One of the first two U.S. political parties, the Federalists came into being, ironically, in the anti-party years of the early 1790s, when parties were thought to be dangerous factions undermining the Republic. Federalism had considerable early success, many significant achievements, and fleeting popular support. Federalists won the first three presidential elections, controlled Congress for most of the 1790s, established the new national government, and kept the nation at peace. Over time, however, the Federalists lost their popular support and with it, their grip on power. Out of power and in opposition to their bitter rivals, the Jeffersonian Republicans, or Democratic Republicans, Federalists either tried to imitate and mirror their opponents or devolved into stinging and increasingly self-defeating attacks. But the Federalist Party had a significant if brief moment during the 1790s and helped to set the agenda for early American politics and government.
The first federal elections of 1788–1789 were not conducted along party lines. Members of Congress were elected, much as representatives had long been chosen, based on reputation and renown. Since they were now the officers of the new federal government and since the great majority had supported the ratification of the new Constitution of 1787, these men appropriated the term Federalist to indicate their support for the Constitution and the new regime. But party identities and identification were weak in the early Republic. Not until 1792 was there a clear opposition group in place to challenge the policies of the administration and its allies in Congress. Furthermore, attitudes toward parties were still negative and neither side claimed to be one. Rather, Federalists considered themselves "the government" or "the nation" and branded their opponents as a "faction," a term that had unhealthy, unrepublican connotations. The Democratic Republicans also denied that they were a party and claimed instead to be protecting the Constitution from the depredations of the Federalist "party" faction that had improperly seized control of the government. Scholars have debated whether it is proper to speak of Federalists and Democratic Republicans as full-fledged parties or merely as loose alliances or proto-parties. No matter where one falls out on this question, it is clear that the competition between the two entities—whatever we may choose to call them—was as intense as any ever seen in American political history and reflected two radically different visions for the future of the nation.
The Federalists coalesced in the first several national Congresses and were comprised of a group of representatives and senators who supported the legislative initiatives of the administration of George Washington. Although President Washington and Vice President John Adams headed the administration, the party's intellectual and political leader was Alexander Hamilton, who began his tenure as secretary of the Treasury in September 1789 and cultivated allies in Congress. Hamilton's ambitious program— creation of a national bank, assumption of state debts from the Revolution, imposition of an excise tax, the establishment of public credit, and encouragement of manufactures—sparked heated opposition and touched off the first party conflict. Federalism appealed to merchants, many large landowners, those engaged in commerce, and the wealthy more generally. Federalists were concentrated in urban port towns (especially in the Northeast), in New England, and in parts of Virginia and the Carolinas (especially Charleston). In addition to Washington, Adams, and Hamilton, key party leaders included John Jay (New York), Fisher Ames (Massachusetts), John Marshall (Virginia), Rufus King (New York), Charles Cotesworth Pinckney (South Carolina), and Thomas Pinckney (South Carolina), along with newspaper editors such as Noah Webster, John Fenno, and Benjamin Russell.
Federalists favored a strong central government and an activist state, stressing the energy and primacy of the executive branch. They favored a foreign policy of neutrality that would keep the United States out of the persistent conflict between Great Britain and France, though many Federalists sympathized with the British. Commercially, the Federalists sought to expand their trade networks with England and extend their shipping to other markets as well. Federalists also favored a loose construction of the Constitution, believing that whatever was not expressly forbidden could be fully legitimate and constitutional. Federalists seized on this interpretation to enact a powerful and sweeping vision of the United States, one that foresaw the country emerging under centralized authority as an industrial, financial, and military power to rival Britain. These views were exemplified by Federalist actions on some of the major policy debates of the 1790s. In the Neutrality crisis of 1793, Federalists rejected Republican calls to aid France in favor of a strict impartiality so as not to antagonize Great Britain. In 1794, Federalists called out troops to suppress the Whiskey Rebellion among western Pennsylvania farmers angered over an excise tax. The next year the Federalist-controlled Senate approved the unpopular Jay's Treaty, a commercial agreement with England that—for all of its shortcomings—maintained the peace between the two nations.
Beyond programs and issues, the Federalist Party also was marked by an attitude or an ideology of unabashed elitism that defined the party at least as much as its policies and programs. That elitism did much to undermine the Federalists in their day and to stigmatize them in historical treatments since. Federalists generally subscribed to an older conception of politics that stressed deference by the people to their leaders. Federalists believed that once the tiny electorate had selected its duly chosen leaders (the "constituted authorities," in a favorite Federalist phrase), the public's responsibility between elections was to defer to the judgment of those leaders, not to try to influence officials toward alternative positions. The party was unprepared to operate in any system not premised on deference, since it lacked a grass-roots (or even top-down) political organization. These beliefs led Federalists—most prominently George Washington himself—to vehemently denounce the Democratic Societies (popular clubs which met to discuss topical political issues and sometimes produced addresses and resolutions) as dangerous, extraconstitutional bodies of great potential mischief and to mock them as "self-created societies." This attitude did much to explain both the party's conception of governing and politics and its eventual downfall as these sentiments grew increasingly anachronistic in a democratizing society. This attitude was also reflected in the political culture of the Federalists. The party centered its celebrations around Washington, especially his birthday of 22 February, which became the highest holy day of the Federalist calendar. The day was marked throughout the nation with parades, the firing of cannon, and dinners, toasts, and processions, all of which served to solidify in the public mind the link between Washington, the administration and its policies, and the Federalist Party. While Washington tried to remain above politics and party and govern as a disinterested national leader, he increasingly sided with Hamilton over Jefferson on political matters and behaved more like a partisan. By the end of his second term, Washington was acting as (and was seen by his opponents) as a strong Federalist despite his Farewell Address of 1796, which warned against domestic political divisions. Federalist political culture mirrored its ideology by promoting deference. But despite their reservations and ambivalence, Federalists at times practiced popular politics and mobilized public opinion effectively on behalf of their measures. Federalists consistently and explicitly linked Washington's incomparable stature to support for party policy. By framing issues as a choice between supporting Washington and legitimate government or supporting some foreign or radical element (be it Citizen Genêt, the Whiskey rebels, the Democratic Societies, or opponents of Jay's Treaty), Federalists regularly rallied the public to their side. Federalists utilized newspapers, petition drives, sometimes even door-to-door campaigning to press their points and produce the desired results. Even though many Federalists were troubled by the use of such tactics, the party often wielded them to great effect, frustrating and defeating their opponents.
Difficulties under Adams. The Federalists began to lose their popular touch when Vice President John Adams succeeded Washington in 1797. Far less popular than Washington and much less adroit politically, Adams was also plagued by a disloyal cabinet and by a fierce division in Federalist ranks between those loyal to the president and those who took their marching orders from Hamilton, out of office but still highly influential. The party also lost its once-sharp political touch. In an ill-advised effort to stamp out the Democratic Republicans and their partisans in the press (all of whom Federalists considered illegitimate anyway), the Federalist Congress passed in 1798 the Alien and Sedition Acts, which were designed to curb the influence of recent immigrants and make criticism of government leaders or policies illegal. But these efforts backfired disastrously. Rather than destroying the opposition, the acts and the high-handed, arbitrary way they were carried out invigorated and revived the Republicans, especially the party newspapers. When he stood for reelection in 1800, Adams presided over a badly divided party and faced a furious and revived opposition. Matched against Jefferson and Aaron Burr, Adams lost the contest, winning sixty-five electoral votes to seventy-three each for his Republican rivals. After a protracted process, the House of Representatives ultimately selected Jefferson as president. When Adams returned to Massachusetts in a bitter fury, no one could know that the Federalists had had their last taste of the presidency. Elections of 1804 and 1808. After Adams's narrow loss in 1800, younger Federalists in particular tried to regroup by appropriating the organizational tactics and campaign methods of the Republicans to build a national political party organization. Despite such efforts, Federalists never again came close to winning the presidency. Jefferson was reelected by a 162 to 14 margin in the electoral college in 1804, defeating Charles C. Pinckney, who carried only Connecticut and Delaware. In 1808 Federalists again ran Pinckney, this time against James Madison. Federalist fortunes revived only briefly due to the unpopularity of Jefferson's embargo of 1807, which was designed to hurt Britain but which seemed to do the most damage to the American commercial economy. Even with this issue handed to them by the Jeffersonians, Federalists could do little better in 1808. Pinckney again ran strongly in New England, where opposition to the embargo was strongest and carried Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and Delaware plus scattered electors from Maryland and North Carolina. Despite making a stronger showing than four years earlier, Pinckney nonetheless lost decisively, carrying just 47 electoral votes to Madison's 122. Election of 1812. The closest the Federalists came to winning the presidency was in 1812 as a significant antiwar sentiment hindered Madison's reelection. Federalists tried to make common cause with anti-war Republicans and ran a fusion ticket that, while potentially adding new members to their base, also ran the risk of upsetting many Federalists who worried that an alliance with Republicans would undermine the party's independence and legitimacy. New York City mayor De Witt Clinton was nominated for the presidency with Pennsylvania's Jared Ingersoll as the vice presidential nominee. In the end, Madison prevailed by only 128 electoral votes to 89 for Clinton. Pennsylvania proved to be the key as Madison carried its 25 electoral votes. Had Clinton carried them, he would have won the election by a narrow margin. Hartford Convention. Now thoroughly routed, losers of four consecutive presidential elections and increasingly becoming a regional party only, Federalists struggled with their future as the War of 1812 raged. In December 1814 and January 1815, delegates representing each of the New England states met at Hartford, Connecticut, to discuss their grievances. Some delegates urged secession of the New England states from the union. That proposal was defeated and the convention issued a moderate set of proposals (such as opposition to the three-fifths clause in the Constitution and to territorial expansion) designed to strengthen the power of the states and restoring the influence of New England Federalism. The Hartford Convention became, at best, irrelevant and, at worst, in the eyes of some, a near-traitorous gathering as news of the resounding victory of the Battle of New Orleans (8 January 1815) arrived and with it the prospect of peace. By merely discussing secession at Hartford, the Federalists finished themselves as a viable political party in many minds. Rufus King was nominated for the presidency against James Monroe in 1816 but he lost badly, 183 electoral votes to just 34, as King carried only Connecticut, Delaware, and Massachusetts. The 1816 election marked the effective end of the Federalist Party at the national level. The party lingered for awhile in New England but never again nominated a presidential candidate. Some Federalists retreated into literary endeavors, hoping to redirect culture and society—a political project carried on by other means. The Hartford Convention, the presidential election defeats, and the slow evaporation to extinction as a party stood in stark contrast to and marked a sad end to what had once been a visionary and vibrant party with many achievements to its credit. Federalists, it can be argued, served the nation well in their time but ultimately were too much at odds with the direction of the nation's political development to survive as a party. See alsoAdams, John; Alien and Sedition Acts; Democratic Republicans; Election of 1796; Election of 1800; Hamilton, Alexander; Hartford Convention; Jay's Treaty; Jefferson, Thomas; Newspapers; Washington, George; Whiskey Rebellion .
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