Manifest Destiny and American Territorial Expansion

Jefferson wanted to expand the United States borders west, and he was the most ambitious of all the Founding Fathers in favor of expanding. Joseph Ellis, a Thomas Jefferson historian, stated, "For Jefferson, more than any other major figure in the revolutionary generation, the West was America's future. In 1803, Jefferson bought Louisiana from France for $15 million dollars and doubled the size of America by 828,000 square miles. Fear of the potential threat that the French posed while living in the United States, also wanting the port at New Orleans, and wanting the fertile land that Louisiana had to offer, is what drove Jefferson to do the possibly unconstitutional purchase with France. Once the deal was finalized, Jefferson sent in Captain Meriwether Lewis and Second Lieutenant William Clark to explore the land, in what he had just purchased, and to find a faster route to the Pacific for commerce. The Lewis and Clark expedition, along with the help of Sacajawea and her husband Toussaint Charbonneau, explored much of this Louisiana territory. This expedition also went into the Pacific Northwest territory, to which Britain had laid a claim to. After the Louisiana Purchase, places that were touching occupied areas of the United States were most appealing to the land hungry citizens and politicians, and these politicians used fear to gain them.
             One of the reasons that the War of 1812 with Britain happened was fear of other countries would try to come and prevent America from expanding. After the war, the boundaries remained unchanged but many Native American tribes lost land, which led for the increase in land becoming available, especially after the death of Chief Tecumseh. There was also fear of Europe and Mexico coming into North America, and claiming land for themselves. This caused some politicians in government to fear that America had a possibility of being taken over. Since Britain tried to halt the United States from expanding with the War of 1812, many politicians used this fear of American land being taken over by others, to push forward with expanding into places like Florida, Oregon and Texas, which were under either Spain, Mexico, or Britain's control.