What is political democracy?

According to wikipedia, it means that he believed that citizens should have more input into the way party’s presidential and vice presidential candidates are selected, and that citizens should have a larger influence onto the government, one of which ways is to have elected judges (as opposed to appointed judges) and another way is to expand the definition of a voter to include all white male adults, not just property owners.

But Jackson was also criticized for political patronage, although he was credited with being the enemies of the banks and he also implemented the theory of switching office holders on a regular basis as a method to prevent corruption if the civil services.

From what I’ve read, Jackson considered himself as a refomer amongs Democrats, he represented the political reform wing of the Democratic party. He represented an era where the two party system in the U.S is expanded in the South, which was formerly dominated by one party.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Party_System#Jackson:_Bank_War_and_Spoils_System
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacksonian_democracy

THANK YOU.

Heh, I love to show off my useless knowledge..lol

To answer your question: “What is political democracy?” Political democracy is generally synonymous with direct democracy as opposed to liberal democracy which is a form of representative democracy such as we have in the United States, among other modern democracies. I guess the closest any society has come to a “political democracy” or “direct democracy” is Athens, and they only come close if you don’t consider women, immigrants and slaves to be “people.” But in judging Athens and Jacksonian America by modern, 21st century standards one might fail to understand what reforms and changes meant to the people and to the power elites at the time.

DBQ. Is that “document based question”? I remember that from the AP American History exam. Those were tough!

I love what I have read about ‘Ole Hickory’ , he went against the grain in so many ways, especially the bankers.
He probably meant there is no true political representation because all the power brokers were in the Senate at the time and controlled the legislation much like today. He wanted more power from the House which is closer to the people and represent the needs of the people.