On February 13, 1843, an aging Andrew Jackson wrote to his old comrade-in-arms William B. Lewis, seeking an appointment to the Naval Academy for fourteen-year-old son of friend. The youth's name was John Assure the secretary and the President, Old Hickory added grimly, he has not one drop of John Q. Adams blood in him. A year later Jackson received letter from well-meaning correspondent, urging him to make peace with gracious and good man John Q. Adams. The General would have none of it. After going over the old ground, all the way back to the alleged corrupt bargain of 1825, Jackson asked, what has John Q. Adams or Henry clay ever done for this countries [sic] good-nothing, but much mischief. Jackson had barely year to live, and Adams, upon learning of his death, described Jackson, among other things, as a murderer, and adulterer.1Contemporary observers and later historians have noted the painful contrast between the last years of Jackson and Adams and those of Thomas Jefferson and the first Biographers of the latter pair invariably dwell happily on their personal and political reconciliation, their fourteen-year correspondence in old age, and their joint expiration on July 4, 1826.2 Those who write of John Quincy Adams or Andrew Jackson must contend with the contrasting nasty relations between their respective heroes in their twilight years. No one has sought to explain the difference. Perhaps there is no explanation, other than the combative personalities of the participants. But the feud, if it may be called that, bears some re-examination.Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams belonged to the second generation of American political leaders. The first generation, that of Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, and the first Adams, we have been told many times, lived in an age of political passion. The future of the Republic was not assured; the legitimacy of partisanship was in doubt. Such was the intensity of feeling, Thomas Jefferson famously complained, that there were times in which men who had once been friends would cross the street to avoid meeting one another. However, once the Republic appeared to be firmly established, and the Washingtons, Jeffersons, Hamiltons, and John Adamses had passed from the scene, political opposition and organized partisanship came to be accepted. Not only were they no longer deemed threatening to republicanism, they were seen in fact by an increasing number of citizens as beneficial. While some opponents might still cross the street to avoid one another, others often enjoyed one another's company once the political combat of the day had ended and it was time for relaxation.3But Andrew Jackson and the second Adams persisted in seeing partisan politics in personal terms that can best be described as apocalyptic. For them, the passion that dominated the 1790s never died out. Perhaps the honor culture that some have found in the earliest years of the Republic somehow lived on in the lives of these two men. For Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams, especially the latter, the political indeed was always the personal.4As John William Ward demonstrated so brilliantly over generation ago, the personalities and backgrounds of John Quincy Adams of Massachusetts and Andrew Jackson of Tennessee seemed intended for contrast.5 One was the product of careful nurturing and seemingly unlimited opportunity, the erudite son of famous father from one of the oldest parts of the new nation, while the other was an orphaned undisciplined offshoot of the frontier who had made it largely on his own. As young man, John Quincy Adams headed for Europe and Harvard, while Andrew Jackson headed for the Appalachians and Nashville.Often overlooked, however, are the parallels. If Jefferson and the first Adams died in the same year, Jackson and the second Adams were born in the same year, 1767. Unlike their later contemporaries in politics (e. …
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Jun 1, 2003
Gerd Korman + 12
Open Access