American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House

by Jon Meacham

Taney demurred, citing the press of business before the Supreme Court, but, given his own opposition to recharter, was pleased that Carson was so determined to vote with Jackson against the Bank. After the vote, Taney was surprised to hear that Carson had voted with Biddle. “Upon my return I mentioned what had passed to a friend … who[said]that[Carson] … had obtained a loan of twenty thousand dollars from the Bank, and had changed his opinion.” Reflecting on the sequence of events, Taney was philosophical about what had transpired, seeing in it evidence of both perennial human weakness and the threat that an institution such as the Bank posed in a democracy: Now I do not mean to say that he was directly bribed to give his vote. From the character he sustained and from what I knew of him I think he would have resented anything that he regarded as an attempt to corrupt him. But he wanted the money, and felt grateful for the favor, and perhaps thought that an institution which was so useful to him, and had behaved with so much kindness, could not be injurious or dangerous to the public, and that it would be as well to continue it. Men when under the influence of interest or passion often delude themselves thoughtlessly, and do not always acknowledge even to themselves the motives upon which they really act.… It was one of the dangers arising from this mammoth money power, that its very duties as collecting and disbursing agent brought it constantly in contact with members of ...