There were several similarities in Teddy Roosevelt and Andrew Jackson as president. Both were strong chief excecutivies, who had followed weak or relatively weak presidents. McKinley, Cleveland, Benjamin Harrison, Chester Arthur, Rutherford B. Hayes, and U.S. Grant largely deferred to Congress. Jackson's predecessors, John Quincy Adams, James Monroe, James Madison, and Thomas Jefferson did not have such a strong view of the presidency as Jackson. Jackson was the first president to really use the veto. Both men had been military heroes. TR known as a "Rough Rider" in Cuba and Gen. Jackson for the Battle of New Orleans.
A more careful analysis will show the two differed significantly however. Roosevelt gave firery speeches, but worked well with people and was reasonable. He had a constructive legacy of busting some trusts but not being an enemy of Wall Street and business. TR left a constructive legacy of conservation, food and drug regulation, and labor reform. Without really much rashness he strengthened our navy, "spoke softly and carried a big stick," and of course had the Panama Canal built. Roosevelt was culltured, highly intelligent, and wrote an excellent history of the American West.
Andrew Jackson was a very different man. While Roosevelt was athletic and an able boxer, Jackson fought several duels and killed a man. Jackson could be rash, petty, and vindictive. He was very ignorant about economics. Because he had a personal aversion to banks and Nicholas Biddle, he had the Bank of the United States destroyed. This wreaked havoc on the American economy as the central mechanism for handling the currency was dissolved. As a result there was a panic of 1837, and continual panics until the creation of the Federal Reserve Board under President Wilson. Jackson saw himself as destroying a great monster, the BUS, under Nicholas Biddle whom he despised. No good came from the destruction of the BUS. It just made the American economy less efficient and banking carried on less effectively under "Pet Banks," who were Jackson's supporters who personally benefited from the BUS' destruction, although the nation did not.
Other reckless acts by Jackson can be cited. In a really strange incident he championed the cause of the wife of a cabinet member, Peggy Eaton. At best Eaton was a very loose woman. When the cabinet members wives, led by Mrs. John C. Calhoun, would not socialize with her, he forced the cabinet to resign! This folly, which never would have occurred under TR, is called "The Eaton Malaria." Jackson almost brought the United States into war with France over an extremely trivial matter. Defying the Supreme Court and humanity, Jackson was mainly responsible for the Cherokee Indian removal from Georgia, and "The Trail of Tears."
Jackson did ably stand up to the South Carolina secessionists and John C. Calhoun. Old Hickory could politically compromise, such as on the tariff. Also, the idea of a "Spoils System," under Jackson is a great exaggeration. He used rhetoric that caused criticism, but in reality the government office turnover was about the same under him, as under his predecessors.
In closing, Jackson was not incompetent, but he lacked the vision and constructiveness of TR.
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