Bank War

The Bank War refers to the political struggle that developed over the issue of rechartering the Second Bank of the United States (BUS) during the Andrew Jackson administration (1829–1837). Anti-Bank Jacksonian Democrats were mobilized in opposition to the national bank’s re-authorization on the grounds that the institution conferred economic privileges on financial elites, violating U.S. constitutional principles of social equality. The Jacksonians considered the Second Bank of the U.S. to be an illegitimate corporation whose charter violated state sovereignty and therefore it posed an implicit threat to the agriculture-based economy dependent upon the U.S. southern states' widely practiced institution of slavery. With the Bank charter due to expire in 1836, the President of the Bank of the United States, Nicholas Biddle, in alliance with the National Republicans under Senator Henry Clay (KY) and Senator Daniel Webster (MA), decided to make rechartering a referendum on the legitimacy of the institution in the general election of 1832.

When Congress voted to reauthorize the Bank, Jackson, as incumbent and candidate in the race, promptly vetoed the bill. His veto message justifying his action was a polemical declaration of the social philosophy of the Jacksonian movement pitting "farmers, mechanics and laborers" against the "monied interest" and arguing against the Bank’s constitutionality. Pro-Bank National Republicans warned the public that Jackson would abolish the Bank altogether if granted a second term