Post-War European Threats and The Rise of US Economic Nationalism
The Treaty of Ghent in December 1814 did not resolve US-British boundary and territorial disputes in Louisiana and Spanish Florida. The frontier remained a flashpoint for international strife. In addition, British economic aggression persisted. In an egregious move to recapture American markets, Great Britain proceeded to systematically flood the US markets with superior manufactured items at cut-rate prices, the aim of which was to drive American manufacturers out of business.
These geostrategic and economic provocations caused a shift in domestic policy. The strict constructionist ideologists of the dominant Jeffersonian Republican Party - though averse to concentrating power into the hands of the federal government - recognized the expediency of nationalizing certain institutions and projects as a means of achieving national growth and economic security.
In his Seventh Annual Message to the Fourteenth Congress on December 5, 1815, President James Madison suggested legislation to create 1) a national bank with regulatory powers 2) a program of federally funded internal improvements for roads and canals, and 3) a protective tariff to shelter emerging American manufacturing from the advanced industries in Europe.
Read more about this topic: Dallas Tariff
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