Origins of Jacksonian Political Economy in Tennessee, 1768-1830
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University of Tennessee, Knoxville TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange Doctoral Dissertations Graduate School 12-2019 Origins of Jacksonian Political Economy in Tennessee, 1768-1830 Matthew Joseph Menarchek University of Tennessee, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_graddiss Recommended Citation Menarchek, Matthew Joseph, "Origins of Jacksonian Political Economy in Tennessee, 1768-1830. " PhD diss., University of Tennessee, 2019. https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_graddiss/5737 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized administrator of TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. For more information, please contact [email protected]. To the Graduate Council: I am submitting herewith a dissertation written by Matthew Joseph Menarchek entitled "Origins of Jacksonian Political Economy in Tennessee, 1768-1830." I have examined the final electronic copy of this dissertation for form and content and recommend that it be accepted in partial fulfillment of the equirr ements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, with a major in History. Daniel Feller, Major Professor We have read this dissertation and recommend its acceptance: Robert J. Norrell, Luke E. Harlow, Sharon Ann Murphy Accepted for the Council: Dixie L. Thompson Vice Provost and Dean of the Graduate School (Original signatures are on file with official studentecor r ds.) Origins of Jacksonian Political Economy in Tennessee, 1768-1830 A Dissertation Presented for the Doctor of Philosophy Degree The University of Tennessee, Knoxville Matthew Joseph Menarchek December 2019 Copyright © 2019 by Matthew Joseph Menarchek All rights reserved. ii Acknowledgments A scholar incurs many institutional and personal debts. I thank Dr. Daniel Feller for serving as my dissertation advisor. His guidance through the dissertation itself and through the administrative details has been invaluable. May all students of history find a teacher like him, who inspires historical interest and imagination. I thank Dr. Robert J. Norrell, Dr. Luke E. Harlow, and Dr. Sharon Ann Murphy for serving on my dissertation committee. I thank the History Department for its financial support through teaching and research assistantships. The professional and courteous staffs of the Hodges Library Special Collections at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, the Calvin M. McClung Historical Collection of the East Tennessee History Center in Knoxville, and the Tennessee State Library and Archives in Nashville made my research all the more enjoyable. Special thanks to Stephen Rutherford and Trent Hanner of the state archives, who took particular interest in me and my project. I recall one of my committee members telling a research seminar that writers should never fill their acknowledgments with superfluous personal references. I must disregard this advice. Only the personal provided enough encouragement to finish. My parents and my brother exemplify the kind of love that bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things—the love that never fails. Innumerable other relatives and friends contributed in their own way. The good folks at Custom Foods of America daily called me “Doctor,” an uncomfortable reminder that I had not yet attained that title. These individuals believed in me more than I believed in myself. For that I am grateful. iii Abstract This dissertation examines the nature of Jacksonian class politics through a study of Tennessee from 1768 to 1830. White Tennesseans, including Andrew Jackson himself, embraced commercial development, material improvement, and market transactions, despite political rhetoric that praised agricultural independence and denounced monied corruption. Opposition to banks and internal improvements usually emerged from political rivalries, not ideology. Economic downturns, such as the Panic of 1819, produced temporary reactions against the market economy. When Andrew Jackson was elected President of the United States in 1828, no popular discontent existed against money and commerce generally, or against the Bank of the United States in particular. Jackson himself initiated the Bank War for political and personal, not economic, reasons. iv Table of Contents INTRODUCTION: THE JACKSONIAN ETHOS ................................................................... 1-11 CHAPTER 1: SPECULATIVE BEGINNINGS ...................................................................... 12-71 CHAPTER 2: COMMERCIAL ADVENTURES ................................................................. 72-102 CHAPTER 3: ORIGINS OF THE BANK WAR IN TENNESSEE ................................... 103-126 CHAPTER 4: PANICKED SPECULATORS TURNED DEBTORS................................. 127-158 CHAPTER 5: JACKSONIAN PRODUCERS..................................................................... 159-187 CHAPTER 6: ANDREW JACKSON, THE BANK OF THE UNITED STATES, AND TENNESSEE ....................................................................................................................... 188-226 CONCLUSION: THE JACKSONIAN DISSONANCE ..................................................... 227-230 BIBLIOGRAPHY ................................................................................................................ 231-247 VITA ............................................................................................................................................248 v Introduction The Jacksonian Ethos On July 10, 1832, the Senate of the United States received from President Andrew Jackson a veto of the bill rechartering the Bank of the United States. Jackson’s message accompanying the veto attacked the Bank on several grounds—it maintained a monopoly, enjoyed exclusive privileges, received investments from foreign stockholders, and created a monied interest dangerous to liberty. Most importantly the Bank was unconstitutional, exercising no necessary or proper function for the federal government. The Bank, Jackson believed, had allowed the rich and powerful to influence governmental policy for private gain. All societies had distinctions in wealth and talent, “but,” said Jackson, “when the laws undertake … to make the rich richer and the potent more powerful, the humble members of society—the farmers, mechanics, and laborers—who have neither the time nor the means of securing like favors to themselves, have a right to complain of the injustice of their Government.” Although the Bank had until 1836 before its present charter expired, any hope that the veto could be overcome was quashed when Jackson was reelected in November of 1832. The United States would not have another central bank until Congress created the Federal Reserve system in 1913.1 Historians ever since have used Jackson’s “Bank War” as the central event in interpretations of Jacksonian class politics. The motivations and intentions of Jackson himself, 1 Andrew Jackson, “Veto Message,” July 10, 1832, in James D. Richardson, comp. and ed., A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents (1897; reprint, New York: Bureau of National Literature, 1911), 2: 1153. 1 of his advisers and associates, and of his supporters throughout the country speak to the essence of Jacksonian Democracy. In destroying the Bank of the United States, did Jackson and Jacksonians demonstrate an antipathy toward all banks? Did they oppose the increasingly commercialized economy of market exchange and credit relations? Did their debates among themselves and with their political opponents reflect class divisions or personal and political animosities? To answer these questions is to understand whether the inheritors of the American Revolution welcomed enterprise, seeking to participate in a competitive economic order that promised gain, or resisted it, seeking to rectify capital’s exploitation in order to preserve the independence of farmers, craftsmen, and laborers.2 Arthur Schlesinger Jr.’s The Age of Jackson provides the foundation for all modern historiography of Jacksonian America. Schlesinger argues that American history cycles between capitalist dominance and democratic dominance. Capitalists expand the economy but initiate crises by gathering excessive power and wealth. Democracy responds, challenging the established order and instituting reforms that more equitably distribute the benefits of growth. Schlesinger argues that the Jacksonian Era, and the Bank War in particular, was such a time of reform. Jackson’s political support in this effort came from eastern workers, southern planters, and intellectuals. By destroying the Bank, the business community was checked, and Jackson saved capitalism from itself. Schlesinger’s Jackson as liberal reformer and Democratic man of the people has held up well. John Ashworth’s ‘Agrarians’ and ‘Aristocrats’: Party Political Ideology in the United States, 1837-1846 argues that “more obviously anti-entrepreneurial than entrepreneurial, more nearly anti-capitalist than pro-capitalist, and more overtly radical than 2 Although dated, James Parton’s three-volume biography of Jackson is an excellent primer on his life and the Jacksonian era. See James Parton, Life of Andrew Jackson, vols. 1-3 (New York: Mason Brothers, 1860-1861). 2 conservative, Jacksonian Democracy was an avowedly egalitarian movement which sought to utilise the power that democracy gave to the individual in