duties of the secretary of state. Monroe received the electoral votes of all but three states: Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Delaware. The eight-year association between Adams and Monroe was marked by a growing mutual trust and respect that culminated in the Monroe Doctrine. Monroe's first administration faced two major crises, one foreign and one domestic. Monroe sent General Andrew Jackson to drive them out. In the first years of Monroe's administration, slavery was becoming a national issue. When Monroe took office, the states were equally divided between slave and free states. On March 6, Monroe signed the bill into law. Monroe's second term as president was relatively uneventful. Monroe was 67 years old when he turned over the presidency to Adams and retired to Oak Hill in Loudoun County, Virginia. After his wife died, Monroe sold Oak Hill and moved to New York City to live with his younger daughter, Maria Hester Gouverneur, and her husband. He died on July 4, 1831, five years after Jefferson and John Adams had died and 55 years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. ...
