Andrew Jackson a Wealthy National Hero

Andrew Jackson was seen as just a wealthy national hero until he was elected as the seventh president for the United States in 1828; he stayed President from 1829-1837. In the 1828 election, Andrew Jackson ran against John Quincy Adams and he won in both electoral votes(getting 178 vs J.Q.A’s 83) and popular votes(647,286 against J.Q.A’s 508,064). This presidential election was actually a rematch of the 1824 Presidential Election which pitted John Quincy Adams(National Republican) against Andrew Jackson(Democrat), in which John Quincy Adams had been chosen to be President.

As the president, Jackson essentially altered politics in the U.S. It’s highly debatable whether Andrew Jackson was a good or bad president because a lot of people reacted in philippic ways seeing him as a slave owner who forced Native Americans out of their homes and others saw him as this great war hero who changed the U.S.’s political establishment for the better.

Jackson owned as many as 161 slaves, buying and selling those he had grow his cotton and build & tend to his home. He used their labor to make him wealthy and he even brought them to the white house with him to keep working for him. Some records showed he would even beat his slaves; for instance, he once brutally whipped a woman, in public, whom he felt was acting above her place and when slaves ran away he would pursue them then proceeded to put them in chains once they had recovered. He even offered in an advertisement in the newspaper an extra $10 for every 100 whips doled upon Tom, a 30-year-old slave who tried to run away in 1804. These are a couple of many reasons people resented him/the idea of him becoming President.

Andrew Jackson quickly earned his popularity by inviting the public to attend the inauguration ball at the White House. The crowd was so large that furniture and dishes had been broken in attempts to get a glimpse of the President and the event gave him the nickname “King Mob”. After serving in both the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812, Jackson was very popular for being seen as a national hero after defeating the British in the Battle of New Orleans. Being seen as a military hero and a man of the people gave him the popularity he needed for his votes.

In my opinion, I don’t like Andrew Jackson having been elected for President because of the type of person he was. He owned up to 300 slaves in his lifetime and never freed any of them. He opposed any policies involved with outlawing slavery in western territories as the U.S. expanded and he helped to ban deliveries of anti-slavery tracts.

Even if he did change some things politically or etc. that helped shape today’s presidency, that doesn’t make him a good man after all the things he’s done. His ‘fans’ love him for being a “man of the people” but it’s pretty hard to be a man of the people when he abused the people who got him to gain his social foothold just because he believed they were acting above their place, a place that was force upon them when they should’ve decided that for themselves like any other person.

Bibliography

1. https://www.270towin.com/1828_Election/
2. https://www.history.com/news/andrew-jackson-presidency-controversial-legacy
3. https://www.biography.com/us-president/andrew-jackson
4. https://learningenglish.voanews.com/a/americas-presidents-andrew-jackson/3787327.html

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