• The American System • 1819 • Republican Revival • Adams versus
Jackson • Jacksonian Democracy and the South • Jacksonian Democracy
and the Market Revolution • The Second American Party System
NATIONALPOLITICALLEADERSfromthe1820suntiltheoutbreakoftheCivilWar
faced two persistent problems. First, economic development and territorial
expansion made new demands on government—demands that involved federal
participation in state and local affairs. Second, a deepening rift between slave and free states rendered such involvement contested and dangerous.
The Whig Party proposed the American System as the answer to both ques-
tions. The national government, said the Whigs, should subsidize roads and canals, foster industry with protective tariffs, and maintain a national bank to control
credit and currency. The result would be a peaceful, prosperous, and truly national market society. If the South, the West, and the Northeast profited by doing business with each other, the argument went, sectional jealousies would quiet down.
Jacksonian Democrats, on the other hand, argued that the American System was
unconstitutional, that it violated the rights of states and localities, and that it taxed honest citizens to benefit corrupt and wealthy insiders. Most dangerous of all,
argued the Democrats, Whigs would create an activist, interventionist national government that would anger the slaveholding South. To counter both threats, the
Jacksonians resurrected Jefferson’s rhetoric of states’ rights and inactive, inexpensive government—all of it deeply inflected in the code of white male equality,
domestic patriarchy, and racial slavery.
THE AMERICAN SYSTEM
President James Madison delivered his annual message to the 14th Congress in
December 1815. He asked for legislation to create a new national bank, a tariff to protect American manufacturers, and congressional support for canals and roads.
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The American System
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CHRONOLOGY
1816
Congress charters a Second Bank of the United States and the
first avowedly protective tariff ◆ Dartmouth College v.
Woodward defines a private charter as a contract that cannot
be altered by a state legislature
1819
Controversy arises over Missouri’s admission to the Union as
a slave state ◆ Panic of 1819 marks the first failure of the
national market economy
1820
Missouri Compromise adopted
1823
Monroe Doctrine written by Secretary of State John Quincy
Adams
1824
Gibbons v. Ogden asserts federal control of interstate
commerce
1824–1825
Adams wins the presidency over Andrew Jackson ◆ Adams
appoints Henry Clay as secretary of state ◆ Jacksonians
charge a “Corrupt Bargain” between Adams and Clay
1827
Cherokees in Georgia declare themselves a republic
1828
Jackson defeats Adams for the presidency ◆ “Tariff of
Abominations” passed by Congress ◆ John C. Calhoun’s
Exposition and Protest presents doctrine of nullification
1830
Congress passes the Indian Removal Act
1832
Jackson reelected over Henry Clay ◆ Worcester v. Georgia
exempts the Cherokee from Georgia law ◆ Jackson vetoes
recharter of the Bank of the United States
1833
Force Bill and Tariff of 1833 end the nullification crisis
1834
Whig Party formed in opposition to Jacksonians
1836
Congress adopts “gag rule” to table antislavery petitions ◆
Van Buren elected president
1837
Financial panic ushers in a severe economic depression
1838
U.S. Army marches the remaining Cherokee to Indian
Territory
1840
Whig William Henry Harrison defeats Van Buren for
presidency
Congress agreed. Made up overwhelmingly of Jeffersonian Republicans and led by
the young southern and western nationalists who had favored the war, this
Congress reversed many of the positions taken by Jefferson’s old party. It chartered a national bank, enacted a protective tariff, and debated a national system of roads and canals at federal expense. Most prewar Republicans had viewed such programs
as heresy. But by 1815, the Republican majority in Congress accepted them as
orthodox and necessary. Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin explained: “The War has renewed and reinstated the national feelings which the Revolution had
given and which were daily lessened. The people have now more general objects
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