The Whig Party was a political party of the United States during the era of Jacksonian democracy. Considered integral to the Second Party System and operating from 1833 to 1856,^[1] the party was formed in opposition to the policies of President Andrew Jackson and the Democratic Party. In particular, the Whigs supported the supremacy of Congress over the Executive Branch and favored a program of modernization and economic protectionism. Their name was chosen to echo the American Whigs of 1776, who fought for independence, and because "Whig" was then a widely recognized label of choice for people who saw themselves as opposing autocratic rule.^[2] The Whig Party counted among its members such national political luminaries as Daniel Webster, William Henry Harrison, and their preeminent leader, Henry Clay of Kentucky. In addition to Harrison, the Whig Party also counted four war heroes among its ranks, including Generals Zachary Taylor and Winfield Scott. Abraham Lincoln was a Whig leader in frontier Illinois.

In its over two decades of existence, the Whig Party saw two of its candidates, Harrison and Taylor, elected President of the United States. Both, however, died in office. John Tyler became president after Harrison's death, but was expelled from the party, and Millard Fillmore, who became president after Taylor's death, was the last Whig to hold the nation's highest office.

The party was ultimately destroyed by the question of whether to allow the expansion of slavery to the territories. With deep fissures in the party on this question, the anti-slavery faction successfully prevented the nomination of its own incumbent President Fillmore in the U.S. presidential election of 1852; instead, the party nominated General Winfield Scott, who was soundly defeated. Its leaders quit politics (as Lincoln did temporarily) or changed parties. The voter base defected to the Republican Party, various coalition parties in some states, and to the Democratic Party. By the U.S. presidential election of 1856, the party had lost its ability to maintain a national coalition of effective state parties and endorsed Millard Fillmore, now of the American Party, at its last national convention.http://www.ourcampaigns.com/RaceDetail.html?RaceID=229111

Handbill for Clay, 1844

Origins and policies

Whig Party banner from 1848 with candidates Zachary Taylor and Millard Fillmore.

The Whigs came to unite around economic policy, celebrating Clay's vision of the "American System" which favored government support for a more modern, industrial economy in which education and commerce would equal physical labor or land ownership as a means of productive wealth. Whigs sought to promote domestic manufacturing through protective tariffs (as had Alexander Hamilton 40 years prior), a growth-oriented monetary policy with a new Bank of the United States, and a vigorous program of "internal improvements"?-especially to roads, canal systems, and railroads-?funded by the proceeds of public land sales. The Whigs also promoted public schools, private colleges, charities, and cultural institutions.

By contrast, the Democrats hearkened to the Jeffersonian political philosophy ideal of an egalitarian agricultural society, advising that traditional farm life bred republican simplicity, while modernization threatened to create a politically powerful caste of rich aristocrats who threatened to subvert democracy. The Democrats wanted America to expand westward across the continent. Whigs had a very different vision: they wanted to deepen the socio-economic system by adding more and more layers of complexity, such as banks, factories, and railroads. In general, the Democrats were more successful at enacting their policies on the national level, while the Whigs were more successful in passing modernization projects, such as canals and railroads, at the state level, but not the federal (which had to wait until Abraham Lincoln's presidency to be fully realized).

Party structure

Rejecting the party loyalty that was the hallmark of tight Democratic Party organization, the Whigs suffered greatly from factionalism throughout their existence. On the other hand, the Whigs had a superb network of newspapers that provided an internal information system; their leading editor was Horace Greeley of the powerful New York Tribune. In their heyday, in the 1840s, the Whigs had strong support in the manufacturing Northeast and the border states. However, the Democratic Party grew more quickly over time, and the Whigs lost more and more marginal states and districts. After the closely contested 1844 elections, the Democratic advantage widened, and the Whigs were only able to win nationally by splitting the opposition. This was partly because of the increased political importance of the western states, which generally voted for Democrats, and Irish Catholic and German immigrants, who also tended to vote for Democrats.

The Whigs, also known as the "white heads", won votes in every socio-economic category, but appealed more to the professional and business classes: doctors, lawyers, merchants, ministers, bankers, storekeepers, factory owners, commercially-oriented farmers and large-scale planters. In general, commercial and manufacturing towns and cities voted Whig, save for strongly Democratic precincts in Irish Catholic and German immigrant communities; the Democrats often sharpened their appeal to the poor by ridiculing the Whigs' aristocratic pretensions. Protestant religious revivals also injected a moralistic element into the Whig ranks. Many called for public schools to teach moral values; others proposed prohibition to end the liquor problem.

The early years

In the 1836 elections, the party was not yet sufficiently organized to run one nationwide candidate; instead William Henry Harrison ran in the northern and border states, Hugh Lawson White ran in the South, and Daniel Webster ran in his home state of Massachusetts. It was hoped that the Whig candidates would amass enough U.S. Electoral College votes among them to deny a majority to Martin Van Buren, which under the United States Constitution would place the election under control of the House of Representatives, allowing the ascendant Whigs to select the most popular Whig candidate 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 1 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.

A brief golden age

By 1844, the Whigs began their recovery by nominating Henry Clay, who lost to Democrat James K. Polk in a closely contested race, with Polk's policy of western expansion (particularly the annexation of Texas) and free trade triumphing over Clay's protectionism and caution over the Texas question. The Whigs, both northern and southern, strongly opposed expansion into Texas, which they (including Whig Congressman Abraham Lincoln) saw as an unprincipled land grab. In 1848, the Whigs, seeing no hope of success by nominating Clay, nominated General Zachary Taylor, a Mexican-American War hero. They stopped criticizing the war and adopted no platform at all. Taylor defeated Democratic candidate Lewis Cass and the anti-slavery Free Soil Party, who had nominated former President Martin Van Buren. Van Buren's candidacy split the Democratic vote in New York, throwing that state to the Whigs; at the same time, however, the Free Soilers probably cost the Whigs several Midwestern states.

Horace Greeley's New York Tribune — the leading Whig paper — endorsed Clay for President and Fillmore for Governor, 1844

Compromise of 1850

Taylor was firmly opposed to the Compromise of 1850 and committed to the admission of California as a free state, and had proclaimed that he would take military action to prevent secession. But, in July 1850, Taylor died; Vice President Millard Fillmore, a long-time Whig, became President and helped push the Compromise through Congress, in the hopes of ending the controversies over slavery. The Compromise of 1850 was first proposed by Henry Clay.

Death throes, 1852?1856

Millard Fillmore, the last Whig president

In 1854, the Kansas-Nebraska Act exploded on the scene. Southern Whigs generally supported the Act while Northern Whigs strongly opposed it. Most remaining Northern Whigs, like Lincoln, joined the new Republican Party and strongly attacked the Act, appealing to widespread northern outrage over the repeal of the Missouri Compromise. Other Whigs in 1854 joined the Know-Nothing Party, attracted by its nativist crusades against "corrupt" Irish and German immigrants. In the South, the Whig party vanished but as Thomas Alexander has shown, Whiggism as a modernizing policy orientation persisted for decades.^[4] Historians estimate that, in the South in 1856, Fillmore retained 86 percent of the 1852 Whig voters. He won only 13% of the northern vote, though that was just enough to tip Pennsylvania out of the Republican column. The future in the North, most observers thought at the time, was Republican. No one saw any prospects for the shrunken old party, and after 1856 there was virtually no Whig organization left anywhere.^[5] Some Whigs and others adopted the mantle of the "Opposition Party" for several years and had some success.

In 1860, many former Whigs who had not joined the Republicans regrouped as the Constitutional Union Party, which nominated only a national ticket; it had considerable strength in the border states, which feared the onset of civil war. John Bell finished third. During the latter part of the war and Reconstruction, some former Whigs tried to regroup in the South, calling themselves "Conservatives", and hoping to reconnect with ex-Whigs in the North. They were soon swallowed up by the Democratic Party in the South, but continued to promote modernization policies such as railroad building and public schools.^[6]

In today's discourse in American politics, the Whig Party is usually mentioned in the context of a political party losing its followers and reason for being, often exemplified by the phrase "going the way of the Whigs."

Presidents from the Whig Party

Presidents of the United States, dates in office

1. William Henry Harrison (1841)
2. John Tyler (1841-1845)
3. Zachary Taylor (1849-1850)
4. Millard Fillmore (1850-1853)

Additionally, John Quincy Adams, elected President as a Democratic-Republican, later became a National Republican and then a Whig after he was elected to the House of Representatives in 1831.

Candidates

Contemporary use of the name

• The American Whig Party - One of several modern political parties using the title of "Whig". This fringe group of strict conservatives invoke the planks of the original Whig Party with a consideration of present day conditions. (Note: this party appears to be defunct, as its home page is now dead. The last archive, from February 8, 2008, may be viewed here.)
• Modern Whig Party The most prominent political organization to use the title of "Whig." ^[7] The Modern Whig Party is the largest minor political party in the US in terms of membership after the major third parties.^[8] This group of middle-of-the-road moderates has nearly 10,000 members, to include about 6,500 members affiliated with the military.^[9] This group differs from the other organizations to invoke the "Whig" moniker due to a physical Washington, DC address for its executive committee, as well as recognized chapters in 14 states ^[10], including Florida which is registered with the state Division of Elections.http://blog.oregonlive.com/oregonatwar/2008/06/modern_whig_party_has_appeal_t.html; http://whigsinvirginia.blogspot.com; http://www.independentpoliticalreport.com/2008/06/modern-whig-party-3000-members-and-growing/#more-382
• Neowhig Party This group proudly proclaims themselves as "The Smart Party, For Smart People...and you". However, this group seems far more likely to be an ironic joke rather than a serious political party. It is uncertain if they can be taken seriously as a political party.

See also

• List of Whig National Conventions
• History of United States Democratic Party
• History of United States Republican Party
• American election campaigns in the 19th century
• Whig (British political faction)

Bibliography

• Alexander, Thomas B. "Persistent Whiggery in the Confederate South, 1860-1877," Journal of Southern History, Vol. 27, No. 3 (Aug., 1961), pp. 305-329 online at JSTOR
• Atkins, Jonathan M.; "The Whig Party versus the "spoilsmen" of Tennessee," The Historian, Vol. 57, 1994 online version
• online version
• Online through JSTOR
• Online through JSTOR
• Hammond, Bray. Banks and Politics in America from the Revolution to the Civil War (1960), Pulitzer prize; the standard history. Pro-Bank
• Online through JSTOR
• Online through JSTOR
• Online through JSTOR
• Mueller, Henry R.; The Whig Party in Pennsylvania, (1922) online version
• Nevins, Allan. The Ordeal of the Union (1947) vol 1: Fruits of Manifest Destiny, 1847-1852; vol 2. A House Dividing, 1852-1857. highly detailed narrative of national politics
• Poage, George Rawlings. Henry Clay and the Whig Party (1936)
• Schlesinger, Arthur Meier, Jr. ed. History of American Presidential Elections, 1789?2000 (various multivolume editions, latest is 2001). For each election includes good scholarly history and selection of primary documents. Essays on the most important elections are reprinted in Schlesinger, The Coming to Power: Critical presidential elections in American history (1972)
• Sharp, James Roger. The Jacksonians Versus the Banks: Politics in the States after the Panic of 1837 (1970)
• Smith, Craig R. "Daniel Webster's Epideictic Speaking: A Study in Emerging Whig Virtues" online
• Van Deusen, Glyndon G. Thurlow Weed, Wizard of the Lobby (1947)
• Wilson, Major L. Space, Time, and Freedom: The Quest for Nationality and the Irrepressible Conflict, 1815-1861 (1974) intellectual history of Whigs and Democrats

Notes

• Although Tyler was elected vice president as a Whig, his policies soon proved to be opposed to most of the Whig agenda, and he was officially expelled from the party in 1841, a few months after taking office.

References

External links

• The American Presidency Project, contains the text of the national platforms that were adopted by the national conventions (1844-1856)

ca:Partit Whig dels Estats Units cs:Whig Party (USA) de:United States Whig Party es:Partido Whig de los Estados Unidos fr:Parti whig (États-Unis) ko:??? (??) it:Partito Whig (Stati Uniti) nl:Whig Party (Verenigde Staten) ja:????? (????) no:Whig Party (USA) pl:Ameryka?ska Partia Wigów pt:Partido Whig (Estados Unidos da América) ru:?????? ????? (???) sq:Partia Whig fi:Yhdysvaltain Whig-puolue sv:Whig-partiet tr:Whig Partisi zh:??? (??)