John Adams John Adams (October 30 [O.S. October 19] 1735 – July 4, 1826) was the second president of the United States (1797–1801),[2] having earlier served as the first vice president of the United States. An American Founding Father,[3] Adams was a statesman, diplomat, and a leading advocate of American independence from Great Britain. Well educated, he was an Enlightenment political theorist who promoted republicanism, as well as a strong central government, and wrote prolifically about his often seminal ideas, both in published works and in letters to his wife and key adviser Abigail Adams, as well as to other Founding Fathers. Adams' revolutionary credentials secured him two terms as George Washington's vice president and his own election in 1796 as the second president. In 1800, Adams was defeated for re-election by Thomas Jefferson and retired to Massachusetts. Early life Susanna Boylston Adams was a member of one of the colony's leading medical families, the Boylstons of Brookline.[9][10]
James Madison James Madison, Jr. (March 16, 1751 – June 28, 1836) was an American statesman, political theorist and the fourth President of the United States (1809–1817). He is hailed as the "Father of the Constitution" for being instrumental in the drafting of the United States Constitution and as the key champion and author of the United States Bill of Rights.[2] He served as a politician much of his adult life. After the constitution had been drafted, Madison became one of the leaders in the movement to ratify it. In 1789, Madison became a leader in the new House of Representatives, drafting many basic laws. Early life and education From ages 11 to 16, the young "Jemmy" Madison was sent to study under Donald Robertson, an instructor at the Innes plantation in King and Queen County, Virginia in the Tidewater region. At age 16, he returned to Montpelier, where he began a two-year course of study under the Reverend Thomas Martin in preparation for college. Religion Early political career
George Washington George Washington (February 22, 1732 [O.S. February 11, 1731][Note 1][Note 2] – December 14, 1799) was the first President of the United States (1789–1797), the commander-in-chief of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. He presided over the convention that drafted the United States Constitution, which replaced the Articles of Confederation and which remains the supreme law of the land. Washington was elected President as the unanimous choice of the electors in 1788, and he served two terms in office. Washington was born into the provincial gentry of Colonial Virginia; his wealthy planter family owned tobacco plantations and slaves. Because of his strategy, Revolutionary forces captured two major British armies at Saratoga in 1777 and Yorktown in 1781. Washington proclaimed the United States neutral in the wars raging in Europe after 1793. Early life (1732–1753) Washington's birthplace Braddock disaster 1755
James Monroe Facing little opposition from the fractured Federalist Party, Monroe was easily elected president in 1816, winning over 80 percent of the electoral vote and becoming the last president during the First Party System era of American politics. As president, he bought Florida from Spain and sought to ease partisan tensions, embarking on a tour of the country that was generally well received. With the ratification of the Treaty of 1818, under the successful diplomacy of his Secretary of State John Quincy Adams, the United States extended from the Atlantic to the Pacific, giving America harbor and fishing rights in the Pacific Northwest. The United States and Britain jointly occupied the Oregon Country. Monroe supported the founding of colonies in Africa for free African Americans that would eventually form the nation of Liberia, whose capital, Monrovia, is named in his honor. Early life His paternal great-grandfather Andrew Monroe emigrated to America from Scotland in the mid-17th century.
John Quincy Adams John Quincy Adams Bemis argues that Adams was able to: gather together, formulate, and practice the fundamentals of American foreign-policy – self-determination, independence, noncolonization, nonintervention, nonentanglement in European politics, Freedom of the Seas, [and] freedom of commerce.[4] Adams was the son of former President John Adams and Abigail Adams. As a diplomat, Adams played an important role in negotiating key treaties, most notably the Treaty of Ghent, which ended the War of 1812. Adams is best known as a diplomat who shaped America's foreign policy in line with his ardently nationalist commitment to America's republican values. Adams was elected a U.S. Early life, education, and early career[edit] Adams first learned of the Declaration of Independence from the letters his father wrote his mother from the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia. Early political career (1796–1817)[edit] Washington administration[edit] Massachusetts politics[edit] Harvard professor[edit]
Andrew Jackson Jackson was nicknamed Old Hickory because of his toughness and aggressive personality; he fought in duels, some fatal to his opponents.[2] He was a wealthy slaveholder. He fought politically against what he denounced as a closed, undemocratic aristocracy, adding to his appeal to common citizens. He expanded the spoils system during his presidency to strengthen his political base. Early life and education Jackson was born on March 15, 1767. His parents were Scots-Irish colonists Andrew and Elizabeth Hutchinson Jackson, Presbyterians who had emigrated from Ireland two years earlier.[5][6] Jackson's father was born in Carrickfergus, County Antrim, in current-day Northern Ireland, around 1738.[7] Jackson's parents lived in the village of Boneybefore, also in County Antrim. When they emigrated to America in 1765, Jackson's parents probably landed in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In 1824, Jackson wrote a letter saying that he was born at an uncle's plantation in Lancaster County, South Carolina.
Martin Van Buren 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. 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. Early life and education[edit] Van Buren was the first president born a citizen of the United States, as all previous presidents were born before the American Revolution. Early political career[edit] U.S. Gubernatorial portrait of Martin Van Buren. Jackson Cabinet[edit]
William Henry Harrison William Henry Harrison (February 9, 1773 – April 4, 1841) was the ninth President of the United States (1841), an American military officer and politician, and the first president to die in office. He was 68 years, 23 days old when inaugurated, the oldest president to take office until Ronald Reagan in 1981. Harrison died on his 32nd day in office[a] of complications from pneumonia, serving the shortest tenure in United States presidential history. His death sparked a brief constitutional crisis, but its resolution settled many questions about presidential succession left unanswered by the Constitution until the passage of the 25th Amendment in 1967. He was grandfather of Benjamin Harrison, who was elected as the 23rd President in 1888. After the war, Harrison moved to Ohio, where he was elected to the United States House of Representatives. Returning to his farm in Ohio, Harrison lived in relative retirement until nominated for the presidency in 1836. Early life[edit] Governor[edit]
John Tyler Tyler became the first Vice President to succeed to the office of President on the death of the incumbent. He was also the first of five people to serve as President without ever being elected to that office, the other four being Millard Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, Chester A. Arthur and Gerald Ford. Tyler's opposition to federalism and emphatic support of states' rights endeared him to his fellow Virginians but alienated him from most of the political allies who brought him to power in Washington. Upon the death of President Harrison on April 4, 1841, only a month after his inauguration, a short Constitutional crisis arose over the succession process. As President, Tyler opposed the Whig platform and vetoed several Whig party proposals. Tyler essentially retired from electoral politics until the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861. Early life and law career[edit] Early political career[edit] Start in Virginia politics[edit] U.S. The death of U.S. Return to state politics[edit] U.S.
James K. Polk Polk was the last strong pre–Civil War president, and he is the earliest of whom there are surviving photographs taken during a term in office. He is noted for his foreign policy successes. He threatened war with Britain over the issue of which nation owned the Oregon Country, then backed away and split the ownership of the region with Britain. Polk oversaw the opening of the U.S. Scholars have ranked him favorably on the list of greatest presidents for his ability to set an agenda and achieve all of it. Early life Polk was home schooled.[5] His health was problematic and in 1812 his pain became so unbearable that he was taken to Dr. The house where Polk spent his adult life before his presidency, in Columbia, Tennessee, is his only private residence still standing. Early political career James K. Polk courted Sarah Childress, and they married on January 1, 1824 in Murfreesboro.[17] Polk was then 28, and Sarah was 20 years old. Speaker of the House Governor of Tennessee Election of 1844
Zachary Taylor In 1845, as the annexation of Texas was underway, President James K. Polk dispatched Taylor to the Rio Grande area in anticipation of a potential battle with Mexico over the disputed Texas-Mexico border. The Mexican–American War broke out in May 1846, and Taylor led American troops to victory in a series of battles culminating in the Battle of Palo Alto and the Battle of Monterrey. He became a national hero, and political clubs sprung up to draw him into the upcoming 1848 presidential election. Early life and family[edit] Leaving exhausted lands, his family joined the westward migration out of Virginia and settled near what developed as Louisville, Kentucky, on the Ohio River. In June 1810, Taylor married Margaret Mackall Smith, whom he had met the previous autumn in Louisville. Military career[edit] By 1837, the Second Seminole War was underway when Taylor was directed to Florida. Mexican–American War[edit] Taylor's men advanced to the Rio Grande in March 1846. Election of 1848[edit]
Millard Fillmore As an anti-slavery moderate, he opposed abolitionist demands to exclude slavery from all of the territory gained in the Mexican War. Instead he supported the Compromise of 1850, which briefly ended the crisis. In foreign policy, Fillmore supported U.S. Navy expeditions to "open" Japan, opposed French designs on Hawaii, and was embarrassed by Narciso López's filibuster expeditions to Cuba. He sought re-election in 1852, but was passed over for the nomination by the Whigs. When the Whig Party broke up in 1854–1856, Fillmore and other conservative Whigs joined the American Party, the political arm of the anti-immigrant, anti-Catholic "Know-Nothing" movement, though he himself was not anti-Catholic. Fillmore co-founded the University at Buffalo[2] and helped found the Buffalo Historical Society and the Buffalo General Hospital. Early life and career In 1834, he formed a law partnership, Fillmore and Hall (which became Fillmore, Hall and Haven in 1836), with close friend Nathan K. Politics