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The Nastiest Elections In American History
Posted by newscoma | Posted in Newscoma | Posted on 22-05-2008
I rather slammed this morning but I had to share this list from Neatorama about the nastiest elections in history.
Here’s an example from the campaigning files of Thomas Jefferson vs. John Adams:
In case you’re wondering exactly how down-and-dirty these campaigns got, consider the fact that this is the only election in history where a vice president has run against the president he was currently serving under. You can imagine that things were a little tense in the White House in the months leading up to the election.
Jefferson hired a writer to pen insults rather than dirty his own hands (at least at first). One of his most creative lines said that Adams was a “hideous hermaphroditical character which has neither the force and firmness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman.”
Wow. They don’t write insults like that anymore.
Oh, that’s not even the worst of it. The campaign against Andrew Jackson was probably the worst ever. During that campaign, Jackson’s opponents published the Coffin handbills, notorious political ads featuring coffins representing an “account of some of the Bloddy Deeds of Gen. Jackson.” The handbill accused Jackson of murder, called his mother was a prostitute and said his marriage was an adulteress affair.
[...] Newscoma reminds us of a political campaign in which on side called the other candidate a “hideous hermaphroditical character which has neither the force and firmness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman.” [...]
Imagine what Jefferson might have said if he had never been best friends with Adams?…Oh the humanity.