Presidential elections were held in the United States from October 26 to December 2, 1824. Andrew Jackson, John Quincy Adams, Henry Clay and William Crawford were the primary contenders for the presidency. The result of the election was inconclusive, as no candidate won a majority of the electoral vote. In the election for vice president, John C. Calhoun was elected with a comfortable majority of the vote. Because none of the candidates for president garnered an electoral vote majority, the U.S. House of Representatives, under the provisions of the Twelfth Amendment, held a contingent election. On February 9, 1825, the House voted (with each state delegation casting one vote) to elect John Quincy Adams as president.
The Democratic-Republican Party had won six consecutive presidential elections and by 1824 was the only national political party. However, as the election approached, the presence of multiple viable candidates resulted in there being multiple nominations by the contending factions, signaling the splintering of the party and an end to the Era of Good Feelings, as well as the First Party System.
Adams won New England, Jackson and Adams split the mid-Atlantic states, Jackson and Clay split the Western states, and Jackson and Crawford split the Southern states. Jackson finished with a plurality of the popular vote (there was no popular vote in six states including New York, the most populous state), and also of the electoral vote (due to the Three-fifths Compromise), while the other three candidates each finished with a significant share of the votes. Clay, who had finished fourth, was eliminated. Adams was the first son of a former president to become president.
This is one of two presidential elections (along with the 1800 election) that have been decided in the House. It is also one of five elections in which the winner did not achieve at least a plurality of the national popular vote and the only election in which the candidate who received the most electoral votes from the Electoral College did not win the election. It is also, to date, the election with the lowest popular vote percentage for an elected president (32.7%).
Background
The Era of Good Feelings, associated with the administration of President James Monroe, was a time of reduced emphasis on political party identity. With the Federalists discredited, Democratic-Republicans adopted some key Federalist economic programs and institutions. The economic nationalism of the Era of Good Feelings that would authorize the Tariff of 1816 and incorporate the Second Bank of the United States portended abandonment of the Jeffersonian political formula for strict construction of the Constitution, limited central government, and primacy of Southern slaveholding interests.
An unintended consequence of wide single-party identification was reduced party discipline. Rather than political harmony, factions arose within the party. Monroe attempted to improve discipline by appointing leading statesmen to his Cabinet, including Secretary of State John Quincy Adams of Massachusetts, Secretary of the Treasury William H. Crawford of Georgia, and Secretary of War John C. Calhoun of South Carolina. General Andrew Jackson of Tennessee led high-profile military missions. Only House Speaker Henry Clay of Kentucky held political power independent of Monroe. He refused to join the cabinet and remained critical of the administration.
Two key events, the Panic of 1819 and the Missouri crisis of 1820, influenced and reshaped politics. The economic downturn broadly harmed workers, the sectional disputes over slavery expansion raised tensions, and both events plus other factors drove demand for increased democratic control. Social disaffection would help motivate revival of rivalrous political parties in the near future, though these had not yet formed by the time of the 1824 election.
Nominations
Candidates who withdrew before election
The previous competition between the Federalist Party and the Democratic-Republican Party collapsed after the War of 1812 due to the disintegration of the Federalists' popular appeal. President James Monroe of the Democratic-Republicans was able to run effectively unopposed in the 1820 election. Like previous presidents who had been elected to two terms, Monroe declined to seek re-nomination for a third term. The presidential nomination was thus left wide open within the Democratic-Republican Party, the only remaining major national political entity.
During the first year of Monroe's second term, it was said that 17 names had been mentioned as possible candidates, although formal nominations did not occur until late December. Among these possible candidates, William H. Crawford was seen as the most formidable, with many observers anticipating that John Quincy Adams would be his primary rival, and Henry Clay regarded as a likely outside contender. Crawford, a native of the Georgia frontier, was physically imposing and a powerful political figure. He was the first president pro tem of the Senate to be elected continuingly and had nearly beaten Monroe for the party nomination in 1816. As Secretary of the Treasury, he had helped to reorganized the nation's finances after the War of 1812 and establish the Second Bank of the United States. As such, he came to be seen as the treasury candidate.
Crawford cultivated a strong base of support for the nomination, especially among influential political figures who could manage the congressional caucus and had, in the words of William Lowndes, his own "Organized Party" (the Old Republicans). Opponents accused him of consolidating power through the Tenure of Office Act of 1820, which required financial officeholders to be reappointed every four years. In creating a web of support among self-interested agents, Crawford became a man suspected of deliberately contriving his own election, something feared by all others. Despite these accusations, his supporters believed that he was not the conniving, maneuvering self-seeker his rivals branded him to be. It is impossible to know for certain, however, as little of his personal correspondence survives.
Calhoun and Lowndes
The first people to be publicly nominated as candidates were Calhoun and Lowndes. Calhoun had been clashing with Crawford since the spring of 1820, when the latter began a retrenchment campaign in response to the Panic of 1819. Calhoun and his partisans viewed the effort as designed to emasculate the Department of War and discredit its secretary, especially as Congress failed to pass similar proposed reductions in the civil list.
Calhoun, up until this point a staunch nationalist, shared many policy positions with Adams. Though claiming to prefer Adams, he feared that Adams could not defeat Crawford in the Southern and Middle states. Therefore, it fell upon him to challenge the assumption that Crawford was the favorite of the Southeast, hopefully defeating Crawford and his radicals. Overestimating his popularity, Calhoun believed that he could build a solid core of support by appealing to the economic interests of the two most powerful states, New York and Pennsylvania, and by consolidating his home base in the Southeast. In particular, he focused on Pennsylvania, where he made relations with the Family Party—a group of young Republican politicians in Philadelphia, led by George M. Dallas and Samuel D. Ingham, who opposed the state's Republican leaders that favored Crawford. In December, he was apparently nominated by the faction, and later that month, a group of congressmen, mainly from Pennsylvania, called on him in Washington and formally invited him to become a candidate, which he accepted after "some hesitation."
Before the nomination, he had informed Lowndes of his intention to run for president early in his stay at Calhoun's residence in Washington, which began in December 1821. Lowndes, while having spoken positively of the other men, assured Calhoun he preferred his election. However, during Lowndes' journey to Washington, and without his knowledge, lowcountry moderates in the South Carolina legislature made an unprecedented move by attempting to nominate Lowndes. This effort was led by James Hamilton Jr., the Charleston delegation, and others from the tidewater parishes and Middle District counties east of the Broad River. They called a caucus of the legislature, which met in the hall of representatives on December 18, with about 2/3 of both houses in attendance. Opposition to the motion consisted primarily of upcountry partisans of Calhoun who, caught off guard, argued for delay, declaring the proposal premature and condemning the very idea that a single small state should attempt to name a president for the whole nation. While recognizing Calhoun's credentials, Lowndes' supporters argued that he was a more nationally prominent figure who would be more acceptable to citizens across the country. The motion to recommend Lowndes for president narrowly passed, 58 to 54, embarrassing Calhoun's campaign.
The two men agreed not to alter their plans. Calhoun would enter the race as planned, while Lowndes would neither decline the nomination nor encourage an active campaign on his behalf, but follow the course dictated by his health. As this would most likely result in a voyage abroad, effectively removing Lowndes from further consideration, the difficulty presented by his nomination would be resolved, and supporters could transfer their backing to Calhoun. Despite this, his supporters remained insistent on his candidacy and encouraged him to stay. Lowndes died on October 27, 1822, en route to a recuperative visit to England. The next month the legislature transferred their nomination to Calhoun. Later, in February 1824, Dallas gave his support to Jackson's presidential campaign, with Calhoun as his running mate.
Clinton, King, Thompson, and Tompkins
While Republicans in Northern states wished to support a man of their own, many were reluctant to rally behind Adams. By early 1823, critics among his supporters complained that Adams was "too fastidious and reserved," failing to engage in the political collaboration expected of a leader. They argued that presidents were no longer chosen purely on merit but rather through the influence of politicians and newspapers. His perceived "indifference" simply served to "chill and depress the kind feeling and fair exertions of his friends."
Rather than endure such a leader, many potential supporters began searching for an alternative Northern candidate, though this effort ultimately proved fruitless. Rufus King was too old and also unwilling. Vice President Daniel D. Tompkins had long-since been dismissed as a viable successor to Monroe due to a combination of health problems and a financial dispute with the federal government, and he formally ruled himself out of making a presidential run at the start of 1824. Secretary of the Navy Smith Thompson, believing his New York ties might make him a viable option, delayed accepting a seat on the U.S. Supreme Court for eight months before being persuaded that he stood no chance of the presidency. Clinton, while having been supported by a small minority for president in 1820, suffered from the memory of his past involvements with Federalists, and in 1822 had become too electorally weak to compete, let alone win New York presidentially against the state's political machine.
State legislative nominations
The Niles' Weekly Register, reporting on Washington politics in its January 26, 1822, issue, reported the names of Calhoun, Thompson, Clinton, Lowndes, Tompkins, Adams, Clay, and Crawford as being put forth as candidates. The newspaper also reported that "one or two others are casually spoken of" but did not identify them. Lowndes' nomination had sparked intense speculation in Washington during the first week of the new year, concerned with the ramifications of the way Lowndes had been nominated. In a letter to his wife, Lowndes stated, "The House is in terrible confusion. I thought when I came here that the question was in fact confined to two persons Mr Crawford and Mr Adams. Now we have all the Secretaries and at least two who are not secretaries named..."
That year, Kentucky and Missouri legislature caucuses nominated Clay, and Tennessee nominated Jackson. In January 1823, a meeting of Ohio legislators approved resolutions naming Clay. In early 1823, the legislatures of Massachusetts and Maine stated a preference for Adams but did not make a formal nomination, as they wished to ensure party unity nationwide. In January 1824, a caucus in the Mississippi legislature divided evenly between supporting Adams and Jackson. In Rhode Island, the "State Junta" initially committed itself in early 1824 to supporting the caucus candidate but soon realized they could not sway public opinion against Adams. Consequently, they refrained from pressing for Crawford out of fear of jeopardizing their state ticket. In early 1824, the Connecticut legislature nominated Adams. In March 1824, a state party convention at Harrisburg nominated Jackson. In June 1824, the New Hampshire legislature nominated Adams.
The legislatures of Maine, New York, Virginia, and Georgia were in favor of the Congressional nominating caucus.
Congressional nominating caucus
While not always popular, in past elections the party had relied on a congressional caucus, sometimes referred to as the "King Caucus," to nominate their presidential candidates, a process that had consistently succeeded in identifying the party favorite. Now, however, there was no certainty that the caucus would work again. Proponents, many of whom supported William H. Crawford, argued that it was essential for maintaining the stability of the republic and ensuring party unity on the presidential question. Opponents, including some of Crawford's own supporters, criticized the process as limiting the people's choice and effectively predetermining the outcome of the popular election.