THE CHANGES IN JACKSON'S PRESIDENCY

By: Brianna Winton, Dakota Hull, Michael Sperlich, and Cameron Eckert

JACKSON'S PRESIDENCY Jackson was an active executive who vetoed more bills than all previous presidents. He believed in rewarding loyalty and appealing to the masses. He relied on an informal group of advisors called the "Kitchen Cabinet" to set policy instead of his real cabinet.

During Jackson's presidency, sectional issues began to arise. Many Southern states wished to preserve states' rights. They were upset over tariffs and when in 1832, Jackson signed a moderate tariff, South Carolina felt they had the right through "nullification" (the belief that a state could rule something unconstitutional) to ignore it. Jackson stood strong against South Carolina, ready to use the military if necessary to enforce the tariff. In 1833, a compromise tariff was enacted that helped mollify the sectional differences for a time.

JACKSON’S PRESIDENCY In 1832, Jackson vetoed the Second Bank of the United

State's charter. He believed the government could not constitutionally create such a bank and that it favored the wealthy over the common people. This action led to federal money being put into state banks who then loaned it out freely leading to inflation. Jackson stopped the easy credit by requiring all land purchases be made in gold or silver which would have consequences in 1837.

Jackson supported Georgia's expulsion of the Indians from their land to reservations in the West. He used the Indian Removal Act of 1830 to force them to move, even discounting the Supreme Court ruling in Worcester v. Georgia (1832) that said they could not be forced to move. From 1838-39, troops led over 15,000 Cherokees from Georgia in what is called the Trail of Tears.

POLITICAL PARTY CHANGES

The party that Andrew Jackson founded during his presidency called itself the American Democracy. In those same years, changes in electoral rules and campaign styles were making the country's political ethos more democratic than it previously had been. Both circumstances combined to fix the identity of this era in Americans' historical memory as the age of Jacksons Democracy.

THE ECONOMIC CHANGES When South Carolina claimed a right to nullify a federally

imposed tariff, Jackson asked for and received Congressional authority to use the military to enforce federal laws in the state Nullification. His reelection in 1832 was partially the result of his controversial veto of a bill to charter the Bank of the united States, which was unpopular with many of his supporters .The intensity of the political struggles during his tenure led to the strengthening of the Democratic Party and to the further development of the two-party system.

Jackson made the veto a major issue in his 1832 reelection campaign.

In March 1833 Jackson gained from Congress a “Force Bill” giving him the power to use federal force to ensure compliance with the tariff as well as a reduction in the high rates designed to defuse the crisis.

PICTURES OF JACKSON’S PRESIDENCY

WHAT SOCIAL CHANGES HAPPENED IN JACKSON’S PRESIDENCY?

The Jacksonian regime represented a modification of the undisguised planter rule brought about by the interaction of four main classes: planters, capitalists, petty-bourgeoisies and the rising proletariats.

Let us first turn to the planters. The impact of cotton on the South caused profound changes. The great engine of change was the demand for land. The wasteful mode of cotton cultivation caused the rapid exhaustion of the soil. Charles A. Beard wrote that what the planters were chiefly marketing was the “pristine fertility” of the land.

The plantation system plowed inexorably westward, turning up the land like an enormous and insatiable bulldozer. The five years following the War of 1812 saw a great westward movement known as “The Great Migration.” Several hundreds of thousands of people were shifted to the trans-Alleghany region, leading to the formation of two territories, the admission of three states, the merciless clearing of the Indians to beyond the Mississippi.