Primary Sources

This section is organized chronologically (with a few exceptions). Some of these sources are also found distributed under their respective topics.

Before becoming president | First term | Second term | After the presidency | Collections of Jackson documents

Before becoming president

Photo of Henry Clay's appointment as secretary of state (7 March 1825). If there was a corrupt bargain, this was the reward. (Library of Congress, "American Memory")

First term

First Inaugural Address (March 4, 1829) with printable version, from TeachingAmericanHistory.org. Also found here and here.

A letter of Margaret Bayard Smith to Mrs. Kirkpatrick (March 11, 1829). The White House Historical Association provides this famous description of Jackson's inauguration:

"Ladies fainted, men were seen with bloody noses and such a scene of confusion took place as is impossible to describe,--those who got in could not get out by the door again, but had to scramble out of windows. At one time, the President who had retreated and retreated until he was pressed against the wall, could only be secured by a number of gentlemen forming round him and making a kind of barrier of their own bodies, and the pressure was so great that Col Bomford who was one said that at one time he was afraid they should have been pushed down, or on the President. It was then the windows were thrown open, and the torrent found an outlet, which otherwise might have proved fatal."

Several Newspaper Accounts of President Andrew Jackson's First Inauguration from the White House Historical Association. The Daily National Intelligencer reports:

"… midst all the excitement and bustle of the occasion, the whole day and night of the Inauguration passed off without the slightest interruption of the public peace and order, that we have heard of. At the mansion of the President, the Sovereign People were a little uproarious, indeed, but it was in any thing but a salacious spirit."

Has anyone attempted to discover the truth? Mrs. Smith's account and other smack of parti pris gossip.

Selections from the letters of Margaret Bayard Smith discussing Peggy Eaton and her ostracism by polite society.

President Jackson's Executive Order Regarding Military Pensions (April 8, 1829), cracking down on corruption? From Yale's Avalon project.

Proclamation Regarding Duties on Austrian Vessels (May 11, 1829), from Yale's Avalon project. See also Proclamation Regarding Duties on Austrian Vessels (June 3, 1829).

First Annual Message to Congress (December 8, 1829) on many topics, from TeachingAmericanHistory.org.

First State of the Nation Speech (Dec. 1829) from From Revolution to Reconstruction.

Our Documents: "President Andrew Jackson's Message to Congress 'On Indian Removal'" (1830).

"It gives me pleasure to announce to Congress that the benevolent policy of the Government, steadily pursued for nearly thirty years, in relation to the removal of the Indians beyond the white settlements is approaching to a happy consummation."

If you don't know it, Our Documents, from the National Archives, is a wonderful collection of 100 "milestone" documents in American history. Each document gets the royal treatment—high-res scrollable images, transcripts (take that Library of Congress!), PDF version. Saddly, this is the only document from Jackson's administration—commentary on the sad state of his reputation. A second—perhaps better—choice would have been his nullification proclamation. Not only was that the template for Lincoln's pro-union rhetoric, but, as a document, it has more historical tension around it. Jackson's Indian removal was a done deal, and this message did not electrify.

Webster Oration: "Liberty and Union, Now and Forever, One and Inseparable" (January 26, 1830), from Henry J. Sage's Jefferson and Jackson's America resources. Sage characterizes it as "probably the most famous speech given in the first half of the 19th century." It doesn't make for the best reading today.

Proclamation Regarding Public Lands Near Huntsville, Alabama (March 30, 1830), from Yale's Avalon project.

Andrew Jackson's famous toast at the Jefferson-day dinner (April 13, 1830). "Our union. It must be preserved." Includes background.

Cherokee Indian Removal Debate U.S. Senate (April 15-17, 1830)

Veto of Maysville Road Bill (May 27, 1830), abridged

Proclamation Regarding Land Sales in Louisiana (June 5, 1830), from Yale's Avalon project.

President Jackson's Executive Order to Transmit General Order 29 Providing a Pardon for Military Deserters in Time of Peace (June 12, 1830), from Yale's Avalon project.

Proclamation Regarding Duties on Vessels of the Grand Dukedom of Oldenburg (September 18, 1830), from Yale's Avalon project.

Proclamation Regarding the Opening of United States Ports to British Vessels (October 5, 1830), from Yale's Avalon project.

Second State of the Nation Speech (Dec. 6, 1830) from From Revolution to Reconstruction.

Marshall's opinion in Cherokee Nation v. the State of Georgia (1831)

Proclamation Regarding Public Lands in Arkansas (February 10, 1831), from Yale's Avalon project.

Third State of the Nation Speech (Dec. 6, 1831) from From Revolution to Reconstruction.

"Jackson and the nullifiers" 1832 song.

"So sound the trumpet, beat the drum,
Play Yankee doodle dandy,
We Jackson boys will quickly come,
And be with our rifles handy."

Fourth State of the Nation Speech (Dec. 4, 1832) from From Revolution to Reconstruction.

Andrew Jackson's Bank Veto (July 10, 1832) from Henry J. Sage's Jefferson and Jackson's America. Also available here (Avalon). The publisher Houghton Mifflin has a page with the veto and questions for students.

Clay, Senate speech on Jackson's veto of the bank bill (July 10, 1832)

South Carolina Ordinance of Nullification (passed November 24, 1832) from Henry J. Sage's Jefferson and Jackson's America.

Jackson: Proclamation to the People of South Carolina (December 10, 1832) also here:

"I consider, then, the power to annul a law of the United States, assumed by one state, incompatible with the existence of the Union, contradicted expressly by the letter of the Constitution, unauthorized by its spirit, inconsistent with every principle on which it was founded, and destructive of the great object for which it was formed."

Andrew Jackson to Martin Van Buren discussing the nullification crisis (13 January 1833). Includes a summary of contents and images, but no text. Good grief—go that extra mile! From the Library of Congress' "American Memory" project.

Message to the Senate Regarding a Treaty with Naples (January 16, 1833). Interesting relative to official secrets, from Yale's Avalon project.

The Force Bill (March 2, 1833), to enforce US laws against South Carolina's nullification.

Second term

Second inaugural address (March 4, 1833), with printable version, from TeachingAmericanHistory.org. Also found here.

Fifth State of the Nation Speech (Dec. 3, 1833) from From Revolution to Reconstruction.

Sixth State of the Nation Speech (Dec. 1, 1834) from From Revolution to Reconstruction.

Seventh State of the Nation Speech (Dec. 7, 1834) from From Revolution to Reconstruction.

Eighth State of the Nation Speech (Dec. 5, 1834) from From Revolution to Reconstruction.

Farewell Address (March 4, 1837), a powerful restatement of his political beliefs. Also found here.

After the presidency

Van Buren's Inaugural Address (Mar. 4, 1837), from From Revolution to Reconstruction.

Letter: Amasa J. Parker to Harriet Parker describing the boardinghouse where he and two future presidents resided (December 31, 1837). This wasn't Peggy Eaton's boarding house, of course, but it does shed light on the boarding-house culture of official Washington. Includes a drawing of the table (page two). For some inexplicable reason the Library of Congress thinks we want images of the letter without a transcript. From the Library of Congress' "American Memory" project.

Selections for Henry Clay on Jackson and Political Power, from Henry J. Sage's Jefferson and Jackson's America. Clay "tramps the dirt down":

"The late President of the United States advanced certain new and alarming pretensions for the Executive Department of the government, the effect of which, if established and recognized by the people, must inevitably convert it into a monarchy."

So much for the Clinton "haters."

Dying words to family and slaves, "I go a short time before you, and I want to meet all in heaven, both white and black."

"'Representative Men': Andrew Jackson and Henry Clay" by Joseph Glover Baldwin, Southern Literary Messenger (September 1853). Facsimile and text available. The article is split into two parts; here is the second part. From MOA, The Making of America.

Collections of Jackson documents

Avalon Project, Yale Law School. This collection includes some of the more obscure documents found above.

Teaching Ameican History resource page, with a number of documents.

Links and Primary Sources about the Jacksonian period, from historyteacher.net.

Bartleby.com quotations, mostly from The Columbia World of Quotations.