Democratic-Republicans

A more sympathetic look at Aaron Burr, the man who killed Alexander Hamilton.

Historian Brian Murphy explains the Manhattan Company; a bank disguised as a municipal water corporation that helped to transform Early Republican politics.

Space and place in New York City's responses to the French Revolution.

The presence of Federalist judges frustrated Thomas Jefferson and his Democratic-Republican Party, bring justice Samuel Chase under fire.

1796, the first contested presidential election.

Aaron Burr was the highest-ranking official to stand trial for treason, which some people have invoked now amid probes into ex-president Donald Trump.

This armed uprising in 1794, over taxation by the fledgling new government, threatened to destroy the new union within six years of the Constitution’s ratification.

Jefferson and his connection to partisanship in early America.

The manner in which the debate unfolded is a reminder of the ways slavery affected everything it touched.

It forced a conversation about the dangers of misinformation, one we need to have again today.

On early American attempts to kick out foreigners.

A new book persuasively argues that the Federalists’ attempt to squash opposition and the free flow of ideas was even more nefarious than we thought.

Why criminalizing political opposition can be dangerous.

The origins of our efforts to keep foreign countries out of our elections.

Even America's founding document isn't immune to the powers of polarization.

To the framers, working in secret was meant to deliver enlightened legislation.

The resurgence of the debate over the Sage of Monticello's legacy: Is Jefferson the ultimate patriot or ultimate hypocrite?

Elbridge Gerry was a powerful voice in the founding of the nation, but today he's best known for the political practice with an amphibious origin.

The word is two centuries old.

A madman versus a crook? Unexpected twists? Fake news? Welcome to the election of 1800.