Jacksonian Democracy – Andrew Jackson and the Trail of Tears

In 1828 Congress passed a new tariff that doubled the rates for certain exports up to 45%, beginning what is known in American history as the Nullification Crisis. This tariff, called the Tariff of Abominations, infuriated southerners in America, who accused Congress of promoting the interests of the industrial North and the expense of southern agriculture. Soon after the Tariff of Abominations was enacted, Vice President John C. Calhoun anonymously issued the Doctrine of Nullification, which stated that as creators of the federal Union, the states of that Union had the right to nullify any act of Congress believed to be unconstitutional. Henry Clay attempted to create a compromise to the situation in 1832, just as South Carolina threatened to secede from the Union. In 1833 Clay came up with a compromise, which stated that the federal government would lower rates over a ten year period that would amount to a 20% drop in the tariff.

Andrew Jackson, who had won the presidential election in 1828, began to push for the elimination of the National Bank soon after Clay’s compromise, stating that the bank was a dangerous monopoly that benefitted the rich over the poor. The topic of the bank became an issue in 1832 when it became an issue in the presidential campaigns. After a bill to re-charter the bank was passed, President Jackson vetoed it. Jackson attempted to establish his presidency, or Jacksonian Democracy, as an expansion of political participation regardless of class or wealth. He began this soon after his presidency by setting up a spoils system for his government, which gave his supporters jobs within his government. Jackson believed that the spoils system would ensure the future support from the state branches of his party if his followers remained within the government. Jackson differed from presidents before and after him, because he appointed government officials no matter what their political party, believing that every America was potentially as competent as the next.

After Jackson stopped depositing funds into the National Bank, a system of Pet Banks, or smaller state banks gained in power. The president of the National Bank, Nicholas Biddle, tightened the credit of the national bank, which forced a financial crisis. After Jackson weakened federal control over the banking system, Pet Banks issued their own banks notes and set up a system of having credit easy enough to obtain that it caused land speculation. After this speculation caused land prices to increase, the economic panic entered into a depression in 1843.

Though many American citizens hoped to absorb American Indians, state and federal government officials called for the removal of Cherokee, Chickasaw, Seminole, and many other Indian tribes. President Jackson, who had led an aggressive campaign against the Seminole tribe in Florida, signed in the Indian Removal Act, which relocated American Indians beyond America’s borders into Oklahoma. After protests, Congress stated in 1831 that Indian nations were dependent on America and did not possess the right to sue for their land. Jackson ignored an eventual overturn in this ruling during the Worcester v. Georgia Supreme Court case, which ruled that Georgia did not have power over Indian lands. Jackson forced the Cherokee to Oklahoma and tarnished his “Jacksonian Democracy” with the Trail of Tears, the Cherokee Indians’ 800 mile journey to Oklahoma in which 4000 Indians perished.

Notes taken from college-level lectures