Andrew Jackson and the Central Bank

“The Bank is trying to kill me, but I will kill it.”
— President Andrew Jackson

President Andrew Jackson of Tennessee was the 7th President of the United States. Jackson’s efforts to shut down the central bank were believed to have resulted in an attempt on his life. After he recovered from the assassination attempt, Jackson redoubled his efforts to shut down the central bank and was successful.

From Wikipedia:

The Second Bank of the United States was authorized for a twenty year period during James Madison’s tenure in 1816. As President, Jackson worked to rescind the bank’s federal charter. In Jackson’s veto message the bank needed to be abolished because:

  • It concentrated the nation’s financial strength in a single institution.
  • It exposed the government to control by foreign interests.
  • It served mainly to make the rich richer.
  • It exercised too much control over members of Congress.
  • It favored northeastern states over southern and western states.
  • Following Jefferson, Jackson supported an “agricultural republic” and felt the Bank improved the fortunes of an “elite circle” of commercial and industrial entrepreneurs at the expense of farmers and laborers. After a titanic struggle, Jackson succeeded in destroying the Bank by vetoing its 1832 re-charter by Congress and by withdrawing U.S. funds in 1833.

    This 1833 Democratic cartoon shows Jackson destroying the devil’s Bank:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Jackson