With the United States nearly doubling in size resulting from the Louisiana Purchase by president Jefferson on April 30, 1804, a vast new area remained undiscovered. Stemming from Jefferson's anti- federalist views, this purchase would "extend the agricultural character of the United States.." (Barth pg. 6). Jefferson not only hoped farmers for centuries to follow would benefit from the purchase, but that the sheer amount of land that was acquired during the purchase would prevent the federal government from having too much influence on its citizens. Not everyone approved of Jefferson's decision, Federalist businessmen anticipated "economic chaos and coin rushing into infinite space" (Barth pg.6). With Jefferson's design for the new and much larger nation now in place, the expedition he envisioned long before the Louisiana Purchase even took place was now needed to explore the newly acquired land, " The brainchild of President Thomas Jefferson, it was a high point of his preoccupation with the American West. The expedition was republican in nature due to the expansionist views Jefferson had in mind for it to achieve. Jefferson's idea of a waterway through this new and uncharted territory would make access to the west and maybe even all the way to the Pacific far much easier, thus providing easier trade routes to the west.
             Jefferson suggested in 1783 to George Rodgers Clark and older brother William Clark that he lead an expedition to explore the land west of the Mississippi in hopes of discovering a waterway to the west. Clark declined because he did not receive reimbursements from the government for expenditures during the war and was broke. Jefferson continued to push for expeditions into this uncharted territory but had little success. When Jefferson became president in 1801 he wanted this land to be reserved for the United States. When the land was acquired after the Louisi...