Back then, the first American national bank was run by wealthy businessmen and elite politicians that only favored the industrial northern states, merchants and wealthy people over farmers, artisans, laborers, and planters. President Jackson, being a self-made man, a supporter of the common people, opposed the national bank because it did not provide equal opportunity to all, it violated state sovereignty (each state should have their bank and not be dominated by one large bank) and because he deemed it as a corrupted centralized entity that violated people's liberties.