Who was James Monroe?
Monroe was a Revolutionary War soldier, wounded at Trenton. His later career took in the Senate, diplomatic posts in Paris and London, the Virginia governor's chair, and the State and War departments in James Madison's cabinet. A Democratic-Republican, he won the presidency in 1816. By 1820 the Federalists had faded so far that nobody seriously ran against him, and the period earned the label Era of Good Feelings. Yet it was not calm throughout. A financial crash hit in 1819, Congress split over whether Missouri could allow slavery, Spain gave up Florida, and in 1823 Monroe sent a message to Congress that later got his name.
Political views
- His 1823 message told European powers not to plant new colonies in the Americas, and promised that the U.S. would not take sides in Europe's conflicts.Source: millercenter.org
- He signed the Missouri Compromise of 1820. It paired a slave state, Missouri, with a free one, Maine, and closed the northern part of the Louisiana Purchase to slavery.Source: millercenter.org
- In 1818 Andrew Jackson led troops into Seminole territory on his orders. A treaty with Spain the next year then transferred Florida to the U.S.Source: millercenter.org
- His answer to the Panic of 1819 was mainly to ease the terms for people buying federal land. He expected the economy to mend itself.Source: en.wikipedia.org
- In 1824 he signed a tariff that raised duties to shelter American manufacturers.Source: millercenter.org
- He vetoed a 1822 bill for tolls on the Cumberland Road, saying Congress lacked the power, yet later signed bills to survey and extend the road.Source: avalon.law.yale.edu
- When Gabriel planned a slave rebellion in 1800, Monroe, then Virginia's governor, called out the militia. Twenty-six of the enslaved men seized were put to death by hanging.Source: en.wikipedia.org
Legacy
Fans of Monroe point to the sense of shared purpose that followed the War of 1812, to skilled diplomacy that won Florida and welcomed the new Latin American republics, and to a principle that shaped American foreign policy for a century. Detractors say his administration offered little help after the 1819 crash, and that the Missouri deal pushed the slavery quarrel into the future without solving it. Monroe held enslaved people for life. Historians also note that the Florida campaign hit Seminole and Creek towns that gave shelter to people fleeing slavery. Presidents after him leaned on the Monroe Doctrine to defend interventions that many Latin Americans regarded as imperial.
In their own words
“The American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers.”