In "American Lion," Jon Meacham understandably focuses on the political aspects of the bank war and does not try to explain how the Bank of the United States (BUS) operated, how it impacted the economy and/or its impact on the average person of the time. In trying to write a book of less than 400 pages about someone like Jackson it would be almost impossible to get into that kind of detail. I didn't expect anything different, but I am still left with those and other questions unanswered and, thus far, unable to find a book with those answers.
Meacham does write about corruption issues in the bank and various inappropriate ways that it tried to influence public policy. At one point Meacham writes about how a congressman from North Carolina was originally anti-bank, but voted for the re-charter supposedly because he had received a $20,000 loan from the bank. If true this was clearly inappropriate. Yet while I did not see it in Meacham's book, I know I have read elsewhere that when Jackson had the federal government's deposits moved from the BUS to various state banks, the majority of those banks were, in fact, banks that supported Jackson. State banks it should be remembered were banks with state charters, they were private businesses and this kind of behavior doesn't seem any more appropriate than that attributed to the BUS.
Meacham does repeat a story that I had never heard before which suggests an almost paranoiac attitude on Jackson's part. Jackson's then Secretary of the Treasury, William Duane refused to go along with removing the federal deposits from the BUS so Jackson fired him. Nothing wrong with that, but supposedly afterwards Jackson believed that Duane was a secret agent for the BUS put into his cabinet to support the bank's interest. Given that a number of Jackson's supporters in the bank war (inlcuding his Vice President Martin Van Buren) opposed the removal of the deposits this seems like a highly irrational response on Jackson's part.
In his review of Meacham's book for the New York Times, Andrew Clayton, history professor at Miami of Ohio, praises the author's work, but suggests that an opportunity was missed to "reflect on the nature of American populism as personified by Jackson." As I understand it Clayton is questioning what happens when someone elected by the majority of the people thinks and acts as if his positions represent not just the majority, but the entire people. He then specifically asks "Was the United States better off without the Bank of the United States?"
I think that to answer that question one has to understand more about the bank and how it functioned in the economic world of its day especially its impact on every day life. It seems like the bank may have combined central bank functions (today's Federal Reserve) with commercial bank for profit functions. Under the best of circumstances that could lead to confusion about which function takes priority and how public funds held by the bank are used. But that doesn't mean that the best solution is simply to destroy the bank without anything to go in its place.
I guess what I am trying to say is that what I have read about the bank war seems incomplete. And until the issues raised here and in other posts are researched, analyzed and written about I am unconvinced that the bank was the evil that Jackson and others considered it to be. I would also like to see more analysis on the claims of the corruption of the bank and how it tried to inappropriately influence government and public policy. As noted previously the amount of energy I feel about this may be some kind of "calling" to take this on as a book, but as promised, no decisions about future books will be made until the end of 2009. I think my next step is to read Nicholas Govan's biography of Nicholas Biddle (President of the BUS - pictured above) and Bray Hammon's book about banking in the ante bellum United States. Until then at least this should be the last post about Andrew Jackson .
Meacham does write about corruption issues in the bank and various inappropriate ways that it tried to influence public policy. At one point Meacham writes about how a congressman from North Carolina was originally anti-bank, but voted for the re-charter supposedly because he had received a $20,000 loan from the bank. If true this was clearly inappropriate. Yet while I did not see it in Meacham's book, I know I have read elsewhere that when Jackson had the federal government's deposits moved from the BUS to various state banks, the majority of those banks were, in fact, banks that supported Jackson. State banks it should be remembered were banks with state charters, they were private businesses and this kind of behavior doesn't seem any more appropriate than that attributed to the BUS.
Meacham does repeat a story that I had never heard before which suggests an almost paranoiac attitude on Jackson's part. Jackson's then Secretary of the Treasury, William Duane refused to go along with removing the federal deposits from the BUS so Jackson fired him. Nothing wrong with that, but supposedly afterwards Jackson believed that Duane was a secret agent for the BUS put into his cabinet to support the bank's interest. Given that a number of Jackson's supporters in the bank war (inlcuding his Vice President Martin Van Buren) opposed the removal of the deposits this seems like a highly irrational response on Jackson's part.
In his review of Meacham's book for the New York Times, Andrew Clayton, history professor at Miami of Ohio, praises the author's work, but suggests that an opportunity was missed to "reflect on the nature of American populism as personified by Jackson." As I understand it Clayton is questioning what happens when someone elected by the majority of the people thinks and acts as if his positions represent not just the majority, but the entire people. He then specifically asks "Was the United States better off without the Bank of the United States?"
I think that to answer that question one has to understand more about the bank and how it functioned in the economic world of its day especially its impact on every day life. It seems like the bank may have combined central bank functions (today's Federal Reserve) with commercial bank for profit functions. Under the best of circumstances that could lead to confusion about which function takes priority and how public funds held by the bank are used. But that doesn't mean that the best solution is simply to destroy the bank without anything to go in its place.
I guess what I am trying to say is that what I have read about the bank war seems incomplete. And until the issues raised here and in other posts are researched, analyzed and written about I am unconvinced that the bank was the evil that Jackson and others considered it to be. I would also like to see more analysis on the claims of the corruption of the bank and how it tried to inappropriately influence government and public policy. As noted previously the amount of energy I feel about this may be some kind of "calling" to take this on as a book, but as promised, no decisions about future books will be made until the end of 2009. I think my next step is to read Nicholas Govan's biography of Nicholas Biddle (President of the BUS - pictured above) and Bray Hammon's book about banking in the ante bellum United States. Until then at least this should be the last post about Andrew Jackson .
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