AN ALTERNATE AMERICAN PARTY SYSTEM: PART 0 (Introduction)
"Ever since the tumultuous presidential election of 1830 and the ensuing elections henceforth, two major (and rather loose and big-tent) political parties/coalitions prevailed within the United States of America that had managed to survive throughout the mid-19th century and had shaped the Second Party System;
the Nationalist Party, which was considered to be the political organization of Northern businessmen and the upper-class elite who largely emphasized using the power of trade protectionism to steer the young and burgeoning American republic forwards in its path of domineering glory over its European counterparts;
and the big-tent Republican Party, the party that supposedly captured the interests of the common red-blooded yeoman farmer who was largely disinterested with social issues such as slavery and internal reform, and instead was seemingly interested on preserving America's status as a nation reliant on free trade principles and maintaining as little government interference as possible with the frequently phrased and quoted 'business of the common man and nothing more' being the political party's unofficial ideological anthem.
These two large and rather disillusioned political organizations arguably campaigned solely on the legacies of two of the United States' principle founders; Alexander Hamilton, the Nation's first Treasury Secretary and its fourth President, and Thomas Jefferson, the Nation's first official Secretary of Foreign Affairs and the nation's second President. These two sole men undoubtedly created the Second Party System and had possibly even influenced its later downfall due to their seemingly insurmountable legacies serving as metaphorical rocks on the shoulders of America's future leaders and their reputation as the respective leaders of their parties.
The election of 1824, in particular, is considered to be a watershed moment for the rapidly unnerving Federalist Party and one of the hallmark moments that led to the creation of the Nationalist Party and the dawn of the Second Party System. Many of my fellow political academics and even myself henceforth believe that this election was primarily caused by the rather cantankerous and uncooperative presidency of Mr. Federalist himself, John Quincy Adams (1819 to 1825).
Unfortunately for this ambitious man, he was faced by an equally ambitious and hostile Republican congress that blamed the nation's economic deficits throughout the Adams presidency following the Panic of 1822 solely on the man himself rather than analyzing their own failures by refusing to even attempt to accept Mr. Adams's proposals to aid the nation's current economic impurities.
A particularly venomous session of Congress during the Panic of 1822 and the chaos ensuing it.
As such, the Federalist Party certainly was not in the best prospects during the 1824 election and was even condemned to lose the presidential and congressional elections by notoriously pro-Federalist newspapers across the United States. It was certainly not the greatest time to be a Federalist and had possibly even signaled the later collapse of the party in 1826/27, just three years later.
However, all was different in the Republican Party, which was seemingly inescapable in its dreams and ambitions to engulf the American political system by the 1824 election. This was their dream, their destiny! Republicans knew that 1824 would be the year wherein their names would be forever memorialized in the history of American politics as the first of the last! The first Republicans to overtake the Federalist carcass, and the last year wherein the Federalists would even exist as a political entity! All praise should go the emboldened Republican Party, right?
Right?!
But, unfortunately for the seemingly unstoppable Republicans, one man would solidify their party core. One man would bring these giddy Republicans back to the sensible earth wherein they grew and settled upon. Ashes to sky, sky to ashes this man would do such an ambitious organization.
And his name was John Caldwell Calhoun.
Calhoun, despite having little governmental experience and being one of the youngest presidential candidates in United States history at the age of 42 by 1824, was able to invigorate a rising party and was able to firmly establish himself as a prominent figure within the Republican Party by being a major advocate of mass governmental reform, economic modernization through the use of (low) tariffs, and overall centralizing the U.S. government without having to use the power of a national bank (although Calhoun certainly was not completely opposed to the idea of establishing a small national bank that still gave some economic influence to the states).
These positions infuriated two particular wings of the Republican Party: first, the Old Jeffersonians, who proclaimed themselves to be solely inspired by the original founders of the Republican Party and Jefferson in particular, who wished to establish the United States as a small and de-centralized agrarian republic that maintained its economic stability on the backs of the common yeoman white farmer rather than the backs of economic magistrates in the nation's largest cities and without raising a single tariff on economic goods to 'preserve the stability of the yeoman farmer'. Despite their sharp contrasts with Calhoun's Federalist-esque ideology, they begrudgingly supported the young Southern Senator to ensure party unity.
However, another faction was absolutely outraged by Calhoun's positions and had even left the party to form their own political organization...and that would be the Free Republicans, who were Northern anti-slavery Republicans despised Calhoun's favorable opinions on slavery and were further outraged by Calhoun's opinions on economic centralization and the like. The faction would eventually merge with the Federalists to form the Nationalist Party in 1830, but that is a story for another day...
On the other side of the spectrum, the Federalists nominated famed general William Henry Harrison in order to capitalize on the seemingly shattered and disorganized Republican vote and to campaign less on actual politics and issues of the day, but to campaign on the fame of such an acclaimed general like Harrison.
Nevertheless, on Election Day 1824, the results were in, and the Republicans still managed to claim victory for their party.
ELECTION OF 1824
Sen. John C. Calhoun (R–SC) / Gov. Daniel D. Tompkins (R–NY) ~ 134 EVs
(50.8%; 185,843 votes)
Gen. William Henry Harrison (F–OH) / Atty. Gen. William Wirt (F–VA) ~ 124 EVs
(42.1%; 154,016 votes)
Sen. Martin Van Buren (FR–NY) / Rep. Charles F. Mercer (FR–VA) ~ 3 EVs
(6.8%; 24,877 votes)
John Caldwell Calhoun, the Republican nominee who had changed the face and message of his party, had won the executive throne.
Only the future could tell what this man's impact would be in the history of the United States as a sovereign state."
~ The prologue of noted American historian and academic Robert G. Kardaschoff's best-selling 1997 novel "A Comprehensive History of American Politics: Chapter II"