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John Tyler: President John Tyler
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John Tyler (1841-1845) is remembered for several reasons. He had more children (15) than any other President. Tyler was born while Washington was President; his youngest child (born when Tyler was almost 70 years old) lived to see Harry Truman in the White House. Tyler was ... the only President to support the Confederacy during the Civil War (1861-1865), being a member of the Confederate Provisional Congress and a member-elect of the Confederate House of Representatives. But it was his very first act as President for which he is most remembered, merely declaring that he was indeed the President of the United States.
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At the secession of the first southern states in 1861, John Tyler led a compromise movement, although his effort failed. Tyler subsequently contributed to the creation of the Confederacy and was a member of the Confederate Congress at his death in 1862. Following the Civil War, Tyler's wife returned to Sherwood Forest to reclaim the plantation, which had been badly battered during the Union occupation of Charles City County. The property remains the home of John Tyler's grandson and his family, and is open to the public as a historic house museum. The original French parlor wallpaper was reproduced during a restoration in the 1970s and the interior includes many possessions of President Tyler and the Tyler family.
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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.
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John Tyler graduated from Bucknell University in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, in 1968 with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and subsequently served as an officer in the U.S. Navy. He received the Juris Doctor degree from Emory University School of Law in 1973, where he earned the American Jurisprudence awards in Corporate Taxation, Taxation of Corporate Reorganizations, and Trial Practice. After graduating from Emory, John joined the international accounting firm of Arthur Andersen & Co. where he practiced international tax planning and compliance. In 1976, he joined the Carter-Mondale Presidential Campaign where he served as Assistant Controller for the Campaign. In 1977, he joined the staff of the Regional and District Counsel of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) where he represented the IRS in U.S. Tax Court, as well as in handling criminal tax and collection matters. In 1979, John joined an Atlanta law firm where he later became a partner, practicing primarily in the areas of tax controver-sies, real estate, corporate, partnership and personal tax planning.
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Within a few months after the 1840 election victory of the Whig ticket of "Tippicanoe and Tyler too," John Tyler became the first vicepresident in American history to succeed to the presidency on the death of an incumbent. Mockingly dubbed an "accidental" president by the political pundits of the day, the new chief executive quickly as well as deftly confronted the sectionalist challenge of the antislavery forces by counteracting and replacing, in some instances unabashedly co-opting, their vision of a free diplomacy with one dedicated to national destiny and glory. In this context, Tyler's foreign policy during his presidency becomes more comprehensible. Initially, with Daniel Webster as secretary of state, who shared Tyler's enthusiasm for commercial expansion if not his concern to protect the institution of slavery, the administration settled Anglo-American border disputes, extended the Monroe Doctrine to bring the Hawaiian Islands into the American sphere of influence, and opened the way for the first American mission to China. With Upshur as secretary of the Navy, and later as secretary of state, the administration expanded the Navy for coastal defense and, more importantly, to promote and protect "an empire of commerce" in the hemisphere and all along the Pacific rim. In addition, Tyler and Upshur, and later Calhoun, had a territorial expansionist agenda that sought to secure Pacific Ocean ports in California, and included the speedy annexation of Texas coupled with a diplomatic strategy to secure Oregon for the North and West as a sectional trade-off for Texas.
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John Tyler had been a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, governor of Virginia and a member of the Senate before being tapped by the Whigs to be William Henry Harrison's running mate in 1840. The Whigs had chosen Tyler not for his policies, but to draw support from the south. A month into his term, Harrison died and Tyler was president. By the end of his term, neither the Whigs nor the Democrats supported him, and he chose not to run for re-election. He was succeeded by Democrat James K. Polk. At the time of his death, Tyler was a member of the Confederate Congress, in revolt against the United States.
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President John Tyler