-Regional economic differences
-The economic panic of 1819
-Regional political differences
-The Missouri Compromise
-An end to good feelings

[SLIDE 1]

Europe needed American food and goods while it rebuilt after the Napoleonic Wars. The promising European markets and the excitement of American expansion westward fueled a frenzy of economic speculation in America. Farmers, plantation owners, and northeastern manufacturers bought land, slaves, or equipment using the easy credit that had become available. 

[SLIDE 2]

Federal land policy changed in 1800 and 1804, introducing lower minimum acreage per purchase (160 acres), lower price per acre ($1.64), and the use of installment payments for purchase on credit. Small farmers saw the opportunity to own their own farms, while speculators sought to get rich through investment. Speculators bought large amounts of land on credit with the intention of subdividing the land into smaller farms for people who couldn't afford to buy the government's minimum 160-acre lots. Speculator's also offered installment payments, so again, everyone was buying land on credit. In addition, banks, both supervised and unsupervised, offered credit to farmers who needed money to get their farms started. In this way, the amount of indebtedness multiplied.

[SLIDE 3]

Things might have gone on as they were, and the debtors might simply have paid off their debt over time, but that is not what happened. Europe began to rebuild and was better able to supply its own needs. It also bought commodities from its colonies in Africa, Asia, and the Pacific, instead of from the U.S. The U.S. government tried to prevent disaster by tightening credit, and the Second Bank followed suit, demanding repayment of its loans. Next, state banks and land speculators did the same. Since no one had that cash, the tower of credit collapsed. As prices fell, farmers and manufacturers were unable to repay their debt. Factories closed, throwing people out of work. Farms were repossessed. Debtors were thrown into prison. The number of paupers soared.

[SLIDE 4]

Economic panic causes regional tensions to come to the fore. Commercial farmers who had specialized to produce cash crops like wool, hemp, and wheat, joined together with manufacturers and western miners to demand protective tariffs to limit the amount of low-priced European goods coming in. Small farmers farming their own land, known as yeoman farmers, did not want tariffs because they would likely result in rising prices on items they needed. Southern commercial farmers, unlike other commercial farmers, opposed tariffs because the most important market for their cotton was England, and they didn't want England retaliating with import tariffs of its own on southern cotton.

[SLIDE 5]

One way to gain support for a regional interest was to trade favors with another region. Log rolling was a tit-for-tat method of gaining votes, along the lines of "you wash my back; I'll wash yours." By supporting Western interests, the North was able to gain the support of the West for Northern interests.

[SLIDE 6]

The problem was that the United States was expanding. Whether new states were part of the North or the South could tip the balance in favor of one regional interest over the other. Then, in 1819, Missouri applied for statehood.

[SLIDE 7]

Missouri's application for statehood had the capacity to tip the delicate balance between northern and southern economic interests. Although from our perspective the key issue was slavery, it should be understood that at the time the issue was not only slavery; Missouri's statehood involved a power struggle over a whole host of economic issues. Nevertheless, slavery was now becoming an important ingredient in the struggle for power among the sections of the country. New York congressman James Tallmadge, Jr. introduced an amendment to make Missouri a free state; the South opposed the amendment. When Maine, which had been part of Massachusetts, applied for statehood later in the year, a compromise became possible, one which would hold for about thirty years. Henry Clay, for his role in creating the compromise, became known as the "Great Pacificator."

[SLIDE 8]

The compromise would help the Union hold together for decades to come, but it did not satisfy everyone. It would eventually be repealed when the time came for decisions to be made about the status of Kansas and Nebraska, both of which were north of the compromise line. Then, the Supreme Court will declare that the Missouri Compromise had been unconstitutional. These are major events that will lead up to the Civil War, and which we will discuss in a future lesson.

[SLIDE 9]

In the south, concern over the Missouri Compromise seethed as embattled slaveholders worried about the future of slavery. In Charleston, South Carolina, a free black man named Denmark Vesey would become a focal point for white fear, or perhaps a pawn in political plotting. Denmark Vesey had bought his freedom and had a carpenter's shop. He was a founder of the local AME Church. In 1822, Vesey was arrested, judged in a secret trial, and executed, along with 34 of his alleged followers. The records for this series of events are open to a good deal of doubt. It is not today known for sure whether this supposed plot existed, or whether it was organized enough to have been carried out. Various records indicate that some white people thought that slaves had learned about the Compromise and had been encouraged to rebel by white debate on the subject. Some blamed the AME Church, rising literacy among slaves, and slaves brought from Haiti during its Revolution. The event fed white fears of a slave uprising and, like the earlier Gabriel's Rebellion, led to further restrictions. 

[SLIDE 10]

The Federalists had fielded their last presidential candidate in 1816. In 1820, Monroe had run for his second term essentially unopposed and had been handily reelected, even during the contentiousness of the Missouri crisis. In the 1824 election, however, there was only one political party, but that party was truly divided. The party caucus system foundered. The Republican party caucus, which was dominated by the southern states, nominated Treasury Secretary William Crawford of Georgia, but with division running deep, alternate candidates decided by defy the caucus system and run on their own.

[SLIDE 11]

Most voters, in all regions but New England, defied their party leaders and voted for Jackson, who won the popular vote. With so many candidates, however, Jackson only won a plurality of votes in the Electoral College, while the Constitution requires a majority. The vote was then required to go to the House to decide. Jackson and Adams had won the most votes, with Crawford coming in a distant third, and Clay trailing at fourth. Clay was now constitutionally out of contention, and when Crawford suffered a stroke, he too was out of the running. Clay, though, was Speaker of the House and decided to back Adams since they agreed on a good deal. With Clay's support, Adams won the vote in the House. Jackson's supporters were livid, calling Clay, formerly of Virginia and now of Kentucky, the "Judas of the West,” meaning he had sold out the interests of the South and the West.
 
John Quincy Adams was the son of President John Adams, who was the only Federalist to be elected president, the only New Englander, and the only president until his son not to be from Virginia. Now, the election of John Quincy Adams as a Republican president broke the Virginia dynasty of Republican presidents from Virginia that had stretched since Jefferson.