I. The “Corrupt Bargain” of 1824

1. After the Era of Good Feelings, politics was transformed. The big
   winner of this transformation was the common man. Specifically, the
   common white man as universal white manhood suffrage (all white men
   could vote) became the norm.
2. In the election of 1824, there were four towering candidates:
   Andrew Jackson of Tennessee, Henry Clay of Kentucky, William H.
   Crawford of Georgia, and John Q. Adams of Massachusetts.
   • All four called themselves Republicans.
   • Three were a “favorite son” of their respective region but Clay
     thought of himself as a national figure (he was Speaker of the House
     and author of the “American System”).
3. In the results, Jackson got the most popular votes and the most
   electoral votes, but he failed to get the majority in the Electoral
   College. Adams came in second in both, while Crawford was fourth in the
   popular vote but third in the electoral votes. Clay was 4th in the
   electoral vote.
4. By the 12th Amendment, the top three electoral vote getters would
   be voted upon in the House of Reps. and the majority (over 50%) would
   be elected president.
5. Clay was eliminated, but he was the Speaker of the House, and since
   Crawford had recently suffered a paralytic stroke and Clay hated
   Jackson, he threw his support behind John Q. Adams, helping him become
   president.
   • When Clay was appointed Secretary of the State, the traditional
     stepping-stone to the presidency, Jacksonians cried foul play and
     corruption. Jackson said he, the people’s choice, had been swindled out
     of the presidency by career politicians in Washington D.C.
   • John Randolph publicly assailed the alliance between Adams and Clay.
6. Evidence against any possible deal has never been found in this “Corrupt Bargain,” but both men flawed their reputations.

II. A Yankee Misfit in the White House

1. John Quincy Adams was a man of puritanical honor, and he had
   achieved high office by commanding respect rather than by boasting
   great popularity. Like his father, however, he was able but somewhat
   wooden and lacked the “people’s touch” (which Jackson notably had).
2. During his administration, he only removed 12 public servants from
   the federal payroll, thus refusing to kick out efficient officeholders
   in favor of his own, possibly less efficient, supporters.
3. In his first annual message, Adams urged Congress on the
   construction of roads and canals, proposed a national university, and
   advocated support for an astronomical observatory.
   • Public reaction was mixed: roads were good, but observatories
     weren’t important, and Southerners knew that if the government did
     anything, it would have to continue collecting tariffs.
4. With land, Adams tried to curb over-speculation of land, much to
   Westerners’ anger even though he was doing it for their own good, and
   with the Cherokee Indians, he tried to deal fairly with them although
   the state of Georgia successfully resisted federal attempts to help the
   Cherokees.

III. Going “Whole Hog” for Jackson in 1828”

1. Jacksonians argued, “Should the people rule?” and said that the
   Adams-Clay bargaining four years before had cheated the people out of
   the rightful victor.
   • They successfully turned public opinion against an honest and honorable president.
2. However, Adams’ supporters also hit below the belt, even though Adams himself wouldn’t stoop to that level.
   • They called Jackson’s mother a prostitute, called him an adulterer
     (he had married his wife Rachel thinking that her divorce had been
     granted, only to discover two years later that it hadn’t been), and
     after he got elected, Rachel died. Jackson blamed Adams’ men who had
     slandered Andrew Jackson for Rachel Jackson’s death—he never forgave
     them.
3. John Q. Adams had purchased, with his own money and for his own
   use, a billiard table and a set of chessmen, but the Jacksonians had
   seized this, criticizing Adams’ incessant spending.

IV. “Old Hickory” as President

1. When he became president, Andrew Jackson had already battled
   dysentery, malaria, tuberculosis, and lead poisoning from two bullets
   lodged somewhere in his body.
2. He personified the new West: rough, a jack-of-all-trades, a genuine folk hero.
3. Born in the backwoods of the Carolinas (we’re not even sure if it
   was North or South Carolina, and both states still claim to be his
   home), Jackson had been early orphaned, was interested in cockfighting
   as a kid, and wasn’t really good with reading and writing, sometimes
   misspelling the same word twice in one letter.
4. He went to Tennessee, where he became a judge and a congressman,
   and his passions were so profound that he could choke up on the floor.
5. A man with a violent temper, he got into many duels, fights, stabbings, etc…
6. He was a Western aristocrat, having owned many slaves, and lived in
   a fine mansion, the Hermitage, and he shared many of the prejudices of
   the masses.
7. He was called “Old Hickory” by his troops because of his toughness.
8. He was anti-federalist, believing that the federal government was
   for the privileged only, although he maintained the sacredness of the
   Union and the federal power over the states. Still, he welcomed the
   western democracy.
9. Jackson commanded fear and respect from his subordinates, and
   ignored the Supreme Court on several occasions; he also used the veto
   12 times (compared to a combined 10 times by his predecessors) and on
   his inauguration, he let commoners come into the White House.
   • They wrecked the china and caused chaos until they heard that there
     was spiked punch on the White House front lawn; thus was the “inaugural
     bowl.”
   • Conservatives condemned Jackson as “King Mob” and berated him greatly.

V. The Spoils System

1. The spoils system rewarded supporters with good positions in office.
2. Jackson believed that experience counted, but that loyalty and
   young blood and sharp eyes counted more, and thus, he went to work on
   overhauling positions and erasing the old.
3. Not since the election of 1800 had a new party been voted into the
   presidency, and even then, many positions had stayed and not changed.
4. Though he wanted to “wipe the slate clean,” only 1/5 of the men
   were sent home, and clean sweeps would come later, but there were
   always people hounding Jackson for positions, and those who were
   discharged often went mad, killed themselves, or had a tough time with
   it.
5. The spoils system denied many able people a chance to contribute.
6. Samuel Swartwout was awarded the lucrative post of collector of the
   customs of the port of New York, and nearly nine years later, he fled
   for England, leaving his accounts more than a million dollars short,
   and thus becoming the first person to steal a million dollars from the
   government.
7. The spoils system was built up by gifts from expectant party
   members, and the system secured such a tenacious hold that it took more
   than 50 years before its grip was even loosened.

VI. The Tricky “Tariff of Abominations”

1. In 1824, Congress had increased the general tariff from 23% to 37%, but wool manufactures still wanted higher tariffs.
2. In the Tariff of 1828, the Jacksonians (who disliked tariffs)
   schemed to drive up duties to as high as 45% while imposing heavy
   tariffs on raw materials like wool, so that even New England, where the
   tariff was needed, would vote the bill down and give Adams another
   political black eye.
   • However, the New Englanders backfired the plan and passed the law (amended).
   • Daniel Webster and John C. Calhoun reversed their positions from
     1816, with Webster supporting the tariff and Calhoun being against it.
   • The Southerners immediately branded it as the “Tariff of Abominations.”
3. In the South at this time, Denmark Vesey, a free Black, led an
   ominous slave rebellion in Charleston. This raised fears by Southern
   whites and led to a tightening of control over slaves.
   • The South mostly complained because it was now the least expanding of the sections.
   • Cotton prices were falling and land was growing scarce.
4. Southerners sold their cotton and other products without tariffs,
   while the products that they bought were heavily taxed. The South said
   all tariffs did for them was hike up prices.
5. Tariffs led the U.S. to buy less British products and vice versa,
   but it did help the Northeast prosper so that it could buy more of the
   South’s products.
6. John C. Calhoun secretly wrote “The South Carolina Exposition” in
   1828, boldly denouncing the recent tariff and calling for nullification
   of the tariff by all states.
7. However, South Carolina was alone in this nullification threat,
   since Andrew Jackson had been elected two weeks earlier, and was
   expected to sympathize with the South against the tariff.

VII. “Nullies” in South Carolina

1. South Carolinians, still scornful toward the Tariff of 1828,
   attempted to garner the necessary two-thirds majority to nullify it in
   the S.C. legislature, but determined Unionists blocked them.
2. In response to the anger at the “Tariff of Abominations,” Congress
   passed the Tariff of 1832, which did away with the worst parts of the
   Tariff of 1828, such as lowering the tariff down to 35%, a reduction of
   10%, but many southerners still hated it.
3. In the elections of 1832, the Nullies came out with a two-thirds
   majority over the Unionists, met in the state legislature, and declared
   the Tariff of 1832 to be void within S.C. boundaries.
   • They also threatened with secession against the Union, causing a huge problem.
   • President Jackson issued a ringing proclamation against S.C., to
     which governor Hayne issued a counter-proclamation, and civil war
     loomed dangerously.
   • To compromise and prevent Jackson from crushing S.C. and becoming
     more popular, the president’s rival, Henry Clay, proposed a compromise
     bill that would gradually reduce the Tariff of 1832 by about 10% over a
     period of eight years, so that by 1842 the rates would be down to 20%
     to 25%.
4. The Tariff of 1833 narrowly squeezed through Congress.
5. However, to save face, Congress also passed the Force Bill (AKA the
   “Bloody Bill”) that authorized the president to use the army and navy,
   if necessary, to collect tariffs.
6. No other states had supported South Carolina’s stance of possible secession, though Georgia and Virginia toyed with the idea.
7. Finally, S.C. repealed the nullification ordinance.

VIII. The Trail of Tears

1. By 1830, the U.S. population stood at 13 million, and as states emerged, the Indians were stranded.
2. Federal policy officially was to acquire land from the Indians through formal treaties, but too many times, they were tricked.
3. Many people respected the Indians, though, and tried to Christianize them.
   • i.e. the Society for Propagating the Gospel Among Indians (est. 1787).
4. Some Indians violently resisted, but the Cherokees were among the
   few that tried to adopt the Americans ways, adopting a system of
   settled agriculture, devising an alphabet, legislating legal code in
   1808, and adopting a written constitution in 1827.
5. The Cherokees, the Creeks, Choctaws, Chickasaws, and the Seminoles were known as the “Five Civilized Tribes.”
6. However, in 1828, Congress declared the Cherokee tribal council
   illegal, and asserted its own jurisdiction over Indian lands and
   affairs, and even though the Cherokees appealed to and won in the
   Supreme Court, Jackson refused to recognize the decision.
7. Jackson, though, still harbored some sentiment of Indians, and
   proposed that they be bodily transferred west of the Mississippi, where
   they could preserve the culture, and in 1830, Congress passed the
   Indian Removal Act, in which Indians were moved to Oklahoma.
   • Thousands of Indians died on the “Trail of Tears” after being
     uprooted from their sacred lands that had been theirs for centuries.
   • Also, the Bureau of Indian Affairs was established in 1836 to deal with Indians.
8. In 1832, in Illinois and Wisconsin, the Sauk and Fox tribes revolted but were crushed.
9. From 1835 to 1842, the Seminoles waged guerrilla warfare against
   the U.S., but were broken after their leader, Osceola, was seized; some
   fled deeper into the Everglades of Florida; others moved to Oklahoma.

IX. The Bank War

1. Andrew Jackson, like most westerners, distrusted big banks, especially the BUS—Bank of the United States.
   • To Jackson and westerners, the BUS was simply a tool of the rich to get richer.
   • The BUS minted coin money (“hard money”), but not paper money.
     Farmers out west wanted paper money which caused inflation, and enabled
     them to more easily pay off their debts.
   • Jackson and westerners saw the BUS and eastern banks as being in a
     conspiracy to keep the common man down economically. This conspiracy
     was carried out through hard money and debt.
2. The BUS, led by Nicholas Biddle, was harsh on the volatile western
   “wildcat” banks that churned out unstable money and too-lenient credit
   for land (which the westerners loved). The BUS seemed pretty autocratic
   and out of touch with America during its New Democracy era, and it was
   corrupt.
3. Nicholas Biddle cleverly lent U.S. funds to friends, and often used the money of the BUS to bribe people, like the press.
4. However, the bank was financially sound, reduced bank failures,
   issued sound notes, promoted economic expansion by making abundant
   credit, and was a safe depository for the funds of the Washington
   government.
5. It was highly important and useful, though sometimes not necessarily pure and wholesome.
6. In 1832, Henry Clay, in a strategy to bring Jackson’s popularity
   down so that he could defeat him for presidency, rammed a bill for the
   re-chartering of the BUS—four years early.
7. He felt that if Jackson signed it, he’d alienate his followers in
   the West and South, and if he vetoed it, he’d lose the supports of the
   “best people” of the East.
8. He failed to realize that the West held more power now, not the East.
9. The re-charter bill passed through Congress easily, but Jackson
   demolished it in a scorching veto that condemned the BUS as
   unconstitutional (despite political foe John Marshall’s ruling that it
   was okay), and anti-American.
10. The veto amplified the power of the president by ignoring the Supreme Court and aligned the West against the East.

X. “Old Hickory” Wallops Clay in 1832

1. Jackson’s supporters again raised the hickory pole while Clay’s men
   detracted Jackson’s dueling, gambling, cockfighting, and fast living.
2. However, a new third party, the Anti-Masonic Party, made its entrance for the first time.
   • Opposed to the fearsome secrecy of the Masonic order, it was
     energized by the mysterious murder of someone who threatened to expose
     the Freemason’s secrets.
   • While sharing Jacksonian ideals, they were

against Jackson, a Mason.
* Also, they were supported by churches hoping to pass religious reform.

1. Also for the first time, national conventions were held to nominate candidates.
2. Clay had the money and the “support” of the press, but the poor
   people voted too, and Jackson won handily, handing Clay his third loss
   in three tries.

XI. Burying Biddle’s Bank

1. Hoping to kill the BUS, Jackson now began to withdraw federal funds
   from the bank, so as to drain it of its wealth; in reaction, Biddle
   began to call for unnecessary loans, personally causing a mini panic.
2. Jackson won, and in 1836, the BUS breathed its last breath, but
   because it had been the only source of sure credit in the United
   States, hard times fell upon the West once the BUS died, since the
   wildcat banks were very unreliable.

XII. The Birth of the Whigs

1. Under Jackson, the modern two-party system of politics came to be.
2. Opponents of Jackson despised his iron-fisted nature and called him
   “King Andrew.” This wide group coalesced into the Whig party, united
   only by dislike of Jackson.
3. Generally, the Whigs:
   • Disliked Jackson
   • Supported Henry Clay’s American System and internal improvements.
4. Once formed, American would have at least two major political parties thenceforth.

XIII. The Election of 1836

1. “King Andrew” was too old to run again, but offered Martin van Buren to follow in his coattails.
2. The Whigs suffered from disorganization. They tried to offer a
   favorite son candidate from each section of the country—their hopes
   were that no one would win a majority of electoral votes, the election
   would thus be thrown to the House of Representatives, and they could
   win there. Their scheme failed, and van Buren won.

XIV. Big Woes for the “Little Magician”

1. Van Buren was the first president to have been born in America, but
   he lacked the support of many Democrats and Jackson’s popularity.
2. A rebellion in Canada in 1837 threatened to plunge America into
   war, and Van Buren also inherited the depression caused by Jackson’s
   BUS killing.

XV. Depression Doldrums and the Independent Treasury

1. The Panic of 1837 was caused by the “wildcat banks” loans, the
   over-speculation, the “Bank War,” and the Specie Circular stating that
   debts must be paid in specie (gold or silver), which no one had.
2. Failures of wheat crops caused by the Hessian fly also worsened the
   situation, and the failure of two large British Banks in 1836 had
   already started the panic going.
3. Hundreds of banks fell, including some of Jackson’s “pet banks,”
   banks that had received the money that Jackson had withdrawn from the
   BUS to kill it.
4. The Whigs proposed expansion of bank credit, higher tariffs, and
   subsidies for internal improvements, but Van Buren spurned such ideas.
5. Instead, he proposed the “Divorce Bill” (separating the bank from
   the government and storing money in some of the vaults of the larger
   American cities, thus keeping the money safe but also unavailable) that
   advocated the independent treasury, and in 1840, it was passed.
   • The next year, the victorious Whigs repealed it, but in 1846, it
     was brought back; it finally merged with the Federal Reserve System in
     the next century.

XVI. Gone to Texas

1. Americans continued to covet Texas, and in 1823, after Mexico had
   gained independence from Spain, Stephen Austin had made an agreement
   with the Mexican government to bring about 300 families into a huge
   tract of granted land to settle.
2. The stipulations were: (1) they must become Mexican citizens, (2)
   they must become Catholic, and (3) no slavery allowed. These
   stipulations were largely ignored by the new settlers.

XVII. The Lone Star Rebellion

1. The Texans (among them Davy Crockett and Jim Bowie) resented the
   “foreign” government, but they were led by Sam Houston, a man whose
   wife had left him.
2. In 1830, Mexico freed its slaves and prohibited them in Texas, much to the anger of citizens.
3. In 1833, Stephen Austin went to Mexico City to clear up differences and was jailed for 8 months.
4. In 1835, dictator Santa Anna started to raise an army to suppress the Texans; the next year, they declared their independence.
5. After armed conflict and slaughters at the Alamo and at Goliad,
   Texan war cries rallied citizens, volunteers, and soldiers, and the
   turning point came after Sam Houston led his army for 37 days eastward,
   then turned on the Mexicans, taking advantage of their siesta hour,
   wiping them out, and capturing Santa Anna.
6. The treaty he was forced to sign was later negated by him on grounds that the treaty was extorted under duress.
7. Texas was supported in their war by the United States, but Jackson
   was hesitant to formally recognize Texas as an independent nation until
   he had secured Martin Van Buren as his successor, but after he
   succeeded, Jackson did indeed recognize Texas on his last day before he
   left office, in 1837.
8. Many Texans wanted to become part of the Union, but the slavery issue blocked this.
9. The end was an unsettled predicament in which Texans feared the return of Santa Anna.

XVIII. Log Cabins and Hard Cider of 1840

1. In 1840, William Harrison was nominated due to his being issueless and enemyless, with John Tyler as his running mate.
2. He had only been popular from Tippecanoe (1811) and the Battle of the Thames (1813).
3. A stupid Democratic editor also helped Harrison’s cause when he
   called the candidate a poor old farmer with hard cider and
   inadvertently made him look like many poor Westerners.
4. With slogans of “Tippecanoe and Tyler too,” the Whigs advocated
   this “poor man’s president” idea and replied, to such questions of the
   bank, internal improvements, and the tariff, with answers of “log
   cabin,” “hard cider,” and “Harrison is a poor man.”
5. The popular election was close, but Harrison blew Van Buren away in the Electoral College.
6. Basically, the election was a protest against the hard times of the era.

XIX. Politics for the People

1. When the Federalists had dominated, democracy was not respected, but by the 1820s, it was widely appealing.
   • Politicians now had to bend to appease and appeal to the masses,
     and the popular ones were the ones who claimed to be born in log cabins
     and had humble backgrounds.
   • Those who were aristocratic (too clean, too well-dressed, too grammatical, to highly intellectual) were scorned.
2. Western Indian fighters and/or militia commanders, like Andrew
   Jackson, Davy Crocket, and William Henry Harrison, were quite popular.
3. Jacksonian Democracy said that whatever governing that was to be done should be done directly by the people.
4. This time was called the New Democracy, and was based on universal white manhood suffrage.
   • In 1791, Vermont became the first state admitted to the union to allow all white males to vote in the elections.
5. While the old bigwigs who used to have power sneered at the
   “coonskin congressmen” and the “bipeds of the forest,” the new
   democrats argued that if they messed up, they messed up together and
   were not victims of aristocratic domination.

XX. The Two-Party System

1. The Democrats had so successfully absorbed the Federalist ideas
   before, that a true two party system had never emerged—until now.
2. The Democrats
   • Glorified the liberty of the individual.
   • Clung to states’ rights and federal restraint in social and economic affairs.
   • Mostly more humble, poorer folk.
   • Generally from the South and West.
3. The Whigs
   • Trumpeted the natural harmony of society and the value of community.
   • Berated leaders whose appeals and self-interest fostered conflict among individuals.
   • Favored a renewed national bank, protective tariffs, internal improvements, public schools, and moral reforms.
   • Mostly more aristocratic and wealthier.
   • Generally from the East.
4. Things in Common
   • Based on the people, with “catchall” phrases for popularity.
   • Both also commanded loyalties from all kinds of people.