# 302 - 1903 3c Jackson, purple

Issue Date: February 11, 1903
Quantity issued: 276,212,074 (estimate)
Printed by: Bureau of Engraving and Printing
Method: Flat plate
Watermark: Double
Perforation: 12
Color: Bright violet

 

Happy Birthday Andrew Jackson 

Jackson received a minimal education in a small “old field school.” When he was 13, Jackson joined the American Revolution as a courier along with his brother Robert. The brothers were captured by British troops and nearly starved to death while being held as prisoners of war. They contracted smallpox and were eventually released by their mother’s bargaining. Within a matter of months Jackson’s mother and brother died, leaving him an orphan at age 14. He bitterly resented the British for the rest of his life.

After working briefly as a saddle maker and teacher, Jackson studied law in North Carolina. Admitted to the bar in 1787, he became a successful frontier lawyer. Jackson quickly proved himself as a tough and effective lawyer, often arguing cases over land claims, assaults, and battery. He went on to serve as a delegate to the Tennessee constitutional convention, served as a U.S. Representative when Tennessee became a state, and then as a Tennessee Supreme Court Judge.

During the First Seminole War Jackson took control of Pensacola, Florida removed the Spanish governor, and tried and executed two British subjects who had been helping the Indians attack his men. Stories of Jackson’s ruthlessness spread through the Seminole tribes and created an international incident. Secretary of State John Quincy Adams supported him and urged Spain to protect or cede the area to the U.S. As a result, the U.S. acquired the Florida Territory through the Adams-Onis Treaty.

Jackson’s inauguration was the first presidential inauguration open to the public. With Jackson’s election, a new era in political philosophy was introduced: the Jacksonian Democracy. Jackson aimed to introduce equality for the common man, which he achieved in part by expanding voting rights to include all white male adults, rather than just landowners. This in part helped him achieve his goal of increasing public participation in government. In 1835, Jackson successfully lowered the federal debt to just $33,733.05, its lowest since 1791.

Jackson was also faced with another crisis while in office – the Nullification Crisis or Secession Crisis of 1828-32. Some people believed that high tariffs (the Tariff of Abominations) on European imports made those same goods more expensive than those from the Northern states, which raised the prices the Southern planters paid. Southerners felt that these high tariffs benefited Northern industrialists while hurting Southern farmers. Jackson told Congress that “The Constitution… forms a government not a league…To say that any State may at pleasure secede from the Union is to say that the United States is not a nation.” When the protectionists agreed to a Compromise Tariff, they retracted their Nullification Ordinance.

This legislation was unpopular in the North, but Southerners supported it due to recent discoveries of gold on Cherokee land. A meeting between Cherokee John Ridge and U.S. politicians resulted in the Treaty of New Echota, which many Indians rejected because they did not see Ridge as their leader. Martin Van Buren then sent 7,000 troops to remove the Cherokees, resulting in over 4,000 Cherokee deaths along the “Trail of Tears.” In the end, over 45,000 American Indians were moved west, with the U.S. government purchasing nearly 100 million acres of Indian land plus an additional 32 million acres of western land.

 

In 1902, the Postmaster General commissioned an entirely new series of general issues. Until this time, the current regular issues had been in use since 1890 with relatively few changes.

 

The ornate new designs, however, were not the only addition to the 1902 series. The 13-cent denomination was added, and two new faces were introduced – Benjamin Harrison and Admiral David Farragut. For the first time in postal history, an American woman was honored.

 

A slight change was also made in the format. Each stamp in this series bears the inscription, “Series 1902.” This caused some concern abroad, as many European philatelists wondered whether the U.S. was planning on issuing new stamps each year. Many of the stamps, however, did not even reach post offices until 1903, and the next general issues were not produced until 1908.