The alliance with the
Calhoun forces was kept up, although it was already jeopardized by the
feeling of the South Carolinian's friends that they, and not Jackson's
friends, should lead in the coming campaign. After a good deal of
hesitation the supporters of Crawford came over also. Van Buren
coquetted with the Adams forces for a year, and the old-line
Republicans, strong in the Jeffersonian faith, brought themselves to
the support of the Tenneseean with difficulty; but eventually both
northern and southern wings of the Crawford contingent alined
themselves against the Administration. The decision of Van Buren
brought into the Jackson ranks a past master in party management, "the
cleverest politician in a State in which the sort of politics that is
concerned with the securing of elections rather than fighting for
principles had grown into a science and an art." By 1826 the Jackson
forces were welded into a substantial party, although for a long time
their principles involved little more than hostility to Adams and
enthusiasm for Jackson, and they bore no other designation than
Jackson men.
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