This leaven of Americans affected the whole. They had been accustomed to the fostering hand of the National Government in the matter of improving means of transportation and communication in the older States from which they had migrated, and they did not hesitate to demand such aid for their new localities. Thus the people in their westward movement, carrying with them remembrances of the benefits of government assistance enjoyed in their former homes, have extended the system of national improvements across the continent. There was a pressing demand for assistance in the Louisiana country. The province had been long neglected because of the frequent changes in ownership and the Latin method of colony holding. The task of Americanising this foreign element was imperative. The extent of territory to be brought under harmonious rule was extensive and varied. It was impossible for the Administration, in providing for the welfare and defence of the acquisition, not to be drawn into measure after measure of that paternalistic nature for which the party had so roundly criticised the Federalists. The sole management of Territories was vested in the National Government. The individual States could have no part in providing for the inhabitants of the Louisiana Purchase. [Illustration: TAKING POSSESSION OF THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE. Occupying presumably the same balcony in which Laussat, Wilkinson, and Claiborne stood on the front of the Spanish _cabildo_ at New Orleans, in December, 1803, witnessing the replacing of the French flag by the American flag in the public square below, there stand, in the illustration, the Governor of Louisiana, with a descendant of Claiborne, the Archbishop and the Mayor of New Orleans, enacting the scene in December, 1903.] Federalist precedent had paved the way for Republican action. Since the Revolutionary days, Congress had been accustomed to maintain troops on the border for the protection of settlers. The establishment of forts in distant parts made necessary the construction of roads between the posts and their connection with the settled parts for the conveyance of troops and supplies. The addition of the vast tract of Louisiana demanded an immediate extension of military posts and military roads.