Louisiana Purchase Research Paper

Over the centuries Louisiana has represented various benefits to different nationalities–both geographically and politically. Louisiana nowadays is completely different from Louisiana during the time of the Louisiana Purchase. During the creation of Louisiana Territory, no one had maps or documents to present; therefore boundaries had periodically shifted. What was known was that it stretched from the Mississippi River in the east to the Rocky Mountains in the west and from the Gulf of Mexico in the south to the Canadian border in the north. The first colonists to sail by Louisiana’s coast were Spanish explorers in 1520, who encountered the Mississippi River for the first time on land in 1542. The Spanish, however, never strengthen their position …show more content…
In addition, he served as three-time governor of the French colony of Louisiana intermittently from 1702 to 1743. During his governing he succeeded to stabilize and develop the colony by making plantations along the Mississippi river and attracting more colonists from France. One of his accomplishments was the foundation of New Orleans in 1718, which became the capital of the whole territory two years later. Later New Orleans became a major port and a major center in North America, that would become the one of thr main reasons for Louisiana purchase. In 1756 was the begining of the French and Indian War, between France and Britain. During this war King Carlos III of Spain supported his Bourbon cousin, Louis XV of France, but that only led to the lost of a few of his important colonies to the victorious British. To compensate Spain for its losses, France ceded the North American territory, which was not lost to Britain – Louisiana. This was kept secret until France could negotiate peace with the British, because the French preferred Louisiana to be under Spanish control than in the hands of Great …show more content…
In the 1790s, the western and southern borders of the United States had been a source of tension between Spain and the United States. The U.S. border extended to the Mississippi River, but its southern stretch remained in Spanish territory – Louisiana. Spanish officials, reluctant to encourage U.S. trade and settlement in a strategic frontier area, kept the Mississippi River and the port of New Orleans closed to American shipping. For this reason, the American Diplomat Thomas Pinckney made a treaty to establisha an agreement between the two countries. The treaty was an important diplomatic success for the United States. It resolved territorial disputes between the two countries and granted American ships the right to free navigation of the Mississippi River as well as duty-free transport through the port of New Orleans, then under Spanish control. While in Spain the financial system was facing serious trouble as the banknotes were circulating as legal currency. In addition, the British attacks on Spain's colonies, along with their commercial blockade, added to the already worsening economic situation, with the national debt increasing eightfold between 1793 and

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