Background
Jackson was born on September 21, 1757, in Moretonhampstead, England, the son of James and Mary (Webber) Jackson. At the age of fifteen he emigrated to Georgia and was placed under the protection of John Wereat, a Savannah lawyer.
Jackson was born on September 21, 1757, in Moretonhampstead, England, the son of James and Mary (Webber) Jackson. At the age of fifteen he emigrated to Georgia and was placed under the protection of John Wereat, a Savannah lawyer.
Jackson studied law with George Walton.
Jackson's six years of military service during the Revolution were rendered in the Georgia state forces, and "impassioned eloquence" was one of his chief contributions to the cause. He took part in the unsuccessful defense of Savannah (1778), the battle of Cowpens, and the recovery of Augusta (1781). In July 1782, at which time he held the rank of lieutenant-colonel, he was ordered by General Wayne to take possession of Savannah upon its evacuation by the British. Three weeks later the legislature of Georgia gave him a house and lot in that town. After studying law, he built up a practice that he estimated was worth £3, 000 a year by 1789. He served several terms in the Georgia legislature, was appointed colonel of the militia of Chatham County (1784) and brigadier-general (1786), and was elected an honorary member of the Society of the Cincinnati. In 1788 he was elected governor, but declined the office on the ground of his youth and inexperience. In 1789 he was elected member of Congress from the eastern district of Georgia. Anthony Wayne defeated him for re-election in 1791. Jackson, charging fraud, induced the House of Representatives to unseat Wayne, but failed to get the place for himself. He was sent to the legislature, and in 1792 was appointed major-general for service against the Creek Indians. He was elected to the United States Senate in 1793 but resigned in 1795 on account of the Yazoo scandal and, returning to Georgia, was elected to the legislature, where he led the successful fight for the repeal of the obnoxious act. He was an influential member of the convention of 1798 that framed a new state constitution. Governor from 1798 to 1801, he was again elected to the United States Senate in the latter year and served in that body until his death in 1806. He was a member of the Georgia commission that made the land cession of 1802. His principles were not inflexible, for he was shortly thereafter one of the chief advocates of the Eleventh Amendment to the Constitution. Although he supported Jefferson and Burr in 1800 and, when his party was victorious, counseled a political ally not to be "squeamish" about dismissing Federalist office-holders, he refused to acknowledge the obligation of party regularity, opposing the administration's bill for the government of the Orleans Territory (1805) and its efforts to settle with the Yazoo claimants and to prohibit the African slave trade. In Georgia he cultivated the up-country leaders, among them William H. Crawford, and while in the Senate urged federal aid for a road from Kentucky to Augusta, Georgia. While governor he recommended to the state legislature that it either pay Miller and Whitney a "moderate" sum for their patent right to the cotton gin or else suppress the right. He killed Lieutenant-Governor Wells of Georgia in a duel fought without seconds (1780). Jackson's own death, which occurred in Washington, D. C. , on March 19, 1806, is said by some to have been due to wounds received in the last of his many duels.
In national politics Jackson was an independent Republican. In the first Congress he assailed vehemently the judiciary bill and Hamilton's financial measures, defending the "gallant veteran" of the Revolution against the "wolves of speculation"; but he was a professed admirer of Blackstone, urged a stringent naturalization law as a bar to the "common class of vagrants, paupers and other outcasts of Europe, " and opposed amending the Federal Constitution.
Honorary member of the Society of the Cincinnati
An English country boy moulded by the Southern frontier, Jackson was a fervid patriot in speech and a violent partisan in action. Gentle and affectionate towards family and friends, a reader of the Encyclopedia and a patron of the University of Georgia, he would fight at the drop of a hat.
On January 30, 1785, Jackson married Mary Charlotte Young, by whom he had five sons. Four of these were later prominent in the public life of the state.