Jackson 1 Transcript

and now we begin with the second section
within this PowerPoint the Jacksonian a
period or the Jacksonian era which
basically covers the eight years of
Andrew Jackson's presidency his
presidency will change the way we look
at the White House and the role of the
president in general it will change the
modern election system and the modern
politician and Andrew Jackson for better
or worse he's a greatly debated figure
we'll leave a major impact on that that
position he is no friend of the Native
American and as you know often known as
the probably worst president - in terms
of supporting Native American rights his
policies will eventually lead to the
infamous Trail of Tears which takes
place under the next president's term
Van Buren and he is also greatly
celebrated by some historians as
defending the federal government and the
Constitution by expanding democracy by
encouraging greater suffrage or greater
voting power specifically for white land
holding men so he's an interesting
character and he's gonna change history
in a lot of ways which is why we have a
whole section mostly about him we've
talked about Andrew Jackson before he
grew up in the Carolinas and I talked
about him as a young boy the young boy
of Waxhaws in south carolina who had
refused to shine the boots of a sorry
goods refused to shine the boots of a
British officer and was slashed with a
sword when he spat at the officer his
brothers and mother died in the war his
father died shortly after his birth and
so he was orphaned
a very very early age there by the end
of the Revolutionary War at the age of
14 with really no family he became
dependent on extended family members and
you know just kind of moved in and
around different friends and families
for survival through that he learned to
independence how to take care of himself
and through just sheer grit worked his
way up eventually he will serve in the
military he'll gain a reputation there
he'll become a lawyer and a land
speculator out of Tennessee through that
popularity he eventually becomes a
senator a United States Senator for
Tennessee as well as a supreme as well
as a justice a judge for the Tennessee
Supreme Court he was a planter and a
slave holder certainly racist against
African Americans as well as Native
Americans but he's a very odd person
during the Creek Wars where American
troops pushed out Creek natives after
ordering the destruction of a village he
discovers a young Creek boy who he
actually takes pity on and adopts his
name was his name was Lynn Koya and so
he adopts this this young boy who
actually dies from disease years later
at the age of 16 so he's like the the
guy who really destroyed natives but
also strangely adopted this native boy
and and loved him his wife dies before
he actually enters the White House and
it sort of greatly disturbed him he
always had her just to sort of his one
love he didn't have any children himself
and so he sort of had these adopted
family members nieces and nephews that
he loved very much as we'll see later
through this lecture he's also kind of
seen as a bit of a badass he has fought
in or had fought in several duels been
hit a few times I'm he's actually been
shot before and shot at others killed
others
he actually in one duel was nearly
killed a bullet was lodged into his
chest just inches from his heart and was
never actually taken out because it was
too close to his heart nobody would
operate on it as we'll see later he is
also a straw dinero a shrewd politician
politicians whether you like it or not
for better or worse they have to be
great chess players they know they have
to know how to work the game those are
the people that end up being very
successful now ideally they use that
power for good and some of course
unfortunately some politicians use that
power to really just sort of help
themselves and so what kind of a shrewd
politician and what kind of a man
Jackson was has been sort of left up to
the devices of historians that's why
when we talk about at the beginning of
this semester why you know reading
multiple sources even multiple books
from well-known historians is important
because Jackson's a really great example
I have currently in my office one book
about Andrew Jackson actually won a
Pulitzer where the author goes on and on
about Jackson is sort of the greatest
president ever the sort of unsung hero
and how he's so important and then just
kind of barely mentions what he does to
the natives whereas other historians
have sort of really focused on what he
did to the Native Americans and undercut
some of his successes so and neither of
these authors are lying they're both
telling the truth it just depends on how
you tell the story so we'll look at both
sides of the story for Andrew Jackson
so Andrew Jackson the senator from
Tennessee the guy from the backwoods the
unconventional guy runs for office in
the very famous election of 1824 this is
where some people have made connections
to Trump many connections are completely
unfounded and some connections are maybe
fair in the recent election in 2016
Trump was viewed as the outsider and a
lot of people liked that because they
felt like government was taken over by
these political insiders these political
you know politician politicians who had
made politics their career and they
wanted someone from the outside and so
Trump was someone who although you know
plane and politics earlier was not
really a politician the same thing kind
of true and not true with with Andrew
Jackson Andrew Jackson absolutely is a
politician he has worked his way up the
political ladder right he's been an
attorney and a judge right if you want
to be a president someday going to law
school is probably a good idea he then
built his wealth rule and he then
becomes governor and senator and now
he's running for the presidency so he is
different than Trump and that he does
follow a political career
he's seller to Trump though and that he
still considered the outsider because
he's not the traditional politician he
is at this point the first politician
who is born west of the Appalachian
Mountains so he's considered this
frontiersman even though he has wealth
he was he's a true sort of rags to
riches story as opposed to some of the
other people who run against who either
came from moderate or extreme wealth so
he runs here under the Democratic
Republican ticket and that means again
he's part of kind of the old school
Democrats the Jeffersonian Democrats
that believe in limited government they
believe that you know we should expand
West so that every American has access
to land and not a huge supporter of you
know all the things that would have been
on Alexander Hamilton's bucket list IQ
axons very opposed
to the bank he's opposed to cash the
creation of cash or banknotes he's
opposed to too much dependence on
foreign trade he's opposed to too much
dependence on the market economy so he's
very old-school Democrat and he runs
against some really heavy players in the
north the most significant is John
Quincy Adams who is the son of John
Adams
so John Adams is basically the only
person who's like a true-blue Federalist
because he acknowledges it George
Washington was certainly a federalist
but doesn't acknowledge it as much John
Quincy Adams is his son so he very much
believes like his father did in the
Federalist ideals the significance of
the bank the importance of trade the
rise of the market economy he's opposed
to slavery so these new nationalists are
a new faction of the Democratic Party
that are starting to take a turn towards
semi federalist ideals so we have a
Democrat Republican
old-school Democrat running against the
new nationalists or Democrat with
Federalist tendencies and the real show
comes down to here in the election of
1824 Andrew Jackson the outsider versus
John Quincy Adams the insider because
he's also a very influential member or
has influence in Congress at this point
the problem with 1824 as we see in other
elections where more than two people run
multiple candidates have the ability to
spread the vote very thin and so even a
single independent person right even a
single you know third candidate can
potentially skew the election results so
that happens in 1824 even though Adams
and Jackson kind of are the stars of the
show two other people run as well now
Jackson walks away there were a total of
about 261 electoral votes and Jackson
walks away with the most he got 99
electoral votes he also got a the
highest number in terms of the popular
vote as you can see on the map
the next most popular person was John
Quincy Adams who received 80 for the
electoral votes and then below that we
have Crawford and clay who are both
popular particularly clay is a very
powerful member of Congress Speaker of
the House he's the head of his party so
these guys run as well but they don't
get quite as many votes but they got
enough electoral votes to prevent any
one person from getting the majority so
here's kind of a misunderstanding about
the electoral college sometimes the
person who gets the greatest number of
electoral votes isn't necessarily the
winner because the Constitution says
that it's the person who gets a majority
of the whole which means more than 50%
right so today we have you know 538
electoral votes so for somebody to win
you know that magic number is that 270
so right now the magic number in 1824
was 131 to get more than 50% well
Jackson got the greatest number but he
didn't get the majority that means that
we don't have a winner so even though
Jackson wins the greatest number of
popular vote and the greatest number
electoral vote according to our
Constitution he does not become
president so according to our
Constitution what happens is the House
gets to vote and the house votes by
state so each state in the House rep
sends in one vote so it's not each
person so each state votes and once that
vote came out John Quincy Adams got the
greatest number of votes and this was in
part due to Crawford and Clayton outs
they figure they they can see of course
that they don't have enough votes to be
President and they would much rather
adams be president than jackson so they
drop out and encourage their political
friends to support John Quincy Adams so
John Quincy Adams gets the greatest
number of votes in the house and he
actually becomes the sixth President of
the United States so this is known as
the contested election of 1825
right the electoral votes come out at
the end of 1824 and the House voted in
early 1825 and this was extremely
upsetting to the American people it's
still very upsetting it there's still a
lot of debates about the electoral
college right there was a lot of upset
of course when we see even today people
winning the electoral college but losing
the popular vote so this is a very very
relevant discussion and the American
people were extremely upset that Jackson
who not only won the popular vote but
also won the greatest number of
electoral votes still was not president
because these you know dirty politicians
as they were viewed by the American
people they kind of rigged the election
and gave it to John Quincy Adams so John
Quincy Adams entered the White House
really unpopular because of the
seemingly scandal of this election and
it wasn't scandalous it was actually
completely elite completely legal they
followed the Constitution but it was
just extremely disheartening to the
American people like they really don't
have a choice in who their president is
and this helped to make Andrew Jackson
enormously popular so he's gonna run
again in four years and he'll have even
more popularity in part because many
Americans felt like the election was
stolen from him and in this cartoon we
see a depiction of that contested
election with the dogs and these kind of
evil people that run government
destroying this proud strong American
and so the American people will not let
that happen
in another eight or excuse me four years
so again four years go by John Quincy
Adams even though he's very ambitious
and has some nice ideas he's not going
to be a shrewd enough politician to
control Congress and get them in line to
pass the bills that he wants to turn
into laws so he's becoming less popular
for years go by and it's another
election season for the presidents and
again in John excuse me um Andrew
Jackson will decide to run again
against John Quincy Adams so we have
another election between the two of them
and this time it's just the two of them
here in 1828 in 1828 we see the same
thing we saw in 1824 but exemplified
really heightened again this idea that
if you want to be a part of modern
politics if you want to be President or
even a member of Congress or even
governor you probably need to join one
of the two largest political parties
right now at the time that would mean
here the Democratic Republicans or the
faction outside of Democratic
Republicans which are the new
nationalists so the election of 1824 and
1828 really create modern politics as
we've seen it ever since with mostly
just two parties competing for votes and
so today you know as sort of unfortunate
as it might be actually when people vote
they're really just voting Republican or
they're really just voting Democrat and
people very rarely will votes you know
outside of their party even if it's
someone they don't necessarily care for
right they might vote for someone who
they don't really like who's running as
a Republican but they would never vote
Democrat right and the same thing you
might have people that will always vote
Democrat even if they're not a huge fan
of the person running because they will
never ever vote Republican so we see
that that start that start off here in
1828 and in 1824 again Andrew Jackson it
has the power of the people he's a very
popular guy they called him Old Hickory
as you can see in this ad here because
he was seen as being really tough like
Hickory which is apparently a very hard
piece of wood the man of the people the
hero of two wars and of Orleans so he's
already seen as a war hero what's
interesting about Andrew Jackson though
is when he runs both in 1824 and 1828 he
really doesn't say exactly what he's
gonna do right he has no real specific
plans he doesn't say vote for me and I
have this really
if ik economic reform plan that we're
gonna pass or you know or this is how
I'm going to initiate trade with these
countries right he doesn't say that he's
very very vague in what's in what he's
gonna do Ryan he just keeps saying vote
for me I'm tough or vote for me I'm a
war hero
vote for me I'm the man of the people
and just because people liked what he
was saying even though he was kind of
saying nothing they just liked that and
so they they voted for him so that's
another thing that we start to see in
modern politics where more and more
we're interested in the personality of
the person running as opposed to the
issues right again if you think of sort
of the Trump campaign and there have
been a lot of comparisons between Trump
and Jackson some are founded and fair
and some are entirely unfounded and not
fair but and I'll allow you to sort of
figure out which ones on your own but if
you recall in this you know in the 2016
election season Trump supporters liked
that he talked tough they liked that he
just tweeted about everything they liked
that he would you know just sort of said
whatever was on his mind and when you
talk or when you hear these people on
the news they would say that I like that
he just says what's on his mind I like
how he says how it is instead of trying
to always be politically correct like
these politicians I'm sick of right so
even though Trump me you know or or
Jackson in this case maybe gave fewer
specifics of what they were going to do
what issues they were going to correct
people liked Jackson's personality they
liked that he was from the West he's
going to be actually the first president
who was born west of the Appalachian
Mountains and one of our first
presidents who was born truly poor and
and had to you know out of his own grit
sort of rise up so people just liked
that the story of him again
what Andrew Jackson's gonna realize what
Bernie Sanders realized what Trump
realized what all modern politicians who
really want to reach very high places
particularly the presidency realized is
that they have to join a political party
because that is what
modern politics are right again the
reality is and this note might annoy you
but we're probably only gonna see a
Democrat or Republican president for
years to come right it's very unlikely
you're gonna see a green party
presidents it's just not a party that a
majority of the American voters are
comfortable with and so we're gonna
start to see that here right and the
political cartoon you see at the bottom
left is of the 1824 election where you
have John Quincy Adams or sorry the 1824
election where you have John Quincy
Adams in particular they're sort of
leaning out in the front little bald guy
and Andrew Jackson the lean guy they're
in the front you know running against
one another and that an election really
now is kind of like what they're saying
here a footrace between two individuals
right and we're voting for them based on
whose personality we like better and
we're only going to pay attention to
those two because they are both backed
by major political parties and finally
another thing that we start to see more
and more in the elections of 1824 and
1828 are more and more the politician
that makes a living by holding public
office initially our founding fathers
had hoped that people that run for the
Senate or the house or even the
presidency or even you know just just
governor or you know City Council or a
mayor that when you run for public
office you do so out of you know as part
of your civic duty right that you
already have a full-time job you're a
merchant or a lawyer or a teacher and
then you take time away from your job to
kind of volunteer so that you can run
for office and help to push issues that
you think are important and then once
you've you know completed your term or
you're not not reelected then you return
to whatever your full-time job was right
but there's no such thing as a
professional politician right who just
goes from you know mayor to governor to
you know state sent it to the US Senate
to the presidency right but by after
1828 we start to see more and more
politicians that made a living from
holding public office just jumping from
one job to another which means they make
a living you know supporting a political
party and and that's why we kind of make
this joke that many politicians have
sort of sold their soul at one point
just because they've been in the game
for so long
Jackson is going to win this election he
wins both the popular and electoral vote
and for four reasons we've already
discussed and when he takes the
presidency we can describe him fairly I
think as a little bit arrogant he
believed that his house or excuse me he
believed that Congress the House and the
Senate as well as his cabinet were not
really there to advise him or to counter
him but they were there to basically see
his will right to you know do what he
wanted he's a big supporter of the
patronage system or the spoils system he
was publicly a supportive supporter of
this the patronage system or the spoils
system is basically a system of giving
jobs or appointments to people who have
helped you in the past right or to
people who are friends or family members
it's a you scratch my back I'll scratch
yours as opposed to the merit system
where people are appointed or given jobs
based on their worthiness right their
ability to do the job well but he kind
of always believed that he knew what was
right he made the argument that the
people elected me because they want my
ideas to be at the forefront
so whatever the cabinet says whatever
the Congress says or the Senate says it
takes a second
it takes a backseat to what I want right
because the people elected me and he
could be very shrewd and calculating
and he's described as a bully by some
historians in the way that he'll move
through cabinet members cabinet members
that disagree with him will be removed
he will he's really someone I mean I'm
not aware that he actually kept a list
but he'd be like the type of guy that
keeps I got like a hit list right you
upset me you're going on the list you
know my list and I'm eventually
coming after you and so he worked in
very calculating ways to you know get
people's political careers to kind of
slow down and you can be annoyed with
that you know that might seem like a
terrible thing but you know Abraham
Lincoln did the same thing as we'll see
Abraham Lincoln was also a very shrewd
politician very calculating politician
it's just that Abraham Lincoln used his
powers his manipulation to get the 13th
amendment passed which freed the slaves
and with that's you know why Abraham
Lincoln is is often a favorite president
of historians because he wasn't only you
know trying to free the slaves which of
course is a morally good thing to do but
he was very smart right in the way that
he went about it and so people really
liked that about him Jackson's the same
way he's the same thing as Lincoln he's
a very manipulative of Congress he is
just a really smart guy he knows the
political game and he knows how to get
what he wants by manipulating Congress
and his advisors so when the question of
course is did Jackson use this these
powers for good or evil and then as I
already mentioned he's a big supporter
of the the patronage system as well
now Jackson's one goal sort of heading
into the White House even though he was
relatively unspecific of what he was
going to do right he was just like vote
for me I'm just like you and people were
like Mogae until they voted for him he
vows to expand suffrage he vows to
expand the vote right so suffrage it
just comes from a Latin term but it
means the right to vote that's what
suffrage means so he wants to expand the
right to vote for people but he's not
going to abolish property laws because
he also believes in a hands-off
government which means he lets the
states do what they want and States real
we only want to hear from people who are
have a vested interest in the state
right and in elections and those are
land holders so most states still had
varying levels of property requirements
to vote so if Jackson wants to expand
suffrage he needs to expand land and so
ironically the people things that people
love about him which is that he is going
to expand the vote are directly
connected to the things that people hate
about him he was able to expand the vote
by expanding America's territory and he
expanded it into native territory and
kicked natives in very violent ways and
shady ways off of their land so he could
put white families on that land making
them property owners and giving them the
right to vote so if you were a poor
white male you loved yourself some
Andrew Jackson right if you are Native
American or African American you hate
yourself
some some Andrew Jackson right because
as we expand West particularly the south
we're also going to be expanding cotton
which means we're going to be expanding
slavery and Andrew Jackson was a big big
supporter of the expansion of slavery
so this is where Jackson becomes sort of
confusing and why you know depending on
who you talk to
was he a good president or not because
if you go back in time and you talked to
a you know you know a white guy who you
know was poor and getting screwed by the
elites of society
he loves Andrew Jackson right he is
going to be able to you know gain a
little bit more power and possibly
property because of him so the poor
liked him but if you're anyone else you
you probably don't like him at all
and so it's jackson's president that
takes us into what we just call the
Jacksonian age or the Jacksonian era
which is also known as the age of the
common man because this president is
ushered in that kind of reinvigorates
some old Jeffersonian policies
government had largely been run for the
most part by people who supported the
market economy supported a growing
government they weren't all Federalists
but they carried with them these
Federalist tendencies and Jackson is
really the first president to start to
push government a different way we also
call it the age of the common man
because it is also a moment where we see
government expressing concern for the
average American not just the wealthy
American as Andrew Jackson suggested
right these are the pea-jacket and sorry
Andrew Jackson as Alexander Hamilton
said Alexander Hamilton said in his
financial plan that we have to support
you know the big guys because they're
the ones who turn the economic wheel
well Jackson disagrees much later on and
he believes that the job of the American
government is to assist the average
person of course that is a very popular
tagline to get you elected right if you
want to get elected you say things like
I'm going to help the common American
and therefore the common American will
vote for you so this uh sure Xin what's
known as populism which has both
positive and negative connotations in
American history populism starts off as
this very nice belief that the job of
the American government is to help
common people average citizens right not
the big Rockefellers and Carnegie's and
and Amazon's and GM's of the country but
to help Paul and Mike and Susan and
Christian and whoever right average
people and so it's called populism
because of course that's a very popular
message
the problem with populism though is that
some
presidents have used it for the purposes
of getting elected and because it argues
that we should help the common American
then of course the next question to
follow is who is an American who is the
common American who is an average
American and what we end up seeing is
the rest of us who are not
multi-billionaires the rest of us you
and I fight against one another at the
bottom for the government's attention
it's like children fighting amongst one
another for their parents attention or
for their parents inheritance or
something like that and so populism at
its heart has a really nice idea but in
reality it's taken on really sort of
racist connotations so Jackson does
deserve credit for ushering in an era of
democratic reform because he is going to
expand suffrage more people will be able
to vote because of Jackson because he
assists in property acquirements and the
way he does that is by expanding West so
a big part of his eight years as
president is to expand into native
territory by expanding into native
territories taking those lands giving
them to the States that expands
opportunities and the vote for Americans
living within the states and so again
that's a very populist message for
average poor Americans who are
struggling who I can't vote in their
state because of property requirements
even though property requirements are
served Wendling at this point it's very
popular for poor Americans who feel kind
of brushed aside by the powers that be
right so Jackson seems to be sort of
this saving grace and if you are a white
poor male in the 1830s you probably
really really liked Andrew Jackson right
if you're Native American you hate him
it's a sort of great insult to even
bring him up
Jackson is absolutely
the more significant president's next to
maybe Thomas Jefferson and Van Buren who
are responsible for ignoring policies
and trees with Native Americans for
pushing natives west and for really
horrendous crimes and violence against
natives he himself participated in the
Seminole Wars and the Creek Wars and as
president he will continue that policy
of pushing Native Americans westward or
fighting them through war for the
purposes of acquiring their land for
Americans so if your Native American
obviously Andrew Jackson is not not your
guy another group of course that will
not be helped by Andrew Jackson are our
slaves African Americans and even free
box in the north because Andrew
Jackson's helping the common man and the
common man during eight years a Andrew
Jackson's president is our poor white
males right so we're also going to a
help poor white males by denying rights
for people who are not poor white males
so by encouraging expansion westward in
the south that's also going to expand
slavery so Jackson's also responsible
for assisting in the expansion of
slavery westward as well so again the
issue with populism and this is where
you know Jackson is both praised and
criticized is that yes it helps people
who are not the bigwigs who are not
powerful members of society it helps
average people that's what government
should do help those people and that's a
great thing to do however it shows in
this question of who is an American who
deserves government help and the
government will say you know this
particular group deserves help and not
others and so it actually creates
hostility amongst groups within the
United States in this case most notably
between poor whites and blacks or Native
Americans
when he runs in these two elections but
in 1824 and 1828 against John Quincy
Adams again we see this that these
personalities take over and so John
Quincy Adams would put these ads out
that would say things like don't vote
for Andrew Jackson he's a jackass and he
would use this play on words right
Jackson jackass which and jackass of
course is a donkey right don't vote for
him he's a jackass he's a stubborn mule
right you don't want to vote for this
guy right he's just you know you want to
vote for a stallion right a queen well
bred horse which is like me versus this
sort of dirty donkey west of the
Appalachian Mountains which is Andrew
Jackson and so when John Quincy Adams
came out with that series of political
attacks Andrew Jackson responds by
saying yeah I'm a jackass right yeah I'm
a stubborn mule and a donkey and that's
what you want America you want a
stubborn jackass in the White House
because I will be stubborn to get these
policies passed for you and I will force
Congress to support the common man right
we don't want these you know wealthy
elite clean snooty politicians in office
you want someone who's rugged and tough
like you and that actually ironically
gained him more support all right so
he's able to this is obviously a joke
there to the left but anybody else care
to discuss politics kind of the attitude
that he brings into the White House and
people like loved that about him they
loved that he seemed like sort of a
badass
so because Andrew Jackson adopts the you
know and really sort of takes advantage
of John Quincy Adams credit criticism
and adopts the idea that he is going to
be a stubborn mule he is going to be a
jackass that's how we get the Democratic
donkey so Andrew Jackson is commonly
seen as the first Democratic presidents
or the first president of the Democratic
Party because we're going to slowly stop
calling them the Democratic Republicans
and we're
just gonna start calling them by the
first word which is the democrats the
republicans then technically don't exist
yet
abraham lincoln is considered the first
demence and andrew jackson's considered
the first democratic president now don't
be confused by that as I said before
what it is to be a Democrat and what it
is to be a Republican is not the same
thing as it is now so when you have
politicians that stand up and they try
to say well you know you should support
the Democratic Party because Andrew
Jackson that tough president he was a
Democrat
well Andrew Jackson is a Democrat is not
necessarily the same things as a
Democrat today right the policies and
what it means to be a Democrat will
change dramatically the same thing when
you hear Republicans saying you know
we're the party of Abraham Lincoln well
me yeah a name you are but you know
Abraham Lincoln may not may or may not
have been a Republican today right
because the issues are different right
Abraham Lincoln was fighting over states
rights and slavery Andrew Jackson was
fighting over Native American rights and
expansion - you know those aren't the
same issues we fight over today right
Abraham Lincoln and Jackson weren't
having debates over you know abortion or
you know building a wall or healthcare
or you know nuclear periphery
proliferation or things like that
right so yes the names Democrat
Republican are coming around right now
but just try to appreciate that that's
the only thing that makes them similar
to today is the name alone the policies
are different and therefore the parties
themselves are different
but still this uh sure xin the founding
of the democratic party all right and
you can see in the picture there that
all these guys would not necessarily get
along with one another you know
certainly maybe not jackson who's kind
of lingering there in the back
but this begins obviously clinton's in
the front just getting crazy but this
brings in sort of the modern democratic
party and as we start to create the
modern democrats we move into a second
party system so we're no longer in the
era of good feelings because as the new
nationalists break off from the
democratic republicans the democratic
republicans just become the democratic
you know Jacksonian party the new
nationalists will kind of become this
new party called the Whigs and so the
era of good feelings is over by the time
we get to the late 1820s and basically
up until the years before the civil war
we're going to be in what's known as the
second party system so the second party
system was between the Whigs and the
Democrats again the first party system
was between the Democratic Republicans
and the Federalists and their big debate
was how to interpret the Constitution
should we have a Bank of the United
States now we have the second party
system between the Whigs and the
Democrats what's the difference between
the two the Whigs are basically created
because they hate Andrew Jackson so
these are all the guys who were really
opposed to this random guy from the West
becoming the presidents these are gonna
it's gonna it will be a party made up
mostly of elites Whigs will be more
likely are going to be wealthy planters
in the south who want to keep their
elite status or they're going to be you
know wealthy merchants from the north
but they're mostly going to be people
who are on the East Coast and and who
have a little bit of money or at least
are part of
you know sort of a middle class but the
wigs are created to fight against Andrew
Jackson really that is their founding
they are anti Jackson that's who they
are and because they oppose the
president's they favored more conger
more power being in Congress right they
really don't like the presidents they
think that we need to try and loosen the
powers of Jackson and that Congress
should really try to take over another
thing they really hated about Jackson
was his spoils system they hate they
called him King Andrew that by using the
patronage system and you can see that
there at the bottom by being able to
sort of grant jobs to people at the
federal government or to greatly support
people and state governments Andrew
Jackson is able to create this large
group of politicians who who have to
support them because they owe him
something right and so the Whigs
referred to him you can see at the top
here they referred to him as King Andrew
the first right that instead of being a
president who is evenly balanced between
the three branches as was intended by
the Constitution he's taken on more
power than was intended and he does do
that to an extent he's going to use his
powers in the Constitution further than
anyone else did so it's not that he did
a lot of things that were illegal he
does a couple things that are
technically illegal which we'll talk
about but he uses what what legal powers
he has to gain more power and one of the
great powers that the presidents has is
the right to veto now prior to Jackson
presidents usually vetoed a bill that
came out of Congress because they
thought it was unconstitutional Andrew
Jackson will veto a bill just because he
thinks it's a bad policy he'll just be
like I don't like that I think that's
stupid veto
whereas before people would be like well
I don't really like it but if Congress
voted for it then I guess I'll support
it it's not unconstitutional Andrew
Jackson is going to use just in his
first four years alone he
vetoed he vetoed 12 bills which is more
than all the other presidents before him
combined the first six presidents in
total vetoed nine bills but in his first
year alone he vetoed twelve bills and so
it becomes much more common for
presidents today since Andrew Jackson to
start vetoing bills just because they
don't like them right they're like I
don't only think I don't really like
that I don't I don't want it that's not
what I promised the people I would do so
I'm gonna veto it and and and Congress
that because this was new like we're
used to presidents doing that today but
because Andrew Jackson did this and it
was sort of new Congress really saw this
as an abuse of his power Whigs also
because they're part of those new
nationalists again right they believe
the goal of the federal government is to
expand the market economy make the
government's and you know the market
economy wealthier bring in more revenue
and so they need to increase federal
government power to do that right so
they believe that power within the
federal government should be used to
help build and support the market
economy whereas Democrats like Janet
Jackson they obviously like Jackson the
Democratic Party built itself around
Andrew Jackson so they favor the power
of the presidency over Congress and
unlike the Whigs who want to expand the
powers of the federal government to
increase the market economy the
Democrats believe in limited government
right sort of hands off governments let
the states do what the states want at
the federal government for the most part
should remain pretty small they believe
that by the only reasons the federal
government should get involved are not
to support the big corporations like an
Amazon or Google today but instead they
should promote competition so they
should actually try to squash big
companies they want to destroy
monopolies they want to destroy special
privilege they want to destroy the
elites so again if you are kind of poor
and anti elitist than you
Jaxson right but if you are highly sort
of educated and a major you know
corporate investor or a major you know
importer/exporter
you probably don't like Jackson the
Whigs also believed at least those from
the north right not everyone in the
south believe this so even Whigs were
kind of faction but northern Whigs also
believed that the federal government
should is not only responsible for
supporting the market economy but that
it should also be responsible for the
moral welfare of all Americans and so in
the northern cities Whigs supported
temperance which is you know prohibition
of alcohol they wanted to get rid of
alcohol they felt that the federal
government should get rid of alcohol and
eventually the federal government will
but not until World War one with the
eighteenth Amendment and more and more
people in the north also felt it was
immoral to have slaves so a lot of your
you know anti-slavery movements in the
north will be supporting the Whig Party
as well if you're a Whig in the south
you're probably don't care about this as
much you're certainly cool with slavery
and you're really only a wig because you
want to see the federal government
support big corporations you know big
monopolies like you know big AG and big
cotton where as Democrats because they
believed more in states rights they did
not believe it was the rights of the
federal government to tell a state what
to do right if some states want to have
slaves fine if some states don't want to
have slaves fine if some states want to
get rid of alcohol fine if some states
want to drink and party it up fine it is
not the job of the federal government to
tell or regulate morality and so slavery
of course is going to be a huge morality
debate in the United States leading to
the civil war should the Fed does the
federal government have the right to
dictate morality in another states right
eventually Lincoln and their and their
what will be the Republican Party will
say yes
and that's why they try to get rid of
slavery and of course the southern
states who want to maintain states
rights and more specifically the states
rights right to have slaves will argue
no so that's the basic difference
between the Whigs and the Democrats