Agrarian America : Thomas Jefferson

1. Agrarian America: Thomas Jefferson Presentation created by Robert Martinez Primary Content: America’s History (Henretta, Brody, Dumenil) Images as cited.

2. Alexander Hamilton paid a high political price for his success. Even before Washington began his second four-year term in 1793, Hamilton’s financial measures had split the Federalists into two irreconcilable factions. www.teapartytribune.com

3. Most northern Federalists stuck to the political alliance led by Hamilton, while most southern Federalists joined a rival group headed by Madison and Jefferson. www.bookapex.com

4. By the elections of 1794, the two factions had acquired names. Hamilton’s supporters retained the original name: Federalists. http://www.greatouroboros.com/?tag=alexander-hamilton

5. Madison and Jefferson’s allies called themselves Democratic Republicans or simply Republicans. foundingfathers.webwise.de

6. Thomas Jefferson spoke for the southern planters and western farmers who rejected Hamilton’s economic and social policies. b-womeninamericanhistory19

7. Well-read in architecture, natural history, agricultural science, and political theory, Jefferson embraced the optimistic spirit of the Enlightenment. etext.virginia.edu

8. He firmly believed in the “improvability of the human race” and so deplored the corrupt financial practices and emerging social divisions that threatened its achievement. aphistory2010.yolasite.com

9. Having seen the poverty of factory laborers in the manufacturing regions of Britain, Jefferson doubted that wageworkers had the economic and political independence necessary to sustain a republic. autocww.colorado.edu

10. Jefferson’s democratic vision of America was of an agricultural society based on free labor. trochwiki.wikispaces.com

11. Although he had grown up a slave owner, Jefferson pictured the West settled by productive farm families. http://niahd.wm.edu/?browse=entry&id=2958

12. “Those who labor in the earth are the chosen people of God,” he wrote in Notes on the State of Virginia (1785). remnanttrust.ipfw.edu

13. The grain and meat from their farms would feed European nations, which “would manufacture and send us in exchange clothes and other comforts.” http://www.hermes-press.com/completing.htm

14. Jefferson’s notion of an international division of labor was similar to that portrayed by Scottish economist Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations (1775). stimulatedboredom.com

15. Turmoil in Europe brought Jefferson’s vision closer to reality by creating new opportunities for American farmers. ellaparis.com

16. The French Revolution began in 1789; four years later, France’s republican government went to war against a British-led coalition of monarchies. cabreraj.blogspot.com

17. As warfare disrupted European farming, wheat prices leaped from 5 to 8 shillings a bushel and remained high for twenty years, bringing substantial profits to Chesapeake and Middle Atlantic farmers. http://avoca37.org/11jackc/2009/11/27/maryland-colonial-brochure/ www.agricorner.com

18. Simultaneously, a boom in the export of raw cotton, fueled by the invention of the cotton gin and the mechanization of cloth production in Britain, boosted the economies of Georgia and South Carolina. etc.usf.edu

19. As Jefferson had hoped, European markets brought prosperity to American farmers and planters. www.loc.gov