>> the populists did NOT come around until the 1880s out of the Grange movement. Jackson “appealed to the common man” vs. the elites would be accurate, but there was no such thing as “populist” in 1828 <<
OK, so we can just call Jackson the first successful “commoner” candidate, as long as we specify that he was not the “great” commoner. Works for me!
>> Lee Benson showed . . . it wasn’t until 1840 that a true economic vote occurred that might be called a vote of the “common man.” <<
With New York as a test case, right? Certainly an interesting hypothesis, even tho’ at 1st glance it strikes me as verging on Beardish economic determinism. But I’d need to study his methodology to make a professional judgment. And by the way, one has gotta wonder how the paradigm holds up for all the other states that year?
Anyway, Harrison and/or his Whig puppet masters sure did pull off a fast one in 1840, appealing to the “common man” even though WHH was the wealthy scion of Virginia planters — not mention his having another wealthy VA planter scion as his running mate. Sorta like Donald Trump having another reality TV celebrity, like a member of the Hilton Clan, for his veep nominee?
You sound like you bought into the Schlesinger (liberal-to-marxist) interpretation of the "Age of Jackson." The truth is, Jackson was Van Buren's second choice behind William Crawford of Georgia (a wealthy planter) to premiere in his new Democrat Party.
Van Buren, as I have written in Seven Events that Made America America created a new political party to challenge the "Democratic/Republicans" who had pretty much started calling themselves just "Republicans" (the party of Monroe and J. Q. Adams) for one purpose only: to keep slavery out of the national debate. His idea was brilliant, if horrible. He would ask people to check their ideology at the door---either pro- or anti-slavery---and elect Democrat candidates and in return they would (depending on level of effort) be rewarded with party, then state, then national government jobs. (The "spoils system") I reiterate, the purpose of the Democrat Party AS FOUNDED was to protect and perpetuate slavery.
Crawford had a heart attack. Van Buren then had to fill in with Jackson, who in 1824 wasn't ready, nor was Van Buren's system. Adams's naming of Henry Clay as SecState allowed Van Buren and Jackson to scream "corrupt bargain," and they began running for 1828 immediately. The "common man" stuff had little to do with 1828. Rather it was a masterpiece of propaganda as Van Buren bought (yes, bought) hundreds of papers and personally named the editors to spread the Democrat word. Many still maintain the name "Democrat" in the masthead.
That's why Benson and McCormick and others were able to discover that the notion that Jackson's election represented the "common man" was a myth---one harped on constantly by Schlesinger, the most liberal of historians, and Charles Beard, the Marxist who said that in 1828 "democracy foamed perilously near the crest." Wow.
Yes, Harrison did pull one over on the Democrats. They accused him of being a lazy drunk who only wanted to stay in his log cabin and drink hard cider, so he made up thousands of little log cabins that he gave out at campaign events, and, of course, always had bottles of hard cider laying around.
As for "puppet masters," only Van Buren was that. Despite being "personally opposed" to slavery---as so many "anti-abortion" people are, he deliberately perpetuated slavery for another 30 years, although the wonderful irony is that he himself could not benefit from the system he created and was beaten by Old Tippicanoe.