By 1797, he had emerged as the leader of the Democratic-Republican opposition to the Adams administration.
“We are all republicans: we are all federalists.”You can find this distaste for faction and longing for unity throughout American history, up to the present.
Americans, including their political leadership, have a real and serious distaste for partisanship and political parties even as they are, and have been, as political and partisan a people as has ever existed.
I was reminded of all this while reading a recent opinion essay by Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, in which he dreamed of a world without politics or partisanship at all — a world of “common sense solutions” and bipartisan camaraderie.
“What is clear to all those who wish to listen is that the overwhelming majority of Americans believe in unity,” Manchin wrote in USA Today.
Persons:
Thomas Jefferson, Adams, ” Jefferson, “, Joe Manchin, ” Manchin, Manchin, ”, Michael Bloomberg
Organizations:
Democratic, Republican
Locations:
West Virginia, USA, New York