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UNITED STATES  navigation of the Mississippi was secured from Spain (1795), and emigration began to flow freely across the Alleghanies. The Federalist party controlled the first two Congresses, and organized the government much as it is to-day. Protection of American manufactures was begun, the national debt funded, the debts of the states being assumed as part of it, a national bank founded, and Washington City appointed to be the capital after 1800. John Adams was elected president and Thomas Jefferson vice-president in 1797. But the Federal party passed three laws about aliens and sedition that the Anti-Federalists (then called Republicans, but Democrats now) considered political persecution. In 1801 the Anti-Federalists came into power in the election of Thomas Jefferson as president. (See ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; and ).

Meanwhile Vermont (1791), Kentucky (1792) and Tennessee (1796) had become states. Whitney (1793) had invented the cotton-gin, which made cotton-growing profitable and slave-labor apparently necessary, and so played a part in politics. “The West” had begun to be a factor in our growth, for the Indians of Ohio had been compelled to surrender their lands and the safety with which settlement could be made gave it a new impetus. The rising spirit of migration inspired the people to try to improve the communications, and attempts were made to introduce turnpikes and canals. Our population (1800) had become 5,308,483.

Jefferson, though believing that the constitution should be interpreted narrowly and the powers of the national government severely restricted, was forced by events to do things that not even the Federalists had done. He doubted if the nation had the right to buy and hold territory, but in 1803 he bought the Louisiana country, thus more than doubling the area of the United States. He also sent Lewis and Clark to explore the Oregon country. In 1803 the Barbary pirates were reduced to submission. In 1807 an embargo act forbade foreign commerce altogether, in order to starve Great Britain into fair treatment of the United States. It injured American commerce greatly, but did nothing else; and the relations between England and the United States grew more and more strained. Ohio had become a state in 1803; Fulton had made steam a commercial success in navigation (1807), so that within four years steamers plowed the western rivers and

emigration crossed the Mississippi; and the slave-trade was abolished (1808). (See ; ; and ).

Madison succeeded Jefferson in 1809, and tried to carry out Jefferson's policy, but in 1812 had to declare war against England. The United States could no longer tolerate the British claim of sovereignty over naturalized American citizens, the claim to the right to search the ships of neutrals, the claim of a right to impress her subjects as seamen, wherever found. On land the war was disastrous, as a whole, for America, though the battles of Chippewa, Lundy's Lane and New Orleans were American victories; but at sea and on the lakes it was successful, the United States winning 15 out of 18 engagements. Peace was renewed on Dec. 24, 1814. Nothing was said about search and impressment, but Britain never again searched American ships or impressed American seamen. The war strengthened the national government and took the Democratic party to many of the positions of the Federalists. The supreme court, John Marshall of Virginia being chief-justice (1801—35), also took advanced positions in favor of the federal government. Protection to American industries was renewed, and inventive genius grew rapidly. By 1810 our population had grown to 7,239,881. Louisiana had become a state in 1812. (See ; ; ; and ).

Madison was in 1817 succeeded by Monroe, and the old Democratic party became two parties (1825). Clay was the leader of the new Democracy, which called itself Whigs and took in the remains of the Federal party; Calhoun and Jackson of the party which now formally called itself the Democratic party. The westward movement of population was growing more and more, and Indiana, Mississippi, Illinois, Alabama, Maine and Missouri all joined the Union during 1816-21. The population (1820) had become 9,638,453. All our territory east of the Mississippi (except the northern part of the old northwest) had become states, Florida had been bought from Spain, and the Indians between Georgia and the Mississippi had ceded their lands and left this territory open for settlement. Commerce between the east and the west was facilitated in 1825 by the completion of the Erie Canal. In 1823 Monroe promulgated the Monroe doctrine.

(q. v.) in 1825 followed Monroe, being elected as a National Republican. He upheld the system of internal improvements and of protection to manufactures, the tariff of 1828 being extremely protectionist. (See ; ; ; and ).

Jackson became president in 1829. 