ANDREW JACKSON, His Life and Times, H.W. Brands 2005. This 560 page biography, with small print, may not be for the faint of heart. However, to understand this pivotal American leader sheds light both on where we've been and where we are today. Abraham Lincoln was his successor as a president of the people. Many of the issues with which Lincoln had to deal were becoming manifest in Jackson's time. Jackson truly understood that the foundations of democracy were the ordinary people.
I thought this quote captured some of what Jackson might say to us today. "The mass of the people have more to fear from combinations of the wealthy and professional classes---from an aristocracy which through the influence of riches and talents, insidiously employed, sometimes succeeds in preventing political institutions, however well adjusted, from securing the freedom of citizens." p. 498
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