This must have been a wrenching moment for Jefferson, who had long been a Francophile. Manifest destiny was in full effect. Aside from the obvious drive for conquest by Napoleon, he knew that when war started between the two countries, Britain would attempt to take Louisiana. [45] In 2021 dollars, the $15 million purchase price is equivalent to $336.92million. Why did France leave Louisiana? However, one has to question whether the French ruler considered the consequences of selling France's interest in Louisiana. The Americans thought that Napoleon might withdraw the offer at any time, preventing the United States from acquiring New Orleans, so they agreed and signed the Louisiana Purchase Treaty on April 30, 1803, (10 Floral XI in the French Republican calendar) at the Htel Tubeuf in Paris. According to the Library of Congress, Napoleon did not have enough troops to occupy Louisiana while simultaneously subduing Saint-Domingue. Watch: Elon Musk Comes Clean on Why He Bought Twitter Spain turned the territory over to France in a ceremony in New Orleans on November 30, a month before France turned it over to American officials. Majority Leader John Randolph led the opposition. In 1796, Spain allied itself with France, leading Britain to use its powerful navy to cut off Spain from America. . As for the ever-succinct Thomas Jefferson, he wasted little time on rhetoric. [37][38], Effective October 1, 1804, the purchased territory was organized into the Territory of Orleans (most of which would become the state of Louisiana) and the District of Louisiana, which was temporarily under control of the governor and judicial system of the Indiana Territory. While the transfer of the territory by Spain back to France in 1800 went largely unnoticed, fear of an eventual French invasion spread across America when, in 1801, Napoleon sent a military force to secure New Orleans. He had always seen Saint Domingue, with a population of more than 500,000, producing enough sugar, coffee, indigo, cotton and cocoa to fill some 700 ships a year, as Frances most important holding in the Western Hemisphere. Under the leadership of Toussaint Louverture, slaves took over the entire island of Hispaniola, including St. Domingue and its neighbor Santo Domingo. The British had re-entered the war and France was losing the Haitian Revolution and could not defend Louisiana. The rest was history. Hed planned to send troops to Louisiana to take over the colony, which he had received from the Spanish through a secrettreatyin 1800, in the hopes ofusingthe territory as a trade venue for the commodities produced in Haiti. How did France obtain the Louisiana Territory? - 2023 [1][2] More recently, the total cost to the U.S. government of all subsequent treaties and financial settlements over the land has been estimated to be around 2.6 billion dollars. French policy makers had felt for some time that Frances possessions in the Antilles would inevitably be contaminated by Americas idea of freedom and would eventually take their own independence. The acquisition of the Louisiana Territory for the bargain price of less than three cents an acre was among Jeffersons most notable achievements as president. Inspired by republican ideals of liberty, fraternity and equality, they pressed for their rights, and some were given the right to vote in 1790 by the French government. By 1860, there weremore than100,000 slaves in Missouri, and slaves were valued at over $44 million (about $112 billion today). There was also concern that an increase in the number of slave-holding states created out of the new territory would exacerbate divisions between North and South. Its believed that the failure of France to put down a slave revolution in Haiti, the impending war with Great Britain and probable British naval blockade of France combined with French economic difficulties may have prompted Napoleon to offer Louisiana for sale to the United States. Why did France sell the Louisiana Purchase to the United States Louis. Napoleon sent a massive 30,000 troops French expeditionary force commanded by his brother-in-law Charles Victor Emmanuel Leclerc to St. Domingue to accomplish this goal. So many slaves died of yellow feverand ill treatment that the entire slave population turned overevery 20 years, and slaves were held in subjugation through a strict caste system. [1][2], Domestic opposition and constitutionality, Formal transfers and initial organization. [23], After Monroe and Livingston had returned from France with news of the purchase, an official announcement of the purchase was made on July 4, 1803. As told by Michigan State University, both of them were shocked when the French minister, Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand, asked how much they would pay for the entire territory. [47] However by December 1803, the British directed Barings to halt future payments to France. There is no people, no legislature, no counselors. The treaty called for the return of the vast territory to France in exchange for the small kingdom of Etruria in northern Italy, which Charles wanted for his daughter Louisetta. The treaty was signed by Barb-Marbois, Livingston and Monroe on May 2 and backdated to April 30. (Louisiana Shaping) They lost a lot of resources due to previous losses in other areas of the world. As described by Louisiana State University, France even went so far as to send convicts from debtors' prisons to the colony in 1717 in order to increase its settlement. Reports of the retrocession caused considerable unease in the United States. The main issue for the Americans was free transit of the Mississippi out to sea. In the meeting, he said that Napoleon had read an account in the London press that 50,000 British troops might be sent to New Orleans. Thus, the correct answer is option A. In fact, Talleyrand was intruding on a deal that Napolon had assigned to the French finance minister, Franois de Barb-Marbois. The Louisiana Purchase: Why did Napoleon sell? | Bruce Kauffmann What were some of the benefits of the Louisiana Purchase quizlet "[29] The sale of course was not "worthless"the U.S. actually did take possession. Twelve years before, he had returned from a five-year stint as American minister to Paris, shipping home 86 cases of furnishings and books he had picked up there. by force of arms. As Secretary of State James Madison explained, The Mississippi is to them everything. You have come to a very corrupt world, Napolon told him frankly, adding roguishly that Talleyrand was the right man to explain what he meant by corruption. [14][15] The total of $15million is equivalent to about $337million in 2021 dollars, or 64 cents per acre. Spains King Charles IV finally got around to signing the royal decree officially transferring the territory to France, and on October 16, the Spanish administrator in New Orleans, Juan Ventura Morales, who had agreed to administer the colony until his French replacement, Laussat, could arrive, arbitrarily ended the American right to deposit cargo in the city duty-free. How did the French Own Louisiana? [42] In October 1803, the U.S. Treasury had some $5.86 million in specie on hand, $2 million of which would be used to pay a portion of the debts assumed from France as part of the purchase. PBS describes how by 1812, France had increased its army strength to 600,000 men, not to mention the thousands in the navy. By any measure, it was one of the most colossal land transactions in history, involving an area larger than todays France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Germany, Holland, Switzerland and the British Isles combined. On the following day, October 21, 1803, the Senate authorized Jefferson to take possession of the territory and establish a temporary military government. As it turns out, France, or more accurately its ruler Napoleon Bonaparte, had some good reasons for doing it. France regained sovereignty of the western territory in the secret Third Treaty of San Ildefonso . GOP Election Officials Walk Fine Line On Fraud, Integrity - HuffPost France turned over New Orleans, the historic colonial capital, on December 20, 1803, at the Cabildo, with a flag-raising ceremony in the Plaza de Armas, now Jackson Square. The British had re-entered the war and France was losing the Haitian Revolution and could not defend Louisiana. This was the key to our international influence., The bicentennial is being celebrated with yearlong activities in many of the states fashioned from the territory. Spain, no longer a dominant European power, did little to develop Louisiana during the next three decades. By the time Monroe arrived in Paris on April 12, the situation had, unknown to him, radically altered: Napolon had suddenly decided to sell the entire Louisiana Territory to the United States. The French government replied that these objections were baseless since the promise not to alienate Louisiana was not in the treaty of San Ildefonso itself and therefore had no legal force, and the Spanish government had ordered Louisiana to be transferred in October 1802 despite knowing for months that Britain had not recognized the King of Etruria in the Treaty of Amiens. As a result, trappers pelts, agricultural produce and finished goods risked exposure and theft on open wharfs while awaiting shipment to the East Coast and beyond. The Louisiana Purchase was the acquisition of the territory of Louisiana by the United States from the French First Republic in 1803.However, France only controlled a small fraction of this area, most of which was inhabited by Native Americans. It took until 1820 for them to agree on theMissouri Compromise, which drew an imaginary line across the new territory that separated free and slave areas. Her work has appeared in outlets like The Washington Post, National Geographic, The Atlantic, TIME, Smithsonian and more. France had just re-taken control of the Louisiana Territory. Would that make the United States too powerful? The scene caused a servant to faint, and when Lucien lingered to try to argue the point, Napoleon said to his brother that if he opposed him he would break him like a snuffbox which he smashed into the floor.

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