The Formative Decade
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olitically
and economically, the 1790s was the nation's formative decade. During this
decade that the United States implemented the new Constitution, adopted a bill of
rights, created its first political parties, and built a new national capital
city in Washington, D.C. The 1790s were also years of rapid economic and
demographic growth. It was during this critical decade that the United States
established the foundations of a prosperous, growing economy.
But
the 1790s were also years of conflict and threats of civil war. At the root of
conflict were two divergent visions of the kind of nation the United States
should become. Alexander Hamilton envisioned an economic and military power
modeled on Britain, with a strong central government, a national bank, a
standing army, and flourishing industry. Thomas Jefferson offered a very
different ideal. He envisioned an agrarian society, without a central bank,
taxes, a standing army, or a large government bureaucracy.
The
Hamiltonians and the Jeffersonians both feared for the future of the new
nation. Hamilton and his supporters were convinced that the Jeffersonians
sought to subvert legitimate government, private property, religion, and
morality, and ally the United States with revolutionary France. The
Jeffersonians believed that Hamilton and his supporters wanted to recreated the
monarchical society that Americans had rebelled against in 1776 and that they
were willing to use the army to suppress the peoples' liberties.
Rarely in American history has political rhetoric been so impassioned. At the end of the decade, the Federalists warned that if Jefferson were elected president, Americans would "see your dwellings in flames" and "female chastity violated."