support for the office of Secretary of State. No formal investigation was conducted, so the matter was neither confirmed nor denied. When Clay was indeed offered the position after Adams was victorious, he opted to accept and continue to support the administration he voted for, knowing that declining the position would not have helped to dispel the rumors brought against him. Jackson referred to Clay as the "Judas of the West". By appointing Clay his Secretary of State, President Adams essentially declared him heir to the presidency, as Adams and his three predecessors had all served as Secretary of State. Jackson and his followers accused Adams and Clay of striking a "corrupt bargain", and the Jacksonians would campaign on this claim for the next four years, ultimately helping Jackson defeat Adams in 1828. Ironically, Adams offered Jackson a position in his Cabinet as Secretary of War, which Jackson declined to accept. Electoral College selection See also Contested elections in American history United States presidential elections in which the winner lost the popular vote 1876 United States presidential election 1888 United States presidential election 2000 United States presidential election 2016 United States presidential election Notes References Citations Sources Ammons, Harry. 1959. "James Monroe and the Era of Good Feelings". Virginia Magazine of History and Biography, LXVI, No. 4 (October 1958), pp. 387–398, in Essays on Jacksonian America, Ed. Frank Otto Gatell. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970. Brown, Richard H. 1966. "The Missouri Crisis, Slavery, and the Politics of Jacksonianism". South Atlantic Quarterly, pp. 55–72, in Essays on Jacksonian America, Ed. Frank Otto Gatell. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970. Dangerfield, George. 1965. The Awakening of American Nationalism: 1815-1828. New York: Harper & Row. online Kolodny, Robin. "The Several Elections of 1824." Congress & the Presidency: A Journal of Capital Studies 23#2 (1996) online. Wilentz, Sean. 2008. The Rise of American Democracy: Jefferson to Lincoln. New York: Horton. Further reading Kolodny, Robin. "The Several Elections of 1824." Congress & the Presidency 23#2 (1996) online. Morgan, William G. “John Quincy Adams Versus Andrew Jackson: Their Biographers And The ‘Corrupt Bargain’ Charge.” Tennessee Historical Quarterly 26#1 (1967), pp. 43–58. online Morgan, William G. “Henry Clay’s Biographers and the ‘Corrupt Bargain’ Charge.” Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 66#3 (1968), pp. 242–58. online Ratcliffe, Donald J. The One-Party Presidential Contest: Adams, Jackson, and 1824's Five-Horse Race (University Press of Kansas, 2015) xiv,