Distribution of electoral college votes in the 1804 US presidential election
The fifth US presidential election was contested by incumbent Democratic-Republican President Thomas Jefferson, and the Federalist Party's Charles Cotesworth Pinckney. This was the first election to include the changes made by the Twelfth Amendment to the US Constitution, which separated the way in which electoral votes were cast regarding the president and vice-president (in previous years, there was no distinction between candidates running for these positions, which led to complications in the 1796 and 1800 elections).
In 1804, President Jefferson was re-elected by a landslide, with 162 electoral votes to Pinckney's 14, winning 15 out of 17 states. Some states used a popular vote to determine who their electoral vote would go to, (although this would not become standard practice until 1824) with Jefferson receiving almost three quarters of the popular vote. Jefferson's success was due to the economy's strong performance during his first term, as well as his role in the Louisiana Purchase, where he purchased the Louisiana territory from France for just fifteen million dollars, (worth approximately 34 billion dollars in 2019) almost doubling the territory of the United States in the process.
In 1804, President Jefferson was re-elected by a landslide, with 162 electoral votes to Pinckney's 14, winning 15 out of 17 states. Some states used a popular vote to determine who their electoral vote would go to, (although this would not become standard practice until 1824) with Jefferson receiving almost three quarters of the popular vote. Jefferson's success was due to the economy's strong performance during his first term, as well as his role in the Louisiana Purchase, where he purchased the Louisiana territory from France for just fifteen million dollars, (worth approximately 34 billion dollars in 2019) almost doubling the territory of the United States in the process.
