Make a draft; round out; anticipate; transfer; restrain; reinforce; regulate; stimulate

In 1787, Americans had a meeting at Philadelphia to make a draft of a new constitution creating a more powerful central government. George Washington was elected the first president of the new nation in 1788. The Congress rounded out the Constitution of the United States with a Bill of Rights, adopted in 1789, guaranteeing such fundamental rights as freedom of speech and religion, and establishing barrier against tyranny by guaranteeing fair trials and preventing illegal searches. George Washington's presidency also saw the emergence of America's first political party system, a development not anticipated in the Constitution, but fundamental to democratic government as it developed in the United States.

The election of Thomas Jefferson[9] to the presidency is sometimes called the “Revolution of 1800.” It was the first peaceful transfer of government from one political party to another in a popular election. Thomas Jefferson sought to reinforce America's democratic character by reducing the size of the central government. He favored “a wise and provident government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned.” Jefferson considered farmers the backbone of democracy: “Those who labor in the earth are the chosen people of God, ” he wrote. By purchasing Louisiana in 1803, then a region of about 2, 1 million sq. km, Jefferson anticipated that he had assured the spread of agrarian democracy.

The early 19th century brought America's first major war, the War of 1812, which actually lasted from 1812 to 1815. It had its shameful moments, when the British occupied and burned down Washington. The war was rich, however, in its legacy to American patriotism. American navy officer Oliver Hazard Perry won a naval victory on the Lake Erie and sent a famous message to his superiors: “We have met the enemy, and they are ours.” Another seaman, James Lawrence, mortally wounded, electrified his crew with his dying words: “Don't give up the ship! ” During a long and hazardous night, Francis Scott Key watched the British bombardment of Baltimore. He looked anxiously to see whether the American flag would dip in surrender, and wrote an anthem describing his experience. It began: “Oh say can you see, by the dawn's early light, what so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming…” Key's poem became the U.S. national anthem in 1931. America's one great victory on land during the war—by Andrew Jackson[10]—came at New Orleans after the Treaty of Gent had officially ended the conflict. This overwhelming victory stimulated American self-assurance, and helped Jackson win the presidency a few years later.