THE WAR OF THE GIANTS: THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION OF 1824 AND THE RESHAPING OF AMERICAN POLITICS

Abstract

Often mischaracterized as a sedate, muddled, and issueless personality contest, the U.S. presidential election of 1824 actually proved an important transitional contest between the First and Second American Party Systems. The five very active candidates involved in the contest created dynamic organizations, sponsored energetic newspaper networks, staged congressional legislative battles, and spread vicious personal attacks against each other, presaging the tactics of the more-celebrated succeeding 1828 election. Four key developments determined the outcome of the 1824 contest. One, the decline of the opposition Federalists encouraged the Republican Party to fracture into five competing candidacies. Two, Secretary of War John C. Calhoun's vicious political attacks fatally undermined the campaign of frontrunner Treasury Secretary William H. Crawford. Three, political outsider General Andrew Jackson successfully equated the practice of politics with corruption, capturing a plurality of the popular vote by running against Washington politicians. Four, Secretary of State John Quincy Adams' superb insider deal-making ability undergirded his successful effort to win the required House election once no candidate received a majority of electoral votes from the popular election. While adversely affecting the political careers of all the participants except Jackson, the election of 1824 accelerated the ongoing trend toward democratized presidential elections and helped give birth to the Second American Party System.