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Senator Robert Y. Hayne, South Carolina, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
James Monroe entered the final year of his second term feeling good. It was, after all, the “Era of Good Feelings.” In eight years, the nation’s fifth President had accomplished much. His country had many things to feel good about.
And there was more coming.
Monroe’s decision to not seek reelection confirmed the tradition of the self-imposed limit of two terms as president. Before this, however, people had a legitimate thought that Monroe would run for an unprecedented third term. He had other thoughts. In a way, they were bigger thoughts.
But he had to wait for a slow-moving Congress to give the thumbs-up.
It seems several citizens took it upon themselves to invite Lafayette to return to the nation where he first made his mark in history. While they weren’t necessarily serving in Continue Reading “Lafayette’s Farewell Tour: What Took Congress So Long?”
Lafayette’s Farewell Tour: The Lucky Winner Is…
Previous: America In 1824
To Major Joseph Wheaton of Washington came word from Lafayette that “…duties to the cause of freedom make it, if not a matter of hope, at least a point of honor, to keep his present post.”1 Similarly, Lafayette wrote to Dr. James Thatcher, “At this moment a sense of duty keeps me on the European side of the Atlantic.”2
While the papers proclaimed these missives as “the latest communication from Lafayette,”3 they were months old by the time they hit the press. It wasn’t as if Lafayette disliked America. In truth, he loved his adopted country. He wrote his good friend William Eustis, Continue Reading “Lafayette’s Farewell Tour: The Lucky Winner Is…”