JACKSON
JACKSU:^
vetoed by the President. July 10, 1832, as a mo-
nopoly encouraging foreign investors who were
not taxed; excluding competition; and giving to
banks privileges denied to individuals; and the
people sustained the President. In the election
of 1832, Jackson received 687,502 popular and 219
electoral votes and Henry Clay 530,189 p<jpular
and 49 electoral votes. Pennsylvania gave her
30 electoral votes to William Wilkins and thus
Van Buren received 30 less than Jackson. Mas-
sachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Delaware,
Maryland and Kentucky voted for Clay. The
23d congress assembled, Dec. 3, 1832. In it was
the greatest array of statesmen who had filled
important stations, ever gathered in a single
congress in the history of the nation. The house
was Democratic, the senate Whig and the oppo-
sition of the President to the Bank of the United
States was the chief issue, and a financial panic,
accompanied by great commercial distress, fol-
lo%ved. In 1833 Secretary of State Livingston
was appointed U.S. minister to Prance and Louis
McLane of Delaware was appointed his successor
in the state department and William J. Duane
succeeded to the treasury portfolio. When Mr.
Taney's name came before the senate for confirm-
ation as secretary of the treasury, June 23, 1833,
in place of Mr. Duane, removed for refusing to
withdraw the deposits from the Bank of the
United States, it was promptly rejected by a vote
of thirty to fifteen, but the appointment of Ben-
jamin F. Butler of New York as attorney-general
was confirmed and Levi Woodbury was trans-
ferred from the navy department to the treasury,
and the navy department went to Mahlon Dick-
inson of New Jersey. The President appointed
Andrew Stevenson of Virginia, former speaker
of the liouse, U.S. minister to England, Mr.
Aaron Vail, the charge d'affaires, having per-
formed the duties of the office since Mr. Van
Buren's return in 1832, and when the senate re-
jected the nomination the President adhered to
his purpose till a senate was willing to confirm
tiie nomination in 1836. In 1835, when a vacancy
occurred in the bench of the U.S. supreme court,
Roger B. Taney was appointed, but the senate
refused to consider his name and when Chief-Jus-
tice Marshall died in 1835 the President appointed
Mr. Taney to the vacant seat, and the senate, now
Democratic, promptly confirmed the nomination.
Mr. Barry resigned his place as j)ostni;uster-gen-
eral on April 10, and Amos Kendall was ap-
pointed. On the return of Mr. Livingston from
France and the settlement of the French im-
broglio in 1836. General Cass was appointed U. S.
minister to France, and Benjamin F. Butler was
appointed secretary of war. at the same time
continuing to hold the attorney-generalship. In
1835 the last instalment of the national debt was
paid, and a banquet was given in Washington in
honor of the event. President Jackson attended
the funeral of Representative Warren R. Davis,
of Soutii Carolina, Jan. 30, 1835, the services
being held in the rotunda of the capitol. After
the services, when tiie President was descending
the east steps of the capitol on his way to his
caiTiage, leaning on the arm of Secretary of State
Forsyth, a lunatic named Lawrence snapped a
pistol at him. The cap exploded without dis-
charging the pistol, and Jackson with uplifted
cane advanced upon his assailant, who with his
left hand drew another i)istol and attemjited to
fire it, but the cap again failed to explode, and
the man was arrested and confined in an asylum.
In the excitement the President ciiarged the at-
tempt on his life to his political enemies, but he
apparently had no foundation for the charge. In
183G Vice-President Van Buren was elected
President, Richard M. Johnson Vice-President,
and James K. Polk was speaker of the 34th con-
gress, which would expire March 3. 1837. The
congress in both its branches was Democratic,
and during the first week of the session Colonel
Benton forced to a final vote his proposition,
made over two years before, to exjjunge from
the journal Mr. Clay's resolution of 1834 which
censured President Jackson for removing Secre-
tary Duane and the deposits. This liad been
made a party measure in several states, and on
March 16, 1837, after a debate for thirteen con-
secutive hours, the motion to expunge passed
the senate by a vote of 25 to 19. At the close of
his term as President, Andrew Jackson, then
seventy years of age, retired to the Hermitage
and followed the life of a planter, his adopted
son, with his wife and children, being members
of the household, and they kept up the old-time
hospitality for which the General was celebrated.
On Aug. 18, 1840. he sent a letter of protest to
the Nashville Union in answer to Henry Clay,
who in a speech at Nashville had charged Jack-
son with appointing Edward Livingston, '"a de-
faulter," secretary of state, and Samuel Swart-
wout collector of the port of New York, knowing
that he was an associate of Aaron Burr. Jackson
answered the charge by asserting that Clay voted
in the senate for the confirmation of Livingston,
and associated with Aaron Burr in Lexington,
Ky. Late in life he was received in the com-
munion of the Hermitage church, which had
been the religious home of his wife for many
years. He was elected a ruling elder of the
church, but declined the office, quoting the Bible
injunction, " Be not hasty in laying on of iiands,"
and adding, '• I am too young in the church for
such an office." Harvard college conferred on
him the honorary degree of LL.D. in 1S.'^3. and in
June, 1845, the New York Historical society of-
