Page 247 - American Stories, A History of the United States

The Politics of Nation building
9.1
After the War of 1812

9.2
9.3 What decisions did the federal government face as the country expanded?
G that accompanied them were bound to generate political controversy. Farm-
9.3 eographic expansion, economic growth, and the changes in American life

ers, merchants, manufacturers, and laborers were affected by the changes in
different ways. So were northerners, southerners, and westerners. Federal
and state policies that were meant to encourage or control growth and expansion did
not benefit all these groups or sections equally, and unavoidable conflicts of interest
and ideology occurred.
But, for a time, the national political arena did not prominently reflect these con-
Era of Good Feeling A description flicts. A myth of national harmony prevailed, culminating in the Era of Good Feeling
of the two terms of President during James Monroe’s two terms as president. Behind this facade, individuals and
James Monroe (1817–1823) during groups fought for advantage, as always, but without the public accountability and need
which partisan conflict abated for broad popular approval that a party system would have required. As a result, popu-
and federal initiatives suggested
increased nationalism. lar interest in national politics fell.
The absence of party discipline and programs did not immobilize the federal gov-
ernment. The president took important initiatives in foreign policy; Congress legislated
on matters of national concern; and the Supreme Court made far-reaching decisions.
The common theme of the public policies that emerged between the War of 1812 and
the age of Andrew Jackson, which began in 1829, was an awakening nationalism—a
sense of American pride and purpose that reflected the expansionism and material
progress of the period.

The Missouri compromise

In 1817, the Missouri territorial assembly applied for statehood. Since there were
2,000–3,000 slaves in the territory and the petition made no provision for emancipat-
ing them or for curbing slave imports, Missouri would enter the Union as a slave state
unless Congress blocked it. Missouri was the first state, other than Louisiana, to be
carved out of the Louisiana Purchase, and resolving the status of slavery there would
have implications for the rest of the trans-Mississippi West.
When the question came before Congress in early 1819, sectional fears and anxiet-
ies bubbled to the surface. Many northerners resented southern control of the presi-
dency and the fact that the three-fifths clause of the Constitution, by which every five
slaves were counted as three persons in figuring the state’s population, gave the South’s
free population added weight in the House of Representatives and the electoral college.
The South, on the other hand, feared for the future of what it regarded as a necessary
balance of power between the sections. Until 1819, a strict equality had been main-
tained by alternately admitting slave and free states; in that year, there were eleven of
each. But the northern population was growing more rapidly than the southern, and
the North had a decisive majority in the House. Hence the South saw its equal vote in
the Senate as essential for preserving the balance.
In February 1819, Congressman James Tallmadge of New York introduced an
amendment to the statehood bill, banning further introduction of slaves into Missouri
and requiring the gradual elimination of slavery within the state. The House approved
his amendment by a narrow margin. The Senate, however, voted it down. The issue
remained unresolved until a new Congress convened in December. In the great debate
that ensued in the Senate, Federalist leader Rufus King of New York argued that Congress
was within its rights to require restricting slavery before Missouri could become a state.

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