Presidential Race Name-Calling And Slurs Goes Back A Long Way (OP-ED)

By TOM HESTER SR.

As New Jersey voters play their role in deciding what may be the most important presidential election of their lifetime, here is an unexpected report on two candidates the majority may be familiar with -- then Vice President Thomas Jefferson and incumbent President John Adams.

Former president Donald Trump may have to be considered the all-time champion of nasty political name-calling, but this kind of ugliness can be traced back to the presidential campaign of 1800 between Jefferson and Adams, the only time in a presidential election where a sitting vice president challenged an incumbent president.

Jefferson's side said of Adams, "This federal gem (the president was a Federalist) is not only a repulsive pendant, a gross hypocrite and unprincipled, but in private life one of the most egregious of fools upon the continent " But the jab was not enough. Jefferson's camp got nastier describing Adams as, ""having hideous hermaphrodical character, which has neither the force and firmness of a man, nor the gentleness of a woman," a vulgar reference to his genitalia.

Adams' side fired back that Jefferson, a Democratic-Republican, was "a mean-spirited low-lived fellow, the son of a half-breed Indian squaw sired by a Virginia Mulatto fellow." They added Jefferson was a "weakling, atheist, libertine and a coward."

The widow Martha Washington was moved by the name-calling to tell a clergyman that Jefferson, who served as President George Washington's secretary of state, was "one of the most detestable of mankind."

Appointed electors from the 16 states decided the presidential race and Jefferson carried New Jersey to win the first of two terms.

Republican Trump has called his Democratic opponent Vice President Kamala Harris "Crazy Kamala," "Laffin Kamala," and "Lying Kamala." He has tagged her vice-presidential candidate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, "Tampon Tim." In a returning jab, Harris and Walz have called Trump "weird".

In a 2023 study printed in Journal of Election, Public, Opinion and Politics, found that Democrats and Republicans don't like Democratic candidates' doing name-calling, but Republicans do like their candidates tossing jabs.

But presidential name calling and jabs continued after Jefferson and Adams and before Trump.

In 1828, former president John Quincy Adams, a National Republican, the son of the former president, and a former aide to the U.S. ambassador to Russia at age 14, faced off against Gen. Andrew Jackson, a Democrat, and the hero of the War of 1812 Battle of New Orleans. The Cincinatti Gazette, a supporter of Adams, described Jackson's mother as "a common prostitute brought to the United States by British soldiers," and that Jackson was "one of her seven Mulatto children."

If that wasn't enough, Adams' campaign issued a leaflet that charged Jackson was a cannable and accused him of eating after a battle, "A dozen of those dead Indians' bodies for his breakfast, which he devoured without leaving a fragment."

In turn, Jackson's people accused Adams that he succeeded as an ambassador's aide by providing "women for services of the Russian czar." New Jersey's electors voted for Adams, but Jackson won the presidency.

1848, Lewis Cass, a Democrat, lost the presidential election to Zachary Taylor, a Whig. It didn't help when Horace Greeley, owner of the New York Tribune, printed that the Democrat was "That pot-bellied, mutton-headed, cucumber-soled Cass."

Abraham Lincoln was not immune to nasty name calling. During his 1860 presidential campaign, the Charleston Mercury tagged him as a "nightman," a person who emptied privies at night. In an 1864 edition, Harper's Weekly listed many of the insults Lincoln had been called: "Ignoramus Abe, despot, old scoundrel, filthy storyteller, perjurer, liar, robber, thief, braggart, tyrant, buffoon, fiend, butcher, monster, land-pirate." New Jersey voted against Lincoln in both his 1860 and 1864 election victories.

In 1868, the Detroit Free Press endorsed former New York Gov. Horatio Seymour, a Democrat, over Ulysses S. Grant, a Republican, and the general credited with winning the Civil War. The newspaper described Grant, "As a leading radical." "Grant is a drunkard." "Grant is a man of vile habits and no ideas." Grant won an overwhelming victory. New Jersey again sided with the loser.

William McKinley, a Republican. was elected president in 1896 and again in 1900, both times with the support of New Jersey. But as McKinley dealt with the Spanish government as the Spanish-American War loomed in 1898, his assistant secretary of the Navy, Theodore Roosevelt, charged the president "Possessed no more backbone than a chocolate eclair." Roosevelt became McKinley's vice president in 1900 and replaced him as president when McKinley died from an assassin's gun in 1901.

New York Gov. Al Smith, a Democrat, became the first Catholic to seek the presidency in 1928. He ran up against strong religious prejudice. Herbert Hoover, a Republican gained an overwhelming victory. Alabama U.S. Sen. Thomas Heflin called Smith "the pope's agent." John F. Kennedy, a Democrat, and the first Catholic elected president in 1960, faced the same accusation

In 1952, when President Harry S. Truman, a Democrat, called congressional Republicans, "A bunch of snotty-gusters, newsman Eric Severeid pleaded for "calmness." During 2008 Democratic primary election, Barack Obama's campaign chief, Samantha Power, called his opponent Hillary Clinton "a monster." Power was forced to resign.

In the aftermath, CBS newsman Bob Schieffer told viewers, "You know I'm glad we've moved campaigns to a higher level, but you know what, sometimes I really miss the old days."

Eight years later, Trump announced his first bid for the White House. In the GOP primary he called an opponent, Texas U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, "Lyin Ted," and insulted his wife. In the general election, Trump called Hillary, "Crooked Hillary."

The old days were back.

Tom Hester is a journalist who spent 44 years with daily newspapers in Newark, New Brunswick, Jersey City, and Atlantic City.