Get documents about "CHAPTER 1 1
Document Sample
CHAPTER11
A Democratic Revolution
1820–1844
Chapter Instructional Objectives
1. Analyze & explain the rise of popular politics during the 1820s.
2. What was the significance of Andrew Jackson’s presidency?
3. What were the origins & ideology of the Whig Party?
4. How did the events of the 1820s & 1830s shape American culture?
Chapter Annotated Outline
I. The Rise of Popular Politics, 1820–1829
A. The Decline of the Notables & the Rise of Parties
1. Expansion of the franchise (the right to vote) was the most dramatic
expression of the Democratic Revolution;
a. beginning in the late 1810s, many states revised their constitutions
to give the franchise to nearly every white farmer & wage earner.
2. In America’s traditional agricultural society:
a. wealthy notables dominated the political system & managed local
elections by building up supporting factions.
3. In the Midwest & the Southwest:
a. There was a broad male franchise
b. “middling” men were elected to office & listened to the demands of
the ordinary citizens.
4. The elites in most eastern legislatures grudgingly accepted a broader
franchise for their states…WHY?
a. To deter migration to the western states,
5. Between 1818 & 1821, some eastern states:
a. reapportioned legislatures on the basis of population
b. instituted more democratic forms of local government.
6. Americans began to turn to government in order to advance business,
religious, & cultural causes.
7. As the power of the notables declined, the political party emerged as the
organizing force in the American system of government.
a. Parties were political machines that gathered the diverse agenda of
social & economic groups into a coherent legislative program.
b. Party power enabled men of little or no personal distinction or ability
to achieve office by following party policy.
8. Between 1817 & 1821,Martin Van Buren:
a. Created the first statewide political machine
b. He later organized the first nationwide political party, the
Jacksonian Democrats.
c. Argued that political parties kept the government from abusing its
power & insisted that state legislators follow the majority decisions
of a party meeting, or caucus.
1
B. The Election of 1824
1. With the democratization of politics, the aristocratic Federalist Party
virtually disappeared, & the Republicans broke up into competing factions.
2. The election of 1824 had 5 candidates all calling themselves Republicans:
a. John Quincy Adams
b. John C. Calhoun
c. William H. Crawford
d. Henry Clay
e. Andrew Jackson
3. Congress selected William Crawford as the official candidate
a. The other candidates refused to accept the selection & sought
support among ordinary voters.
b. Jackson received nationwide support
c. no candidate received an absolute majority in the electoral college
d. Members of the House of Representatives had to choose the
president.
4. Clay assembled a coalition of congressmen that voted for Adams
a. Adams repaid Clay by appointing him secretary of state.
5. Jacksonians in Congress condemned Clay for arranging this “corrupt
bargain.”
C. The Last Notable President: John Quincy Adams
1. Adams embraced the American System proposed by Clay:
a. Protective tariffs
b. Federally subsidized internal improvements
c. A national bank.
2. Adams’s policies favored:
a. The business elite of the Northeast
b. The entrepreneurs & commercial farmers in the Midwest
c. Won little support among southern planters.
3. Congress defeated most of Adams’s proposals, approving only a few
navigation improvements & a short extension of the National Road.
4. Adams’s Tariff of 1816:
a. Effectively excluded imports of cheap English cotton cloth, giving
control of that market to New England textile producers.
5. The new tariff of 35 percent on imported goods:
a. Alienated the South, because they now had to buy either higher-cost
northeastern goods or highly taxed British goods.
6. Southerners felt the tariff was legalized pillage & labeled it a “Tariff of
Abominations.”
D. “The Democracy” & the Election of 1828
1. Southerners refused to support Adams’s bid for a second term:
a. Most were offended that he supported the land rights of Indians
b. Blamed him for the new tariff.
2
2. Adams felt that the country should ask for his services; Van Buren &
politicians handling Old Hickory’s campaign had no reservations about
“running” for office.
3. Jacksonians first called themselves “Democratic Republicans” but eventually
became simply “Democrats,”
a. Name conveyed their message that through them the middling
majority—the democracy—would rule.
4. Jackson’s message & image appealed to a variety of social groups
a. In 1828, he became the first president from a western state
b. His popularity frightened men of wealth & influence.
II. The Jacksonian Presidency, 1829–1837
A. Jackson’s Agenda: Patronage & Policy
1. To decide policy, Jackson primarily relied on his so-called “Kitchen
Cabinet”—an informal group of advisors.
2. Jackson created a loyal & disciplined national party…HOW?
a. Using the spoils system to reward backers with government posts
b. He also insisted on rotation in office to free up still more jobs for his
followers.
3. Jackson’s main priority was to destroy Clay’s American System.
B. The Tariff & Nullification
1. Although opposition to the Tariff of 1828 helped Jackson to win the
election, a major political crisis saddled him with protecting it:
a. In November 1832 the South Carolina state convention adopted an
Ordinance of Nullification
i. Declared the tariffs of 1828 & 1832 null & void &
threatened secession.
2. John C. Calhoun maintained that the U.S. Constitution had been ratified by
state conventions; therefore, a state convention could declare a
congressional law null & void.
3. Jackson repudiated his vice president’s (Calhoun) ideas & asserted that
nullification was unauthorized & destructive.
4. Congress passed a Force Bill authorizing the use of the army & navy to
force South Carolina’s obedience. At the same time, legislation was passed
to reduce tariffs.
5. South Carolina rescinded its nullification of the tariff, & Jackson had
established the principle that no state could nullify a law of the United
States.
C. The Bank War
1. The Second Bank of the United States kept state banks from issuing too
many notes
a. They collected notes
b. Regularly demanded specie
c. This prevented monetary inflation & higher prices.
2. Most Americans did not understand the regulatory role of the Second Bank:
3
a. They feared its ability to force bank closures, which left them holding
worthless paper.
3. Jackson’s opponents persuaded the Second Bank’s president to request an
early recharter…WHY?
a. They had hoped Jackson’s veto would split the Democrats before the
election of 1832.
4. Jackson vetoed the bank bill & became a public hero
a. He declared that the Second Bank promoted the advancement of the
few at the expense of the many.
5. Jackson won the election of 1832:
a. Dumped Calhoun as vice president
b. Chose Martin Van Buren instead.
6. Jackson had Secretary of the Treasury Roger B. Taney withdraw the
government’s gold from the Second Bank & deposit it in state “pet” banks.
7. Jackson opponents in the Senate:
a. Passed a resolution censuring the president for acting independently
of Congress
b. Jackson continued to dismantle the bank & turned it into a state-
chartered bank in Pennsylvania.
8. Jackson had destroyed
a. National banking
b. The American System of protective tariffs
c. Internal improvements
9. The result was a profound change in the policies & powers of national
government.
D. Indian Removal
1. In the late 1820s, whites in both the West & East called for the
resettlement of the Indians west of the Mississippi River.
2. Indian peoples still controlled vast tracts of land
3. 1827: the Cherokees introduced a new charter of government modeled
directly on the U.S. Constitution.
4. The Georgia legislature:
a. Declared that the Cherokees were merely tenants on state-owned
land, not an independent nation
b. Jackson agreed; he withdrew the federal troops that had protected
Indian enclaves.
5. Jackson’s Indian Removal Act of 1830:
a. Provided territory in modern-day Oklahoma & Kansas to Indians
who would give up their ancestral holdings.
b. Jackson sent troops & applied both military force & diplomatic
pressure to force seventy Indian peoples to sign treaties & move
west of the Mississippi.
6. Supreme Court:
a. In Cherokee Nation v. Georgia (1831) the Supreme Court denied
Indian independence
4
b. Worchester v. Georgia (1832) the Supreme Court voided Georgia’s
extension of state law over the Indians.
7. Far from respecting Cherokee territory, Jackson moved relentlessly to take
it from them.
8. The Trail of Tears:
a. President Martin Van Buren’s ordered General Winfield Scott’s army
to march the Cherokees 1,200 miles to the new Indian Territory—the
journey is remembered as the Trail of Tears.
9. The national government asserted its control over most eastern Indian
peoples & forced their removal to the West.
E. The Jacksonian Impact
1. Jackson permanently expanded the authority of the nation’s chief
executive:
a. He used the rhetoric of popular sovereignty to declare that the
president is the direct representative of the American people.
2. Roger B. Taney:
a. Jackson appointed him chief justice of the Supreme Court
b. He persuaded the Court to give constitutional legitimacy to Jackson’s
policies of antimonopoly & states’ rights.
c. In Charles River Bridge Co. v. Warren Bridge Co. (1837), Taney’s
ruling undermined the legal positions of chartered corporations &
encouraged competitive enterprise.
d. In 1837, Taney’s decisions enhanced the regulatory role of state
governments (Mayor of New York v. Miln) & restored some of the
states’ economic powers (Briscoe v. Bank of Kentucky).
3. Most states mounted a constitutional revolution:
a. Extending the vote to all white men
b. Reapportioning legislatures on the basis of population
c. Mandating the election of officials.
4. The new state constitutions changed the “republican” governments to
“liberal” regimes that:
a. Limited the power of the state
b. Protected taxpayers from state debt.
5. Jacksonian “populists”:
a. Embraced small government
b. Embraced laissez-faire outlook
c. In public, at least:
i. They attacked government granted special privileges
ii. Celebrated the power of the ordinary people.
III. Class, Culture, & the Second Party System
A. The Whig Worldview
1. The rise of the Democracy & Jackson’s tumultuous presidency sparked the
creation in the mid-1830s of a second national party—the Whigs.
2. Whigs:
a. Goal was a political world dominated by men of ability & wealth
5
b. Sought votes among evangelical Protestants & upwardly mobile
middle- & working-class citizens in the North.
c. Northern Whigs called for a return to Clay & Adams’s American
System;
d. Southern Whigs advocated economic development but did not
support high tariffs & social mobility.
3. Many Whig voters previously were Anti-Masons, members of a powerful but
short lived political movement of the late 1820s.
4. In the election of 1836, the Whigs faced Martin Van Buren;
a. Van Buren emphasized his opposition to the American System & his
support for individual rights.
5. The Whigs ran 4 regional candidates in the election hoping to throw the
contest to the House, which they controlled, but the plan failed, & Van
Buren won.
B. Labor Politics & the Depression of 1837–1843
1. The ideology of artisan Republicanism:
a. Working Men’s parties embraced this vision
i. Led them to join the Jacksonians in demanding equal
rights & attacking chartered corporations & monopolistic
banks.
2. Taking advantage of the economic boom of the early 1830s, workers
formed unions to bargain for higher wages.
3. Employers:
a. Attacked the union movement
b. Brought lawsuits to overturn closed shop agreements that required
them to hire only union members.
c. Argued that such agreements violated:
i. Common law
ii. Legislative statutes that prohibited “conspiracies” in
restraint of trade; judges usually agreed.
4. The Panic of 1837:
a. Threw the American economy into disarray
b. Panic began when the Bank of England sharply curtailed the flow of
money & credit to the United States.
c. To pay their foreign loans & commercial debts, Americans had to
withdraw specie from domestic banks
d. Lacking adequate specie & without a national bank to turn to,
domestic banks suspended all payments in specie.
5. By 1839 the American economy fell into deep depression:
a. Canal construction fell by 90%
b. Prices dropped nearly 50%
c. Unemployment rose to 20% in some areas.
6. Depression devastated labor movement
a. Depleted membership of unions & destroyes their bargaining power
b. By 1843, most unions had disappeared.
6
7. During the depression:
a. Commonwealth v. Hunt upheld the rights of workers to form unions
& enforce a closed shop
b. Van Buren established a ten-hour day for federal employees.
C. “Tippecanoe & Tyler Too!”
1. The Whigs blamed Jackson’s policies for the Panic of 1837, &, as Van Buren
had just entered office, the public turned its anger on him because he did
nothing to stop the downturn.
2. Van Buren’s Independent Treasury Act of 1840 actually delayed recovery
because it took specie out of state banks & put it in government vaults.
3. In 1840 the Whigs nominated William Henry Harrison, victor of the Battle of
Tippecanoe, for president & John Tyler for vice president.
4. Harrison was not a strong leader, but the Whigs wanted someone who
would rubber stamp their programs for protective tariffs & a national bank.
5. The contest—the great “log cabin” campaign—was the first time two well-
organized parties competed for the loyalties of a mass electorate, using
organized public events to draw in voters. The Whigs used the log cabin as
an icon of their candidate’s (largely fictional) egalitarian tastes & common
background.
6. The Whigs boosted their political hopes & their populist image by
welcoming women to their festivities.
7. Harrison was voted into the White House, & the Whigs had a majority in
Congress, but a month later Harrison died of pneumonia, so Tyler became
president.
8. Tyler—who was more like a Democrat when it came to economic issues—
was hostile toward the Second Bank & the American System.
9. Tyler favored the common man & the rapid settlement of the West, so he
approved the Preemption Act of 1841, which enabled settlers short on cash
to stake claims to federal land.
10. The split between Tyler & the Whigs allowed the Democrats to regroup &
recruit more supporters; the Democrats remained the majority party in
most parts of the nation.
11. The Democratic Revolution exacted a price in that the practices adopted to
sway masses of voters introduced the spoils system & a coarser, less
substantive, standard of public debate.
12. Still, unlike most of the contemporary world, the United States now had
universal white male suffrage & a highly organized system of representative
government that was responsive to ordinary citizens.
7
