During the Adam's administration, when he was still living in Philly, partisans of he and Jefferson used to identify their poltical leanings by wearing cockades on their lapels. Adam's thugs wore black cockades and Jefferson's red, white and blue, for the colors of the French flag.
Gettign caught in the streest of Philly wearing red, white and blue could get you a thourough thrashing by Adam's "patriots."
From a reveiw of American Aurora, a book on the era by Richard Rosenfeld ( a must read for DUers, I'd say)
"The people who were for the federalists and Adams, in their hats they wore a cockade. A cockade is an ornament, a rosette, worn on a hat as a badge . . .And all the men, the elites at the time, Hamilton right there in lower Manhattan, went around with a hat that either had a black cockade for the federalists and aristocratic control, or a red, white, and blue cockade for Jefferson and defenders of representational democracy. The word cockade comes from the Old French cocky."
http://www.populistamerica.com/elites_and_the_hopi_elders