The federalists, long holding the dominant role in the political parties now was fighting for survival during 1800. The Federalists and Democratic Republicans functioned as the two national political parties with John Adams and Thomas Jefferson at the head. Adam's Federalists waged a defensive struggle for a strong central government and the prosperity and order that was secured with such a government. Jefferson's republicans presented opposition, in effort to guard purity, liberty, and states' rights. With unpopular measures taken by the Federalists, under Adams, the most devastating blow to the Federalist party was the unnecessary but extravagant military populations which swelled public debt and required new taxes. It was clear that the role of the Federalists was petering out, while the Jeffersonians quickly took advantage.
The revolution of 1800 was not a revolution of a massive popular upheaval or an upending of the political system but the peaceful orderly transfer of power on the basis of results that were accepted by both parties. However this change in power marked the sinking of the Federalist Party into political oblivion, and the first party overturn in American history, John Adams, was the last Federalist president of the United States. Jefferson triumphantly set out on a mission to restore the republican government, check the growth of government power, and halt the decay of virtue that had set in under Federalist rule.
Now in power Jefferson had important decisions to make that would affect the nation in drastic ways. He quickly learned that it was far easier to condemn from the stump than to govern consistently. An important decision made by Jefferson was the repeal of the excise tax. Jefferson's devotion to principle ended up costing the federal government about one million dollars a year, in badly needed revenue. Now despite Jeffersonian views on the national bank, newly appointed secretary of the Treasury, Albert Gallatin succeeded in reducing the federal debt, deemed a bane rather than a blessing by both Gallatin and Jefferson, as well as balancing the budget. Surprisingly, despite repealing the excise tax, the Jeffersonians did not alter the Federalist programs for funding the national debt and assuming the Revolutionary War debts of the states. The Jeffersonians launched no attack on the Bank of the United States, nor dud they repeal the protective Federalist tariff. In fact in later years the Jeffersonians embraced some of the Federalist ideals to the point of rechartering a bigger bank along with boosting the protective tariff to higher levels.
One of the biggest economic and geographic achievements of Jefferson was the Louisiana Purchase. Perhaps the most magnificent real estate bargain in history the purchase allocated some 828,000 square miles of land at about three cents per acre. Securing, with one bloodless stroke, the western half of the richest river valley in the world laid a major foundation for future world power. The transaction established valuable precedents for future expansion along with removing a significant European power from the Continent, the States were now in the position to disengage almost entirely from the ancient system of Old World rivalries.
In Addition to the role in economics, the change in political power also had an effect on the Judiciary branch of government. The Judiciary Act of 1801 and the signing of the commissions of the federalist "midnight judges" were some of the last things done by the