IT WAS AN explosive statement—too explosive, as it turned out, for the South Carolina legislature, which ordered five thousand copies of Calhoun’s treatise printed but declined for the moment to adopt it formally. Calhoun hoped it would function as a shot across the bow of the aggrandizers in Washington. Much would depend on the new administration. “We have a dead calm in politics, which will continue until after the arrival of the President elect,” he remarked to a South Carolina friend in January 1829. “There has been much idle speculation in relation to the formation of the new cabinet. It is a subject on which General Jackson himself, I take for granted, has not made up his mind, nor will he, if he acts prudently, till he has had an opportunity of seeing the whole ground.” On the matter of the tariff in particular, Calhoun detected signs of progress. “I think there is a lowering of tone on the part of the Tariff states, and I am not altogether without hope, if General Jackson takes a correct general view of his position and places a sound man at the head of the Treasury Department, but that something like justice may be done to us.” Yet South Carolina and all defenders of states’ rights must remain vigilant.
The dead calm gave way to a tempest within weeks. The idea of inaugurating Andrew Jackson sent his supporters into delirium, with thousands deciding to join their champion on his great day. Some came to forestall any last-minute shenanigans by Adams and Henry Clay, whose joint capacity for another corrupt bargain was thought to have no bounds. Some simply wanted to celebrate the coming of age of democracy. Many were Westerners, thrilled to install a neighbor in the White House. Nearly all considered themselves the salt-of-the-earth types Jackson epitomized. More than a few were his former soldiers; on them were lost Clay’s warnings about a military man at the head of the government. A sizable portion felt that the political classes in Washington looked down on them; as much as they admired Jackson for his accomplishments, they loved him for the fact that they could look him level in the eye, man to man, and know he’d not take it amiss.
They descended on Washington like an invading army. The national capital had never seen their like. They filled the inns and restaurants; they crowded the sidewalks and spat tobacco juice into the gutters. On the day of the inauguration they converged on the Capitol to witness Jackson’s arrival. He entered the Senate chamber and nodded to John Calhoun, presiding. Calhoun administered the oath of office to the new members of the Senate. He had just finished when John Marshall, who would administer the oath to Jackson, entered. The rest of official Washington followed, with members of the House taking seats in the gallery and diplomats and attachés sitting and standing where they could.
On the stroke of noon Calhoun swung his gavel and adjourned the brief indoor session. All proceeded to the eastern portico of the Capitol, where Jackson’s partisans awaited his appearance. The moment they saw the gaunt figure topped by the wild white hair, they raised a shout that sounded like a war whoop. Their cheering continued while twenty-four cannons heralded the new commander in chief.
Jackson stood calmly amid the uproar. When the tumult eventually eased, Justice Marshall stepped forward. The hubbub persisted loudly enough that only those in front could hear Marshall’s voice and almost none could hear Jackson’s. But when Jackson raised to his lips the Bible on which he had sworn, the army of his followers knew the deed was done, and they erupted once more.
Jackson turned to the crowd. His gaze brought them swiftly to silence. His inaugural address was succinct. He cited the free choice of the people as the source of his legitimacy and the fundament of democracy. He pledged to honor the rights of the states and interpret the Constitution strictly. He would pursue peaceful, constructive relations with foreign powers.
“It was grand—it was sublime,” wrote Margaret Bayard Smith of the ceremony. “Thousands and thousands of people, without distinction of rank, collected in an immense mass round the Capitol.” Mrs. Smith was one of the small group who made Washington their home rather than simply their place of business. She had known Jefferson and she dined with Henry Clay. She was skeptical of Jackson and wary of his followers. But the spectacle of the people claiming the presidency for one of their own caused her to reconsider; perhaps there was something to this idea of democracy after all.
She soon had third thoughts. Upon Jackson’s conclusion, the crowd rushed the portico. Jackson shook hands with the first dozen but was compelled to retreat before the crush of the rest. He mounted his white stallion, maneuvered among the masses, and began the procession toward the executive mansion. “Such a cortege as followed him!” wrote Mrs. Smith. “Country men, farmers, gentlemen mounted and dismounted, boys, women and children, black and white. Carriages, wagons and carts all pursuing him to the President’s house.”
At the mansion the crowd’s enthusiasm reached new heights and its behavior new lows. “What a scene did we witness!” Margaret Smith said. “A rabble, a mob, of boys, negros, women, children, scrambling, fighting, romping. What a pity, what a pity! No arrangements had been made, no police officers placed on duty, and the whole house had been inundated by the rabble mob.” Smith arrived too late to see the president, who had been nearly suffocated by well-wishers and been forced to flee to the safety of a nearby hotel. The celebration became a riot. “Cut glass and china to the amount of several thousand dollars had been broken in the struggle to get the refreshments. Punch and other articles had been carried out in tubs and buckets. But had it been in hogsheads it would have been insufficient.” The revelers stuffed themselves with cake and ice cream and clamored for more. “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.”
Margaret Smith couldn’t decide whether the day augured well or ill. But it certainly augured something new. “It was the People’s day, and the People’s President, and the People would rule,” she said.