2 Presidency

Following the War of 1812, Monroe was elected president in the election of 1816, and re-elected in 1820. Monroe, the last American Revolutionary War veteran to serve as president, was almost uncontested in his two elections.

Monroe's presidency was later labeled "The Era of Good Feelings", in part because partisan politics were almost nonexistent. The Federalist Party had died out, and the rift between the Democratic Party and the Whig Party had not yet happened. Practically every politician belonged to the Democratic-Republican Party.

Unfortunately these "good feelings" did not endure, although Monroe, his popularity undiminished, followed nationalist policies. Across the facade of nationalism, ugly sectional cracks appeared. A painful economic depression undoubtedly increased the dismay of the people of the Missouri Territory in 1819 when their application for admission to the Union as a slave state failed. An amended bill for gradually eliminating slavery in Missouri precipitated two years of bitter debate in Congress. The Missouri Compromise bill resolved the struggle, pairing Missouri as a slave state with Maine, a free state, and barring slavery north and west of Missouri forever.

Monroe is probably best known for the Monroe Doctrine, which he delivered in his message to Congress on December 2, 1823. In it, he proclaimed the Americas should be free from future European colonization and free from European interference in sovereign countries' affairs. It further stated United States's intention to stay neutral in European wars and wars between European powers and their colonies but to consider any new colonies or interference with independent countries in the Americas as hostile acts toward the United States. Monroe did not begin formally to recognize the young sister republics until 1822, after ascertaining that Congress would vote appropriations for diplomatic missions. He and Secretary of State John Quincy Adams wished to avoid trouble with Spain until it had ceded the Floridas, as was done in 1821.

The United Kingdom, with its powerful navy, also opposed reconquest of Latin America and suggested that the United States join in proclaiming "hands off." Ex-Presidents Jefferson and Madison counseled Monroe to accept the offer, but Secretary Adams advised, "It would be more candid ... to avow our principles explicitly to Russia and France, than to come in as a cock-boat in the wake of the British man-of-war." Monroe accepted Adams's advice. Not only must Latin America be left alone, he warned, but also Russia must not encroach southward on the Pacific coast. ". . . the American continents," he stated, "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 Power." Some 20 years after Monroe died in 1831, this became known as the Monroe Doctrine.

3 Cabinet

OFFICE	NAME	TERM
President	James Monroe	1817–1825
Vice President	Daniel Tompkins	1817–1825
Secretary of State	John Quincy Adams	1817–1825
Secretary of the Treasury	William Crawford	1817–1825
Secretary of War	George Graham	1817
	John C. Calhoun	1817–1825
Attorney General	Richard Rush	1817
	William Wirt	1817–1825
Postmaster General	Return Meigs	1817–1823
	John McLean	1823–1825
Secretary of the Navy	Benjamin Crowninshield	1817–1818
	John C. Calhoun	1818–1819
	Smith Thompson	1819–1823
	Samuel L. Southard	1823–1825

4 Supreme Court appointments

Monroe appointed the following Justices to the Supreme Court of the United States:

• Smith Thompson - 1823

5 See also

• U.S. presidential election, 1816
• U.S. presidential election, 1820
• List of places named for James Monroe

6 External links

• First Inaugural Address
• Second Inaugural Address
• A genealogical profile of the President

Preceded by: James Madison	President of the United States 1817–1825	Succeeded by: John Quincy Adams
Preceded by: Robert Smith	United States Secretary of State 1811–1814, 1815–1817	Succeeded by: John Quincy Adams
Preceded by: John Armstrong, Jr.	United States Secretary of War 1814–1815	Succeeded by: William H. Crawford

Presidents of the United States of America

Washington | J. Adams | Jefferson | Madison | Monroe | J.Q. Adams | Jackson | Van Buren | W. Harrison | Tyler | Polk | Taylor | Fillmore | Pierce | Buchanan | Lincoln | A. Johnson | Grant | Hayes | Garfield | Arthur | Cleveland | B. Harrison | Cleveland | McKinley | T. Roosevelt | Taft | Wilson | Harding | Coolidge | Hoover | F. Roosevelt | Truman | Eisenhower | Kennedy | L. Johnson | Nixon | Ford | Carter | Reagan | G. Bush | Clinton | G.W. Bush

Monroe, James Monroe, James Monroe, James Monroe, James Monroe, James Monroe, James Monroe, James Monroe, James Monroe, James Monroe, James

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