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What made Andrew Jackson an unusually powerful president for his time?
During his two terms as president from 1829 to 1837, Andrew Jackson significantly increased the power of the presidency and of the federal government. Naturally instilled with strong and charismatic personality, Jackson was not shy about employing tactics that his predecessor had largely refrained from using. These included frequently using the presidential veto, ignoring the Supreme Court when it suited him, and asserting federal authority over the states. Given Jackson’s bold actions and manner as president—especially in relation of the restraint exhibited by the six presidents who preceded him in that office—his enemies were somewhat justified in calling him an autocrat. The claim that Jackson was a tyrant (which was also commonly voiced during his tenure) is more open to debate, however.
How did Jackson’s use of the veto and belligerent relationship with the Supreme Court set him apart?
Jackson not only used the veto more than any previous president ever had to that point, but he also wielded veto power in an entirely different way from previous presidents. Jackson’s actions regarding the Bank of the United States provide one example. Even though the Supreme Court had declared the Bank constitutional in 1819 in McCulloch v. Maryland, Jackson vetoed the act to renew the Bank’s charter. Regardless of the Supreme Court’s approval of the Bank, Jackson believed that it was harmful to the nation. No previous president had exercised veto power based merely on personal belief.
Another example of Jackson’s disregard for Supreme Court decisions was when he moved ahead with enforcement of the Indian Removal Act of 1830 even after the Supreme Court under Chief Justice John Marshall had made rulings favoring the Cherokee Nation in Worcester v. Georgia in 1832. Jackson chose to ignore the ruling, and is reputed to have said, “John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it,” in response to it.
What were Jackson’s views presidential and federal government powers?
Jackson did not believe that the three branches of the federal government were equal. He resolutely believed that the executive branch should be the strongest of the three—stronger than either the Supreme Court or Congress. Moreover, Jackson firmly held that the federal government had supremacy over the individual states. When South Carolina nullified the 1828 Tariff of Abomination, Jackson was horrified at such outright disregard for federal authority. In response, he organized troops loyal to the federal government to enforce tax collection in South Carolina. Many historians believe that if Henry Clay had not proposed the Compromise Tariff of 1833, the Civil War might have started 30 years earlier, during this Nullification Crisis.
Did Andrew Jackson fundamentally change the role president?
With his assertion of federal authority and his expansive use of power, Jackson permanently changed the office of the presidency. As a result of his unprecedented actions in office and the general perception that his presidency was a success, his successors were able to wield much more power over the Supreme Court, Congress, and the states. Jackson did act autocratically at times, but without him, the presidency would not be what it came to be. Presidents including Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Wilson, and Franklin Roosevelt would not have been able to achieve what they did had not Jackson laid the foundation for a more powerful executive than the framers of the Constitution had in mind.
What were the justifications for the United States and Mexico going to war in 1848?
Mexico and the United States both had causes to go to war even before the Texas disputes. Mexico had defaulted on U.S. loans valued at several million dollars, and both countries had claims on Texas. Even though white Texans had won their independence in the 1836 Texas Revolution and had petitioned the Congress for annexation the same year, Mexico still considered the Texas Republic a territory in revolt. Although Mexico had twice failed to retake Texas, it held out hope that it would succeed one day.
What was the U.S. path to war with Mexico after President Polk to office in 1845?
By the time the new president, James K. Polk, had convinced the United States Senate to annex Texas in 1845, Mexico’s claims on Texas—at least in the eyes of Americans—had expired. The United States therefore claimed all of Texas down to the Río Grande. This action sparked another controversy, since Mexico claimed that the southern border of Texas was farther north, at the Nueces River. After Mexico rebuffed Polk’s offer to buy the disputed territories (not just in Texas, but also in California and land in between), Polk strategically stationed General Zachary Taylor and a small force at the Nueces. When news arrived in Washington, D.C., that Taylor’s troops had been attacked in April of 1846, Polk acted swiftly and persuaded Congress to declare war.
Just days after the declaration, Polk’s agents and a U.S. Navy ship seized San Francisco and Sacramento—timing that Polk’s critics found suspicious. Abraham Lincoln, a U.S. representative from Illinois at the time, questioned Polk’s motives in the “Spot Resolutions” when he badgered administration officials about exactly where Taylor’s troops had been “attacked.” Nevertheless, Polk had succeeded in gaining authorization for the war that would yield Texas, California, and the lands in between to the United States.
Was James K. Polk justified in asking Congress to declare war on Mexico?
Although Mexico and the United States were already on a collision course over Texas by the time of the Mexican War, evidence suggests that President Polk engineered the war by provoking Mexican troops in disputed territory in Texas. In retrospect, it seems likely that he essentially started a war with Mexico in order to seize California, end the debate for Texas, and win all the western land in between (all territory that Polk had unsuccessfully attempted to buy from Mexico just prior to the outbreak of hostilities).
Polk’s defenders point out that he had won the presidency in 1844 (albeit in a close election in terms of the popular vote) on a platform that unambiguously promised the annexation of Texas and other western territories to the American votes. It can be argued that Polk was, in essence, delivering on his campaign promises of manifest destiny and westward expansion by taking Texas (and California and other territories along with it) by the means which were available for him to do so.
What were the key advances during of Market Revolution of the early 1800s?
The Market Revolution brought enormous changes to the United States, economically, socially, and politically, and in so doing pushed the North and the South further apart. The most important drivers of the Market Revolution were Eli Whitney’s cotton gin (1794) and interchangeable parts (1798), Cyrus McCormick’s mower-reaper (1833), and textile factories. Internal improvements such as canals and railroads were also crucial to the Market Revolution.
What was the impact of the cotton gin in the South and in the North?
Eli Whitney’s cotton gin (patented in 1794) completely transformed agriculture and thus had drastic effects on the American economy and society, both North and South. In the South, the invention, which made it much easier to harvest cotton, turned cotton into a highly profitable crop, which prompted southern plantation owners to abandon almost all other crops and switch to cotton production. The most profound impact of the invention, however, was that it was the impetus for southern planters purchasing thousands of additional slaves from Africa and the West Indies to expand their cotton production capacity before the slave trade was banned in 1808. It also led to the size of plantations increasing from relatively small plots to huge farms with as many as several hundred slaves each. Because the entire Southern economy became dependent on cotton, it also became dependent on slavery.
In response to this increasing cotton production, textile factories were built in the New England and the Mid-Atlantic states. These factories helped give rise to the wage labor system and urbanization. The development of factories also produced a larger, wealthier merchant class—a group that helped lead the formation of the nationalistic Whig party, which was an important force in U.S. politics of the period. Although Northern factories certainly benefited indirectly from slavery, Northern social customs were not tied to slavery, and Southern customs were.
What was the impact of McCormick’s reaper in the West?
Cyrus McCormick’s mower-reaper (patented in 1833) revolutionized the West U.S. just as the cotton gin had revolutionized the South. When McCormick’s machine increased wheat production, western farmers began to ship their surplus to the North. The North, in turn, shipped manufactured goods that helped develop the West.
What was the overall impact of the Market Revolution on national divisions?
Over time, economic, social, and political changes resulting from the implementation of such developments as the cotton gin, the mower-reaper increased the separation between the North and the South. While the North became an industrialized, highly interconnected region that traded vigorously with the West (aided in time by the development of railroads), the South fell further behind and became more and more reliant on cotton and slaves. Southern politicians therefore sought to protect the slavery that was so important to their economy, contributing to the growing sectional divide that led to the Civil War.
What was the dynamic between workers and business owners in the North?
In the North, as in every industrial economy, those with economic power sought to protect that power from those who did not have as much—namely the masses in the workforce. Thus, to the powerful businessmen of the North, a decidedly undemocratic ideology that closely linked the wealthy to the government and put political power in the hands of elites (free from the influence of the masses) proved very attractive.
How did southern plantation owners interact with slaves and with small farmers?
In contrast to the North, the workforce in the South was made up primarily of slaves, with no chance to rise in the economic ranks and vie for the power of the plantation owners. (Of course, this could be described as an “undemocratic ideology” as well, but calling slavery undemocratic is a significant understatement.) Moreover, southern plantation owners did not have an antagonistic relationship with small farmers. To the contrary, they trusted their abilities to be elected by the small farmers and to lead them in peace. Thus, to southerners, an ideology that placed the power of the government in the hands of the (non-slave) people did not seem dangerous, but logical.
