Some writers put all the blame on Jackson for the overthrow of the old lofty ideals and standards of Federal politics, which occurred in his presidency. But Jackson, though coarse and ignorant, was not evil-minded nor intentionally unpatriotic; nor was he, even if so disposed, gifted with the power of corrupting the entire politics of the country. The mischiefs which broke out in his time were nation-wide and must have been due to a nation-wide cause. The fact is that the party of which Jackson happened to be the leader was caught in a movement, the full meaning and effect of which was unsuspected by everybody. The wash of the French Revolution had reached us and had swept manhood suffrage into our boat. Schurz says that in Jackson’s administration there was infused into the government and the whole body politic a spirit of lawlessness which outlived Jackson, and of which the demoralizing influence is felt to this day; that barbarous habits were then first introduced into the field of national affairs, and selfishness made a ruling motive in politics, resulting in a crop of corruption which startled the country. All this is true; the mistake is in ascribing to Jackson or to any one person a widespread deterioration no one man could possibly have accomplished. For such a far-reaching effect, a universal cause was needed; and that that cause was manhood suffrage no candid investigator can possibly doubt. McLaughlin in his _Life of Cass_ (p. 136) recognizes that the introduction of the spoils system in 1829 cannot be solely charged to Jackson or to Van Buren; that they were the mere conduits through which was conducted into federal politics the flood of corruption produced by other causes. But those causes he fails to specify. “It came by natural evolution ... the offices of trust were handed over to the men who brought the greatest pressure to bear, and could make plain their political influences to the scullions of the kitchen cabinet. If the student of American politics is to understand the place which the spoils system holds he must see that its introduction was a natural phase in our national development.” And he describes the brutality of “the scrambling, punch-drinking mob which invaded Washington at Jackson’s inauguration.” It needs no Sherlock Holmes, however, to tell us that the advent of this mob and their possession of the administration would not have been “a natural phase in our national development” had it not been for the specific operation of the new institution of manhood suffrage. The influences which it introduced in our political structure were favorable to the spoils system, which was popularly felt to be a proper result of the filling of all offices by vote of the masses. The _Cyclopedia of American Government_ states that the people favored the introduction of the spoils system. As Marcy said in a speech about that time, “They see nothing wrong in the rule that to the victors belong the spoils of the