The first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, appointed by George Washington, was John Jay. John Adams and Alexander Hamilton were both lawyers, but neither ever served on the Supreme Court. John Marshall served as the fourth Chief Justice, but many consider him to be the most important of the early judges for establishing the powers of the Judiciary Branch. Edmund Randolph was the first Attorney General of the United States.

Patrick Henry was fiercely opposed to the new Unites States Constitution of 1789, believing it put too much power in the hands of the Federal government and the office of the President, in particular.  Until the passage of the Bill of Rights in 1791, Henry was a prominent critic of the new government.

All of the Presidential Elections from 1876 to 1888 were extremely close, but  the 1876 election between Democrat Samuel B. Tilden and Republican Rutherford B. Hayes saw a candidate win the popular vote and not the electoral vote.  In a heated post-election battle, 20 electoral votes were contested.  The Democrats gave Hayes the 20 electoral votes, and the election, under the condition that Reconstruction ended in the South, a deal known as the Compromise of 1877.

William Seward was a firm advocate for Manifest Destiny and pressed the United States government to purchase the Alaska territory from Russia. In his own time he was widely ridiculed for the decision: the arrangement was colloquially referred to as “Seward’s folly” in many parts of America; however, the vast natural resources in Alaska have proved significant throughout American history—most significantly with the discovery of oil and gold at the turn of the twentieth century.

It was John Adams, the 2nd President of the United States, who represented the British soldiers responsible for what Americans call the Boston Massacre.

In 1803, Marbury v. Madison established the principle of judicial review, giving the Supreme Court the power to determine the constitutionality of an act.

It is the 2nd Amendment that protects a citizen's right to bear arms.  Additionally, the 1st Amendment protects the freedom of petition.

On April 12th, 1861, the first shots of the American Civil War were fired at Fort Sumter, South Carolina.

The election of 1796 resulted in victory for John Adams. He represented the Federalist Party and received a slightly greater share of the popular vote than Thomas Jefferson, the Democratic-Republican candidate. The election campaign was a particularly acrimonious one. Federalists desired a loose interpretation of the Constitution and a strong Federal government. They attempted to associate the Democratic-Republicans with the chaos of the French Revolution. The Democratic-Republicans on the other hand desired an agricultural nation, with a strict interpretation of the Constitution and heavily limited Federal authority. They attempted to portray the Federalists as monarchists and autocrats. In the end, Adams was elected President and, in a quirk of the voting system in place at the time, Thomas Jefferson was elected Vice-President. 

All of these were of relative importance in the Presidential election campaigns of 1844. However, James Polk’s support of Manifest Destiny ultimately turned the tide in his favor. Polk was able to merge the issues of the annexation of Texas and Oregon into one ideology, expressed as Manifest Destiny. This garnered the support both of Southern voters and North-Western voters and helped grant Polk a narrow victory over Henry Clay.