Selecting a Secretary of the Navy: The Andrew Jackson Way

Claude Berube

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Andrew Jackson's first choice for Secretary of the Navy was John McLean.  

Much has been written lately comparing the current administration to that of the nation’s seventh president, Andrew Jackson, as well as the mood of the nation being Jacksonian.  For example, in Robert Kaplan’s latest book, “Earning the Rockies,” the author suggests that Americans are the heirs of Jackson’s foreign policy sharing “[a belief] in honor, literal faith in God, and military institutions.”  Jackson’s presidency may be known for eliminating the national debt, the Nullification Crisis, the Petticoat Affair, and the Second Bank of the United States.  What Jackson is less known for is how he selected his Secretaries of the Navy as well as how he changed the Navy through them.

His first choice for Secretary of the Navy was John McLean.  A former member of Congress, he served on the Ohio Supreme Court as well as Postmaster General under Presidents Monroe and Quincy Adams.  During the election of 1828, he threw his support behind Jackson and was rewarded with offers of both Secretary of the Navy and Secretary of War.  Declining both, he received Jackson’s nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court just two days after the inauguration.

John Branch served as the first of Jackson’s three successive Secretaries.  A North Carolinian, he served in that state’s legislature and as its Speaker of the House before serving a three-year term as Governor.  Branch then served in the U.S. Senate until assuming his office in the administration in 1829.  Branch immediately recognized changes were required due to fiscal mismanagement and began replacing clerks from the previous administration.  He “fully believes that great abuses exist in the disbursement of public money under the rules or customs,” recalled Fourth Auditor of the Treasury Amos Kendall.  Kendall had been an editor of a pro-Jackson newspaper and proved his worth to Jackson not only regarding navy reform but throughout both terms as one of Jackson’s closest and most loyal advisers.  According to biographer Robert Remini, Jackson trusted and expected only a few individuals to report to him directly – one of those was Kendall.

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