James Monroe Research Paper

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James Monroe was born on April 28,1758 in Westmoreland County, Virginia, at this time Virginia was a British colony. He was the oldest son of five children, one sister and three brothers. They were the children of Elizabeth Jones Monroe and Spence Monroe. Spence Monroe was a farmer and a carpenter. When James was eleven he started to attend Campbelltown Academy. In 1774 when James Monroe was sixteen Spence Monroe died and James was left to manage the family property. James Monroe attended the college of William and Mary in Williamsburg the July after his father died. Monroe wasn’t very interested in college while he was there. He heard people speak against the British and he agreed that the colonies should be free. He started taking part in The states above 35 30 latitude line in the Louisiana purchase were all free states. States below the line were slave states. Former president Thomas Jefferson saw what the potential anger build up could lead to and tried to warn the congress. Henry Clay came up with the American System which is where the government paid for road and canals. Monroe took no time shooting this idea down. Monroe believed that states and cities should pay for the roads and canals. James Monroe will always be best known by his Doctrine, but what most people don’t know is that most of the Monroe Doctrine was written by the Secretary of State, John Quincy Adams. Also that Adams was the one who told him to do it. The Monroe Doctrine was originally a letter to congress in 1823. The document stated that it was the end of colonizing the Americas. When James and Elizabeth Monroe retired they moved to their Virginia estate called Oak Hill. During the next five years James still apart of the community he is a part of college boards, but still kept his life private. In 1830 Elizabeth Kortright Monroe died and Monroe moved in with his daughter Maria Hester and her husband in New York. While in New York James wrote two books but unfortunately neither were finished. On the Fourth of July 1831 James Monroe died and was buried in New York in 1831 then reburied in 1858 in

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