Millard Fillmore

Millard Fillmore in the 1850s

Millard Fillmore (born January 7, 1800 in Cayuga County , New York , † March 8, 1874 in Buffalo , New York) was an American politician of the Whig Party and from July 9, 1850 to March 4, 1853 the 13th President of the United States .

Fillmore came from a humble background and later studied law . His political career began with the election to the US House of Representatives , which he belonged from 1833 to 1843 for the Whig Party . After a failed candidacy as governor of New York , he was later elected to the office of New York State Comptrollers . Fillmore held this post from 1848 to 1849. In 1848 he was nominated for Vice-Presidential Candidate of the Whig Party, he was elected US Vice-President in November of that year alongside Zachary Taylor . He took up this office in March 1849. After the unexpected death of President Taylor in July 1850, Fillmore had to assume the presidency himself for the remainder of the term. His reign was strongly influenced by the worsening conflict between the northern and southern states over slavery . The main point of contention was whether the territories gained in the course of the Mexican-American War should accept or forbid slavery. The compromise of 1850 , supported by Fillmore , initially found a balance, which, however, by no means satisfied all political actors. In particular, the lack of support from the northern states prevented the nomination of the president by his own party in the next presidential election in 1852 . As a result, he had to leave the White House in March 1853 without standing for a vote. In 1856 he ran for the Know-Nothing Party , a short-lived splinter party, again unsuccessfully for the presidency. Until his death in 1874, Fillmore no longer appeared politically.

Life to the presidency

Childhood, education and legal career

Millard Fillmore was born on January 7, 1800 in a Cayuga County log cabin to one of eight children. He was the second born and eldest son of the farmer Nathaniel Fillmore (1771–1863). His mother was Phobe Millard (1781-1831). Both had moved from Vermont to Upstate New York before he was born. As a child, Fillmore only attended school irregularly because he had to help cultivate the barren land. When he was a teenager, his father took him over for a small sum of money in an apprenticeship as a tailor in a village 100  miles away. Fillmore loathed the hard, exploitative work, and he borrowed $ 30  to buy himself out of college. He returned to his family. There he sought further training, read a lot and attended a school in a nearby town. In particular, the teacher and his future wife Abigail Powers , who was only two years older than him, encouraged Fillmore in his pursuit of education and lent him books. His father was able to find him a clerk's position with a local judge, which was connected with training in law. Fillmore and Powers got engaged in 1819, and they married in 1828. The marriage produced a son and a daughter. In 1819 he went to Hope , where he began to study law, which he successfully completed in 1823. He then worked as a lawyer. In 1834 he founded a law firm in western New York State.

Early political career

Lithograph of Millard Fillmore as a Congressman

His political activity began in 1828 when he was elected a member of the New York State Assembly , where he held a mandate for the Anti-Masonic Party , a short-lived protest party against the emerging Democrats around Andrew Jackson , until 1831 . During this time he moved to Buffalo with his family . After his two-year term in the State Legislature , he joined the newly formed Whig Party . Fillmore earned his reputation there when he helped set up the party in New York State in the early 1830s. He ran for the Whigs in the fall of 1832 as a member of the House of Representatives and was elected. He exercised this mandate from 1833 to 1835 after losing the election in 1834. Two years later, however, Fillmore ran again as a Whig candidate and was elected a second time to Congress . After several confirmations in office, the congress was still a member until 1843, having waived another application the year before. As a member of parliament, he was one of the critics of Presidents Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren . Fillmore loyally supported the policies of Senator Henry Clay , the most prominent and influential politician of the Whig Party. He spoke out in favor of a consolidation of the American economy through more investment by the federal government in infrastructure. Fillmore, like much of the Whig Party, was also a staunch advocate of higher tariffs, which should protect industry in the Northern States. The Democrats, on the other hand, spoke out in favor of lower tariffs in order to enable the agricultural-producing southern states to have better trading conditions with foreign countries. As chairman of the influential Way and Means Committee Fillmore in 1841 was instrumental in the formulation of a new customs law that but twice by President John Tyler with a veto was stopped. Only a compromise between the Whigs, who had a congressional majority, and the expelled President in 1842 led to a new law.

In the House of Representatives, Fillmore appeared as a moderate opponent of slavery . He also spoke out in favor of a ban on slavery in the federal district, as well as against admitting Texas to the USA as a "slave state". In 1841 he was also one of his party's candidates for the post of Speaker of the House of Representatives . In the end, however, the Whigs chose John White .

After the end of his time as a member of Parliament, Fillmore withdrew briefly into private life before he was discussed as a possible Vice-Presidential candidate for the Whigs in 1844 . Theodore Frelinghuysen was nominated at the party congress . His party finally nominated him that same year as a candidate for governor of New York . In the election, however, Fillmore was narrowly defeated by the Democrat Silas Wright with 47:49 percent of the vote. After this defeat, he practiced again as a lawyer in Buffalo for a while. In 1847, Fillmore returned to political life when he ran for the office of New York State Comptroller (Chairman of the State Audit Office). In autumn of that year he was elected with a clear majority. After taking office, his focus was on reforming the banking system of New York State. He also campaigned for the construction of the Erie Canal .

The 1848 presidential election

Whigs election poster for the 1848 presidential election

As four years before, Fillmore was again under discussion as a candidate for the vice-presidency for the 1848 presidential election . At the instigation of Henry Clay, the Whigs finally nominated him in the second ballot for this office. Contrary to what is customary today, the vice-presidential candidate was not selected by the presidential candidate at the time, but was determined at the party congress. The candidate for the presidency was the popular General Zachary Taylor from Louisiana, who, however, had never held a political office before and initially did not seek the presidency. With this selection, the Whigs wanted to repeat their electoral success of 1840 . Fillmore as a running mate ( running mate ) seemed from the perspective of the Whigs, therefore, in many ways the ideal complement to Taylor: He came from the north of the country, could produce political experience and help win the important New York State, considered by its status most populous state in the USA at that time had the most electoral votes . The election campaign in autumn 1848 was carried out with comparatively little enthusiasm; the Whigs took no position on sensitive political issues such as the expansion of slavery. They were particularly focused on highlighting Taylor's popularity as a successful commander of the Mexican-American War . Fillmore played a rather subordinate role. It should appeal to sufficient voters, especially in the important state of New York.

On election day, November 7, 1848, Taylor and Fillmore won with 47.3 percent of the vote. The Democrat Lewis Cass accounted for 42.5 percent, and another ten percent were in favor of the former Democratic President Martin Van Buren , who ran as a candidate for the abolitionist Free Soil Party . In the decisive Electoral College, the Whig duo had 163 votes and the Democrats 127 votes. The state of New York played a key role, as Taylor and Fillmore achieved a narrow majority of votes here and thus all 36 electors of that state were able to secure themselves.

Vice President of the United States (1849-1850)

Daguerreotype by Millard Fillmore from 1849

Fillmore took office on March 4, 1849 as US Vice President ; Taylor took over the presidency. However, since that day fell on a Sunday, the official celebrations were not held until the following day.

Although Fillmore had good contacts in Congress from his own time in the House of Representatives, he did not belong to the inner circle around the President. Taylor and Fillmore only met personally after the presidential election. In the 19th century it was by no means uncommon for vice-presidents not to be more closely involved in government affairs. The administration therefore did not seek advice from the administration when it came to filling government posts with politicians from Fillmore's home state, New York. Otherwise, Fillmore was busy in the 16 months of his vice-presidency by virtue of his office with the management of the Senate sessions, since he presided over the parliamentary chamber as its president. During this time, the Capitol held controversial discussions about the future of the territories gained by the Mexican-American War. Although himself a slave owner, President Zachary Taylor categorically opposed the extension of slavery to these areas. Fillmore was also not a supporter of slavery, but unlike the President he advocated a compromise between the “free states” of the north and the “slave states” in the southern part of the country. In the spring of 1850, he told Taylor that in the event of a Senate stalemate, he would vote in favor of the compromise presented by Senator Henry Clay (as Senate chairman, the vice president usually has no right to vote, but if there is a tie he can cast a decisive vote on an outcome bring about). President Taylor then threatened to exercise his right of veto.

Presidency (1850-1853)

Assumption of office

The White House in the mid-19th century

President Taylor died unexpectedly of gastroenteritis on July 9, 1850 , after consuming cold milk and cherries during the celebration of the American National Day on July 4, 1850 after an extended stay in the blazing sun. Fillmore then took over the presidency under the American constitution for the remainder of the current term of office. On July 10, 1850, he took the oath for his new office. After John Tyler in 1841, nine years earlier, he was the second vice president to rise to the office following the president's death.

Due to political differences, his assumption of office led to the resignation of the Taylor ministers within a few weeks and months and thus to an almost complete replacement of the cabinet by Fillmore. The new president believed that ministers had had a negative influence on Taylor in deliberations on the compromise of 1850. Fillmore almost exclusively appointed politicians to the cabinet who supported the desired compromise.

Like Thomas Jefferson and his predecessor Taylor, Fillmore is one of the few American presidents who never made use of their right of veto during their tenure . He signed and executed all legislative resolutions passed by Congress.

The compromise of 1850

Discussions on the compromise of 1850 in the US Senate

Official portrait of Millard Fillmore in the White House

→ Main article : Compromise of 1850

Domestically, Fillmore's entire presidency was overshadowed by the conflict over the extension of slavery, the resulting compromise of 1850 and its consequences.

As a result of the Mexican-American War of 1846-1848, the United States was able to annex much of what is now the southwestern part of the country. The new territories became more and more the subject of bitter political disputes in Congress. Since California applied for membership of the Union as a slave-free state (slavery was already illegal there under Mexican rule), proponents of slavery from the southern states were forced to demand compensation. For the southern states, slavery was an essential part of their economic system, which had specialized in the production of cotton and other agricultural products. Therefore politicians and the population from this part of the country saw their existence threatened. Radical southern politicians disliked the idea of ​​geographical restrictions on slavery and rejected any interference by the federal government in their rights. There were repeated threats of secession , which would ultimately have meant a break up of the United States. In August 1850, Fillmore sent Congress a special message expressly calling for the 1850 Compromise to be passed. In doing so, he fundamentally modified Taylor's policy: unlike his predecessor, he advocated the principle of popular sovereignty , which gave the new states and territories the right to decide whether to permit or prohibit slavery. The compromise negotiated by Senator Henry Clay, known as the Great Compromiser , was accepted by a large majority in Congress in early September 1850; by September 20, 1850, Fillmore had signed the entire bundle of laws.

With the compromise of 1850, California was newly admitted to the Union as a slave-free state. Texas waived areas east of the Rio Grande for monetary compensation (repayment of all debts by the federal government) . From these and other areas ceded by Mexico, the New Mexico Territory was formed, which included the current states of New Mexico and Arizona . In this territory it was determined that the population could decide for themselves whether the states should remain slave-free. In the District of Columbia , where slavery remained legal, the slave trade was banned.

However, by no means all political actors were satisfied with the compromise. The so-called Fugitive Slave Act , part of the compromise, sparked a storm of indignation, especially in the north, which rejects slavery . This law required that slaves who had escaped to the north had to be returned to their owners in the south. Abolitionists disparagingly called the law the Bloodhound Law . There were solidarity campaigns and the liberation of captured slaves who had fled. Many slaves continued to flee to Canada . Fillmore, in particular, who signed the law, became the target of ridicule and contempt from anti-slavery opponents . Especially in the north, the president was accused of having betrayed his origins. Fillmore justified his comparatively compromise-ready attitude towards the South with his higher-ranking goal of wanting to preserve the unity of the country. In Fillmore's view, maintaining the unity of the United States was more important than restricting slavery too much, which could have given the South a reason for secession. During deliberations in Congress, Fillmore expressed his position in a familiar quote: “God knows I despise slavery. But it's an existing evil ... so we have to endure it; therefore we must give the legal protection guaranteed by the Constitution ”.

Whether a rejection of the compromise of 1850 (for example through a different stance by Fillmore or the continuation of Taylor) would actually have led to secession remains an unanswered question about which even historians do not agree. Beyond Fillmore's presidency, however, tensions between the parts of the country (which were partly caused by the compromise) continued in the course of the 1850s, which ultimately led to the civil war in 1861 . Hence, the compromise of 1850 proved by no means a permanent solution to the slavery problem.

Foreign policy

Graphic portrait of Fillmore

Millard Fillmore on a presidential dollar

Fillmore was relatively active in foreign policy . By focusing on foreign affairs, the Fillmore administration tried to divert attention from the tense domestic political situation. A few weeks after he took office, Fillmore appointed prominent Whig politician Daniel Webster as his foreign secretary . Webster, who remained in this post until his death in October 1852, brought with him great foreign policy experience, having headed the State Department from 1841 to 1843 under Presidents William Henry Harrison and John Tyler .

In the democratically oriented revolutions that occurred in Europe around 1848/49 , many Americans saw parallels with their own history at that time. The US government under Millard Fillmore was positive about these movements. There were even voices pleading for US military intervention in favor of the revolutionaries (so-called Young America Movement ). Fillmore and Webster, however, spoke out against such a request and limited themselves to rhetorical support for the democratic forces.

Since the southern states' route to the Pacific was cut off in the course of the compromise of 1850, the ranks of southern politicians in Congress considered annexing Cuba in order to establish slavery there. The President and his Foreign Ministers Daniel Webster and Edward Everett (who succeeded him after Webster's death in 1852) rejected such requests, as they feared a military conflict with European powers. Politicians from the northern states also categorically refused to join Cuba.

Another foreign policy event of importance during Fillmore's presidency was Matthew C. Perry's expedition , which he sent in 1852 and which was able to force the opening of Japan in 1854 (but after his term in office) .

Election from 1852 and end of term

Fillmore initially indicated in 1851 that he would not run for his own term as president in the 1852 presidential election, but later decided to run. At the Whigs' party convention in June 1852, he led the ballots narrowly at first, but it was not enough to achieve the absolute majority required. When the majority of Daniel Webster's delegates later went over to his opponent, General Winfield Scott , Scott was chosen as a presidential candidate. With Scott's nomination, the Whigs hoped to repeat their earlier successes with the candidacy of a popular general. Fillmore's position in the compromise of 1850 and the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 he signed made himself unpopular, especially with delegates from the more liberal, northern states, which were predominantly opposed to slavery. As a result, most of the northern delegates voted for General Scott and Fillmore was not up for re-election. By the death of Henry Clay in June 1852, who had last spoken out for Fillmore, he was politically weakened.

In the 1852 election campaign, the outgoing president no longer played an active role. Winfield Scott was defeated on November 2, 1852 by the Democrat Franklin Pierce . This bitter election defeat also marked the beginning of the decline of the Whig Party, which collapsed within a few years due to the internal party conflict over slavery. Former Whig politicians and opponents of slavery such as Abraham Lincoln formed in the Republican Party from 1854, while supporters converted to the Democrats. Others, like Fillmore, joined the short-lived Know Nothing Party.

On March 4, 1853, Fillmore's presidency ended with the inauguration of Franklin Pierce. Millard Fillmore was the last Whigs president to reside in the White House . He is also the last US head of state to date who was neither a Democrat nor a Republican .

Recorded states

During Millard Fillmore's presidency, California was incorporated into the United States on September 9, 1850 .

Appeals to the Supreme Court

Fillmore appointed a Supreme Court Justice during his tenure :

• Benjamin Robbins Curtis - September 22, 1851

Further appeals were made to lower federal courts.

Later years

Return to private life

Fillmore in his later years (after 1865)

After the end of his presidency in March 1853, Fillmore retired into private life. In addition to his political disappointment at not being a candidate for his party, there were also private losses. A few weeks after leaving the White House, his wife Abigail died of pneumonia that she contracted when Pierce was inaugurated. In July 1854, Fillmore also suffered the death of his 22-year-old daughter Mary Abigail, who died of cholera. In 1855 the former US president made an extensive trip to Europe. During his visit to Rome , Fillmore was given a private audience with Pope Pius IX. granted.

The election of 1856

In the 1856 election , he ran again for the presidency of the American Party , an anti-Catholic and anti-immigrant party that had nominated him in absentia as a candidate. However, he was only third with 21.6 percent of the vote; only in Maryland did he and his running mate Andrew Jackson Donelson gain a majority and thus eight votes in the Electoral College . The remaining parts of the Whig Party rallied around Fillmore and nominated him as a presidential candidate, although much of the party had since disbanded and the Republican Party was formed. However, the Democratic candidate, James Buchanan , emerged as the election winner .

Old age and death

In 1858, Fillmore married the wealthy widow Caroline McIntosh for the second time. The former US president was a co-founder of the Buffalo Historical Society , which opened in 1862, and its first incumbent president. In the presidential election in 1860 he supported the candidacy of John Bell , who ran for the Constitutional Union Party together with Fillmore's former Secretary of State Edward Everett as a vice-presidential candidate. When the country was on the brink of civil war, Bell's electoral platform spoke out in favor of preserving the Union; but without taking a stand on the violent political conflict over slavery. During the Civil War from 1861 to 1865, Fillmore was politically on the side of the Union states, but he disagreed with the policies of President Abraham Lincoln on many points . In April 1865, after Lincoln's assassination, his New York home was smeared with black paint by an angry mob , some of Lincoln's supporters, because Fillmore had criticized the murdered president while he was alive. His successor Franklin Pierce's house was also defiled. During the Reconstruction in the mid and late 1860s, Fillmore supported President Andrew Johnson's policies .

Millard Fillmore died on March 8, 1874, at the age of 74, of complications from a stroke . After his death he was buried in the Forest Lawn Cemetery in Buffalo. Since then, on January 7th, Fillmore's birthday, a simple ceremony in memory of the former president has taken place at his grave.

Aftermath

Fillmore statue in Buffalo, New York

The compromise of 1850 and the postponed beginning of the Civil War give his short presidency of 969 days a certain significance in American history. His stance was able to secure the preservation of the Union for a few years, but as a result of his policies and those of his successors, further social divisions occurred, especially with regard to slavery in the USA. However, he was unable to give the office of president any new impetus, which is why he is hardly known even in the United States in the 21st century.

See also

• Fillmore Cabinet

literature

• Jörg Nagler : Millard Fillmore (1850-1853): The aggravation of the slavery question. In: Christof Mauch (Ed.): The American Presidents. 6th, continued and updated edition. Munich 2013, ISBN 978-3-406-58742-9 , pp. 158–162.
• Paul Finkelman: Millard Fillmore . The American Presidents Series: The 13th President. In: Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. , Sean Wilentz (Eds.): The American Presidents . 1st edition. Times Books, New York City 2011, ISBN 978-1-4299-2301-9 .
• Holman Hamilton: Prologue to Conflict: The Crisis and Compromise of 1850 . University Press of Kentucky, Lexington 2005, ISBN 0-8131-9136-X .
• Benson Lee Grayson: Unknown president: the administration of President Millard Fillmore . University Press of America, Washington, DC 1981, LCCN  81-000034
• Robert J. Rayback: Millard Fillmore: Biography of a President . Buffalo Historical Society, Buffalo 1959, LCCN  58-014009
• Fillmore, Millard . In: Encyclopædia Britannica . 11th edition. tape 10 : Evangelical Church - Francis Joseph I . London 1910, p. 344 (English, full text [ Wikisource ]).

Web links

Commons : Millard Fillmore  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Wikiquote: Millard Fillmore  - Quotes

Wikisource: Millard Fillmore  - Sources and full texts (English)

• Biography ( January 15, 2009 memento on the Internet Archive ) on the White House website
• Millard Fillmore in the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress (English)
• Works by Millard Fillmore in Project Gutenberg (English)
• Michael F. Holt (Editor): American President: Millard Fillmore (1800–1874). Miller Center of Public Affairs of the University of Virginia (English)
• The American Presidency Project: Millard Fillmore. University of California, Santa Barbara database ofspeeches and other documents from all American presidents
• Life Portrait of Millard Fillmore on C-SPAN , June 11, 1999, 149 minutes (English-language documentation and discussion with historian Anthony M. Cohen and guided tour of the Fillmore House by the curator of the museum there)
• Millard Fillmore in the database of Find a Grave (English)

Individual evidence

1. ^ ^{A b} Millard Fillmore - Life before the presidency . Miller Center of Public Affairs
2. ^ Paul Finkelman: Millard Fillmore . Pp. 10-12.
3. ^ Jörg Nagler: Millard Fillmore (1850-1853). The exacerbation of the slavery question. In: Christof Mauch (Ed.): The American Presidents. 5th, continued and updated edition. Munich 2009, pp. 158–162, here: p. 159.
4. ↑ ^{a b} Jörg Nagler: Millard Fillmore (1850-1853). The exacerbation of the slavery question. In: Christof Mauch (Ed.): The American Presidents. 5th, continued and updated edition. Munich 2009, pp. 158–162, here: p. 160.
5. ↑ ^{a b c} Millard Fillmore - Domestic Affairs . Miller Center of Public Affairs
6. ^ Jörg Nagler: Millard Fillmore (1850-1853). The exacerbation of the slavery question. In: Christof Mauch (Ed.): The American Presidents. 5th, continued and updated edition. Munich 2009, pp. 158–162, here: pp. 160–161.
7. ↑ Michael F. Holt: Prologue to Conflict: The Crisis and Compromise of 1850 Univ. Prof. Kentucky 2005, p. 107 ff.
8. ↑ Allen Nevins: Ordeal of the Union. Volume 1: Fruits of Manifest Destiny. 1847-1852. C. Sribner's Sons, London 1947. (Reprint: Collier Books, 1992, ISBN 0-02-035441-X )
9. ↑ Booth, Sherman Miller 1812-1904 . wisconsinhistory.org
10. ↑ Robert J. Rayback: Millard Fillmore: Biography of a President . Buffalo Historical Society, New York 1959, p. 181.
11. ↑ ^{a b} Jörg Nagler: Millard Fillmore (1850-1853). The exacerbation of the slavery question. In: Christof Mauch (Ed.): The American Presidents. 5th, continued and updated edition. Munich 2009, pp. 158–162, here: p. 161.
12. ^ Millard Fillmore - Foreign policy . Miller Center of Public Affairs
13. ^ Millard Fillmore - Campaigns and Elections ( Memento March 17, 2015 in the Internet Archive ), Miller Center of Public Affairs
14. ↑ Michael F. Holt: Prologue to Conflict: The Crisis and Compromise of 1850 . Univ. Prof., Kentucky 2005, p. 185.
15. ↑ Michael F. Holt: Prologue to Conflict: The Crisis and Compromise of 1850 Univ. Prof. Kentucky 2005, p. 186 ff.
16. ^ ^{A b} Millard Fillmore - Life after the presidency . Miller Center of Public Affairs
17. ↑ Including the dates of his taking office and leaving office as complete days, Fillmore was in office for 970 days.
18. ^ Millard Fillmore - Impact and legacy . ( March 8, 2013 memento on the Internet Archive ), Miller Center of Public Affairs