=Jefferson and His Constitutional Scruples.=—­When the news of this extraordinary event reached the United States, the people were filled with astonishment, and no one was more surprised than Jefferson himself.  He had thought of buying New Orleans and West Florida for a small sum, and now a vast domain had been dumped into the lap of the nation.  He was puzzled.  On looking into the Constitution he found not a line authorizing the purchase of more territory and so he drafted an amendment declaring “Louisiana, as ceded by France,—­a part of the United States.”  He had belabored the Federalists for piling up a big national debt and he could hardly endure the thought of issuing more bonds himself.

In the midst of his doubts came the news that Napoleon might withdraw from the bargain.  Thoroughly alarmed by that, Jefferson pressed the Senate for a ratification of the treaty.  He still clung to his original idea that the Constitution did not warrant the purchase; but he lamely concluded:  “If our friends shall think differently, I shall certainly acquiesce with satisfaction; confident that the good sense of our country will correct the evil of construction when it shall produce ill effects.”  Thus the stanch advocate of “strict interpretation” cut loose from his own doctrine and intrusted the construction of the Constitution to “the good sense” of his countrymen.

=The Treaty Ratified.=—­This unusual transaction, so favorable to the West, aroused the ire of the seaboard Federalists.  Some denounced it as unconstitutional, easily forgetting Hamilton’s masterly defense of the bank, also not mentioned in the Constitution.  Others urged that, if “the howling wilderness” ever should be settled, it would turn against the East, form new commercial connections, and escape from federal control.  Still others protested that the purchase would lead inevitably to the dominance of a “hotch potch of wild men from the Far West.”  Federalists, who thought “the broad back of America” could readily bear Hamilton’s consolidated debt, now went into agonies over a bond issue of less than one-sixth of that amount.  But in vain.  Jefferson’s party with a high hand carried the day.  The Senate, after hearing the Federalist protest, ratified the treaty.  In December, 1803, the French flag was hauled down from the old government buildings in New Orleans and the Stars and Stripes were hoisted as a sign that the land of Coronado, De Soto, Marquette, and La Salle had passed forever to the United States.

[Illustration:  THE UNITED STATES IN 1805]

By a single stroke, the original territory of the United States was more than doubled.  While the boundaries of the purchase were uncertain, it is safe to say that the Louisiana territory included what is now Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, South Dakota, and large portions of Louisiana, Minnesota, North Dakota, Colorado, Montana, and Wyoming.  The farm lands that the friends of “a little America” on the seacoast declared a hopeless wilderness were, within a hundred years, fully occupied and valued at nearly seven billion dollars—­almost five hundred times the price paid to Napoleon.