Monroe and John Quincy Adams
Unfinished Business Generally: (true for all six presidents)
1. Not only is slavery not ended, but the number of slaves in South increases at an
unbelievable rate
End of Rev = 600,00 slaves
Beg of Civil War = 3.5 million slaves
2. American “land grab” in West
Land taken from Native Americans
Later, land taken from Mexico
3. Political right of voting not given to all white men (regardless of education,
wealth and property) until Andrew Jackson – seventh president
4. Presidential power held by Virginians (Virginia Dynasty) and John Adams/John
Quincy Adams – two New Englanders
other regions in U.S. – West, North, South other than Virginia do not gain
presidential power
5. No rights for free African-Americans or women
Constitutional rights given only to elite white men
James Monroe
Most important because of foreign policy:
a. Acquires Florida and established boundaries of Louisiana (1819)
Adam-Onis Treaty (brokered by John Quincy Adams)
b. Monroe Doctrine – ends intervention in U.S. by Europeans
Domestic Policy:
a. Era of Good Feelings
Monroe tries to lessen the partisanship of previous administrations
b. Missouri Compromise
Maine enters as free state: Missouri as slave state
pres. Undermined by increasing sectionalism over slavery
c. President during first serious economic recession in U.S. history (Panic of
1819) – does little to solve this
Pres. During increasing nationalist sentiment in U.S. (true for presidents from #5 to Lincoln)
Economic And Social History, 1820s-1840s
westward expansion and economic development + nationalist fervor
Expansion and Migration
a dramatic westward surge of settlers had to be encouraged.
Extending the Boundaries
When John Quincy Adams hammered out the Transcontinental Treaty of 1819 with
Spain
“mountain men” were popularized.
Manifest Destiny
Settlement to the Mississippi
The People and Culture of the Frontier.
A Revolution in Transportation
Political leaders realized the importance of linking these distant citizens with the rest of
the nation through a viable transportation network.
Roads and Steamboats
The National (or Cumberland) Road was the first of the overland toll roads.
Chartered by the states, these “turnpikes” failed, for the most part, to meet the
need for cheap transportation over great distances. America's river network
proved to be more efficient, and the Ohio-Mississippi system beckoned first the
flatboat trade and, after Robert Fulton's invention in 1807, the steamboat.
The Canal Boom
Emergence of a Market Economy
Transportation improvements provoked increases in farm income and instigated
commercial agriculture to take hold of the nation’s economy, further pulling the country
into the web of a global, market economy.
The Beginning of Commercial Agriculture
Increasing farm productivity promoted the transition from subsistent diversification
farming to profit-oriented staple farming. The availability of good farmland, increasing
demand for cotton, the invention of the cotton gin, and slave labor made the South the
world’s greatest cotton producer.
Early Industrialism
The surge of a market economy encouraged new industrial development. The nation’s
first factory system emerged in New England’s textile industry. The U.S.’s infant
industries before the 1840s, however, developed less dramatically than in European
regions; as late as 1840, only 8.8 percent of the nation’s population labored in factories.
The Politics of Nation Building
A cohesive nationalist sentiment united the U.S. following the War of 1812. This spirit
quelled the combatant political rhetoric that dominated the nation’s early political
discussions, provoking many to proclaim the period an “era of good feelings.”
Henry Clay called for an “American System” of protective tariffs and financed internal
improvements
Pres. John Quincy Adams
OVERALL: not a bad president, but ineffective; hated by supporters of A. Jackson – fails to
make a positive connection with many citizens – never able to use Jackson’s ‘democratic
rhetoric’; Congress voted against all but one of his legislative efforts
In 1824 Adams won bitter four-cornered presidential contest
behind Andrew Jackson – Jackson campaigns against JQA aggressively after JQA
becomes president; creates a lot of hostility against JQA
b. resolved in Adams's favor in the House of Representatives with Henry Clay
a.
Adams's subsequent choice of Clay as secretary of state raised a cry of "corrupt
bargain”
he was unable to carry out his nationalist program.
proposals for different policies fail in face of Congressional anger (Federal internal
improvements, a uniform bankruptcy law, federally supported educational and scientific
institutions, and the creation of a department of the interior).
tnly success w/ Congress is the appointment in 1826 of two delegates to attend the
Panama Congress, arranged by Simón Bolívar.
committed to a protectionist policy, Adams signed the Tariff of Abominations
(engineered by the Jacksonians in 1828), although it was certain to alienate the South and
displease New Englanders, whose manufactures were not granted additional protection.
alienated much Southern and Western opinion by his efforts to protect the interests of the
Cherokees in Georgia
Jackson – and some of press – portray JQA as an aristocrat hostile to the interests of the
"common man”; loses to Jackson
JQA - The Congressman
At the end of his presidency, his retirement was brief.
1831 elected to the House of Rep for eight successive terms until his death.
generally associated with the Whigs, he pursued an independent course.
drafted tariff bills
approved Jackson's stand on nullification, but he considered the compromise tariff of
1833an excessive concession to the nullifiers.
After 1835 identified with the antislavery cause, although he was not an abolitionist.
revoke the gag rule that required the tabling of all petitions relating to slavery.
nationalist
advocate internal improvements
battled to save the Bank of the United States