Martin Van Buren

Martin Van Buren
8th President of the United States
In office March 4, 1837 – March 4, 1841
Vice President	Richard Johnson
Preceded by	Andrew Jackson
Succeeded by	William Henry Harrison
8th Vice President of the United States
In office March 4, 1833 – March 4, 1837
President	Andrew Jackson
Preceded by	John Calhoun
Succeeded by	Richard Johnson
United States Minister to the United Kingdom
In office August 8, 1831 – April 4, 1832
Nominated by	Andrew Jackson
Preceded by	Louis McLane
Succeeded by	Aaron Vail (Acting)
10th United States Secretary of State
In office March 28, 1829 – May 23, 1831
President	Andrew Jackson
Preceded by	Henry Clay
Succeeded by	Edward Livingston
9th Governor of New York
In office January 1, 1829 – March 12, 1829
Lieutenant	Enos T. Throop
Preceded by	Nathaniel Pitcher
Succeeded by	Enos T. Throop
United States Senator from New York
In office March 4, 1821 – December 20, 1828
Preceded by	Nathan Sanford
Succeeded by	Charles E. Dudley
14th Attorney General of New York
In office February 17, 1815 – July 8, 1819
Governor	Daniel D. Tompkins John Tayler DeWitt Clinton
Preceded by	Abraham Van Vechten
Succeeded by	Thomas Jackson Oakley
Personal details
Born	(1782-12-05)December 5, 1782 Kinderhook, New York, U.S.
Died	July 24, 1862(1862-07-24) (aged 79) Kinderhook, New York, U.S.
Resting place	Kinderhook Cemetery Kinderhook, New York
Political party	Free Soil (1848–1854)
Other political affiliations	Democratic-Republican (Before 1825) Democratic (1828–1848)
Spouse(s)	Hannah Hoes (1807–1819; her death)
Children	Abraham John Martin Smith
Profession	Lawyer
Signature

Martin Van Buren (December 5, 1782 – July 24, 1862) was the eighth President of the United States (1837–1841). Before his presidency, he was the eighth Vice President (1833–1837) and the tenth Secretary of State (1829–1831), both under Andrew Jackson.

Van Buren was a key organizer of the Democratic Party, a dominant figure in the Second Party System, and the first president not of British or Irish descent—his family was Dutch. He was the first president to have been born a United States citizen, since all of his predecessors were born British subjects before the American Revolution. He is the only president not to have spoken English as his first language, having grown up speaking Dutch, and the first president from New York.

As Andrew Jackson's Secretary of State and then Vice President, Van Buren was a key figure in building the organizational structure for Jacksonian democracy, particularly in New York. As president, he did not want the United States to annex Texas, an act which John Tyler would achieve eight years after Van Buren's initial rejection. Between the bloodless Aroostook War and the Caroline Affair, relations with Britain and its colonies in Canada also proved to be strained.

His administration was largely characterized by the economic hardship of his time, the Panic of 1837. He was scapegoated for the depression and called "Martin Van Ruin" by political opponents. Van Buren was voted out of office after four years, losing to Whig candidate William Henry Harrison. In the 1848 election Van Buren ran unsuccessfully for president on a third-party ticket, the Free Soil Party. Van Buren died fourteen years later at the age of seventy-nine.

Early life and education

A bronze marker with a map of the State of New York at the top, under which is the word Birth site and other text

Historical marker located at the birthplace of Martin Van Buren.

Martin Van Buren was born in the village of Kinderhook, New York, on December 5, 1782, about 25 miles (40 km) south of Albany, New York. His father Abraham Van Buren (1737–1817) was a farmer working with slaves, was the owner of six slaves, and was a tavern-keeper in Kinderhook. Abraham Van Buren supported the American Revolution and later the Jeffersonian Republicans. Martin Van Buren's mother was Maria Hoes Van Alen Van Buren (1747–1818).

Van Buren was the first president born a citizen of the United States, as all previous presidents were born before the American Revolution. His great-great-great-grandfather Cornelis Maessen van Buren had come to the Americas in 1631 from the small city of Buren, Dutch Republic, in present day Netherlands. Van Buren grew up in a Dutch-speaking community. His native language was Dutch, and to date, he has been the only U.S. President who has spoken English as a second language.

Van Buren received a basic education at a poorly lit schoolhouse in his native village and later studied Latin briefly at the Kinderhook Academy and at Washington Seminary in Claverack. He excelled in composition and speaking. His formal education ended before he reached 14, when he began studying Law at the office of Francis Sylvester, a prominent Federalist attorney in Kinderhook. After six years under Sylvester, he spent a final year of apprenticeship in the New York City office of William P. Van Ness, a political lieutenant of Aaron Burr. Van Buren was admitted to the bar in 1803.

Van Buren married Hannah Hoes, his childhood sweetheart and first cousin once removed, on February 21, 1807, in Catskill, New York. Like Van Buren, she was raised in a Dutch home and never lost her distinct Dutch accent. The couple had five sons and one daughter: Abraham (1807–1873) a graduate of West Point and career military officer; John (1810–1866), graduate of Yale and Attorney General of New York; Martin, Jr. (1812–1855), secretary to his father and editor of his father's papers until a premature death from tuberculosis; Winfield Scott (born and died in 1814); and Smith Thompson (1817–1876), an editor and special assistant to his father while president. Their daughter was stillborn. After 12 years of marriage, Hannah Van Buren contracted tuberculosis and died on February 5, 1819, at the age of 35. Martin Van Buren never remarried.

Early political career

Van Buren had been active in politics from at least the age of 17 when he attended a party convention in Troy, New York where he worked to secure the Congressional nomination for John Van Ness. However, once established in his practice, he became wealthy enough to increase his focus on politics. He was an early supporter of Aaron Burr. He allied himself with the Clintonian faction of the Democratic-Republican Party, and was surrogate of Columbia County, New York from 1808 until 1813, when he was removed.

Van Buren joined the opposition party in 1813, and was a member of the New York State Senate from 1812 to 1820, and New York Attorney General from 1815 to 1819. He was a presidential elector in 1820, voting for James Monroe and Daniel D. Tompkins.

At first he opposed Clinton's plan for the Erie Canal, but later supported it when the Bucktails were able to gain a majority in the Erie Canal Commission, and supported a bill that raised money for the canal through state bonds.

In 1817, Van Buren's connection with so-called "machine politics" started. He created the first political machine encompassing all of New York, the Bucktails, whose leaders later became known as the Albany Regency. The Bucktails became a successful movement that emphasized party loyalty; they captured and controlled many patronage posts throughout New York. Van Buren did not originate the system, but gained the nickname of "Little Magician" for the skill with which he exploited it. He also served as a member of the state constitutional convention, where he opposed the grant of universal suffrage and tried to maintain property requirements for voting.

He was the leading figure in the Albany Regency, a group of politicians who for more than a generation dominated much of the politics of New York and powerfully influenced the politics of the nation. The group, together with the political clubs such as Tammany Hall that were developing at the same time, played a major role in the development of the "spoils system", a recognized procedure in national, state and local affairs. He was the prime architect of the first nationwide political party: the Jacksonian Democrats. In Van Buren's own words, "Without strong national political organizations, there would be nothing to moderate the prejudices between free and slaveholding states." Like Madison in the 1790s, Van Buren was struggling to find an institutional solution to the original Constitution's failure to resist the centralizing ambitions of those like Hamilton who hoped to transform a regime of checks and balances into an administrative republic.

U.S. Senate and national politics

Gubernatorial portrait of Martin Van Buren.

In February 1821, Martin Van Buren was elected a U.S. Senator from New York, defeating the incumbent Nathan Sanford who ran as the Clintonian candidate. Van Buren at first favored internal improvements, such as road repairs and canal creation, therefore proposing a constitutional amendment in 1824 to authorize such undertakings. The next year, however, he took ground against them. He voted for the tariff of 1824 then gradually abandoned the protectionist position, coming out for "tariffs for revenue only."

In the presidential election of 1824, Van Buren supported William H. Crawford and received the electoral vote of Georgia for vice-president, but he shrewdly kept out of the acrimonious controversy which followed the choice of John Quincy Adams as President. Van Buren had originally hoped to block Adams' victory by denying him the state of New York (the state was divided between Van Buren supporters who would vote for Crawford and Adams men). However, Representative Stephen Van Rensselaer swung New York to Adams and thereby the 1824 Presidency. After the lost election, Van Buren dropped Crawford, and instead supported Andrew Jackson to be the next presidential candidate.

Always notably courteous in his treatment of opponents, he showed no bitterness toward either Adams or Henry Clay, and he voted for Clay's confirmation as Secretary of State, notwithstanding Jackson's "corrupt bargain" charge. At the same time, he opposed the Adams-Clay plans for internal infrastructure improvements (roads, canals, bridges etc.) and declined to support the proposal for a Panama Congress. As chair of the Judiciary Committee, he brought forward a number of measures for the improvement of judicial procedure and, in May 1826, joined with Senator Thomas Hart Benton in reporting on executive patronage. In the debate on the "tariff of abominations" in 1828, he took no part but voted for the measure in obedience to instructions from the New York legislature, an action which was cited against him as late as during the presidential campaign of 1844.

Van Buren was not an orator, but his more important speeches show careful preparation and his opinions carried weight; the oft-repeated charge that he refrained from declaring himself on crucial questions is hardly borne out by an examination of his senatorial career. In February 1827, he was re-elected to the Senate by a large majority. He became one of the recognized managers of the Jackson campaign, and his tour of Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia in the spring of 1827 won support for Jackson from Crawford. Martin Van Buren sought to reorganize and unify "the old Republican party" behind Jackson. At the state level, Jackson's committee chairs would split up the responsibilities around the state and organize volunteers at the local level. "Hurra Boys" would plant hickory trees (in honor of Jackson's nickname, "Old Hickory") or hand out hickory sticks at rallies. Van Buren even had a New York journalist write a campaign piece portraying Jackson as a humble, pious man. "Organization is the secret of victory," an editor in the Adams camp wrote. He once said to a group of lobbyists the famous quote and "By the want of it we have been overthrown." In November 1828, Van Buren was elected Governor of New York for the term beginning on January 1, 1829, and resigned his seat in the Senate.

Martin Van Buren's tenure as New York governor is the second shortest on record. While his term was short, he did manage to pass the Bank Safety Fund Law (an early form of deposit insurance) through the Legislature.

Jackson Cabinet

On March 5, 1829, President Jackson appointed Van Buren Secretary of State, an office which probably had been assured to him before the election, and he resigned the governorship on March 12. He was succeeded in the governorship by his Lieutenant Governor, Enos T. Throop, a member of the regency. As Secretary of State, Van Buren took care to keep on good terms with the Kitchen Cabinet, the group of politicians who acted as Jackson's advisers, and did not oppose Jackson in the matter of removals from office but was not himself an active "spoilsman."

He won the lasting regard of Jackson by his courtesies to Peggy Eaton, wife of Secretary of War John H. Eaton, with whom the wives of the cabinet officers led by Vice President Calhoun's wife, Floride Calhoun had refused to associate in the Petticoat Affair. Aside from the Petticoat Affair, he skillfully avoided entanglement in the Jackson-Calhoun imbroglio.

1832 Whig cartoon shows Jackson carrying Van Buren into office

No diplomatic questions of the first magnitude arose during Van Buren's service as secretary, but the settlement of long-standing claims against France was prepared and trade with the British West Indies colonies was opened. In the controversy with the Bank of the United States, he sided with Jackson. After the breach between Jackson and Calhoun, Van Buren was clearly the most prominent candidate for the vice-presidency.

Vice-Presidency

In December 1829, Jackson had already made known his wish that Van Buren receive the nomination. In April 1831, Van Buren resigned as Secretary of State as a result of the Petticoat affair—though he did not leave office until June. Van Buren still played a part in the Kitchen Cabinet. In August 1831 Van Buren was appointed Minister to the United Kingdom and he arrived in London in September. He was cordially received, but in February, he learned that his nomination had been rejected by the Senate on January 25, 1832. The rejection, ostensibly attributed in large part to Van Buren's instructions to Louis McLane, the American minister to Britain, regarding the opening of the West Indies trade, in which reference had been made to the results of the election of 1828, was the work of Calhoun, the vice-president. When the vote was taken, enough of the majority refrained from voting to produce a tie and give Calhoun his longed-for "vengeance." No greater impetus than this could have been given to Van Buren's candidacy for the vice-presidency.

After a brief tour through Europe, Van Buren reached New York on July 5, 1832. The 1832 Democratic National Convention, the party's first and held in May, had nominated him for vice-president on the Jackson ticket, despite the strong opposition to him which existed in many states. Van Buren's platform included supporting the expansion of the naval system. His declarations during the campaign were vague regarding the tariff and unfavorable to the United States Bank and to nullification, but he had already somewhat placated the South by denying the right of Congress to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia without the consent of the slave states.

Election of 1836

Main article: United States presidential election, 1836

It took Van Buren and his partisan friends a decade and a half to form the Democratic Party; many elements, such as the national convention, were borrowed from other parties.

In the election of 1832, the Jackson-Van Buren ticket won by a landslide. When the election of 1836 came up, Jackson was determined to make Van Buren, his personal choice, President to continue his legacy. Martin Van Buren's only competitors in the 1836 election were the Whigs, who ran several regional candidates in hopes of sending the election to the House of Representatives, where each state delegation would have one vote. William Henry Harrison hoped to receive the support of the Western voters, Daniel Webster had strength in New England, and Hugh Lawson White had support in the South. Van Buren was unanimously nominated by the 1835 Democratic National Convention at Baltimore, Maryland. He expressed himself plainly on the questions of slavery and the bank at the same time voting, perhaps with a touch of bravado, for a bill offered in 1836 to subject abolition literature in the mails to the laws of the several states. Van Buren's presidential victory represented a broader victory for Jackson and the party. Van Buren entered the White House as a fifty-four-year-old widower with four sons. Martin Van Buren was the first candidate to use grassroots campaigning in his presidential campaign. He wanted to make a political party that united the plain republicans of the north and the planters of the south.

Twentieth Century etymologist Allen Walker Read published research asserting the wide usage of the phrase "O.K." (okay) -- "Old Kinderhook" -- started during the presidential campaign and subsequent presidency of Martin Van Buren.

Presidency 1837–1841

Policies

Presidential Dollar of Martin Van Buren

Martin Van BurenIssue of 1938

Martin Van Buren announced his intention "to follow in the footsteps of his illustrious predecessor", and retained all but one of Jackson's cabinet. Van Buren had few economic tools to deal with the Panic of 1837. The Panic was followed by a five-year depression, with the failure of banks and then-record-high unemployment levels. Some modern economists have argued that the Panic was caused by the bank policies of the Jackson administration, with the power to create money being distributed into decentralized banks, most of which would then continue to cause a massive inflationary bubble.

Van Buren advocated lower tariffs and free trade, and by doing so maintained support of the South for the Democratic Party. He succeeded in setting up a system of bonds for the national debt. His party was so split that his 1837 proposal for an "Independent Treasury" system did not pass until 1840. It gave the Treasury control of all federal funds and had a legal tender clause that required (by 1843) all payments to be made in specie, but it further inflamed public opinion on both sides.

In a bold step, Van Buren reversed Andrew Jackson's policies and sought peace at home, as well as abroad. Instead of settling a financial dispute between American citizens and the Mexican government by force, Van Buren wanted to seek a diplomatic solution. In August 1837, Van Buren denied Texas' formal request to join the United States, again prioritizing sectional harmony over territorial expansion.

In the case of the ship Amistad, Van Buren sided with the Spanish Government to return the kidnapped slaves. Van Buren oversaw the movement of Cherokee, Choctaw, Creek, Chickasaw and Seminole tribes from Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, and South Carolina to the Oklahoma territory, executing the orders passed under Jackson. To help secure Florida, Van Buren also continued the Second Seminole War, which had begun while Jackson was in office. Fighting was not resolved until 1842, after Van Buren had left office.

In 1839, Joseph Smith, Jr., the founder of the Latter Day Saint movement visited Van Buren to plead for the U.S. to help roughly 20,000 Mormon settlers of Independence, Missouri, who were forced from the state during the 1838 Mormon War there. The Governor of Missouri, Lilburn Boggs, had issued an executive order on October 27, 1838, known as the "Extermination Order". It authorized troops to use force against Mormons to "exterminate or drive [them] from the state". In 1839, after moving to Illinois, Smith and his party appealed to members of Congress and to President Van Buren to intercede for the Mormons. According to Smith's grandnephew, Van Buren said to Smith, "Your cause is just, but I can do nothing for you; if I take up for you I shall lose the vote of Missouri".

Van Buren took the blame for hard times, as Whigs ridiculed him as Martin Van Ruin. Van Buren's rather elegant personal style was also an easy target for Whig attacks, such as the Gold Spoon Oration. State elections of 1837 and 1838 were disastrous for the Democrats, and the partial economic recovery in 1838 was offset by a second commercial crisis in that year. Nevertheless, Van Buren controlled his party and was unanimously renominated by the Democrats in 1840. The revolt against Democratic rule led to the election of William Henry Harrison, the Whig candidate. He once mentioned his relief of leaving office saying, "As to the presidency, the two happiest days of my life were those of my entrance upon the office and my surrender of it".

Administration and Cabinet

Portrait of Martin Van Buren

The Van Buren cabinet
Office	Name	Term
President	Martin Van Buren	1837–1841
Vice President	Richard Mentor Johnson	1837–1841
Secretary of State	John Forsyth	1837–1841
Secretary of the Treasury	Levi Woodbury	1837–1841
Secretary of War	Joel R. Poinsett	1837–1841
Attorney General	Benjamin Butler	1837–1838
	Felix Grundy	1838–1840
Henry D. Gilpin	1840–1841
Postmaster General	Amos Kendall	1837–1840
John M. Niles	1840–1841
Secretary of the Navy	Mahlon Dickerson	1837–1838
James K. Paulding	1838–1841

Judicial appointments

Main article: Martin Van Buren judicial appointments

Supreme Court

Van Buren appointed two Justices to the Supreme Court of the United States:

• John McKinley – 1838
• Peter Vivian Daniel – 1841

Van Buren appointed eight other federal judges, all to United States district courts.

Later life

1858 portrait by GPA Healy, on display at the White House

On the expiration of his term, Van Buren returned to his estate, Lindenwald in Kinderhook, where he planned out his return to the White House. He seemed to have the advantage for the nomination in 1844; his famous letter of April 27, 1844, in which he frankly opposed the immediate annexation of Texas, though doubtlessly contributing greatly to his defeat, was not made public until he felt practically sure of the nomination. In the Democratic convention, though he had a majority of the votes, he did not have the two-thirds which the convention required, and after eight ballots his name was withdrawn. James K. Polk received the nomination instead.

Daguerreotype of Martin Van Buren, circa 1855.

In 1848, he was nominated by two minor parties, first by the "Barnburner" faction of the Democrats, then by the Free Soilers, with whom the "Barnburners" coalesced. He won no electoral votes, but took enough votes in New York to give the state—and perhaps the election—to Zachary Taylor. In the election of 1860, he voted for the fusion ticket in New York which was opposed to Abraham Lincoln, but he could not approve of President Buchanan's course in dealing with secession and eventually supported Lincoln.

Martin Van Buren then retired to his home in Kinderhook. After being bedridden with a case of pneumonia during the fall of 1861, Martin Van Buren died of bronchial asthma and heart failure at his Lindenwald estate in Kinderhook at 2:00 a.m. on July 24, 1862. He was 79 years old. He is buried in the Kinderhook Cemetery along with his wife Hannah, his parents, and his son Martin Van Buren, Jr. A cenotaph to him is located near the parking lot of the Kinderhook Reformed Dutch Church. Van Buren outlived his four immediate successors as President (William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, James K. Polk and Zachary Taylor).

Memorials

Van Buren County, Michigan, is named after him. It was so named in 1829 while Van Buren was Secretary of State. This was done in hopes of winning support in the Jackson administration for Michigan's bid to become a state. Van Buren County is one of several counties named after Jackson or members of his cabinet for this reason.

Van Buren, Arkansas is named after him. Formerly known as Phillips Landing, a Post Office established in 1831 was called Van Buren after the Secretary of State.

In popular culture

Martin Van Buren was portrayed by Nigel Hawthorne in the 1997 historical drama film Amistad.

In Seinfeld, the episode The Van Buren Boys is focused on a gang based on the president.

In the movie "Silver Linings Playbook" Van Buren is mentioned as the person to coin the phrase "OK".

See also

• American election campaigns in the 19th century
• Independent Treasury
• Charlotte Dupuy, slave who worked for Van Buren at Decatur House, while her suit for freedom against Henry Clay proceeded
• List of Presidents of the United States
• U.S. Presidents on U.S. postage stamps
• The Van Buren Boys

Bibliography

• Alexander, Holmes (1935). The American Talleyrand: Martin Van Buren.
• Brooke, John L. (2010). Columbia Rising: Civil Life on the Upper Hudson from the Revolution to the Age of Jackson. Chapel Hill: Published for the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture, Williamsburg, Virginia, by the University of North Carolina Press. ISBN 978-0-8078-3323-0.
• Cole, Donald B. (1984). Martin Van Buren and the American Political System. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-04715-7.
• Curtis, James C. (1970). The Fox at Bay: Martin Van Buren and the Presidency, 1837–1841. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky. ISBN 978-0-8131-1214-5.
• Gammon, Samuel Rhea (1922). The Presidential Campaign of 1832. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press.
• Henretta, James A. (2004). "Martin Van Buren". In Brinkley, Alan; Dyer, Davis (eds.). The American Presidency. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. pp. 103–114. ISBN 0-618-38273-9.
• Holt, Michael F. (1999). The Rise and Fall of the American Whig Party: Jacksonian Politics and the Onset of the Civil War. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-505544-3.
• Lynch, Denis Tilden (1929). An Epoch and a Man: Martin Van Buren and His Times. New York: H. Liveright.
• Niven, John (1983). Martin Van Buren: The Romantic Age of American Politics. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-503238-3.
• Remini, Robert V. (1959). Martin Van Buren and the Making of the Democratic Party. New York: Columbia University Press.
• Schouler, James (1889). History of the United States of America: 1831–1847. Democrats and Whigs. Vol. 4. Washington, D.C.: W. H. Morrison.
• Silbey, Joel H. (2002). Martin Van Buren and the Emergence of American Popular Politics. Lanham, Md: Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-0-7425-2243-5.
• Silbey, Joel H. (2009). Party Over Section: The Rough and Ready Presidential Election of 1848. Lawrence, Kan: University Press of Kansas. ISBN 978-0-7006-1640-4.
• Wilson, Major L. (1984). The Presidency of Martin Van Buren. Lawrence, Kan: University Press of Kansas. ISBN 978-0-7006-0238-4.

References

• Van Buren, Martin (1867). Van Buren, Abraham; Van Buren, John (eds.). Inquiry into the Origin and Course of Political Parties in the United States. New York: Hurd and Houghton. ISBN 1-4181-2924-0.
• Van Buren, Martin (1920). Fitzpatrick, John Clement (ed.). The Autobiography of Martin Van Buren. Annual Report Of The American Historical Association For The Year 1918. Vol. II. Washington D.C.: Govt. Print. Off. ISBN 0-678-00531-1.

External links

• Martin Van Buren: A Resource Guide at the Library of Congress
• United States Congress. "Martin Van Buren (id: V000009)". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
• Martin Van Buren at Find a Grave
• Martin Van Buren at the White House
• American President: Martin Van Buren (1782–1862) at the Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia
  • Inaugural Address (March 4, 1837), at the Miller Center
• Martin Van Buren National Historic Site (Lindenwald), National Park Service
• Martin Van Buren at C-SPAN's American Presidents: Life Portraits
• Works by Martin Van Buren at Project Gutenberg