'John Tyler, Jr.' (
March 29,
1790 –
January 18,
1862) was the tenth (
1841-
1845)
President of the United States. A long-time
Democrat-Republican, he was elected
Vice President on the
Whig ticket and on becoming president in 1841, broke with that party. His term as Vice President began on
March 4, 1841 and one month later, on
April 4, incumbent President
William Henry Harrison died of what is today believed to have been
viral pneumonia. Harrison's death left Tyler, the
federal government, and the American nation briefly confused on the
process of succession.
Opposition members in
Congress argued for an acting
caretaker that would continue to use only the title Vice President. The act of taking over as official president, rather than as
acting president, came from the influence of the
Harrison cabinet and some members of Congress. Members of Harrison's cabinet feared an ''acting'' leader would compromise the ability to successfully run the country. Tyler took the
presidential oath of office, initiating a custom that would govern future successions, and became the first U.S. vice president to assume the office of president upon the death of his predecessor. It was not until
1967, that Tyler's action of assuming full powers of the presidency was legally codified in the
Twenty-fifth Amendment. His most famous achievement was the annexation of the
Republic of Texas in
1845. Tyler was the first president born after the adoption of the
U.S. Constitution.
Biography
John Tyler was born the son of
John Tyler, Sr. (1747-1813) and
Mary Armistead (1761-1797), in
Charles City County, Virginia, as the second of eight children. He was educated at the
College of William and Mary and went on to study law with his father, who became
Governor of Virginia (1808-1811). Tyler was admitted to the bar in 1809 and commenced practice in Charles City County. He served as a captain of a volunteer military company in 1813 and became a member of the
Virginia House of Delegates 1811-1816 and was later a member of the
council of state in 1816.
Tyler was elected as a Democratic-Republican to the
Fourteenth Congress to fill the vacancy caused by the death of
John Clopton. He was reelected to the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Congresses and served from December 17, 1816, to March 3, 1821 in the House of Representatives. Tyler declined to be a candidate for renomination in 1820 because of impaired health. He became a member of the Virginia State house of delegates 1823-1825. Tyler was elected to be the
Governor of Virginia (1825-1827). He was popularly known as voting against nationalist legislations and for his open opposition of the
Missouri Compromise.
Tyler was elected as a
Jacksonian (later
Anti-Jacksonian) to the
United States Senate in 1827. He was reelected in 1833 and served from March 4, 1827, to February 29, 1836, when he resigned. He served as
President pro tempore of the Senate during the Twenty-third Congress, and was chairman of the
Committee on the District of Columbia (Twenty-third and Twenty-fourth Congresses), as well as the Committee on Manufactures (Twenty-third Congress), a member of the Virginia State constitutional convention in 1829 and 1830 and a member of the Virginia State House of Delegates in 1839.
He was drawn into the newly-organized
Whig Party, and was elected
Vice President in 1840 as running mate to
William Henry Harrison. Their campaign slogans of "Log Cabins and Hard Cider" and "
Tippecanoe and Tyler too" are among the most famous in American politics. "Tippecanoe and Tyler too" not only offered the slight sectionalism that would further be apparent in the presidency of Tyler, but also the nationalism that was imperative to gain the American vote. He was inaugurated March 4, 1841, and served until the death of President Harrison on April 4, 1841. Upon Harrison's death, Tyler became the new President.
Tyler was the first Vice President to assume the Presidency in this manner. He acceded to the Presidency upon the death of President Harrison on
April 4,
1841, and took the
Presidential oath of office as specified by the Constitution on
April 6. The
Cabinet and
United States Senate agreed with Tyler that he was President and not merely
Acting President of the United States, and as the Constitution was not explicit on that aspect of succession (until the 1967 ratification of the
25th Amendment), both the House and Senate passed resolutions recognizing Tyler as President. He even delivered an Inaugural Address, proving his formal entrance into the position.
After his presidential career Tyler became a delegate to and president of the peace convention held in
Washington, D.C. in 1861 as an effort to devise means to prevent the impending war. Tyler was a delegate to the
Confederate Provisional Congress in 1861; elected to the House of Representatives of the Confederate Congress, but died in Richmond, Virginia, January 18, 1862, before he could assume office. He is buried in
Hollywood Cemetery.
John Tyler was married twice. His first wife was Letitia Christian Tyler with whom he had 8 children; she died in the White House in September 1842. His second wife was Julia Gardiner Tyler ( July 23, 1820 - July 10, 1889), with whom he had 7 children. As of 2007, one of his grandsons,
Harrison Ruffin Tyler, is still alive.
Presidency 1841-1845
Policies
Tyler's presidency was rarely taken seriously in his time. He was usually referred to as the "Acting President" or "His Accidency" by opponents. Further, Tyler quickly found himself at odds with his former political supporters. Harrison had been expected to adhere closely to
Whig Party policies and work closely with Whig leaders, particularly
Henry Clay. Tyler shocked
Congressional Whigs by vetoing virtually the entire Whig agenda, twice vetoing Clay's legislation for a national banking act following the
Panic of 1837 and leaving the government deadlocked. Tyler was officially expelled from the Whig Party in 1841, a few months after taking office, and became known as "the man without a party." The entire cabinet he had inherited from Harrison resigned in September, aside from
Daniel Webster, Secretary of State, who remained to finalize the
Webster-Ashburton Treaty in 1842, demonstrating his independence from Clay.
For two years, Tyler struggled with the Whigs, but when he nominated
John C. Calhoun as Secretary of State, to 'reform' the Democrats, the gravitational swing of the Whigs to identify with "the North" and the Democrats as the party of "the South," led the way to the sectional party politics of the next decade.
The last year of Tyler's presidency was marred by a freak accident that killed two of his Cabinet members. During a ceremonial cruise down the
Potomac River on
February 28,
1844, the main gun of the
USS ''Princeton'' blew up during a demonstration firing, instantly killing
Thomas Gilmer, the
Secretary of the Navy, and
Abel P. Upshur, the
Secretary of State. Julia Gardiner (whom Tyler had met two years earlier at a reception, and would go on to become his second wife) was also aboard the ''Princeton'' that day. Her father, David Gardiner, was among those killed during the explosion. Upon hearing of her father's death, Gardiner fainted into the President's arms.
[1] Tyler and Gardiner were married not long afterwards in New York City, on
June 26,
1844.
Annexation of Texas
Tyler advocated annexation of
Texas to the Union. Whigs opposed this expansion because it would upset the balance between North and South and risked war with Mexico. However the Whigs lost the 1844 election to
James K. Polk, who favored annexation. When the Senate blocked a treaty (which needed a 2/3 vote), Tyler pushed Congress to annex Texas through an adopted joint resolution. The tactic worked and it passed the House 132-72 and the Senate 27-25. The
Missouri Compromise helped to promise security to the west of the United States with the line of 36°30'N. Such meant that any states north of the line would be free and those south of the line would be open to slavery. The option to potentially have four more states south of the line, left the House ready and willing to pass the bill. On March 3, Tyler sent instructions to his representative in Texas,
Andrew Jackson Donelson, to announce the annexation. The next day, he left office. Even with a brief period of skeptical instinct, Polk told Donelson to carry out the orders of Tyler. Texas formally joined the Union on December 29,1845, when James K. Polk was President.
Rhode Island's Dorr Rebellion
In May 1842, when the
Dorr Rebellion in
Rhode Island came to a head, Tyler pondered the request of the governor and legislature to send in Federal troops to help it suppress the Dorrite insurgents. The insurgents under Thomas Dorr had armed themselves and proposed to install a new state constitution. Previous to such acts, Rhode Island had been following the same constitutional structure that was established in 1663. Tyler called for calm on both sides, and recommended the governor enlarge the franchise to let most men vote. Tyler promised that in case an actual insurrection should break out in Rhode Island he would employ force to aid the regular, or Charter, government. He made it clear that federal assistance would be given, not to prevent, but only to put down insurrection, and would not be available until violence had been committed. After listening to reports from his confidential agents, Tyler decided that the 'lawless assemblages' were dispersing and expressed his confidence in a "temper of conciliation as well as of energy and decision." He did not send any federal forces. The rebels fled the state when the state militia marched against them.
[2] With their dispersion, they accepted the expansion of suffrage.
Separation of Church and State
On July 10, 1843, President Tyler wrote a letter to Joseph Simpson which included "The United States has adventured upon a great and noble experiment, which is believed to have been hazarded in the absence of all previous precedent — that of total separation of Church and State. No religious establishment by law exists among us. The conscience is left free from all restraint and each is permitted to worship his Maker after his own judgment. The offices of the Government are open alike to all. No tithes are levied to support an established Hierarchy, nor is the fallible judgment of man set up as the sure and infallible creed of faith. The Mohammedan, if he will to come among us would have the privilege guaranteed to him by the Constitution to worship according to the Koran; and the East Indian might erect a shrine to Brahma if it so pleased him. Such is the spirit of toleration inculcated by our political institutions… The Hebrew persecuted and down trodden in other regions takes up his abode among us with none to make him afraid… and the Aegis of the government is over him to defend and protect him. Such is the great experiment which we have tried, and such are the happy fruits which have resulted from it; our system of free government would be imperfect without it."
Impeachment attempt
In 1843, after he vetoed a tariff bill, the House of Representatives considered the first
impeachment resolution against a president in American history. A committee headed by former president
John Quincy Adams concluded that Tyler had misused the veto, but the impeachment resolution did not pass.
Administration and Cabinet
Supreme Court appointments
Tyler appointed the following Justices to the
Supreme Court of the United States:
★
Samuel Nelson - 1845
States admitted to the Union
★
Florida – March 3, 1845
Post-Presidency
Tyler retired to a Virginia
plantation named "Walnut Grove" that he had bought, renaming it "Sherwood Forest" to signify that he had been "outlawed" by the Whig party. He withdrew from electoral politics, though his advice continued to be sought by states-rights Democrats.
Tyler postage stamp
Confederate allegiances and death
Tyler had long been an advocate of
states' rights, believing that the question of a state's "free" or "slave" status ought to be decided at the state level, with no input from the federal government. He was a slaveholder for his entire life. He re-entered public life to sponsor and chair the
Virginia Peace Convention in February 1861. The convention sought a compromise to avoid
civil war while the
Confederate Constitution was being drawn up at the
Montgomery Convention. When the Senate rejected his plan, Tyler urged
Virginia's immediate
secession.
Having served in the provisional
Confederate Congress in 1861, he was elected to the
Confederate House of Representatives but died of
bronchitis and bilious fever before he could take office. His final words were "I am going now, perhaps it is for the best." Tyler is buried in
Hollywood Cemetery in
Richmond, Virginia. The city of
Tyler, Texas is named for him.
[3]
Throughout Tyler's life, he suffered from poor health. Frequent colds occurred every winter as he aged. After his exit from the White House, he fell victim to repeated cases of dysentery. He has been quoted as having many aches and pains in the last eight years of his life. In 1862, after complaining of chills and dizziness, he vomited and collapsed during the Congress of Confederacy. He was revived, yet the next day he admitted to the same symptoms. It was likely that John Tyler died of a stroke.
Trivia
★ Tyler is the only
President to have served as
President ''pro tempore'' of the Senate.
★ Tyler's favorite horse was named "The General". He is buried at his
Sherwood Forest Plantation with a gravestone which reads, "Here lies the body of my good horse 'The General'. For twenty years he bore me around the circuit of my practice an in all that time he never made me blunder. Would that his master could say the same."
[1]
★ In all, Tyler had fifteen children, eight with his first wife
Letitia and seven with his second wife
Julia. His last surviving child, Pearl Tyler, who was also his last child born, died on
June 30,
1947, one hundred years, one week and six days after the death of his first child, Mary Tyler.
★
John Dunjee claimed to be the
illegitimate son of John Tyler, a child of Tyler and one of his female slaves. There was also a mulatto woman who frequently traveled with the Tyler family who was alleged to be the president's daughter.
★ John Tyler, born
March 30,
1790, is the first President born after the Ratification of the Constitution of the United States (Virginia having ratified it in 1788) making him a contender for the first President to be born a United States Citizen. Because Rhode Island (the last of the original thirteen colonies to ratify the Constitution) didn’t ratify the Constitution until
May 29,
1790, the second contender is James Buchanan, born
April 23,
1791. However, because the tenth Amendment wasn’t ratified until
December 15,
1791, James Polk is the third contender being born
November 2,
1795.
★ Tyler's death in January 1862 was the only one in presidential history not to be officially mourned in Washington, because of his allegiance to the
Confederacy.
★ Tyler is sometimes considered the only president to die outside the
United States seeing that his place of death,
Richmond, Virginia, was part of the
Confederate States at the time.
See also
★
Second Party System
★
Dorr Rebellion
★
U.S. presidential election, 1840
★
Sherwood Forest Plantation
★
Letitia Christian Tyler
★
Julia Gardiner Tyler
References
★
White House website John Tyler biography, 2007.
★ Chitwood, Oliver Perry. ''John Tyler, Champion of the Old South.'' University of North Carolina Press: 1939.
★ Crapol, Edward P. ''John Tyler, the Accidental President.'' The University of North Carolina Press 2006. ISBN 978-0807830413.
★ Crapol, Edward P. "John Tyler and the Pursuit of National Destiny." ''Journal of the Early Republic'' 1997 17(3): 467-491. ISSN 0275-1275.
★ Kruman, Marc W., and Alan Brinkley, editor. ''The Reader's Companion to the American Presidency: John Tyler.'' Houghton Mifflin Company: 2004. ISBN 978-0395788899.
★ Macmahon, Edward B. and Leonard Curry. ''Medical Cover-Ups in the White House.'' Farragut Publishing Company: 1987. ISBN 978-0918535016.
★ Monroe, Dan. ''The Republican Vision of John Tyler'' Texas A&M University Press: 2003. ISBN 1-58544-216-X.
★ Peterson, Norma Lois. ''The Presidencies of William Henry Harrison and John Tyler.'' University Press of Kansas: 1989. ISBN 978-0700604005.
★ Schouler, James.
of the United States of America: Under the Constitution vol. 4. 1831-1847. Democrats and Whigs.'' (1917) online edition
1. Paletta, Lu Ann and Worth, Fred L. (1988). "The World Almanac of Presidential Facts".
2. Chitwood pp 326-30
3. Who's Buried in Grant's Tomb?: A Tour of Presidential Gravesites, , Brian, Lamb, National Cable Satellite Corporation, 2000, ISBN 1-881846-07-5
4. Paletta, Lu Ann and Worth, Fred L. (1988). "The World Almanac of Presidential Facts".
External links
★
Extensive essay on John Tyler and shorter essays on each member of his cabinet and First Lady from the Miller Center of Public Affairs
★
Official Whitehouse biography
★
Biography by Appleton's and Stanley L. Klos
★
U.S. Senate Historian's Office: Vice Presidents of the United States--John Tyler
★
POTUS - John Tyler
★
Tyler's letters refusing government intervention, April and May, 1842
★
★
★
List of Descendants
★
First State of the Union Address
★
Second State of the Union Address
★
Third State of the Union Address
★
Fourth State of the Union Address
★
John Tyler's Health and Medical History
★
Hollywood Cemetery - John Tyler's final resting place
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