In this lecture from Yale's DeVane course America at 250: A History, Professor Joanne Freeman examines the 1790s as a pivotal decade for the young United States, focusing on how power was placed and contested among the early presidency and emerging political factions. Recorded as part of this one-time-only course tracing United States history from the 1770s forward, the session continues Freeman's sequence on the founding era, following directly from the prior class's discussion of the Constitution's framing into the practical question of how presidential power actually took shape in its first years.