Signers

 

​​After participating in the Irish Rebellion (1798), Jackson fled with his uncle to Germany, and soon thereafter moved to Philadelphia. In 1801, he became a merchant in Nashville; six years later, his two-story home was one of 17 houses in the re​sid​ential section of the city. Jackson made many prominent friends in Nashville, including John Coffee with whom he co-founded the Cypress Land Company​ in 1818 to speculate in Alabama land. In​​​ the 1820's, Jackson moved to the area of Florence, Alabama a​​nd started a plantation. Andrew Jackson had been a f​riend and an investor in ​the Cypress Land Company, but in the late 1820s the two men had a falling out: when Andrew was accused of favoring business associates in the acquisition of Indian lands following treaties that he negotiated, James was not sufficiently supportive in denying those accusations. James Jackson served in both houses of the Alabama legislature (he was President of the state senate in 1831-32​​). He also imp​orted and raised racehorses --"the most successful importer in the history of the American thoroughbred." He may have been supposedly "the first breeder and im​porter of race horses in the United States."​​