Whig Party (United States) - 1836-1840

1836-1840

In the 1836 elections, the party was not yet sufficiently organized to run one nationwide candidate; instead William Henry Harrison was its candidate in the northern and border states, Hugh Lawson White ran in the South, and Daniel Webster ran in his home state of Massachusetts. Whigs hoped that their three candidates would amass enough Electoral College votes among them to deny a majority to Martin Van Buren. That would move the election to the House of Representatives, allowing the ascendant Whigs to select their most popular man as president. The Whigs came only a few thousand votes short of victory in Pennsylvania, vindicating their strategy but failed nonetheless.

In late 1839, the Whigs held their first national convention and nominated William Henry Harrison as their presidential candidate. In March 1840, Harrison pledged to serve only one term as President if elected, a pledge which reflected popular support for a Constitutional limit to Presidential terms among many in the Whig Party. Harrison went on to victory in 1840, defeating Van Buren's re-election bid largely as a result of the Panic of 1837 and subsequent depression. Harrison served only 31 days and became the first President to die in office. He was succeeded by John Tyler, a Virginian and states' rights absolutist. Tyler vetoed the Whig economic legislation and was expelled from the Whig party in 1841. The Whigs' internal disunity and the nation's increasing prosperity made the party's activist economic program seem less necessary and led to a disastrous showing in the 1842 Congressional elections.