Much happened in American history during the
time generally referred to as the antebellum years. Usually, that period is the time between the
end of the “era of good feeling” – following the War of 1812 – and the
onslaught of the Civil War in 1861.
Within those nearly fifty years, the nation had the rise and fall of a
major political party that technically produced four presidents – two elected
as presidents and two assuming that office from the position of vice president upon
the deaths of the presidents they served.
The timeline this blog is reporting –
this is the third posting doing so – has already reviewed the first of these cases,
the election of William Henry Harrison and elevation of John Tyler. Given the brevity of Harrison’s time in the
White House, that term of office basically belonged to Tyler.
In the last posting, one sees that that
term was characterized by Tyler opposing key Whig policy proposals, those being
the re-chartering of a national bank and higher tariff rates. Basically, he can be considered a reluctant
Whig or as a Democrat in Whig’s clothing.
This was so much the case that he was ushered out of the party. To underline that fact, the party refused to
nominate him for another term in 1844.
With that, this timeline begins its next entry in describing how the
Whigs further proceeded during these antebellum years:
1844-1847
The Whigs in the next election season
faced a divided Democratic Party. Former
president and leading candidate, Martin Van Buren, came out in opposition to
the annexation of Texas through a proposed treaty with the self-proclaimed
independent Texas – drawn up by the former Secretary of State, John C. Calhoun –
and eventually rejected by the Senate.
Unfortunately for Van Buren, the rank-and-file
Democrats supported that proposal, along with the acquisition of Oregon (a
British possession). They were able to
deprive Van Buren the nomination and instead they went for the relatively unknown
candidate, James K. Polk, who was promoting expansion. Polk’s main link to the national political
stage was his friendship with former President Andrew Jackson, who was still
alive. Polk was fully onboard with the proposed
acquisitions of both Texas and Oregon.
As for the Whigs, they were unified
going into the ’44 election. Given his
disappointments in previous years, Clay finally saw a clear way to attain the
Whig nomination and he did so unopposed, with a united party behind him. But one should remember that, as backdrop,
the nation was in the grips of severe depression and the Whigs, however
tenuously the claim could be made, was the party in power.
On election day, Clay’s doomed fate in
attaining the presidency persisted. Polk
captured the imagination of Southern voters with his position on annexation –
in the case of Texas, that meant the addition of a slave state – and was aided
with animosity among certain anti-Whig groups in the North especially Catholics
and foreign-born voters.[1] Bottom line, Polk won with only 49.1% of the
popular vote but with 170 Electoral College votes over Clay’s 105. If Clay could have gotten a few more votes in
New York (less than 2%), he would have won the election.
Just before Tyler’s last days in office,
a coalition of Southern Whigs and Democrats issued a joint resolution favoring
the annexation of Texas, and it became a state in 1845. But Mexico withheld recognizing that Texas was
no longer part of Mexico until 1848 and only then as a result of the
Mexican-American War.
This blog has already reported on that
war and its outcomes.[2] In sum, Polk, as president, was victorious in
conducting that war and then went on to negotiate with the British the
acquisition of the Oregon Territory which resulted in the statehoods of both
Oregon and Washington. That is, in his one
four-year term, Polk maneuvered the largest increase in the nation’s land area –
over a million square miles.
In terms of the Whig reaction to these
developments, it was a token opposition to the war claiming Polk instigated it
by ordering General Zachary Taylor to the Rio Grande area, but they went along
with voting for the declaration of war that initiated the hostilities against Mexico. In other areas, Polk reestablished Van
Buren’s Independent Treasury System and successfully supported lower tariffs. This helped the Whigs to reenergize
themselves in opposition to these policies.
One result of that mobilization,
especially among Northern Whigs, was a push to back a Democratic proposal by
Congressman David Wilmot – the “Wilmot Proviso” – that called for the
prohibition of slavery in the newly acquired lands. Support for the “proviso” also came from
Northern Democrats but it did not make it through the Senate. The proposal was part of a Polk initiative to
offer $2 million for a down payment to Mexico to purchase California as part of
the treaty with that nation.[3]
Beyond this limited agreement over the expansion
of slavery, the two parties had clear divisions concerning land expansion –
Whigs generally opposed territorial acquisition. Despite that, they, in the Senate, voted, in
1848, for the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, so as to end the war with Mexico.
As the next election season approached, Polk’s
energetic term was coming to an end – he was not going to seek reelection. The Whigs faced whether they looked backward for
yet another Clay candidacy or forward by anointing yet another war hero. The former promised an economic based
campaign and the latter meant Whigs swallowing a level of acceptance for the
Mexican War. That acceptance would give the
territorial expansion made possible by Polk’s efforts the party’s implied
blessings. In addition, the war hero,
Zachary Taylor, was voicing antagonism toward Whig policies.
The process by which the party decided
for Taylor began in 1847 in that Clay led the Whigs against Polk’s war and the
president’s policy to acquire territories.
These sentiments were particularly strong among Northern Whigs. Other rumblings were also heard from other
quarters including a level of division among the Democrats.
That is, still in the mix of potential
candidates was former president Martin Van Buren. The next posting will begin with a look at
the ’48 campaign and how this mix of characters – Van Buren, Clay, Taylor, and
others – made for an active election season.
It will go a long way in setting the stage for the Whigs’ final acts on
the American political stage.
[1]
Michael F. Holt, The Rise and Fall of the American Whig Party: Jacksonian
Politics and the Onset of the Civil War (Oxford University Press, 1999).
[2] See Robert Gutierrez, “A Mixed Bag,” Gravitas: A Voice for Civics (a blog, July 20,
2021), accessed July 29, 2021, https://gravitascivics.blogspot.com/2021_07_18_archive.html .
[3]
The treaty ending the Mexican-American War was signed in Mexico. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed on
February 2, 1848. The treaty called for
the transfer of 55 percent of Mexican territory to the US. Parts of the following states came from that
area: Arizona, California, Colorado,
Nevada, New Mexico, Texas, and Utah. See “On This Day, the
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo Is Signed,” Constitution Daily, National
Constitution Center (February 2, 2021), accessed July 30, 2021, https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/on-this-day-the-treaty-of-guadalupe-hidalgo-is-signed
.
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