Returning from military service in the Revolutionary War, James Monroe studied law under Thomas Jefferson. Monroe became interested in politics and was a member of the Virginia legislature, delegate to the Continental Congress, member of the Virginia ratifying convention, U.S. senator from Virginia, minister to France, and governor of Virginia. This all took place between 1782-1802. Jefferson sent him on a second diplomatic mission to France to help Robert R. Livingston negotiate the purchase of New Orleans, which resulted in the Louisiana Purchase.

Less successful were attempts to purchase Florida from Spain and negotiate a commercial treaty with Britain. In 1811 he was named secretary of state in the Madison Administration, also taking the role of secretary of war after the British capture of Washington in 1814.

Monroe was elected president by an overwhelming majority in 1816, and he won unopposed in 1820. On the domestic front, he supported increases in tariffs, opposed restrictions on slavery in Missouri as a prerequisite to statehood, and rejected federal subsidy of internal improvements except by constitutional amendment.

Monroe perhaps is better known for foreign affairs triumphs. He approved the agreement demilitarizing the long boundary with Canada, purchased Florida from Spain, marked the U.S. boundary with Spanish territory across the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean, and set a treaty with Russia that limited Russian expansion down the Pacific coast. The Monroe Doctrine effectively reduced the threat of European intervention in the affairs of Latin American countries.