U.S. presidential election, 1828

United States presidential election, 1828

← 1824 October 31 – December 2, 1828 1832 →
All 261 electoral votes of the Electoral College 131 electoral votes needed to win
Turnout	57.6%
Nominee Andrew Jackson John Quincy Adams Party Democratic National Republican Home state Tennessee Massachusetts Running mate John C. Calhoun Richard Rush Electoral vote 178 83 States carried 15 9 Popular vote 642,553 500,897 Percentage 56.0% 43.6%
Presidential election results map. Blue denotes states won by Jackson and Calhoun or Smith, yellow denotes those won by Adams/Rush. Numbers indicate the number of electoral votes allotted to each state.
President before election John Quincy Adams Democratic-Republican Elected President Andrew Jackson Democratic

John Quincy Adams
Democratic-Republican

Andrew Jackson
Democratic

The United States presidential election of 1828 was the 11th quadrennial presidential election, held from Friday, October 31, to Tuesday, December 2, 1828. It featured a re-match between incumbent President John Quincy Adams, and Andrew Jackson, who won a plurality of the electoral college vote in the 1824 election. With no other major candidates, Jackson and his chief ally Martin Van Buren consolidated their bases in the South and New York and easily defeated Adams. The Democratic Party merged its strength from the existing supporters of Jackson and their coalition with some of the supporters of William H. Crawford (the "Old Republicans") and Vice-President John C. Calhoun. Jackson was the first president whose home state was neither Massachusetts nor Virginia.

The Tariff of 1828, referred to by its opponents as the Tariff of Abominations, had been signed into law earlier in the year, increasing tariff rates to above 60%. Though it had narrowly passed in the House, it was unpopular with the Southern states as they imported materials and goods from abroad. Jackson and the Democrats opposed the tariff though their politiquing had made it become law, and the unpopularity of the bill led to a division of the vote into two main sections: the Northern, minority Adams vote, and the Southern, majority Jackson vote. Jackson also personally appealed to the Western states, and he carried their electoral votes as well.

The election ushered Jacksonian Democracy into prominence, thus marking the transition from the First Party System (which resulted in the ascendance of Jeffersonian Democracy) to the Second Party System. With the ongoing expansion of the right to vote to most white men, the election marked a dramatic expansion of the electorate, with 9.5% of Americans casting a vote for President, compared with 3.4% in 1824. Historians debate the significance of the election, with many arguing that it marked the beginning of modern American politics with the decisive establishment of democracy and the permanent establishment of a two-party electoral system.