Brinkley, Chapter 9 Notes Brinkley, Chapter 9 Jacksonian Democracy Expanding Enfranchisement The "Age of Jackson" was a transformation in American politics. Until the 1820s most states restricted voting to 4 Things to know about Andrew Jackson: white male property owners, taxpayers, or both. 1. Enfranchisement Enfranchisement expanded first in the NW Territory allowing all adult white males the right to vote and all voters the right to hold 2. Tariffs public office. 3. Banks The process was far from complete. No slaves could vote. Southern election laws continued to favor the planters and politicians of the old 4. Indians The most striking trend of the early 19th counties. Free blacks could not vote anywhere century was the method of choosing in the South and hardly anywhere in the North. presidential electors. In 1800, state There was no secret ballot. legislatures chose the presidential 1824 = 27% adult white males voted electors. By 1828, electors were chosen by popular vote in all states except South 1828 = 58% adult white males voted Carolina. 1840 = 80% adult white males voted President of the Common Man Spoils System Jackson embraced a simple theory of democracy. Government should offer "equal protection and Jacksonians also transformed the process by equal benefits" to all white male citizens and favor no region or class over another. which presidential candidates were selected. Jackson attacked the eastern aristocracy and the Jackson believed government offices belonged to the extending opportunities to the rising classes of the people, not to a self-serving bureaucracy. West and the South. Wanted to eliminate Henry Clay's American System of internal improvements. Jackson rejected the idea of "property in office" - that officials held permanent title to Jackson's commitment to extending power beyond entrenched elites led him to reduce an office. He insisted on the rotation of the functions of the federal government. Believed a concentration of power in DC officeholders, so that when an administration restricted opportunity to people with political connections. was voted out, its bureaucratic appointees would also have to leave government service. Jackson was also strongly committed to the preservation of the Union. He asserted the supremacy of the Union. This ideology was in stark contrast this Vice President's ideas "To the victor belong the spoils." on Federalism - John C. Calhoun Calhoun and the Nullification Crisis The Nullification Crisis Calhoun Championed states' rights of nullification. Calhoun developed a states’ rights The crisis began in 1832 when By 1833 Calhoun represented interpretation, arguing that a state could high-tariff congressmen SC in the US Senate declare a congressional law to be ignored southern warnings unconstitutional and therefore void within a that they were “endangering state’s borders. the Union” and reenacted the Act of nullification rested Tariff of Abominations. on the constitutional Jackson vowed to enforce government’s arguments developed in authority to establish tariffs no matter the The South Carolina cost. He declared that SC’s Ordinance of In response, leading SC politicians Exposition and Protests Nullification violated the Constitution. called a state convention and adopted (1828) written anonymously the Ordinance of Nullification Jackson warned, “Disunion by armed by VP Calhoun. declaring the tariffs of 1828 & 1832 to force is treason.” be null and void; prohibited the Calhoun used the arguments of Jackson strengthened federal forts in South Carolina and ordered a warship to collection of tariffs in SC after 2/1/1833, Jefferson & Madison in the Kentucky Charleston. and threatened secession if federal & Virginia Resolutions of 1798. When Congress convened in early 1833, it passed the Force Bill authorizing the officials tried to collect them. Sovereignty lay in the states. president to use the military to see that acts of Congress were obeyed. 1 Brinkley, Chapter 9 Notes Clay's Compromise Jackson and the Bank War Calhoun faced a predicament as he took his place in Jackson could not legally destroy the Bank before its the Senate. No state supported South Carolina. expiration so he weakened it considerably. Clay's election to the Senate though averted a crisis. The bank was privately managed and operated under a 20 Clay devised a compromise by which the tariff would year charter (set to expire in 1836) from the federal be lowered gradually so that by 1842 it would reach government, which owned 20% of its stock. approximately the same level as in 1816. The The Bank of the US held a monopoly on federal deposits, compromise and the force bill were passed on the same provided credit to businesses, issued dependable currency, day, both signed by Jackson. Nicholas Biddle and regulated state banks. Nicholas Biddle, who ran the Bank, established prosperity to the Bank and In South Carolina, the convention reassembled and repealed its nullification faith from the American people. Jackson was intent on destroying the Bank. of the tariffs, but then nullified the force act - a purely symbolic act. Calhoun and his followers claimed a victory for nullification, which they insisted, In 1832, Henry Clay and Daniel Webster persuaded Nicholas Biddle to seek an forced the revision of the tariff. early extension of the bank’s charter. They had the votes in Congress to recharter the bank and hoped to lure Jackson into a veto that would split the The episode taught Calhoun and his allies that no state could defy the federal Democrats just before the 1832 elections. government alone. Recharter Bill Vetoed The American System Biddle, along with his allies, Daniel Webster and Henry Clay proposed a recharter bill in 1832 to Congress, 4 years before the Bank's expiration. Clay won support from those who supported his American System. Congress approved the measure and Jackson vetoed it. Congress failed to override the veto. The Bank issue became the paramount issue of the 1832 election. Strengthen the Second Use tariff revenues to Internal build the proposed Clay ran against Jackson using Bank of the US improvements roads and canals. the issue of the Bank to to encourage support his candidacy. He lost economic to Jackson and Martin Van development: His nationalistic program won praise in the West, Buren (V.P.) Build roads which needed transportation improvements, but In September 1833, Jackson and canals elicited sharp criticism in the South. Van Buren appointed Roger Taney as his denounced the American System as "consolidated 3rd Treasury Secretary. Jackson government" finally found someone that would weaken the bank. The "Monster" Destroyed Jackson's Political Victory Taney removed federal deposits from the Bank and deposited them into state banks. Without choice, Biddle had to call in loans to restore deposits, Through the Nullification Crisis and the and raise interest rates. Caused a Bank War, Jackson destroyed both national mild recession. banking and the American System of protective tariffs and internal improvements As financial conditions worsened in created by Henry Clay and John Quincy the winter of 1833-1834, supporters Under pressure from the business Adams. of the Bank sent petitions to community, Biddle had to reverse his Washington urging its contraction of credit. In doing so, he lost Jackson's tactics in crushing the nullification rechartering. Jacksonians blamed all hope of a recharter. Jackson won a movement & the Bank helped galvanize growing the recession on Biddle and refused political victory. The Bank was dead. opposition. The loosely organized National the charter. Republican party became more organized and * Impact = Unstable Banking in the US until 1913 with grew in numbers and called themselves Whigs. the establishment of the Federal Reserve. Ali Rodgers, 2012-2013 AP Survivor! 2 Brinkley, Chapter 9 Notes The Emergence of the Second Party System The Two Parties The Whig party took its name to echo the Whigs of the Democrats Whigs Revolutionary Era - those who opposed tyranny. Whig Platform: Supremacy of Congress over the Opposed anything that benefitted Favored expansion of federal power President. Program of modernization and economic the privileged class. protectionism. Wanted industrial and commercial Notable Whigs: Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, William The rights of states should be development. Henry Harrison, Zachary Taylor. protected except to the extent they interfered with social Feared that rapid territorial growth The 2 Parties: Religious & Ethnic Divisions and economic mobility. in the West would produce Whigs Democrats instability. "Honest workers" * Irish and German Catholics * Evangelical Protestants Valued entrepreneurs and institutions * Associated with constant development & "Simple farmers" that promoted economic growth. * Shared vague aversion to improvement. Envisioned a society commercial development and Strongest among wealthy aristocrats in the progressing toward unity and order. Supported territorial expansion the Democrats seemed to Northeast and the South, and the ambitious that benefitted all Americans. respect their culture * Looked at immigrant communities as farmers and rising commercial class of the groups that needed taught "American" ways. West. The Removal of the Indians The "Five Civilized Tribes" Jackson's attitude toward the Indian tribes in More troubling to Jackson in the 1830s were the "Five Civilized Tribes" The Cherokee tried to stop Georgia from taking the eastern US was simple. Move West. In western Georgia, Alabama, their lands through an appeal in the Supreme Jackson