Lecture. Im chief historian at the u. S. Capitol historical society. Welcome. Im really pleased today to introduce you if you dont already know jeanne and david heidler. Theyve been speakers here before for their book on George Washingtons circle and today were really honored that were one day in to the official existence of their latest book on Andrew Jackson, the rise of drew jackson was released yesterday. So were at the threshold of greatness here with the book. I hope you all consider buying. Theyll be available afterwards to sign it for anyone interested and i want to point out their previous book was washington circle. Were selling discounted copies back there. Im told that the hard cover that were selling is five cents more than amazons soft cover so that sounds like a winwin. I hope youll have some Great Questions for jeanne and david. This is a hot topic. I assume some of you are familiar faces but some of you might have been drawn specifically because of Andrew Jackson who has been in the news lately. So lets hear about why, how hes a template for maybe modern politics and you will be taking q a afterwards so think of Great Questions. Ive got a couple. With that, ill ask you to help me welcome jeanne and david. Thank you. [applause] david got it working. Good. Hello, everyone. Chu for that gracious introduction and the boost on the book that just came out yesterday. Can everyone hear me all right . Good. Ill try to keep up the volume here and so that we dont have any problems with that. It is delightful to be back here again. Several years have passed and we see some familiar faces and have met some new friends. Today we would like to talk to you about the central aspect that drove the campaign for 1828 in the wake of the one for 1824, which was the charge of the corrupt bargain. And to ask the question, how corrupt was it. And thats where we get into this business of smear or truth. Part of this is the natural aftermath of an election which is always a time of mixed emotions and contrasting moods. You have the elation of the victors and the disappointment of the defeated and these balance each other after a fashion which leads to a better perspective on the event and the future and gives proportion, a sense of proportion. The first shock of defeat will subside and elation over victory becomes relief over having attained it. From this, theres an equilibrium if everything works right, which is necessary for sound governance. In the best case, the victor is never completely vindicated and the defeated is never completely demolished. A healthy political system preserves the adversarial role as a way to check curve and discourage over we weaning with our and at the same time the extremes of failure and success must be avoided because if they persist, there lies the path to irreconcilable differences and the heedless exercise of power and the reckless form of resistance. Fundamental to avoiding all of this is a general belief that good faith is operating as a given in the election and its aftermath. Imagine, then, the chaos that is likely to ensue if the defeated emerging from the election convinced that they have been cheated, that the process itself was manipulated in bad faith and that the result is illegitimate, that the beneficiaries of it are shallow huksters at best, and evil at worst. Subverting the peoples will, destroying the democratic idea for the venal gain of power. That would be bad enough. But imagine if the losers did not really believe this but were willing to act as if they did, that they were intent upon convincing as many people as possible that the things they know to be lies are the truth. The damage of such an effort, even if unsuccessful, could be incalculable. If its successful its certainly to be devastating and it is that situation that can be broadly categorized as a smear. A smear is a deliberate fabrication at worst or at least a willful twisting of the truth to sully the reputation of the target. Strictly speaking, the truth cannot be a smear. The purpose of it in politics is as a scheme to achieve advantage over an opponent outside of traditional means such as debate over issues of policies or contrasting differences which are presented either in person or through pertinent issues being explored in writing. Candidates and entities resort to the smear because they wish to distract from something. They wish to change the subject. It could be from their own personal failings or foibles or their own records, either in personal matters where they behaved questionably or past political stances that were or have become unpopular. In short, distraction is the operative function of a smear. For a candidate with nearly unassailable credibility, it is an easy way to damage an opponent and this is where it becomes especially dangerous. Credibility comes from popularity. A sterling deed, an inspiring life story or even a sense of identification with people that creates a bond for even essentially ephemeral reasons it is nonetheless in parts authority. The fallacy of arguing from authority is only matched by the ease of doing so. It is to say that you should believe me because of who i am, discounting the need for evidence or even dismissing contradictory evidence as irrelevant. Jeanne hello. At the heart of our story today is the constitutional role of the house of representatives in deciding a president ial election such as the one in 1824 an election where no candidate received a majority in the Electoral College. This had only happened once before, the election of 18 helped, when Thomas Jefferson tied with his Vice President ial running mate, aaron burr. It is somewhat odd that it hadnt happened more than one time before because the framers of the constitution actually envisioned it happening pretty frequently. They thought that because they believed that favorite sons from the various states would run in each of the quadrennial elections and as a result there would be no majority in the Electoral College. That would throw it into the house of representatives. They chose the house because it is considered the peoples house. The frequency of the elections of course, make it more responsive to the will of the people. This was the mechanism envisioned. Now, if someone did receive a majority in the Electoral College originally, that person would become the president. The person who came in second would become the Vice President but that election of 1800 obviously illustrated that that wasnt practical and so the changes brought on by the 12th amendment to the constitution resulted. In that 12th amendment it provided for separate elections for president and Vice President and in the event that there was not a majority, the top three candidates would then go before the house. The house would vote by states. Each state having one vote. The rationale for that was the same as for the Electoral College. It was to prevent the larger states from dominating the elections. A simple majority in the house would then provide the victor. The physical process of the voting and how it was achieved, how it was counted thats kind of a story for another day. What is pertinent for us today are the 1824 Election Results. There were simply too many candidates. By the time they got to the election in the fall, there were four. Secretary of state John Quincy Adams of massachusetts secretary of the treasury william h. Crawford of georgia, speaker of the house henry clay of kentucky and senator Andrew Jackson of tennessee. The abundance of candidates assured that no one would going to receive a majority in the Electoral College and that was apparent by the late fall of 1824. Accordingly, the 12th amendment kicked in. The top three in the Electoral College vote were jackson, adams and crawford. These would be the candidates before the house of representatives. David we do a tag team thing here, you know. Like in wrestling. Jackson men insisted that jacksons plurality in the popular and electoral votes was a decisive factor in determining the outcome of the house election. In a letter to john overton on december 19, 1824, jackson referred to himself as, quote having been supported by the majority of the people, which wasnt the case. But jackson correctly assumed this wasnt the time for subtly. So with certitude and tenacity, the message was hammered home. Jackson had won the election because of the popular vote, he had won the election because of the plurality in the Electoral College and it was incumbent on the house to endorse these conclusions out of a basic fairness. It was the only way, said the jacksonnites to truly represent the will of the people. Jacksons managers assiduously tried to elevate the relevance of these numbers and its easy to see why. As expected, jackson came in first in the Electoral College with 99 votes but far short of the 131 majority necessary for victory. But it was jacksons significant lead in the popular vote that animated his supporters. 18 of 24 states in 1824 chose the electors by popular vote. Jackson had more than 40,000 votes than his closest competitor, John Quincy Adams and more than 110,000 votes than william h. Crawford, the third place finisher. Lost in the comparison of these figures, however is a reality that not one of these numbers really matters. Only the electoral counts of jacksons 99, adams 84, and crawfords 41, are pertinent to the constitutional prescriptions for referring these men to the question before the house of representatives. The flawed logic in the appeal of the popular vote is made evident by scrutinizing the case of henry clay, who had beaten crawford in the popular vote by more than 6,000. But crawford had won louisiana thanks to some skullduggery on the part of the adams and jackson camps in the legislature. Louisiana chose the electors. And as a result, crawford came in first by winning louisiana and as a result became one of the three candidates who was going to go before the house. This fairly clearly shows that comparing the apple of popular votes to the orange of electoral ones was, in short, a pointless exercise. Because of the complicated nature of this question, which im sure you will all agree is fairly complicated at this point, it would prove a highly effective way of manipulating public opinion. Consequently, the pressure to influence house members with these spurious claims was spence and persistent. The house would not take up the question until february 29 9, 1825, which gave not only the supporters of jackson but also those of adams and crawford to cobble together the simple majority in the house necessary for victory. They also courted one another with promises, seeking pledges of support operatives moving between the operatives of the other two, bending the truth and lying when truthfulness didnt seem to work. The Practical Applications of all of this become evident as a result of what happened in january of 1825. Henry clay, speaker of the house, was strongly inclined to support John Quincy Adams as soon as clay knew he lost the election and he knew it in the fall. He knew it before louisiana. He was deducing that he was not going to go before the house of representatives. As he became aware of that, he only wanted to make certain that adams was supportive of his program, of the clay program for national improvement, before throwing his support to him. To that end, he had an extended interview with adams on the night of january 9 1825. It is possibly one of the most pivotal events in american political history. The details of the meeting are theyve never been made clear. Adams usually recorded things volumeenously and completely in his diary. He does not for this. What is clear is that the results of the meeting were to be devastating to the reputations of both of these men because clay was going to use his enormous influence after this as speaker of the house in the cause of John Quincy Adams. Jeanne there were certainly problems with this meeting. Its context was unfortunate for it took place in the midst of a whirl of proposed deals by all the parties concerned including the jacksonnites. Let me read a couple of passages from our book to illustrate how some of this deal making was going on. Ohio congressman john sloan found himself fitting across a dinner table from sam houston an important jackson operative who mused between bites that ohio would surely go for jackson in the house vote. Sloan was an experienced politician in his mid 40s, a jeffersonian who had preferred clay. His response to houston was measured. He had not spoken to the others of his delegation, he said, guardedly. Sloan believed houston looked anxious as he spoke about what a splendid administration it would make with old hickory as president and mr. Clay as secretary of state. Later, as houston bade sloan farewell he made doubly sure his offer had not been misunderstood. Well i hope you from ohio will aid us in electing general jackson, sloan recalls him saying with a winking repeat of the proposed deal, and then your man, meaning mr. Clay, can have anything he pleases. And then there was the case of daniel cook of illinois. Old hickorys men heard the distressing news that the young illinois congressman, daniel p. Cook intended to vote for adams. At 30 years of age and in frail health he suddenly found himself at the center of an unsettling effort to influence his vote. Illinois was a relatively new state and its small population granted only one representatives representatives representative but since each state had only one vote in the house election, dan cook by himself was as important as all of new york or pennsylvania. Illinois had mostly gone for jackson and old hickorys men forcefully demanded that those general Election Results do more than guide cook in the house vote. He should accept them as the verdict of the people or else. Pennsylvania, jackson man samuel ingham, took this tack with cook. A rumored alliance with adams and clay would be unpopular, he muttered darkly to cook, and it would hurt cooks career to join it. Ingham watched the young man absorb this threat and saw someone not at all weighing his options to cut his losses. Ingham accordingly, switched his mood and smiled benevolently. Cook said ingham could be territorial governor of arkansas if his vote helped Andrew Jackson become president. For daniel p. Cook the offer of the whole world was insufficient to purchase his vote at the cost of his integrity. But arkansas . Ingham knew when to drop it. Now, henry clay was courted by the jackson and crawford men, as well. And the murkiness of these overtures encouraged significant misunderstandings at the time and massive ones later. Clay enjoyed the attention and prolonged it which was unwise. It would be unfortunately easy to conclude in this setting that clay, in meeting with adams, was arrange egg quid arranging a quid pro quo for his support. As the february 1825 vote approached, expectations were high on all sides and there was also a lot of discussion about how should the house consider the candidates. Clearly, the intention of the constitution was to have it act independently of all general Election Results. What, after all, did the framers of the constitution intend . If the house were merely to ratify an Electoral College plurality, why have the house vote at all . An Electoral College plurality would be sufficient to select a winner, if that was the case. But that was explicitly not the case per the constitution. Rather the top three finishers in the Electoral College came before the house equally entitled with none favored over the others by any previous election result. The constitution clearly meant for the house to start its considerations from scratch and then the vote was held. John quincy adams won on the first ballot. Now, there are enormously complicated reasons why this happened and we wont talk about them today but we need only be aware that adams was elected on the first ballot to everyones surprise, mostly to the jacksonnites. Jackson favorite was magnanimous which strikes us at first as an act. Then the very night after the vote jackson and adams came facetoface. Again, from the book. The monroes held their weekly reception and while everyone seemed drained by the experience, they were also grateful that despite the angry talk, broad recriminations and a grinding apprehension, the election in the end had been decided with a calm dignity. The president s gathering was not festive but it was uneventful, which was pleasant for people weary of events. A Kindred Spirit pervaded the whole scene the National Intelligencer reported. The friends of the different candidates mingled together and conversed with a good humor and frankness contrasted with the virulence and malignity which in parts of the country had attended the discussion of this question. President elect John Quincy Adams stood in the center of the room in the midst of a press of people offering congratulations. He received them with a drawn smile and stiff bows. He felt another press of people behind him and turned just as Andrew Jackson turned to face him. The president s reception fell silent. Guests suddenly became conscious of the cramped space and instinctively backed away from the two men to create a small empty circle with them at its center. The last bit of stray laughter and murmuring voices went quiet in the corners of the room. Adams looked up at the gaunt face. Andrew jackson bowed low. He extended his hand. Adams took it. The bow at the reception that seemed promising, as did the handshake. But jackson was actually seething and then the announcement came that John Quincy Adams had named henry clay as his secretary of state. This set off the explosion. Jackson wrote to a friend,