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The term corrupt bargain refers to three historic incidents in American history in which political agreement was determined by congressional or presidential actions that acted against the most clearly defined legal course of action at the time (though in none of the three cases were illegal actions taken). Two of these involved the resolution of indeterminate or disputed electoral votes from the United States presidential election process, and the third involved the disputed use of a presidential pardon. In all three cases, the president so elevated served a single term, or singular vacancy, and either did not run again, or was not reelected when he ran.

In the 1824 election, without an absolute majority in the Electoral College, the 12th Amendment dictated that the Presidential election be sent to the House of Representatives, whose Speaker and candidate in his own right, Henry Clay, gave his support to John Quincy Adams, and was then selected to be his Secretary of State. In the 1876 election, accusations of corruption stemmed from officials involved in counting the necessary and hotly contested electoral votes of both sides, in which Rutherford B. Hayes was elected by a congressional commission.

Election of 1824

After the votes were counted in the U.S. presidential election of 1824, no candidate had received the majority needed of the Presidential Electoral votes (although Andrew Jackson had the most), thereby putting the outcome in the hands of the House of Representatives. There were four candidates on the ballot: John Quincy Adams, Henry Clay, Andrew Jackson, and William H. Crawford. Following the provisions of the Twelfth Amendment, however, only the top three candidates in the electoral vote were admitted as candidates, eliminating Henry Clay.

To the surprise of many, the House elected John Quincy Adams over rival Andrew Jackson. It was widely believed that Clay, the Speaker of the House, convinced Congress to elect Adams, who then made Clay his Secretary of State. Jackson's supporters denounced this as a "corrupt bargain." The "corrupt bargain" that placed Adams in the White House and Clay in the State Department launched a four-year campaign of revenge by the friends of Andrew Jackson.

Claiming that the people had been cheated of their choice, Jacksonians attacked the Adams administration at every turn as illegitimate and tainted by aristocracy and corruption. Adams aided his own defeat by failing to rein in the pork barrel frenzy sparked by the General Survey Act. Jackson's attack on the national blueprint put forward by Adams and Clay won support from Old Republicans and market liberals, the latter of which increasingly argued that Congressional involvement in internal improvements was an open invitation to special interests and political logrolling.

A 1998 analysis using game theory mathematics argued that contrary to the assertions of Jackson, his supporters, and countless later historians, the results of the election were consistent with so-called "sincere voting", that is, those Members of the House of Representatives who were unable to cast votes for their most-favored candidate apparently voted for their second- (or third-) most-favored candidate.

Regardless of the various theories concerning the matter, Adams was a one-term President; his rival, Jackson, was elected President by a large majority of the electors in the election of 1828 and then a second term in the election of 1832.

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1974 pardon of Nixon

Gerald Ford's 1974 pardon of Richard Nixon was described as a "corrupt bargain" by critics of the disgraced former president. The critics claimed that Ford's pardon was quid pro quo for Nixon's resignation, which elevated Ford to the presidency. The most public critic was US Representative Elizabeth Holtzman, who, as the lowest-ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, was the only representative who explicitly asked whether the pardon was a quid pro quo. Ford cut Holtzman off, declaring, "There was no deal, period, under no circumstances."

See also

• Smoke-filled room

References

1. https://www.270towin.com/1824_Election/
2. "The Election of 1824 Was Decided in the House of Representatives: The Controversial Election was Denounced as 'The Corrupt Bargain'", Robert McNamara, About.com
3. Stenberg, R. R. (1934). "Jackson, Buchanan, and the "Corrupt Bargain" Calumny". The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography. 58 (1): 61–85. doi:10.2307/20086857.
4. Book review of John Lauritz Larson's Internal Improvement: National Public Works and the Promise of Popular Government in the Early United States
5. Jenkins, Jeffrey; Sala, Brian (1998). "The Spatial Theory of Voting and the Presidential Election of 1824". American Journal of Political Science. 42 (4). Midwest Political Science Association: 1157–1179. doi:10.2307/2991853. JSTOR 2991853.
6. "For Ford, Pardon Decision Was Always Clear-Cut" The New York Times, December 29, 2006

• Political history of the United States
• Political terminology of the United States
• Political controversies in the United States
• 1824 United States presidential election
• 1876 United States presidential election
• Watergate scandal