Zachary Taylor: The Tease

I've mentioned before that Taylor wasn't exactly a political lifer. President was the very first elected office he held.

But he took not being political to a new extreme. Here's part of an actual letter he wrote in response to a reporter asking him to state his political views:

"I reiterate what I have often said...I am a Whig but not an ultra Whig. If elected I would not be the mere president of a party- I would endeavor to act independent of party domination and should feel bound to administer the Government untrammelled by party schemes.

Second- the veto power- the power given by the Constitution to the Executive to exercise his veto is a high conservative power, but in my opinion, it should never be exercised except in cases of clear violation of the Constitution, or manifest haste or want of due consideration by the Congress. Indeed I have though for many years past, that known opinions and wishes of the Executive have exercised undue and injurious influence upon the Legislative Department of the government and from this cause I have thought that our system was in danger of undergoing a great change from its true theory."

So....he didn't want to actively enforce party beliefs and he prefers to let congress figure out what to do, reserving his veto for extreme cases and not letting his beliefs influence it. Not exactly playing to the base.

I'm not saying that they should have put some fire breathing party animal on the ticket, but it just seems strange to put someone on the ticket that almost refuses to be classified as even belonging to the party they're running for.

It was a testament to the exhaustion of the American people with the party politics of the increasingly southern dominated democratic party. Could an independent get elected in this day and age, or have the two parties gotten their tentacles too deep into the keys to power?

Zachary Taylor: Office Politics

The idea of a President and his cabinet and/or his Vice President not getting along is really nothing special. We had the 'kitchen cabinet' of Andrew Jackson which led to armed posses and near duels over a woman's honor, we had Thomas Jefferson's service as Vice President to John Adams who felt that he was actively trying to undermine him and today is no different- with the presidential hopefuls John McCain and Sarah Palin who now it seems, could barely stand each other.

That's all normal, but never before the Polk administration did a President have so much animosity towards an active General fighting a war. As General Zachary Taylor, a Whig (not even a declared Whig at that point), was fighting the Mexican War, James Polk, a democrat, did everything that he could to minimize his victories on the field of battle so he couldn't become another War Hero president like Henry Harrison.

Polk was like a less corrupt Richard Nixon, brilliant and effective, but thinking that everyone was out to get him. By the time of his administration, the Whigs blossomed into an effective national protest movement against the Democratic policies of national expansion and limited 'internal improvements' Polk espoused. He constantly wrote to friends, suspecting Taylor of 'Whiggery'.

The irony of this strained relationship, is that Taylor was more or less completely apolitical until the Whigs convinced him to accept the presidential ticket in the election of 1848. Once he accepted the nomination as Whig candidate, he refused even to put his beliefs in writing, simply saying that he'd 'protect and enforce the constitution'. I think that Taylor's limpness on issues hardly put him in the category of Whig crusader.

Imagine today if President Obama kept General Gates' from enacting his policies to keep him out of presidential contention. How would the American people feel about that?

Zachary Taylor: The Occupation of Mexico City?

If you're like me, you have a cursory understanding of American history. You know the big events, the big players, wars etc. but may be surprised when you go a little deeper than the front page of the major chapters of a High School History book.

For example, I knew their was a 'Mexican War', but for some reason, I always thought that it took place in what were once Mexican territories, New Mexico of course, Texas, California... but I had no idea that the U.S. Army marched all the way down to Mexico City and occupied it.

It seems ridiculous that I don't know this, but there it is. It really happened.

One of the best parts about this project is that you find these kinds of things out. It seems like the majority of a lot of these biographies (especially the ones on minor presidents like Taylor who died in office) focus mostly on the movements and events that happened leading up to their presidency and I'm OK with that.

The viewpoint from one author to another will change dramatically or focus on different parts of the country. All this variety fills in a lot of blanks for me and makes me appreciate the complex nature of our history.

Zachary Taylor: The Trainee Politician 1849

Many politicians before and after Taylor had well known military careers as war heroes and he was no exception. What is exceptional however is that his very FIRST political office was President of the United States.

It's understandable that many Americans don't want career politicians as President, but it's hardly imaginable that someone who never held any political position could be elected to the highest office in the land (think of the flack Sarah Palin got and she was the mayor of Wasilla!). Taylor spent nearly 40 years in the military before being nominated by the Whig party.

The Whig party calculated that having a Southerner and Northerner on the same ticket would be a good political move in this divided time and they were right. The irony is that as a career military man, Taylor didn't foster the strong Whig beliefs that they might have expected- at least none that he shared publically during the campaign.

Taylor, like Harrison got elected because most of what was known about him was nothing more than that he was a war hero. Taylor took the opposite approach as Polk in the election before and rather than being the candidate to make a bold stand on his beliefs, Taylor would take almost no public stands on the issues of the day other than that he believed in the constitution. He let people decide for themselves what his beliefs were and seemed to attract voters on conflicting sides of the same issue.

Many politicians have tried this tactic throughout world history, but I guess it takes a newbie to pull it off.