ELECTION #14, 1840. The NASTY-METER is 3.

ELECTION #14, 1840. The CANDIDATES.

DEMOCRAT: MARTIN VAN BUREN.

Van Buren was screwed from day one as far as getting reelected. His four years in office were an economic disaster. The recession was caused, in large part, by Jackson vetoing the Bank of the United States rechartering bill passed by Congress. The government was now depositing the money in Jackson's "pet banks" - run by his cronies, instead of the Bank of the United States, which Jackson had gutted. These pet banks were making large loans to speculaters, and add to this vicious high inflation, a crop failure in 1835, and a new "hard money" law forcing banks to repay money borrowed from the government in specie rather than currency. By the summer of 1837 America's economic life had ground to a standstill. The panic would last several years, forcing factories to close and sending families to beg on the streets. Van Buren was a decent guy but didn't know how to handle an economic crisis. The first cartoon portraying the Democratic Party as a donkey appeared during this election. Jackson rode the beast, Van Buren walked behind it, hat in hand, saying, "I shall tread in the footsteps of my illustrious predecessor."

Once again the Democrats held their nominating convention in Baltimore. Van Buren was easily renominated but there was a squabble again over Richard Johnson, his VP. Many Democrates balked at Johnson for "openly and shamefully living in adultery with a buxom negro," But in the end he was renominated.


WHIG: WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON.

The WHIGS held their first nominating convention in 1839, in Harrisburg, PA. Henry Clay wanted to be the nominee but because he was a Mason, the Antomasons in the Whig Party would not support him. So they settled on William Henry Harrison, who had done well in the 1836 election. And his reputation as a war hero still inspired a great deal of loyalty and even though he was a Virginia aristocrat he managed to portray himself as a "aw-shucks" guy with a log cabin constituency. The voters bought it.


The CAMPAIGN in 1840.

The WHIGS were handed a wonderful gift at the beginning of the 1840 campaign when a newspaper article ridiculed Harrison, saying he should be given a barrel of hard cider and allowed to sit in his log cabin beside the fire. The WHIGS seized on this and turned it to advantage, portraying Harrison as a man of the people. In almost no time, Harrison became the "log cabin and hard cider" candidate, a guy who hung out with the coonskin cap boys, plowed the back forty with his own hands, and was always ready to raise a glass of cider. Never mind his Virginia ancestry and ownership of at least 2,000 acres - he was now a man of the people. The log cabin symbol was everywhere: There were log-cabin-shaped newspapers, songbooks, pamphlets, and badges. You could buy Log Cabin Emollient or whiskey in log-cabin-shaped bottles from the E.C. Booz distillery (incidentally, this is how the word "booze" entered the English language).

Harrison was the first candidate to have a campaign slogan. His slogan was "Tippecanoe and Tyler, too." He was commander of U.S. forces when they defeated the Native Americans at Tippecanoe, in the Indiana Territory on November 7, 1811. The leader of the Indians was not Tecumseh, but his half brother Tenskwatawa. Tecumseh was killed in a later battle. Tyler was the name of his VP.

The Democrts protested that Harrison wasn't born in a log cabin, didn't drink hard cider, and, when you came right down to it he wasn't much of a war hero, (a mediocre strategist, Harrison sustained heavy casualties at Tippecanoe). It didn't do a bit of good as the WHIGS charged forward yelling "Tippecanue and Tyler, too."


The WINNER was WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON.

Harrison got 1,275,390 popular votes and 234 electoral votes.
Van Buren got 1,128,854 popular votes and only 60 electoral votes.

On a cold, blustery March 4, 1841, Harrison delivered the longest inaugural address of all the presidents (8,445 words and 105 minutes) wearing neither a hat or coat. He came down with a cold, developed pneumonia, and died on April 4, 1841, after one month in office. It was the shortest presidency in our history. He was succeeded by his VP, John Tyler.

A part of American folklore is that Native-Americans Tecumseh or his half-brother Tenskwatawa, put a curse on American presidents elected in the zero years. The curse has some validity - look at the following:
- Harrison, elected in 1840, died after one month.
- Lincoln, elected in 1860, was assassinated in 1865.
- Garfield, elected in 1880, was assassinated in 1881.
- McKinley, reeledcted in 1900, was assassinated in 1901.
- Harding, elected in 1920, died of natural causes in 1923.
- FDR, reelected in 1940, died of natural causes in 1945.
- JFK, elected in 1960, was assassinated in 1963.
- Reagan, elected in 1980, survived an assassination attempt in 1981.

But George W. Bush broke the curse, he was elected in 2000 and served all eight years.

(My comment about this election. One thing I've observed about human behavior in my life is that no matter what the TRUTH is, it is, many times, what people THINK the TRUTH is that counts. This 1840 election is a good example. People wanted to believe that Harrison was born in a log cabin, drank hard cider, was one of the coonskin cap boys, and plowed the back forty with his own hands, even though none of it was true. It proves my point.)