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314 monopolies and banks went very close to the rights of property. It demanded that all charters should be repealable, urgently favored a metallic currency, resisted the application of English precedents in law courts and legislatures, and desired an elective judiciary. It lasted as a separate party only five or six years, and then was cajoled out of existence by superior political tactics; but it was not without reason that the name spread to the whole party, for, laying aside certain extravagances, two or three of its chief features soon came to be adopted by the Democrats.

On the great measures of public policy, therefore, the position of the administration was not clear and thorough, but the tendency was in the right direction, especially when contrasted with the policy urged by the Whigs. In regard to internal improvements, the administration early took up a position which the result fully justified, and in its opposition to the distribution of the surplus revenue its position was unassailable. In its practical administration of the government there is less ground for satisfaction in the retrospect. Besides the general lowering of tone which has been mentioned, there were scandals and abuses which it is not necessary to specify. General Jackson's first cabinet fell to pieces suddenly, under the effect of a private scandal and of the President's attempt to coerce the private social tastes of his cabinet, or rather of their wives. He held to the doctrine of popularity, and its natural effect upon a man of his temper, without the sobriety of training and culture, was to stimulate him to lawless self-will. He regarded himself as the chosen representative of the whole people, charged, as such, with peculiar duties over against Congress. The "will of the people" here received a new extension. He found it in himself, and what he found there he did not hesitate to set in opposition to the will of the people as this found expression through their constitutional organs. At the same time the practice of