Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I am choosing to post about Jackson because the Treasury Department has just announced they will be making a new $20 bill that removes Jackson and replaces him with Harriet Tubman.
My thread is really directed at the Jackson Presidency. Did this man really do anything in office that is worthy of fame or adulation? My recollection is that he gets credit for promoting the "common man" over gentry and aristocrats, but other than that I don't know what he accomplished. Its said that the night of his inauguration there was a huge party at the White House in which everyone off the street was invited. People were supposedly drunk and swinging from the chandeliers.
I think about what was negative that occurred during his presidency and three things come to mind:
1. He ignored the U.S. Supreme Court which legally upheld the right of Cherokee Indians to their lands and used the army to drive them out of Georgia and into Oklahoma after a forced migration during which many Indians died. Seriously, this is an impeachable offense as President. A president is obliged to "faithfully execute the law". This President simply ignored a law, or court ruling, he didn't like.
2. He set out to abolish the Bank of the United States which created insecurity in our monetary policy and probably helped lead to the Panic of 1837 which was a serious recession/depression according to historians.
3. He issued the "Specie Circular" in 1837, just before he left office requiring all persons to pay debts to the government in gold or silver coin. This seriously tightened credit and also helped lead to the Panic of 1837.
All this leaves out being a slave owner, etc. I won't judge that because so many presidents were slave owners before the Civil War.
Jackson may have been a brave commander during the War of 1812 during the Battle of New Orleans, but I fail to find much merit in his presidency.
Why was he famous in the first place and put on the $20 bill?
Don't forget that as a judge he would go out and bring in men on warrants at gun point, killing a few of them at the same time. And this warrants were based on fines as low as $5 and they were warrant he wrote himself. Judge, jury and executioner and like so many so called military officers in those days, (he bought his commission) and had no formal military train at all.
As far as I'm concerned he was a coward and a bigot for murdering so many Native Americans that died on the Trail of Tears. And should have never been placed on any of our present American currency.
Maybe they should put him on the PENNY, its small, insignificant and useless like him and Lincoln is all ready on the $5 bill.
Last edited by EarthBound?; 04-22-2016 at 05:39 AM..
Well, you know, I sit in air conditioned comfort enjoying the 21st Century world. Cannot say I would be anywhere near as altruistic if I lived in AJ's world. Especially on the Frontier.
My view of Andrew Jackson is that he played a major role in shaping the southeastern US during his time and to this day, ranging from Tennessee to Florida to Louisiana.
Not mentioned in this thread, he single-handedly, in or around 1819, without the orders of the politicians in Washington and perhaps against their will, but certainly against their diplomatic policy at the time, chased the Spanish out of Florida, basically their garrisons in and around Pensacola and also St. Augustine, I believe, and annexed the entire territory to the United States which the government recognized later de facto.
Around that time there was fear that he might march an army against the politicians in Washington DC.
In the end, Andrew Jackson, a great populist, viewed by many as a great man, however nasty, played through the political system and mastered it, serving two terms as president and having his vice president also elected for one term (a record only matched by Ronald Reagan and George Bush some 150 years later).
Personally I don't care whose face appears on the paper bills, which people use less and less nowadays anyway. It's a sop, a day late and a dollar short.
The real question is whether we have a sound monetary system (doubtful, but not impossible to correct).
I think that we should cleanse our currency of all traces of the old white patriarchy. Glorifying dead white males only keeps people of color down. Here is what I propose:
$1 - Martin Luther King JR. Even if he was a bit of an Uncle Tom in his 'content of our character' right-wing drivel
$2 - Rigoberta Menchu.
$5 - Nat Turner. Lincoln can still be on the back, since he finished that Nat started.
$10 - Cesar Chavez.
$20 - Keep ol' Harriet on the front, but get rid of the evil patriarch on the back and replace him with John Brown, or some other crazed mass murderer with the right color of victims. We'll make the exception in his case.
$50 - Eleanor Roosevelt
$100 Amelia Earhart - keep those $50's and '100's close together in your purse.
Coins could go to other heroines of the Struggle like Alexandra Kollontai (sex workers should like that), Rosa Luxembourg, Emiliano Zapata, and John Allen Muhammed.
5 pages and no one knows about the "Central Bank" concept and Jackson s stand on it.
LOL...it was touched on slightly. I said early that Andrew Jackson would be overjoyed to be removed from any paper currency.
Now the thread is losing focus...back to measuring the man by modern standards. Less complex to discuss I guess. There was an Andrew Jackson thread in one of the forums that got locked...I do not wonder why. I think some of those posters that locked up that thread have migrated here.
Don't forget that as a judge he would go out and bring in men on warrants at gun point, killing a few of them at the same time. And this warrants were based on fines as low as $5 and they were warrant he wrote himself. Judge, jury and executioner and like so many so called military officers in those days, (he bought his commission) and had no formal military train at all.
Andrew Jackson was too cool for official warrants! He's like the Dirty Harry of his times!
Common practice for almost all countries during that age was to buy commissions, but he got his military training the old fashioned way - EXPERIENCE - that is, killing Redcoats at the age of 13 in the Revolutionary War.
If he were alive today he would be the Dos Equis "most interesting man" symbol.
LOL...it was touched on slightly. I said early that Andrew Jackson would be overjoyed to be removed from any paper currency.
Now the thread is losing focus...back to measuring the man by modern standards. Less complex to discuss I guess. There was an Andrew Jackson thread in one of the forums that got locked...I do not wonder why. I think some of those posters that locked up that thread have migrated here.
It's not just a matter of forum users judging him by modern standards. The move to replace him with Harriet Tubman on the 20 is all about judging the past by modern standards - indeed, a particularly vehement subset of those standards.
The only positive accomplishment of Jackson that you allude to in your entire post is "holding the country together during his presidency". I assume you refer to the Tariff of Abominations and South Carolina's subsequent attempt to claim it could nullify federal laws. In any event, South Carolina backed down quickly and I'm unaware of any other southern states that threatened to leave the union with it. The crisis was worse in 1850 during the Compromise of 1850. It may have been worse in 1820 during the Missouri Compromise.
Judicial review of congressional acts was established in 1803 and Jackson chose to blatantly ignore the Supreme Court thirty years later. Those who believe in a nation of laws must reject this man and the way he acted.
I submit that Jackson does appeal to certain kinds of people. Some people prefer to resolve issues through force rather than dialogue and this is perhaps why they approve of his dueling. Some people think the answer to serious monetary problems is to go back to a gold standard and abolish the federal reserve system. I suspect that kind of mentality would approve of Jackson. Alexander Hamilton, a real hero, and our first Secretary of the Treasury, understood the importance of a national bank and sought to establish one. The result was to put the United States on solid fiscal footing and pave the way for several decades of prosperity. Jackson undid that and unleashed the Panic of 1837. He was basically a crude guy who served in the military and his answer to virtually every problem was either to threaten force or actually engage in it. Unlike someone like Dwight Eisenhower who although he was a general understood diplomacy as well as the use of force. Jackson executed deserters. He hung British people who he felt were acting contrary to the interests of the United States in Florida. There was nothing subtle or diplomatic about him. Kicking the Indians out of Georgia by force was right in line with everything else he had done.
None of this is really about whether Jackson ought to be on the $20 bill or not. Its about whether this man was a good President or not. Some people see him as good, but can do very little to pinpoint his accomplishments. He was not a good President whether they put him on the front of the back of a $20 bill.
Wow, an Elite that really holds a grudge for a long, long time.
Are you still mad because Jackson was the first Democrat elected President??
I don't think Jackson was a "good" President. He was a "great" President. There is a difference.
This country would be a totally different country without Jackson as President. I think there is the measure of greatness.
Did he change the country? YES.
Did he, on balance, change it for the better?? YES
Without Jackson's Presidency we would have been a very different country. In my belief, a country where the common man did NOT belong. That change, bringing the average American into the political system is HUGE. Yeah, they trashed the White House during the party.
But it was a small price to pay for creating the America that we had until a relatively short time ago.
Wow, an Elite that really holds a grudge for a long, long time.
Are you still mad because Jackson was the first Democrat elected President??
I don't think Jackson was a "good" President. He was a "great" President. There is a difference.
This country would be a totally different country without Jackson as President. I think there is the measure of greatness.
Did he change the country? YES.
Did he, on balance, change it for the better?? YES
Without Jackson's Presidency we would have been a very different country. In my belief, a country where the common man did NOT belong. That change, bringing the average American into the political system is HUGE. Yeah, they trashed the White House during the party.
But it was a small price to pay for creating the America that we had until a relatively short time ago.
I can't respond to your post because other than saying Jackson was a "great president" and that he "brought the common man into the political system" you don't really say anything at all.
How did he bring the "common man into the political system"? Tell me some things he did that resulted in the "common man" entering the political system? What makes him a "great" president instead of a "good" president?
I've explained exactly what he did wrong in previous posts. You need to explain exactly what he did right. Did he get voting laws changed? Did he get the electoral college system repealed? Did he get the law changed to allow direct elections for senators? The answer to all these is "No".
I think what I'm encountering here is the power of legend. Some people heard as children that Jackson was a great president. Their teachers and parents must have been right. So, without any evidence to actually support it, they continue to spread a myth. That's the shame of American history. Too many don't read anything at all about it as adults. They just continue to believe generalities they were taught as children.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
