12) Zachary Taylor - Old Rough and Ready

Zachary Taylor was the first president for which I chose one of The American Presidents Series books. These biographies are meant to give the reader an overview of the major events in each presidents’ life and presidency in a quick, readable volume. John Eisenhower’s “Zachary Taylor” achieved this goal, however 140 pages was not enough to get a good sense of Taylor and his times. For that reason, this is likely the last of these books I’ll read during this project.

Born in Virginia, not far from Montpelier, Zachary Taylor was a distant cousin of James Madison. Taylor’s family moved west to Kentucky when he was young, so like Polk and Jackson before him, Taylor was raised on the frontier. At 23 years old in 1808, he joined the Army. The timing was fortuitous as the young country was about to go back to war with England in the War of 1812 and many proxy battles would occur on the frontier. Taylor’s gained notoriety in the Indiana Territory as he heroically defended Fort Harrison against natives led by William Henry Harrison’s oft antagonist, Tecumseh. Taylor’s performance ultimately led to his promotion to Major, however when the War ended and the size of the Army was reduced Taylor was demoted back to Captain. With his pride wounded he retired from the Army until his rank of Major was returned to him the next year.

Taylor's image seems to fit the nickname
"Old Rough and Ready"

Military life kept Taylor away from his family often and he was determined that his daughter never marry a military man for that reason. As fate would have it his daughter, Sarah, would fall in love with and marry an Army man and Taylor did not approve. Sarah married the future president of the breakaway Confederate States, Jefferson Davis. Tragically, both contracted malaria shortly after their marriage. Jefferson got better, but Sarah went quick. Taylor and Davis would find themselves on the same steamship about 12 years later in Louisiana as Davis was on his way to marry his second wife, Varina Howell. The animosity Taylor had felt toward Davis was gone and while they didn’t agree politically Taylor treated him like a son for the rest of his life.

By the time of the Mexican American War, Taylor was a General and deployed by President James Polk into contested territory in West Texas. When Taylor’s troops were engaged he wrote to his Commander in Chief that hostilities had begun, kicking off the war. Taylor would go on to win victories against the Mexicans, most notably at Palo Alto and Buena Vista.

During his military career Taylor had never made public his political leanings however his success during the war with Mexico had turned him into an American hero. The Whigs needed a viable candidate to challenge the Democrats and Kentucky senator John Crittenden acted as kingmaker pushing for Taylor on the 1848 ticket. The Whigs needed Taylor to declare his politics though. Knowing this, Crittenden deployed three of his aides to Taylor’s Mississippi home who cajoled him into writing a letter to his friend Captain J.S. Allison. The publishing of supposed private letters was a standard form of press release in 18^th and 19^th century American politics. The Allison letter served to establish Taylor’s Whig credentials and Taylor and Millard Fillmore were elected to the Whig ticket at the party’s convention in Philadelphia. As was customary of the time, the potential nominees did not attend the convention. Taylor was home in Mississippi and alerted by mail of his selection. However, more than a month past with no response and party officials began to get anxious. It turned out that the letter had been sitting at the Baton Rouge post office. In 1848 postage stamps were yet to be invented and Taylor had informed the postmaster that he would no longer accept incoming mail on which postage was due, so the postmaster had thrown the letter from Philadelphia into a dead letter file.

Taylor’s presidency was dominated by the issue of slavery. Despite a rush gold-seekers to the California Territory, Congress could not vote on statehood due to the implications of congressional imbalance between slave and non-slave states. The organization of the Oregon Territory was engulfed in the slave issue as well. Meanwhile, Texas had designs on the newly acquired New Mexico Territory and even threatened secession over the issue prompting one of my favorite presidential quotes to date: “If it becomes necessary I’ll take command of the Army myself and if you are taken in rebellion against the Union I will hang you with less reluctance than I hanged deserters and spies in Mexico.” Taylor’s desire was not to be questioned, despite Polk’s misgivings as discussed in the prior post.

Following July 4^th festivities in 1850, Taylor became ill. He would expire on July 9^th, less than a year and a half after taking office. It was likely cholera that killed him, the same ailment that killed his predecessor James Polk, however rumors persisted that he was poisoned by pro-slavery Southerners. This has never been substantiated despite testing. It seems odd that conspiracy theorists would hold that a slaveholder was killed by those with pro-slavery sympathies. Perhaps, Thomas Hart Benton’s effusive eulogy can shed some light. Benton was a congressional institution during the mid-1800s and a Democrat, who owed Taylor no favors in Eisenhower’s words. Benton said of Taylor:

“His death was a public calamity. No man could have been more devoted to the Union or more opposed to the slavery agitation, and his position as a Southern man and a slave-holder, his military reputation and his election by a majority of the people of the States would have given him a power in the settlement of these questions which no President without these qualifications would have possessed.”

Counterfactuals sometimes feel like a cheap attempt to rewrite history and it feels unfair to Lincoln and the other politicians and soldiers who gave their lives to preserve the Union to bestow on Taylor any credit toward that achievement. However, Benton’s words are about a man who does not get any credit. Taylor remains a president little remembered by history, in part due to Union soldiers destroying his son’s house during the Civil War and with it all of his personal papers. Benton’s words give us insight into the convictions of a president who, unlike his successor Millard Fillmore, believed that the Union must be preserved without slavery not preserved by allowing slavery to fester, ignored, in the South. Three presidents and ten-and-a-half years are all that would separate Taylor’s death and the first shots of the Civil War in South Carolina, whether the survival and reelection of Taylor could have altered that remains an unknowable what-if.

11) James Polk - Young Hickory

The eleventh president was another that I did not know what to expect from. The subtitle of Walter Borneman’s book, “The Man Who Transformed the Presidency and America,” set lofty expectations.

Polk was born in current-day North Carolina and moved to Tennessee as a child. His childhood wasn’t easy. Life on the American frontier was difficult enough, but various illnesses made it even more challenging. By the age of 17, Polk’s parents resolved to send him to Philadelphia to seek the care of Dr. Philip Syng Physick, “the father of American surgery.” Polk could go no farther than Danville, Kentucky.  A Kentucky surgeon removed urinary stones in what must have been an excruciating and terrifying experience. Fortunately, Polk’s health was finally improved, but the primitive surgery is likely the reason he never had children.

Polk hitched his political wagon to the giant of Tennessee Democratic politics, Andrew Jackson, as a young man. Polk served seven terms in the US House of Representatives, making it to the Speakership, before running for governor of Tennessee. While Polk won his first campaign for governor, he lost the next two elections to James “Lean Jimmy” Chamberlain Jones. Lean Jimmy was a Whig showman of little substance and Polk’s losses to him were huge political disappointments and may have ended a less ambitious politician’s career.

The revival of Polk’s career came in the form of a political misstep from Jackson’s protégé, and a master politician in his own right, Martin Van Buren. Polk’s aim was to run as Van Buren’s vice president. However, Van Buren’s equivocation over Texas annexation was a betrayal that Jackson couldn’t forgive; Jackson threw his considerable weight behind Polk for President in 1844. To ensure support from all factions of the splintered Democratic Party, Polk promised to serve only one term. Polk got the Democratic nomination and thanks to an antislavery third party candidate splitting the vote in New York, he squeaked out a win in the general election over perpetual Whig candidate Henry Clay.

Polk would indeed transform the presidency, as the title suggested. He fundamentally strengthening the office into the strong executive we know today. Polk showed evidence of his iron will early when he laid down the ground rules for his cabinet members. Cabinet members would have to a) sign a pledge to support the Democratic platform, b) resign if they decided to run for president, and c) not vacation outside of Washington. Polk would be the first president to reaffirm the Monroe Doctrine by declaring “people of this continent’s right alone” to control the Oregon territory which was jointly held with England.

Where Polk truly transformed the presidency was over the United States’ claim to the Southwest. Polk wanted to force Mexico to accept the United States’ right to Texas and gain control over New Mexico and California. Mexico’s refusal to negotiate was making it seem that they would be convinced only by force. Polk prepared to demand that Congress declare war, ostensibly over Mexico’s refusal to deal with an American envoy. What Polk didn’t know was that Zachary Taylor’s troops had already been engaged by Mexican soldiers in contested West-Texas territory. Polk received a gift prior to approaching Congress. A memo from General Zachary Taylor reached Washington stating that “hostilities may now be considered as commenced.” With that information, Polk went to Congress and told them the war had already begun, they had better accept it. Between the House and the Senate, the total debate time was less than a day and a half. From that point forward the Executive has assumed war making powers from congress, fundamentally strengthening the office of the president.

Polk’s four years in office were dominated by western expansion and the Mexican American War. By the time he left office, the United States had added modern day Utah, Nevada, California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and parts of Arizona, New Mexico, Wyoming, and Montana. There is no question that Polk transformed the nation. Acquiring the land was one thing, but adding new states was another. Mid-nineteenth century American politics was completely dominated by slavery and the addition of new “free states” was unacceptable to Southern politicians who were increasingly feeling marginalized and unwilling to upset the balance between free and slave states in congress. The “peculiar institution” dominated national issues, it was becoming evident to prescient politicians that secession was a matter of time.

Polk upheld his pledge not to run for a second term. Lewis Cass ran on the Democratic ticket and in an ironic twist, a third party candidate split the New York vote again, but this time gave the election to the Whig candidate, Zachary Taylor. Despite the fact that Taylor had served as a general under Polk, he did not think highly of him. Polk wrote that Taylor seemed, “a well-meaning old man… uneducated, exceedingly ignorant of public affairs, and of very ordinary capacity.” Polk turned the reigns over to Taylor fearing that Taylor would unwind the land gains Polk’s administration had achieved. The fear proved unfounded, however Polk would not live to be proved wrong. Just 103 days after leaving office, Polk died of cholera. A long tour of the South on his way home to likely did not help.

The America and the office of the presidency that Polk left behind were much different than what he had inherited from John Tyler. Politically, however, slavery remained a ticking time-bomb that would explode in a mere twelve years.

10) John Tyler – The Accidental President

John Tyler’s presidency was a unique one that challenged the young democracy and the resiliency of its Constitution. Tyler assumed the presidency in 1841 following the death of William Henry Harrison, 126 years before the adoption of the 25^th Amendment to the Constitution, which would spell out the order of succession to the Presidency. Upon Tyler’s ascendency to the executive there were some, most notably Henry Clay, who asserted that Tyler was acting president only, devoid of authority to serve out Harrison’s term. Tyler rejected this idea and was ultimately granted legitimacy by Congress. The Tyler Precedent would define presidential succession until the Cold War.

In a time of bitter partisanship and splintering political parties, Tyler’s politics didn’t fit neatly in either of the major political parties of the day. The early part of his political career as a member of the House of Representatives, Virginia House of Delegates, Governor of Virginia, and the US Senate Tyler was a Democrat. Despite his party affiliation, Tyler often found himself at odds with the preeminent Democrat of the day, Andrew Jackson. Like Jackson, Tyler did not support the Bank of the US, however he didn’t agree with Jackson’s decision to strip the bank of its deposits. He also agreed with Jackson that South Carolina should not nullify Federal Law, however Tyler was a strict believer in state’s rights and the force with which Jackson came down on South Carolina didn’t sit well with Tyler. Tyler would fall

in with the nascent Whig party, found his way onto the Whig ticket in the 1840 Presidential election as William Henry Harrison’s running mate, and was President of the United States upon Harrison’s death shortly thereafter.

The Tyler / Whig love affair was short lived. Before his first year in office ended Tyler had vetoed two banking bills favored by Henry Clay and the congressional Whigs. All but one of his cabinet members resigned and Clay dubbed him “The President without a party.” Whig newspapers heaped vitriol on Tyler for the duration of his presidency.

The legacy of Tyler’s presidency is the annexation of Texas. Tyler worked hard to shepherd annexation legislation through congress and coordinate with the Texan government. This work was disrupted by the USS Princeton disaster wherein the newly built ship’s main gun backfired during a celebratory cruise down the Potomac. Thomas Gilmer and Abel Upshur, Tyler’s secretaries of the Navy and State, respectively died along with four others in the disaster. Both Gilmer and Upshur had been key players in annexation effort. Despite their differences, Tyler appointed John Calhoun to fill the position at State, and Calhoun helped devise a joint resolution of congress to back annexation just before Tyler left office.

Tyler once again identified as a Democrat after his break with the Whigs. He agreed, for the sake of the party, not to seek reelection and back James Polk. Polk angered Tyler by never living up to the unspoken agreement to repay some Tyler men through patronage.

Tyler is not highly regarded by historians. To his supporters he was unwavering supporter of state’s rights, however in the mid-19^th century supporting state’s rights was a euphemism for supporting slavery and when the Civil War came around Tyler ended up on the wrong side of history.

Photo of Tyler and Monroe's gravesite,
courtesy of http://www.presidentsgraves.com

In retirement, Tyler initially opposed war. He presided over the “Peace Convention” which proposed to President James Buchanan that slavery be prohibited in the North, that slavery be continued in the South, that questions involving slavery in the South be resolved by Federal courts according to common law, and that any new states decide on slavery themselves. Tyler changed his tack after the Senate overwhelmingly rejected these proposals. He now believed that if the South presented a united front, by seceding from the union, war would be avoided. He was wrong. Tyler lived long enough to see shots ring out at Fort Sumter, his home state of Virginia secede, and the Confederates triumph at Bull Run. Tyler likely died believing that the South could defeat the Union troops. Interestingly, Tyler is the only US president who was not buried under the American flag. In an attempt to galvanize Southerners, Jefferson Davis ordered a grand burial for Tyler, under the Confederate flag, next to James Monroe’s grave.

9) William Henry Harrison - Old Tippecanoe

William Henry Harrison, the ninth president of the United States, was in office for 31 days. Harrison was the first Whig to serve as president of the United States. The Whigs were a motley crew consisting of anti-Masons, national Republicans, and anti-Jackson Democrats. While there wasn’t a common platform to hold the Whigs together, they employed rhetoric and the press deftly. The election of 1840, in which Harrison defeated the incumbent Van Buren, was one of little substance. Oliver Perry Chitwood, John Tyler’s biographer, pointed out that the Whig press successfully framed Harrison as a rugged frontiersman while painting Van Buren as an aristocrat. In reality Van Buren was largely a self-made man, as you may recall from the prior post, and Harrison was a scion of Virginia gentry. Harrison’s campaign slogan, “Tippecanoe and Tyler, Too” was one of the most successful and enduring in American history.

There are contradictory accounts about Harrison’s death. The author, Robert Owens, tells the story you often hear; Harrison delivered a long inaugural speech in bad weather, contracted pneumonia, and died shortly thereafter. Chitwood tells a different story, which I’m more inclined to believe given the timeline. Chitwood says that Harrison’s inauguration took place on “beautiful day.” It wasn’t until March 24^th, 20 days after the inauguration, that Harrison contracted pneumonia. This makes the story that Harrison contracted his illness during the inauguration difficult to reconcile.

Owens’ book, Mr. Jefferson’s Hammer, was the first I read during this project that wasn’t a biography. I didn’t realize it when I picked the book up, but it’s really an account of Harrison’s time as governor of the Indiana Territory and his role in 19^th Century American Indian policy. The book spends very little time discussing his childhood and even less discussing his post-Indiana work.  While this was a bit of a divergence from the “presidential biography” tact, the book was still interesting and I certainly learned about a little known president.

Harrison’s father, Benjamin, was governor of Virginia, he was a leader in the House of Burgesses, and a signer of the Declaration of Independence. When Harrison applied to join the Army, Washington himself approved the application likely due to his friendship with Benjamin.

Harrison’s most famous military conquest was his role in the Battle of Tippecanoe. Owens tells a story not as glorious as one might expect. Harrison’s Indian adversaries attacked at night in an attempt to kill Harrison. Harrison likely escaped because his customary gray horse ran off earlier that day and he was riding another. Harrison’s men held off the Indians, but suffered dozens of deaths and injuries. Initial criticisms of Harrison’s ill preparation were quickly suppressed as Andrew Jackson defended his actions. 

Like Jackson, Harrison became involved in Aaron Burr’s failed attempt to split the union. Burr conspired with General James Wilkinson whom Harrison had served under at the beginning of his Army career. Wilkinson requested that Harrison send Burr to Congress as Indiana’s representative, a request that he didn’t oblige.

President Thomas Jefferson wrote to Harrison in 1803, which was early in Harrison’s tenure as governor, instructing him to acquire as much Indian land in the Mississippi Valley and to keep this plan secret. Jefferson wanted to secure the Ohio and Mississippi rivers in the event that France (i.e. Napoléon) were to militarize their newly acquired Louisiana Territory. A common refrain in American history education is the story of unfair treaties that the American settlers coerced Indians in to in order to give legal cover to the subjugation of Indian land. Harrison’s time as Governor of Indiana is a case study in this practice. The common tactics seemed to be: (i) When possible negotiate with a tribe on friendly terms with the Americans, these tribes often had tenuous claims on the land that Americans were negotiating over. (ii) Institute an annuity system whereby the tribes were paid over time. This secured the dependence of that tribe on the American government and served as leverage over the tribe’s leadership. (iii) Try to structure payment for land to include farm equipment and/or livestock to help in the “civilizing” of the tribes.  The idea of protecting the Western border from France was to become a moot point soon as the Louisiana Purchase was completed by Jefferson’s administration later in 1803.

While Harrison's time in the highest office was brief, the role he played in the West is an important chapter in American history. Harrison was a slaveholder and a proponent of slavery and worked to institutionalize it in the Indiana Territory, a battle he lost as the country slowly marched toward a Civil War whose first shots would ring out 20 years, almost to the day, after Harrison's death.

8) Martin Van Buren - The Little Magician

Only 43 men have held the title of President of the United Sates at the time of this writing, so naturally there are firsts in every presidency. Martin Van Buren, I would argue, was the first pure politician to rise to the presidency. Before assuming the presidency Van Buren served in the Senate, as Governor of New York, Secretary of State, minister to the United Kingdom, and Vice President. It isn’t the long list of offices that makes Van Buren the first ‘pure politician’; Jefferson, Monroe, and Quincy Adams had similar resumes; it was Van Buren’s work forming modern Democratic Party that gives him that title.

Born about 100 miles north of New York City in the Hudson River town of Kinderhook, Van Buren grew up in an isolated, Dutch village. Much of Washington Irving’s writings are set in Van Buren’s New York. Like his future mentor, Andrew Jackson, Van Buren’s life was marred by tragedy. Van Buren’s mother, father, and wife all died over a three-year span leaving him with four sons, aged two to eleven, to raise on his own.

Van Buren helped to build the Albany Regency, one of the first political machines in the young republic. At a time when communication over long distances was difficult the Regency crafted a system to maintain party discipline wherein the governor and senators sent policy to the caucus in the state legislature that informed the partisan press. Circuit judges also played a roll in spreading the party line as they rode the circuit around New York. The Regency began to give Americans a more positive image of political parties, which were beginning to be seen as a force for good that facilitated political engagement and curbed corruption.

As a luminary of the Regency, Van Buren worked to intertwine the powerful northern and southern states of New York and Virginia. This required a flexibility that would stay with him throughout his political life. Van Buren’s flexibility is most notable in his support for slavery at a time when New York’s abolitionist movement was swelling. Van Buren was of a class of politicians who believed that maintaining the union justified the status quo on slavery, a position he later abandoned when it suited him.

Van Buren’s presidency was unspectacular. He spent the majority of his single term attempting to deal with the Panic of 1837, a consequence of both European financial pressures and Andrew Jackson’s heavy-handed economic intervention. Van Buren’s main objective was to secure an independent treasury bill, reversing the policy of depositing federal funds into state banks. Van Buren’s quest for an independent treasury served to split the Democratic Party that he had worked so hard to build. When the bill passed, three years into Van Buren’s term, it had little practical effect as it merely legislated a practice that had been in effect for a year.

In his reelection campaign William Henry Harrison handily defeated Van Buren. That Harrison excited the electorate with his log cabin imagery and Tippecanoe slogans was evidenced by an increase in the popular vote from 1836 to 1840 from 1.5 million to 2.4 million. Van Buren would again seek the Democratic nomination in 1844 but lost to James Polk. In 1848, he ran as a member of the Free Soil Party which opposed slavery, he failed to carry a single state.

The career politician was often regarded as a shrewd manipulator, nicknamed The Little Magician, Van Buren flip-flopped on a number of issues including the Erie Canal (originally opposed), Jackson’s bank modifications, and slavery. It was Van Buren’s work to form the Democratic Party, and modern party structure in general, which is Van Buren’s lasting legacy.

7) Andrew Jackson - Napoleon of the Woods

Andrew Jackson was born in 1767 in Western South Carolina. Jackson’s life would be marked by tragedy from an early age; his father died while Jackson’s mother, Elizabeth, was still pregnant with him. In 1779, Jackson’s older brother died at the Revolutionary War Battle of Stono Ferry. Shortly thereafter, Andrew, and his remaining brother Robert, were captured by British soldiers and imprisoned. Andrew was beaten badly for refusing to polish a soldier’s boots and both boys were exposed to smallpox. During an exchange of prisoners, Elizabeth secured the release of her sons and five neighbors. On just two horses, they made the 45-mile journey home. Unfortunately Robert succumbed to smallpox two days after returning. Once Andrew had recovered, Elizabeth made the long trip to the Charleston harbor, where she would help nurse two nephews, and others, who were being held prisoner aboard boats by the British. Elizabeth would contract cholera and die in Charleston. At 14 years old Andrew Jackson had lost his entire family.

Two years of law apprenticeship and Jackson was ready to practice, he headed west and settled in Nashville. The rudimentary and corrupt legal system gave Jackson ample opportunity to build a practice. At times Jackson was responsible for half of the cases being tried in the county.

It was in Nashville where Jackson began to build his reputation. He served on the Constitutional Committee formed to win Tennessee’s statehood. He went on to serve one term as Tennessee’s first representative in Washington. Next, he was elected to the US Senate, a post he was unprepared for and would quickly resign. Jackson’s election to the state’s Superior Court allowed him to begin to shine. Despite a lack of formal legal education, Jackson became known for being a fair, effective, typically correct, and swift judge (he once heard 50 cases in 15 days).

Jackson yearned for military glory, and wanted the generalship of Tennessee’s militia. This was an elected position that local Revolutionary War hero, John Sevier, also wanted. The two ultimately tied, with the Governor breaking the tie in Jackson’s favor. Jackson and Sevier would become lifelong enemies and the Governor’s decision caused a political break between Eastern (Sevier) & Western (Jackson) Tennessee.

Jackson’s time in the military was eventful. Early on he aided Aaron Burr, evidently ignorantly, in Burr’s infamous plot to divide the union. As the War of 1812 broke out, Jackson was called on to defend New Orleans, however he received orders from Secretary of War John Anderson, the man who almost cost the US Washington DC later in the war, to disband prior to reaching New Orleans. Jackson ignored the order and marched his men 450 miles back to Nashville, in doing so he earned the nickname Old Hickory.

Jackson soon led his men to fight the Creek Indians, in what would be known as the Creek War. The Creek War was a civil war among the Creeks that Jackson used to the US’s advantage. Jackson routed the Creek’s leading many flee to Florida; the Creek’s who stayed behind had been friendly to the Americans and Jackson took advantage of them. He negotiated a treaty that turned over 3/5 of present day Alabama and 1/5 of Georgia to the Americans. Jackson had turned an Indian civil war in to an enormous land grab for the United States.

Jackson’s men had been campaigning for about a year after the Creek War, but instead of returning home Jackson led his men to occupied New Orleans with designs to take it from the British. The battle would be another decisive American victory with around 70 American casualties comparing to well over 1,500 for the British. The Battle of New Orleans would cement Jackson’s status as living legend, however there were a couple of wrinkles in the New Orleans story. The Treaty of Ghent, which ended the War of 1812, had already been signed when the Battle of New Orleans was fought, and even if it hadn’t it was likely that New Orleans would have ended the war. However, Jackson kept the city under martial law until official word of the war’s end arrived two months later. This strange decision rankled residents and it led to Jackson’s arrest and a guilty verdict for which Jackson paid a fine of $1,000. Supporters raised the money to cover his expenses, but ever the politician, Jackson donated the money to the families of deceased soldiers.

After New Orleans, Jackson was instructed to execute Article IX of the Treaty Of Ghent. The article called for the return of property taken from peaceful Indians after 1811. Whether Jackson didn’t believe that any Indians would be peaceful toward settlers or he just outright ignored the order, it is clear that Jackson did not return any land. In fact, he continued to sign treaties with Indians, usually under the direct or implied threat of force, to secure land in Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi. At the end of this time was the First Seminole War in which Jackson used the threat of the Seminole Indians as justification to invade and ultimately take Florida from the Spanish.

By 1822, Jackson was ready to return home.  He was physically exhausted, suffering from both dysentery and malaria. His name was again put forward for a Senate seat, a post for which he was now more prepared and a role that would strengthen his now inevitable presidential bid. In his first presidential bid, the election of 1824, Jackson won the popular vote but the Electoral College was split throwing the decision to the House of Representatives. Henry Clay delivered Kentucky and thus the presidency to John Quincy Adams despite Kentucky not giving Adams a single electoral vote. Clay then accepted Secretary of State in Adams’ administration. Jackson’s supporters deemed this “the corrupt bargain” and it effectively ended Clay’s political ambitions.

The Election of 1824 convinced many that there was a major corruption problem in the federal government and the Democratic Party grew out of a desire to return to Jeffersonian republicanism, reclaiming the government for the people. Jackson won in 1828 and there was mandate for change.  What opponents began to call the “spoils system,” Jacksonians called rotation. This was the practice of replacing officeholders in an attempt to root out corruption, entitlement to office, and lack of accountability. Over his two terms, it is estimated that about 8% of the federal workforce was replaced.

Jackson’s eight years in office were eventful. Despite his numerous accomplishments prior to the presidency, my opinion is that Jackson is the first president, save perhaps Jefferson, whose most impactful days came during his presidency. The three most impactful and controversial events of his presidency were the Indian Removal Act of 1830, his veto of the 2^nd Bank of the US, and the nullification crisis.

The Indian Removal Act passed the Senate on party lines, but barely passed the House. A section of the country didn’t support removal, however the majority of Americans either quietly or vocally supported removal. The legislation would force all Indians living within state boundaries to move into pre-designated territories in Oklahoma. The horrors of removal are undeniable, at least 45,000 Indians were removed during Jackson’s presidency and thousands died along the way. While not a defense of removal, it is important to note the support of removal by a majority of Americans, who viewed Indians as terrorists. Also, removal likely prevented Southeastern tribes from annihilation that would have come at the hands of settlers. This is the reasoning Jackson used to justify his actions.

The 2^nd Bank of the US was a federally chartered bank that held the government’s money. Jackson believed it to be an undemocratic monopoly benefitting only the rich, so when its charter for renewal passed through the Senate and House he vetoed it. This veto was extremely important as it fundamentally redefined the presidency. Never before had a president vetoed something for reasons other than constitutionality. The bank veto effectively redefined the executive branch as paramount to the legislative and judicial. Jackson had a weak grasp of financial matters, as did many of the men he surrounded himself with, while he understand many of the negative aspects of the bank he couldn’t grasp its importance to the American economy. The bank’s dismantling had a predictably negative effect made worse by the Bank’s tightening of credit in an attempt to stir up support. Jackson never wavered saying of those lobbying against the veto, “If they send ten thousand of them…I will not relax a particle from my position.” The Whig Party grew out of the Democratic Party’s split following the veto.

The nullification crisis was the first real sign of the coming Civil War. South Carolina passed a law nullifying federal tariffs, thus raising the question of whether federal laws could be invalidated within a state’s boundaries. Jacksons’ response was clear and forceful, stating that the United States superseded the states themselves. Jackson’s proclamation against nullification is one of the most important presidential documents in American history as it would form the basis for Lincoln’s actions against secession 30 years later. 

Portrait of an elderly Jackson
by the prolific George Peter
Alexander Healy

This the most I’ve written on any one president and it still feels incomplete to me. I’ve said nothing about Jackson’s duels, the first assassination attempt on a president, the scandal surrounding his marriage(s) to Rachel or her subsequent death, the John Eaton affair, his efforts to bring Texas into the union, or slavery. Jackson was a complicated man, one whose positive impact on his country’s development has been greatly overshadowed by his mistreatment of the Indians. I will end with what I found to be the greatest irony in Jackson’s legacy: Jackson despised paper money, he called it “ragg money” and believed it weakened society and benefitted the rich at the expense of the poor. Ironic then that his face has been immortalized on the $20 bill.

6) John Quincy Adams - The Abolitionist

John and Abigail Adams expected much of their oldest son, John Quincy and while the pressure JQA felt at a young age is similar to what the elder John experienced, John and Abigail could offer their son opportunities and resources unavailable to John and they made sure he knew it:

“You come into life with advantages which will disgrace you if your life is mediocre… if you do not rise to the head of not only your profession, but your country it will be owing to your own laziness, slovenliness, and obstinacy,” wrote the elder John to his son.

In Paul Nagel’s John Quincy Adams: A Public Life, A Private Life I met the most surprising man I’ve encountered on my introduction to the Presidents. JQA is a man remembered mostly for sharing a name with John Adams; I’ve found that many don’t even realize he’s John’s son. While his presidency is not worth remembering, it could fairly be considered America’s first “failed presidency”, his contributions to his country were vast, his work ethic was astonishing, and his life was simply amazing.

On January 12, 1779 he wrote “A Journal By Me JQA.” John would continue that diary for nearly 70 years. JQA’s diary explored personal struggles, political triumphs and frustrations, extensive travels, and daily minutia. It is an enlightening and important piece of American history not only because of its “real-time” views of the 19^th century, but because it documents a man who spent much of his youth overseas, served as an ambassador to the Netherlands, Prussia, Russia, and England, Secretary of State, President, and Congressman (in that order!).

Part of what makes JQA so endearing is his diary, it gives us an unusually personal look into his character and thus makes him much more relatable than other historical giants. JQA appears to have struggled, at times mightily, with depression. An early trigger was his mother, Abigail, who again comes off as overbearing (as she did in John Ferling’s book on John Adams). As we learned from Ferling’s book, Abigail had many difficult years raising her children as her husband served in various posts overseas. However, her parenting style appears to have been a sort of 18^th century-helicopter/tiger-mom-hybrid. One such example occurred when she strongly encouraged JQA to break off a relationship, feeling that her son had yet to reach a point where he could sufficiently support a family. In 1818, while JQA was serving as James Monroe’s Secretary of State, Abigail passed away. JQA did not return to Massachusetts to attend the funeral.

The first Presidential photograph
to appear on this blog, and perhaps the
earliest existing photograph of a US
President (1843).

While serving as Minster to England, JQA met Louisa Johnson, the daughter of an American father and British mother. Abigail again tried to end this relationship, but the ocean between mother and son gave JQA the strength to resist his mother’s influences. JQA and Louisa wed in 1797 and would live to celebrate their golden anniversary. Louisa comes across as a strong-willed and intelligent first lady who managed an emotionally unstable husband, the resentment of her mother-in-law, personal tragedies including several miscarriages and her son’s suicide, extensive world travel, and the bitter political battles that JQA engaged in over his career. Nagel says that Louisa’s letters give evidence to a strong strength of intellect, which he believes may have surpassed her husband’s had she received more education.

John had a lifelong passion for literature and composed a great deal of poetry, wrote a widely-distributed travel report on the European region of Silesia, and spent nearly a year translating Christoph Martin Wieland’s Oberon poem to English from German. Adam’s translation of Oberon wasn’t published until 1940, but the editor, A.B. Faust said that it was “remarkable for its fidelity to the original and its genuine artistry.” JQA often expressed a desire to retire from politics and focus on writing, however he could never pull himself away – after being defeated by Andrew Jackson for a second presidential term, something he seemed genuinely relieved about, he went on to represent Massachusetts in Congress for another 17 years until, literally, collapsing on the floor of the US House of Representatives at age 80.

You’ll note that I’ve said little about JQA’s time as President and that’s because his many accomplishments worth remembering did not happen while he was in the White House. As Secretary of State, JQA was deeply involved in developing the philosophy that was to become the Monroe Doctrine, ever the diplomat JQA felt the Doctrine should be communicated through back channels. However, Monroe’s desire to incorporate it into the State of the Union won out.

When John’s accomplishments are remembered today, it is often his opposition to slavery. While his motivations are sometimes questioned, as many of the Southern politicians who backed slavery where John’s enemies, it can not be debated that John spent the majority of his 17 years in the House of Representatives fighting against the spread of slavery to new states and the “Gag Rule” which prevented discussion of slavery in Congress. Additionally, JQA argued in front of the Supreme Court in defense of the enslaved Africans who had captured the slave ship Amistad and ultimately won their freedom.

JQA’s life was fascinating and I would encourage any one with an interest in history or great people to explore his life. He was groomed for greatness and achieved it. He was a tortured soul whose life spanned much of the time between the Revolution and the Civil War.  At times he rose above politics in a way that we often wish politicians would today, yet at times he succumbed to partisan rancor in a way we would find all too familiar today. Despite his shortcomings, I can say without hesitation, that he is my favorite President to this point.