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On the 4th of March, 1829, in the presence of the Senate, the members of the House of Representatives and a vast concourse of people, General Andrew Jackson took the oath of office and entered upon the administration of the government of the United States.

A long train of fortunate events had prepared his way for a happy and prosperous career in his new character as a Civil Magistrate. His military success at a peculiar crisis had given him a strong claim upon the country, and the energy, decision and self-devotion manifested in various trying emergencies had obtained for him a large share of the public confidence.

Nor was the aspect of the political atmosphere less propitious. The administration of his predecessor had been arrested by the popular will in the midst of its career, before the merits or demerits of its policy had been fully tested, and with so decided an expression of public feeling against its continuance, as to leave its members no ability and appa-. rently little inclination to offer an early opposition to the new Executive. The community was tired of political warfare, and a general disposition was evinced to give the measures of the administration a fair trial. Some uncertainty of course existed as to the policy which the new President

might feel bound to adopt. His political experience had not been great, and the inferences which the public had drawn as to his principles from his declarations and votes when in the federal Senate, had been rendered somewhat uncertain by the contradictory assertions made by his supporters in different sections of the Union and by the decided political character of that portion of his adherents, who had been ranked in the previous contest among the friends of the late Secretary of the Treasury (Mr Crawford). That class of public men was regarded as contending for a strict, or what was denominated a narrow, construction of the Federal Constitution, and their support was given to him upon principles of opposition to the policy that governed the administration of Mr Monroe. All the other candidates in that contest were sustained upon a contrary principle.

The con

struction given to the Federal Constitution, by which Congress was deemed to be empowered to protect domestic manufactures, to appropriate moneys for works of internal improvement, to create an United States Bank, and generally to regulate and control all affairs strictly national, had become the settled policy of the country. Strong objections were still urged to this construction, by the Representatives from the Southern States, and by some of the leading friends of Mr Crawford in other sections of the Union. But it had been too long and too generally acquiesced in to permit the hope of a successful appeal to public opinion in behalf of can

didates offered upon principles of opposition to that construction. All the candidates consequently were understood to be in favor of that construction. Mr Calhoun was an early and ardent advocate of that principle, and had efficiently contributed when in Congress and also while in the Cabinet to the adoption of the principal measures, which had provoked the hostility of those who contended for a literal construction of the Constitution. Mr Clay had long been distinguished as the eloquent and uncompromising supporter of the American System, a system whose characteristic features were the protection of domestic industry and a liberal application of the public treasure to purposes of internal improvement. Mr Adams at an early period of his political life had manifested his attachment to the cause of internal improvement, and he made no secret of his opinions concerning the powers of Congress in all matters of national concern.General Jackson had not occupied so conspicuous a station in political life; but while in the United States Senate he had been no less decided in his opinions on the long disputed question as to the constructive powers of Congress. During his short term of service the following bills providing for internal improvement came under consideration: 1st. A Bill authorizing a road from Memphis in Tennessee to Little Rock in Arkansas. 2d. A Bill for making certain roads in Florida. 3d. A Bill to procure necessary surveys for roads and canals. 4th. A Bill to improve the navigation of the Mis

sissippi, Ohio and Missouri. 5th. A Bill for making a road in Missouri. 6th. A Bill to subscribe to the stock in the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal Company. 7th. A Bill to extend the Cumberland road to Zanesville. 8th. A Bill authorizing a subscription to the Portland and Louisville Canal Company. On the passage of all these bills, General Jackson's name was recorded in the affirmative; and his vote in favor of the tariff of 1824, a tariff which was founded on the principle of protection, afforded sufficient evidence that his opinions accorded rather with those of Mr Adams, Clay and Calhoun, than with those of the supporters of Mr Crawford.

In the presidential contest of 1824, therefore, the friends of the Secretary of the Treasury stood alone in the attitude of opposition to the established policy of the country. The supporters of the other candidates indeed had their personal preferences, but in point of principle there was no essential difference between them. At an early period of the canvass the Secretary of War (Mr Calhoun) was withdrawn by his friends in Pennsylvania, who, yielding to the popular feeling of the State, fell in to the support of General Jackson. This example was followed by his adherents throughout the Union with some few exceptions, and they mainly contributed to the sudden and rapid augmentation of the strength of General Jackson during that canvass.

In this transfer of support, however, no sacrifice of principle was supposed to have been made. It

was merely relinquishing a personal preference under the pressure of circumstances, and the election of General Jackson, equally with that of Mr Adams, would then have been regarded as a pledge to the country of the continuance of the policy of the preceding administration. Mr Clay's principles were similar; but from the ardor of his character, his fearless disregard of consequences and his avowed opinions in behalf of the American System, and on the subject of South American independence, apprehensions were entertained that he would not sacrifice enough to expediency, but would follow those opinions out to their legitimate consequences. Hence it was obvious that no sacrifice of principle was involved in the support, indifferently, of any of these candidates who stood on a common ground of policy. Mr Crawford alone was supported upon opposite principles, and as it was manifest that in such a contest his weakness would be evinced, an attempt was made to represent him as the only orthodox republican candidate, and to nominate him as such to the suffrages of the nation through a caucus of the members of Congress assembled at Washington. The attempt totally failed. It was regarded by a great majority of the people as an unauthorized interference with their constitutional privileges, and it terminated in the caucus candidate's being brought by the votes of Virginia and Georgia and a few scattered votes from New York and Delaware, into the House of Representatives as the

lowest of the three candidates, from which the President was to be chosen. Here the choice fell upon Mr Adams, and from the moment of his election the partisans of the unsuccessful candidates united in opposition, either avowed or secret, to his administration. Those who had originally advocated the claims of General Jackson found a sufficient motive to opposition in the defeat of their favorite, whose election they asserted was demanded by the people. That reason however could not be urged by the friends of the caucus candidate, who had been zealously sustained to the last, in spite of ill health, although the result in the electoral colleges had demonstrated that he had but a slight hold upon the public favor. Indeed the entire failure of this party in their election plainly indicated the unpopularity of its political creed, and at the commencement of Mr Adams' administration it held itself aloof and apparently uncommitted as to its future course. The candidate who was boldly taken up as the opposition candidate, had evinced as latitudinarian sentiments concerning the powers of Congress as his successful rival, and to come in to his support would be to abjure those political doctrines which were deemed so essential to the independence of the States.

The political principles of the party already organized, therefore, were as heterodox as those of the existing Cabinet, and any combination which might take place must be founded upon the sacrifice of principle by one of the

sections of the opposition. This discordance in its materials prevented any harmonious concert of action at the first session of the nineteenth Congress; but during the vacation and the succeeding session, great efforts were made to promote a closer union between the different sections of the opposition, and before the adjournment it had assumed a consistent shape. The first public intimation of this union was given by a leading opposition member from Virginia, who shortly before the close of the second session of the 19th Congress, announced, that the combinations for effecting the election of General Jackson were nearly completed. Shortly before this public declaration, an intimation almost equally distinct of future opposition, was given by one of the most prominent leaders of the caucus party in a letter to the Legislature of New York, expressing his acknowledgments for his re-election to the federal Senate. In this letter he promises zealously to exert himself to protect the remaining rights reserved to the States and to restore those of which they had been divested by construction.

Other indications, which could not be mistaken, were given of the intention of the caucus party to join the opposition, and that one of the main grounds of opposition would be, that certain powers which the Federal Government had habitually exercised were unauthorized by the Constitution and that they ought no longer to be submitted to. It had been a favorite doctrine of the Virginia

school of politics, that the powers of the General Government had been extended beyond their constitutional limits, and the dispute between the federal authorities and those of Georgia in relation to the Creek treaty, had rendered it convenient for that State to contend most earnestly for the same construction of the Constitution. A most intimate connexion had been cultivated between the politicians of this school and the leading supporters of Mr Crawford in New York, who inclined to the same construction of the Constitution, and who were not much behind their southern coadjutors in declaring their determination to favor the election of General Jackson. This determination of the opposition to combine in his support, induced much speculation as to the nature of the pledges, which were said to have been given as to his political course, and it was boldly predicted, that an opposition so constituted, could not continue united after the government should fall into its hands, without a complete sacrifice of principle by one of the sections of the combined party.

The President would of course be compelled to adopt the literal construction of the Constitution or to pursue the policy marked out by his predecessors. During the pendency of the election, the public might be left in doubt. Such as were inclined to promote his elevation in the North and West could justify their preference, by appealing to his votes when in the Senate in favor of the Tariff and Internal improvement; while his supporters in the South

could be equally zealous, either relying upon a more intimate acquaintance with his opinions, or upon those measures which his character as a candidate, sustained upon the principle of reform, should compel him to adopt in case of success. But after his inauguration he must decide between these conflicting pretensions, and this decision would compel those to whom that decision should prove unpalatable to decide in their turn between the abandonment of their political party or their principles. This very position properly viewed was but another of the fortunate circumstances in which the successful competitor for the Chief Magistracy found himself placed at the time of his elevation. Chosen by an unparalleled majority of the electoral votes, he owed his success to his own popularity. Generally sanctioning the policy under which our national institutions had been built up, he was at liberty to review his opinions and to establish them upon incontrovertible and immutable grounds. His administration was not bound to persist in any particular measures which experience had proved to be inexpedient; but claiming as it did to be constituted upon the basis of reform, it was able to modify the existing policy, and to carry out its principles under all the advantages offered by the lights of experience and the development of public opinion. Equally uncommitted was he respecting the parties, which had formerly distracted the country. His advice to Mr Monroe in 1816 to