4.8: Jackson and Federal Power

Andrew Jackson

The seventh President of the United States (1829-1837), who as a general in the War of 1812 defeated the Creek Nation at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend and the British at New Orleans. As president he opposed the Bank of the United States, objected to the right of individual states to nullify disagreeable federal laws, and increased the powers of the presidency. He also oversaw the first official U.S. government policy of Native American removal from their ancestral lands.

Democratic Party

One of the two major U.S political parties, it was founded in 1828 around Andrew Jackson to support a decentralized government and state's rights. It evolved out of the Jeffersonian, limited-government wing of the Democratic-Republican Party in the 1820s. It opposed the Bank of the U.S., pioneered the spoils system, and appealed to the "common man."

Whig Party

Anti-Jackson political party formed in the early 1830s that generally stood for national community and a more activist government. It was led by Henry Clay and Daniel Webster and backed by wealthier conservatives, supporters of the National Bank people, and plantation owners. Its members came mainly from the National Republican wing of the Democratic-Republican Party, which adopted many of the Federalists' policy positions. They took their name from the British political party that had opposed King George during the American Revolution. Their policies included support of industry, protective tariffs, and Clay's American System.

Henry Clay

Secretary of State under John Quincy Adams and senator from Kentucky, who ran for president five times until his death in 1852. He was a strong supporter of the American System, a war hawk for the War of 1812, Speaker of the House of Representatives, and known as "The Great Compromiser." He was Jackson's main political opponent and the leader of the National Republicans who became the Whig Party. His political strategy to corner Jackson on his position on rechartering the Second Bank of the U.S. backfired, leading to Jackson's reelection in 1832.

Second National Bank of the United States

This bank was chartered in 1816, five years after the First National Bank lost its charter. It was opposed by Andrew Jackson, who killed it off after defeating Henry Clay in the election of 1832 and quarreling with the bank's final president, Nicholas Biddle, during the Bank War.

tariffs

Taxes on imported goods. A series of tariff acts beginning in 1816 caused sectional and political divisions among Americans who argued about the fairness and purpose of the tariffs. South Carolina threatened to nullify the Tariff of 1828 (the so-called Tariff of Abominations") in a stand-off with President Jackson.

internal improvements

The program for building roads, canals, bridges, and railroads in and between the states. There was a dispute over whether the federal government should fund these infrastructure projects, since Congress was not specifically given that power by the Constitution and the infrastructure would be built only in specific places and states at the expense of all taxpayers.

turnpikes

Privately built toll roads that charged a fee to travelers who used them. They were sometimes referred to as turnpikes because barriers, including pikes, would be turned aside to allow wagons and other traffic to pass. Henry Clay's American System proposed federal subsidies for these roads to support economic activity and westward expansion.

Indian Removal Act

Passed in 1830, this act of Congress authorized Andrew Jackson to negotiate land-exchange treaties with tribes living east of the Mississippi. The treaties enacted under this act's provisions paved the way for the reluctant—and often forcible—emigration of tens of thousands of American Indians to west of the Mississippi River, mostly to Oklahoma, which was known as the "Indian Territory" at the time.

Worcester v. Georgia

The U.S. Supreme Court led by Chief Justice John Marshall ruled in this case that the Cherokee nation was a distinct community in which the state laws of Georgia had no force. The state of Georgia had tried unsuccessfully for years to remove the Cherokee from lands coveted by white settlers. Marshall ruled the Cherokee a sovereign nation under the authority of the federal government. Jackson, who sympathized with white frontier settlers, ignored Marshall's ruling in a challenge to the Constitution's checks and balances.

Trail of Tears

The forced removal of Cherokee Indians by the U.S. Army at the orders of President Jackson. They traveled from North Carolina and Georgia through Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri, and Arkansas - more than 800 miles (1,287 km) - to the Indian Territory. More than 4, 00 Cherokees died of cold, disease, and lack of food during the 116-day journey.

First Seminole War

In April 1818 Jackson invaded Spanish Florida to capture Seminole raiders. Jackson took over most of Spain's most important military posts, and overthrew the governor of Florida. He did all this without receiving any direct orders. This upset many Spanish leaders, but most Americans supported Jackson

Second Seminole War

A collection of Native American tribes who had relocated to Florida resisted the pressures to relocate westward in this 1830s war. Chief Osceola staged an uprising in 1835 to defend the American Indians' land. The war was the costliest Indian War fought by the U.S. government, in part due to widespread guerrilla warfare. Osceola was eventually captured by white troops in 1837, and the government gave up on the war by 1842. By then most Native Americans in Florida had either been killed or forced westward.

Osceola

Seminole leader who resisted the removal of his people from Florida in the 1830s during the costly Second Seminole War. He died under suspicious circumstances after being tricked into surrendering in 1837.

"Five Civilized Tribes"

Cherokees, Choctaws, Creeks, Chickasaws, and Seminoles, known collectively as "civilized" due to some degree of assimilation into white European culture and some intermarriage with whites. They were forced out of their homelands by white settlers westward expansion and U.S. government policy enforced by the U.S. Army.

Treaty of Fort Jackson

Signed late in 1814, this treaty ended the Creek War (a part of the larger War of 1812) and forced the Creek to give up millions of acres of their ancestral lands in the southeast.

Nullification Crisis

A sectional crisis during the presidency of Andrew Jackson

Bank War

Political battle between Jackson, Clay and Nicolas Biddle, the president of the Second Bank of the U.S., over the renewal of the Bank's rechartering, which according to law took place every twenty years. Clay lost the election of 1832 after his strategy to force Jackson into a corner on the issue backfired. Jackson vetoed the recharter in his second term and moved the U.S. government's funds in the Bank to various state banks, derisively called pet banks by Jackson's opponents because some were controlled by Jackson supporters.