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Steve Tran Andrew Jackson Birth Date: March 15, 1767 Death Date: June 8, 1845 Party: Democratic Date of Terms in Office: 1829-1837 Vice President(s): John C. Calhoun (1829-1832) Martin Van Buren (1833-1837)

Andrew Jackson deserves a C for his presidency. His actions against anything he deemed evil, was extreme. His decisions hurt our economy a lot. He also angered the Native Americans. Andrew Jackson’s main goal was to help out Western America and the common people rather than the rich. He tried to meet this goal by getting rid of the Bank of the U.S., which was foreclosing land on the debtor westerners. That backfired and it caused instability in the economy which hurt the west just as much as the rest of the country. Also, his goal for the Federal Government was to replace all of the office holders of the government that weren’t supporters of his. He met this goal when he did appoint many Democratic Party supporters into office. Andrew Jackson also wanted to keep the Union a whole and stop succession if there was any. This goal he did meet when the South tried to succeed from the Union. Jackson sent a militia down to North Carolina and threatened them away from succession. He also wanted to reduce the national debt, which he attempted to do when he vetoed bills on using federal funds to build roads. Jackson met most of his goals when he was in office, but many of those goals had bad affects on America. Andrew Jackson’s relationship with Congress was not really that great at all. After all Andrew Jackson was known as a “King” for using the presidential power of veto. He vetoed the charter for the national Bank of the U.S. He also vetoed bills on using federal funds for internal improvements like the Maysville Bill. He even used pocket vetoes against Congress. Even when Congress passed a bill, Jackson didn’t want it to pass. The Tariff of Abomination was Jackson trying to hurt John Q. Adam’s reputation by getting a bill vetoed, but it backfires when Congress does pass the bill. From this we see that Congress and Jackson didn’t get along well at all. One positive thing that Andrew Jackson did was that he used his powers to prevent succession. The South was trying to succeed due to the Tariff of Abomination that had been passed. The South felt that was discrimination against them. North Carolina wanted to nullify the Tariff in their state by threatening with succession. Andrew Jackson put a stop to this by force when he ordered the militia to invade North Carolina if they started something. This had prevented a succession temporarily, but in all reality it was Jackson who started it when he decided to gamble on whether the tariff would pass or not. Also, it was Henry Clay who got rid of the tension with his compromise. Overall, Jackson did attempt to stop a succession and it work temporarily but he was the one that caused it, and someone else bailed him out. A negative thing that Jackson did during his presidency was destroying the national Bank of America. When the Bank of the U.S. needed to be rechartered, Jackson vetoed it. This led to an economic crisis where the stable currency of the bank was now gone. The Bank was needed for investment in businesses for the North. The West now bought land on unstable money causing Jackson to issue the Specie Circular, which made people buy land using metal money. This upset the people who wanted cheap easy money. The panic of 1837 was caused by Jackson’s destruction of the Bank of the United States. This is one of the worst things Andrew Jackson did during his presidency. One precedent that Andrew Jackson set for the United States was the idea of a two-party system. By Jackson’s action about rewarding loyal party members, it caused people to pick a party. He created the Spoil System, allowing the party in office to hold lots of offices. This of course led to the appointment of people who were not qualified for their jobs. One person appointed by Jackson’s Spoil System stole a million dollars from the government. The two-party system that was set up by Jackson did allow a strong check and balance system using the parties. In conclusion, Andrew Jackson deserves a C for his presidency. He did meet his goals of destroying the bank, getting loyal party members into office, keeping the national debt low, and stopped succession. Some of those goals had bad affects on America though. He didn’t get along with Congress well because he used his veto power more than average. He did stop succession by North Carolina, but he was the one that caused it and it was Henry Clay that saved him. He went and destroyed the Bank of the U.S. causing the Panic of 1837 and lots of instability in the economy. He did establish the two-party system which does protect one party from having too much power, and he created the Spoil System which allowed the winning party to get their people into offices. Overall though, Jackson didn’t do too great in his presidency. He caused more bad than he did good.

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"Andrew Jackson." __The White House__. 2008. 12 Oct. 2008 http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/aj7.html Kennedy, David M., Lizabeth Cohen, and Thomas A. Bailey. __American Pageant : Advanced__ __ Placement __. 12th ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin College Division, 2001.   Microsoft Corporation. "Andrew Jackson." __Microsoft Encarta Online Encyclopedia__. 2008. 12 Oct. 2008 .

MultiEducator Inc. "Andrew Jackson." __HistoryCentral.com__. 2008. 12 Oct. 2008 .