By Timothy Carl
For a number of years I found it difficult to understand how the Democratic Party of 1828 led by Andrew Jackson could become a socialist party led by Barack Hussein Obama. After all, the parties of the early 1800’s were ultra-conservative and supportive of the US Constitution when compared to the two major parties of today. Right?
Aside from the fact that Andrew Jackson was a truly evil and vindictive figure, who mercilessly assaulted the American Indian populations of the United States, he surely could not have been a socialist! While it is true that in 1827 the British subject Robert Owen fathered the cooperative movement, while subsequently others followed a similar course, did Jackson and Martin van Buren (the political architect of the modern party system) actually follow their theories? No, this would be false.
However, the question remains, how did the Democratic Party devolve into a socialist bastion of public ownership, government control, a planned economy, and a lack of faith in individualism, among other socialistic tenants? The answer came to me not through my own devices, but simply by reading “What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815-1848” by Professor Daniel Walker Howe.
In his amazing book, Professor Howe states, “The Democratic and Whig Parties took very different stands on the subject of class. Echoing Jackson’s Bank Veto, Democrats called upon the working classes--a term they generally used in the plural and defined to include farmers and planters--to oppose the machinations and oppressions of no producers. Whigs insisted that there was no such thing as class conflict, that the different economic classes, like the sections of the Union, were interdependent, and in any case, class membership was fluid. Rhetoric of class conflict they deplored as demagogic. To some extent, urban workingmen chose their political party according to which analysis of class relations they found persuasive. Where industrialization had de-skilled and proletarianized workers, and where workers felt alienated from their employers because of ethnic differences, labor voted Democratic. Where workers felt that the system worked and that they enjoyed an opportunity to better themselves, they voted Whig.”
Howe goes on by stating that, “The success of the Democratic Party among white wage-earners owed more than a little, unfortunately, to the emphasis it placed on white supremacy. Democratic politicians found an effective way to synthesize their party’s appeal to two disparate groups, the northern working class and the southern planter class. They declared that solicitude for southern slaves distracted attention from the plight of northern “wage-slaves,” who, they insisted, were actually worse off.”
For Jackson and van Buren the party system they created and the course they navigated for the Democratic Party was a matter of power. President Jackson often spoke of the US Constitution, while upholding it only as long as it coincided with his policies. Perhaps there is no greater demonstration of this “convenient” support of the constitution than with the Supreme Courts decision in Worcester v. Georgia, 31 U.S. (6 Pet.) 515 (1832).
In Worcester v. Georgia the Court ruled in favor of the Cherokee nation, stating that the nation was a "distinct community" and one "in which the laws of Georgia can have no force”. This decided federal supremacy over states concerning Indian affairs. It was also one example of a growing number of Court decisions supporting Indian rights.
Many historians attribute the quote, "John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!" to President Jackson concerning the decision. Although many also dispute this quotation, Jackson’s response was to follow-up by initiating a policy Cherokee removal (also called the Trail of Tears). For those who are not familiar with this policy, it was the forced relocation of the Cherokee nation between 1836 to 1839. It was during this forced relocation that approximately 4,000 Cherokees died on their way under brutal circumstances and horrible humiliation from their ancestral homes to present day Oklahoma.
Andrew Jackson may or may not have said "John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!" However, it is clear when looking into Andrew Jackson’s presidency that he knew that the Supreme Court had no way of enforcing their decisions and that in spite of a short lived exception, the congress was controlled by the Democratic Party, and would turn a blind eye towards any instance when the president behaved in a manor which would be inconsistent with his oath of office. For example, on March 28, 1834 President Jackson was censured by the United States Senate for his questionable actions in removing US funds from the Bank of the United States. When the Democrats were re-instated as the majority party in the Senate, the censure was not just removed, the Democrats ordered it to be expunged, hoping that history would not realize it had ever happened. This reminds me a great deal of what happened in the Soviet Union and other socialist nations in the years to come in dealing with what would be deemed inconvenient history.
It was also the Jackson and van Buren duo who as founding fathers of the Democratic Party created the spoil system which enlarged the Democratic voter base while increasing the dependency of large numbers of citizens on government positions for their livelihoods. These same voters / government workers clearly knew what was expected of them if they were to continue to be paid: support the Democratic Party, its policies and its candidates..
It was also Jackson who instituted a “kitchen cabinet” to often bypass the cabinet which under the constitution had specific powers and had to be approved by the US Senate. Aside from the differences in the times and positions, is this much different than Obama’s czars?
If one would investigate the creation of the Democratic Party in much more depth than is the intent of this article, it becomes crystal clear how the Democratic Party of the early 1800’s could de-evolve into the socialist party of today. It was born of a theory that the best way to power is to make as many people dependent upon government jobs as possible, while simultaneously dividing the nation on class and racial grounds, making sure that such a coalition gives them at least a plurality and hopefully a majority. It is a party that at its inception demonstrated a distain for the constitution when it conflicted with party policies and supported individual rights only if it didn’t conflict with its maintenance of control. In fact, many of the political gimmicks which we look at with distain today can be attributed to the Jackson and van Buren duet of the early Democratic Party and the political system they created.
Looking back at history, it is not so hard to understand how the party of Jackson became the party of Obama and Lenin.
