Jefferson's and Hamilton's Vision of America
Amy Lorrington
HIS/409: American Revolutionary History
December 15, 2015

Jefferson's and Hamilton's Vision of America
After the American Revolution, the politicians in the country began to discuss ways in which the country should handle business so as to make America financially stable. Many politicians, such as Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton, had opposing views on how the country should achieve this result. One opinion was to increase farming but to maintain export relationships with Europe for the manufacture of goods. Another opinion was to increase farming, but to also decrease export of goods with Europe and to diversify the workforce within America to produce the goods that were previously imported from Europe.
Document 1, Notes on the State of Virginia, was written by Thomas Jefferson in the 1780s as a way to introduce American commodities to the European population as a valid source of trade of goods. Prior to the American Revolution, clothing in America was imported from Europe. During the Revolutionary War period, Americans were required to make clothing from their own resources as clothing from Europe was not available. European clothing was made from materials such as linen and silk, but these materials were not available in America. Americas used materials such as cotton and wool to make their clothing (Baumgartner, 2014). According to Jefferson, clothing made from cotton was comparable to the quality of clothing that was made in Europe but the clothing made from wool was not as attractive or comfortable. With this in mind, Thomas Jefferson writes about the need to maintain relationships with Europe for trade. Because America has plenty of land, it makes sense that Americans would use to land to produce resources that can be used for clothing. Jefferson expresses the desire that