Watson, Harry. Liberty and Power: The Politics of Jacksonian America. New York: Hill and Wang, 1990

== Summary ==
This
book argues that the Jacksonian America’s political parties (Democrats and
Whigs) represented a serious policy debate about the future of the Republic and
the nature of its society and economy. Watson writes: “Intensified involvement
in politics and the formation of enduring political parties in the government
and in the electorate were the two most fundamental elements in the political
changes of the Jacksonian era.” (6) Faced with accusations of corruption and
favoritism, a factory system that created a new classes of wage earners who found
they did not share common interest in the promised republican theory, expansion
of slavery and threat of slave revolt, and increased ethnic and cultural
diversity, an eager generation of politicians – represented by Andrew Jackson –
put together the structure of a second American party system. The two defining
features of Jackson’s presidency was the relationship between the state and
national power and the federal stance toward economic development (Federal
government’s role in promoting the “Market Revolution.”) His Whig opponents
found that the only way to challenge him was to replicate his tactics – party
politics. Jacksonian democrats represented small producers who were threatened
by the economic changes of their times and the Whigs were the champions of the
emerging market order, who called for the expansion of markets, development of
transportation systems, establishment of reliable networks of credit, and the
concentration of capital for larger purposes. Watson writes: “The two great
political parties, Democrats and Whigs, who dominated American antebellum
politics thus grew out of a contest over the relationship between the emerging
capitalist economy and the traditions of republican liberty and equality.”
(171) By the 1850s, American politics took competing public interests for
granted and accepted political parties as indispensable. The legacy of this new
system of American politics brought Americans closer to a liberal view of
society and government, as each party celebrated the rights of the common man, encouraged
individual self-improvement, and a balance between liberty and power, though
with differing views on how to do so.
Example: Jackson
associated government assistance to the Market Revolution with long and short
term forms of corruption. He challenged protective tariffs and opposed the
national bank, circulation of paper money, and most federal aid it internal
improvements. “Jackson hoped these policies would cripple the economic
developments that tended to restrict the ‘liberty’ and ‘virtue’ of America’s
small farmers and independent producers.” (133) These polices encouraged
Americans who felt trapped or threated by economic change to join the
Democratic party.
See also: Charles Sellers, Scott Sandage,