When Washington left his status as president after his second term that was the first time that a presidential election was actually an informal business. The first two times that an election happened, it was an easy win for George. So the 1796 election was the first one in which the process and the Electoral College was important.
John Adam’s (Federalist), won against Thomas Jefferson (Democratic-Republican), and Tom became the Vice President. The Jay Treaty, which was instituted under John’s presidency, heightened tensions between France and US. The reason for this Treaty was that France was becoming a very violent country with its gruesome revolution. France started fighting with Europe, and even captured some American Merchant ships that were believed to be trading with Britain.
John appointed 3 men, John Marshall, Charles Pinkney, and Gerry Elbridge as ambassadors, and they met Talleyrand, the man they would be negotiating peace with. The ambassadors were told that if they wanted a treaty, they were going to have to pay a bribe. John told them that they shouldn’t under any circumstance, give the French any money. They were promptly arrested.
After a year of trying to make a peace treaty with the French, Marshall and Pinkney were edged out of the conversation. The XYZ affair was the fall out of their arrival. Adams’ wanted the fact that they had been imprisoned to stay quiet, so the major details weren’t released.
But the Dem.-Rep. thought that that there was another reason, and Adams was forced to release it. The only difference with this version was that the key characters that were serving under Talleyrand were now named X, Y, and Z.
The French, after discovering this, declared unofficial war on the US, and the US did the same. This meant that they were preparing for war, but didn’t openly attack each other. Adams called Congress for permission to rebuild the Navy, as preventive measures, and it was a good thing that he did, because most of the battles were fought on the high seas.
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