eager for the Presidency, loyally intermitted his own. seeking. But Adams had adventured upon changing times, and despite his forceful intellectuality, elevated character, and admirable virtues was not the man to stem the personal tide which, almost from the day of his inauguration, set in against him. The cause of General Jackson, sustained in the contest of 1824 by considerably the largest group of Presidential Electors, as well as by a marked plurality of the popular vote, appealed more and more to the country, and was determinedly promoted by the General himself. It was widely felt that the casting of the Clay votes for Adams represented, to say the least, an ill-chosen discrimination, which Clay should have refrained from encouraging in deference to the superior favor shown Jackson by the people; and Adams's appointment of Clay as Secretary of State was by many considered not merely a reward in questionable taste, but-as the result proveda move for the interest of a union of forces to control the next election. Jackson joyfully accepted the issue thus palpably drawn, and with all his vehement passion and enormous energy threw himself into the fight, swearing that it should cease only with the utter annihilation of Adams and Clay. In consequence the Republican party was riven asunder, the supporters of Jackson becoming known as Democratic Republicans, and those of Adams and Clay as National Republicans. It presently accorded more with the liking of the Jacksonians to call themselves plain Democrats, but several years elapsed before the National Republican organization took the official name of the Whig party. No

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national nominating assemblage was held by either faction in 1828, as the rival candidatures of Jackson and Adams were predetermined by the course of events and endorsed in the States without dissent. Adams was overwhelmed, having only 83 Electoral votes against 178 for Jackson; and on the popular vote also Jackson was given a large majority.1 Calhoun (Democrat) was reëlected Vice-President, with 171 Electoral votes against 83 for Richard Rush (National Republican), of Pennsylvania, and 7 for William Smith (Democrat), of South Carolina.

For fundamental and permanent historic importance the Presidential election of 1828 transcends any other from the time of the establishment of the government until 1860. It introduced into national politics, for the first time, a biparty system calculated to endure on account of the adaptation of both the resulting parties to American popular conditions, their alertness and virility in competing with one another, their fertility and facility in constructive matters and also in criticism, and their ability to stand defeat. It directly led to an ordered discussion of public questions and affairs by the formulation of political issues under the supervision and discipline of national party organizations, which, in turn, came out into the open arena of popular debate and action instead of basing themselves upon the "general agreement" of a few dignified chiefs or the extemporized authority, and consequently despotic command, of a caucus.

1Popular vote:-Jackson, 647,231; Adams, 509,097.

The acquisition of power by the popular party as the result of Jefferson's triumph in 1800, says Carl Schurz,1 brought a realization of the truth that the government belonged to the people, and not to "a limited circle of important gentlemen." This it was that afterward made it always so easy for the Republicans to beat the Federalists. The Federalist party was far too select. At heart, and often avowedly, it held to the essential ideas of "curbing the unruly democracy" and resisting demagogic demands, overlooking the stubborn fact that the democracy comprised vastly the major part of the population as well as a host of most brilliant, masterful, and sincere leaders-men who were as unselfishly patriotic as any Federalist, and who largely, moreover, compared not unfavorably with their critics for character, breeding, and probable capability of understanding the public welfare. Disfavoring characterizations of the democracy as such, and of its qualified advocates, incur naturally a vigorous, and, what is more serious, a mass, resentment; they have in general been avoided (publicly at least) by the more practiced politicians of later days. But the Federalists, even with the advance of time and the accumulation of distressing misfortunes, forgot nothing and learned nothing. Their failure to develop into a resourceful force of opposition to the Republicans proved fatal to themselves and was not well for the country. For it became consequently quite unnecessary for the Republicans to observe any particular circumspection in their own course, or to show progressiveness or fore1Life of Henry Clay, vol. i, p. 40.

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thought in dealing with existing matters or shaping policies for the future; they had but automatically to defeat the Federalists at every election, and meanwhile be exceedingly well content under the wise and beneficent guidance of their great men.

Several factors of highly conservative influence in their nature and operation contributed to the simplicity of national politics during the early career of the government. One of these was the limitation of the suffrage (especially on the basis of property qualification), which so generally prevailed from the beginning and was relaxed only with great caution. With but a restricted number of the body politic entitled to vote, no elaborate party machinery was required, and the methods of appeal for popular support were of the most elementary kinds. Another very effective deterrent to the development of national party action and expression along the lines of issues and coördinated consultations of the public at large, was the long persistence in many States of the practice of appointing the Presidential Electors by the Legislatures, thus debarring the people from directly stipulating their preference for President.1 But the most potent and pervading of the circumscribing factors to which we have alluded was the

1In practice, however, the system of appointing the Presidential Electors by the Legislatures operated fairly to reflect the popular choice; there was always great party activity in the individual States, which well assured conformity by the Legislatures to the predominating sentiment. The objections to the method were its indirection and the legislative assumption of a power which it was felt should reside in the people. As late as 1824 six of the States-Delaware, Georgia, Louisiana, New York, South Carolina, and Vermont-adhered to the old plan of legislative selection of the Electors; but in 1828 it had been abandoned by all except South Carolina.

Thomas Jefferson, 3d president; born at Shadwell, Va., April 13, 1743; lawyer; member of colonial house of Burgesses, 176974; chairman of committee which drew Declaration of Independence, signed August 2, 1776; governor of Virginia, 1779-81; member of state house of representatives 1782; minister plenipotentiary to France 1784; sole minister to the king of France for three years from March 10, 1785; secretary of state of United States from September, 1789 to December 3, 1793; vice president, 1797-1801; president from 1801 to 1809; died at Monticello, Va., July 4, 1826.