Some of Jefferson's opponents argued that he owed his victory over Adams to the South's inflated number of electors, due to counting slaves as partial population under the Three-Fifths Compromise. Others alleged that Jefferson secured James Asheton Bayard's tie-breaking electoral vote by guaranteeing the retention of various Federalist posts in the government. Jefferson disputed the allegation, and the historical record is inconclusive.The transition proceeded smoothly, marking a watershed in American history. As historian Gordon S. Wood writes, 'it was one of the first popular elections in modern history that resulted in the peaceful transfer of power from one 'party' to another.' Jefferson told Secretary of War General Henry Dearborn (Indian affairs were then under the War Department), 'If we are constrained to lift the hatchet against any tribe, we will never lay it down until that tribe is exterminated or driven beyond the Mississippi.' Miller agrees that Jefferson believed that Indians should assimilate to American customs and agriculture.
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