Our Nation Research Paper

In the beginning, our nation- as any new nation would start- got off shaky. With tensions high in Britain, casually spreading to other European countries, trade was difficult. Not only was trade difficult, but preventing rebellion from having to form a new government no one knew how to use was also a struggle. Though we had these problems, our nation’s people persevered through the hard times. Our nation obviously overcame the new problems we faced to become one of the strongest nations in the world. We would not be here today without our first strong, powerful leaders, George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison. Our first, and probably most influential president, was George Washington. George Washington set precedents

John Adams was not exactly like George Washington, despite working under him for over eight years. Adams first downfall was the Alien and Sedition Acts. These acts were the most bitterly contested acts of our nation yet. Our nation was designed to be a safe place for immigrants and people in general to live- the nation as a whole was built from refugees from England- yet these acts prevented our country from being able to do that. Although he was not perfect, he truly tried to be fair. During the Boston Massacre trial, Adams defended the British soldiers for shooting the five American citizens, he believed that the Americans were pestering and the British soldiers were only doing their job to protect themselves. John Adams certainly did not have a perfect presidency, but he served his job

Jefferson loved liberty in every form and he worked for freedom of speech, press, religion, and civil liberties. Jefferson swore "eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the minds of man." "Jeffersonian Democracy" refers to the ideal that the majority of people must govern themselves. He wanted to keep the government simple and free of waste. The downsides of Jefferson came from his other beliefs- he claimed he believed in small government spending, but he bought the “Louisiana Purchase”- which was actually a great thing for the United States, yet it was a big government purchase. This caused some opposition, but in the end the purchase went through without any major rebellions. After serving two terms, Jefferson retired from politics and returned to his plantation at Monticello. Overall, Thomas Jefferson was another one of our greatest presidents that helped in the shaping of our