Jay Cost, How Congress Lost, Part VII: The Ambiguous Legacy of Andrew Jackson

Jay Cost, How Congress Lost, Part VII: The Ambiguous Legacy of Andrew Jackson , American Enterprise Institute, May 2025.

Unlike his predecessors, President Andrew Jackson viewed himself as the voice of the people and not merely an executive who must “take care that the laws be faithfully executed” (article III, section 3). Cost argues Jackson’s power plays briefly expanded presidential power but then met with pushback. Over the long run, however, American presidents became increasingly Jacksonian.