France was the United States' first friend. The 1778 Treaty of Alliance between the two nations secured French military support in the American War for Independence. Yet just two decades later, the nations stood at the brink of a formal war, battling each other in the halls of diplomacy and on the high seas. The Quasi-War (1797–1800) was America's first major international crisis and it precipitated a domestic political struggle that threatened to tear apart the new republic.

International Conflict

The first years of the new national government brought a rift among Americans over foreign policy, which corresponded to their divergent visions of political economy. These differences emerged in Congress between protoparties, factions with similar voting records but lacking the formal organization of parties. Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton and fellow Federalists promoted a strong national commercial agenda, focused...