Early Presidents Discussion Board Assignment July 14

TAYLOR TO GRANT

The election of 1848 featured the beginning of a weak presidential period in American history. The four presidents before the Civil War as known as the four stooges of early American history and they were responsible for the coming of the Civil War because as a group they created a power vacuum at a critical time in our history. The stooges begins with the election of Zachary Taylor, the military hero of the Mexican War. Taylor came at a time when the nation needed a strong president because congress was becoming increasingly split between north and south. But they would not get a strong president with Zachary Taylor. He was a strange mix of slave owner and supporter of a strong national government. Yet he provided little leadership in his two years as president and was not a politician. Experts would tell us that he is really the first career military man to become president in our early history. During a crisis in congress over the expansion of slavery into the nearly acquired southwest area, he opposed the expansion of slavery, yet he was a slave owner. Generally he tended to avoid decisions and in the summer of 1850 he ate unripe cherries and milk. He got very sick and died in office. For years it was believed that he died of acute indigestion, but recently there were stories of how he was poisoned. So in 1991 his body was exhumed and tested and it was discovered that he was not poisoned, but he died of natural causes. Here are the results of the Taylor scientific investigation: http://www.ornl.gov/ORNLReview/rev27-12/text/ansside6.html It seemed strange that he would have been poisoned, for he made few enemies while he was president. Taylor was the third Whig president and is rated low as president. He now joins John Adams in the lowest category.

When Taylor became the second Whig president to die in office, Whig Millard Fillmore now became president. Many Americans still today ask the question: Who is Millard Fillmore? He is actually the most forgotten of the early presidents. Fillmore was a lawyer from Buffalo, New York. He had been born and raised in New York state and had some political experience having served in the House of Representatives. But he was known as a weak speaker and weak politician. When he became president, even his father questioned his leadership qualities. Fillmore continued the Taylor tradition; he generally avoided decisions and was a weak leader president. He did support the uneasy Compromise of 1850 that solved few problems and he was rejected by his party in 1852. But by 1852 the Whig party was slowly beginning to fall apart. It is believed that the only real fact to remember about the Fillmore presidency is that he became the first president to put a bathtub in the white house. So we have this picture of Fillmore taking a bath as the nation continues to fall apart. Fillmore is also rated low along with Taylor.

The election of 1852 featured the Whig candidate who was another military hero from the Mexican War General Winfield Scott. The Whigs had won two elections with the Jackson formula and they now hoped that they could win a third election with the Jackson formula. But Scott was known as a heavy drinker and this would hurt his chances. Some also felt that his lack of political experience would help push the nation toward war. The Democrats in 1852 nominated another darkhorse; their first darkhorse candidate James Polk has become a very strong president in foreign affairs. The Democrats also wanted to offer a candidate who would keep the nation together. In essence the Democrats offered a "safe" candidate in 1852. The darkhorse was Franklin Pierce of New Hampshire. Pierce was a virtual unknown in 1852 and did little campaigning. But the Democrats supported the Compromise of 1850 which eased sectional problems in congress, while Scott was a questionable candidate. In 1852 Franklin Pierce was elected the fourteenth president of the United States.

Franklin Pierce had some political background in state and national politics, but he entered office in a very nervous state for his young son had just been killed in a train wreck. Plus he was married to a very dominant woman. Pierce made few decisions as president and those ideas he has created more tension between north and south. He discussed the idea of buying Cuba and making it a Southern state, so he seemed to be pro-South and to be interested in extending slavery. On the other hand, he supported the Kansas Nebraska Act which allowed people in Kansas to decide on whether they wanted slavery or not. This led to fighting in Kansas between northerners and southerners and created "bleeding Kansas." Franklin Pierce was to be a safe president, but he was not particularly safe. He was dominated by his wife, his ideas created more tension, and he was rejected by the Democrats in 1856. He is rated a below average president. It is during his presidency that the Whig party divided into a Southern group and a Northern group and disappeared. This is the end of the 2nd Republican party; there are been four Whig presidents: two died in office and two were accidental presidents. These four presidents are little remembered in American History. All of the Whig presidents are rated lower and have little influence on our history. It was also during the presidency of Pierce that a new party started in the Midwest. This was initially a regional party and the name of the party was the Republican Party. This party stood against two evils: the expansion of slavery and the Mormons.

In 1856 this new Republican Party nominated explorer John Fremont for president. He called himself "the glamour boy" of American politics, but his appeal was regional. The only national party with national appeal was the Democratic party. This party nominated the best of the four stooges: James Buchanan. He was elected in 1856 and now this Pennsylvania native became president at a critical time in our history. Buchanan had a very capable political background he moved from state to national politics; he was Secretary of State under Polk and Minister to England during the presidency of Pierce. He was an honest hardworking politician who wanted to keep the national together, but he did not have the leadership or ability to accomplish that difficult task. He is to be remembered as the last gentleman president with his old style of dress. He is the only bachelor president in American history and some recent research indicates that he may have been gay. He had eye problems that made him appear cock-eyed and he was obsessed with detail. He spent time researching the job of a man who seems to have ripped off the federal government for a little money; he himself once refused a check for thousands of dollars because it was off by one cent.

Buchanan came at a very difficult time in our history and is rated average often for his efforts to overcome the impending crisis ahead: the Civil War. He seemed to rely on the courts to make decisions that would keep the nation together. Actually the supreme court with the Dred Scott Decision made matters worse when it ruled that slavery could exist anywhere in the United States. He had an excellent background in foreign affairs, but this was not a time for foreign affairs, it was a time for extraordinary leadership. Buchanan did not possess that leadership. He talked of the improving economy and then the economy suffered a depression. His policies were inactive during this economic crisis. Actually Buchanan did too little too late to cause the Civil War to be avoided. Many historians feel that by the time of Buchanan the Civil War was virtually inevitable or unavoidable. Even the unity of the Democratic Party had fallen apart by 1860. There was a northern Democratic candidate and a southern Democratic candidate. The Republican support was primarily in the north and west. Of course, the fact that the Republicans took control of the House of Representatives in 1858 also led to the frustrations of Buchanan as president.

The election of 1860 was a sectional or regional election. The election of Republican candidate Abraham Lincoln became the immediate cause of the Civil War. Southern states now became to leave or secede from the union. This was the final tragedy of the presidency of James Buchanan. He knew that secession was illegal but he decided that the federal government had no power to stop the southern states from leaving the union. So James Buchanan just watched as the nation fell apart. When Abraham Lincoln became president, he faced a real crisis: the nation was split. He now had to bring the union back together.

It is difficult to describe the life of this man Abraham Lincoln. There is more written about Abraham Lincoln than any person in the history of the world except for Jesus Christ. And the myths connected with Lincoln are more numerous and more believable than the myths connected with the life of George Washington. We know that Lincoln is the most commercialized person in American History; there are more monuments and tributes to Lincoln than anyone else. He is so far the only president to be featured in Disneyland and Disney World. He was a natural literary genius; he had an excellent sense of humor and he has become one of the most hated and criticized presidents in our entire history. Who is this man: Abraham Lincoln and what are some of the myths connected with him?

It is true that Lincoln was born in a log cabin, but he was born in Kentucky, not Illinois. His family was a farm family that moved to Indiana where his mother died. Lincoln here received little education, he said, "less than a year altogether." But he had the basics of reading and writing. His father remarried and the family now moved to Illinois. At age 22 Lincoln left home and moved to New Salem, Illinois, near Springfield. It appeared that he had problems with his father and he spoke little of his father the rest of his life. He tried various occupations at this time and even served briefly in the Indian war the Black Hawk War.

The Lincoln myth includes his honesty and his obsession with learning. There were numerous stories about Lincoln as an honest child; one of those stories involved his going to the store during a blizzard for his mother. He returned home with one cent too much in change. He then walked back through the blizzard to return that money because he was so honest. His obsession with learning also involved a series of stories such as his reading at night by the fire in the fireplace and his plowing fields during the day and reading a book on top of the plow at the same time. Again his honesty was evident even though he had such an obsession for learning. One day he dropped a borrowed book in the mud when he was plowing. He was so upset, he worked at various jobs to pay for the cost of the book. Lincoln has also been pictured as a role model for hard work and success. Actually he disliked manual labor. He did not like farming and he did try many jobs such as working on the building of a railroad, and as a river boatman and even as a store owner, but he failed at these jobs and then he turned to politics. As with the Washington myth, the stories about Lincoln and his early life cannot be substantiated and they are believed to be false.

In 1832 Lincoln became a member of the Whig party and was elected to four successive terms to the Illinois legislature. He now became a lawyer and moved to Springfield, where he built a successful practice. Now he met Kentuckian Mary Todd who became his wife; they had four sons but he outlived all of them but two. Lincoln now was elected to the House of Representatives as a Whig politician; he was one of the leading voices against the Mexican War. He then returned to law in Springfield. By this time in his life Lincoln did not believe that the federal government had the power to end slavery where it existed, but he did believe that slavery should not be allowed to be extended outside of the South and into the new territories in the West. He now joined the nearly formed Republican Party and he ran against Democrat Stephen Douglas for the senate seat from Illinois. The Lincoln-Douglas political debates are among the best political debates in our history. While Lincoln was not appointed to the senate, he did achieve much publicity. Lincoln was the choice of the Republican Party in 1860 and was elected as president. His election would cause southern states to leave the union and would lead to the beginning of the Civil War.

The Lincoln Myth involves his honesty, his hard work, his obsession with learning, his ideal relationship with his family even though he was raised by a stepmother and talked little with his father after he left home, his tendency for democracy even though he was a Whig, and the myth focuses on the fact that he was shot on Good Friday. For years he was pictured as the American Christ and for years Easter was called Black Easter. Abraham Lincoln was the sixteenth president of the United States and he had one of the most difficult tasks of any president: to bring the union back together.

Abraham Lincoln was the third war president at a time when the four war president was Jefferson Davis the president of the Southern Confederacy. An evaluation of Lincoln as president will focus on his role as the president of the Civil war and will focus on how he solved the basic problems of that war. By the time that he had become president seven southern states had seceded from the union. He immediately decided to send supplies to Fort Sumter in the Charleston, South Carolina, harbor. This fort was a symbol of federal authority in the state that had first left the union. South Carolina tried to prevent those supplies and fired on the fort on April 12, 1861, and the Civil War began.

Abraham Lincoln was similar to James Madison in that he did not have a military background or a good understanding of the military. He tried to understand the military and tried to be a good commander in chief by reading books about military planning and strategy. There is no doubt, however, that Lincoln mishandled the military and was often at odds with his military commanders. Take George B. McClellan, for example; McClellan was initially supported with much enthusiasm by Lincoln, but McClellan never lived up to his potential. Still Lincoln stayed with him too long. It was only late in the Civil War that Lincoln developed a chain of command idea in which he began to give more authority to military leaders and in which he took a less direct role in military strategy and planning. Lincoln finally created the role of what a modern war president should be.

Lincoln was also accused of being a tyrant and dictator for violating the civil rights of many Americans and for also violating the constitution. There were over 13,000 arbitrary arrests during his presidency and there was even a fear that he would postpone the election of 1864. Of course, the Democrats were greatly responsible for exaggerating Lincoln's suppression of civil liberties.

In defense of Lincoln, he solved the basic problems of war and was an outstanding war president and war politician. Lincoln had an outstanding war cabinet that included all of his major rivals for the Republican nomination for president in 1860. William Seward was Secretary of State, Salmon P. Chase was Secretary of the Treasury, Edward Bates was Attorney General, and Edwin Stanton was Secretary of War. This cabinet often disagreed with him and caused him many problems, but it is viewed as one of the strongest war cabinets in our history. Another major problem for Lincoln was the manpower problem. Every war in our history up to that time had been fought by volunteers; Lincoln initially turned to the use of volunteers, but he refused to use black volunteers. The Civil War was the bloodiest war in American history and the volunteers began to decrease in number. Lincoln now created the draft system to solve the manpower problem. This draft system was highly criticized and even led to riots throughout the North, but it was successful in solving the manpower problem. In addition, Lincoln did use blacks in the military.

Finances were a major problem for Lincoln and for the north. Lincoln used taxes in the wealthy to get money to support the war effort; he also turned to the sale of government war bonds. Up to that time in our history paper money was of different sizes and different colors. Lincoln decided to stabilize the currency by making money all the same size and color; he created the greenback dollars that we use today. Lincoln handled the finances of war very well. One of the most difficult areas for Lincoln was for him to get support for the war cause. He needed support from the wealthy in the north and from those in the West. Here Lincoln became a very capable war politician by working with Congress and getting laws and programs passed that would cater to the wealthy in the north and to those in the West. He restored the National Bank; Washington had established this bank, Jackson had killed it, and Lincoln brought it back. He also got congress to pass a high tariff-tax on imports- that would favor the wealthy factory owners. For those in the West, he was able to get congress to pass the Homestead Act which gave those in the West 160 acres of free public land. He also supported education in the West by a land grant policy of giving land for state colleges throughout the west. He was able to get support from key elements in the north and west.

As the Civil War was dragging along and while there was pressure on Lincoln to end the war, Lincoln became an outstanding war politician by creating a new cause for the war. On January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. While this was a limited freedom document, it was clear that Lincoln was out to end the slave system and out to destroy the South. He then went to congress and sought a congressional amendment to officially end all slavery in the United States. The Emancipation Proclamation created a new interest and new excitement in the war. Finally Lincoln achieved his goal: to save the union. It took the invasion and conquest of the South to achieve this difficult goal, but it was achieved on April 9, 1865 when General Robert E. Lee surrendered to General Ulysses Grant. Lincoln now prepared for the difficult task of rebuilding the nation: this was known as the reconstruction process. He believed that the nation should be reconstructed as quickly as possible. In his second inaugural address in 1865, he urged, "malice toward none" and "charity for all." Congress, on the other hand, believed that the South should be punished for the Civil War and there should be a harsh program of reconstruction. But Lincoln never got an opportunity to follow a program of presidential reconstruction. He was shot at Ford's Theater in Washington, D.C. by John Wilkes Booth on April 14, 1865 and Lincoln died the next morning. Vice President Andrew Johnson now became president. Lincoln is the only early president to be assassinated as president; Johnson becomes the third accidental president in our early history.

Abraham Lincoln is rated high as president. He was the only president to deal with an internal war known as the Civil War. He was a Midwest farmer with Midwest values who became an extraordinary war president and war politician. He did solve the basic problems of war and he did bring the union back together. He also did start the end of slavery in American history. If he had not been assassinated, he would have had to deal with the difficult problem of reconstruction. It is possible that this struggle with congress over reconstruction would have hurt his rating as president and may have even led to his impeachment. But that difficult problem now rested with Southerner Andrew Johnson.

Andrew Johnson was born in poverty in Tennessee and became a tailor for much of his life before he entered politics. He had the appeal of Jackson Ian Democracy, but this Southern senator supported the union as Tenneesee left the union. He was a hero in the north and a traitor in the south. He became a supporter of Lincoln and was chosen by Lincoln as vice president in 1864 to show Lincoln's attempt to bring the nation together quickly. Johnson continued the policies of Lincoln in reconstruction but he was opposed by Radical Republicans in congress who began to pass laws to punish the south and to lead to a military occupation of the south. Johnson tried to stop these laws by use of the veto but congressmen continued to override his veto. Johnson became frustrated; he turned to drink and became abusive. Congress now charged that he broke the Tenure of Office Act when he illegally removed Stanton as Secretary of War. These charges led to eighteen formal charges of impeachment in the House of Representatives. Johnson had earned the nickname "King Veto" through his constant use of the veto. Now he stood before the Senate on trail for crimes of impeachment. Actually Johnson was just in the way of congressional reconstruction and they wanted him out of office. When the final votes were taken, Johnson remained president by one vote. The Senate needed a two thirds majority to remove Johnson as president. Johnson remained an unpopular president and is rated a below average president.

In 1868 the only united party was the Republican party. The Radical Republicans wanted to avoid the problems they had with Johnson. The Republicans now turned again to the Jackson Formula and nominated Ulysses Grant, a military hero, the commanding general of the Northern army at the end of the Civil War, for president. Grant accepted the nomination and would become the last Jackson Formula president in our early history and the eighteenth president of the United States. Grant is rated one of the worst American presidents ever and the worst two term presidents in our history. Why was Grant such a poor president?

Ulysses Grant had no political experience and no political background. He was unaware of what a president should be. He was similar to Zachary Taylor. These are career military men who have never been elected to a political position in their lives and who have no understanding of politics. He had an attitude similar to John Adams: it was an honor,not a job. This attitude created the Grant Tradition: the tradition of allowed power in government to shift to congress and this is where power would remain for years after Grant.

Grant abused the spoils system. He brought some of the most incompetent individuals into government; they were friends from the military and were relatives. He saw nothing wrong with rewarding his military buddies and relatives. Actually the White House became like Camp White House with the number of military men in the executive department of Grant. Grant also saw nothing wrong with taking gifts from people and doing favors. By modern standards people continually bribed Grant. He began to drink heavily and was continually given liquor as a gift. He loved to smoke cigars and was given more than 20,000 boxes of cigars during his presidency. His goal was to smoke every cigar in every box. He was also a womanizer and saw nothing wrong with going to houses of prostitution. His favorite prostitute was Little Egypt and his relationships with this lady was well known.

The two term Grant presidency also featured the highest level of corruption and the largest number of scandals in American History. Grant was not involved with the corruption and scandals, but he allowed them to take place and was identified with them. This is why he became increasingly unpopular and would leave on a low. The scandals first appeared in his first term as president. The Credit Mobilier Scandal involved congressmen building stock in a railroad company and giving generous grants of land and money to that railroad company. The Salary Grab Scandal involved congress trying to give itself a 50% increase in salary. One of the scandals that showed Grant as president was the Black Friday Scandal. Jay Gould and Jim Fisk were wealthy men who wanted to control all of America's gold. But this was difficult because the United States Treasury was continuing to sell gold. So Gould and Fisk became friends of Grant and gave him gifts and took him on a trip to Boston. As a favor, Grant, who had little knowledge of economics, ordered the treasury to stop selling gold. The price of gold rose substantially. Congress even investigated this situation and stated that Grant was a victim of poor judgment, but he was not involved in this scandal.

In 1872 Grant was renominated for president by the Republican party, the Democrats were still weak and divided and nominated newspaperman Horace Greeley who had just become a vegetarian and who spent more time on the evils of meat than the scandals of Grant. Grant was now elected for a second term: a term that featured more scandals and more corruption on all levels of government and all levels of society. During his second term there occurred the Whiskey Ring Scandal and the Belknap Scandal. Orville Babcock was the private secretary of the president and was involved in stealing government tax money; this was the Whiskey Ring Scandal. William Belknap was the Secretary of War and was found to be stealing Indian funds. He was removed from this position before he was arrested and would go to jail. The scandals and corruption were hurting Grant's rating. He was becoming increasingly unpopular and he could not understand why. He even wanted to be elected for a third term. But the party rejected Grant and he left office on a low to be rated one of the worst presidents in our entire history.