1823. Attorney-General, Richard Rush, continued; William Wirt, Virginia, November 13, 1817. Postmaster-General, R. J. Meigs, continued; John McLean, Ohio, June 26, 1823.
The period of Monroe's term of office has been commonly known in American political history as the Era of Good Feeling. Party questions were in abeyance, and when, in May, 1817, the President began an extended tour in the Northern and Western States, the warmth of the welcome given him by all classes of the people showed that the nation was contented, prosperous, and loyal. In accordance with the recommendations of the President's first message, the slightly protective tariff of 1816 was continued for seven years. (See Tariff.) On December 10, 1817, Mississippi was admitted to the Union. In 1818 (December 3d) Illinois became a State, and on February 22, 1819, the United States purchased from Spain for $5,000,000 the territory of east and west Florida (in which region hostilities had recently been carried on against the Seminole Indians), together with all the claims which Spain might have to territory as far west as the Pacific, north of the forty-second parallel, including, of course, the Oregon country; while the United States relinquished all claim to the province west of the Sabine River (Texas). This treaty, however, was not formally ratified until 1821. Early in 1818 the people of the Territory of Missouri (q.v.), which had been included in the Louisiana Purchase, applied for admission to the Union. A bill providing for such admission was framed, but amended in the House in such a way as to forbid slavery in the new State. As so amended, the bill passed the House by the votes of the members from the free States, but was defeated in the Senate. This action brought the question of slavery prominently into the sphere of national politics, never again to disappear until the extinction of that institution as the result of the war between the States in 1861-65. In the Congress which met in December, 1819, the question of the admission of Missouri was again brought forward, coupled with a proposition for the admission of Maine, which had hitherto been a part of Massachusetts. An arrangement known as the ‘Missouri Compromise’ (q.v.) was effected (1820) by the action of Clay and the conservative members of both sections, which provided that the admission of Maine and Missouri should be voted upon separately, that slavery should be permitted in Missouri, but that slavery should forever be prohibited in territories acquired from France north of the parallel of 36° 30′ except Missouri. Maine was admitted in 1820 and Missouri in 1821, the latter step having been delayed by a vigorous debate in Congress occasioned by a clause in the proposed State Constitution which prohibited the settling of free negroes in the State (see Missouri Compromise), the Missouri Legislature finally pledging the State not to shut out any negro citizen of another State. At the same session of Congress, Alabama was admitted to the Union (December 14, 1819). In 1820 the Presidential campaign resulted in the reëlection of Monroe and Tompkins, Monroe receiving all the electoral votes but one, which was cast for John Quincy Adams.
In 1821 the strict constructionists among the Republicans defeated bills looking to a national canal system and a higher tariff, and the President vetoed a bill for the outlay of national funds upon the Cumberland Road (q.v.). In December, 1823, in his annual message to Congress, Monroe promulgated the famous declaration that has since been known as the Monroe Doctrine (q.v.). In 1824, the nationalist policy being then followed by a majority in both Houses, there was adopted a more strictly protective tariff, framed with the design of excluding foreign competitors from American markets (see Tariff), while a bill for making survey's for a national canal system also became law. The political issues arising out of the founding of a new government as well as out of international complications had now lost their importance, and attention was becoming centred on internal matters, as to none of which were sectional or factional issues as yet clearly drawn, although the sudden introduction of the slavery question into Congressional politics was to acquire more significance than any other circumstance of the administration. However, as there was now only one political party, the Republican, the Presidental election of 1824 was largely a personal and factional contest. When the electoral votes were counted, 99 were for Andrew Jackson, of Tennessee; 84 for John Quincy Adams, of Massachusetts; 41 for William H. Crawford, of Georgia; and 37 for Henry Clay, of Kentucky; there being thus no choice for President, and the decision being thrown into the House of Representatives, where, by a coalition of the supporters of Clay and Adams, the latter was finally chosen, Adams receiving the votes of thirteen States, while Jackson had those of seven, and Crawford those of four. The electors had chosen John C. Calhoun, of South Carolina, to be Vice-President, by a vote of 182 to 78 for various other candidates.
X. Administration of John Quincy Adams (1825-29). Cabinet.—Secretary of State, Henry Clay, Kentucky, March 7, 1825. Secretary of the Treasury, Richard Rush, Pennsylvania, March 7, 1825. Secretary of War, James Barbour, Virginia, March 7, 1825; Peter B. Porter, New York, May 26, 1828. Secretary of the Navy, S. L. Southard, continued. Attorney-General, William Wirt, continued. Postmaster-General, John McLean, continued.
A new division of the American people into parties dates from the beginning of this administration. The party previously known as Republican or Democratic-Republican soon took the name of Democratic (see Democratic Party), while the Clay and Adams factions, which had been identified with the doctrine of loose construction, after taking the name of National Republican, changed it eventually to that of Whig (see Whig Party), by which the party continued to be known for some twenty-five years. The basis for the new party division lay largely in the factional differences between the followers of Adams and those of Jackson, and one result of this was the prolonged controversy throughout the administration of Adams and the development of especially bitter relations between the factions of the leaders, which continued throughout the two terms of Jackson. Owing to the determined obstruction which was made by the opponents of the Administration, few of its measures were carried, so that the net results of the four years' work were comparatively slight, and the period became distinguished chiefly by
