When President Monroe toured the country for the first time at the beginning of his presidency (in the summer of 1817), in order to assess existing fortifications in the Northern States, but also to get in contact with an ample representation of Americans - no other President before him met as many people as he did - he was warmly received. He had a very affable and likeable personality, and everywhere he went, from Maine to Boston, and from Detroit to Washington D.C., he received a fond and enthusiastic reception. It was, in fact, during Monroe's visit to New England, that a journalist coined the expression "Era of Good Feelings," a phrase that has come to represent the years that spanned Monroe's presidency.
