Note 72 — Part II THE TRADITIONAL DEMOCRACY

It became at once evident that a government whose chief function was to see that individual rights, property rights, state rights, were not invaded, was hardly adequate to unite our colonies with all their separatist instincts, or to meet the needs of a rapidly developing continent. Our national government at once adopted a constructive policy. Guided by Hamilton it assumed constructive powers authority for which could be found in the constitution only by a most liberal construction of its terms. When Jefferson, an antinationalist, acquired Louisiana in 1803, it seemed plain that no such restricted national government as was at first conceived could possibly work.