The presidential election of 2024 gave voice to voter frustration. Donald Trump ran against the Establishment and is credited with addressing the needs of the everyday voter in contrast to Democrat elitism.
The United States has been at this crossroads before with Andrew Jackson. If he succeeds in his plans, Trump may well usher in a seminal political realignment reminiscent of what came to be known as Jacksonian Democracy.
Nearly 100 years ago, in 1828, Andrew Jackson was elected president after losing an election to John Quincy Adams in 1824. That 1824 loss left Jackson embittered by what he called a "Corrupt Bargain" between Washington, D.C., insiders, namely Henry Clay and Adams.
Henry Clay was a D.C. fixture. He served as one of the most powerful speakers of the House of Representatives in history.
Adams, of course, was the son John Adams, the second president of the United States.
Clay ran for president in 1824 as did Andrew Jackson and Adams. When none of the candidates obtained the required number of Electoral College votes, the election was thrown into the House of Representatives.
Clay threw his support to Adams and otherwise helped to ensure his victory over Andrew Jackson whom Clay thought unfit for the office.
In victory, Adams made Clay his Secretary of State — at the time, an office of greater esteem than Vice President and the entrée to running for president in the future, which Clay did.
Jackson, who had won the popular vote, and his supporters dubbed that reward of an appointment a "Corrupt Bargain." Jackson was so incensed by the insider deal that he resigned his U.S. Senate seat and left Washington, D.C., for his home in Tennessee.
But that was not the last of Jackson. For the next four years, the fierce soldier and commander from the battlefields relentlessly took his political fight to John Quincy Adams and the Washington, D.C., elites.
Jackson started a new party — ironically called the Democratic Party. In 1825, more than three years before the next election, Jackson had the Tennessee legislature nominate him for president.
Jackson's bid to defeat John Quincy Adams in 1828 was made easy by the ineffectual Adams, who famously said in his First Annual Message to Congress (now the State of the Union), "We are palsied by the will of our constituents."
Then and now that was seen as an elitist sneer at the voters whose needs he was said to ignore in favor of the D.C. elites.
In opposition, Jackson cast himself as the guardian of rights of the common man against the elites — stating that "the voice of the people ... must be heard."
In his First Annual Message to Congress Jackson further stated:
"Corruption in some and in others a perversion of correct feelings and principles divert government from its legitimate ends and make it an engine for the support of the few at the expense of the many."
Voter participation surged under the populist Jackson, so much so that the historian William MacDonald would opine that Jackson "made middle class democracy what it had never been before in the United States, a working scheme of government."
Jackson won reelection in 1832 and his party, the Democrats, won the election of 1836.
In the 1930s, Franklin Delano Roosevelt did much the same en route to three straight presidential victories and then Democratic control of the House of Representatives for 38 straight years.
It rather appears we have arrived at that Jacksonian moment again — the common man against the elites with the former championed by a fiery populist.
Echoes of those Jacksonian sentiments have dominated Donald Trump's political tenure. From his famed mantra of "drain the swamp" to his call to end taxation of Social Security and tips, Trump is almost singularly focused as a politician and as a president on the support of the many at the expense of the Establishment few.
And the voters have responded.
The 2024 election saw Latino voters, young voters, Black voters and more abandon the Democratic Party in record numbers because the Democratic Party was no longer the Party of Andrew Jackson — with Republicans in control of the House, the Senate, and the Presidency.
Of course, realignments take more than a single election. They often require political promises to be converted to legislative victories followed by economic success for voters.
Trump's plans are to restore the economic fortunes of middle class at the expense of the political Establishment. If successful, Trump could turn the 2024 voting results into a realignment as large as Andrew Jackson before him.
Tom Del Beccaro is an acclaimed author, speaker and national columnist. Tom makes over 400 radio and TV appearances per year, nationally and globally. He's heard and seen by millions, inclusive of Newsmax. Mr. Del Beccaro is the former Chairman of the California GOP and a former U.S. Senate Candidate. His is the author of the book, "The Divided Era." His acclaimed new book, "The Lessons of the American Civilization," tells the story of the rise of the American civilization and societal changes it faces today, along with lessons for America's future.