Defining a Nation United States of America

Defining A Nation

Jordan Yates

        On the afternoon of April 30, 1789, George Washington stepped out onto the balcony of Federal Hall in Lower Manhattan to take the oath as the first President of the United States. Some precedents Washington set for future Presidents were that he established the Cabinet within the Executive Branch a body that was not outlined within the constitution. Also, he supported innovative fiscal concepts such as the Bank of America and a national debt, which would be later adopted Washington dedicates a large part of his farewell address to discussing foreign relations and the dangers of permanent alliances between the United States and foreign nations, which he views as foreign entanglements. This issue dominated national politics during the French Revolutionary Wars between France and Britain.

The Louisiana Purchase (1803) was a land deal between the United States and France, in which the U.S. acquired approximately 827,000 square miles of land west of the Mississippi River for $15 million. The Louisiana Purchase of 1803 changed the United states drastically because with the purchase the United States was doubled in size and gave the country complete control of the port of New Orleans and provided territory for westward expansion. Without the purchase in 1803 farmers would not have been able to ship their crops or get paid because the Mississippi river and the port of New Orleans were controlled by France.

         The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. Established pursuant to Article III of the U.S. Constitution in 1789. The 1st United States Congress provided the detailed organization of a federal judiciary through the Judiciary Act of 1789. The Supreme Court, the country's highest judicial tribunal, was to sit in the nation's Capital, and would initially be composed of a Chief Justice and five associate justices.

Jacksonian democracy is a 19th-century political philosophy in the United States that espoused greater democracy for the common man as that term was then defined. Originating with 7th President Andrew Jackson and his supporters, it became the nation's dominant political worldview for a generation. Some positive elements of Jacksonian Democracy were that he Believed the common man should have the biggest influence on government, not the rich. So, they wanted all white males to be able to vote, not just landowners. Also, he Believed in "Manifest Destiny" - the idea that Americans had a destiny to settle American west Yet not all the features of Jacksonian democracy were positive. In his drive for westward expansion, Jackson encouraged the removal and relocation of Native American tribes who stood in the way of American expansion, the most prominent example being the Cherokee who in 1836 were forced to relocate from the South to Oklahoma in an incident known today as the Trail of Tears. Polk's expansionist policies had similarly negative impacts on Native Americans.

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