Zachary Taylor

Zachary Taylor (November 24, 1784–July 9, 1850) was an American military leader and the twelfth President of the United States. Taylor had a 40-year military career in the U.S. Army, serving in the War of 1812, Black Hawk War, and Second Seminole War before achieving fame while leading U.S. troops to victory at several critical battles of the Mexican-American War. A Southern slaveholder who opposed the spread of slavery to the territories, he was uninterested in politics but was recruited by the Whig Party as their nominee in the 1848 presidential election. In the election Taylor defeated the Democratic nominee, Lewis Cass, and became the first U.S. president to never hold any prior office. Known as "Old Rough and Ready," Taylor died of acute gastroenteritis just 16 months into his term. Vice President Millard Fillmore became President.

Early life and family

Taylor was born on November 24, 1784, in a log cabin near Barboursville in Orange County, Virginia.

Zachary Taylor was the third of eight children of Richard Taylor and Sarah Strother. Taylor's family was aristocratic: James Madison was a second cousin and Robert E. Lee was a fourth cousin once removed. In his infancy, Taylor's family moved to Kentucky, where Taylor grew up on a plantation. He was known as "Little Zack" and was educated by private tutors. He is one of the descendents of King Edward III of England ^*.

Taylor met Margaret "Peggy" Mackall Smith of Maryland in early 1810, and they were married on June 21, 1810. They had one son and five daughters, two of whom died in infancy. The surviving children were:

Ann Taylor (born April 9, 1811)
Sarah Knox Taylor (born March 6, 1814)
Mary Elizabeth (Betty ) Taylor (born April 20, 1824)
Richard (Dick) Taylor (born January 27, 1826)

Ironically, Sarah Knox Taylor married future Confederate president Jefferson Davis at age 21 over her father's strenuous objections; she died from malaria three months after the marriage.

Military career

On May 3, 1808, Taylor joined the U.S. Army, receiving a commission as a first lieutenant of the Seventh Infantry Regiment. He was ordered west into Indiana Territory, taking command at the Battle of Fort Harrison; he was promoted to captain in November 1810.

During the War of 1812, Taylor became known as a talented military commander. Assigned to command Fort Harrison on the Wabash River, at the northern edge of president-day Terre Haute, Indiana, he successfully commandeered a small force of soldiers and civilians to stave off an British-inspired attack by about 500 Native Americans between September 4 and September 15. The Battle of Fort Harrison, as it became known, has been referred to as the "first American land victory of the War of 1812." Taylor received a brevet promotion to major on October 31, 1812. Taylor was promoted to lieutenant colonel on April 20, 1819, and colonel on April 5, 1832.

Taylor served in the Black Hawk War (May-August 1832) and the Second Seminole War (1835-1842). During the Seminole War, Taylor fought at the Battle of Lake Okeechobee and received a brevet promotion to brigadier general in January 1838. It was here he gained his nickname "Old Rough and Ready" for his rumpled clothes and wide-brimmed straw hat. On May 15, 1838, Taylor was promoted commanding general of all U.S. forces in Florida.

James K. Polk sent the Army of Occupation under Taylor's command to the Rio Grande in 1846. Mexico attacked Taylor's troops and Taylor defeated them despite being outnumbered 4-to-1. Polk later declared war; in the Mexican-American War that followed, Taylor won additional important victories at Monterrey and Buena Vista and became a national hero.

Polk kept Taylor in northern Mexico, disturbed by his informal habits of command and his affiliation with the Whig Party. He sent an expedition under General Winfield Scott to capture Mexico City. Taylor, incensed, thought that "the battle of Buena Vista opened the road to the city of Mexico and the halls of Montezuma, that others might revel in them."

Election of 1848

He received the Whig nomination for President in 1848 although he had never even bothered to vote before. In fact, he had never even bothered to register and did not vote in his own election. His homespun ways were political assets; his long military record appealed to northerners; and his ownership of slaves would attract southern votes. He also had not previously committed himself on troublesome issues. He ran against the Democratic candidate, Lewis Cass, who favored letting the residents of territories decide for themselves whether they wanted slavery. In protest against Taylor, a slaveholder, and Cass, an advocate of "squatter sovereignty," northerners who opposed extension of slavery into territories formed the Free Soil Party and nominated Martin Van Buren. In a close election, the Free Soilers pulled enough votes away from Cass to elect Taylor.

To the astonishment of Whigs, Taylor virtually repudiated their platform, As historian Michael Holt explains:

Taylor was equally indifferent to programs Whigs had long considered vital. Publicly, he was artfully ambiguous, refusing to answer queries about his views on banking, the tariff, and internal improvements. Privately, he was more forthright. The idea of a national bank "is dead, & will not be revived in my time." In the future the tariff "will be increased only for revenue"; in other words, Whig hopes of restoring the protective tariff of 1842 were vain. There would never again be surplus federal funds from public land sales to distribute to the states, and internal improvements "will go on in spite of presidential vetoes." In a few words, that is, Taylor pronounced an epitaph for the entire Whig economic program.1999 p 272

Presidency

Policies

Although Taylor had subscribed to Whig principles of legislative leadership, he was not inclined to be a puppet of Whig leaders in Congress. He acted at times as though he were above parties and politics. As disheveled as always, Taylor tried to run his administration in the same rule-of-thumb fashion with which he had fought Indians.

Under Taylor´s administration the United States Department of the Interior was organized, although the department had been activated under President Polk´s last day in office.

Compromise of 1850

The slavery issue dominated Taylor's short term. Although he owned slaves, he took a moderately anti-slavery position. Taylor urged settlers in New Mexico and California to draft constitutions and apply for statehood, bypassing the territorial stage. New Mexico was too small to act but California—which had high population growth from the gold rush—wrote a constitution that did not allow slavery; it was approved by the voters and a new state government took over in December 1849 without Congressional approval. Southerners were furious with Taylor (a southerner) and with California. In February 1850, Taylor held a stormy conference with southern leaders who threatened secession. He told them that if necessary to enforce the laws, he personally would lead the Army. Persons "taken in rebellion against the Union, he would hang ... with less reluctance than he had hanged deserters and spies in Mexico." He never wavered. Henry Clay then proposed a complex Compromise of 1850. Taylor died as it was being debated. (The Clay version failed but another version did pass under the new president, Millard Fillmore.)

Administration and Cabinet


OFFICE	NAME	TERM

President	Zachary Taylor	1849–1850
Vice President	Millard Fillmore	1849–1850

Secretary of State	John M. Clayton	1849–1850
Secretary of the Treasury	William Meredith	1849–1850
Secretary of War	George Crawford	1849–1850
Attorney General	Reverdy Johnson	1849–1850
Postmaster General	Jacob Collamer	1849–1850
Secretary of the Navy	William Preston	1849–1850
Secretary of the Interior	Thomas Ewing	1849–1850

Supreme Court appointments

none

States admitted to the Union

none

Death

On July 4, 1850, Taylor attended Independence Day ceremonies at the Washington Monument on a hot day. He consumed several bowls of cherries and iced milk (milk with ice shavings). The combination of milk and cherries caused his stomach to create excessive amounts of acid and he contracted gastroenteritis (stomach illness). He was diagnosed by his physicians with cholera morbus, a term that included diarrhea and dysentery but not true cholera. The cause of the gastroenteritis is variously described as cholera, typhoid fever, or even food poisoning. ^*

Taylor died on July 9. He is buried in Louisville, Kentucky, in what is now the Zachary Taylor National Cemetery. Taylor was succeeded by Vice President Millard Fillmore.

Surviving family

Taylor's son Richard became a Confederate Lieutenant General, while his daughter Sarah Knox Taylor (1814–1835) had married future President of the Confederate States Jefferson Davis three months before her death of malaria. Taylor's brother, Joseph Pannill Taylor, was a Brigadier General in the Grand Army of the Republic during the Civil War. Taylor's niece Emily Ellison Taylor was the wife of Confederate General Lafayette McLaws.

Trivia

Some people believe that Taylor was assassinated. If true, Zachary Taylor would have been the first president assassinated, beating Abraham Lincoln by 14 years. However, Taylor's body was exhumed and autopsied in 1991. A medical examiner then concluded that the amount of arsenic found in the hair and nail samples was not nearly sufficient to be fatal.
Taylor's term of service was scheduled to begin on March 4, 1849, but as this day fell on a Sunday, Taylor refused to be sworn in until the following day. Vice President Millard Fillmore was also not sworn in on that day. As a result, it is often claimed that the previous president pro tempore of the Senate, David Rice Atchison, was "president for a day," or that the presidency was vacant. Most scholars believe that according the U.S. Constitution, Taylor's term began on March 4, regardless of whether he had taken the oath or not.
It is believed that Taylor sometimes needed to be boosted into his saddle, since he stood 5 feet 8 inches or 5 feet 9 inches (172-175 cm) tall. He weighed between 170 and 200 pounds (80-90 kg).
Taylor always preferred old clothes (including his unique straw hat) to military uniforms, leading to his nickname, "Old Rough and Ready."
In 1942, a Liberty ship named the SS Zachary Taylor was launched. The ship was scrapped in 1961.
Taylor had a stutter.
Taylor was a poor writer and had difficulty spelling.
Taylor never voted in his life until he voted for himself.

References

Bauer, Jack K. Zachary Taylor: Soldier, Planter, Statesman of the Old Southwest. Louisiana State University Press: 1993. ISBN 0807118516
Hamilton, Holman. Zachary Taylor: Soldier of the Republic (1941) vol 1
Hamilton, Holman. Zachary Taylor: Soldier in the White House (1951) vol 2
Michael F. Holt; The Rise and Fall of the American Whig Party: Jacksonian Politics and the Onset of the Civil War. (1999)
Smith, Elbert B. The Presidencies of Zachary Taylor and Millard Fillmore. University Press of Kansas: 1988. ISBN 070060362X.

External links

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