=The Protective Tariff of 1816.=—­The Republicans supplemented the Bank by another Federalist measure—­a high protective tariff.  Clay viewed it as the beginning of his “American system” of protection.  Calhoun defended it on national principles.  For this sudden reversal of policy the young Republicans were taunted by some of their older party colleagues with betraying the “agricultural interest” that Jefferson had fostered; but Calhoun refused to listen to their criticisms.  “When the seas are open,” he said, “the produce of the South may pour anywhere into the markets of the Old World....  What are the effects of a war with a maritime power—­with England?  Our commerce annihilated ... our agriculture cut off from its accustomed markets, the surplus of the farmer perishes on his hands....  The recent war fell with peculiar pressure on the growers of cotton and tobacco and the other great staples of the country; and the same state of things will recur in the event of another war unless prevented by the foresight of this body....  When our manufactures are grown to a certain perfection, as they soon will be under the fostering care of the government, we shall no longer experience these evils.”  With the Republicans nationalized, the Federalist party, as an organization, disappeared after a crushing defeat in the presidential campaign of 1816.

=Monroe and the Florida Purchase.=—­To the victor in that political contest, James Monroe of Virginia, fell two tasks of national importance, adding to the prestige of the whole country and deepening the sense of patriotism that weaned men away from mere allegiance to states.  The first of these was the purchase of Florida from Spain.  The acquisition of Louisiana let the Mississippi flow “unvexed to the sea”; but it left all the states east of the river cut off from the Gulf, affording them ground for discontent akin to that which had moved the pioneers of Kentucky to action a generation earlier.  The uncertainty as to the boundaries of Louisiana gave the United States a claim to West Florida, setting on foot a movement for occupation.  The Florida swamps were a basis for Indian marauders who periodically swept into the frontier settlements, and hiding places for runaway slaves.  Thus the sanction of international law was given to punitive expeditions into alien territory.

The pioneer leaders stood waiting for the signal.  It came.  President Monroe, on the occasion of an Indian outbreak, ordered General Jackson to seize the offenders, in the Floridas, if necessary.  The high-spirited warrior, taking this as a hint that he was to occupy the coveted region, replied that, if possession was the object of the invasion, he could occupy the Floridas within sixty days.  Without waiting for an answer to this letter, he launched his expedition, and in the spring of 1818 was master of the Spanish king’s domain to the south.