Andrew Jackson 1829-1844
The election of Andrew Jackson in 1828 began a Democratic dynasty (by
then the Democratic Republicans of Jefferson’s time were calling
themselves just Democrats). For 24 of the next 32 years, Democrats would
occupy the White House, and Jackson’s policies and philosophy would set
the tone for many of them.
Jackson was the first Westerner to win the office and the first to come from
humble beginnings. He was the first president who hadn’t been to college;
although, he taught himself law. And by the time he ran for president, he
was a wealthy, slave-owning, plantation owner in Tennessee. He was also an
ardent nationalist.
His election marked a revolution in thought. Life on the frontier was
dangerous and difficult. Clearing land, creating farms, forming communities,
dealing with American Indians –all these factors required self-reliance,
initiative, and a will to work. Ancestry and education alone counted for little.
These qualities placed an emphasis on the individual’s abilities and,
according to the late historian, Frederick Jackson Turner, created the
American character. These qualities led to the political idea of the “spoils
system,” which Jackson employed. The spoils system held that every
individual had the ability to run the government. It emphasized the equality
of all but was limited in those days to white males. This emphasis on the
individual is the root of democracy and provided the philosophical base for
Jackson’s Democratic Party and the social relations of the era.
This ‘spoils system’ did much harm because it changed the qualifications of
holding a federal post from being able or experienced to being a campaign
worker or contributor. It helped political machines by giving them
something with which to reward supporters and it reduced the efficiency of
government. It would be decades before civil service reforms would fix
some of the problems created by Jackson’s efforts to democratize the
government.
His vice-president, John C. Calhoun, expected to be Jackson’s successor, but
differences of opinion caused a rift between the two, and Calhoun resigned.
He became a senator from South Carolina and began to embrace states’
rights and nullification. (Nullification was the right of a state to nullify or
refuse to obey a federal law.) (The doctrine of nullification, first expressed
by Jefferson and Madison in the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions, holds
that the individual states have the right to disobey federal laws if they found
them unconstitutional.) (This doctrine remains an issue today –usually
among those on the radical right –see if you can find them in issues today).
Calhoun’s position was increasingly replacing Jackson’s nationalistic
position.
Senator Robert Hayne of South Carolina gave a speech pointing out that
nullification was the only way a state could safeguard its interests and not be
dominated by other areas. Daniel Webster of Massachusetts said that the
people, not the states, had ratified the Constitution. And if the states were
allowed to decide which sections they would or would not subscribe to, then
the country would be held together by nothing but “a rope of sand.”
Webster’s speech had a spectacular effect. Within three months, 40,000
copies were sold and parts of the speech were standard in many textbooks.
One of the students who read his speech was Abraham Lincoln.
Events:
1. Tariffs: In 1828, Congress had passed a bill that set high tariffs on a lot of
imported goods. The North and West favored them, but the South did not.
So, in 1832, Congress lowered the tariffs, but the South was not satisfied.
South Carolina called a convention and decided that the tariff was null and
void and they would defend their decision militarily if necessary. Jackson
sent the army and navy to the state to “crush the rebellion.” But Henry Clay
came up with a compromise and saved the day.
2. The Bank and the Economy: The charter of the country’s only
nationwide bank, the Bank of the Unites States, was due to expire in 1836,
and Clay pushed a bill through Congress in 1832 to extend it. Jackson
vetoed it, contending the Bank was a private monopoly that benefited the
rich. In truth, the Bank’s stock was controlled by only a few men, and there
was some corruption –lending money to members of Congress with little or
no interest, while clamping down hard on banks in the West. But since 1819,
the Bank had provided stability to the economy by requiring local banks to
keep adequate gold and silver reserves to back up the currency they issued
and be careful on making loans. Jackson decided to kill off the Bank before
1836. He ordered that all federal funds be withdrawn and deposited in
smaller banks. When his secretary didn’t want to do it, he got a new one, and
when that one balked, he got a third one who would go along. For awhile
everything was okay, the federal government’s budget deficit dropped to
zero for the first time in history –there was a surplus- then it crashed! He
ordered that all public land could be sold only for gold or silver (Specie
Circular), not paper.
Land sales sagged from 22 million acres to 6 million in one year. Local
banks held mortgages that weren’t being paid, and they couldn’t foreclose
because the land was worthless and no one could buy it anyway. So, in 1837,
after the bank panic, the country sank into a four-year recession. But by this
time, Jackson was out of office and it was someone else’s problem.
3. Nat Turner: In August 1831, a preacher/slave named Nat Turner led 70
followers on a murderous rampage around Southampton, Virginia. Before it
was over, his group had murdered 57 white men, women, and children. Two
months later, Turner was captured and hanged with 19 others. But the
rebellion sent shock waves through the South. In retaliation, about 100
slaves were slain at random. New laws were passed to make it harder for
owners to free slaves, to restrict the ability of slaves to travel without
supervision, and to censor anti-slavery material.
4. Indians: An Indian name for Jackson was “Long Knife.” Jackson
supported a policy of Indian removal that was started by Monroe. In 1830,
Congress passed the Indian Removal Act and set aside $500,000 for the job.
By the time the job was completed in the 1840’s, more than 100,000 Indians
had been moved off of 200 million acres of real estate. Jackson said that the
forced exodus was really a humane gesture, because the only practical
alternative was to exterminate them. Thousands died on this “Trail of
Tears.” Only Henry Clay spoke out against the policy. The tribes did not go
easily. The Sauk and Fox tribe, led by Chief Black Hawk, originally crossed
the Mississippi, and then came back. Met by a large military force, which
included an Illinois military volunteer named Abe Lincoln, the tribe
surrendered. In Florida, the Seminoles fought under Chief Osceola for over a
decade, costing the U.S. military $20 million and 1,500 lives.
5. In 1830, American had its own steam engine locomotive. By 1860, we
had 30,000 miles of track –mostly in the North. VIP: Trains had an
enormous impact. The demands for labor to build tracks encouraged
immigration, and the demand for capital to finance the lines attracted foreign
investment. The ability to transport large amounts of goods and agricultural
products opened new markets and linked old ones. Communication and
passenger service increased.
6. An Illinois blacksmith, John Deere, invented the steel plow. So, now you
could till the prairie. Cyrus McCormick invented a rolling machine that
could both cut down the grain and throw it onto a platform. More food was
produced.
7. Samuel F.B. Morse invented the telegraph –the first true mass
communications medium.
8. In Texas, American settlers rebelled against Mexico and declared their
independence. Jackson recognized the Texas Republic but, because of the
slavery controversy, he refused its application for annexation to the United
States.
Social Changes:
1. Education: In 1837, Horace Mann from Massachusetts drafted a bill that
created a state school board. He advocated tax-supported schools that would
bring together kids from all economic, cultural, and ethnic backgrounds. He
fought for higher salaries for teachers etc. By 1850, every state outside the
South had free elementary schools. Motto: “Be ashamed to die until you
have won some victory for humanity.”
2. Mental Health: Dorothea Dix was a leader in reform of prisons and
insane asylums. In 1843 she published the Memorial to the Legislature of
Massachusetts which was an indictment of the living conditions and
treatment of the insane in institutions in Massachusetts. Her actions led to
changes in treatment of the insane as well as of prisoners and to the
enlargement or establishment of state supported hospitals for the insane in
15 states and Canada.
3. Voting Rights: During the Jackson period, white males throughout the
nation were able to vote as property requirements were dropped. A women’s
movement calling for the right to vote (women’s suffrage) and giving them
the legal rights of men developed. Leaders included Angelina and Sarah
Grimke and Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott. The latter two
organized the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848, which issued a Declaration
of Independence for women modeled on the U.S. Declaration. The women’s
movement was tied also with the abolitionists and F. Douglass.
4. Temperance: Susan B. Anthony became a leader of the movement to
abolish the use of alcohol. According to the temperance leaders, drinking
hurt families and limited the potential of the individual. Anthony was a
Quaker and a leader in the women’s suffrage movement as well.
5. Religious Revival –the Second Great Awakening: Underlying many of
the reform movements was a revival of interest in religion. This interest
focused on the Bible and the need for every individual to read and interpret
it. Revivals have been an important aspect of religion, especially
Protestantism, throughout United States history.
The Growth of Sectionalism:
The Industrial North: As trade and manufacturing became the most
important activities of the northern section of the Unties States, the North
developed the following political and economic needs:
 A national bank that would guarantee uniform and stable currency.
 The end of the sale of cheap lands in the West to workers needed for
northern industry.
 A high protective tariff to protect native manufactured products
against foreign competition.
 Internal improvements (roads and canals) to link the markets and raw
materials of the West to the markets and manufacturing of the
Northeast.
 The prevention of the spread of slavery and the slave-based economic
system to new western territories when it would compete with wage
labor and provide less of a market.
The Slave South: With the invention of Eli Whitney’s cotton gin in 1793,
unskilled slave labor became increasingly important to plantation owners
whose main crop, cotton, produced almost all of southern wealth. The
economic and political needs of the South were:
 Cheap western lands in which more cotton could be grown.
 The extension of slavery to these lands.
 No internal improvements (roads and canals) because they benefited
only the Northeast and West and were to be paid for by tariffs.
 No high tariffs since they raised the price of manufactured goods,
which the South imported from Britain, to whom cotton was sold in
payment.
The Farming West: Since agriculture was the principal activity and chief
source of wealth in the West, its needs were:
 Access to cheap land for expansion.
 Cheap money (much money in circulation even though, as a result, the
value of that money in terms of purchasing power is lessened), which
meant opposition to the national bank that was controlled by eastern
business interests.
 Extension of voting rights to all, regardless of property holdings. This
had started in the new states of the West. At the same time, state
constitutions shifted the choice of presidential electors from the
legislatures to the voters. The advent of the nominating convention to
replace the party caucus, meanwhile, added a popular feature to the
candidate-nominating process. From 1832 on all parties used the
political convention to choose their nominees.
 Internal improvements (roads and canals) to transport produce to
market.
Sectional Compromises:
As each section tried to gain control of the federal government to pass bills
advantageous to itself, bitterness between the sections increased and
problems could be settled only by compromise. Some of the more important
compromises were:
1. Missouri Compromise (1820): Since, if there were more free states than
slave states, the North would gain political control of Congress, the South
opposed the admission of free states unless they were balanced by the
admission of an equal number of slave states. When Missouri requested
admission to the Union in 1818 as a slave state, Henry Clay, (the “Great
Compromiser”) proposed the Missouri Compromise, which states that:
 Missouri would be admitted as a slave state, Maine as a free state.
 Slavery would be prohibited in the Louisiana Territory north of the 36
30 parallel. Missouri was to be the one exception.
2. Compromise Tariff of 1833: When the North pushed a high tariff
through Congress in 1828, the South was angry. When the tariff was slightly
modified and general duties lowered a little in 1832, South Carolina, led by
John Calhoun, threatened secession and refused to obey the law. After
negotiating a new tariff acceptable to the South, Clay saw it pushed though
Congress as well as a bill (Force Act) that would allow the president to use
troops to collect the tariff. The compromise avoided civil war in 1832-1833.
3. Compromise of 1850: When California asked for admission in 1850, the
balance between the North and South was once again endangered. The
Compromise of 1850, called the Omnibus Bill, and also written by Henry
Clay, provided that:
 The people of Utah and New Mexico would vote to determine
whether they should be free or slave states (this idea became known as
popular or “squatter” sovereignty).
 California would be admitted as a free state.
 The Fugitive Slave Law would be strengthened.
 Slave trading would be prohibited in the District of Columbia.
Important Milestones in Expansion 1787-1853:
1. Northwest Ordinance of 1787: Adopted by the government under the
Articles of Confederation, it made provision for lands north of the Ohio
River and east of the Mississippi conquered by George Rogers Clark in the
Revolution and stated that:
 No more than five and no less than three states were to be formed
from this Northwest Territory.
 Inhabitants of a territory would be admitted as a state on equal terms
when its population reached 60,000.
 Slavery was prohibited in the territory.
2. Louisiana Purchase: Extending from the Mississippi River to the Rocky
Mountains and from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico, this vast territory was
purchased from Napoleon for $15 million during Jefferson’s administration
in 1803.
3. Florida Purchase: American settlers in western Florida revolted against
Spain in 1810, and the land was annexed in 1812 and added to the state of
Louisiana. In 1819 the United States purchased the eastern part of Florida
from Spain for $5 million.
4. The Oregon Territory: Originally claimed by Britain, United States,
Spain, and Russia; by 1818 the other two countries ceded rights to the
United States and Britain, which occupied it jointly.
Marcus Whitman led American settlers into the area in 1840. A dispute
developed over the territory as American settlers moved in. In 1844 the
slogan “fifty-four forty or fight,” which meant the United States would take
over all the Oregon territory, helped elect James Polk president. In 1846 a
compromise was worked out with Britain and a treaty signed that gave the
United States rights to the land south of the 49th parallel and Britain the land
north from the 49th to 54th 40’.
5. Gadsden Purchase: A small strip of land, now incorporated in Arizona
and New Mexico, was purchased from Mexico in 1853 to provide a good
southern railroad route to the West. Its purchase completed the territory of
what became the 48 contiguous United States (the lower 48).
6. Manifest Destiny: Many Americans hoped that war with Mexico (1846)
would unite the nation and prevent the sectional conflicts from breaking up
the Union. Many also believed that it was our Manifest Destiny to expand
the borders of the nation to include all of North America. They held that this
expansion would bring benefits to all peoples. Unfortunately, the war added
to sectional divisions as New Englanders did not support it. The peace treaty
added new territory that had to be organized as states. This created both
economic tensions and problems over the spread of slavery to the new ones.
Important Facts:
Jacksonian Democracy and Manifest Destiny are the two chief issues of
these years. Andrew Jackson is the symbol of an age. During this period we
see the beginning of the operation of the political system as we know it
today. It is marked by many economic and social changes. His presidency is
followed by economic depression and then by a decade of expansion for
which the slogan became Manifest Destiny. Manifest Destiny culminated in
the acquisition of Oregon and the Mexican War.