Adams began his term trying to balance relations with both Great Britain and France. Because the terms of Jay's Treaty were so favorable to the British, the French retaliated by raiding American shipping with their navy and privateers.
In 1797, Adams dispatched three envoys to France to resolve the conflict, but the French foreign minister demanded a bribe before negotiations could begin. The American representatives refused, and the incident became known as the XYZ Affair.
Public outrage over French bribery gave Federalist leaders a political opening to pursue war. In 1798, Congress repudiated the Franco-American alliance of 1778 and enlarged the army and navy.
Republicans suspected that the real aim of enlarging the military was to suppress domestic opposition and establish a military despotism rather than to fight the French army (which did not exist in North America).
Adams feared becoming a scapegoat if policies failed and distrusted standing armies, preferring the navy as the nation’s primary defense. Consequently, an unofficial naval war broke out between the United States and France, while Britain continued to impress American sailors and seize ships suspected of trading with France.
Suppression at Home: The Alien and Sedition Acts
Federalist leaders sought to suppress disloyalty at home. In the summer of 1798, Congress passed the Alien and Sedition Acts.
Alien Act: Authorized the president to arrest and deport aliens suspected of feeing treasonable leanings. Never used, but it directly threatened immigrants who had not yet become citizens, many of whom were prominent Jeffersonians.
Naturalization Act: Increased the period required to become a naturalized citizen from 5 to 14 years.
Sedition Act: Imposed heavy fines and imprisonment for writing, speaking, or publishing anything considered to be false, scandalous, and malicious against the government or any officer of the government.
Enforcement was highly partisan: many Republican editors were imprisoned; some newspapers ceased publication.
In total, 25 people were arrested under the Sedition Act and 10 were convicted.
Historically, Americans had accepted that newspapers should not be censored before publication, but could be punished after the fact for sedition.
Jefferson and others argued that the American government rested on the free expression of public opinion and that only overtly seditious acts, not opinions, should be prosecuted. The courts eventually endorsed this view, embracing a broader protection for freedom of speech under the First Amendment.
Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions
In response to the 1798 crisis, Republican-controlled legislatures in Virginia and Kentucky passed a set of resolutions.
Madison wrote the Virginia resolution, Jefferson wrote the Kentucky resolution.
They proclaimed that the Constitution was a compact among sovereign states that delegated strictly limited powers to the federal government. When the government exceeded those limits and threatened citizens’ liberties, states had the right to interpose their authority.
In the 1830s, these resolutions would serve as the precedent for state efforts to nullify federal laws.
Jefferson and Madison were not seeking to rend the Union; they intended the resolutions to rally public opinion for the Republican cause. They opposed any effort to resist federal authority by force.
The Election of 1800
With a naval war ongoing and the Alien and Sedition Acts debated at home, Adams negotiated a peace treaty with France. This courageous act split his party and damaged his reelection prospects by prompting Hamilton’s pro-British wing to oppose him.
Peace returned and the nation benefited, but the Federalist Party remained split; Republican prospects improved.
The Republicans chose Thomas Jefferson to run for president with Aaron Burr for vice president, while Adams sought reelection.
The election produced a sweeping victory for the Republicans: they won the presidency and control of both houses of Congress for the first time. However, Jefferson and Burr received an equal number of votes, and the Constitution did not distinguish between the votes for president and for vice president.
The House of Representatives had to decide the outcome, with each state casting one vote. Burr refused to step aside for Jefferson, leading to a deadlock that lasted almost a week.
The Federalists eventually deemed Jefferson the lesser evil and allowed his election on the 36extth ballot.
In 1804, the Twelfth Amendment corrected the problem by requiring electors to vote separately for president and vice president.
MAP 9.2: ELECTION OF 1800
Party share of electoral votes: Democratic-Republican 53%, Federalist 47%
Candidates (electoral votes): Jefferson ∗(73), Burr t(64), Adams (65), Pickney (64), Jay ′ChosenasvicepresidentbyHouseofRepresentatives′(1)
John Marshall and Judicial Review
After losing the presidency and Congress in 1800, Federalists sought to shore up power by expanding the federal judiciary.
The Judiciary Act of 1801 created 6 circuit courts and 16 new judgeships. These were the “midnight appointments” carried out by Adams in the final weeks of his term.
Among Adams’s last-minute appointments was William Marbury as justice of the peace for Columbia. When James Madison, the new secretary of state, refused to deliver the commissions, Marbury sued.
Marbury v. Madison (1803) went to the Supreme Court. Chief Justice John Marshall, a Federalist and one of the last-term appointees, ruled in favor of Madison but strengthened the power of the federal courts in the process.
Marshall declared that the Supreme Court possessed the authority to review statutes and interpret the Constitution: “It is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is,” upholding the doctrine of judicial review.
Marshall and his colleagues later asserted the power of the Court to review not only federal laws but also state laws; over his long tenure (more than 30 years), he extended judicial review to all acts of government.
As Adams left office, he reflected on the 12 years of Federalist power: the party had demonstrated that a republican form of government could be compatible with stability and order, and had established economic policies that brought prosperity. Washington had set neutrality in foreign affairs as a guiding principle. Yet, for many Federalists, the elections signaled the end of their world.
They believed the forces of history had turned toward the party of “ignorant rabble,” led by the demagogue Thomas Jefferson.