Word: jefferson
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National self-interest quickly drove the two countries apart. In 1800 Napoléon Bonaparte compelled Spain to give him the Louisiana Territory, which he planned to make the hub of a New World empire. President Thomas Jefferson was so alarmed, he considered making an alliance with Britain to drive the French out. But when the French troops en route to occupying Louisiana died of yellow fever in Haiti, Napoléon decided to cut his losses and sold the territory to the U.S. for the bargain price of $15 million. By 1861, however, Napoléon's nephew Napol?...
Today's Democratic Party appears to be taking a page from Jefferson's playbook by contesting the religious vote. In 2006 Democrats successfully ran an ordained minister for Ohio Governor against Ken Blackwell, a darling of the religious right, and a pro-life Catholic for Senator in Pennsylvania against fellow Catholic Rick Santorum. Now, as the numerous public declarations of faith made during this campaign season suggest, the party's leading candidates for President seem to have learned this lesson too and are, no doubt, praying for a similar outcome...
Such tactics had worked in 1796, but this time Jefferson's supporters rushed to his defense. In their party publications, they characterized Jefferson as "an adorer of our God" and "a real Christian." They wooed disaffected Protestants, Catholics and Jews by contrasting their candidate's defense of religious pluralism with Adams' purported support for an evangelical establishment. And turning the tables on their accusers, they also questioned Adams' faith. Despite his bow to civil religion by invoking God's name on public occasions, Adams differed little from Jefferson in his personal beliefs. Both men inclined toward Deism or Unitarianism, though...
Then, as now, many Christians saw biblical beliefs as the foundation for law and liberty. "If our religion were gone, our state of society would perish with it," declared Jefferson's chief evangelical critic, Yale president Timothy Dwight. The Jeffersonians bit back. "Now I don't know that John Adams is a hypocrite, or Jefferson a Deist," one wrote, "yet supposing they are, I am of the opinion the last ought to be preferred to the first [because] a secret enemy is worse than an open and avowed...
...dueling charges largely neutralized the religion issue, which was all Jefferson needed, given public concerns over other Federalist policies. Both political parties reached out to Christian voters. Federalists praised Adams' public support for religious institutions; their opponents trumpeted Jefferson's passion for religious liberty. Each side claimed its candidate was a Christian--or at least as good a Christian as the other guy. By all accounts, Evangelicals still voted overwhelmingly for Adams but not in sufficient numbers to overcome the popular surge for Jefferson's party, which captured the presidency and both houses of Congress. Adams later blamed his defeat...