What the Hell Ruined the Era of Good Feelings?

The “Era of Good Feelings” is usually sold as a victory lap after the War of 1812 — unity, calm, and confidence in the American experiment.

But if you zoom in, it’s less a victory lap than a stress test.

Republican leaders are trying to build the tools of national development — banks, internal improvements, professional administration — while ordinary voters are demanding the opposite: lower taxes, smaller government, fewer insiders cashing in.

And that contradiction matters, because it becomes the political atmosphere in which the first nationwide capitalist downturn — what Americans called “hard times” — hits in 1819.

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In this episode (Sellers, The Market Revolution, Chapter 4 — Part 1), we cover:

Why the Salary Act of 1816 sparked a democratic backlash and a reform frenzy

How Congress went after Andrew Jackson’s Florida invasion — and accidentally boosted his populist appeal

Why New York becomes the key case study: the Bucktails, DeWitt Clinton, and Van Buren’s party machine

The 1821 New York constitutional fight: expanded white male democracy + intensified racial exclusion

Virginia’s reform battles: western voters vs the Tidewater elite — and Jefferson edging toward a more pragmatic democracy

The Old Republican counterattack on capitalism: Macon, John Taylor of Caroline, and the contradictions of planter politics

The Missouri crisis detonates: Tallmadge, Rufus King, sectional power, and the first clear North/South alignment

A speculative boom built on easy credit: exploding bank charters, corporate charters, and financial overreach

The Second Bank’s failures and tightening credit — the setup for the Panic of 1819 (continued next episode)

Guiding question:

How did the post–War of 1812 developmental state provoke a democratic backlash — and why did that backlash, rather than stopping the Market Revolution, reshape it and set the stage for the crisis of 1819?