THE AL SMITH DINNER AND DEMOCRATIC PARTY DINNERS

Yes, the Al Smith Dinner! But what ever happened to the Jefferson-Jackson dinners that the Dems used to celebrate? Named for a founder of the Democratic Party, Thomas Jefferson, and Andrew Jackson who reframed the party after the Era of Good Feelings, these dinners were important political rallies for the Democrats. But no more. Of course Jefferson did own slaves; and so did Jackson. And Al Smith probably opposed abortion.

Perhaps in future, the Democrats will be celebrating with the George Floyd-Sirhan Sirhan Dinners.

Hugh Murray  - You may not be aware, Sirhan Sirhan allegedly declared he did it (shot RFK Sr.) for his country.  Many were bewildered, thinking rambling of a mentally ill assassin.  But Sirhan was a Palestinian, Christian, non Muslim, but Palestinian, and not happy with Robert Kennedy's pro-Israeli policies.  Long before the attacks on the World Trade Center, a Palestinian terrorist changed the course of an American election.

FAMILY VALUES - A THREAT TO THE STATE?

In 1781 after a battle between Tories and Rebels in the Carolinas, two teens raced away into the wilderness when the insurgents lost. Eventually, home, but they were spotted by a Tory who informed the British. Soon several troops arrived at their home and began teaching these colonials what happens to rebels; they proceeded to break dishes, tear clothing, smash furniture. The mother could do nothing but watch while her small treasures were being destroyed before her eyes. Then, the captain demanded her 14-year-old kneel and clean his boots. The lad refused, the officer then raised his sword. It was coming down on the lad's head when the boy raised his hand to deflect the blade. His hand was cut to the bone, and he gained a scar on his forehead. The officer then used the bloodied blade on the 16-year-old brother of the young Andrew. Within a few days, the elder brother and the mother would die (the mother of disease), and Andrew Jackson would survive to haunt the British, especially when he defeated some of their proud veterans who had defeated Napoleon.  In 1815 these British veterans lostg to the ragtag army of volunteers, pirates, free people of color, and some regulars, all led by Andrew Jackson, who thus became the “Hero of New Orleans” and later President of the United States.

In 1381 the Ming Dynasty sought to expand into what had been Mongol territory in Yunan. An officer of the Ming encountered a lad of about 10 on the road; asked him a simple question, and received a “smart a**” answer from the kid, Zheng He. The kid was captures and between age 10 and 14 castrated. He was then sent to serve in the home of newly installed prince. In time, that prince became the new Ming Emperor, and was so impressed by the skills of Zheng, that the servant was made into an Admiral. But not just an admiral. His trips were world marvels. From China, they sailed into the South China Sea (probably the historical expedition for basing today's claims of that sea by the Peoples' Republic of China. Admiral Zheng He probably sailed on the longest wooden ships ever, the main one with 4 decks, and the fleet composed of about 30,000 men. They sailed to Indonesia, South East Asia, India, Arabia, and East Africa. They returned with exotic animals, like giraffes, herbs from the “spice islands,” and knowledge of another route west in addition to the Silk Road. Europe had nothing to compete with such a fleet at this time. By contrast, Vasco da Gama's Portuguese expedition (began 1497) had only 170 men. Columbus sailed in 1492 with 3 ships, but only 90 men. Even if the number of men on Zheng He's voyage is exaggerated, it would still dwarf those of the Europeans decades later.

The Chinese expeditions occurred from about 1400 to 1435. Soon after a new emperor rose to the throne; thought the project a waste, and decided it was more important to build defences against land enemies. He ordered the destruction of the Chinese ocean going fleet, AND the destruction of the blue prints for ths ships, so no such foolishness would occur again.  And eunuchs had considerable power in the Chinese dynasties until 1900.

There are other surprising points about these stories – on one of these major voyages, Admiral He left the command to travel to Mecca, because he was originally a good Muslim.  A major contrast – the Chinese official captured and later castrated the insolent boy. I suspect the British officer near Camden town may have willing to kill the insulant Andrew Jackson, but I doubt if he would ever think of castrating him. Why as castration used more often in one part of the civilized world, and not much at all in the other? Moreover, Zheng He, a eunuch could rise to be an Admiral, commanding 30,000 men.  That would have been unheard of in the West.

I will speculate. I see 2 major reasons for castration, 1, to have defenders of the harem who would be strong enough as fighters, but unable to impregnate the emperor's females. Harems existed not only in China but in the Arab world, and probably in most areas where there was enough wealth for an emperor to have many women. And depending on the inclinations of the emperor, there might also be a harem of men.

If a man is finally able to forge an army to topple an emperor, he become the new ruler, and his family and friends will proceed to take what they want. But there have to be people who take care of government, taxes, who can enter the border, the town, the forbidden city or the royal castle?  All kinds of issues even in early times. Family values are no good for this, because one thinks only of your family or at best, your extended family. The culmination of family values is the Mafia. An emperor may make deals with this or that powerful family, but he will also want some loyal to him. How can you get those who will be loyal to the state above the family? Get a civil service composed of those who have no family. The solution: castration. The civil service exam, and castration, and you will have a loyal civil service.

Why did the castration solution not develop in the West? Around 300 AD, Constantine defeated several traditional pagan Roman competitor emperors, and what was different, Constantine was sympathetic to  Christianity. He quickly issued a Edict of Toleration for the new religion, but in time his successors would go much further.  Many temples were converted into Christian churches, and Christians were granted various privileges. Over time, the old was changed. Without support, for example, the scribes who kept the ancient Egyptian language alive, had to find new professions, and the writings of thousands of years was lost as no one could decipher it until the 1900s. The well-to-do were discouraged from having a wooden male penis hanging near the front door, there was less support for the gladiators and the games, and animals in the coliseums.  Even the Olympic Games, so entrenched in pagan society that it determined a Greek calendar, the Olympics were banned by the Christians. After a century or 2, the new Christian Roman Empire collapsed, Rome itself fell to barbarians, and most of Europe entered the Dark Ages.

Civilization seemed to be ending in the West. Instead of an empire, there would be smaller states, but even these had certain requirement. Mere family values, Mafia values, are hardly just values. It is entirely a society of who you know, not justice.  Family was all.  Secular education and schools had come to an end. The only institution that might have books, and some of the knowledge of the past, of science, of medicine, of building, of weaponry, would be the priesthood of the Roman Catholic Church. So, in the new small states and towns, the duke, or prince, or count, or whatever title, would make a deal with the church. It would support the new state, and it would be privileged in the new state. And unlike families who might simply want to pillage the new state, steal everything they could get for their many relatives, the priests generally had no families of their own. In some ways, they were akin to eunuchs, but with balls. So Europe did not require the service of eunuchs as did China.  In the West, priests would serve the state in the role the eunuchs had in the East.

What about harems in Europe? In Christianity, even the king was allowed only one wife. And from that wife would come the heir. Now the duke might have many mistresses, but if anyone else was caught sleeping with them, he could throw them out of the castle, away from the royal court, into poverty. And even if she had a child by someone else, it would be a bastard with no claim to the thrown. Again, no need for special guards for the mistresses so no need for castration.

Ptolomy was a general of Alexander's army that changed the world. He eventually became ruler of Egypt, and he and his descendants generally adapted to traditional Egyptian customs. Not entirely for the Ptolemys did build one of the wonders of the Ancients, the lighthouse of Alexandria, and they began another wonder, the great library of Alexandria. But they wore the garb of Egyptians, and adopted many customs. Thus, brother-sister marriage occurred between the famous Cleopatra and her brother. But as rivals for the throne, it was surely worse than most bad marriages – Cleopatra with help succeeded in killing her brother before he could do the same to her. Later she had her sister murdered too. She was also a priestess of Isis.  In the Middle East for centuries, where rulers are allowed 4 legitimate wives, and can have many children, and there is no rule of first come first serve, no rule that the eldest become the heir, some of the history of that area is “survival of the fittest – or deadliest” to succeed to the throne.  Of course that can happen in the West too, but less so, with one wife, and the custom of the eldest male becoming the heir.. Prince Harry may complain about being a “spare,” but he is spared from more bloody methods of culling the royal heirs.

Both China and the West were able to create stable empires/states that depended on bureaucracies. Eunuchs and priests were initially needed to begin this building process, and sway people away from mere family values – to plunder everyone to build your family. The state has been, with good reasons, the enemy of family values. Now the question is: Has it gone too far?-------Hugh Murray

Chris, A Chinese friend, responded on 29 July 2024 to an earlier version of this in our correspondence.

This is very interesting comparative study. Some eunuchs were actually having an affair with the big man's women, in their own way. Some eunuchs only cut one ball, so they kept certain sexual functions, only lesser than an ordinary guy. Whatever the case, corruption was common among them, regardless of whether they have children. Powerful eunuchs often end up adopting a child who could carry on their family name. Even more powerful eunuchs get to decide who becomes the next emperor. So I guess greed is part of human nature. 

By the way, it's admiral Zheng. Zheng He was his full name. I didn't know he was a eunuch. Interesting. 

More from Hugh Murray.  I know of the castrati, the choir boys, who to retain their youthful voices, were castrated, but these were a small number.  There may have been a much larger number involved in the African slave trade - not to the West, but to the East, the Middle East and mainly Muslim areas, where they were castrated.  But I know little of this and suggest the reader check it out.

ANDREW JACKSON CHANGED HISTORY'S COURSE

THE STORY OF ANDREW JACKSON: 250 YEARS LATER

Series, People that Changed the Course of History (Ocala, FL: Atlantic Pub. Group, c 2016)

BY DANIELLE THORNE

Rev. by Hugh Murray

Danielle Thorne has written a short book aimed at young adults, but the question she raises in this series is one all should ponder, - “People that changed the Course of History.” 250 years after his birth, is Andrew Jackson worthy to be included in this series?

Her biography demonstrates, but should have stressed more, that our notions of the “wild West” - Texas, Montana, California, Colorado, Wyoming, those notions, those values, those battles with savages of various colors, occurred in the 'wild west' of Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, etc. Indians massacring white settlers, settlers slaughtering Indians, both sides suspicious of the other. But in the early wild West in the lands to become Tennessee and Kentucky, white men were hot headed (many still are), and a few words might be deemed an insult and a duel could, and sometimes did result. Thorne notes that seconds in duels could try to resolve the disputes, sometimes with both antagonists shooting up in the air, allowing both duelists to save face, and perhaps their lives. But sometimes the duels were resolved in blood, and Andrew Jackson nearly lost an arm (in the end, he gained a bullet in that limb), and Jackson also killed an opponent in one such duel.

Because of the many films depicting the American West our images of such gunfights at the corral or at high noon or in hundreds of other films and early popular television series, we rarely think of the same attitudes and activities occurring in the early wild west of North Carolina or Kentucky. The recurring themes lasted as long as there was a frontier. The more formal duels of Hamilton and Burr and Jackson and Charles Dickinson may have been replaced by simpler rules – or no rules, but the basic theme remained the same.

Another point was the brutalities and meanness of the wars on what is now American soil. But in the case of the British against the colonial rebels, there is the general question of how does any occupying army treat rebels who oppose them? Americans may recall TV news of American soldiers in Vietnam setting afire the huts of peasants believed to be Vietcong. Older films portray Nazi occupiers of Italy who might kill 10 or more civilians for each German soldier slain by underground resisters. Yet, it is still a shock to read how a British officer treats a teenage Andrew Jackson and his aunt Jane when the Redcoats are informed that they are a rebel household. Jackson and his aunt watch as the British broke every one of her dishes and broke every leg on her furniture. But when the officer commanded Jackson to wipe the mud from his boots, the youth refused. The officer's reply was swift – he raised his sword to slash it down on Jackson's head. The boy raised his arm to deflect the blow, suffering a deep wound to his hand, yet still receiving a swipe to the face that would leave a scar. However, in the country of occupiers, Jane's home was not burnt, she was not raped, and Andrew would live on to fight again with hatred of the British seared into his scars.

Because the author's intended audience is young adults, she will occasionally include a definition unnecessary for adults, but sometimes her writing is simply perplexing, as ,”Weatherford led that attack on the massacre on the settlement,...”(72) which could be interpreted in opposite ways, and the rest of the sentence is even more confusing. Or “At this time [the election of 1828], a candidate had to win the majority of electoral votes,...”(98) As it is still the case that a candidate must win the majority of electoral votes, her writing here is again confusing. Similarly, when discussing Jackson's problems with his Cabinet, she includes a Fast Fact telling that the President appoints the cabinet and meets with the leaders of various departments, and they consist of the “heads of ...Education, Energy, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security,...”(106) As none of these positions existed during the Jackson Presidency, why not simply list those in Jackson's Cabinet to avoid confusion?

In her discussion of the background to the outbreak of the War of 1812 Thorne totally neglects to mention that many Americans hoped to conquer Canada with the onset of the war.(84) Thorne shows a modern blinder when she writes concerning those who were clearly very religious, like Jackson, and what she perceives as the contradiction of them being both religious and slave owners. “Slavery...raised guilty questions to men in the South, like Jackson, who considered themselves religious.”(135) While many discovered in their religion grounds to condemn slavery, Thorne seems unaware that slavery is mentioned in the Bible, never condemned by Jesus, and a runaway was urged to return to his master by Paul. Many in the South (and elsewhere) saw no contradiction between slavery and Christianity.

More troubling to the modern is Jackson's views on race. During the General's appeal for support to defend New Orleans from the British, Jackson included an appeal to the Free Men of Color (and to pirates, too). He included friendly Indians in his campaign against the hostile (Creek) Red Sticks, and was happy to receive it. But when it came to removing, even the “civilized” Indians from Georgia and Alabama westward to what would become Indian Territory (today's Oklahoma), “Jackson made his feelings very clear. He called them savage and barbaric...their governments were 'crude institutions.'”(137) Thorne quotes historian Robert Remini: “Jackson believed that Indians belonged to a lower order of humanity and that the federal government had the right to deal with them as it saw fit.”(137) Thorne concludes that Jackson “felt America and the white man were more important than people of other colors.”(146)

Strangely, Thorne does not mention the very influential Age of Jackson by Arthur Schlesinger in her text or her bibliography. Of course, Thorne does recognize Jackson's importance in US history. Not only did he put together a rag-tag army in winter 1814-15 that would defeat overwhelmingly the British veterans of the Napoleonic wars, but the British outnumbered his forces 3 to 1. Yet, the British casualties were catastrophic, and included their commander, General Edward Pakenham. With the British failure to capture New Orleans, their empire lost all hope of wresting New Orleans from the US, of blocking American expansion to the Mississippi River and beyond, and of promoting further Indian resistance to American settlement and growth. Thus Jackson's victory allowed the natural thrust of American progress to swell over the mountains down the rivers and valleys and solidify. Moreover, Jackson's exploits in Florida crushed Indian resistance there and halted Anglo-Spanish schemes to disrupt the American south and southwest expansion.

Rightly hailed as a hero after his New Orleans victory, Jackson would enter national politics. One may find that Schlesinger exaggerated when he portrayed Jackson's Presidency as the New Deal of the 19^th century, but Thorne conceded he ended the era of the aristocratic Virginia dynasties.(95) Jackson roused many more Americans to enter the electorate and essentially re-create a sector of Jefferson's Democratic Republican Party as the Democratic Party. While his personality and policies were popular with a majority of the people, there were some who detested him, calling him tyrant and king. While President, a sailor slapped Jackson, and another man shot a pistol at him, but it misfired.(121)

Jackson not only created the modern Democratic Party, with his position on forced Indian resettlement and being a slave owner, it was clear he viewed America basically as a white man's country and the Democratic Party as the party of the white race. That seemed so evident that decades later, in the election of 1868, the Democrats' official campaign song included lyrics: “We are the white man's party.”

For decades Democrats honored their founders with Jefferson-Jackson Day Dinners – speeches and fundraisers. These were major annual events held throughout the country. But as “anti-racism,” and later, “anti-whitism,” became centerpieces of the post-1960s progressive Democratic Party, both Jefferson and Jackson have been lambasted as slave owners. Both are now deemed as embarrassments to many of the new Democratic Party leadership.

Finally, there is one episode that should have been included in this book. In 1840 Jackson returned to New Orleans for the 25^th anniversary of the Battle of New Orleans, and laid a corner stone for a monument. Jackson died in 1845, and in 1851 Place d'Armes was renamed Jackson Square. In 1856 an equestrian statue of Jackson was placed at the center of the Jackson Square in the New Orleans French Quarter. Several identical statues were created. However, I am convinced that the photograph of the Jackson statue in Thorne's book (133) is NOT the one in New Orleans. Moreover, during the Civil War, the Confederates were far less successful in defending New Orleans than had been Jackson, and early in the war, April 1862, the largest city of the Confederacy fell to the Union naval forces under Southern-born David Farragut. The city was occupied by Yankees, and many ladies, to show their disapproval, spit on the Union soldiers. The Yankee general in charge of the Union occupation, Benjamin Butler, then issued an order that any ladies who insulted his troops were to be treated as women of the streets (prostitutes). Reaction was swift. The author of the order was now called “Beast” Butler, vilified throughout the South and in Europe. He had also forced ships coming upriver to wait to insure they were not carrying yellow fever, and there was no epidemic during Butler's reign. Modifying them only slightly, he also added a few words by Jackson to the base of the statue in Jackson Square. During the 1830s, when John Calhoun favored nullification and there was talk of secession of states from the Union, Jackson, slave owner, strongly opposed the dissolution of the nation. And said so. His words were added to the statue during the Yankee occupation to annoy the rebels - “The Union must and shall be preserved.” (Today, the Left wing in New Orleans seeks to remove the Jackson statue.)

For a short book Thorne was able to discuss complex issues like Jackson's hostility toward the National Bank; his preference for state banks, maneuvers by politicians on both sides and the national economic consequences. Thorne explains these difficult concepts simply. She is good at condensing many topics about the growing nation during the Jackson era. One she might have elaborated – what happened to the sailor who slapped the President or to the man who tried to shoot him.

Overall, Thorne has written a short, general appraisal of why Andrew Jackson does indeed deserve to be included in this series of people who changed the course of history.

RED GUARD VS. REAL HERO

ANDREW JACKSON AND THE MIRACLE OF NEW oRLEANS

(New York: Random House Large Print Ed., c 2017)

BY BRIAN KILMEADE and DON YAEGER

Review by Hugh Murray

As New Orleans celebrates its 300thanniversary, and the 202^nd year after Andrew Jackson saved the Crescent City from the British invaders, this book is a welcome fresh breath of history and a portrait of a hero who inspired his compatriots to fend off a larger force composed of veterans who had defeated the military genius, Napoleon. This book is even more welcome today as mobs in New Orleans have demanded the removal of Jackson's statue from Jackson Square in the French Quarter. Meanwhile a politically correct, Democratic mayor, Mitch Landrieu, has already approved the removal of the General Robt. E. Lee statue from Lee Circle and the removal of other statues of military figures like Gen. P. T. G. Beauregard.

Just as Mao's Cultural Revolution in China sought to destroy the history, traditions, and memories of the past – purging libraries, temples, schools, and universities of priceless articles; indeed closing schools, sending pupils to the countryside to be “educated” by the partisan peasantry, sending teachers and professors in dunce caps to be humiliated, beaten, and sometimes killed by the thought police of the Red Guard. The same destructive impulse occurs now in America, and the media is as complicit here as it was in Mao's Red Guard China. The elementary school I attended as a child was named for the first Jew to serve in the US Senate – Judah P. Benjamin. (A Floridian might make that claim, but Sen. David Yulee had converted to Christianity.) Later, Benjamin also served various posts in the Cabinet of Pres. Jefferson Davis – the first Jew in any American Cabinet. But, as some called him “the brains of the Confederacy,” the name of the school I attended had to be changed. After 8^th grade, I went for one year to Beauregard Junior High, named for the commander who ordered the firing by Southern troops on the Union held Ft. Sumter in Charleston harbor, thus beginning what most see as the first shot in the American Civil War. I attended Beauregard for one year, and many would assert that in doing so I was exerting my “white privilege.” Perhaps those critics are right, for attending that school at the same time was another teen who would become known throughout the world, another example of white privilege, Lee Harvey Oswald. Though the building still exists, there is no longer a Beauregard School in New Orleans, and his statue, at the entrance of City Park, has disappeared by order of Mayor (or is it Mao) Landrieu.

Christopher Columbus was revered as a great hero at the anniversary of his most important voyage, celebrated in 1892, but by the 500^th anniversary in 1992 he was maligned as an embarrassment, a villain, imperialist, colonialist, racist, and genocidal exemplar of white male privilege. A man once so honored that the capital of Ohio was named for him, as was even the American capital, Washington, District of Columbia! To those who defend Columbus by maintaining, without Columbus, there would be no America, the politically correct retort is: “Precisely.” They despise Columbus BEAUSE they hate America and all it stands for. And so too George Washington, the “father of his country,” now dismissed as just another slave owner. Jefferson, chief author of the Declaration of Independence, is reviled not only as a slave owner, but as one who took sexual advantage of one of his slaves. Madison, President during the War of 1812, another slave-driver, while Andrew Jackson, was worse – a slave owner, and the President responsible for the “trail of tears,” the removal of the Indians from the Southeast. Jackson even removed the 'civilized' Indians. They were so civilized they owned slaves. After their removal to Indian Territory (now Oklahoma), during the American Civil War, many of the Indians chose to fight for the Confederacy.

When I was young the Democratic Party would have annual fund-raising dinners named Jefferson-Jackson Day Dinners. The Democrats honored a founder and “re-founder” of their party. Today, many Democratic leaders are ashamed of both Jefferson and Jackson. So it is in this period of political correctness and Red Guard destruction, that we can all appreciate the courage of writers like Kilmeade and Yaeger in resurrecting the heroic struggle of Andrew Jackson to save New Orleans from the British invaders.

Kilmeade/Yaeger describe an encounter with British occupying forces when Jackson was a teenager. Tories informed the British of the rebel sympathies of his aunt and her relatives. At one point, an officer ordered the rebel youth to clean the mud from the Briton's boots. Jackson refused. The officer drew his sword, aiming to crash it down on the teen's head. Jackson raised his arm to deflect the blow, which cut his hand deeply, and still got through to leave a scar on his head. Jackson's brother and mother would soon die in events that Jackson related to this British raid, and consequently the youth retained a fiery hatred for the British.

Jackson was scrappy, a young man of the new American southwest. He learned law by clerking, but he was like Burr and Hamilton, willing to duel for his honor. He clearly held a macho ideal. When he heard of an Indian raid (the Red Sticks) in 1813 that wiped out over 200 settlers at Ft. Mims, Alabama near Mobile, Jackson was determined on revenge. He also suspected the British were supplying weapons to the Indians in order to promote attacks upon the Americans. After Jackson and his men decisively defeated the Red Sticks at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend later that year, the Indian leader, William Weatherford, who was half Creek Indian and half Scottish, came alone to Jackson and offered his services as a defeated warrior. Jackson helped him.

When after years of British provocations, Pres. Madison and the Democratic-Republicans finally declared war on Britain in 1812, Jackson was delighted and volunteered his services. Unfortunately, the incompetent War Department generally ignored Jackson's pleas on the need to defend New Orleans, the linchpin of the future of the American West. During the War of 1812 the Americans attempted to invade and conquer Canada, and failed in 1812-13, and in 1814 the British raided the east coast, burning the American capital in Washington and nearly capturing Baltimore. In 1814 in Belgium, peace talks had begun, but there were clauses implying that whoever conquered territory at the end of the war might be able to retain it.

The British sent an expedition of thousands led by Admiral Alexander Cochrane, and General Edward Pakenham, who had won a fine reputation in battles against Napoleon and his allies in Spain and France, and who was hailed as “the hero of Salamanca.” He was also a brother-in-law to the Duke of Wellington (and Pakenham was to become governor of New Orleans, once he had taken the city).

Kilmeade's book includes over half dozen maps to follow the course of the invadsion. Meanwhile, Jackson scrambled to raise a motley crew of US regular army men, Tennessee and Kentucky Volunteers, Free People of Color from Louisiana, Jean Lafitte and his pirates, men of New Orleans society, and any others who might be recruited. Slaves were inducted to dig the trenches to defend the main line at Rodriguez Canal against possible British assault.

The British outnumbered the Americans by at least 3 to 1. Moreover, some of these same British troops had helped defeat the mighty Napoleon. By contrast, the American militia had utterly failed to defend the nation's capital in 1814, and Jackson's impromptu aggregate might run away at the first shot. But they did not. While the statistics may be only approximate, the Americans lost between a dozen and 300; the British between 1,000 and 3,000, including Gen Pakenham himself. Not only was New Orleans saved, but the British would no longer be able to supply Indians with weapons, or promote intrigue to sever Louisiana and the lands west of the Mississippi to a greater Spanish empire in North America or some other anti-American schemes. America would continue to hold the crucial port of New Orleans and new American settlers could continue to pour across the mountains, selling their goods down the Mississippi, and the American republic could continue to expand and fill the continent.

The man most responsible for this victory was Andrew Jackson. This book reminds us of what a hero he was. And if it were so easy to defend New Orleans, why did New Orleans fall so quickly to the Yankees during the Civil War? Early in the Civil War Naval Line Officer James Farragut captured New Orleans, the largest city in the Confederacy, in April 1862. Farragut was born near Knoxville, Tennessee, and resided in Virginia, but he chose to remain on the side of the Americans with the outbreak of war. After the capture of New Orleans, Yankee ships could travel up the Mississippi on longer missions. Later Farragut would become an admiral in the US Navy. The authors should have contrasted the determined and successful defense of New Orleans by Jackson with the Confederacy's loss both of its largest city and of control over the lower Mississippi to the Union invaders.

When New Orleans women gave icy welcomes to the occupying Yankee troops, preferring to spit on them, New Englander Union Gen. Benjamin Butler issued an order that such ladies were to be treated as women of the street (as prostitutes), which caused an international outburst concerning the oppressive Yankee regime. Butler responded with something else to anger the Confederates. Onto the base of the famous statue of Andrew Jackson in Jackson Square, Butler had a few words of Jackson inscribed, modifying them only slightly. Jackson was a slave owner, but in the conflict over nullification in the 1830s, Jackson defied Calhoun and the pro-secession theoreticians: “The Union must and shall be preserved.” These words Butler added that to the base of the statue, and now the Left demands the removal of the statue from Jackson Square!

As America now demotes, denigrates, and dismisses its real heroes, it has begun to replace them with a new set, a set that cannot be easily judged as politically incorrect. The Super heroes of comics and films are no longer really “American heroes.” The movies that tell their stories are shown, not only in America, but round the world, and with China's huge market, the villains can no longer be Chinese. The super heroes no longer illustrate American values, but global values. These fictional heroes are “safe.” No one will discover that they were once slave owners. No one will uncover that they once said something bad about an Amerindian, or bullied a gay, or mocked an Asian's accent, or grabbed a woman, or kissed a man, or tweeted that the only good Martian was a dead Martian. The new super heroes are safe and fun and can appeal to the world. But Jackson is a real hero, a man who said and did things that will NOT appeal to everyone, a man who had faults, a man who was flawed, a man who was human; a hero who was a man. Yes, Jackson was a real hero, who was able to defeat some from the greatest army of his time and save the area west of the Mississippi and New Orleans for the great American experiment in republican government.