Andrew Jackson's Spoils System

12. Spoils System
• The Spoils System was essentially a system in which, once a president got elected, he would give office jobs and official jobs to some of the people who helped him reach office. This system was used by a lot of presidents, but none before Andrew Jackson had used it so lavishly. He gave out a lot of jobs to a lot of his supporters and friends, some of who may not have been the best qualified. Still, this was another way in which Jackson ushered in the ‘Age of the Common Man’.
• The spoils system, in this time periods case, was significant for what Jackson used it for. By bringing more common people into office, Jackson was able to demonstrate to the masses, like he had already done by his own example, that even a common …show more content…
Irish Immigration
• The Irish immigrants were the largest group of immigrants pre-Civil War. Many of them were pushed out of their native home by the potato famine and, faced with starvation, chose to come to America. Since most of them didn’t have much money, and because, since they were coming from farmland and didn’t want to return to it, many of them ended up settling in northeastern cities since they didn’t have the money to travel farther. They were a predominantly Catholic group and faced discrimination for this. They also were treated badly by nativists who thought the immigrants were stealing American jobs.
• The Irish were significant for the impact they had on the industrial side of America and the northeastern cities. Their isolated community groups brought their culture to the Americas, and the large numbers in which they came supplied cheap labor to the growing factory industry at a better rate than any American citizen would work for. This provided a cheap labor force to work the factories. The Irish vote was significantly heard and was predominantly democratic.
14. German …show more content…
For one, they realized over speculating and loaning to risky individuals were bad methods of business practice. They also learned that money should be backed to have its value and prevent these things. Without the panic, practice of these risky procedures in the banks probably wouldn’t have stopped as soon as it did.
17. Development of the Whig party
• The Whig party was formed during the era of Jacksonian democracy and was mostly unique to this time period. This party picked up a lot of ideals that had been left behind by the Federalist Party when they crumbled. They were against Jackson, supported the banks and the federal government, as well as internal improvements, and were all for social tariffs and high reforms. They became one of the two major political parties during this time, if nothing else than simply to oppose the Democrats.
• The Whigs were important for the opposition that they provided to members of the Democratic-Republicans, President Jackson’s powerful party. This Whigs made sure they were heard through Congress and the federal government past Jackson on issues like the bank and slavery, keeping an opposing opinion to Jackson alive in the Age of the Common

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