“Never did a government commence under auspices so favorable. ...  If we look to the history of other nations, ancient or modern, we find no example of a growth so rapid, so gigantic, of a people so prosperous and happy.  In contemplating what we have still to perform, the heart of every citizen must expand with joy when he reflects how near our Government has approached to perfection. ...  If we persevere in the career in which we have advanced so far and in the path already traced, we can not fail, under the favor of a gracious Providence, to attain the high destiny which seems to await us.”

—from James Monroe’s Inaugural Address, March 1817

The Era of Good Feelings

President Monroe’s words emphasized the sense of national pride that swept the United States after the War of 1812.  For a time, Americans’ loyalty to the United States overrode their historical identity with state or region.  The Columbian Centinal, a Boston newspaper, declared this time to be an Era of Good Feelings.  The phrase has since been used to describe the Monroe presidency.

Harmony in national politics had reached a new high mostly because only one major political party—the Republicans—had any power.  The Federalist Party had lost political influence and popularity, in part because of the public’s disapproval of their actions at the Hartford Convention.  At the same time, the War of 1812 had taught a new generation of Republican leaders that a stronger federal government was advantageous.

Examining
Why is the Monroe presidency known as the Era of Good Feelings?
 

Economic Nationalism

American leaders prepared an ambitious program to bind the nation together.  The program included creating a new national bank, protecting American manufacturers from foreign competition, and building canals and roads to improve transportation and link the country together.

ECONOMICS
The Second Bank

Republicans traditionally had opposed the idea of a national bank.  They had blocked the rechartering of the First Bank of the United States in 1811 and offered nothing in its place.  The results were disastrous.  State chartered banks and other private banks greatly expanded their lending with bank notes that were used as money.  Without the regulatory presence of the national bank, prices rose rapidly during the War of 1812.  When the government borrowed money to pay for the war, it had to pay high interest rates on its loans.

Because of these problems, many Republicans changed their minds after the war.  In 1816 Representative John C.  Calhoun of South Carolina introduced a bill proposing the Second Bank of the United States.  With the support of Henry Clay of Kentucky and Daniel Webster of Massachusetts, the bill passed in 1816.  This legislation gave the Bank power to issue notes that would serve as a national currency and to control state banks.

Tariffs and Transportation

Protection of manufacturers was another example of the Republican plan.  Because an embargo had prevented Americans from buying British goods during the War of 1812, American industries had increased their output to meet the demand.  Once the war was over, British goods flowed into the United States at such low prices they threatened to put American companies out of business.

Congress responded with the Tariff of 1816.  Unlike earlier revenue tariffs, which provided income for the federal government, this was a protective tariff, designed to nurture American manufacturers by taxing imports to drive up their prices.  New England shippers and Southern farmers opposed the tariff and the higher prices it caused, but they could not block its passage.

The Republicans also wanted to improve the nation’s transportation system.  In 1816 Calhoun sponsored a federal internal improvement plan, but President Madison vetoed it, arguing that spending money to improve transportation was not expressly granted in the Constitution.  Nevertheless, road and canal construction soon began, with private businesses and state and local governments funding much of the work.

Summarizing
What were three examples of economic nationalism after the War of 1812?
 
 

Henry Clay
1777–1852

Henry Clay was known as the Great Compromiser for his role in working out various agreements between leaders of the North and South.  He served as a Kentucky state legislator, speaker of the U.S.  House of Representatives, U.S.  senator, and secretary of state.  Although a slaveholder himself, Clay supported the gradual emancipation of enslaved persons.  He later abandoned the idea, however, when it proved unpopular with his fellow Kentuckians.

Clay was a consistent champion of nationalism and devoted his career to strengthening the Union.  Although a five-time presidential candidate, the popularity of his opponents and the weakness of his political party, the Whigs, kept him from achieving his lifelong goal of winning the presidency.

John C.  Calhoun
1782–1850

John C.  Calhoun of South Carolina was an influential member of Congress and, at least for a time, a close friend of Henry Clay.  Calhoun was a War Hawk—one who urged war with Great Britain in 1812.  He was also an ardent nationalist in his early career.  After the War of 1812, Calhoun helped introduce congressional bills for a new Bank of the United States, a permanent road system to connect the nation, and a tariff to protect the nation’s industries.

In the 1830s Calhoun abandoned his nationalist stance in favor of states’ rights and sectional interests.  Fearing that the North intended to dominate the South, Calhoun spent the rest of his career trying to prevent the federal government from weakening states’ rights and from interfering with the Southern way of life.
 
 

Judicial Nationalism

The judicial philosophy of the Chief Justice of the United States, John Marshall, provided another boost to the forces helping unify the nation after the war.  Between 1816 and 1824, Marshall ruled in three important cases that established the dominance of the nation over the states and shaped the future of American government.

Martin v.  Hunter’s Lessee

In 1816 the Court decided in Martin v.  Hunter’s Lessee that it had the authority to hear all appeals of state court decisions in cases involving federal statutes and treaties.  In this case, Denny Martin, a British subject, tried to sell Virginia land inherited from his uncle, Lord Fairfax, a British Loyalist during the war.  At that time, Virginia law stated that no “enemy” could inherit land.  The Supreme Court upheld Martin’s case, ruling that Virginia’s law conflicted with the 1783 Treaty of Paris, which recommended that the states restore confiscated property to Loyalists.  This historic decision helped establish the Supreme Court as the nation’s court of final appeal.

McCulloch v.  Maryland

This 1819 case concerned Maryland’s attempt to tax the Second Bank of the United States.  Before addressing Maryland’s right to tax the national bank, the Supreme Court ruled on the federal government’s right to create a national bank in the first place.  In the Court’s opinion, written by Marshall, the bank was constitutional, even though the Constitution did not specifically give Congress the power to create one.

Marshall observed that the Constitution gave the federal government the power to collect taxes, to borrow money, to regulate commerce, and to raise armies and navies.  He noted that the national bank helped the federal government exercise these powers.  He concluded that the Constitution’s “necessary and proper” clause allowed the federal government to create a bank.

Opponents argued that the “necessary and proper” clause meant the government could only do things absolutely necessary, but Marshall rejected that idea.  Instead, he held that “necessary and proper” meant the government could use any method that was convenient for carrying out its powers as long as the method was not expressly forbidden.

Marshall then argued that the federal government was “supreme in its own sphere of action.” This meant that a state government could not interfere with an agency of the federal government exercising its specific constitutional powers within a state’s borders.  Taxing the national bank was a form of interference and therefore unconstitutional.

Gibbons v.  Ogden

This 1824 case involved a company that had a state-granted monopoly over steamboat traffic in New York waters.  When the company tried to expand its monopoly to include traffic crossing the Hudson River to New Jersey, the matter went to court.

The Supreme Court declared this monopoly unconstitutional.  In the Court’s opinion, Marshall stated that the state legislature had overstepped its power in granting the original monopoly.  The Constitution granted the federal government control over interstate commerce, which the court interpreted to include all trade along the coast or on waterways dividing the states.  The state could, however, regulate commerce within its own borders.

In writing the Supreme Court’s decision, Marshall defined interstate commerce in a way that went far beyond the mere exchange of goods between states.  By ruling that anything crossing state boundaries came under federal control, Marshall ensured that federal law would take precedence over state law in interstate transportation.

In these cases, Marshall’s nationalism strengthened the power of the federal government at the expense of the states.  Although defenders of states’ rights bitterly attacked Marshall’s decisions, his views helped make the “necessary and proper” clause and the interstate commerce clause major vehicles for expanding federal power.

Identifying
How did the Supreme Court establish and expand the power of the federal government over the states?
 

Major Supreme Court Decisions, 1801–1824

Marbury v.  Madison (1803)
Declared congressional act unconstitutional; Court asserts power of judicial review

Fletcher v.  Peck (1810)
Protected contracts from legislative interference; Court could overturn state laws that opposed specific provisions of Constitution

Martin v.  Hunter’s Lessee (1816)
Court can accept appeals of state court decisions and review state decisions that involve federal statutes or treaties; asserted the Supreme Court’s sovereignty over state courts

McCulloch v.  Maryland (1819)
Upheld constitutionality of the Bank of the United States; doctrine of “implied powers” provided Congress more flexibility to enact legislation

Cohens v.  Virginia (1821)
Reasserted federal judicial authority over state courts; argued that when states ratified Constitution, they gave up some sovereignty to federal courts

Gibbons v.  Ogden (1824)
Revoked an existing state monopoly; Court gave Congress the right to regulate interstate commerce
 

Nationalist Diplomacy

The wave of nationalism within Congress and among voters influenced the nation’s foreign affairs as well.  Feeling proud and confident, the United States under President Monroe expanded its borders and asserted itself on the world stage.

Jackson Invades Florida

Throughout the early 1800s, Spanish-held Florida was a source of anger and frustration for Southerners.  Many runaway slaves fled there, knowing that Americans could not cross the border into Spanish territory.  Similarly, many of the Creek people had retreated to Florida as American settlers seized their lands.  These people took a new name for themselves—Seminole, meaning “runaway” or “separatist.” The Seminoles used Florida as a base to stage raids against American settlements in Georgia.  Spain was unable to control the border, causing many Americans to clamor for the United States to step in.  As tensions heightened in the region, the Seminole leader Kinache warned a U.S.  general to stay out of Florida:

“You charge me with killing your people, stealing your cattle and burning your houses; it is I that have cause to complain of the Americans. ...  I shall use force to stop any armed Americans from passing my towns or my lands.”

—quoted in The Seminoles of Florida

The warning fell on deaf ears.  Former representative Calhoun, now secretary of war, authorized action against the Seminoles.  In 1818 he sent U.S.  troops under the command of General Andrew Jackson into Florida.  After destroying several Seminole villages, Jackson disobeyed orders and seized the Spanish settlements of St.  Marks and Pensacola.  He then removed the Spanish governor of Florida from power.
 

Furious Spanish officials demanded that Jackson be punished, and President Monroe sided initially with Spain.  Secretary of State John Quincy Adams defended Jackson and argued that the true cause of the dispute lay in Spain’s failure to keep order in Florida.  Adams used this Florida turmoil to put pressure on Spain in ongoing border negotiations.  Occupied with problems throughout its Latin American empire, Spain gave in and ceded all of Florida to the United States in the Adams-Onís Treaty of 1819.  The treaty also finalized the western border of the Louisiana Purchase along Texas’s Sabine and Red Rivers, west along the Arkansas River, and then north to the 42nd Parallel before turning west to the Pacific Ocean.

The Monroe Doctrine

In 1809 rebellions began to erupt in Spain’s colonies.  By 1824 all of Spain’s colonies on the American mainland had declared independence.  Spain’s once vast empire had been reduced to three islands:  Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Santo Domingo.

Meanwhile a group of European countries—Great Britain, Austria, Prussia, and Russia (later joined by France)—formed the Quadruple Alliance in an effort to suppress movements against monarchies in Europe.  Over Britain’s objection, the alliance raised the possibility of helping Spain regain control of its overseas colonies in 1822.

Great Britain and the United States were not pleased.  Both nations enjoyed profitable trade with Latin America and would not welcome a return of Spanish rule.  In August 1823, British officials suggested that the two nations issue a joint statement supporting the independence of the new Latin American countries.  Britain also wished to limit future American expansion in the hemisphere.

Russia’s increasing influence on North America’s Pacific Coast also worried members of Monroe’s administration.  Russia already claimed Alaska, and in 1821 it announced that its empire extended south into the Oregon country between Russian Alaska and the western United States.

Secretary Adams urged President Monroe to avoid working with the British when dealing with the Spanish and Russian threats.  He believed it would be “more dignified to avow our principles explicitly,” than to allow the United States to be looked upon as Great Britain’s junior partner.  Acting without the British, President Monroe declared in 1823 that the American continents were “henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers.”

The president’s proclamation, later called the Monroe Doctrine, was a bold act, because the United States might not have been able to back up its new policy if challenged.  The Monroe Doctrine marked the beginning of a long-term American policy of preventing other great powers from interfering in Latin American political affairs.  At the same time, by keeping the European powers out of the Americas, the Monroe Doctrine upheld Washington’s policy of avoiding entanglements in European power struggles.

Examining
In what ways did American foreign policy become more assertive in the early 1800s?
 

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