Why is the election of 1800 important
The Election of 1800 Explained
ding-dong
learning's back hey guys welcome to hip
Hughes history in the next few minutes
we're going to take a look at one of the
most exciting and contested elections in
American history the election of 1800 so
let's take a look at the candidates
let's take a look at the issues the
winner and some of the big ideas that
transcend that election and really
affect American history throughout its
course
so video let's go let the learning begin
let the fighting begin the auction of
1800 sometimes referred to as the
revolution of 1800 that's the first big
idea it's called a revolution because
for the first time in American history
we have a peaceful transfer of power we
have an outgoing Federalist Party and
we're going to have the incoming
Democratic Republican Party and its
bloodless and in many European countries
when you would have an election and the
other side would win the other game
would win there would be blood you know
spilling on the streets but we call it
the revolution of 1800 because it's a
transfer a peaceful transfer of power
but on one side we have the Federalists
the Federalists are generally seen as
kind of the northern faction of the
country John Adams and his choice was
actually a southerner from South
Carolina
George pickney and what they basically
believed in and you know Washington was
a federalist and Adams is a federalist
they believed in strong centralized
power they're much more pro-british they
were in favor of kind of trade deals
with England and they're not big fans of
the French the French Revolution scares
the hell out of them and they blame was
in a quasi war with the French over the
XYZ affair they're also for higher
tariffs which protect northern
manufacturers and they also responsible
for the Alien and Sedition Act which was
a huge law that was passed under Adams
that was seen by civil libertarians
especially in the south of the southern
governments as a violation of the
Constitution not only in terms of free
speech with the kind of the sedition
part but in an immigration kind of way
and it kind of pissed off you know a lot
of immigration immigrants and
immigration advocates because it starts
to clamp down I think for political
reasons against the Republican Party the
Democratic Republican Party and I
believe in New York there was only one
democratic
public and pro newspaper left because of
the fear of being you know sectionalized
or arrested for speech against the
federalist government but yeah yeah on
the other side we have Thomas Jefferson
of Virginia and we have Aaron Burr of
New York and these are the Democratic
Republicans and sometimes they'll be
called Republicans but I like to reserve
that for Abraham Lincoln in the
Republican Party but this Democratic
Republican Party is more kind of
representative of the southern interests
there against tariffs there against the
National Bank they see the alien
Sedition Act as you know kind of like
you know tyranny what they expected from
a centralized government so therefore
decentralized power they're also much
more likely to support the French
they're not saying they're all pro
French Revolution but they're definitely
kind of that more radicalized element or
anti governmental element of the country
so this is a repeat of 1796 I don't know
if I said that before and they run again
so let's take a look at the results now
all right we basically know we have a
northern interest Federalists side and
we have the Democratic Republican Party
kind of bite you know represented by
Jefferson and burr that are trying to
win so there's another player in this
that we haven't mentioned because you
think that would be enough to have
Federalists running against Democratic
Republicans but the Federalist Party has
a problem and his name is Alex and I
don't mean Alex Trebek I'm talking about
Alexander Hamilton Alexander Hamilton
and sometimes his group of allies were
called the high Federalists because they
are much more in a what do you want to
call it an ideological camp when it
comes to Federalist ideas like we were
talking about before centralized power
and I didn't mention sales tax but
raising money for standing armies and
you know really using the force of the
government not only economically but
through foreign policy to get what they
wanted and he doesn't dig John Adams he
sees John Adams is a little wishy-washy
as maybe maybe it's a personal thing I
think that you know Hamilton had a lot
of influence in the Washington
administration before the affair but
nevertheless he doesn't feel as though
he's going to have you know his marbles
being counted
John Adams so he actually starts to
write oh and writes a letter it releases
a series of letters that are trying to
convince people to to vote against John
Adams and actually to throw their
support in the electoral college for
pickney who is supposed to be the vice
president so this causes kind of a rift
in the Federalist Party and I think it
backfires I mean not only is it going to
cost the Federalist Party votes but it
also backlashes on Hamilton and I think
even kind of a hastens his uh his demise
in the political world we'll see in a
few years later that Aaron Burr who
you're going to you're going to see
Hamilton go after in a moment again is
going to actually shoot Hamilton Aaron
Burr shot Hamilton so let's take a look
at the results and I think it's really
important that we take a moment to
explain a big difference back then in
the electoral college namely the twelfth
amendment today we understand that when
you vote you vote for a ticket you vote
for president and vice president and I'm
not going to reacquaint oral college but
the electors in each state also today
vote for a ticket they put their support
behind Obama Obama Biden or they put
their sorbonne Romney Paul but back then
before the twelfth amendment you
actually cast two ballots as an elector
so you go in and you would vote for
Obama and Biden and the way that it
worked is when they counted the
electoral votes at the end of the day in
the electoral college whoever had the
most votes was president and the most
second vote the second you know most
votes was vice president so the plan all
along they figured out how to
gerrymander this system was that you
would have your electors cast their
votes both for you know the president
and vice president and then you have one
dude one elector who would vote for a
different vice president so instead of
voting for Thomas Jefferson and Aaron
Burr they would vote for Thomas
Jefferson and Luke Skywalker and then
when you counted the votes if you won
the electoral college it would be
Jefferson and burr fail they messed it
up they messed it up the federal is dead
it the Federalists you know one of their
electors voted for John Jay I believe
you know in anticipation
they won that you know it would be you
know Adams and picnic they messed it up
the democratic-republicans messed it up
so at the end of the day we end up with
73 electoral votes and a tie between
Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr so what
happens in electoral tie guys you
remember this it goes to the House of
Representatives well that's great news
right because the Democratic Republicans
had a banner year they you know won the
House of Representatives so they're all
on the same page they'll pick Jefferson
they'll call today they'll go home and
take a nap fail the way the Constitution
works
it's the sitting Congress the sitting
House of Representatives so that's a pro
Federalist Party House of
Representatives know what to do yeah so
they they want to screw Jefferson they
don't want Jefferson they're nemesis you
know their number one enemy to be the
president of the United States so they
start casting their ballot and each time
we find out that we can't get a winner
that Aaron Burr and Thomas Jefferson are
not getting the needed majority to be
the winner so they cast a second ballot
then the House of Representatives has to
do a third and a fifth and a tenth
they went through 35 ballots guys 35
ballots before enter Alex comes back in
and Hamilton convinces some of his
allies in the Congress some of the other
Federalists to support Thomas Jefferson
the nemesis because he believed that
Aaron Burr was untrustworthy that Aaron
Burr didn't have character and even
though he disagreed with Jefferson on
all of these finer points on foreign
policy and taxes and tariffs and
centralized power that he could be
trusted so on the 36th ballot we get
President Thomas Jefferson how do you
like that so in terms of Big Ideas we
have a few big ones right let's just
review really quick first of all it's
caused a revolution
no they view hundreds and we understand
that that that's party change the
peaceful party change is the reason why
we call it the the revolution number two
we really see a cementing of factions in
this electoral map that we're really
going to have a democratic Republican
Party that is you know kind of a
southern rooted party and although the
Federalists are going to be around
forever that faction of north of the
Northeast is going to be a pro-business
manufacturing
centralized power later it will transfer
to the Whigs and then down the road to
the Republican Party and it'll it'll
change but nevertheless I think kind of
the realignment of the map or the
alignment of the map is something that's
really important I mean also the twelfth
amendment the twelfth amendment is going
to correct that constitutional boo-boo
who called these guys geniuses I mean
what are you talking about really the
second guy placed could it become what's
ridiculous
so the twelfth amendment is going to
change that and now we're not going to
have that problem anymore although it's
also important the last thing to say is
that this shows you that the electoral
college is truly an indirect example of
democracy in direct democracy right who
chose the president it wasn't the people
directly it was through the House of
Representatives so remember that can
still happen if you have more than one
two political parties running for the
electing the electoral college if you
split that bad boy up it would be the
sinning House of Representatives that
would choose the president so if we had
an electoral tide today right 269 to 269
it would be President Romney because it
would be the sitting House Republicans
in the House of Representatives that
would choose the president so we hope
that you learn something you know that
1800 I mean gosh you know it ends up a
guy gets shot you know there's an affair
there's dirty letter-writing there's you
know qey claims of you're not an
American my god it hasn't changed has it
so dingdong guys learning is done so
there we go guys make sure if you
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sing yeah all right guys that's it see
you later
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