Life Way of Andrew Jackson

Andrew Jackson lived in his home called “The Hermitage” in Tennessee. Some people believed that Andrew Jackson was the best President since the Founding Fathers. Jackson was a very controversial President. His opinion on Native American removal from their own lands and African American slaves is still controversial to this day. 

Jackson’s parents immigrated to the Carolinas in the 1760’s from Ireland. Jackson never met his father. Andrew Jackson’s father died while his mother was pregnant with him. Jackson grew up on a farm during the American Revolution.

He soon joined the war with the patriots. All of his family died during the Revolution. That caused him to hate the British. 

After the Revolution ends in 1788, he traveled to the west to Kentucky and Tennessee. He settled down in Nashville, Tennessee. He fell in love with Rachel Robarts, but she was married. They both fall in love with each other. Even though she was not allowed to divorce, she still ran off with Andrew Jackson. They soon got married. They went back to Nashville after six months. Rachels original husband sued for divorce. The actions of her getting a divorce followed them till they died.

In 1796, Andrew Jackson was sent by Tennessee to be a representive to congress. No one in the capital knew how to handle him. Jackson did not like how the people their made their deals. He thought it was corrupt. He resigned a year later. Aftet he returned he started to raise race horses and bet on them. He made an enemy of Charles Dickinson through the horse races because he insulted his wife. He dueled Dickinson, and they both were shot. Dickinson died. Jackson was shot by the heart, and the bullet was never removed.

Andrew Jackson was the commander of the Tennessee Militia during the War of 1812. He was excited for his second shot at the British. He ends up mainly fighting the Creek Indians in the South East. He was ruthless against his troops and the Indians. He fought with the Cherokee Indians against the Creek and set the Creek’s village on fire. He killed all 1,000 Indians in the village. Horseshoe Bend was Andrew Jackson’s first victory. Andrew Jackson became known as “Old Hickory.” He gained respect of his soldiers as a General. Andrew Jackson was one of the first men to prove that the Americans could stand against the British. Jackson became an American hero. After the war of 1812, he became wealthy. Jackson made a foundation in Alabama on the land that he stole from the Creeks. 

During 1824, James Monroe was leaving the Presidency, which gave Andrew Jackson the opportunity to run for President. None of the Candidates campaigned for the Presidency. No one in politics thought that Andrew Jackson could ever with the run to be President. Many of the Washington Politicians thought he did not have any qualifications to be President. His lack of experience in politics helped him because it meant he was a man of the people. This election was won by John Adams. Jackson ran against Adams again in 1828. This time the people were ready to vote for Jackson. Most of the men who voted, never voted before this election.

The American people would hold barbeques to talk up Jackson. The people found out about Rachel Jackson’s adultery through newspapers. Everyone was in disbelief. Because of the Backlash of the adultery, Rachel Jackson, the now very religious women, was broken. This election Andrew Jackson was voted the President of The United States. Right after he was elected President, Rachel passed away from a heart attack. Jackson was broken. 

For Andrew Jackson’s eight years of presidency he fought the corrupt government. He fired many people in the government that he thought was corrupt, and hired his own people, many with scandals. The Men and Women of Washington thought Andrew Jackson was sullying the capital. The Vice President, John C. Calhoun, was obsessed protecting slavery. The congress made a law to highly tax on cloth that was used to cloth slaves. 

The Vice President did not like that law, he made nullification for states to not follow laws that they thought was unconstitutional. This almost led to a civil war. They thought that Andrew Jackson would be on their side when they went to a dinner where they were planning on trying to get people on their side. Jackson did not help them, he opposed it. Jackson did not want to break up the union. 

Jackson created the Indian Removal Act in 1830. The Cherokees tried to embrace the white people’s way of life, and they still were forced to leave. The Cherokees dressed like them, learned the language, and even built houses. American soldiers took all the Native Americans out of their houses and forced them on the Trail of Tears. Many of them died on the trail. The Cherokee called him “Jackson the Devil”.  Andrew Jackson survived the first assassination attempt on a President. His presidency overall was him fighting for white men and no one else. On June 8, 1845 Jackson died. He was buried on the Hermitage next to his wife Rachel. 

Jackson did some great things as President, but in my opinion his bad outweighed him. The major thing he did was the Indian Removal Act. Jackson forced thousands of Cherokee Indians off their land and forced them to walk the Trail of Tears. The worst thing is that the Cherokee Indians helped him win the major battle of Horsehoe Ben against the Creeks. The battle is one of the main causes of him even winning the Presidency. The battle made him seem like he was a man of the people, but then he turns his back on the Indians that helped him win. Jackson only cared about the white men. He also adopted two Native American babies after the Battle of Horeshoe Ben. He never took care of them. He just sent them back to his wife. Both of the babies did not live long lives. 

I do admire his love and dedication for his wife Rachel. Many men in that time would have looked at Rachel in disgust because of her “Adultery”. Rachel was in a bad marriage and she fell in love with Jackson. Jackson also fell in love with her. The defeated the odds and got married. I also admire because of his love of his dead wife while he was President that he stood up for Peggy Eaton. He knew how hard it was for Rachel when she had the title of being a Scarlet, so she took sympathy for Peggy and her new husband. 

The documentary greatly benefited from the different views of different ethnicities. It showed that Jackson was a good President that had dark stains on his past and on his Presidency. The Native American Historians really added to the documentary because the white historians mainly praised Jackson. It was interesting to learn that the Native Americans thought of him as the Devil. It showed that everyone did not think that he was a good president which is what is mainly shown in History books and biased documentaries. 

Another negative thing about Andrew Jackson was him being a slave holder. Many of the Founding Fathers were slave holders, but some of them did believe slavery you have been outlawed, like Thomas Jefferson. Jackson just wholeheartedly thought the slaves were completely beneath him. When a slave would run away from his plantation, he would pay money to get the slave back. He would also give extra money to the person who caught the slave if they whipped the runaway slave. 

Overall, Andrew Jackson had some positives and a lot of negatives. He was man of the people, and he was a war hero. He was the first president to ever have an assassination plan against him. He did do heinous acts like the Indian Removal Act. He also did good acts like stopping an early civil war. No one can truly call him a good or a bad person because he is just too complicated.

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