The First Party System

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Today in America we have two political parties who in which are constantly in competition, so that they may implement their own ideas and beliefs into our government. This feuding between political parties is nothing the U.S hasn’t seen since its beginning, starting with the First Party System’s rise and fall in 1789 through 1825. This time period is known as the time of the First Party System in American history. This started with a couple of recognizable figures on both sides from our country’s history; such as Alexander Hamilton and the Federalist Party going against the Democratic Republican Party led by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. These two parties began as national politics but in order to gain more supporters they expanded to…show more content…
Supporters believed that under the Articles of Confederation the government did not hold enough power. The leading figure in this party was Alexander Hamilton who had served as Secretary of Treasury for George Washington’s first term as president. Hamilton proposed the state debts that had come from the revolutionary war, which had created a national debt for the U.S. Hamilton answered this with the idea of the first bank of the United States. The main goal of the idea Hamilton had proposed, of state debts was to avoid unnecessary and possible destructive competition between state and federal governments. Which also allowed the federal government the opportunity for revenue. One of the main emphases for the Hamilton and the Federalist Party was that the federal government was too over power the states. They felt that leaving too much power in the hands of states would only create a weak type of government, with very little power to act. Citizen’s rights would be protected by the legislation, court systems, and of course the Bill Of Rights; distrusting the people with the vote. The federalist created the House of Reps which was directly voted by the people. This was simply put, a way of shutting them up. The federalist also made it clear that no one branch of government would gain too much power over another with the checks and balances system, which was a good…show more content…
They preferred a pretty strict construction of the constitution and look down on Hamilton’s ideas for a national bank and saw them as unconstitutional. The party promoted states' rights and they were threatened by the supposed, the far too powerful tendencies of the Federalist Party which they had seen before with Great Britain. These Democratic Republicans favored Agriculture and opposed the tariffs that Hamilton had proposed; for these supporters mostly included skilled workers, small scale farmers, and plantation owners. So it is safe to say the majority of these types of supporters were vast in the southern frontier states as opposed to their rivals in the northeastern states who were more on the business side of things. Democratic Republicans all in all wanted things to remain the same in the U.S government because they felt that giving more power to the national government by way of national bank or tax would slowly get rid of the people’s voice in politics creating a rerun of the previous outcome with Great Britain. Both party’s with opposite beliefs going back and forth has followed the U.S since this time in history it is safe to say that the First Party System left behind a legacy of feuding in government politics. When it comes to decision
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