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Lead paragraph

The final sentence of the lead paragraph, which currently reads

Sometimes praised as an advocate for working Americans and for preserving the union of states, Jackson is also criticized for his racist policies, particularly regarding Native Americans

is not in line with Wikipedia standards, in my view. The final sentence should place the president in as broad a context as possible within American history. Acknowledgements of a complicated legacy are reserved for the final paragraph of the lead section. See, the Thomas Jefferson article, where the final sentence of the lead paragraph reads

Jefferson was a leading proponent of democracy, republicanism, and natural rights, and he produced formative documents and decisions at the state, national, and international levels.

and in the final paragraph we get an acknowledgement of a complicated legacy

[Historians] acknowledge the fact of his lifelong ownership of large numbers of slaves and give differing interpretations of his views on and relationship with slavery.

I'm suggesting the following as an update

Jackson's election to the presidency in 1828 ushered in the Second Party System in American politics, and his namesake ideology, Jacksonian Democracy, became the nation's dominant political philosophy.

and add the historian and/or popular critiques of him to the final paragraph. I'd like to discuss this with @Wtfiv and others. Ryanjackson10 (talk) 04:07, 19 December 2024 (UTC)

Even for a more policy-based critique (which Jackson's would be), FDR's article can be a precedent, where the final sentence of the opening paragraph is the high level overview

His initial two terms were centered on combating the Great Depression, while his third and fourth saw him shift his focus to America's involvement in World War II.

and the particular controversial policy is held for the last paragraph of the section

Since then, several of his actions have come under criticism, such as his ordering of the internment of Japanese Americans

Ryanjackson10 (talk) 07:23, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
Hi RyanJackson10,
Jackson's legacy is complex and difficult. If you look at the most recent talk above, you can see that his legacy continues to stir controversy. When the article was submitted to Featured Article Review, it was the lead that triggered the issues. But his defining roles tod Much of this is about Jackson's legacy, the complexity is the high level overview that addresses his perceived impact on forming the Democratic political party may be significant. And, creating a balanced first paragraph was took a bit of significant work.
I'm also not sure that Jackson's contribution to the two-party system is his major contribution. It can certainly be argued that Jackson formalized the two-party system, it had been operative informally during the Adams-Jefferson debate. And though Jackson did create the democratic party to be a machine that worked for him and his supporters, this party has long transmuted.
Jackson's long-term legacy and significance today is complicated. But the issue of "union of the states", his populist symbolism, and the ongoing legacy of his policies, particularly in terms of the race are what makes his impact today so central. There's lots of other folk with strong opinions on this, let's see if they want to weigh in. Wtfiv (talk) 17:13, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
Just as a point of clarification, I meant the Second Party System, distinct from the Two Party System 2603:7000:46F0:1AB0:CCE8:1486:460E:23D (talk) 18:15, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
Wasn't signed in for the above comment, but noted. Purely in terms of style, I believe it should be as matter-of-fact as possible, saving popular interpretations of his legacy for later in the section. Ryanjackson10 (talk) 18:30, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
The sentence you don't like at the end of the first paragraph was there at the end of the FAR in April of this year. So the claim that it "is not in line with Wikipedia standards" is off-base. FAR is a tough test of Wikipedia standards.
Comparison with the Jefferson and FD Roosevelt articles is fair, but one could also compare with, for example, the Warren Harding article. In any case, "I have found an article that does it like this" is an argument that, although I have used it myself many times, is not usually conclusive.
The reference to the Trail of Tears is not out of place in the first paragraph; just in my (non-Wiki) outside reading, I'm seeing a lot of it, perhaps more than I used to see ten years ago. Even the discussion of who gets their face on the $20 bill brought up Native Americans. But if you also want to introduce the Second Party System and Jacksonian democracy in that paragraph, I would go along. Bruce leverett (talk) 20:41, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
Points taken. Agreed that the Trail of Tears of noteworthy enough for the first paragraph. IMO it's still vague as is. The Harding article you referenced mentions the particular names of the scandals.
The Second Party System and Jacksonian Democracy are often how Jackson is introduced in the broad context of American history, particularly in textbooks, and also warrant a first paragraph mention. Sounds like we agree on this.
My updated suggestion would be something like

The first nationally elected Democrat, Jackson’s victory in the 1828 Presidential Election ushered in the Second Party System in American politics, following the fall of the Era of Good Feelings three years prior. As president, Jackson oversaw an expansion of the franchise and preserved the union of states, while his policies towards westward expansion and the forced removal of Native Americans became known as The Trail of Tears.

Ryanjackson10 (talk) 22:21, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
This looks reasonably neutral. I am not a Jackson expert, though, so I'd be happy if other editors weighed in. Bruce leverett (talk) 00:09, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
One complaint re: " Sometimes praised as an advocate for working Americans and for preserving the union of states, Jackson is also criticized for his racist policies, particularly regarding Native Americans." try: "Jackson has been praised for leading the fight against monopoly, and for promoting nationalism, and criticized for his treatment of Native Americans." As for "racism" he shared that with 99% of the population so leave it out. Rjensen (talk) 02:00, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
This is still subjective. The spirit of my suggested change is to state the major actions of Jackson’s presidency in a neutral, matter-of-fact manner. If you think the veto of bank recharter deserves mention (which I believe you’re referring to), that’s another matter. But I believe it’s already baked in to the Jacksonian Democracy mention. Ryanjackson10 (talk) 02:22, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
In the FAR review, the issue was that Jackson's legacy was cleaned up too much. The negative impact of his legacy being hidden. The final first paragraph was the result of balancing those positive views and negative views. These latest suggestions are returning to the positive, it seems to me. I'll ping a few editors who have kept on eye on this page and have impacted the editing. Carlstak, ARoseWolf, Jengod, Hydrangeans what do you think about the first paragraph changes suggested above? Wtfiv (talk) 16:50, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
The changes suggested are well meaning but misguided. They swing too far toward a positive portrayal of Jackson to the point of hagiography. The paragraphs as they existed prior to such suggestions are closer to an appropriate balance. The statement his namesake ideology, Jacksonian Democracy, became the nation's dominant political philosophy is especially a problem because it takes on too much of the perspective of outdated sources. As pointed out in Daniel Walker Howe's What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815–1848—part of the renowned Oxford History of the United States series that synthesizes the best of current academic scholarship—"Jacksonian Democracy" was in practice not so much a coherent philosophy as a shorthand for the Democratic Party as led by Jackson and their ambition to exten[d] white supremacy across the North American continent through Indian expulsion and Black chattel slavery (357). Also, oversaw an expansion of the franchise is a misrepresentation: white manhood suffrage was quite widespread before Jackson got into office, and it's part of how he got into office—he did not oversee or instigate a spread of popular democracy. As Howe puts it, if anything, in opposing Black suffrage and Indigenous sovereignty, Jackson wanted to restrict suffrage and stop it from spreading any further than it already had.
What political philosophy Jackson did have did not unite the nation in a dominant stream of thought. True, Jackson's supporters loved him, but Jackson's foes and those he suppressed viscerally opposed him, excoriated as "King Andrew" for his autocratic suppression of abolitionist tracts, paternalistic dismissal of Indigenous sovereignty (and court rulings in favor of the Cherokee), and violent temper against perceived enemies.
All this to say that the suggestions won't get us closer to a balanced portrayal. They veer too far toward hagiography. Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 21:06, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
I hope this comment's not out of place in the thread. Thanks for the ping, Wtfiv. I'm exhausted and all I can handle now is bruschetta and a bottle of wine. If things have cooled down a bit tomorrow, I might be able to wade into this. Not really sure I want to. I've read all this thread so far and it's a bit much. Carlstak (talk) 01:26, 21 December 2024 (UTC)
The updated suggestion, after a critique from @Bruce leverett removed the

his namesake ideology, Jacksonian Democracy, became the nation's dominant political philosophy

The reason I added "expansion of the franchise" was to get a roundabout mention of Jacksonian Democracy/Jacksonian Era. To have an era named after you warrants mention, in my view. I'm all ears for a way to get a mention of it that's more grounded in the facts. Ryanjackson10 (talk) 21:15, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
@Rjensen He shared "racism with 99 percent of the population" is a canard.
  • First of all you're talking about the population that had voting rights (white males) not the population
  • Second, there are countless examples of garden-variety white male American racists who didn't agree with Jacksonian removal or the suppression of abolitionist materials. A handful of weirdos were even anti-racist!
  • Third, Jackson's racism is only part of the story in regards to his land dispossession policies; there's also the massive corruption, abuse of power, and inefficiency. Jackson, who had been doing business with Indians since the 1790s, was perfectly willing to selectively empower Native allies, from Pushmataha to Greenwood LeFlore, who supported his military or imperialist ambitions. Yes, he was possessed of a nearly robotic unquestioning racism, but conquest, control and profit for him and his allied cronies was his paramount obsession. Every Indian treaty was followed up with a U.S. govt land office that surveyed and resold said parcels. The beneficiaries of these were overwhelmingly Jackson's allies. Despite what Remini insists, there is no consensus that Indian removal was inevitable or necessary but it is clear who benefitted and who suffered. The cause was $$$, the effect was perpetuation of systemic racism.
@Ryanjackson10 I would also disagree with the use of "westward" in any description of Jacksonian expansionism. The Louisiana territory was Jefferson and Texas happened mostly without his help (although with plenty of his assistance from his militia and War of 1812 buddies!), whereas Jackson was consumed with moving the border south via conflict with the European empires and indigenous peoples, forcing the cessions of land in present-day Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia. I will concede that the ceded Chickasaw lands where Jackson, Overton, and Winchester founded Memphis are indeed west.
Indian Removal during the Jackson administration was just the federalized culmination of a long long push by Jackson to ethnically cleanse the "Old Southwest". jengod (talk) 18:08, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
Would replacing

..., while his policies towards westward expansion...

with

..., while his policies towards southwestern expansion...

do it? Ryanjackson10 (talk) 18:41, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
Does that work for me? No. Absolutely not. With respect and honor to the thousands of Wikipedians working in good faith on this article for over 20 years, I personally think this biography is a whitewashed and decontextualized recitation of hagiographic, nonsensical, and dishonest propaganda passed down from ancestors who benefitted financially from "Jacksonian democracy".
"Jacksonian democracy," as far as I can tell, should be treated as a grotesque dogwhistle signaling a belief in the "Racial creed of the Southern people," not as some kind of philosophical movement for which Jackson was responsible nor even as any kind of definable, specific, and meritorious advancement toward a more perfect Union.
He obviously couldn't hold a job and was an empty-headed bundle of grievances and sneering spite operating most days at the lizard-brain level but we can't say that.
so we say something like
"He was a guy who lived in Tennessee. He had some slaves. He was an unhinged psycho who did a long series of extralegal filibuster imperialist wars on his own gang-leader thug authority and killed all the right people to benefit all the right people so the Establishment law-and-order club shrugged. The voters bayed for blood and for land, and Jackson was their man. Maysville Road veto. Spoils system. Indian Removal. Inept administration. Retirement. Abducted-twin adopted son squandered all the hard-earned blood money. Enablers all dead or departed. Lonely. Sick. And then he died. The end."
That said, I acknowledge that we here at Wikipedia are but humble encyclopedists seeking to enshrine verifiability, not the ineffable thing called Truth. So everybody will continue to fuss around sentence by sentence trying to send a message through this disordered man's disordered life story.
I mean, I really cannot engage reasonably with this biography because it normalizes that which was never and should not now be deemed normal. So...good luck everyone and I'm sorry I'm not good at leading groups to consensus. Others here can do so admirably and I leave you in their good hands. jengod (talk) 19:39, 20 December 2024 (UTC)

I really cannot engage reasonably with this biography

Agreed! Ryanjackson10 (talk) 19:47, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
folks who love extremely nasty conspiracy interpretations of American politics have no need for Wikipedia--they can turn on the network bews any evening to get more than enough (Today there is a conspiracy at work to have two or maybe three presidents at once....) But for the benefit of Wikipedia standards I think a basic reliance on reliable published sources will do the job. Let me ask Jengold what are the main reliable souces on Jackson he is basing his argument upon? Rjensen (talk) 20:08, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
It's not so much the sources which concern me but the value judgements. More importantly, on a practical level, it's the subjective language, which led to my suggested change in the first place. Ryanjackson10 (talk) 20:18, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
  • Cheathem's Andrew Jackson, Southerner + papers
  • Burstein's Passions of Andrew Jackson
  • Whitney Snow's paper "Slave Owner, Slave Trader, Gentleman: Slavery and the Rise of Andrew Jackson"
  • Michael A. Blaakman's Speculation Nation: Land Mania in the Revolutionary American Republic
  • Walter Johnson's River of Dark Dreams
  • Shire & Knetsch "Ambivalence in the Settler Colonial Present: The Legacies of Jacksonian Expansion"
  • Clark & Guice, The Old Southwest, 1795–1830: Frontiers in Conflict.
  • Belko, William S., ed. (2010). America's Hundred Years' War: U.S. Expansion to the Gulf Coast and the Fate of the Seminole, 1763–1858
  • Tohopeka: Rethinking the Creek War and the War of 1812.
  • Nooe, F. Evan (2024). Aggression and Sufferings: Settler Violence, Native Resistance, and the Coalescence of the Old South
  • Ostler, Jeffrey (2019). Surviving Genocide: Native Nations and the United States from the American Revolution to Bleeding Kansas
  • Dupre, Daniel S. (1997). Transforming the Cotton Frontier: Madison County, Alabama, 1800–1840
  • Unser, Daniel H. (September 1985). "American Indians on the Cotton Frontier: Changing Economic Relations with Citizens and Slaves in the Mississippi Territory". The Journal of American History
all make an ultimately coherent argument that Jackson's Indian wars and presidential removal policy were part of a for-profit imperialist project benefiting slave-owning white land speculators, many of whom were Jackson's long-time allies. jengod (talk) 20:26, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
review of Remini (1979): "Interest in land speculation was a second factor that Remini says influenced Jackson's thoughts about the Indians. Jackson viewed speculation as the quickest path to financial success and social advancement. As the author indicates, land fever shaped negative American attitudes toward Indians, and 'Jackson contracted the fever.' By blocking the establishment of new white communities, the southern tribes impeded the security of the frontier as well as the acquisition of wealth and status by speculators."
Plus paternalism (we're here to help) and security concerns (risk of scalping is admittedly scary).
Link: https://www.jstor.org/stable/42625961 jengod (talk) 20:52, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
+1 While it's easy to take issue with some of jengod's tone, and I would personally say much of this otherwise, I think getting caught up in that is a distraction (and Jackson is too dead to be hurt by it) and that the frustration is understandable. The basic conclusion that Jackson's Indian wars and presidential removal policy were part of a for-profit imperialist project benefiting slave-owning white land speculators, many of whom were Jackson's long-time allies is sound. As said in Daniel Walker Howe's What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815–1848—part of the renowned Oxford History of the United States series that synthesizes the best of current academic scholarship (and What Hath God Wrought is often considered one of the series' best books)—"Jacksonian Democracy" was less about the lofty ideals that men like Schlesinger projected onto it and much more about the extension of white supremacy across the North American continent through colonialism and chattel slavery (357). Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 20:53, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
I think @Rjensen is wrong to object on substance here. This is about the structure of the last sentence of the first paragraph. I believe the suggested change (linked here because it's so far up in comment chain) more appropriately contextualizes Jackson in American History as neutrally as possible, and specifies the big-picture policies previously hinted at (e.g.

forced removal of Native Americans became know as the Trail of Tears

instead of

his racist policies, particularly regarding Native Americans

). Three of the sources @Jengod cited are already in the article, and can be expounded upon and/or the other sources can be added there. Ryanjackson10 (talk) 21:07, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
Is your argument that Jackson's policies do not qualify as racist under the definition of racism or that his racism was unexceptional relative to ______ and therefore the article gives it undue weight in the lede? jengod (talk) 21:32, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
well let's start with jengod's first source: Chethem. To quote Mark Cheathem in Journal of American Ethnic History January, 2021 p 121 : [Jacksonian Democrats] "considered their party the only one representing diversity. In their view, the Democratic Party was a 'big-umbrella' institution, bringing in devotees of different ethnicities, religions, and sectional identities—as long as they were white men." Racism is there in support of democracy, diversity and national unity (not so much big business profits). Rjensen (talk) 21:43, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
I think the term "forced removal of Native Americans" does the same legwork as the term "racist" while remaining as matter-of-fact as possible and specifying where needed. My critique is a structural (possibly tonal?) one, not a definitional or historiographical one. Ryanjackson10 (talk) 21:44, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
on jengod cite #2 Burstein emphasizes Jackson's wild and rowdy youth, which is true enough, but the scholarly consensus is that by the late 1820s he had a much more mature personality and collaborated and made compromises. Reviewer Donald B. Cole says Burstein, "exaggerates the violent frontier characteristics in Jackson's personality and overlooks certain, more stable traits--firmness, courage, idealism, shrewdness, even occasional indecision and willingness to compromise--that came to the fore during his presidency.... On the two major issues of the day--nullification and the Bank of the United States--politics as well as political and economic ideas trumped passion." [H-Net Reviews June 2003]. Rjensen (talk) 22:29, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
Fair enough @Rjensen--criminal menopause comes for us all I suppose.
@Ryanjackson10 what are the chances we'd all agree that racist has the savor of eugenicist physiognomy schemes, which did not particularly compel Jackson, whereas white supremacist acknowledges Jackson's role in the perpetuation of the racialized national caste system established in the antebellum 19th century? I'm just hopefully spitballing I suppose. jengod (talk) 22:39, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
Jengod #3 Whitney Snow's paper outline's Jackson;s early years in the slave trade; does not discuss his politics; Jengod #4 Blaakman's Speculation Nation has only a few sentences on Jackson [eg "Jackson and his successors created a modern bureaucracy devoted to displacing Native nations from their homelands."] the book emphasizes the major historic decision for Indian removal took place many decades before then during the Revolution era. What I'm finding is that the sources are not supporting his rhetoric. Rjensen (talk) 22:51, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
Jefferson to Jackson, 1803: "will also open an asylum for these unhappy people, in a country which may suit their habits of life better than what they now occupy, which perhaps they will be willing to exchange with us: and to our posterity it opens a noble prospect of provision for ages."
yes removal was the plan in from beginning but in addition to Jackson running wars and bullying tribes into treaties throughout the 1810s and 1820s, he's literally stocking the land offices with his pals:
  • John Brahan serves in Jackson's 1812 militia and then after the "Chickasaw Purchase" gets appointed to the Huntsville land office and embezzles $89,000 from the feds while trying to beat the Georgia syndicate buying up all the land. All of Jackson's friends, including John Hutchings (slave trader) and John Coffee move to northern Alabama because that's where they got plantations CHEAP!
  • The Chickasaw Cessions of 1816 and 1818 immediately benefit Jackson and John Overton (judge) who lay out Memphis. You can argue that the Chickasaw were treated fairly (meh) but the beneficiaries are clear, white land speculators turn a profit and resell to other white men to grow cotton with black slaves
  • Archibald Yell is with Jackson at the First Seminole War, is accused of being one of 4 men clubbing a doctor in 1828 for electioneering against Jackson, and then is appointed to the federal land office in Arkansas in 1831 under Pres. Jackson.
The whole thing is a textbook cabal. Jackson's fights in his youthful frontier days are with other land speculators and slave traders--they're gangs of speculators beefing over turf! Joseph Erwin, the McNairys, Sevier, Blount, Wilkinson, Burr, they're all land speculators! They're mildly treason-curious if they think they can get away with it. Mostly they need more more more because it's a speculative bubble.
“For Jackson, the problem of asserting United States sovereignty in the Mississippi Valley and that of subjugating the population contained within the nation’s supposed borders were indissoluble aspects of each other. Not for the last time in the history of the United States, national security and white supremacy were synthesized into state policy and military violence...By the time he was done, Andrew Jackson had added over 100 million acres to the public domain of the United States. The Native civilizations of the Southeast had been destroyed, resettled in “Indian Territory,” the very name of which bespoke the forcible transformation of sovereign nations into racial subjects. All but a handful of tribal “leaders” who cooperated with the government (or, to put it more charitably, saw the writing on the wall and cut the best deal they could) experienced the cognitive dislocation and physical suffering generally associated with the term “ethnic cleansing”; tens of thousands died in the process. By 1840, the homelands of the Choctaw, the Chickasaw, the Creek, the Seminole, and the Cherokee had, through the military power and legal authority of the United States of America, been converted into a vast reserve for the cultivation of whiteness.”
— River of Dark Dreams: Slavery and Empire in the Cotton Kingdom by Walter Johnson jengod (talk) 23:18, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
I'm not so much concerned with the connotation of the adjectives as I am the adjectives themselves. "The forced removal of Native Americans" is the actual thing Jackson did. "His racist policies towards Native Americans" is an abstracted version.
In abstracting it you're naturally forced to "up the temperature" of the adjective to get the same point across, e.g. forced removal to racist policy Ryanjackson10 (talk) 22:55, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
"Forced removal of a [specific race or ethnicity]" sounds text racist to me.
"Forced migration of a [different specific race or ethnicity] to do forced labor" also seems racist.
jengod (talk) 23:21, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
Exactly. Describing the actual policy does the legwork without abstraction. Show, don't tell. Ryanjackson10 (talk) 23:26, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
Ok well we can show that he regularly bought 12 year old black children to resell for exploitation by strangers. Is it an "abstraction" to call him a pimp? Or is it just a kind of vulgar way to say the same thing as "slave trader"?
Who are we trying to protect from the information that Jackson was an absolute towering inferno of fear and hate by removing the word racist? He was frantic his entire life to show us and assure of this fact!
We can both show and tell, and I would argue that it is our testamentary duty according to the principles of this encyclopedia that we do so. jengod (talk) 23:45, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
If we were including that in the opening paragraph, it would more appropriate to say

A slave trader, Jackson regularly purchased adolescent black children for resale into exploitation on the slave market

rather than something like

A slave trader, Jackson was criticized as a pimp for his practices regarding adolescent black children

I use slave trader in both because that's a title or designation, and is appropriately in the article already.
We should be specific where necessary and be as about the facts as we can. When a reader sees the forced removal of an ethnic group, or the selling of children into slavery, they can see that it's racist, or pimpish. We shouldn't simply tell them that it is because we're abstracting. Ryanjackson10 (talk) 00:09, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

RyanJackson10 I saw you mentioned, then struck out a reference implying the lead was referencing A People's History of the United States. Though you struck it out, I want to make it clear that the language in this section was not chosen by such a decision. (Though it may have been playing in the back of some of the editors' mind.) It is the summary of a number of debates running through the old Jackson archives. A compromise between different views and yet creating that balance of Jackson's positive and negative legacy. I think it is important to remember that the lead reflects the article and its focus. that final sentence is a summary of Jackson's legacy as discussed in the article.

To get a sense of the different voices involved crafting the lead, please take a look at the following.

If you take a look at the discussions above, you will see his impact on Native Americans. As jengod (who was not involved in the early discussions linked above or the FAR) points out, Jackson's legacy on Native American in the Southeastern United States is a large part of his legacy. It far exceeds his role as president. This includes and precedes his acts as president, both as military leader, state representative and private speculator. Take a look at the article to get a sense of the size of his impact. And Jackson's Native American legacy is not limited just to the Cherokee trail of tears, but involves treaties starting from The treaty of Fort Jackson that wound up displacing Native Americans from over 3/5ths of Alabama, 2/3 of Mississippi, more than 1/4 of Tennessee, and significant parts of Georgia and Florida. The specific treaties are all referenced in the main article. Wtfiv (talk) 02:53, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

It was in response to a user requesting jengod for her sources, not the article writ large. I struck it out because it was a sideways shot meant to minimize her depth of research, and was therefore uncalled for.
I’ll take a look at these. Thanks. Ryanjackson10 (talk) 03:19, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

Further up this thread, jengod and Ryanjackson10 talk about listing specific policies versus referring to them more abstractly through a characterization. Wtfiv gets at why only referring to Indian Removal isn't sufficient (having been a general and politician before the presidency, Jackson's policies toward Native Americans included more than his presidential actions). As for the place of 'abstracting', I'm inclined to agree with jengod that this is a case where it's possible and appropriate to both show and tell. Earlier this year I created the Des Moines speech article, about an antisemitic speech Charles Lindbergh delivered in 1941. The article could hypothetically have stuck to being 'about the facts' and just described the things Lindbergh accused Jews of and let the readers draw their own conclusion that the speech was antisemitic—but that would kind of be leaving an obvious question unanswered, wouldn't it? When Lindbergh's contemporaries and historians after him have called the Des Moines speech antisemitic, it would be weird for the article to not include that kind of 'abstract' description. Likewise, both contemporaries and later historians of Jackson have characterized his policies as racist and/or white supremacist. Plus, while it's true we can't over-explain every potentially unfamiliar detail, Wikipedia's wide readership means some of our readers are learning things for the first time. A reader of the Des Moines speech might not already know which of Lindbergh's remarks were antisemitic dog whistles; a reader of Andrew Jackson might not yet know that the power dynamic between the United States and certain Indigenous nations created a context in which particular policies and rhetorics of his were, in the assessment of contemporaries and reliable retrospective scholars, racially charged/racially prejudiced/unjustly racially differential etc. There are times, then, when telling has a place. Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 22:19, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

RfC

hey so this shouldn't even be an RfC, sorry for wasting your time, but I've been arguing with this one editor, so if you're not busy, well this editor wants "Jackson's legacy is controversial. He has been praised as an advocate for working Americans and preserving the union of states, and criticized for his racist policies, particularly towards Native Americans." And I'm just confused because no other politician, no other president of the United States of America or any other country has public opinion of them on the very first paragraph of their article. Yeah he was racist, most early presidents were, he lived hundreds of years ago lol. George Washington was a slave owner, gonna mention he was racist in the first paragraph of his article? No. Some argue he's more controversial so that's why his page is like that. Hitler is controversial. His article doesn't say "He is viewed negatively because he killed 6 million Jews" it just says "he killed six million jews." Even though I disagree, we can still add he was racist, I just wanna remove "His legacy is controversial for being racist" and "he was praised" because public opinion is more about people's views on the president than the president himself. And both separate additions of this article probably count as biased editing. DisneyGuy744 (talk) 20:14, 25 January 2025 (UTC)

Andrew Johnson

The hatnote "not to be confused with Andrew Johnson" has been added, removed, re-added etc. several times. There was a (now archived) matching discussion on Talk:Andrew Johnson which didn't reach a consensus. My opinion is such a hatnote is desirable: they're both US presidents in the 1800s, both named Andrew J***son, so they could be easily confused by people who aren't familiar with US presidents (that is, many of our readers, especially those outside the US). If a consensus is reached on this, we should consider adding an invisible comment "do not add/remove hatnote" to the source page to discourage any further reversions. 🦬 Beefaloe 🦬 07:43, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

I absolutely think it should be included. The confusion is *extremely* common amongst students and English language learners, witness:
  • "Did Andrew Jackson get impeached?". homework.study.com. Archived from the original on 2024-12-02. Retrieved 2024-11-30.
  • "Andrew Johnson: Impeached". learningenglish.voanews.com. Archived from the original on 2023-07-22. Retrieved 2024-11-30.
At one point Donald Trump said something about Andrew Jackson that was so weird that when absolutely bewildered professional historians were asked to explain it they thought possibly he confused Jackson and Johnson although that didn't really make sense either. Gunter, Joel (2017-05-01). "Civil War historians take on Trump". BBC News. Retrieved 2024-11-30.
Wikipedia is globalpedia not Americapedia and this is a service business non-profit organization. IMHO, we gotta imagine everyone is an 8th grader trying to write a report on a president they've barely ever heard of before and/or some nice lady in Ankara, Turkey who is just trying to figure out what that news story was referring to. jengod (talk) 20:18, 31 December 2024 (UTC)

Resource for Jackson writers

Just FYI, I created an index of portraits of Andrew Jackson.

Some unsolicited amateur art criticism (free of charge!):

  • EARL: Ralph E. W. Earl is a goddamn terrible artist. It's not just that he's primitive-vernacular-rustic, it's that he created anti-art such as is found in 1982 motel rooms and is produced in oil-painting sweatshops for resale through Temu and Alibaba. The Nathan Wheeler is also primitive-vernacular-rustic, and it is patently ridiculous and it has thus often been the basis for Jackson caricature, and most scholars commenting are like "Uh...maybe he was trying to show Jackson was gaunt because of riding around a lot during the war?...?" but the Wheeler is by far a superior oil painting (and painted portrait specifically!) to any image of Jackson that Earl ever made. Earl's portraits of the "Old Hero" are vapid, dead-eyed voids actually sucking meaning out of the universe. I personally think we should avoid all of them because they are propagandistic (he was Jackson's nephew by marriage among other things), and because they are trash. That said (to my eye at least), the least horrifying of the batch are:
    • the Jockey Club portrait
    • the equestrian portrait because at least the horse, Sam Patch, has something to say
    • Tennessee Gentleman
    • Farmer Jackson
  • SULLY: Of the three extant Sullys, the 1845 that is the basis for the USD$20 is by far the best; they say it's unfinished bc Sully just never got back to it but I personally suspect an intentional homage to Stuart's Athenaeum Portrait of Washington
  • LONGACRE: Longacre's engraving work is all very good—and flattering of Jackson, if you're into that kind of thing! If there was an oil painting version of the 1829 "from life" engraving, I imagine it would be the portrait of Jackson
  • WHAT DID ANDREW JACKSON LOOK LIKE? The truest non-photographic likenesses, IMHO, never having met Mr. Jackson myself:
    • Colonizer era
      • Rembrandt Peale
      • Waldo, especially the first one (notice the subtle smoothing in the face over the series)
      • Jouett contemplative side profile
    • Presidential era
      • Longacre engraving, 1829
    • Post-presidential era
      • Kellogg
      • Marchant
  • DAGUERREOTYPES
    • The first daguerreotype is an absolutely legendary photographic portrait. ART.
    • The second set are notable for being made roughly two months before AJ's death.
  • HONORABLE MENTION: The 1830s Hubard has a bizarre but compelling haunted-house-Miss-Havisham vibe that I suspect is quite authentic; this painting is weird AF but also warrants our attention.

Collecting these was a very interesting tour through American art! The list was intended to be of use to future Jackson-content creators so I wanted to let you all know it was there.

Happy new year and warm regards to you all! jengod (talk) 21:02, 31 December 2024 (UTC)

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