need to raise revenue to pay the interest on the national debt. Using the power to tax as provided
under the Constitution, Hamilton put forth a proposal to tax American-made whiskey. He also knew the
importance of promoting domestic manufacturing so the new United States would no longer have to rely
on imported manufactured goods. To break from the old colonial system, Hamilton therefore advocated
tariffs on all foreign imports to stimulate the production of American-made goods. To promote domestic
industry further, he proposed federal subsidies to American industries. Like all of Hamiltons programs,
the idea of government involvement in the development of American industries was new.
With the support of Washington, the entire Hamiltonian economic program received the necessary
support in Congress to be implemented. In the long run, Hamiltons financial program helped to rescue the
United States from its state of near-bankruptcy in the late 1780s. His initiatives marked the beginning of an
American capitalism, making the republic creditworthy, promoting commerce, and setting for the nation
a solid financial foundation. His policies also facilitated the growth of the stock market, as U.S. citizens
bought and sold the federal governments interest-bearing certificates.
THE DEMOCRATIC-REPUBLICAN PARTY AND THE FIRST PARTY SYSTEM
James Madison and Thomas Jefferson felt the federal government had overstepped its authority by
adopting the treasury secretarys plan. Madison found Hamiltons scheme immoral and offensive. He
argued that it turned the reins of government over to the class of speculators who profited at the expense
of hardworking citizens.
Jefferson, who had returned to the United States in 1790 after serving as a diplomat in France, tried
unsuccessfully to convince Washington to block the creation of a national bank. He also took issue with
what he perceived as favoritism given to commercial classes in the principal American cities. He thought
urban life widened the gap between the wealthy few and an underclass of landless poor workers who,
because of their oppressed condition, could never be good republican property owners. Rural areas, in
contrast, offered far more opportunities for property ownership and virtue. In 1783 Jefferson wrote, Those
who labor in the earth are the chosen people of God, if ever he had a chosen people. Jefferson believed
that self-sufficient, property-owning republican citizens or yeoman farmers held the key to the success and
longevity of the American republic. (As a creature of his times, he did not envision a similar role for either
women or nonwhite men.) To him, Hamiltons program seemed to encourage economic inequalities and
work against the ordinary American yeoman.
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Opposition to Hamilton, who had significant power in the new federal government, including the ear of
President Washington, began in earnest in the early 1790s. Jefferson turned to his friend Philip Freneau to
help organize the effort through the publication of the National Gazette as a counter to the Federalist press,
especially the Gazette of the United States (Figure 8.4). From 1791 until 1793, when it ceased publication,
Freneaus partisan paper attacked Hamiltons program and Washingtons administration. Rules for
Changing a Republic into a Monarchy, written by Freneau, is an example of the type of attack aimed at the
national government, and especially at the elitism of the Federalist Party. Newspapers in the 1790s became
enormously important in American culture as partisans like Freneau attempted to sway public opinion.
These newspapers did not aim to be objective; instead, they served to broadcast the views of a particular
party.
Figure 8.4 Here, the front page of the Federalist Gazette of the United States from September 9, 1789 (a), is shown
beside that of the oppositional National Gazette from November 14, 1791 (b). The Gazette of the United States
featured articles, sometimes written pseudonymously or anonymously, from leading Federalists like Alexander
Hamilton and John Adams. The National Gazette was founded two years later to counter their political influence.
Visit Lexrex.com (http://openstaxcollege.org/l/NatGazette) to read Philip Freneaus
essay and others from the National Gazette. Can you identify three instances of
persuasive writing against the Federalist Party or the government?
Opposition to the Federalists led to the formation of Democratic-Republican societies, composed of men
who felt the domestic policies of the Washington administration were designed to enrich the few while
ignoring everyone else. Democratic-Republicans championed limited government. Their fear of
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centralized power originated in the experience of the 1760s and 1770s when the distant, overbearing,
and seemingly corrupt British Parliament attempted to impose its will on the colonies. The 1787 federal
constitution, written in secret by fifty-five wealthy men of property and standing, ignited fears of a similar
menacing plot. To opponents, the Federalists promoted aristocracy and a monarchical governmenta
betrayal of what many believed to be the goal of the American Revolution.
While wealthy merchants and planters formed the core of the Federalist leadership, members of the
Democratic-Republican societies in cities like Philadelphia and New York came from the ranks of artisans.
These citizens saw themselves as acting in the spirit of 1776, this time not against the haughty British but
by what they believed to have replaced thema commercial class with no interest in the public good.
Their political efforts against the Federalists were a battle to preserve republicanism, to promote the public
good against private self-interest. They published their views, held meetings to voice their opposition,
and sponsored festivals and parades. In their strident newspapers attacks, they also worked to undermine
the traditional forms of deference and subordination to aristocrats, in this case the Federalist elites. Some
members of northern Democratic-Republican clubs denounced slavery as well.
DEFINING CITIZENSHIP
While questions regarding the proper size and scope of the new national government created a divide
among Americans and gave rise to political parties, a consensus existed among men on the issue of who
qualified and who did not qualify as a citizen. The 1790 Naturalization Act defined citizenship in stark
racial terms. To be a citizen of the American republic, an immigrant had to be a free white person of
good character. By excluding slaves, free blacks, Indians, and Asians from citizenship, the act laid the
foundation for the United States as a republic of white men.
Full citizenship that included the right to vote was restricted as well. Many state constitutions directed
that only male property owners or taxpayers could vote. For women, the right to vote remained out of
reach except in the state of New Jersey. In 1776, the fervor of the Revolution led New Jersey revolutionaries
to write a constitution extending the right to vote to unmarried women who owned property worth
50. Federalists and Democratic-Republicans competed for the votes of New Jersey women who met the
requirements to cast ballots. This radical innovation continued until 1807, when New Jersey restricted
voting to free white males.
8.2 The New American Republic
By the end of this section, you will be able to:
Identify the major foreign and domestic uprisings of the early 1790s
Explain the effect of these uprisings on the political system of the United States
The colonies alliance with France, secured after the victory at Saratoga in 1777, proved crucial in their
victory against the British, and during the 1780s France and the new United States enjoyed a special
relationship. Together they had defeated their common enemy, Great Britain. But despite this shared
experience, American opinions regarding France diverged sharply in the 1790s when France underwent its
own revolution. Democratic-Republicans seized on the French revolutionaries struggle against monarchy
as the welcome harbinger of a larger republican movement around the world. To the Federalists, however,
the French Revolution represented pure anarchy, especially after the execution of the French king in 1793.
Along with other foreign and domestic uprisings, the French Revolution helped harden the political divide
in the United States in the early 1790s.
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THE FRENCH REVOLUTION
The French Revolution, which began in 1789, further split American thinkers into different ideological
camps, deepening the political divide between Federalists and their Democratic-Republican foes. At first,
in 1789 and 1790, the revolution in France appeared to most in the United States as part of a new chapter
in the rejection of corrupt monarchy, a trend inspired by the American Revolution. A constitutional
monarchy replaced the absolute monarchy of Louis XVI in 1791, and in 1792, France was declared a
republic. Republican liberty, the creed of the United States, seemed to be ushering in a new era in France.
Indeed, the American Revolution served as an inspiration for French revolutionaries.
The events of 1793 and 1794 challenged the simple interpretation of the French Revolution as a happy
chapter in the unfolding triumph of republican government over monarchy. The French king was executed
in January 1793 (Figure 8.5), and the next two years became known as the Terror, a period of extreme
violence against perceived enemies of the revolutionary government. Revolutionaries advocated direct
representative democracy, dismantled Catholicism, replaced that religion with a new philosophy known
as the Cult of the Supreme Being, renamed the months of the year, and relentlessly employed the guillotine
against their enemies. Federalists viewed these excesses with growing alarm, fearing that the radicalism
of the French Revolution might infect the minds of citizens at home. Democratic-Republicans interpreted
the same events with greater optimism, seeing them as a necessary evil of eliminating the monarchy and
aristocratic culture that supported the privileges of a hereditary class of rulers.
Figure 8.5 An image from a 1791 Hungarian journal depicts the beheading of Louis XVI during the French
Revolution. The violence of the revolutionary French horrified many in the United Statesespecially Federalists, who
saw it as an example of what could happen when the mob gained political control and instituted direct democracy.
The controversy in the United States intensified when France declared war on Great Britain and Holland
in February 1793. France requested that the United States make a large repayment of the money it had
borrowed from France to fund the Revolutionary War. However, Great Britain would judge any aid
given to France as a hostile act. Washington declared the United States neutral in 1793, but Democratic-
Republican groups denounced neutrality and declared their support of the French republicans. The
Federalists used the violence of the French revolutionaries as a reason to attack Democratic-Republicanism
in the United States, arguing that Jefferson and Madison would lead the country down a similarly
disastrous path.
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Visit Liberty, Equality, Fraternity (http://openstaxcollege.org/l/revolution) for
images, texts, and songs relating to the French Revolution. This momentous events
impact extended far beyond Europe, influencing politics in the United States and
elsewhere in the Atlantic World.
THE CITIZEN GENT AFFAIR AND JAYS TREATY
In 1793, the revolutionary French government sent Edmond-Charles Gent to the United States to
negotiate an alliance with the U.S. government. France empowered Gent to issue letters of
marquedocuments authorizing ships and their crews to engage in piracyto allow him to arm captured
British ships in American ports with U.S. soldiers. Gent arrived in Charleston, South Carolina, amid
great Democratic-Republican fanfare. He immediately began commissioning American privateer ships
and organizing volunteer American militias to attack Spanish holdings in the Americas, then traveled to
Philadelphia, gathering support for the French cause along the way. President Washington and Hamilton
denounced Gent, knowing his actions threatened to pull the United States into a war with Great Britain.
The Citizen Gent affair, as it became known, spurred Great Britain to instruct its naval commanders in
the West Indies to seize all ships trading with the French. The British captured hundreds of American ships
and their cargoes, increasing the possibility of war between the two countries.
In this tense situation, Great Britain worked to prevent a wider conflict by ending its seizure of American
ships and offered to pay for captured cargoes. Hamilton saw an opportunity and recommended to
Washington that the United States negotiate. Supreme Court Justice John Jay was sent to Britain, instructed
by Hamilton to secure compensation for captured American ships; ensure the British leave the Northwest
outposts they still occupied despite the 1783 Treaty of Paris; and gain an agreement for American trade
in the West Indies. Even though Jay personally disliked slavery, his mission also required him to seek
compensation from the British for slaves who left with the British at the end of the Revolutionary War.
The resulting 1794 agreement, known as Jays Treaty, fulfilled most of his original goals. The British would
turn over the frontier posts in the Northwest, American ships would be allowed to trade freely in the
West Indies, and the United States agreed to assemble a commission charged with settling colonial debts
U.S. citizens owed British merchants. The treaty did not address the important issue of impressment,
howeverthe British navys practice of forcing or impressing American sailors to work and fight on
British warships. Jays Treaty led the Spanish, who worried that it signaled an alliance between the United
States and Great Britain, to negotiate a treaty of their ownPinckneys Treatythat allowed American
commerce to flow through the Spanish port of New Orleans. Pinckneys Treaty allowed American farmers,
who were moving in greater numbers to the Ohio River Valley, to ship their products down the Ohio and
Mississippi Rivers to New Orleans, where they could be transported to East Coast markets.
Jays Treaty confirmed the fears of Democratic-Republicans, who saw it as a betrayal of republican France,
cementing the idea that the Federalists favored aristocracy and monarchy. Partisan American newspapers
tried to sway public opinion, while the skillful writing of Hamilton, who published a number of essays on
the subject, explained the benefits of commerce with Great Britain.
THE FRENCH REVOLUTIONS CARIBBEAN LEGACY
Unlike the American Revolution, which ultimately strengthened the institution of slavery and the powers
of American slaveholders, the French Revolution inspired slave rebellions in the Caribbean, including
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a 1791 slave uprising in the French colony of Saint-Domingue (modern-day Haiti). Thousands of slaves
joined together to overthrow the brutal system of slavery. They took control of a large section of the island,
burning sugar plantations and killing the white planters who had forced them to labor under the lash.
In 1794, French revolutionaries abolished slavery in the French empire, and both Spain and England
attacked Saint-Domingue, hoping to add the colony to their own empires. Toussaint LOuverture, a former
domestic slave, emerged as the leader in the fight against Spain and England to secure a Haiti free of
slavery and further European colonialism. Because revolutionary France had abolished slavery, Toussaint
aligned himself with France, hoping to keep Spain and England at bay (Figure 8.6).
Figure 8.6 An 1802 portrait shows Toussaint LOuverture, Chef des Noirs Insurgs de Saint Domingue (Leader of
the Black Insurgents of Saint Domingue), mounted and armed in an elaborate uniform.
Events in Haiti further complicated the partisan wrangling in the United States. White refugee planters
from Haiti and other French West Indian islands, along with slaves and free people of color, left the
Caribbean for the United States and for Louisiana, which at the time was held by Spain. The presence
of these French migrants raised fears, especially among Federalists, that they would bring the contagion
of French radicalism to the United States. In addition, the idea that the French Revolution could inspire
a successful slave uprising just off the American coastline filled southern whites and slaveholders with
horror.
THE WHISKEY REBELLION
While the wars in France and the Caribbean divided American citizens, a major domestic test of the new
national government came in 1794 over the issue of a tax on whiskey, an important part of Hamiltons
financial program. In 1791, Congress had authorized a tax of 7.5 cents per gallon of whiskey and rum.
Although most citizens paid without incident, trouble erupted in four western Pennsylv
