On September 1, the American political season begins in earnest. In 2016, the Republican Party had the largest number of candidates to vie for the nomination of either party ever – 17. President Trump was the eventual nominee.
President Biden is a lock on the Democratic Party nomination in 2024. The Republican Party once again is fielding a growing number of candidates. At last count, ten Republicans have announced their candidacy. The frontrunner remains President Donald J. Trump. Only one American president has served in non-consecutive terms: Grover Cleveland – from 1884 to 1888 and again from 1892 to 1896. President Cleveland won the popular vote in 1888 but lost the electoral college. Only six presidents have actually tried becoming president after leaving office. They include Martin Van Buren, Millard Fillmore, Ulysses S. Grant: Grover Cleveland, Theodore Roosevelt, and Herbert Hoover. Only Grover Cleveland made it back to the presidency.
Historians have graded Grover Cleveland as an average president. On the other hand, Andrew Jackson has an above-average label. Jackson lost his first bid for the presidency in 1824, despite winning both the popular vote and the electoral vote plurality. He lost to John Quincy Adams in what Jackson’s supporters called a “corrupt bargain” between Adams and Henry Clay. Jackson beat Adams in a landslide in 1828.
Jackson proved to be one of America’s greatest presidents. He was the only president thus far who has actually balanced America’s budget. This is one of his many accomplishments. Florida and Texas became part of the United States because of Andrew Jackson. He is also known for weeding out corruption. He initiated investigations into all executive departments when elected in 1828. He fired ten percent of Federal bureaucrats in what has become known as the “Tenure of Office Act.” He saved the Navy millions of dollars in today’s terms by reducing overspending. He was a rough and tumble President who got things done. He was not afraid of tangling with anyone. He took on America’s elites who were running what Jackson described as the fourth branch of the government – the Second Bank of the United States. He was dubbed “King Andrew the First” by his opponents. He nearly sent troops down to South Carolina when they tried to secede from the Union. He lived in a very polarized age, when slavery was rampant and the American Indian still lived on great swaths of land throughout America.
He got into a spat with France over money owed to the United States. Despite the French being so angered by Jackson that they sent their naval fleet to threaten America, Jackson got them to pay their debt. President Andrew Jackson was a leader. He may have been bitterly disliked by many (he was the first president to experience an assassination attempt) and reviled by the press, but he was respected by a majority of Americans and foreign leaders.
The United States needs Andrew Jackson now more than ever.
Joseph M. Frager is a physician and lifelong activist.
