A TALE OF TWO TICKETS, PART I

To attract even more voters, the Whigs put a Democrat, an anti-Jackson Democrat, on the ticket as Vice President. They nominated former Congressman and Senator John Tyler. This gave them one of the most famous campaign slogans of all times: “Tippecanoe and Tyler, Too.” Tyler, a life-long Democrat, had split with the Jacksonians over what he considered abuse and violations of the Constitution. The hope was that his presence on the ticket would attract a large number of anti-Jackson Democrats to the Whig ticket that year. It worked.

The popular vote was actually fairly close. The Whig Candidate, William Henry Harrison, won with 52.88% of the vote. But his electoral victory was a huge landslide, with the Whigs taking 234 electoral votes to only 60 for the Democrats. The Whigs barely edged out the Democrats in a large number of states. Certainly, Tyler’s presence on the ticket tipped the scale and greatly aided the Whigs in their victory.

What the Wigs had not counted on was the possibility that Tyler might actually become President. Williams Henry Harrison, the oldest man ever elected President until Ronald Reagan took the title, made the longest inaugural address in history (that title is still his) without the protection of a top hat or coat during a freezing storm on March 4, 1841. He died of pneumonia 30 days later on April 4, 1841. John Tyler became President.

By this time, Henry Clay and the Whigs had finally agreed on a party platform. The Whig legislative program called for high protective tariffs, internal improvements at federal expense, and a new Bank of the United States. Tyler, as a life-long Democrat, opposed all of these measures. As the Whig Congress passed these measures, Tyler vetoed them. When he vetoed the second bill to create a new Bank of the United States, there were mass protests, and the Whig members of Congress formally expelled Tyler from the party. There was even a bill of impeachment introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives, the first in our history, but it failed to pass.

The choice of Tyler for the Vice Presidential nomination certainly helped the Whigs take control of the White House and Congress by attracting anti-Jackson Democrats to the Whig Party. But his promotion to the Presidency after the death of William Henry Harrison prevented the Whigs from accomplishing any of their major goals, and contributed to their loss in the

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