I believe that with the help of Robert Livingston and James Monroe, I have done my country the greatest thing that I could have possibly done it. Recently, I sent both Livingston and Monroe to offer the French 10 million dollars for the ports of New Orleans and the Floridas. They did not come back with that, but rather with something much better. What they returned with was land of huge and unimaginable proportions; the whole territory of Louisiana! The Louisiana territory doubled the size of our country, giving us and additional 828,000 square miles! You can imagine how happy I was when they returned and told me of this amazing news!
At first I had some doubts about whether what I did was correct or not, especially since nowhere in the Constitution that I myself drafted does it say anything about the government having rights to expand the size of the Union itself. Even though I my doubts at the beginning, I envision the day that I have stretched the great land of America to the widths of the whole continent, and maybe even farther! However, after the treaty of the Louisiana Purchase was signed, there was no turning back. Another thing that pushed me to buy all of that land was the fact the Napoleon threatened to take back his amazing offer.
When I was warned that Napoleon might take back that great offer, I shook off all of the doubts that I had and sent Livingston and Madison to sign the deal. I was under a lot of stress, as any person negotiating whether to expand his country or not would have had been under. Even after the land of Louisiana was bought, some people still thought that what I did was "unconstitutional," but as long as I am happy at the end of the day with what I did, and I know what I did was right, I feel better. Soon, people will realize that what I did was for the best of our country, they will find out that I would never do something that would hurt my nation.
The money that I spent will be no problem at all, I am sure that all of it will be remade by all of the new farmland and possible expansions that can be made from all of the Louisiana territory. Plus, I am now one step closer to completing my dream of expanding this country from sea to shining sea! Things like these make, me happy. That is it for now.
-Thomas Jefferson
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