CHAPTER IX

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF JACKSONIAN DEMOCRACY

The habit of the earlier historians of thinking of American history as a chronicle of political and constitutional development has given currency to a very misleading conception of "Jacksonian Democracy." To the ordinary reader of history the phrase refers to a violent change in American government and politics effected during the years from 1829 to 1837 by an irresponsible and erratic military chieftain at the head of the newly enfranchised and untutored masses. Notwithstanding the changing emphasis of historical writing in late years this notion has tended to persist, perhaps through a natural desire of the human kind to seek a simple explanation of events rather than a complex one, and perhaps also because of our tendency to picture a superman or a malign genius as the case may be as the moving force in historic changes.

The researches that have been conducted into the life of the people of the United States in the twenties and the thirties have thrown an entirely different light upon the democratic upheaval of that period. The great changes that occurred are to be regarded as a transformation of American society that made itself manifest not only in the sphere of government but in almost every other phase of human thought and endeavor. Jackson himself was a product, rather than the creator, of the new democratic spirit, for he rode into power on a tide of forces that had been gathering strength for more than a decade and which he had done

little or nothing to bring into being. It will appear that the new democracy was "Jacksonian" only to the extent that Jackson stamped the political phase of the movement with the imprint of his personality, lending it certain picturesque characteristics and dramatic qualities.

In the present discussion the origins and development of this new spirit in American life will be traced in the period of a decade or so before Jackson's elevation to the presidency, as well as during his term of office; and its liberating and liberalizing effects will be followed in the rise of a new society west of the Alleghanies, in the development of a dynamic labor movement in the East, in the literary, social and religious aspirations of the people, and in the profound changes in political organization and governmental practice.

I

The growth of the West affords one vital approach to an understanding of the new democratic outlook of America. Reference has been made elsewhere in this volume to the fact that in the first quarter of the century the whole physical basis of American life was changed by the expansion of the American population across the Alleghanies. In 1800 only one-twentieth of the people lived west of the mountains; but when Jackson was inaugurated president, one-third of them were to be found in that region. Meantime the population of the nation had increased from five and one-third millions to thirty millions; so that the West in 1829 contained almost twice as many people as the entire United States at the beginning of the century. In the train of western migration there sprang up mighty frontier commonwealths, increasing the original number of states from thirteen to twenty-two. By the time Jackson entered the presidency the entire domain east of the Mississippi river had been carved into states save only Michigan, Wisconsin and Florida, and be

yond the great river Louisiana and Missouri had won acceptance as members of the Union.)

All the conditions of life in the West made for the promotion of equalitarian ideas. The democracy of the frontier was not derived from the reading of philosophical disquisitions but grew out of the hardy experiences of the pioneers in wresting the land from savage foe and the primitive resistance of Nature. A man was deemed a man if he could survive the struggle for existence, irrespective of his social antecedents; and land was so abundant that every man might attain a position of economic independence. Political equality was thus based upon a real equality. It was a democracy as yet without organization, one that depended upon personal leadership. The man most successful as an Indian fighter was expected to make the best judge or the best Congressman. It was a democracy opposed to an office-holding class and moved by a deep conviction that any upstanding man was competent to hold any office. Yet on clearcut political issues the people were independent and intelligent. Their political code had as its main tenets: political democracy, equality of economic opportunity, and opposition to monopoly and special privilege.

Distinction between north and south did not as yet exist in the trans-Alleghany region. The difficulties of the pioneer of the Old Northwest in hewing a clearing out of the hard woods of his region were matched by the trials of the Mississippi pioneer in wrestling with the pine forests of the south.

The West with all its crudenesses and virtues came to play a large part in American life in the twenties and the thirties, deepening the channels of democracy and driving through them a roaring tide that threatened to inundate the banks. Henry Clay of Kentucky, Thomas H. Benton of Missouri and Andrew Jackson of Tennessee were all products

of western conditions, though with curious variations, and by their tremendous energy and personal gifts they helped to impress the ideals and prejudices of the frontier upon the national government)

The life of the westerner was crowded with the exigencies of daily living and secondarily with the political problems which the necessity for self-government thrust constantly upon his attention. He had as yet no contribution to make to creative literature or to the fine art of living. The life of the frontier democracy bore the promise of original contributions but its expression had to await the oncoming of the children and grandchildren of the first pioneers.

II

While democracy was working out its destiny in the forests of the Mississippi valley, the men left behind in the eastern cities were engaging in a struggle to establish conditions of equality and social well-being adapted to their special circumstances. To understand the difficulties and oppressive conditions against which this movement of protest was directed, it is necessary to consider the changed circumstances of the life of the common man in the new industrial centers of the East since the opening years of the nineteenth century. Since the days of Jefferson's embargo, New England and the Middle Atlantic states had been undergoing a transformation from a section of predominant agricultural and shipping interests to a section increasingly devoted to manufacturing. This growth of manufacturing marked the advent of the factory system in American history; and while manufacturing was conducted only in scattered districts and upon a comparatively small scale as measured by modern standards, it profoundly influenced the lives of the working class immediately concerned.

Prior to the introduction of the factory system, such

manufacturing as was known in America had been carried on under the "domestic system." Each employer or "master" worked side by side with his journeymen and apprentices, sharing their hard conditions and long hours; and every workingman expected in time to become an employer. There was no sharp division between capital and labor, and no distinct and permanent laboring class. With the application of machinery to work that had hitherto been performed by hand, the situation of the workingman changed radically. Under the new conditions the mass of hired labor shifted from the farm and the village to the trades and the manufactures in the towns in the first quarter of the century. The customary workday on the farm from "sun to sun" or "dark to dark" was carried over into the factory and the trades notwithstanding the greatly altered conditions of labor, and women and children were employed at the same ruinously long hours as the men.

An estimate of the average workday in the manufacturing districts was made in 1839 by James Montgomery, superintendent of the York Factories at Saco, Maine, who calculated that the day's work at Lowell averaged a little more than twelve hours the year around for six days a week, and that in many of the Middle Atlantic and southern states the ordinary working hours approached thirteen a day. There is abundant evidence to show that these figures may be regarded as a conservative statement of the conditions prevailing in the earlier years of the century. The Lowell factories were said to employ 3,800 women and 1,200 men in 1833; at about the same time it was estimated that twofifths of all the factory workers in New England were children under sixteen years of age. Wages had risen nominally, but since they had lagged behind the rise of prices, the workingmen could buy less with their earnings than earlier.

Factory manufacture tended to concentrate in cities; and the period was marked by the rapid growth of urban popula