Readings #1: A Spirit of Nationalism, Politics of the Jackson Era, Fall 2024

Readings #1: A Spirit of Nationalism, Politics of the Jackson Era, Jackson as President To-Do Date: Oct 8 at 11:59pm A Spirit of Nationalism Monroe's presidency brought one-party rule to the United States, but the unanimity was more apparent than real. Although the Republica...

Readings #1: A Spirit of Nationalism, Politics of the Jackson Era, Jackson as President To-Do Date: Oct 8 at 11:59pm A Spirit of Nationalism Monroe's presidency brought one-party rule to the United States, but the unanimity was more apparent than real. Although the Republicans controlled the presidency and Congress, some Republican leaders were developing their own political program. Henry Clay endorsed what he called an American System, which included tariff protection for new industries, federal support for internal improvements such as roads and bridges, and renewal of the national bank, ideas not far removed from what Federalists advocated. Many Republicans agreed with Clay. Congress approved the Second Bank of the United States in 1816 for a twenty-year period and passed a moderate tariff in the same year. Internal improvements were another matter. Federal spending on roads began under Jefferson when Congress agreed to fund the construction of the National Road from the Atlantic coast into Ohio, but Republicans were never comfortable with the idea. Although roads and canals could be justified as “necessary and proper” to carry out such legitimate functions of the federal government as the promotion of commerce, they believed these :  programs really were the responsibility of the states, absent a constitutional amendment. Madison used this argument in vetoing a bill that would have appropriated money for internal improvements. The Era of Good Feelings. With the embargo in the past and the country at peace, a Boston newspaper editor called the postwar period the “Era of Good Feelings.” Monroe sought reconciliation of political differences, so the nickname of the era also applied to his administration. In 1820, Monroe won reelection handily by 231 votes to 1; the sole dissenting elector voted for John Quincy Adams, who ran as an Independent Republican. Even as politi cal lead ers spok e in natio nalist terms, new issues surfaced to create new political divisions. John Marshall's Supreme Court handed down decisions that clearly favored a strong national government, even though the party representing that view, the Federalist, was defunct. In the Dartmouth College case (1819), the Court ruled that charters granted by the states to private organizations were contracts protected under the contract clause of the Constitution, and state legislatures had no right to impair these contracts. The decision in McCulloch v. Maryland (1819), which denied the states the power to tax a federal agency (in this case the Second Bank of the United States), recognized that while the powers of the federal government were limited, the government was “supreme within its sphere of action.” New states and a new crisis. Since 1812, five states had been added to the Union, bringing the total to twenty-two: Louisiana (1812), Indiana (1816), Mississippi (1817), Illinois (1818), and Alabama (1819). In February 1819, Missouri Territory applied for statehood, but its proposed constitution permitted slavery, and at this point, eleven of the twenty-two states were “free” and eleven were “slave” states. Admitting Missouri would thus upset the existing balance. After considerable debate, a compromise credited to Henry Clay's efforts was :  reached. Maine, which was cleaved from Massachusetts, was admitted as a free state, followed by Missouri's admission as a slave state; the balance between free and slave states was thus preserved by the Missouri Compromise. Southerners agreed that slavery would not be permitted north of the 36°30′ line in the Louisiana Purchase. The next six territories to become states would continue the fragile balancing act. Monroe's foreign policy. Secretary of State John Quincy Adams successfully concluded the Transcontinent al Treaty (also called the Adams- Onís Treaty) with Spain, in which Spain gave up its unprofitable and troublesome Florida colony in return for $5 million and a clear boundary line running from the Sabine River between Spanish Texas and Louisiana across to the Pacific Ocean. Adams followed this successful negotiation with a policy statement regarding the new Latin American republics. Approached by the British to join an alliance supporting Latin American independence, Adams proposed instead to create a policy that would inform Europe that the Western Hemisphere was no longer open to colonization and that any such attempt would be viewed by the United States as an unfriendly act. In return, the United States pledged not to get involved in European problems. Because these ideas were written into Monroe's annual message to Congress, the policy eventually became known as the Monroe Doctrine. The Era of Good Feelings did not survive Monroe's two terms as president. By 1824, nationalism was being replaced by the growth of sectionalism, or the sense of one's place :  being in a portion of the nation rather than in the nation as a whole. Thus, even as developments in transportation and communication worked to unite the nation, political differences threatened to pull it apart. Politics of the Jacksonian Era Even though Andrew Jackson was president only from 1829 to 1837, his influence on American politics was pervasive both before and after his time in office. The years from about 1824 to 1840 have been called the “Age of Jacksonian Democracy” and the “Era of the Common Man.” By modern standards, however, the United States was far from democratic. Women could not vote and were legally under the control of their husbands; free blacks, if not completely disenfranchised, were considered second-class citizens at best; slavery was growing in the southern states. Moreover, the period witnessed the resettlement of Native Americans west of the Mississippi River and the concentration of wealth in fewer and fewer hands. But changes did occur that broadened participation in politics, and reform movements emerged to address the inequalities in American society. Even while states were moving toward denying free blacks the right to vote, the franchise was expanding for white men. All states admitted to the Union after 1815 adopted white male suffrage, and between 1807 and 1821, others abolished the property and tax qualifications for voting. These developments had a dramatic effect on national elections. Measuring voter turnout before the presidential election of 1824 is impossible because only electoral votes were counted, but in the 1824 presidential election, 355,000 popular votes were cast, and the number more than tripled—to more than 1.1 million—just four years later, in large part due to the end of property requirements. Minigame: Cast Your Vote (https://www.icivics.org/games/cast-your-vote) The method of voting also began to change. Until the 1820s, a man voted by going to his precinct's voting place and orally stating his choices. The absence of a secret, written ballot allowed intimidation; few would vote against a particular candidate when the room was crowded with his supporters. Printed ballots gave the voter a more independent voice, even though the first ballots were published by the political parties themselves. A ballot printed by the government, the so-called Australian ballot, was not introduced until the late nineteenth century. Furthermore, many political offices became elective rather than appointive, making office holders more accountable to the public. By 1832, almost all the states (South Carolina was the sole exception) shifted the selection of members of the :  Electoral College from their legislature directly to the voters. In 1826, the provisions of the Maryland constitution that barred Jews from practicing law and holding public office were removed. The election of 1824. The Era of Good Feelings came to an end with the presidential election of 1824. Although Republicans dominated national politics, the party was breaking apart internally. Monroe's cabinet included no fewer than three men with presidential ambitions, each representing sectional interests. John C. Calhoun and Secretary of the Treasury William Crawford contended for the role of spokesperson for the South, while Secretary of State John Quincy Adams promoted the interests of New England. Outside the cabinet, Speaker of the House Henry Clay stood for his “American System,” and the military hero Andrew Jackson, the lone political outsider, championed western ideas. :  Party leaders backed Crawford. Although a paralyzing stroke removed him from an active role in the campaign, he received almost as many votes as Clay. Calhoun removed himself from the race, settling for another terra as vice president and making plans for another run at the presidency in 1828 or 1832. Jackson received 43 percent of the popular vote compared to Adams's 31 percent, and he won 99 electoral votes to Adams's 84. Because Jackson did not receive a majority in the Electoral College, the election was decided by the House of Representatives, where Speaker Clay exercised considerable political influence. With no chance of winning himself, Clay threw his support to Adams, who shared his nationalist views. Thirteen of the twenty-one states voted for Adams, and he became president. When Adams appointed Clay his secretary of state, Jackson's supporters angrily charged that a “ corrupt bargain” had been made between the two men. Although there is no firm :  evidence to support the charge, it became an issue that hounded Adams during his presidency and was raised by Jackson himself during the next presidential campaign. The Adams presidency. Few candidates were as qualified as John Quincy Adams to be president, yet few presidents have had such a disappointing term. In his first annual message to Congress (1825), he laid out an extensive program of federal spending that stretched even the most liberal definition of internal improvements. Among other things, Adams called for the creation of a national university and a national observatory. But the president faced determined opposition everywhere he turned, both from Jackson's backers and Calhoun, who filled Senate committees with men who did not support the administration's policies. When Adams asked Congress for funds to send a delegate to the Congress of Panama, a meeting of the newly independent nations of Latin America, southerners argued so vociferously against the idea that the conference had ended by the time money was actually appropriated. Adams did not help his own cause. Refusing to engage in partisan politics, he did not remove opponents from appointed office when he became president and thereby alienated his own supporters. His rather idealistic position earned him little backing for a second term. Politics had an impact on one of the most important domestic issues—protective tariffs. The Tariff of 1824 imposed duties on woolen goods, cotton, iron, and other finished products to protect textile mills in New England and industries in the mid-Atlantic states. Four years later, Congress raised tariffs to the highest level before the Civil War and increased taxes on imports of raw wool. The Jacksonians included the duties on raw material in the legislation to weaken Adams's support from the mid-Atlantic and northern states in the upcoming election. Indeed, Jacksonians believed the bill to be so onerous to different interest groups in different parts of the country that it had no chance of passing. But the Tariff of 1828 did become law, and it was soon called the Tariff of Abominations. The election of 1828. The factionalism within the Republican ranks led to a split and the creation of two parties—Jackson's Democratic Republicans (soon shortened to “Democrats”) and Adams's National Republicans. Martin Van Buren of New York, who preferred rivalries between parties to disputes within one party, masterminded the emergence of the Democrats. The campaign itself was less about issues than the character of the two candidates. Jacksonians denounced Adams for being “an aristocrat” and for allegedly trying to influence Russian policy by providing Tsar Alexander I with an American prostitute during Adams's :  term as ambassador. Supporters of Adams vilified Jackson as a murderer (he had fought several duels), an adulterer (he and his wife had mistakenly married before her divorce from her first husband was final), and an illiterate backwoodsman. These attacks by the National Republicans did little to detract from Jackson's popularity. Ordinary Americans admired his leadership qualities and decisiveness; they preferred to remember Jackson the Indian fighter and hero of the Battle of New Orleans and forget about the important role Adams played in negotiating the Treaty of Ghent, which ended the War of 1812. Jackson also had clear political advantages. As a westerner, he had secure support from that part of the country, while the fact that he was a slave owner gave him strength in the South. Conversely, Adams was strong only in New England. Jackson was swept into office with 56 percent of the popular vote from a greatly expanded electorate. Jackson as President Jackson's inauguration celebration proved unlike that of any previous president. Long before 1829, Washington, D.C., had developed a code of proper behavior for such occasions, and the rowdy crowd that mobbed the White House to cheer on the new president left the city's social arbiters aghast. Many of those attending the inauguration were looking for jobs. Jackson mentioned “ rotation in office”—the dismissal of rival-party officeholders and installment of political supporters in their places—in his inaugural address. Although he did not invent the practice, he endorsed the rotation that his critics called the “ spoils system,” and his administration became identified with it. But Jackson did not make wholesale replacements when he became president, and the turnover during his two terms was rather modest. In any event, he relied more heavily on political allies, newspaper editors, and friends for advice. The only member of his informal advisory group, called the Kitchen Cabinet, who came from within government was Secretary of State Martin Van Buren. With presidential aspirations of his own, Van Buren used his influence to weaken Vice President John Calhoun over the issue of internal improvements. It was Van Buren who drafted Jackson's veto message on the Maysville Road bill, which would have provided indirect federal funding for a road entirely within the state of Kentucky. Politics aside, the veto probably had less to do with Jackson's opposition to internal improvements and more with the fact that the legislation primarily benefited a single state. Indeed, during Jackson's presidency, more money was spent annually on developing the nation's infrastructure than under Adams. :  The Eaton affair. The History vs. Andrew Jackson - James Fester rift between Jackson and Calhoun went beyond new roads; it was personal. When John H. Eaton, Jackson's secretary of war, married a widowed waitress named Peggy O'Neale, the wives of the other cabinet members refused to receive her socially. Jackson was particularly sensitive to such snubs; he blamed the death of his own wife, Rachel, shortly after he took office on the vicious attacks against her during the 1828 campaign. He confronted Floride Calhoun as the leader of Washington's social set, and their arguments became so bitter that they contributed to the estrangement between Jackson and his vice president. The situation flared into open hostility during the nullification controversy. The nullification controversy. To southerners, who depended more on imports than any other region of the country, the Tariff of 1828 was both discriminatory and unconstitutional. Calhoun responded to it by drafting the South Carolina Exposition and Protest , which introduced the idea that states had the right to nullify (refuse to obey) any law passed by Congress they considered unjust. Jackson supported protective tariffs but agreed to a slight reduction in rates in 1832. The change did not go far enough for Calhoun. He resigned the vice presidency in protest and returned to South Carolina, whose legislature promptly sent him back to Washington as a senator. Calhoun claimed that the only tariff permitted by the Constitution was one that raised money for the common good. Tariffs that adversely affected the economy of one part of the nation (the South) while benefiting other regions (New England and the mid-Atlantic states) were unconstitutional. In November 1832, South Carolina passed an ordinance of nullification that forbade customs duties from being collected in its port cities under the new tariff. :  Jackson wasted no time in moving against South Carolina. He proclaimed nullification itself unconstitutional, stressed that the Constitution had created a single nation rather than a group of states, and threatened to use force to collect the customs duties. The forts in Charleston harbor were put on alert by the secretary of war, and federal troops in South Carolina were prepared for action. Military confrontation was prevented through the efforts of Henry Clay, who for the second time in his career achieved a major political compromise. Congress passed two bills in March 1833, both approved by Jackson, that ultimately defused the situation. The Compromise Tariff gradually reduced duties over a ten-year period, and the Force Bill authorized the president to enforce federal law in South Carolina by military means, if necessary. South Carolina withdrew its tariff nullification ordinance, crediting Clay's leadership rather than Jackson's threats. The solution was general enough that both Jackson and Calhoun claimed the victory. The bank crisis. Jackson hated banks, paper money, and anyone who profited from them. Most of his ire was directed at the Second Bank of the United States because it was controlled by private interests and acted as a creditor of state banks. As the depository of federal revenues, it was able to lend money far beyond the capability of state institutions and require them to repay their loans in hard currency, not their own notes. Established in 1816, the Second Bank was due for a new charter in 1836. Nicholas Biddle, its president, tried to get the bank rechartered four years ahead of the expiration. He was backed by Clay, who hoped to use the bank as an issue in his bid for the presidency in 1832. Congress passed the necessary legislation by a significant margin, but Jackson vetoed the bill, and its supporters did not have enough votes to override. Denouncing the early rechartering scheme, Jackson condemned the bank as a privileged monopoly that gave a few men far too much power. Even though the bank had been upheld by the Supreme Court (in McCulloch v. Maryland, 1819) and clearly had strong support in Congress, Jackson still considered the bank unconstitutional. His overwhelming electoral victory in 1832 gave him the political clout to take further action. Not long into his second term, Jackson ordered that the operating expenses of the federal government be paid out of the existing deposits in the Second Bank and that new federal revenues be placed in selected state banks. These state banks became known as “ pet” banks. The short-term results of this policy were twofold. Even though the Second Bank's charter would expire in 1836 by its own terms, withdrawing from the funds already in the bank and discontinuing federal deposits bled the bank dry. Meanwhile, shifting federal :  deposits to the state banks empowered them to print more notes and make more loans. Jackson's criterion for state banks to become pet banks was loyalty to the Democratic party, but his original intention to limit their number was thwarted by the banks' pressing for federal deposits. By the end of 1833, there were twenty-three pet banks. The banks issued paper money backed by federal gold and lent it to speculators to buy federal lands. Public land sales grew rapidly, and to stop excessive speculation, Jackson issued the “ Specie Circular” in 1836. It required that public land be purchased with gold or silver, not paper notes. While speculation was reduced, the new policy drew criticism from westerners, for whom hard currency was scarce. In the long run, Jackson's actions on the banks contributed to a serious economic crisis, which the president left for his hand-picked successor to shoulder. :