Summary Of Father I Can Not Tell A Lie I Cut The Tree

The tenth chapter, “Jacksonian Democracy, 1820-1840”, provides an introduction to the rise of American democracy and the age of Jackson. Towards the beginning of the chapter, the textbook highlights an image by John McRae titled “Father, I can Not Tell a Lie: I Cut the Tree”. The image depicts a fictional story of a younger version of George Washington confessing to his father about cutting one of his cherry trees after receiving a hatchet as a gift. The image illustrates Mason Locke’s, an Anglican minister, book called The Life of Washington that conveys Washington’s trustworthy personality that holds high moral standards. I loved the way this illustration depicts Washington’s values at such an early age, this point is emphasized through the hand clasp shared between Washington and his father as a symbol of trust. Apart from the fact that this story is fiction, the image does a great job at showcasing the importance and value of bravery and honesty that can be implemented in the twenty-first century. Moreover, exhibiting values reader’s from today can remember Washington by (Corbett et al. 10.1).
The third section of the chapter claims that Andrew Jackson, the seventh President of the United States strongly disliked paper currency. This was due to a personal experience called the Panic of 1819 “that had made him uneasy about paper money”. During his presidency, he had clashing opinions with the bank’s director, Nicholas Biddle. Thus, came about the Bank Wars. He saw the bank of the United States as a multi-headed monster that he must slay. He strongly saw gold and silver as the best alternative currency. In contemporary terms, I found this reading to be historically ironic due to the fact that he is the face of the $20 dollar bill that is used throughout the entire country every second, a form of paper currency (Corbett et al.