1824 United States presidential election

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1824 United States presidential election

← 1820 October 26 – December 1, 1824 1828 →

All 261 electoral votes of the Electoral College
131 electoral votes needed to win
Turnout 26.9%[1] Increase 16.8 pp
  x200px Andrew Jackson.jpg
Nominee John Quincy Adams Andrew Jackson
Party Democratic-Republican Democratic-Republican
Home state Massachusetts Tennessee
Running mate John C. Calhoun John C. Calhoun
Electoral vote 84 99
States carried 7 (13 in HR) 11 (7 in HR)
Popular vote 113,122[lower-alpha 1] 151,271[lower-alpha 1]
Percentage 30.9% 41.4%

  x200px Henry Clay.JPG
Nominee William H. Crawford Henry Clay
Party Democratic-Republican Democratic-Republican
Home state Georgia Kentucky
Running mate Nathaniel Macon Nathan Sanford
Electoral vote 41 37
States carried 3 (4 in HR) 3
Popular vote 40,856[lower-alpha 1] 47,531[lower-alpha 1]
Percentage 11.2% 13.0%

Template:1824 United States presidential election imagemap
Presidential election results map. Blue denotes states won by Jackson, orange denotes those won by Crawford, green denotes those won by Adams, light yellow denotes those won by Clay. Numbers indicate the number of electoral votes allotted to each state.

300px
House of Representatives votes by state. States in orange voted for Crawford, states in green for Adams, states in blue for Jackson.

President before election

James Monroe
Democratic-Republican

Elected President

John Quincy Adams
Democratic-Republican

The 1824 United States presidential election was the tenth quadrennial presidential election. It was held from Tuesday, October 26 to Wednesday, December 1, 1824. No candidate won a majority of the electoral vote, becoming the only election to require a contingent election in the House of Representatives under the provisions of the 12th Amendment. On February 9, 1825, the House chose John Quincy Adams as president. It was the first election in which the winner did not achieve at least a plurality of the national popular vote.

The Democratic-Republican Party had won six consecutive presidential elections and was the only national political party. The Congressional caucus nominated Treasury Secretary William H. Crawford for president. Senator Andrew Jackson, House Speaker Henry Clay, and Secretary of State Adams all joined Crawford in seeking the presidency, highlighting factionalism within the party and an end to the Era of Good Feelings. A fifth candidate, John C. Calhoun, withdrew, instead choosing to run for vice president.

Adams won New England, Jackson and Adams split the mid-Atlantic states, Jackson and Clay split the Western states, and Jackson and Crawford split the Southern states. Jackson finished with a plurality of the electoral and popular vote, while the other three candidates each finished with a significant share of the votes. Calhoun became the de facto running mate of Adams and Jackson and as such was elected with a comfortable majority of the vice presidential vote in the Electoral College on 1 December 1824. Clay, who was not a top three finisher, was constitutionally eliminated. Influential within the contingent election, Clay threw his support behind Adams, who shared many of his positions on the major issues. With Clay's backing, Adams won the contingent election on the first ballot.

Background

The Era of Good Feelings associated with the administration of President James Monroe was a time of reduced emphasis on political party identity.[2] With the Federalists discredited, Democratic-Republicans adopted some key Federalist economic programs and institutions.[3][4] The economic nationalism of the Era of Good Feelings that would authorize the Tariff of 1816 and incorporate the Second Bank of the United States portended abandonment of the Jeffersonian political formula for strict construction of the Constitution, limited central government, and primacy of Southern agrarian interests.[5][6][7]

An unintended consequence of wide single-party identification was reduced party discipline. Rather than political harmony, factions arose within the party.[8] Monroe attempted to improve discipline by appointing leading statesmen to his Cabinet, including Secretary of State John Quincy Adams of Massachusetts, Secretary of the Treasury William H. Crawford of Georgia, and Secretary of War John C. Calhoun of South Carolina. General Andrew Jackson of Tennessee led high-profile military missions. Only House Speaker Henry Clay of Kentucky held political power independent of Monroe. He refused to join the cabinet and remained critical of the administration.

Two key events, the Panic of 1819 and the Missouri crisis of 1820, influenced and reshaped politics.[9] The economic downturn broadly harmed workers, the sectional disputes over slavery expansion raised tensions, and both events plus other factors drove demand for increased democratic control.[10] Social disaffection would help motivate revival of rivalrous political parties in the near future, though these had not yet formed at the time of the 1824 election.[11]

Nomination process

The previous competition between the Federalist Party and the Democratic-Republican Party collapsed after the War of 1812 due to the disintegration of the Federalists's popular appeal. President James Monroe of the Democratic-Republicans was able to run without opposition in the election of 1820. Like previous presidents who had been elected to two terms, Monroe declined to seek re-nomination for a third term.[12] Vice President Daniel D. Tompkins was considered unelectable due to his overwhelming unpopularity and major health problems. The presidential nomination was thus left wide open within the Democratic-Republican Party, the only major national political entity remaining in the United States.

Congressional caucus balloting
Presidential candidate Ballot Vice Presidential candidate Ballot
William H. Crawford 64 Albert Gallatin 57
Henry Clay 2 Erastus Root 2
John Quincy Adams 2 John Quincy Adams 1
Andrew Jackson 1 William Eustis 1
William Rufus King 1
William Lowndes 1
Richard Rush 1
Samuel Smith 1
John Tod 1

The Congressional caucus nominated Crawford for president and Albert Gallatin for vice president, but it was sparsely attended and was widely attacked as undemocratic. Gallatin had not sought the nomination and soon withdrew at Crawford's request. Gallatin was also dissatisfied with repeated attacks on his credibility made by the other candidates. He was replaced by North Carolina Senator Nathaniel Macon. State legislatures also convened state caucuses to nominate candidates.[13]

General election

File:PresidentialCounty1824Colorbrewer.png
Results by county explicitly indicating the percentage of the winning candidate in each county. Shades of blue are for Jackson (Democratic-Republican), shades of red are for Adams (Democratic-Republican), shades of yellow are for Clay (Democratic-Republican), and shades of green are for Crawford (Democratic-Republican).

Candidates who withdrew before election

Candidates

All four candidates were nominated by at least one state legislature.[14] Andrew Jackson was recruited to run for the office of the president by the state legislature of Tennessee. Jackson did not seek the task of running for president. Instead, he wished to retire to his estate on the outskirts of Nashville called the Hermitage. However, Jackson was not one to decline such a request.[15][better source needed]

Campaign

Candidates drew voter support by different states and sections. Adams dominated the popular vote in New England and won some support elsewhere, Clay dominated his home state of Kentucky and won pluralities in two neighboring states, and Crawford won the Virginia vote overwhelmingly and polled well in North Carolina. Jackson had geographically the broadest support, though there were heavy vote concentrations in his home state of Tennessee and in Pennsylvania and populous areas where even he ran poorly.

Policy played a reduced role in the election, though positions on tariffs and internal improvements did create significant disagreements. Both Adams and Jackson supporters backed Secretary of War John C. Calhoun of South Carolina for vice president. He easily secured the majority of electoral votes for that office. In reality, Calhoun was vehemently opposed to nearly all of Adams's policies, but he did nothing to dissuade Adams supporters from voting for him for vice president.

The campaigning for presidential election of 1824 took many forms. Contrafacta, or well known songs and tunes whose lyrics have been altered, were used to promote political agendas and presidential candidates. Below can be found a sound clip featuring "Hunters of Kentucky", a tune written by Samuel Woodsworth in 1815 under the title "The Unfortunate Miss Bailey". Contrafacta such as this one, which promoted Andrew Jackson as a national hero, have been a long-standing tradition in presidential elections. Another form of campaigning during this election was through newsprint. Political cartoons and partisan writings were best circulated among the voting public through newspapers. Presidential candidate John C. Calhoun was one of the candidates most directly involved through his participation in the publishing of the newspaper The Patriot as a member of the editorial staff. This was a sure way to promote his own political agendas and campaign. In contrast, most candidates involved in early 19th century elections did not run their own political campaigns. Instead it was left to volunteer citizens and partisans to speak on their behalf.[16][17][18][19]

Results

The 1824 presidential election marked the final collapse of the Republican-Federalist political framework. The electoral map confirmed the candidates' sectional support, with Adams winning in New England, Jackson having wide voter appeal, Clay attracting votes from the West, and Crawford attracting votes from the eastern South. Jackson earned only a plurality of electoral votes. Thus, the election was decided by the House of Representatives. John C. Calhoun, supported by Adams and Jackson, easily won the vice presidency.

Presidential Candidate Party Home State Popular Vote[lower-alpha 1] Electoral Vote
Count Percentage
Andrew Jackson[lower-alpha 2] Democratic-Republican Tennessee 151,271 41.36% 99
John Quincy Adams[lower-alpha 3] Democratic-Republican Massachusetts 113,122 30.92% 84
William Harris Crawford[lower-alpha 4] Democratic-Republican Georgia 40,856 11.21% 41
Henry Clay[lower-alpha 5] Democratic-Republican Kentucky 47,531 12.99% 37
Unpledged electors None Massachusetts 6,616 1.81% 0
Other 6,437 1.71% 0
Total 365,833 100.0% 261
Needed to win 131
Vice Presidential Candidate Party State Electoral Vote[21]
John C. Calhoun Democratic-Republican South Carolina 182
Nathan Sanford Democratic-Republican New York 30
Nathaniel Macon Democratic-Republican North Carolina 24
Andrew Jackson Democratic-Republican Tennessee 13
Martin Van Buren Democratic-Republican New York 9
Henry Clay Democratic-Republican Kentucky 2
Total 260
Needed to win 131

Results by state

Andrew Jackson
Democratic-Republican
John Quincy Adams
Democratic-Republican
Henry Clay
Democratic-Republican
William Crawford
Democratic-Republican
State total
State electoral
votes
#  % electoral
votes
#  % electoral
votes
#  % electoral
votes
#  % electoral
votes
#
Alabama 5 9,429 69.32 5 2,422 17.80 0 96 0.71 0 1,656 12.17 0 13,423 AL
Connecticut 8 no ballots 0 7,494 70.39 8 no ballots 0 1,965 18.46 0 10,647 CT
Delaware 3 no popular vote 0 no popular vote 1 no popular vote 0 no popular vote 2 DE
Georgia 9 no popular vote 0 no popular vote 0 no popular vote 0 no popular vote 9 GA
Illinois 3 1,272 27.23 2 1,516 32.46 1 1,036 22.18 0 847 18.13 0 4,671 IL
Indiana 5 7,343 46.61 5 3,095 19.65 0 5,315 33.74 0 no ballots 0 15,753 IN
Kentucky 14 6,356 27.23 0 no ballots 0 16,982 72.77 14 no ballots 0 23,338 KY
Louisiana 5 no popular vote 3 no popular vote 2 no popular vote 0 no popular vote 0 LA
Maine 9 no ballots 0 10,289 81.50 9 no ballots 0 2,336 18.50 0 12,625 ME
Maryland 11 14,523 43.73 7 14,632 44.05 3 695 2.09 0 3,364 10.13 1 33,214 MD
Massachusetts 15 no ballots 0 30,687 72.97 15 no ballots 0 no ballots 0 42,056 MA
Mississippi 3 3,121 63.77 3 1,654 33.80 0 no ballots 0 119 2.43 0 4,894 MS
Missouri 3 1,166 33.97 0 159 4.63 0 2,042 59.50 3 32 0.93 0 3,273 MO
New Hampshire 8 no ballots 0 9,389 93.59 8 no ballots 0 643 6.41 0 10,032 NH
New Jersey 8 10,332 52.08 8 8,309 41.89 0 no ballots 0 1,196 6.03 0 19,837 NJ
New York 36 no popular vote 1 no popular vote 26 no popular vote 4 no popular vote 5 NY
North Carolina 15 20,231 56.03 15 no ballots 0 no ballots 0 15,622 43.26 0 36,109 NC
Ohio 16 18,489 36.96 0 12,280 24.55 0 19,255 38.49 16 no ballots 0 50,024 OH
Pennsylvania 28 35,929 76.04 28 5,436 11.50 0 1,705 3.61 0 4,182 8.85 0 47,252 PA
Rhode Island 4 no ballots 0 2,145 91.47 4 no ballots 0 200 8.53 0 2,345 RI
South Carolina 11 no popular vote 11 no popular vote 0 no popular vote 0 no popular vote 0 SC
Tennessee 11 20,197 97.45 11 216 1.04 0 no ballots 0 312 1.51 0 20,725 TN
Vermont 7 no popular vote 0 no popular vote 7 no popular vote 0 no popular vote 0 VT
Virginia 24 2,975 19.35 0 3,419 22.24 0 419 2.73 0 8,558 55.68 24 15,371 VA
TOTALS: 261 151,363 41.36 99 113,142 30.92 84 47,545 12.99 37 41,032 11.21 41 365,928 US
TO WIN: 131

Breakdown by ticket

Electoral votes for President
Total Andrew
Jackson
John Q.
Adams
William H.
Crawford
Henry
Clay
John C. Calhoun 182 99 74 2 7
Nathan Sanford 30 2 28
Nathaniel Macon 24 24
Andrew Jackson 13 9 1 3
Martin Van Buren 9 9
Henry Clay 2 2
(No vote for Vice President) 1 1
Total 261 99 84 40 38
Popular vote
Jackson
  
41.36%
Adams
  
30.92%
Clay
  
12.99%
Crawford
  
11.21%
Unpledged electors
  
1.81%
Others
  
1.71%
Electoral vote
Jackson
  
37.93%
Adams
  
32.18%
Crawford
  
15.71%
Clay
  
14.17%

1825 contingent election

With no electoral vote majority, a contingent election took place in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Following the provisions of the 12th Amendment, the top three candidates by electoral votes were admitted as candidates in the House: Andrew Jackson, John Quincy Adams, and William Crawford, with Speaker of the House Henry Clay, who had finished fourth, being eliminated.

Clay detested Jackson and had said of him, "I cannot believe that killing 2,500 Englishmen at New Orleans qualifies for the various, difficult, and complicated duties of the Chief Magistracy."[22] Moreover, Clay's American System was closer to Adams's position on tariffs and internal improvements than Jackson's. Even if Clay had wished to align with Crawford over Jackson, which was highly unlikely in any event since Clay's policy differences with Crawford were even deeper, especially on matters of the tariff, and the fact Crawford had been in poor health, no path to victory was evident.

Ignoring the nonbinding directive of the Kentucky legislature that its House delegation choose Jackson, Clay used his political influence in the House to motivate House delegations in states where he had won at least a voting plurality to vote for Adams.[23] Thus, Adams was elected president on February 9, 1825, on the first ballot,[24][25] with 13 states, followed by Jackson with seven, and Crawford with four.

Balloting in the contingent election

1825 Contingent United States presidential election
February 8, 1825
Candidate Representatives Votes  %
John Quincy Adams 87 13 54.17
Andrew Jackson 71 7 29.17
William H. Crawford 54 4 16.67
Total votes 212 24 100
Votes necessary - 13 >50
State delegations voting for:
Adams Jackson Crawford

Connecticut
       6  
  0     0  
Illinois
       1  
  0     0  
Kentucky
       8  
  4     0  
Louisiana
       2  
  1     0  
Maine
       7  
  0     0  
Maryland
       5  
  3     1  
Massachusetts
      12 
  1     0  
Missouri
       1  
  0     0  
New Hampshire
       6  
  0     0  
New York
      18 
  2    14 
Ohio
      10 
  2     2  
Rhode Island
       2  
  0     0  
Vermont
       5  
  0     0  

Alabama
       0     3     0  
Indiana
       0     3     0  
Mississippi
       0     1     0  
New Jersey
       1     5     0  
Pennsylvania
       1    25    0  
South Carolina
       0     9     0  
Tennessee
       0     9     0  

Delaware
       0     0     1  
Georgia
       0     0     7  
North Carolina
       1     2    10 
Virginia
       1     1    19 

Sources: [26][27][28]

Aftermath

Adams' victory shocked Jackson, who, as the winner of a plurality of both the popular and electoral votes, expected the House to choose him. Not long before the contingent House election, an anonymous statement appeared in a Philadelphia paper, called the Columbian Observer.

The statement, said to be from a member of Congress, essentially accused Clay of selling Adams his support for the office of Secretary of State. No formal investigation was conducted, so the matter was neither confirmed nor denied. When Clay was indeed offered the position after Adams was victorious, he opted to accept and continue to support the administration he voted for, knowing that declining the position would not have helped to dispel the rumors brought against him.[29] By appointing Clay his Secretary of State, President Adams essentially declared him heir to the presidency, as Adams and his three predecessors had all served as Secretary of State.

Jackson and his followers accused Adams and Clay of striking a "corrupt bargain", and the Jacksonians would campaign on this claim for the next four years, ultimately helping Jackson defeat Adams in 1828.

Electoral College selection

Caucus curs in full yell, by James Akin, 1824 (critique of "the press's treatment of Andrew Jackson, and on the practice of nominating candidates by caucus")[30]
Method of choosing Electors State(s)
Each elector chosen by voters statewide <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
Each elector appointed by state legislature <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
State divided into electoral districts, with one elector chosen per district by the voters of that district <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
  • Two electors chosen by voters statewide
  • One elector chosen per congressional district by the voters of that district
Maine


Notes

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 The popular vote figures exclude Delaware, Georgia, Louisiana, New York, South Carolina, and Vermont. In all of these states, the Electors were chosen by the state legislatures rather than by popular vote.[20]
  2. Jackson was nominated by the Tennessee state legislature and by the Democratic Party of Pennsylvania.
  3. Adams was nominated by the Massachusetts state legislature.
  4. Crawford was nominated by a caucus of 66 congressmen that called itself the "Democratic members of Congress".
  5. Clay was nominated by the Kentucky state legislature.

References

Citations

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  2. Ammon, 1958, p. 4: "The phrase 'Era of Good Feelings", so inextricably associated with the administration of James Monroe ..."
  3. Ammon, 1958, p. 5: "Most Republicans like former President [James] Madison readily acknowledged the shift that had taken place within the Republican party towards Federalist principles and viewed the process without qualms." And p. 4: "The Republicans had taken over (as they saw it) that which was of permanent value in the Federal program." And p. 10: "Federalists had vanished" from national politics.
  4. Brown, 1966, p. 23: "a new theory of party amalgamation preached the doctrine that party division was bad and that a one-party system best served the national interest" and "After 1815, stirred by the nationalism of the post-war era, and with the Federalists in decline, the Republicans took up the Federalist positions on a number of the great public issues of the day, sweeping all before them as they did. The Federalists gave up the ghost."
  5. Brown, 1966, p. 23: The amalgamated Republicans, "as a party of the whole nation ... ceased to be responsive to any particular elements in its constituency. It ceased to be responsive to the South." And "The insistence that slavery was uniquely a Southern concern, not to be touched by outsiders, had been from the outset a sine qua non for Southern participation in national politics. It underlay the Constitution and its creation of a government of limited powers ..."
  6. Brown, 1966, p. 24: "Not only did the Missouri crisis make these matters clear [the need to revive strict constructionist principles and quiet anti-slavery agitation], but 'it gave marked impetus to a reaction against nationalism and amalgamation of postwar Republicanism'" and the rise of the Old Republicans.
  7. Ammon, 1971 (James Monroe bio) p. 463: "The problems presented by the [consequences of promoting Federalist economic nationalism] gave an opportunity to the older, more conservative [Old] Republicans to reassert themselves by attributing the economic dislocation to a departure from the principles of the Jeffersonian era."
  8. Parsons, 2009, p. 56: "Animosity between Federalists and Republicans had been replaced by animosity between Republicans themselves, often over the same issues that had once separated them from the Federalists."
  9. Wilentz, 2008, p. 251–252: "The panic ... was pivotal ... the hard times of 1819 and early 1820s revive[d] ... fundamental questions about the nationalist economic policies of the new-style Republicans under Madison and Monroe, and focused inchoate popular resentments on the banks, especially the Second BUS." p. 252: "The Missouri controversy ... proved for more important than the [incidental] outbursts."
  10. Wilentz, 2008, p. 252: "Both the panic and the Missouri debates underscored in different ways the overriding question of democracy as Americans perceived it. In economic matters, the questions arose primarily as a matter of privilege. Should unelected private interests, well connected to government, be permitted to control, to their own benefit, the economic destiny of the entire nation?"
  11. Hofstadter, 1947, p. 51: The "general mass of the disaffection to the Government was not sufficiently concentrated to prevent re-election, unopposed, of President Monroe in 1820 in the absence of a national opposition party; but it soon transformed politics in many states. Debtors rushed into politics to defend themselves, and secured moratoriums and relief laws from the legislatures of several Western states ... A popular demand arose for laws to prevent imprisonment for debt, for a national bankruptcy law, and for a new tariff and public land policies. For the first time Americans thought of politics as having an intimate relation to their welfare."
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  14. Presidential Elections, 1789-2008 County, State, and National Mapping of Election Data; Donald R. Deskins, Jr., Hanes Walton, Jr., and Sherman C. Puckett; University of Michigan Press, 2010; p. 80
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  22. Henry Clay to Francis Preston Blair, January 29, 1825.[full citation needed]
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Sources

  • Ammons, Harry. 1959. "James Monroe and the Era of Good Feelings". Virginia Magazine of History and Biography, LXVI, No. 4 (October 1958), pp. 387–398, in Essays on Jacksonian America, Ed. Frank Otto Gatell. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970.
  • Brown, Richard H. 1966. "The Missouri Crisis, Slavery, and the Politics of Jacksonianism". South Atlantic Quarterly, pp. 55–72, in Essays on Jacksonian America, Ed. Frank Otto Gatell. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970.
  • Dangerfield, George. 1965. The Awakening of American Nationalism: 1815-1828. New York: Harper & Row.
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  • Wilentz, Sean. 2008. The Rise of American Democracy: Jefferson to Lincoln. New York: Horton.

Further reading

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  • Ratcliffe, Donald J. The One-Party Presidential Contest: Adams, Jackson, and 1824's Five-Horse Race (University Press of Kansas, 2015) xiv, 354 pp.
  • Murphy, Sharon Ann. "A Not-So-Corrupt Bargain". Review of The One-Party Presidential Contest: Adams, Jackson and 1824's Five-Horse Race by Donald Ratcliffe. Common-place, Vol. 16, No. 4.

External links