>> next on the presidency, andrew o'shaughnessy discovers the election of 1800 and thomas jefferson's peaceful resolution. he argues it was one of the most toxic in our history, and relied heavily on sheer campaigns -- smear campaigns against ehrenberg, thomas jefferson, and john adams. mr. a shaughnessy is the director of studies at the jefferson study at monticello. this event is one hour. >> and now, let me turn to why you are here this evening, which is not to discuss the 1968 thetion or gas crisis of 1970's, but rather the 1800 election with thomas jefferson, and to hear from a man who has been arguably one of the leading scholars of that most fascinating president of

american figures. i speak of andrew o'shaughnessy, from the university of virginia, where he is also director of the international jefferson studies enter at the thomas jefferson foundation. -- center at the thomas jefferson foundation. we are truly honored to have them here this evening. he is the winner of innumerable prices. prizeorge washington book , and an award from the society of military history, among other book honors. he has the -- he is the author andold world, new world" also "the man who lost america, american revolution, british revolution, and the empire." , because of myd job title, who i think was the best president. i am also asked who is the most ambitious, talented, influential, and even most interesting president.

now, i never know how to answer that except to say, probably jefferson hit all bars, the answer to all of those, which is why i am particularly pleased to have a man here tonight who can tell us exactly what why jefferson was just that .nfluential, interesting so if you will join me in welcoming andrew o'shaughnessy? [applause] andrew o'shaughnessy: well, i would like to thank jeff engel, the george w. bush library, and the center for presidential studies at smu for this invitation. it was particularly welcome because this for me as a sort of homecoming. i realized from my accident i might sound somewhat odd. by actually had my very first academic post in the united states here as a visiting professor at smu in 1989 and

1990. and is the source of a lot of fond memories. i particularly look back on my undergraduate professors from oxford wanted to visit smu while i was here, and he said he wanted me to be his tour manager. he did not want to see the city or anything. he wanted to see somewhere that was remote and rural. [applause] [laughter] explored, but it occurred to me that we would choose granbury. the reason for that is that i found the guidebook, which said it had dinosaur footprints. [laughter] andrew o'shaughnessy: and i certainly knew nowhere in england that has got dinosaur footprints, so that sounded very neat. and we went to granbury. we went into the middle of the

town. i have to say, and i know it has changed a lot. local shops are selling postcards, but i would swear we were in [indiscernible] to what in thet 1940's and 1950's was called the photo fountain. we walked in and sat on the bar, and the guy behind the bar walked out and he was wearing what i discovered last night from my former colleague jeremy adams, the encyclopedia of all things is called a soda fountain jerker hat. and listen tord us and said, you are not from around here, are you? and we said, no. and he said, you are from out of east. [laughter] and we said, we were. and he smiled with the particular grin and said, you are from east texas.

[laughter] and my barber who used to work for me here, i used to go to the barber at the student union, and he would welcome me to the united states of texas. so this was my initiation into texas history. i always after that did visited the so-called texan embassy in london, which was actually a restaurant just off trafalgar square. it was not very good. [laughter] fredrik logevall: it is best to be a part of a federal union. isthe election of 1800 regarded as really the first in the modern history of the west, where power changed hands peacefully from one party to another. i thought, having grown up outside united states, this was undoubtedly wrong, because the

british had elections and had had since the middle ages. it is actually true, certainly in the case of britain, that no government ever changed hands because of an election. members of the house of commons are chosen by the king. king,wed patronage to the the king had to be in agreement with whoever was prime minister. an election could weaken the government. it could strengthen the government, but it did not change the government. and the major thing about this was that it was peaceful. i was very close run. the fact is that the candidate was not decided until the week before the inauguration. governor of as kean,ia and thomas

governor of pennsylvania, ordered their militias to be armed while the outcome was in doubt. there was talk, and there were instances of [indiscernible] john adams actually worried about the possibility of civil war. now i know when jeffrey plans this, it wased partly to coincide with the exhibit, special exhibits at the presidential library, which i hope to see tomorrow. but i am sure he was not unaware we would be in the middle of a buildup to a presidential election. he could not have known quite how exciting, if that is the word you want to use, it would be. he would certainly have known during this time of real polarization that i doubt whether he realized the posits

themselves would be polarized in almost said trick movement of two outside candidates who have not been traditionally part of those parties, posing real challenges. so i suspect that he really wanted me partly to regale you with the smear campaign of 1800 as an antidote to whatever may happen in 2000 and 16. -- 2016. it is worth remembering it is politics as usual. though give you somewhat of a perspective on this election. the fact is, currently that the candidates in this election probably have never been in a period when so many violence has appeared, the election, the appearance of the 1790's has been so popular. one professor at columbia calls

.t founders chic the number of biographies that have emerged, the fact that we now have incredibly popular musical on broadway, hamilton. i think it is a couple of thousand dollars a ticket if you want to try and go without having an advance booking. the run surey of no -- ron chernow biography of hamilton, it has to be said because john adams and ron che rnow or roger hamilton as seen by ron chernow. i think this is healthy. is that we have

gained by the visions and legacies of the people from both aisle.f the political so the problem with a lot of modern work is that the writers parachute down into this evening and it would biographers do, look at the perspective of their particular candidate. in other words, instead of having a perspective unit 16 years later, we get a -- 216 years later, begin a perspective of 1800. one looks through the eyes of amorous -- alexander hamilton and sees jefferson as a very insidious back of alien figure -- machiavellian figure. if you have read books in the 1940's and 1950's, you would have guessed an equally negative view of hamilton and adams, who , not without reason, seen

as highly elitist. when someone said to hamilton and talked about the majesty of the people, hamilton replied, the people are obese. -- a beef. what is really the take away this evening is to give you, before i give you the smears of what you really want to hear, is to give you some ways to think about this election, that i think at least helps you understand a lot about the actors on both sides. , and i most important think most neglected aspect of , we time is that today regard a one-party system as antithetical. we joke about the democratic republic's in eastern europe are in the soviet period.

thewe should remember that founders of all political parties in fact believed that america would be a one-party country. when washington created his first cabinet, and it was intended to embrace individuals and topolitical stripes capture the mood of the nation. they were revolutionary. this was taken 68. they believed individuals are put aside self interest and put the common good, and that they would be a real consensus. i think that is very important, because it means the whole idea of the position was natural. it was true in both britain and america, the idea of an opposition party was simply

synonymous with faction, with trouble making. so the problem for jefferson and james madison was to find a way to legitimately oppose the governing party, to find a new language of politics. in britain, that was quite easy. in britain, the way that opposition expresses itself was to ally themselves with the heir to the throne, so they could still seem to be loyal to the king, but they had was known as a house faction. that was where the kings air lived -- king's heir, in leicester square. in america, there is no instrument for opposition, which is why it looked so insidious and machiavellian. jefferson should probably be remembered as the originator of

the party system. but he would detest that this was his legacy, because he himself said, if i could go to heaven only with a party, i would not go at all. this was also the period in which richard hofstetter called the age of gentlemen politics. tobasically dated that up andrew jackson by namesake. candidates were not to appear to be running at all. they were not to appear to want office. they were not to want to to appear to be ambitious. so the have this pretense that no one is running. it seems ridiculous. the earlier election, the only previous real election, which is

1796, in which jefferson wrote to friends that he had not even been consulted about standing as a presidential candidate, and then in his letter, he crossed out the word consulted and put, not with his consort, whatever that might mean. in other words, it was a pretense that candidates were not moving -- running, and jefferson especially, none of the smears came from the candidates. part.e most and jefferson was the most extreme. he never responded to criticism. he never engaged in the polemics and confrontation. it was all done by third parties. another feature of this period we need to think about is the rise in power that the media, namely, newspapers. , 100apers were being

newspapers in 1790. by 1800, there were 260. the way you sold newspapers was the way you attract audiences to television now. muchis to attract as --wer ability -- guerrilla t negativity, to engage your reasons. the candidates themselves were not engaging in thus your campaigns, the newspapers often with anonymous contributors were encouraging it. that is why this is a particularly negative campaign. another important feature related to the newspapers was that this is the period sees the rise of public opinion and direct appeals from the public. , more fashionably

speaking, the rise of the public spear. voter turnout is increasing during this period. the election of 1800 represents at all times high in terms of the number of people who actually voted. finally, the reason that this is election is that the american revolution is not over. he was still very much recent. -- it was still very much recent . there was a feeling on both sides the opposing party was going to destroy the legacy of the american revolution. this was why they sound so urgent on this matter. the federalists thought that jefferson and the republicans would create positions of anarchy. and the jeffersonian party, the , they thought the

federalists would create a tyranny. this was in neither way absurd. most revolutions -- revolutions failed. they had every reason to be worried. described,i conditions were toxic by the elections of 1800. it was made so by a number of issues that had a reason -- a senson since the for -- ari since the first party of george washington. the divide over state issues, and especially alexander hamilton's economic program.

hamilton admired the british. he had grown up in the british caribbean. he has seen probably the greatest expression of british power, which is the british fleet, which appeared off the coast of the island, would have been larger in terms of the number of men on board those ships in the largest city in america. he sat the when number one broadway in the summer of 1776 with his wife and looked out to brooklyn, and the appearance of the british fleet looked like a great forest had off of new york. it was very impressive. what hamilton was really impressed by was that the british were a small country who had a punch well above their size, and he attribute that to the financial system in britain. and most historians today would

agree with him. what really made britain work was that they largely borrowed and copied from the dutch. national bank, still today the bank of england, a credit system, paper money. the government was able to borrow money in wartime rather than increase taxes, and this is why the british were able to defeat a country like france. during the american universe -- revolution, the british, despite the fact that they had a huge national debt, much larger in proportion to gnp than that modern national debt of the united states, three or four times as large, nevertheless, they stayed stable. there is the french government and bankrupt as a result of the american revolution, leading to the french revolution.

so hamilton wanted to copy the idea of a national bank. he wanted the bank to assume the state debt. and he had a vision for creating a national economic system. jefferson and the republicans were very dubious, but jefferson certainly early on, when both of them were both members of george washington's cabinet, looked to compromise, they have the famous dinner in which they agreed that the capital would be in washington dc, and that the government would assume the state debt. but from that moment onward, the differences between the two of emerge.an to what really drove the party apart would be foreign affairs and the outbreak of french revolution that coincided

washington's inauguration the same year, the first government. initially, americans generally were excited by the french revolution. it seems to be a replica of their own revolution. but gradually, those who be known -- would be known as the federalists of john adams, at least under hamilton become wary. it was to radical, especially the execution of the king, which even thomas payne condemned, but more especially the execution of many of the elite. it started to make some really fearful that the french wouldtion would spread, be a revolution from below. that this would lead to worse

conditions in america. this became more extreme with the outbreak of war between 1793.n and france in the british started to seize goods they had the largest navy, they started to seize american shipping. they started to divide over foreign policy, generally the federalists were very pro-british and regarded britain as their natural economic partner, and jefferson and his followers were very distrustful of britain, thinking britain would draw america into a neocolonial situation, and initially, they remain more tolerant of development in france, even though jefferson ultimately became disenchanted by the french revolution. he supported it much longer than

adams and others. it did not help that the french, and 7093, sent over a repetitive who started to appeal over the president and even appeal congress directly to the people to encourage the creation of a radical republican class. that only fed in two federalists to federalists fears and anarchy. jefferson resigned as secretary of state, and this is the first adication this is going to be party system. as early as two years before that, hamilton was already describing him as the head of a party. later in life could not help observing jefferson that by resigning, going back to monte carlo, sometimes called his wast retirement, jefferson

freeing himself from any criticism while anyone else in the fray, everyone else was suffering from smear campaigns. jefferson was able to stay above politics. -- the most part, medicine madison led the opposition in congress, but jefferson was the one from monticello corresponding with all of his friends who is essentially providing the leadership. essentially, tensions mounted. when the washington administration made a treaty with britain in 1794, the jay treaty, republicans regarded it as much too much to britain. they did not see it, thank you very much out, whereas britain got a most favored nature, most favored trading status with america, while it still would

not admit american ships and american trade to many of its ports, including most importantly, the british west indies. negotiated that treaty and when he got back to america, said i feel myself for the energy everywhere i have went. that essentially led the french, who were still technically in a treaty of alliance with america since the middle of the american 1778, andary war in led the french to now start to also capture american shipping. they took over 300 ships in the next couple of years. this, of course, build up the federalists' opposition to the french. john adams, who succeeded washington as president,

attempted really to be moderate, to negotiate and he sends people over to france to negotiate. they were basically rebuffed. askedt, the agents were to give bribes to their french counterparts, who are only identified into the medic corresponds, names not identified, they are called x, z. nd this outraged american opinion, even among republicans, that the united states would be so rebuffed. and there was talk of actual war with france. it becomes known that the quality of war, the government ,nd the federalists are nervous

even more now at the possibility of desertion by supporters of the french revolution. and they pass the alien and tradition acts, which galvanized republicans. mostwere some of the extreme measures limiting freedom of speech, allowing the government to imprison journalists who invariably were republican journalists, extending the time it took to be actualized as american students -- citizens from five years to 14 years. there were largely hit groups in 1798,he rebellion trying to be radical. and those were likely to support the republican party, it was taken very personally by the republicans. so by 1798, jefferson was

writing to his daughter martha, and he said politics and party destroy the happiness of every being here. it seems like salamanders who consider fire as their element. the candidates in 1800, as you know, before the fourth amendment, they did not distinguish between the president and the vice president. again because no one was ever considering a party system. it was a deficiency of the constitution. and so, the expectation was that the best man would win. they could never conceive that people would be running on the same ticket, that you might have a tie between the president and the vice president. the four candidates or john adams, who was the oldest at 65,

highly experienced from being ambassador in london. he was the vice president. thomas jefferson, who had held state and national office. it had not been known until the 1790's that jefferson, the author of the acquisition of independence, precisely because of these their running mates were not people either the two leading candidates would have necessarily chosen. they were chosen for strategic reasons not because of any friendship or because of admiration. jefferson chose aaron burr who was the only candidate of all of read about the idea of election hearing.

tickets and getting into the dirt of policy. we of course think of him today very much a maverick. that was not entirely apparent at the time. the fact is, as we will see, he was a crucial figure securing the all-important state of new york for the republicans. hinckley it was presidential candidate three times and probably the least known of all of the names. him is aspect to entirely british educated. he has an elite british education and was a marvelous example of how pro-british the federalists were. when he went to school, he was easily the equal, none better than him.

george the third get from the patronage. to delete of the bureaucratic leader and he went to the middle temple, the only kind of law school at his time. he had entirely trained in england and he expressed a lot of what the republicans most contested. tested. contested. the election went on for over a year. as i said earlier, it was only fully decided a week before the actual inauguration, which i think is an all-time record.

they campaigning was done by prophecy not by the candidates themselves other than aaron burr , and either party there was not a central campaign headquarters. more importantly, the president was not directly elected by the people originally under the constitution. it was through the electoral college, which of course still exists. were 16 states and 11 of the states chose their delegates through the legislature and only five of the states had popular elections but delegates. if you are teaching a class it is become more interesting with the whole debate about delegates and conventions within the party.

clearly, electoral college is different from the party conventions, but it is still exactly the same issue popularly elected delegates and delegates doing what constituents asked them to do and delegates making decisions in their own right which is what they did in this case. essentially states different districts elected their own delegates, including maryland and vermont, but most of these days were winner take all. virginia, up until 1800, has been dubbed in one of the first small moves of monroe on jefferson's behalf was the way virginia elected its delegates, because the federalists were making ground in virginia. winner taket been a

all, they would have taken some delegates from virginia. won the election by a small margin. small margins were going to be critical. in the early 1800s, virginia switched to winner take all, which guarantees that jefferson would be the candidate. of critical on was in march new yorknew york -- in which of been critical to john s'victory. it was aaron burr who pulled it off. adam's new that he had lost -- ew that he had lost new york. for him, he had to win south carolina. bridgethese he did to

these sectional lines of the country. they needed a candidate in the north and in the south. other major issue was that the federalist party was becoming increasingly split. adams had never been popular with his own party. even if you read the biography is a ratherlize he complicated figure, not a public ase in public e3 and was regarded to moderate by the high federalists, the extremist in his party, especially alexander hamilton.

england wanted to see it much more hostile stance towards france. reang this election, adams' lly starts to split. hamilton behind the scenes, who was not a candidate that has been a major figure, hamilton was really working to get charles pinkley elected rather than adams. the republican party did not want to get burr elected, sort of an accident that he ended up tied. they really wanted the high federalists wanted to see pinckney rather than adams. as adams said, the party committed suicide and then they blamed me for being the executioner.

agenda, jefferson more clearly than the federalists articulate what it was about test articulated what it was about. he was not giving speeches but did it through correspondence. it had become clear what the republicans were about. first and foremost, he wanted cuts in the government. he wanted a balanced budget. he emphasized the importance of free speech against the sedition act. he wanted to shrink the size of the army and navy which is pretty incredible because the army and navy, in terms of the cost to america represented 1/24 of what british taxpayers are paying for their army.

jefferson said it is great expenses in which it will implicate us and will grind us with burden and sink us under them. he argued, if you have a big military, you're much more likely to go to war. what is also interesting about this election is that they have targeted campaigns and that is partly because it was organized on a local level, so different parties used different appeals in different areas, something that we have caught up again within the last couple of decades, especially. in the south, the federalists in new england were anti-slavery that in the south the response to the haitian revolution, they slave rebellion was to argue that this was the result of the french revolution. when a slave rebellion broke out in virginia in 1800 of

gabrielle's rebellion, they said this is the result of the french revolution, whereas in england, they said this is bad. in south carolina, they condemned jefferson for even talking to benjamin danica, the black man petition who is 1 -- mathematician. i promised you before i ended smear campaign and give you some examples of the smears i must indulge you, as i intended. jefferson always describes his opponents as monographs, aristocrats and he said he was representing the spirit of 1776. this is how one of his newspapers describes john adams. hideous character that is

the boldness of man or the sensibility of woman." they regarded him as pompous. was seto be said, adams on what titles should be used in america and utterly disapproved we should talk about "mr. president" rather than "his excellency." adams had gotten along with later later in reprimanded him for calling george iii a

tyrant. they called jefferson a mean-spirited, the son of a .alfbreed indian squaw, w. strategies used against jefferson, linking him to the radicalism of the french revolution. you have writing in the connecticut papers saying murder robbery, rape and incest will be behave. people newspaper warned to prepare to see your dwellings in slaves, fema chastity violated -- female chastity violated. writing inrginia

papers, fellowal citizens, vote for mr. jefferson . he will cure all of our disorders, relieve us of taxes, and prefersich the see of liberty, the storm of revelation. revolution. all of the federal officers, he will play the devil with the damn banks. commerceut a stop to and will introduce a new order one that will as make every demo happy, no doubt. another attack was jefferson's religious belief, that he was an atheist and an infidel and that america would cease to be godly.

praying to the god of reason and jefferson sacrificing dogs. there was a newspaper editorial that had the headline, the grand question stated. the only question to be asked to every american, laying his hand on his heart is, shell i ortinue allegiance to god declare with jefferson, no god. jefferson had written a letter in 1796, which was meant to be a private letter in which he criticized the government and by implication, george washington. the letter had some strong language and he said that people

had been sampson's in the field and solomons and counsel and it had their head shorn. somehow, this was leaked. it first appeared in a folder vulgar french issue. it was then translated into english. the letter was used to suggest that jefferson was against washington and was really turning his back on the revolutionary legacy. they also brought up his behavior as governor of virginia, that he had run away from the british. it is always a bizarre charge because the legislature, who were most critical of him ran far ahead of him in escaping

richmond and then escaping charlottesville. what always impressed me about jefferson is he stayed long enough to monticello to actually watch this british lesions and loyalists start to come up the slope, which is not a very high mountain and then finally, he left having sent his family off and to advance. the one about which she was most sensitive for his entire political career. he was subsisting about it in the last week of his life, so another words, it hit a point. there were stories about jefferson having a black mistress. bleak than itore would happen later than they certainly speculated. the most bizarre was the story death.erson's

it was one of his enslaved workers who dot, but it's a jefferson had died, not by a federalist paper but by a republican paper. was, that when the federalist heard about it, they rejoiced. in other words, that is a bad party tensions have become. therepublicans won newspaper war because the majority of newspapers were republican and the republicans did much more to work with newspapers than their opponents. the election as you know was a tie. and 73s for aaron burr votes for thomas jefferson. if theams would have won population in the south had not included a count of enslaved

5 of a person under the constitution. he would have won by two votes and that was compellingly put forward in a book by gary wills, the "negro president." far more important at the time was that adams' party split down the middle which cost adams's election. the election was in deadlock. delegates went through 36 different votes. we are talking in some of these primers, maybe a second or third round, 36 rounds of no one giving way. if you look to the secondary book, they both give different explanations as to how the time was broken --tie was broken.

a lot of textbooks say alexander hamilton himself broke the tie, that hamilton finally concluded was worserson's bark than his bite. he's a jefferson is too -- heous not to retain said jefferson was too ambitious not to retain some of his deeds. hamilton had a particular coral ith burr whoel w ultimately killed him in a dual. hamilton pulled him down in a very underhanded way, and rightfully so because as you know burr was a maverick. that is certainly true. hamilton made it known that he supported jefferson. that actually did not help because very much at the time

because hamilton himself was discredited. he wanted to split the party that caused the federalist to published an attack, and open attack on john adams on the character of mr. adams in criticized himself. this did not help because of the party. the person who really broke the figure who held the entire electoral vote for delaware and it was he who changed his vote and essentially did not vote, did not switch to jefferson. he claimed for the rest of his life that an intermediary gained in agreement with jefferson that jefferson would retain certain

officials in the government and that he would not overdo the .ssumption of debt certainly, jefferson denied it. on the other hand, not a foot supposedly this deal consisted of was ever changed. essentially, it was carried, so with a change of the vote, the election was decided a week before the actual inauguration. jefferson would call it the revolution of 1800, felt that changed the nature of politics. that it was claims the unanimous choice of the people when in fact it had been a very close run thing. there is no doubt that the

movement of popular opinion was moving toward the republicans and largely in the south. in the house votes and senate votes. the fact is, this election made the republican party the party of government for decades afterwards. the federalist party disappeared as a party. we have run out of time, but is the immoral -- is there a moral to all of this? jefferson and adams became friends later in life through correspondence. they left their party differences aside and it is one of the great correspondences in history. it ranges not just politics but sciences, gardening, agriculture and shows the incredible intellectual range that these two individuals had.

but i think it's also a lesson is that america is the product partyally opposed visions. we all agreed to to the federalist and a jefferson in terms of democratizing .overnment introducing highlighted the sectional differences in the country. jefferson was entirely successful in the south and in the west. the federalist hold within the north and especially in new england. it would be the federalists during the war of 1812 would talk about confession whereas during the alien and sedition acts, it was jefferson and madison that helped draft the

kentucky and virginia result in really helped introduce the word "nullification." you can see in anticipation of the civil war but by no means did this make the civil war inevitable. thank you. [applause] mr. o'shaughnessy: i am happy. if you have a question, wait for the microphone to come. >> thank you. thank you very much. other than your own books, whose books would you recommend on

this theory? mr. o'shaughnessy: there is a good book by larson on the election of 1800. i am afraid to tell you that identifying the secondary literature is very satisfying. the best book, if you really want to go into debt with this and be serious is a volume of essays called "the election of 1800" which was produced during the election of 2000. under actually held conference organized by monticello and the proceedings lewis engine jan homes who is my predecessor -- jim homes.

there is a brilliant new book on the election of 1826 and there is brilliant essays written by him on the election of 1800. there is a history of the party system that is only one chapter on 1800 and has less detail than what i gave you this evening. if you want to know something about the delegates and how it , it is a good sort of textbook summary of the buildup of party differences, but it is not really a story of the election of 1800. >> there are books being written and bloodenealogy types and a lot of people do not realize this did come up at the

election. people didn't know about it. can you speak on that? mr. o'shaughnessy: it suddenly was referred to in this election, but very bleakly. it came up later. in many ways audley through jefferson. jefferson, before the election of 1800 has started to work with who is oftentor described in the textbooks as a scottish alcoholic, which i think probably, obviously, he had a way with words and was a but political communicator marvelous in terms of negative advertising. he and jefferson fell out after calendar was and the first to talk or he openly hemmings.ai

it was the subject of a cartoon and was used by jefferson's opponent. how complete is the archival record of that election and how much of it has been pieced together by academic supposition with filling in the blanks? mr. o'shaughnessy: i think the archival records are good. negative most of the advertising is conducted to the newspapers and most of the newspapers have been saved. congress is one of the great repositories of american newspapers, it is actually not the library of congress. editor thated by an had been active during the american revolution and began a paper called the massachusetts

by. spy. he kept collections of what was going on in continued the collection. the institution in massachusetts still continues and has most of the newspapers. you know, jefferson was very careful with what he wrote about. he was always aware his correspondence would be used for his biography and it would affect his legacy. wrote to medicine. -- madison. he was aware his letters would be open and read. postmaster, whoever, people would read these things and re-seal them. some feel madison has never got his full due.

theas madison leading opposition. while jefferson was vice president, he spent very little time in washington other than going into vote. it was madison that took the lead. madison very much played a secondary role, highly monroe,ve as with both very good proteges. yes. i should probably wait for the microphone people. yes. >> did the republicans really consider repealing some of hamilton's economic programs and the election of 1800? mr. o'shaughnessy: jefferson let the alien sedition act expire.

he could not do anything about the national bank charter, which should not come up until madison who did let the bank lapse for a period. he never tried to dismantle hamilton's financial system. cross-dressing, a phrase that goes on the great deal. saying, "we quoted are all republicans, which is regarded as a great overture of his former opponents. the real truth is, he regarded them as an aberration. he thought he created the one party government which really did represent the interests of the american people. he never intended to create the opposition.

he fought to his dying day -- thought to his dying day that he created the one party that could embrace and represent america. he did retain a lot of federalists components and did not try to dismantle hamilton's financial system. it was the dividing line in american policy, the issue of banks. these have been the same issues that divided britain which had gone to this much earlier in the mid-18th century. the national debt was a huge issue for britain and one of the reasons they taxed america. read that the party, jefferson's party was referred to as the democratic-republicans are it is th area did is that

correct? mr. o'shaughnessy: jackson simply call it in -- called it the democratic party. the party eventually splits. what i think is amusing is the modern-day republican party, modern-day democrats actually , andhave the same roots obviously the republican party wisconsin justn before the civil war, but certainly it saw some of its nntecedents and jefferson --i jefferson in its earlier period. government, the

republicans at lincoln and the democrats needed someone. nickelon was put on the in the jefferson memorial is built in washington. >> i am going to take the prerogative of the last question which is to ask you something that we are not supposed to ask you historian which is a counterfactual. if our good friend, the delegate vote,elaware does not what happens? play this out? are we still waiting on the final resolution of this voting? mr. o'shaughnessy: that could be the real crisis. i mentioned at the beginning of the talk, and i should have repeated it. james monroe honored the virginia militia to stand guard as did thomas mckean in pennsylvania. the talk is that the selection was stolen. burr himself was somewhat

elusive. he does not seem to discourage the possibility that he might be president. of course, he was not a particular friend of jefferson . vote, burr did say he had no interest in it should go to jefferson. i think that was the most political reply. he was 14 years younger than jefferson, 44 at the time of the election so he could look to think that there may be another opportunity. >> thank you. [applause] mr. o'shaughnessy: thank you very much.

announcer: you are watching "american history tv" all weekend, every weekend on c-span3. to join the conversation, like us on facebook at c-span history. announcer: next on american history tv, history professor lance sussman discusses emanuel celler who served in the u.s. house from 1923 to 1973. in the 50 minute talk, he details his career long fight against immigration restrictions in the united states, culminating a passage of the immigration act of 1965. the lecture is part of a two-day symposium hosted by the u.s. capitol historical society on the history of immigration. >> the next speaker is lance two hats in wears fe