The rise of Andrew Jackson, mitt, manipulation, and the making of modern politics, in which they examine how Andrew Jackson was elected president in 1828. We recorded their remarks that the u. S. Capital Historical Society in 2018. I am going to go ahead and start stuff. Welcome to the latest lunchtime lecture. My name is dr. Man tony, oh chief historian here. Welcome. I am really pleased today to introduce you, if you dont already know, to jean and david heidler. They have been speakers here before for their book on George Washingtons circle. And today, we are really honored that we are one day into the official existence of their latest book on Andrew Jackson, the rise of Andrew Jackson. It was just released officially yesterday. We are at the threshold of greatness here with the book. And i hope you all consider buying. It they will be available afterwards to sign for anyone who is interested. And i also want to point out that their previous book, i said they had been here before, it was washingtons circle. We are selling discounted copies of that back there. I am told the hardcover we are selling is five cents more than amazons soft cover. So that sounds like a winwin. Anyways. I hope you will have some Great Questions for jean and david. This is a hot topic. I assume some of you are familiar, but some may be drawn specifically because of Andrew Jackson, who has been in the news lately. So lets hear about why, how he is a template for modern politics, and we will be taking q a afterwards. I hope you have some Great Questions. And with that, i will ask you to help me welcome jean and david. applause hello, everyone. Thank you for that gracious introduction and the boost on the book that just came out yesterday. Can everyone hear me all right . Good. I will try to keep up the volume here so that we dont have any problems. Its delightful to be back here again. Several years have passed, and we see some familiar faces and have met some new friends. Today, we would like to talk to you about the central aspect that drove the campaign for 1828 in the wake of the one for 1824, which was the charge of the corrupt bargain. To ask the question, how corrupt was it, that is where we get into this business of smear or truth. Part of this is the natural aftermath of an election, which is always a time of mixed emotions and contrasting moods. You have the elation of the victors and the disappointment of the defeated. And these balance each other after a fashion, which leads to better perspective on the event in the future and gives a sense of proportion. The first shock of defeat will subside and elation over victory becomes relief over having attained it. From this, you get an equilibrium. That is necessary for sound governance. In the best case, the victor is never completely vindicated, and the defeated is never completely demolished. A healthy political system preserves the adversarial role as a way to check, curb, and discourage over leaning power. And at the same time, the extremes of failure and success must be avoided. Because if they persist, their lies the path to irreconcilable differences, and to the heedless exercise of power, and to the reckless form of resilience. Fundamental to avoiding all of this is a general belief that good faith is operating as a given and the election and its aftermath. Imagine, then, the chaos that is likely to ensue if the defeated emerge from the election convinced that they have been cheated, that the process itself was manipulated in bad faith, and that the result is illegitimate, that the beneficiaries of it are shallow hugs tours at best, but possibly evil and worst. Subverting the peoples well, destroying the democratic ideal for the venal gain of power. That would be bad enough. But imagine if the losers did not really believe this, but were willing to act as if they did, that they were intent upon convincing as many people as possible that the things they know to be lies are the truth. The damage of such an effort, even if unsuccessful, could be incalculable, if it is successful, certain to be devastating. And it is that situation that can be broadly categorized as a smear. A smear is a deliberate fabrication at worst, or at least a willful twisting of the truth to sally the reputation of the target. Strictly speaking, the truth cannot be a smear. The purpose of it in politics is as a scheme to achieve advantage over an opponent outside of traditional means such as debate over issues of policies, or contrasting differences which are presented either in person or through pertinent issues being explored in writing. Candidates and entities resort to these smears because they wish to distract from something. They wish to change the subject. It could be from their own personal failings or foibles, or their own records, either in personal matters where they behave questionable, even or past political stances that were or have become unpopular. In short, distraction is the operative function of a smear. For a candidate with nearly unassailable credibility, it is an easy way to damage an opponent. And this is where becomes especially dangerous. Credibility comes from popularity, a sterling bead, and inspiring life story, or even a sense of identification with people that creates a bond for essentially ephemeral reasons. It is nonetheless in parts of authority. The fallacy of arguing from authority is only matched by the ease of doing so. It is to say that you should believe me because of who i am, discounting the need for evidence or even dismissing contradictory evidence as irrelevant. Hello. At the heart of our story today is the constitutional role of the house of representatives in deciding a president ial election, such as the one in 1824, an election where no candidate received a majority in the Electoral College. This had only happened once before, the election of 1800, when thomas jefferson, tied with his Vice President ial running mate aaron burr. It is somewhat odd that it hadnt happened more than one time before, because the framers of the constitution actually envisioned it happening pretty frequently. They thought that because they believed that favorite sons, from the various states, would run in each of the quadrangular elections, and as a result there would be no majority in the Electoral College, that would throw it into the house of representatives. They chose the house because it is considered the peoples house, the frequency of the elections make it more responsive to the will of the people. This was the mechanism envisioned. Now, if someone did receive a majority in the Electoral College originally, that person would become the president. The person who came in second would become the Vice President. But that election of 1800 obviously illustrated that that wasnt practical. And so the changes brought on by the 12th amendment to the constitution resulted in net 12th amendment, and provided four separate elections for president and Vice President. And in the event that there is not a majority, the top three candidates would then go before the house. The house would vote by states. Each state having one vote. The rationale for that was the same as for the Electoral College. It was to prevent the larger states from dominating the elections. A simple majority in the house would then provide the victor. The physical process of the voting and how it was achieved, how it was counted, that is kind of a story for another day. What is pertinent for us today are the 1824 Election Results. There were simply too many candidates. By the time they got to the election in the fall, there were four. Secretary of state John Quincy Adams of massachusetts, secretary of the treasury william h. Crawford of georgia, speaker of the house henry clay of kentucky, and senator Andrew Jackson of tennessee. The abundance of candidates assured that no one was going to receive a majority in the Electoral College, and that was apparent by the late fall of 1824. According lee, the 12th amendment kicked in. The top three in the Electoral College votes were jackson, adams, and crawford. These would be the candidates before the house of representatives. We do sort of have a tag team thing here. Like in wrestling, one of you could come up and try to keep one of us away from the podium. Jacksons men insisted that his plurality in the popular and electoral votes was a decisive factor in determining the outcome of the house election. In a letter to john over ten on december 19th of 1824, jackson referred to himself as having been supported by the majority of the people, which wasnt the case. But jackson correctly assumed this wasnt the time for subtlety. With servitude and tenacity, the message was hammered home. Jackson had won the election because of the popular vote. He had won the election because of a plurality in the Electoral College. And it was incumbent on the house to endorse these conclusions out of a basic fairness. It was the only way, said the jacksonites, to truly represent the will of the people. Jacksons managers assiduously tried to pump these numbers, and its easy to see why. He came in first in the Electoral College, but far short of the hundred 31 majority necessary for victory. But it was jacksons significant lead in the popular vote that animated his supporters. 18 to 24 states and 1824 chose the electors by popular vote. Jackson had more than 40,000 votes than his closest competitor, John Quincy Adams, and more than 110,000 votes than william h. Crawford, the third place finisher. Lost in the comparison of these figures, however, is the reality that not one of these numbers really matters. Only the electoral counts of jacksons 99, adams 84, and crawfords 41 are pertinent to the constitutional prescriptions for referring these men to the question before the house of representatives. The flawed logic in the appeal of the popular vote is made evident by scrutinizing the case of henry clay, who had beaten crawford in the popular vote by more than 6000. But crawford had won louisiana thanks to some skulduggery on the part of the adams and jackson camps in the legislature. Louisiana chose the electors, and as a result, crawford came in the by winning louisiana, and as a result, became one of the three candidates who was going to go before the house. This fairly clearly shows that comparing the apple of popular votes to the orange of electoral ones was, in short, a pointless exercise. Because of the complicated nature of this question, which i am sure you will all agree is fairly complicated at this point, it would prove a highly effective way of manipulating public opinion. Consequently, the pressure to influence house members with these spurious claims was intent and persistent. The house would not take up the question until february 9th, 1825, which gave not only the supporters of jackson, but those of adams and crawford more than two months to cobble together the simple majority in the house necessary for victory. They also courted one another with promises, seeking pledges of support, operatives moving between the operatives of the other two, bending the truth, and lying when truth didnt seem to work. The Practical Applications of all of this become evident as a result of what happened in january of 1825. Henry clay, speaker of the house, strongly inclined to support John Quincy Adams as soon as he knew, clay knew, that he had lost the election. And he knew this in the fall. He knew it before louisiana. He was juicing that he was not going to go before the house of representatives. As he became aware of, that he only wanted to make certain that adams was supportive of his pro gram for National Improvement before throwing his support to him. To that end, he had an extensive interview with adams on the night of january 9th, 1825. It is possibly one of the most pivotal events in american political history. The details of the meeting have never been made clear. Adams usually recorded things voluminously and completely in his diary. He did not for this. What is clear is the results of the meeting were to be devastating to the reputations of both of these men, because clay was going to use his enormous influence after this as speaker of the house in the cause of John Quincy Adams. Now, there were certainly problems with this meeting. Its context was unfortunate, before it took place in the midst of a whirl of proposed deals by all the parties concerned, including the jacksonites. Let me read a couple passages from our book to illustrate how some of this deal making was going on. Ohio congressman, john sloan, found himself sitting across a dinner table from sam houston, an important jackson operative, whom used between bites that ohio would surely go for jackson in the house vote. Sloan was an experienced politician in his mid forties, a jeffersonian, who had preferred clay. And his response to houston was measured. He had not spoken to the others of his delegation, he said guardedly. Sloan believed houston looked anxious as he spoke about what a splendid administration it would make with old hickory as president and mister clay as secretary of state. Later, as houston bed farewell, he made doubly sure his offer had not been misunderstood. I hope you from ohio will aid us in electing general jackson, sloan recalled him saying with a winking repeat of the proposed deal. And then your man, meeting mister clay, can have anything he pleases. And then there was the case of daniel cookeville annoy. Old hickorys men heard the distressing news that the young illinois congressman, daniel p cook, intended to vote for adams. At 30 years old and in frail health, he suddenly found himself at the center of an unsettling effort to influence his vote. Illinois was a relatively new state. Its small population granted only one representative. But since each state had one vote in the house election, dan cook by himself was as important as all of new york or pennsylvania. Illinois had mostly gone for jackson, and old hickorys men forcefully demanded that those general Election Results to more than guide cook in the house vote. He should accept them as the verdict of the people, or else. Pennsylvania, jackson man Samuel Ingram took this tact with koch. Theyve rumored alliance of adams and clay would be unpopular, he muttered darkly to cook. And it would hurt kochs career to join it. He watched the young man absorb this threat, and saw someone not at all weighing his options to cut his losses. He according lee switched his mood and smiled, benevolently. Cook said he could be territorial governor of arkansas if his vote helped Andrew Jackson become president. For daniel p cook, the author of the whole world was in sufficient to purchase his vote at the cost of his integrity. But arkansas . In gum knew when to drop it. Henry clay was courted by the jackson and crawford men as well. And the murkiness of these overtures encouraged significant misunderstandings at the time, and massive ones later. Clay enjoyed the attention, and prolonged it, which was unwise. It would be unfortunately easy to conclude in this setting that clay, in meeting with adams, was arranging a quid pro quo for his support. As the february 1825 vote approached expectations were high on all sides. And there was also a lot of discussion about how should the house consider the candidates. Clearly, the intention of the constitution was to have attacked independently of all general Election Results. What, after all, did the framers of the constitution intend . If the house were merely to ratify and Electoral College plurality, why have the house vote at all . And Electoral College plurality would be sufficient to select a winner, if that was the case, but that was explicitly not the case per the constitution. Rather, the top three finishers in the Electoral College came before the house equally entitled, with none favored over the others by any previous election result. The constitution, clearly met for the house to start its considerations from scratch. And then the vote was held. John quincy adams one on the first ballot. There is enormously complicated reasons this happened, but we only need be aware that adams was elected on the first ballot to everyones surprise, mostly to the jacksonites. Jackson at first was magnanimous, which strikes as perhaps as an act. Then, the very night after the house vote, Jackson Adams came face to face. Again, from the book, the monroes held their weekly reception, and while everyone seemed drained by the experience, they were also grateful that despite the angry talk, broad recriminations, and a grinding apprehension, the election in the end had been decided with a calm dignity. The president s gathering was not festive, but it was an eventful, which was pleasant for people weary of events. A Kindred Spirit pervaded the whole scene, the national intelligentsia reported. The friends of the different candidates mingled together and conversed with the good humor and frankness contrasted with the virulence and malignancy, which in some parts of the country had attended the discussion of this question. President elect, John Quincy Adams, stood near the center of the room in the midst of a press of people offering congratulations. He received them with a drawn smile and stiff back. He felt another oppressive people behind him and turned just as Andrew Jackson turned to face him. The president s reception fell silent. Guests suddenly became conscious of the cramped space and instinctively backed away from the two men to create a small, empty circle with them at its center. The last bit of stray laughter an