Introduction

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Introduction
The Jacksonian Era arguably began when Jackson lost the 1824 presidential election to John Quincy Adams, because it was at that time that Jackson harnessed his party's apparatus to campaign for 1828. Many new states’ constitutions eliminated property qualifications for officeholders, while more offices were becoming elective rather than appointive: voting became more widespread and more important, thus competition between candidates increased, manifested in less concern for issues than for character assassinations of opponents. Response to this was a new party system, which required money, people, and organizations to run campaigns and get out the vote. Jackson, a firm believer in the "common man," used all of this to gain the presidency on 1828. Jackson's supporters, the Jacksonian Democrats, included rich and poor, abolitionists and slaveholders, and came from all regions of the country; they were united by suspicion of special privilege and large business corporations, belief in freedom of economic opportunity and political freedom (for white males), the conviction that ordinary citizens could perform the tasks of government, and support for states’ rights. Jackson ran his administration according to such principles, as he employed the spoils system and rotated his appointees through offices, killed the second Bank of the United States, and preferred to leave local improvement projects to the states. Jackson did, however, also believe in the Union and the power of the presidency, which he utilized in the Cherokee removal (contrary to Supreme Court rulings), negotiating trade agreements with Britain and exacting reparations from France, and in facing down the Nullification Crisis. Jackson was not, however, terribly economically savvy, as his idea to distribute surplus federal revenues to the states would have caused deficits, his battle against the bank threatened to provoke a panic, and his Specie Circular caused an economic downturn, the panic of 1837, which he bequeathed to his hand-picked successor, Martin Van Buren. The Whig candidate, William Henry Harrison, running a Jacksonesque campaign, defeated Van Buren in 1840.

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