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What Are The Causes Of The Westward Expansion

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The westward expansion all started during Thomas Jefferson’s presidency. Jefferson wanted an agricultural country and pushed for more land to achieve this goal. During his presidency when Jefferson sent Robert Livingston to get New Orleans from France and came back with land double the size of their country that is when this expansion started. Jefferson determined the nature of the expansion as well as congress. The reason is because if congress didn 't agree to the expansions then they would not expand their land. Jefferson was a major factor of motivating the push for expansion, not only did he tell the people he wanted to expand but made sure people did by lowering the prices for land. This made more people want live out there and want to expand there land as well. Another factor was John L. O’Sullivan’s document on Manifest Destiny which stated, “America is destined for better deeds…..The expansive future is our arena, and …show more content…

During the expansion a major policy change was that everyone would have to become agriculture and live the agricultural way of life. Meaning they would have to farm, trade or if not make the supplies for the farmers. These policies especially affect the Indians because Jefferson wanted, “to encourage them to abandon hunting, to apply to the raising stock, to agriculture and domestic manufacture, and thereby prove to themselves that less land and labor will maintain them in this, better than in their former mode of living.” (Jefferson, p. 1) Their new policies were easy for the American colonist to get use to but not the Indians as it was a new way of life. The Indians would have to assimilate to the American life. With all that said the westward expansion went through a lot to actually get expanded. With the consent that they needed from congress and the obstacles in their way the expansion was able to happen but at a slow rate. Motivation from others did help to speed up the process but all in all expansion was able to happen in the

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