With a disastrous economic crisis falling into the rearview mirror and anger brewing on both sides of the political aisle, the stage is set for an ugly, contentious presidential election. On one side, a seasoned, astute Democrat, a former-New York US senator and secretary of state who ascended from humble beginnings.
On the other, a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, born the heir of a wealthy family, although campaigning as the champion of the “common man.”
That election in 1840 was crazy, am I right?
“What?!” You’re thinking. That sounds a whole lot like 2016! Feel a little eerie?
Yes, it should. It’s time to find out what a race from over 150 years ago can teach us about ourselves. And better yet, how we can use it to prepare for the future. Let’s go back and find out.
The Little Magician
Among a variety of clever nicknames, President Martin Van Buren was often known as “The Little Magician” for his pint-sized stature as well as his uncanny ability to find himself on the right side of political controversies.
But, Van Buren, the man also known as “The Red Fox of Kinderhook,” will get destroyed in this election — at least in the Electoral College. Eerie, right?
The Panic of 1837
President Van Buren came into office in 1837 at a prosperous time for America. However, the new president’s honeymoon period would last only three months until the Panic of 1837 hit. The panic was the one of the first depressions in American history, the popping of an economic balloon created by state banks in the West and their careless expansion policies.
Land speculation cratered the banks, prospectors lost their property and Van Buren swallowed the blame; although President Jackson’s closure of the National Bank a few years earlier set the nation on the path to panic. Van Buren’s popularity would never recover from the pessimism that grew from the depression and even led to another nickname: Van Ruin.
To Whig or not to Whig?
The Democrat’s challengers in 1840 were the Whigs. They had formed seven years earlier, pulling together portions of defunct parties like National Republicans and the Anti-Masonics to oppose then-President Andrew Jackson.
They were still searching for a figurehead to run behind and were stuck between two candidates: the party’s founder and principal policy worker Henry Clay or the military hero William Henry Harrison.
Clay was a more controversial figure, so, in a bid to capitalize on the folk hero celebrity of “Old Hickory” Andrew Jackson, the Whigs put all their chips behind Harrison, old “Tippecanoe.”
Log Cabins and Hard Cider
After the panic, Americans were not happy with Martin Van Buren. In fact, they were primed and ready for a grassroots revolution; for the everyday American to reclaim their country. And the Whigs were thrilled to give it to them. Their champion of the common man: William Henry Harrison.
Oddly enough, though, Harrison was not particularly common. He was actually born an heir to a wealthy, slave-run Virginia plantation. He lived in Ohio, which was considered frontier at the time, but lived on a huge property. He may have once had a house partially made of logs, though. Maybe.
However, his Democrat opponents likened him to an old man that would rather pick up his pension and sip some hard cider in his cabin than be president. An insult that would backfire so fantastically that Harrison committed his whole campaign to it. The “Log Cabin candidate” they called him for his rough-riding frontier spirit. A man of hard cider, just like you! A regular American for regular Americans. I warned you this would be eerie, didn’t I?
A Man of Gold Spoons
President Van Buren, on the other hand, was labeled an out-of-touch aristocrat, even though he was the one raised by a humble New York tavern keeper. A tavern keeper! Come on, it doesn’t get much more hard cider and log cabins than that.
But, the rhetoric had spoken. A Whig congressman even delivered a speech about President Van Buren’s White House renovations. Representative Charles Ogle of Pennsylvania roasted the president for his fancy dishware for two days.
He went into ruthless detail about how beautiful the gold spoons were and how very expensive the fine china was. Van Buren was living in luxury on the taxpayer dime, although much of the renovations were done by Andrew Jackson and the fine china had been accumulated by presidents for the last half-century. But hey, politics, right?
It didn’t matter. The speech was massive.
Thousands of copies of the speech flooded the country. The new penny press spun the message to the masses at a pace never before seen. The Whigs adopted all sorts of everyday materials to make Harrison relatable.
There were Harrison handkerchiefs, teapots, they made cider bottles in the shape of log cabins and even made a 10-foot paper ball. Seriously. People even wrote songs about him, most famously, the spunky little diddy “Tippecanoe and Tyler, too!”
Tippecanoe and Tyler, too!
Who is this Tyler, you should be wondering. That would be Harrison’s running mate, John Tyler. Tyler was a former Democrat who had just abandoned his party after a spat during the recent Nullification crisis. What is that? An article for another day, probably.
Even though he was still very much a Democrat and therefore disagreed with the Whigs on almost everything. Whigs utilized Tyler as a way to feign unity — but mostly to rack up votes in the South. Politics, right?
“Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story”
It is said that the election of 1840 was the first modern American election. There were no platforms. Everything in the campaign was done to have an advantage over the other side. Everything was rhetoric. Sound familiar?
Harrison easily beat Van Ruin in the Electoral College, despite a close popular vote. Shortly after, a coatless Harrison delivered an unending inauguration speech in the rain almost twice as long as any other president before him or since.
He died from pneumonia after one month in office. One month. Now John Tyler was president — a former Democrat who agreed with the Whigs on almost nothing. He would spend his time in office blocking their legislation. They called him “His Accidency.”
The Whig party would die a decade later. An unbelievable win with nothing to show for it, their legacy.
The seemingly modern political ploys that are employed today may seem unique to us, and they may feel insurmountable. But they have happened before. And we’ve survived, learned and moved on past 1840, despite how ruthless and similar it was to the way we do things now. We hardly ever think about the Whigs, “Old Tippecanoe” or ol’ Martin Van Ruin anymore.
Now more than ever it’s important that we make our parties today learn from the mistakes of our past — or they too will go the way of the Whigs.
