The American Montfort (1806–07 election)

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

Improved relations with France and victory over the corsairs of Tunis, Algiers, and Tripoli characterized the foreign policy of the second Gallatin—Madison administration, whose efforts to protect American trade with Europe amidst the war raging between Great Britain and Napoleonic France yielded mixed results in the period from 1804 to 1807. The jewel of their labors was the 1804 acquisition of the Louisiana Territory from France, which doubled the size of the country with a single stroke of a pen resolved long-standing tensions regarding American merchant access to the port of New Orleans. Peace with Britain proved more elusive, as continued American trade with the Continent inspired fury in the Court of St. James, and American merchant vessels crossing the Atlantic became frequent prey of the Royal Navy.

Domestically, the events of the next three years were closely entwined with the decline and fall of Aaron Burr, who responded to the defeat of his faction in the 1803 general election by dueling and killing the man he held most responsible: former Prime Minister and chieftain of Federalism Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton's death at Burr's hand ruined the latter's reputation and exposed him to charges of murder, and the onetime Secretary of War fled west, where he became embroiled in the affair that came to be known as "Burr's Rebellion." The full extent of the role Burr may have played in encouraging discontent among the inhabitants Western Kentucky was never fully known. What seemed clear enough, was that in the spring of 1806, a ragtag company of two-hundred-odd white settlers in Western Kentucky took up arms in rebellion, responding to Indian raids and the perceived encroachment of federal power. The rebels seize several courthouses and expelled what few agents of the central government there were to be found; but by late July, the rebellion had begun to lose momentum, and the remaining rebels surrendered to the Kentucky militia.

Letters produced after the fact suggested Burr had some prior knowledge of the rebels' intentions, and had for a time hoped to use the uprising to detach Western Kentucky from the Union, and by taking New Orleans, establish an empire west of the Appalachians. Hazy plans for an expedition down the Mississippi outlined in correspondence with British agents in Canada fell apart, and Burr took no further action to pursue secession; but the publication of his letters to James Wilkinson, a general in the United States Army and a Spanish agent who for a time encouraged Burr's plans before turning on him, raised a fresh storm of controversy, and facing charges of treason, Burr fled to Texas.

Now the sole leader of his party's caucus as Madison retires to seek the presidency, Gallatin seeks a third mandate from the public as the 1806 elections approach. His Republicans bill themselves as the party of free trade, low taxes, and peace abroad, seeing in newly-acquired western lands the foundations of a republic of independent farmers free from the corrupting influence of markets and speculators. They are opposed by the Federalists, once again led by Timothy Pickering, who decry the purchase of Louisiana as unconstitutional and accuse Gallatin of endangering American trade by needlessly antagonizing the British. There are also the so-called Independent Republicans, led by Kentucky's Henry Clay, of whom no-one is quite sure what to make. The descendants of Burr's dissident faction from 1803, they present an "third something" against the old Federalist and Republican banners, drawing their support from the West and parts of the South: ready to fight either Britain or France should the moment call for it, and broadly sympathetic to Burr's Rebellion, they are as much a personal vehicle for their leaders as an ideological outfit.

Also on the ballot is the presidency: with the incumbent Jefferson determined to retire, the Republicans have thrown their support behind Secretary of State Madison, while the Federalists have again nominated former U.S. Ambassador Charles Cotesworth Pinckney. The Independents are backing the candidacy of Secretary of War George Clinton, despite Clinton's personal rivalry with Burr and his role in suppressing the 1805 rebellion.

Two days. Due to their regional focus, the Independent Republicans are capped at 25 seats (18% of the total).

[Gass3268]

I like my Presidents Republican and my Prime Ministers Federalist.

Madison/Pickering

[Former President tack50]

All Republican, all the time!

[Wikipedia delenda est]

Pinckney/Clay.

[Mr. Smith]

Clinton/Pickering

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

The 1806-07 United States general election
In spite of the furious opposition of the Federalists, who gave their all to topple the Republican administration in 1806, Albert Gallatin proved himself equal to the storm, surviving charges of incompetence and even disloyalty to return to Philadelphia still the largest party in the House.  Two years after Hamilton met his end at Weehawken, the Federalist challenge proved largely impotent in the face of a superior Republican organization, and the party managed only marginal gains, failing even to crest one third of the seats in the lower chamber. Yet the success of the Independent Republicans across the West and Mid-Atlantic, as well as Virginia, where James Monroe led the anti-Madison Republicans, left the government short of an overall majority, forcing Gallatin to offer accommodation to the renegade leaders in the next Congress. The race for president was similarly narrow, Madison besting his rivals by a majority of four votes in the electoral college, the third son of the Old Dominion to occupy the Executive Mansion that had so far seen only Virginians live under its roof.


Republican (Albert Gallatin) 71 seats (-11), 47.0% popular votes
Federalist (Timothy Pickering) 46 seats (+3), 35.0% popular votes
Independent Republican (Henry Clay) 25 seats (+8), 18.0% popular votes


Secretary of State James Madison (Republican, Virginia) 93 electors, 48.0% popular votes
Former U.S. Ambassador Charles Cotesworth Pinckney (Federalist, South Carolina) 42 electors, 24.0% popular votes
Secretary of War George Clinton (Republican, New York) 40 electors, 28.0% popular votes

[Former President tack50]

What happens if no one gets a majority of Electoral votes?

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

I think you accidentally listed the percentage of seats for the House vote instead of the popular vote as labeled ?

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

What happens if no one gets a majority of Electoral votes?

It would go to the House, as IRL—seeing as we elect the House alongside the presidency in these, the House vote would most likely be simulated, unless the result were for some reason unclear.

I think you accidentally listed the percentage of seats for the House vote instead of the popular vote as labeled ?

The popular vote totals have been adjusted versus the poll to account for the seat cap on the IRs—basically I assumed a 1:1 ratio of % of the vote to seat share for the Independents, which gives them 18% of the pv, and evenly distributed the excess between the major parties. Given the strong showing for the IRs in the poll, I'm leaning toward scrapping the cap for the next elections, but it will depend on how the dice roll for 1807–1810 turns out.