Stephen B. Meister Commentary During the presidency of Thomas Jefferson, the Tenth Congress enacted the Insurrection Act of 1807, which was then signed by Jefferson into law, to foil the plot of Revolutionary War hero Aaron Burr—following the destruction of his political career after he shot and killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel—to raise an army to establish his own dynasty in what was then the Louisiana Territory. The Insurrection Act empowers the president of the United States to deploy U.S. military and federalized National Guard troops to suppress civil…
