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Civics Series: Presidential Transitions
History of Presidential Transitions
Has It Always Been Like Now?
We think our most recent change in Presidential administration is contentious. But our national history has seen worse. It goes back over 200 years to the third Presidential election and several since then.
1801 Presidential Transition: from John Adams to Thomas Jefferson
Perhaps the most contentious election in all of U.S. history was in 1800. The incumbent President, Federalist John Adams — who was the second President, having served as Vice President to the first President George Washington, ran against Democratic-Republican candidate Thomas Jefferson — Adams’ Vice President at the time, and Aaron Burr.
It was the first election with a change in the Presidential political party.
Jefferson had won, but the election was so tumultuous that Jefferson called it the “Revolution of 1800.” In a sense, it was a lengthy, bitter rematch of the 1796 election between the pro-French (think: French Revolution) and pro-decentralization Democratic-Republicans under Jefferson and Aaron Burr against incumbent Adams’ pro-British and pro-centralization Federalists.
