Andrew Jackson

For almost 2 centuries following the end of his presidency in 1837, Andrew Jackson was one of the most beloved presidents in US history. His name was written in gold, frankincense, and myrrh, just like those of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, the Roosevelts, Woodrow Wilson, and others. However, his reputation in recent years has undergone a similar transformation to that of Ulysses S. Grant. It's actually a very apt comparison: Both were respected generals prior to the presidency who came from then-undeveloped regions of the country. Grant was from the mid-west (specifically Ohio) and Jackson was from the wild wilderness bordering the Carolinas. Both led their nations in crucial battles during massive wars; Jackson during the Battle of New Orleans at the end of the War of 1812 and Grant during the Siege of Petersburg during the civil war. Both stood up for the downtrodden as president. Grant extended new political rights to black people and Native Americans, while Jackson fought for the working class and advocated giving them more representation in the federal government.

Grant used to be considered one of the worst presidents in US history because of how corrupt his cabinet was. Jackson, as previously stated, was considered one of the best presidents in US history because of his pursuit of broader economic equality. However, Grant's progressivism has rightfully caused his ranking to improve ever since 1999 and 2000. Meanwhile, Jackson's racist policies, particularly the forced deportation of indigenous tribes, have rightfully caused Jackson's ranking to decline since 2010. However, I don't entirely agree with this change. Jackson certainly deserves more criticism for his racism, but we should focus on other elements of his administration too. For the most part, the rest of the Jackson Administration was actually very positive - at least in my opinion - and so for that reason, I rank Jackson as an above-average president.

On March 4, 1829, Jackson took the oath of office and, in the process, was inaugurated as president of the United States, replacing John Quincy Adams. Throughout his first few years in office, Jackson introduced a series of important reforms that made the federal government more considerate toward ordinary Americans. He dramatically reduced corruption and expanded democracy. By the start of 1835, Jackson had also paid off the entire national debt. To this end, he kept spending more or less under control and sold large swathes of western land to private settlers, raising the revenue he needed to pay off the debt (Thomas Jefferson used similar methods in his day). To this day, Jackson is the only president in all of American history to ever completely liquidate the national debt. Jackson's democratization has also failed to garner the respect it deserves today. The Electoral College - an awful institution that brought us terrible presidents like Donald Trump and Benjamin Harrison - was nearly abolished when Jackson asked Congress to draft Constitutional amendments terminating the system. Had Jackson succeeded in this pursuit, we would be able to directly elect our president!

While these reforms were positive, they did come with major caveats that make Jackson, to me, the worst of the good presidents. For instance, while Jackson reduced corruption, he also created the spoils system, a similarly dishonest and shady policy in which politicians would hash out patronage jobs to supporters rather than those who were genuinely qualified. The spoils system jeopardized the efficiency of the federal government all the way until 1883 when Chester A. Arthur abolished it through the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act. While Jackson deserves to be criticized for the spoils system, it should be noted that elements of what would become the spoils system had emerged long before Jackson secured the presidency. Even George Washington appointed John Quincy Adams as ambassador to the Netherlands solely because the latter had written some op-eds defending the former's foreign policy.

Paying off the whole national debt was an amazing accomplishment, but the rest of Jackson's economic policy was less than stellar. For instance, he abolished the American System. Proposed by Henry Clay and enacted by James Madison, the American System was a 3-pronged recovery agenda meant to help revive the US economy following the War of 1812. Among its various calls for financial change was a call for increased spending on roads. That, Clay and Madison theorized, would improve the country's transportation system, facilitating more travel between the different regions of the country and so produce more commerce and economic activity. By terminating these policies, Jackson worsened infrastructure. Although, it should be noted that some of Jackson's opposition was understandable.

For instance, Jackson began his crusade against the American System by vetoing the Maysville Road Bill, which would have permitted the federal government to buy a $100,000 stock in the Maysville, Lexington, Paris, and Washington Turnpike Company in order to finance that corporation's construction of a road in Kentucky. Since the law would only benefit one state and not a whole region or the entire Union, it was, as Jackson explained, likely unconstitutional. Jackson also abolished the Second Bank of the United States (another result of the American System) which had, by his inauguration, become a corrupt vehicle for wealthy industrialists to get even richer at the expense of workers, farmers, and the general economic health. However, the way he handled the SBUS' funds following its dissolution was very irresponsible. He gave the money to several state and private banks, creating a popular demand for loans that state banks printed money to keep up with, worsening inflation.

Jackson also issued an executive order called the Specie Circular, which required that all land be paid for in gold and silver. This made participation in the land speculation market near impossible for most Americans, killing off that industry and further damaging the economy. The inflation and lack of activity regarding land speculation both contributed to the Panic of 1837. However, contrary to what many will tell you, Jackson was not solely responsible for the Panic of 1837, even if he was largely culpable. In 1836 and 1837, 800 different banks shut their doors due to increased debt, something Jackson was not to blame for. The collapse of these banks rendered their deposits inaccessible and their workers unemployed, plunging the economy into the Panic of 1837.

Returning to the topic of the Second Bank of the United States, Jackson vetoed another bill just before destroying the SBUS: A bill that would have postponed the bank's dissolution from 1836 to 1851. This veto is notable as, prior to it taking place in 1832, presidents only ever vetoed bills they considered unconstitutional. Jackson vetoed the recharter of the SBUS on the grounds of his personal distaste for the bank. With this, the tradition of presidents only vetoing unconstitutional legislation came to an end, something that Jackson deserves credit for. Not only can Constitutional bills still be harmful and thus worthy of a veto, but since the Constitution allows Congress to override presidential vetos with a 2/3 majority, Congress overriding a president's Constitutionality-based veto would create the image that Congress can usurp the Constitution.

As much as I like Jackson, I can admit to other flaws of his presidency. For starters, while he never completed it, he did support the annexation of Texas, a horrible idea that added to pro-slavery power in Congress and inflamed tensions with Mexico. The fact that John Tyler went through with the annexation of Texas is why I hold his presidency in such low esteem. Of course, Jackson also signed the Indian Removal Act. This was a horrible law that allowed the president to broker treaties that forced indigenous tribes to abandon resource-rich homelands east of the Mississippi River in exchange for unsettled lands west of the Mississippi River. The Indian Removal Act would be used by various presidents, including Jackson, to rob Native Americans of their riches and to forcibly deport them. At one point, Jackson forced Cherokees in Georgia to leave for Oklahoma, with 4,000 dying along the way.

In 1835, Jackson also enabled slaveholding power and violated the First Amendment by prohibiting the post office from delivering pro-slavery texts to southern clients. Not even paying customers! Additionally, Jackson nearly sparked a war with France. In 1831, Jackson signed a treaty with France in which Paris agreed to pay reparations for damages they caused neutral American ships during the Napoleonic Wars in exchange for lower tariffs on French wine. When the French government refused to enforce the treaty, Jackson began mobilizing the military and sending violently-worded messages to Congress describing the scandal. While Britain did diffuse the situation in 1835, Jackson still deserves criticism for his awful behavior here.

However, Jackson also had many great achievements that I have yet to mention. For instance, his treaty with France was not the only such agreement securing European compensation for the harm they caused America. Throughout the early 1830s, Jackson negotiated about a dozen treaties with countries like Denmark, Sweden, and Britain ensuring reparations for damages they had done to American citizens and American citizens' property. He also brokered numerous trade deals, including a trade agreement with Siam (modern-day Thailand). This was the first-ever trade deal between the US and an Asian country! Jackson also added 2 new seats to the Supreme Court and appointed the first Catholic to the Supreme Court. That latter action may seem minor, but it should be remembered that at this point in American history, Catholics faced a lot of prejudice and persecution. Jackson was taking genuine action to advance the separation of church and state and religious freedom.

But all of these accomplishments pale in comparison to one of, if not the, greatest accomplishment of the Jackson presidency: Preserving the Union during the Nullification Crisis. In the spring of 1828, a Jacksonian Congress, desperate to undermine the approval ratings of Jackson's rival John Quincy Adams, drafted and approved the Tariff of 1828. Since the south was agrarian and pre-industrial, it relied on foreign imports to obtain industrial goods. As a result, the tariff bill raised import tax rates to an astonishing 50%, making almost everything except crops inaccessibly expensive to southern consumers and further diminishing whatever remaining affection they had for Adams. Owing to his extreme protectionism, Adams signed the bill on May 11, 1828. A few months later, Jackson won the presidency, being inaugurated on March 4, 1829.

In December 1828, South Carolina, infuriated by what they called "the Tariff of Abominations", published a document called South Carolina Exposition and Protest. In this essay (written anonymously by Vice President John C. Calhoun), the South Carolina state legislature unveiled a doctrine known as nullification, which stated that states could stop following any federal statute not embedded within the Constitution. On July 15, 1832, Jackson, a supporter of free trade, signed a new tariff, lowering import taxes from 50% to 35%. I already consider this a positive. I am a protectionist, but I consider the Tariff of 1828 to be far too extreme. Meanwhile, I think the Tariff of 1832 was much more reasonable. However, South Carolina did not consider it that way. While they were happy about the lower tariff rates, they viewed a 15% decline as inadequate.

On November 24, 1832, South Carolina issued the Ordinance of Nullification. This piece of legislation explained that after February 1, 1833, the federal government would be prohibited from enforcing the Tariffs of 1828 and 1832 within the borders of South Carolina. It also threatened that South Carolina would secede if federal authorities didn't obey the Ordinance of Nullification and demanded that all state officials (except legislators) take an oath promising to uphold the nullification doctrine and its use in this instance. Jackson was rightfully outraged by this policy. The Supremacy Clause of the Constitution (as well as numerous vital Supreme Court rulings such as Fletcher v. Peck, McCulloch v. Maryland, Martin v. Hunter's Lessee, and Cohens v. Virginia) makes it very clear that states have to follow the federal government. They cannot stop following federal statutes, even flawed ones. If South Carolina was allowed to avoid the Tariff of 1832, then states may think that they could get away with avoiding important and progressive federal statutes. Perhaps in 1967, we'd see Texas nullifying the end of segregation.

A few weeks into the Nullification Crisis, Jackson, on December 10, 1832, condemned the nullification doctrine and then stationed federal troops led by Winfield Scott around the borders of South Carolina. From there, Jackson signed the Force Bill, authorizing the president (himself at the time) to use federal military force in order to enforce tariffs. Soon after, on March 2, 1833, Jackson averted civil war by signing the Compromise Tariff of 1833. This law maintained the enforcement of the Tariff of 1832 but instituted a 2%-decline in import taxes for each of the 10 years following the passage of the compromise bill. As a result, the tariff rate declined by 20% come 1843, rendering it identical to what it was in 1827. Jackson both signalled to the south that nullification would no be tolerated to affirmed and prevented a civil war!