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October 20, 2004
The Dirtiest Election of All Time
The election is less than two weeks away, and for many it’s not coming a second too soon. Combining the normal partisan fighting among the two major political parties with a hotly contested election in 2000, many have concluded that this is the dirtiest election in our history.
Not so fast says Paul Johnson on the pages of today’s WSJ. Those who claim that this is the most divided the country has been need to take a look back at our own history, starting in 1824:
John Quincy Adams's election in 1824 was a landmark because it accelerated the move toward choosing electors by popular vote. Out of 356,038 votes cast, Andrew Jackson emerged the clear leader with 153,544, Adams being 40,000 votes behind. Jackson also had the most electoral college votes, 99 to 84, with 78 for other candidates. But under the 12th Amendment, if no candidate got a majority of the college, the election went to the House, which picked the winner from the top three, voting by state. This put the choice effectively into the hands of Henry Clay, the all-powerful Speaker, who gave it to Adams, on the secret condition Adams made him secretary of state. Jackson denounced the election as "a corrupt bargain," and there was a growing feeling that future presidents must be chosen by the voters.
In reaction to an upwelling of Jackson support, negative campaigning took on a whole new meaning for the 1828 election that again pitted Adams against Jackson:
Adams's supporters retaliated by the campaign poster known as the Coffin Handbill, listing 18 murders Jackson was supposed to have committed. Those who claim the current election is the dirtiest know little about 1828. An English visitor, shown a school in New England (where Adams was paramount), put questions to the class, including "Who killed Abel?" A child promptly replied "General Jackson, Ma'am." An Adams pamphlet accused Jackson of "trafficking in human flesh," another accused his wife of being a bigamist and adulterer. After seeing it, she took to her bed and died shortly after the election. To his dying day Jackson believed his political enemies had murdered her. On his side, pamphlets accused Adams of fornication, procuring American virgins for the Tsar while serving as ambassador in Russia, and being an alcoholic and sabbath-breaker. A White House inventory listing a billiard-table and a chess-set led to the accusation that Adams had introduced "gambling furniture." (His most curious presidential habit, of taking a daily swim in the Potomac stark naked, went unnoticed.)
It makes what’s going on between Kerry and Bush look like child’s play.
Posted by Peter Mork at October 20, 2004 10:54 AM
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