Cathcon's History Paper Thread

[CathKhan]

In AP History class, We have to do a paper on anything from Columbus to 1800. My teacher (we'll call him Harry Miller from now  on) kept pushing the 1800 election. I liked elections, but when I went to sign up for it, it had been taken. Therefore, I just went back four years and chose the 1796 election. Not sure what I'll use this thread for, but this is the placeholder for interesting facts I find, discussion, and maybe asking for possible sources.

[CathKhan]

Whoa! Just discovered that apparently Maine was once part of Massachusetts.

[CathKhan]

Okay, does anybody know how to cite this place? I'm planning on using this as my site of reference for the election results, found here. There're a couple of categories on the citing guide that I'm not sure how to fill.

The guide:
Editor, Author, or Compiler name (if available). Name of site.
Version number. Name of institution/organization affiliated with this site (sponsor or publisher), date of resource creation (if available). Medium of Publication. Date of Access.

What I have so far is:
Editor: Dave Liep
Name of Site: Dave Liep's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections
Version Number: _____________
Name of institution: _________________________
Date of Resource Creation: October 22nd, 2000
Medium of Publication: Web
Date of Access: September 18th, 2011

Anyone know how to fill in the two empty spaces?

[Senator Ben]

I don't think everything needs to be filled in, if nothing is available for it.

[CathKhan]

I don't think everything needs to be filled in, if nothing is available for it.

Yeah I just ended up skipping over those two.

[shua]

Whoa! Just discovered that apparently Maine was once part of Massachusetts.

Yep - from the 17th century until the Missouri Compromise.

[WillK]

Things I find interesting:

- SC casting its votes for Jefferson and Pinckney, even though they were opposed to each other

- more unity on the Federalists part and Pinckney would have been VP or even Pres.

[Vasall des Midas]

The extreme fractiousness / lack of unity / backstabbing that led to Jefferson's election as VP. To what extent did that lead to the opposite extreme at the 1800 election (which of course caused a constitutional crisis and then the bastardized joke of an EC system you've had ever since as a result of that crisis)?

[CathKhan]

My teacher told me the day the notecards were due that we needed a thesis with them. I hadn't yet prepared a thesis as I felt I didn't really know enough. Looking through my notecards quickly, I came up with one on the fly, basically stating "The 1796 Election would not have happened as we know it without the teams of John and Abigail Adams, and Thomas Jefferson and James Madison", meaning that without Abigail and Madison, we wouldn't have the same election that we have today. Tomorrow, my outline is due. I didn't find out about it until about an hour ago, so this, in case anyone on this forum cares, is my outline. I'm only putting it up because I actually typed it on this forum due to Microsoft Word's stupid auto-formatting messing me up.


I. Introductory Paragraph
     A. Vague History of the Adams-Jefferson Team
     B. The two new teams
II. The Adams Team and the Candidacy of John Adams
     A. Personal History of the two
          1. John Adams
          2. Abigail Adams
          3. Meeting and Marriage
     B. The Revolution (1765-1777)
          1. Build up to Revolution
               a) The Stamp Act
               b) The Boston Massacre
          2. Actions at the Continental Congress (1774-1777)
               a) Meeting Jefferson and impression
      C. The Revolution, Diplomat, and Politician (1777-1789)
          1. Ambassador to France and to the Netherlands (1782-1788)
          2. The 1789 Election
               a) Results
     D. The Vice-Presidency and Preparation for 1796
          1. Results and Adams' side of the story
III. The Jefferson Team and the Candidacy of Thomas Jefferson
     A. History of Jefferson up to and including the Revolution
          1. Early Life
          2. Continental Congress, Governor of Virginia, and Revolution
               a) Second Continental Congress (1775-1776)
                    i. Meeting Adams
                    ii. The Declaration
               a) State Legislator and Governor of Virginia (1776-1781)
                    i. Meeting Madison, history of Madison
               b) Short History of Madison
     D. Further Political Life (1781-196)
          1. Delegate to the Congress of the Confederation of Virginia (1783-1784)
          2. Ambassador to France (1785-1789)
          3. Secretary of State
               a) 1792 Election
          4. The Jefferson Campaign and the work of Madison
               a) The mentality of Jefferson
IV. Summary of the Election
     A. The Waiting
          1. The Adams Home
               a) Abigail consoling Adams
          2. Jefferson's deniability
          3. Rumors begin to float
          4. The final results
V. Conclusion Paragraph
     A. Referring to specific examples in preceding text
     B. The effects on history
     C. Closing Statement

[Senator Ben]

Seems good; if perhaps a bit much.

[CathKhan]

Seems good; if perhaps a bit much.

I have no idea how much he wants it detailed (I left the only paper he gave us on it at school as I assumed we had no homework), so I just went with what I had and tried to do as good as I could on the fly.

[The Mikado]

The idea that John and Abigail Adams had an analogous relationship to Thomas Jefferson and James Madison is certainly one that will raise eyebrows. 

[Sibboleth]

I recommend writing it from a Marxist or Post-Structuralist position. Just to see the reaction.

[CathKhan]

The idea that John and Abigail Adams had an analogous relationship to Thomas Jefferson and James Madison is certainly one that will raise eyebrows. 

It may... it may.

I recommend writing it from a Marxist or Post-Structuralist position. Just to see the reaction.

I actually have a friend who got one of his sources from marxist.com

[Sibboleth]

I actually have a friend who got one of his sources from marxist.com

Er... wow. Trottery.

[CathKhan]

I actually have a friend who got one of his sources from marxist.com

Er... wow. Trottery.

Actually no. He just happened to find information on marxist.com or something like that. From what I know, he's a Republican.

[CathKhan]

Two. More. Paragraphs. And I'm done with the rough draft. If only I can keep my motivation and train of thought for the next half-hour.

[Lief]

I recommend writing it from a Marxist or Post-Structuralist position. Just to see the reaction.

I make a point of trying to write all my English literature papers from a Marxist perspective. It's pretty much the only thing that makes ten pages about Jane Austen bearable.

[I Am Feeblepizza.]

It would be very interesting if perhaps you could post the resulting paper in this thread.

[CathKhan]

It would be very interesting if perhaps you could post the resulting paper in this thread.

Okay then. I have no idea how good it is in others' eyes as my teacher just checked for length on the rough draft, but it should be up shortly.

[CathKhan]

NOTE: The outline posted here is not the one I ended up handing in. It turns out my teacher has some sort of format that seems to defy common sense, so I'm posting the counter-argument even before my thesis. On the counter-argument, that alone is bullsh**t as I had to practically fabricate one. Without further ado, here goes.


Christopher Clark
Mr. Miller
A. P. United States History
October 7th, 2011

John, Abigail, Thomas, James, and the 1796 Election
[Yeah, it's a gay stupid title, I know. I try to go beyond just having "the 1796 Election", and I doubt one of my more smart-ass-esque titles would've helped me]

   On September 17th, 1796, the signal for the 1796 Presidential race to start was dropped from on high as newspapers carried President George Washington’s farewell address and he bowed out of the race for President. This left two men, formerly friends, Vice-President John Adams and former Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, the leading candidates for the Presidency (McCullough, 462). The two had a long history, tracing back to 1775 when both were delegates to the Continental Congress. Adams and many other delegates had heard of Jefferson’s reputation even before he had arrived and there was much talk about the young Virginian who had become known as an advocate of colonial rights. While Jefferson remained mostly silent in Congress, his decisiveness and leadership soon gained him the favor of Adams who had been impressed by what he saw  (Cunningham, 36-37). This friendship would continue up to and past Jefferson’s drafting of the Declaration of Independence in 1776 (Cunningham, 46-47). However, the friendship would not continue eternally. It would be broken up over disagreements as to the role of government, each man’s opinion of Thomas Payne (Cunningham, 167-168), the French Revolution (McCullough, 437-438, 443-444,), philosophy (McCullough, 450), and the politics of the day. Ellis writes of Jefferson’s support of the French Revolution, something Adams saw as having nothing to do with the American Revolution, as the last straw in the already strained Adams-Jefferson relationship (170). With those many conflicts came the forging of two rival teams that would, come 1796 and later 1800, square off.
   John and Abigail Adams had been married since 1764. Throughout the writings of David McCullough, the private thoughts of John Adams are most revealed through his correspondence with his wife Abigail. With issues ranging from the various elections (458), to Jefferson and the French Revolution (442-443), to Adams’ own inner, troubled emotions (464). Come the 1796 election, John Adams would be less of a candidate, and more half of a team as it was he and his wife, Abigail, who worked and strove for the Presidency. On the other side were Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. Meeting in the Virginia Assembly in 1775, Jefferson soon gained an ally in his beliefs in freedom and equality (Cunningham, 55). This pair, while not nearly as magical or dynamic as the Adams-Jefferson team had been during the days of the Revolution, found its strength in seamless efficiency and effectiveness (Ellis, 172), and would in fact go on to create one of the nation’s first, and in time most powerful, political parties (Cunningham, 172).
   The seeds of political parties would come about following the end of the First Congress in 1791. With groups aligning in support of Hamilton—and strangely enough, not in support of Washington, Washington was not a party man—and groups aligning in opposition to Hamilton and more in support of Jeffersonian ideals, the stage would soon be set for a two-party system with Thomas Jefferson and James Madison leading the opposition, referred to by many sources as the Republicans, the modern discussion counts them as the Democratic-Republicans (Cunningham, 171-174). While it was true that “from 1794 to 1979, Thomas Jefferson operated as the informal leader of what would become the nation’s first opposition political party, the Democratic-Republicans”, and it is true “Jefferson allowed his name to be nominated by a caucus of Democratic-Republican leaders who were against John Adams’s run for the presidency” (Miller Center), the workings of James Madison go unaccounted for. The same is to be said for the McCullough’s statement “Adams and Jefferson were the leading candidates in what was the first presidential election with two parties in opposition”.  While McCullough will give Abigail her credit, that statement alone does not do enough to explain the two rival teams—not merely the two rival candidates—of the 1796 election.
   In all truth, the 1796 election was not to be fought by two candidates, but by two teams as the presence of Abigail Adams and James Madison in the election proved just as important as the presence of the candidates themselves. Were it not for Abigail and Madison, the 1796 election could have and maybe would have been entirely different from the election recorded in this world’s history books.
   “Adams’ partner in the dance was Abigail, whose political instincts rivaled Madison’s legendary skills and whose knowledge of her husband’s emotional makeup surpassed all competitors. She had always been his ultimate confidante, the person he could trust with his self-doubts, vanities, and overflowing opinions.” Such words, coming from page 174 of Joseph B Ellis’s “Founding Brothers” seem to contain all that is needed to say about the role Abigail would play in both the 1796 election as well as the political life of John Adams. Come the year 1796 and the gearing up of the partisan newspaper machines in preparation for the match to take place between the perceived front-runners Jefferson and Adams, Adams would quickly turn to his wife, begging of her support in the election. At last receiving her support, the Adams team would move into high gear, setting up electoral counts estimating Adams’ chances (Ellis, 176-177). From the beginning of his candidacy, the beginning of the Fourth Congress starting in March, 1795, Adams would be confiding in Abigail as he had for many years and as he would for many years (McCullough, 458).
   

[CathKhan]

NOTE: One of the requirements at the end of that paper was a "killer quote". Fact is, there is no quote that someone said that somehow matches exactly what I'm trying to say, and none that I found in my research. So if you find some odd Abigail Adams quote at the bottom, know why it's there.



Across the aisle, Madison scurried about in Virginia, preparing the way for Jefferson. Despite the claims, true as they may be that Jefferson allowed himself to be nominated by the Democratic-Republicans (Miller Center), that fails utterly to describe the composition of what would become the Jefferson candidacy, headed mainly by James Madison (Ellis, 173). Since his resignation as Secretary of State on December 31st, 1793 (Cunningham, 194), Jefferson seemed determined to keep out of politics. Resigning himself to Monticello and focusing on such things as crop rotation and expanding Monticello to designs he had seen in France, Jefferson’s only political contact with the outside world was through Madison. Jefferson’s mentality is a subject of particular interest. He seemed to be politically ambitious yet to deny his political ambitions to even himself, instead choosing to ignore politics altogether even as part of his mind churned away at political news and events (Ellis, 171-173). This is why the role of Madison is so crucial, even more crucial than the role that Abigail played as Adams’ advisor, confidant, and friend. Cunningham himself proposes that Madison went to work crafting the Jefferson campaign without even Jefferson’s consent, though it is believed Jefferson knew of what was going on in the world around him (200). Without Madison, there very well may have been no Jefferson candidacy and given the affect Jefferson had on American politics, this crucial detail is one that had a very profound and significant affect on American politics to this day.
   As results trickled in throughout November, December, and into the next year, Adams remained high strung. Treasury Secretary and political manipulator Alexander Hamilton, an enemy of both Jefferson and Adams despite sharing party identification with Adams, had been pushing Federalist electors to support Federalist Vice-Presidential candidate Thomas Pinckney over Adams. “For a while, when it appeared that Pinckney might win and Adams come in second, the Sage of Quincy exploded”. When he had set out on his mission for the Presidency earlier that year, he had viewed the Presidency as his right. “Why else had he been willing to languish in the shadow of the vice presidency for those godforsaken years if not to use it as a stepping-stone to the prize itself?” Adams feared, to the point of irrationality, the possibility of a tie in the electoral vote, or possibly a loss, saying that he would resign the Vice-President should he come in second place (Ellis, 176-178). With Abigail only able to comfort him through correspondence, he at first claimed, “Fear takes no hold of me”. However, this was not to last as he soon fell into yet another bout of depression, writing on December 7th, 1796, the he could pronounce Thomas Jefferson to be the next President of the United States, “But here alone abed, by my fireside, nobody to speak to, pouring upon my disgrace and future prospects—this is ugly.” (McCullough, 464) At Monticello, Jefferson would be relayed information by his trusted lieutenant Madison (Ellis, 178) and would take up correspondence with him (Cunningham, 203). While publicly he would still deny his candidacy for President, by the time the election was taking place he was well aware (Ellis, 178). In the end, with 13 candidates receiving electoral votes (Liep) and Adams having gained back confidence with the news that he would soon win (McCullough, 464), Adams would scrape by with 71 electoral votes to Jefferson’s 68 (Ellis, 178), one over the needed amount for a majority (Liep), and a three vote difference that Jefferson had in fact predicted two months before it became official (Ellis, 178). And all throughout the harrowing election, filled with the possibilities of either a Pinckney or a Jefferson victory, Abigail stood steadfastly by Adams whether in person or in correspondence and Madison remained Jefferson’s informant and political organizer.
   The 1796 election was more than merely a contest between two men. It was only thanks to the work of them as well as their partners in their endeavors—Adams with his loyal spouse Abigail and Jefferson with his lieutenant and political ally Madison—that the election happened as it did. John Adams would serve as President of the United States from March 4th, 1797 to March 4th, 1781, to be defeated by Jefferson four years later in an 1800 rematch (Moore, 21, 27). Perhaps the best words are those of Abigail to Adams following Adams’ eventual victory. “The cold has been more severe than I can ever before recollect. It has frozen the ink in my pen, and chilled the blood in my veins, but not the warmth of my affection for him for whom my heart beats in the still calm of Peacefield, and the turbulent scenes in which he is about to engage.”
 
Appendix: The Final Results
From Dave Liep’s Atlas of U. S. Presidential Elections:
http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/index.html

-Vice-President John Adams (Federalist-Massachusetts) 71 electoral votes
-Former Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson (Democratic-Republican-Virginia) 68 electoral votes
-Ambassador to the United Kingdom Thomas Pinckney (Federalist-South Carolina) 59 electoral votes
-Senator Aaron Burr (Democratic-Republican-New York) 30 electoral votes
-Governor Samuel Adams (Democratic-Republican-Massachusetts) 15 electoral votes
-Chief Justice Oliver Ellsworth (Federalist-Connecticut) 11 electoral votes
-Former Governor George Clinton (Democratic-Republican-New York) 7 electoral votes
-Former Chief Justice John Jay (Federalist-New York) 5 electoral votes
-Chief Justice James Iredell (Federalist-North Carolina) 3 electoral votes
-Former Governor Samuel Johnson (Federalist-North Carolina) 2 electoral votes
-President George Washington (Federalist-Virginia) 2 electoral votes
-Senator John Henry (Democratic-Republican-Maryland) 2 electoral votes
-Minister to France Charles Cotesworth Pinckney (Federalist-South Carolina) 1 electoral vote
 
Works Cited
1.   Moore, Kathryn. The American President. United States: Barnes & Nobles Inc.    2007.Print.
2.   Dave Liep. Dave Liep’s Atlas of U. S. Presidential Elections. 10/22/2010. Web.    9/18/11
3.   McCullough, David. John Adams. United States: Simon & Schuster, 2001. Print.
4.   Cunningham Jr., Noble. The Pursuit of Reason: The Life of Thomas Jefferson.    United States: Louisiana State University Press, 1988. Print.
5.   Ellis, Joseph. Founding Brother: The Revolution Generation. United States:    Alfred A. Knopf, 2001. Print.
6.   millercenter.org. Miller Center, University of Virginia, 2011. Web. October 4th,    2011.

[CathKhan]

Also, for those of you interested in what I consider a better paper, here is my 10th grade English paper on policy during the Cold War. It's a much more partisan paper and many of you may find it to merely be the ramblings of some uneducated anti-communist kid in Michigan. I admittedly barely touched on the eighties at all in it, but I remain proud of it.

[I Am Feeblepizza.]

Is it bad that I write this kind of stuff in my free time?

[Stranger in a strange land]

Okay, does anybody know how to cite this place? I'm planning on using this as my site of reference for the election results, found here. There're a couple of categories on the citing guide that I'm not sure how to fill.

The guide:
Editor, Author, or Compiler name (if available). Name of site.
Version number. Name of institution/organization affiliated with this site (sponsor or publisher), date of resource creation (if available). Medium of Publication. Date of Access.

What I have so far is:
Editor: Dave Liep
Name of Site: Dave Liep's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections
Version Number: _____________
Name of institution: _________________________
Date of Resource Creation: October 22nd, 2000
Medium of Publication: Web
Date of Access: September 18th, 2011

Anyone know how to fill in the two empty spaces?

Name of Institution would be Dave Liep's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections. I've seen his maps published in newspapers with that name as the source. Plus, that's the official name given on the about the Atlas page: http://uselectionatlas.org/BOTTOM/about.php.