Nor did
he disdain to make such use of his position as would win friends or
remove enemies. He proposed to Calhoun a foreign mission, suggested
the same to Clay, favored an ambassadorship for Clinton, and urged
the appointment of Jackson to Mexico. These overtures were politely
declined by the candidates, and Adams was forced to fight for the
presidency against the men whom he would so gladly have sent to
honor their country abroad.
CHAPTER XII
THE MONROE DOCTRINE (1821-1823)
The place of slavery in the westward expansion of the nation was not
the only burning question which the American people had to face in
the presidency of Monroe. Within a few years after that contest, the
problem of the independence of the New World and of the destiny of
the United States in the sisterhood of new American republics
confronted the administration. Should the political rivalries and
wars of Europe to acquire territory be excluded from the western
hemisphere? Should the acquisition of new colonies by European
states in the vast unsettled spaces of the two Americas be
terminated? These weighty questions were put to the mild Virginian
statesman; history has named his answer the Monroe Doctrine.
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