The Travails of the Jeffersonian Republic [1804-1808]
Foreign entanglements  during Jefferson's second term leads to a highly unpopular

and failed embargo that revived the moribund Federalist Party.

 

 

 

The Election of 1804

 

France and Great Britain are at war [AGAIN]

 

Napoleon is getting the upper hand on the land

 

Great Britain is dominating the seas - Both countries tried to stop the other from getting supplies from other nations – from neutral nations

 

1805 France made the Berlin-Milan Decrees

closed all European ports to trade with Britain; French seized any ship going from the continent to Great Britain

 

Continental System, in the Napoleonic wars, the blockade designed by Napoleon to paralyze Great Britain through the destruction of British commerce. The decrees of Berlin (November 21, 1806) and Milan (December 17, 1807) proclaimed a blockade: neutrals and French allies were not to trade with the British. 

 

1805 Britain responded with the Orders in Council

Restrict trade of neutral countries; set up a blockade between America and the continent

 

 

The British began to seize American ships.  Because of conditions in the British navy lots of British sailors had left the Navy and come to America to join the American Navy. Britain wanted the sailors back… Impressment (they took Americans too!!)

 

 

 

Chesapeake Affair (1807)

Chesapeake/Leopard Incident- Started when the American ship (Chesapeake) encountered the British ship (Leopard). Chesapeake refused to allow the ship to be searched by the Leopard, so the Leopard opened fire. Chesapeake surrendered and four men were dragged off to be impressed, so Jefferson expelled all British warships from American waters and denounced impressments.

 

 

1807 –Jefferson believed that both Great Britain and France needed our trade – he believed that if we stopped trading with them they would see it was wrong to go after neutrals

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1807- Embargo Act was passed

 

For a president who had so skillfully mastered Congress and public opinion in his first term, Jefferson failed to explain clearly the purpose of the embargo or rally the public behind his policy. What Jefferson viewed as an assertion of American neutral rights, Britain viewed as an American intervention in the war that aided France.

 

 

No American ship can leave an American port for a foreign port

 

No foreign vessel can load a cargo at an American port

 

Coast wise shipping must post a bond twice the value of the ship and cargo (once delivery was made the bond would be repaid)

 

 

Jay’s Treaty (1795) had been ineffective and unpopular – but it hadn’t hurt anyone

 

 

 

  

 

The Embargo Act hurt some…SUCH AS

 

#1 Merchants in New England (wealthy people in NE)

#2 Shippers and people who ran the ports (who were mostly Federalists)

 

In New England the states refused to enforce the act  there weren’t enough Federal Officials to get the enforcement done they needed help from the states – and they didn’t get it Connecticut – called the act unconstitutional (Sound familiar???) smuggling was going on all over the north east  THE ACT WAS A FLOP

 

American domestic exports dropped over 70%  the following year. Domestic imports dropped over 40%

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1808- Jefferson took his cues from Washington and decided not to run again.

1809 – a couple of days before Jefferson left office a new act was passed  Non-Intercourse Act

 

What did it say? We could trade – just not with ports controlled by Britain or France.

 

 

 

 

Read More: The First Barbary War

 

War between USA and Tripolitania, 1801-05 The cause of the war was pirates from the Barbary States seizing American merchant ships and holding the crews for ransom, demanding the U.S. pay tribute to the Barbary rulers.

 

This practice had been customary among European nations and the nascent United States in exchange for immunity from attack on merchant vessels in the Mediterranean.

 

President Thomas Jefferson refused to pay this tribute. Despite his opposition to the expense of maintaining a navy, Jefferson dispatched an American naval squadron to Tripolitan waters. By means of a special “Mediterranean Fund,” the navy—which had been partially dismantled and was perhaps nearing extinction—actually increased in size.

 

 

A peace treaty is eventually signed, US pays a symbolic ransom of $60,000 and Tripoli frees about 300 US captives.

 

 

In recent years Somali pirates have seized dozens of vessels and made millions of pounds from ransoming their crews.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thoughts On....  Jefferson's Leadership

 

1. Jefferson set the crucial precedents for modern presidential leadership: directing his party, mobilizing public opinion, and guiding legislation through Congress.

 

2. He expanded the authority of both the presidency and the federal government, an ironic legacy for the champion of strict construction and states’ rights.

 

3. He established the American tradition of continental expansion. He doubled the size of the Union, swept away constitutional barriers to expansion, and laid an ideological and cultural foundation for expansion with a vision of an empire of liberty that stretched across the continent.

 

 

4. His policies of political isolation combined with continental expansion and commercial freedom would profoundly influence the future course of American foreign policy.

 

5. His domestic policies of low taxes, economy in government, and minimal military establishments would become part of policy debates in America through the beginning of the twenty-first century.

 

6. Jefferson shared the prejudices of his time regarding women and non-whites. He could be remarkably obtuse to the dangers of revolution and disorder. He probably sexually exploited his slave Sally Hemings and did not acknowledge or provide for his mixed-race children.

 

7. Jefferson was neither a flawless icon nor a deceitful rogue. He played a vital role in establishing the freedom and self-government that we enjoy today. But he was also a human being, torn by passions beyond his control, beset with the

prejudices of his day, and filled with the uncertainties and contradictions that define the human condition.