Page:The Presidents of the United States, 1789-1914, v. I.djvu/342

284 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS self against the cruel imputation. To mention the charge to Jackson, whose course in Florida had been severely censured by Clay, was enough to make him believe it; and he did so to his dying day. It is not likely that the use made of this "griev ance" had much to do with Jackson s victory in 1828. The causes at work lay far deeper. The population west of the Alleghanies was now be ginning to count for much in politics. Jackson was our first western president, and his election marks the rise of that section of our country. The democratic tendency was moreover a growing one. Heretofore our presidents had been men of aristo cratic type, with advantages of wealth, or educa tion, or social training. A stronger contrast to them than Jackson afforded cannot well be imagined. A man with less training in statesman ship would have been hard to find. In his defects he represented average humanity, while his excel lencies were such as the most illiterate citizen could appreciate. In such a man the ploughboy and the blacksmith could feel that in some essential respects they had for president one of their own sort. Above all, he was the great military hero of the day, and as such he came to the presidency as naturally as Taylor and Grant in later days, as naturally as his contemporary Wellington became prime minister of England. A man far more politic and complaisant than Adams could not have