1836 United States presidential election

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1836 United States presidential election
Flag of the United States (1836-1837).svg
  1832
  • November 3 – December 7, 1836
1840  

294 members of the Electoral College
148 electoral votes needed to win
Turnout56.5% [1] Decrease2.svg 0.5 pp
  Martin Van Buren circa 1837 crop.jpg William Henry Harrison by James Reid Lambdin, 1835 crop.jpg HLWhite.jpg
Nominee Martin Van Buren William Henry Harrison Hugh L. White
Party Democratic Whig Whig
Alliance Anti-Masonic
Home state New York Ohio Tennessee
Running mate Richard M. Johnson Francis Granger John Tyler
Electoral vote1707326
States carried1572
Popular vote764,176550,816146,109
Percentage50.8%36.6%9.7%

  Black Dan (cropped).jpg Willie p magnum crop.jpg
Nominee Daniel Webster Willie P. Mangum
Party Whig Whig
Alliance Nullifier
Home state Massachusetts North Carolina
Running mate Francis Granger John Tyler
Electoral vote1411
States carried11
Popular vote41,201N/A
Percentage2.7%N/A

ElectoralCollege1836.svg
Presidential election results map. Blue denotes states won by Van Buren/Johnson, Yellow denotes those won by Harrison/Granger, Maroon denotes those won by White/Tyler, Pink denotes those won by Webster/Granger, and Green denotes those won by Mangum/Tyler. Numbers indicate the number of electoral votes allotted to each state.

President before election

Andrew Jackson
Democratic

Elected President

Martin Van Buren
Democratic

1837 contingent U.S. vice presidential election
February 8, 1837

52 United States senators
27 votes needed to win
  Richard Mentor Johnson A29919 (cropped 3x4).jpg Francis Granger (cropped 3x4).jpg
Candidate Richard M. Johnson Francis Granger
Party Democratic Whig
Senate vote3316
Percentage63.46%30.77%

1837 US Contingent VP Election.svg
Senate by state. Blue denotes states that voted for Johnson, Yellow denotes those that voted for Granger, Green denotes those that did not vote. State with multiple colors had Senators that voted differently from each other.

Presidential elections were held in the United States from November 3 to December 7, 1836. Incumbent Vice President Martin Van Buren, candidate of the Democratic Party, defeated four candidates fielded by the nascent Whig Party.

Contents

The 1835 Democratic National Convention chose a ticket of Van Buren (President Andrew Jackson's handpicked successor) and U.S. Representative Richard Mentor Johnson of Kentucky. The Whig Party, which had only recently emerged and was primarily united by opposition to Jackson, was not yet sufficiently organized to agree on a single candidate. Hoping to compel a contingent election in the House of Representatives by denying the Democrats an electoral majority, the Whigs ran multiple candidates. Most Northern and border state Whigs supported the ticket led by former Senator William Henry Harrison of Ohio, while most Southern Whigs supported the ticket led by Senator Hugh Lawson White of Tennessee. Two other Whigs, Daniel Webster and Willie Person Mangum, carried Massachusetts and South Carolina respectively on single-state tickets.

Despite facing multiple candidates, Van Buren won a majority of the electoral vote, and he won a majority of the popular vote in both the North and the South. Nonetheless, the Whig strategy came very close to success, as Van Buren won the decisive state of Pennsylvania by just over two points. As Virginia's electors voted for Van Buren but refused to vote for Johnson, Johnson fell one vote short of an electoral majority, compelling a contingent election for vice president. In that contingent election, the United States Senate elected Johnson over Harrison's running mate, Francis Granger.

Van Buren was the third incumbent vice president to win election as president, an event which would not happen again until 1988, when George H. W. Bush was elected president. He is also the most recent Democrat to be elected to succeed a two-term Democratic president, and the only sitting Democratic vice president to win the presidency. [2] Harrison finished second in both the popular and electoral vote, and his strong performance helped him win the Whig nomination in the 1840 presidential election. The election of 1836 was crucial in developing the Second Party System and a stable two-party system more generally. By the end of the election, nearly every independent faction had been absorbed by either the Democrats or the Whigs. [3]

Nominations

Democratic Party nomination

1836 Democratic Party ticket
Martin Van Buren Richard M. Johnson
for Presidentfor Vice President
Martin Van Buren MET ap93.19.2.jpg
Richard Mentor Johnson A29919.jpg
8th
Vice President of the United States
(1833–1837)
U.S. Representative
from Kentucky
(1807–1819, 1829–1837)
Andrew Jackson, whose second term as president expired on March 4, 1837 Andrew jackson head.jpg
Andrew Jackson, whose second term as president expired on March 4, 1837

The 1835 Democratic National Convention was held in Baltimore, Maryland, from May 20 to 22, 1835. The early date of the convention was selected by President Andrew Jackson to prevent the formation of opposition to Martin Van Buren. Twenty-two states and two territories were represented at the convention with Alabama, Illinois, and South Carolina being unrepresented. The delegate amount per state varied from Maryland having 188 delegates to cast its ten votes while Tennessee's fifteen votes were cast by one delegate. [4]

The convention saw the first credentials dispute in American history with two rival delegations from Pennsylvania claiming the state's votes. The issue was solved by seating both delegations and having them share the state's votes. An attempt to remove the two-thirds requirement for the selection of a candidate was passed by a vote of 231 to 210, but was later restored through a voice vote. [4]

Some Southerners opposed Johnson's nomination, due to his open relationship with an enslaved woman, whom he had regarded as his common-law wife. At the convention, Van Buren was nominated unanimously with all 265 delegates in favor, but the Virginia delegates supported Senator William Cabell Rives against Johnson. However, Rives got little support and Johnson was nominated with one more vote than the two-thirds requirement. [5] [4]

Convention vote
Presidential voteVice presidential vote
Martin Van Buren 265 Richard M. Johnson 178
William C. Rives 87

Whig Party nomination

Whig presidential candidates
William Henry Harrison by James Reid Lambdin, 1835 crop.jpg William Henry Harrison
Former U.S. Senator from Ohio
Black Dan (cropped).jpg Daniel Webster
U.S. Senator from Massachusetts
HLWhite.jpg Hugh L. White
U.S. Senator from Tennessee
Willie p magnum crop.jpg Willie Person Mangum
U.S. Senator from North Carolina
Whig vice-presidential candidates
Francis Granger (cropped 3x4).jpg Francis Granger
U.S. Representative from New York
John Tyler (cropped 3x4).png John Tyler
U.S. Senator from Virginia

The Whig Party emerged during the 1834 mid-term elections as the chief opposition to the Democratic Party. The party was formed from members of the National Republican Party, the Anti-Masonic Party, disaffected Jacksonians, and small remnants of the Federalist Party (people whose last political activity was with them a decade before). Some Southerners who were angered by Jackson's opposition to states' rights, including Sen. John C. Calhoun and the Nullifiers, also temporarily joined the Whig coalition. [5]

Unlike the Democrats, the Whigs did not hold a national convention. Instead, state legislatures and state conventions nominated candidates, being the reason why so many candidates from the Whig party ran in the general election. Southern Nullifiers placed Tennessee Senator Hugh Lawson White into contention for the presidency in 1834 soon after his break with Jackson. White was a moderate on the states' rights issue, which made him acceptable in the South, but not in the North. The state legislatures of Alabama and Tennessee officially nominated White. The South Carolina state legislature nominated Senator Willie Person Mangum of North Carolina. By early 1835, Massachusetts Senator Daniel Webster was building support among Northern Whigs. Both Webster and White used Senate debates to establish their positions on the issues of the day, as newspapers carried the text of their speeches nationwide. The Pennsylvania legislature nominated popular former general William Henry Harrison, who had led American forces at the Battle of Tippecanoe. The Whigs hoped that Harrison's reputation as a military hero could win voter support. Harrison soon displaced Webster as the preferred candidate of Northern Whigs. State legislatures, particularly in larger states, also nominated various vice presidential candidates. [5]

Despite multiple candidates, there was only one Whig ticket in each state. The Whigs ended up with two main tickets: William Henry Harrison for president and Francis Granger for vice president in the North and Kentucky, and Hugh Lawson White for president and John Tyler for vice president in the middle and lower South. In Massachusetts, the ticket was Daniel Webster for president and Granger for vice president. In South Carolina, the ticket was Mangum for president and Tyler for vice president. In Maryland, it was Harrison and Tyler. Of the four Whig presidential candidates, only Harrison was on the ballot in enough states for it to be mathematically possible for him to win a majority in the Electoral College, and even then, it would have required him to win Van Buren's home state of New York. [5]

Anti-Masonic Party nomination

After the negative views of Freemasonry among a large segment of the public began to wane in the mid-1830s, the Anti-Masonic Party began to disintegrate. Some of its members began moving to the Whig Party, which had a broader issue base than the Anti-Masons. The Whigs were also regarded as a better alternative to the Democrats.

A state convention for the Anti-Masonic Party was held in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, from December 14 to 17, 1835, to choose presidential electors for the 1836 election. The convention unanimously nominated William Henry Harrison for president and Francis Granger for vice president. The Vermont state Anti-Masonic convention followed suit on February 24, 1836. Anti-Masonic leaders were unable to obtain assurance from Harrison that he was not a Mason, so they called a national convention. The second national Anti-Masonic nominating convention was held in Philadelphia on May 4, 1836. The meeting was divisive, but a majority of the delegates officially stated that the party was not sponsoring a national ticket for the presidential election of 1836 and proposed a meeting in 1837 to discuss the future of the party.

Nullifier Party nomination

The Nullifier Party had also begun to decline sharply since the previous election, after it became clear that the doctrine of nullification lacked sufficient support outside of the party's political base of South Carolina to ever make the Nullifiers more than a fringe party nationwide. Many party members began to drift towards the Democratic Party, but there was no question of the party endorsing Van Buren's bid for the presidency, as he and Calhoun were sworn enemies. Seeing little point in running their own ticket, Calhoun pushed the party into backing the White/Tyler ticket, as White had previously sided against Jackson during the Nullification Crisis.

General election

Campaign

Results by county explicitly indicating the percentage of the winning candidate in each county. Shades of blue are for Van Buren (Democratic), shades of orange are for Harrison (Whig), shades of green are for White (Whig), and shades of red are for Webster (Whig). PresidentialCounty1836Colorbrewer.png
Results by county explicitly indicating the percentage of the winning candidate in each county. Shades of blue are for Van Buren (Democratic), shades of orange are for Harrison (Whig), shades of green are for White (Whig), and shades of red are for Webster (Whig).

In the aftermath of the Nat Turner's Rebellion and other events, slavery emerged as an increasingly prominent political issue. Calhoun attacked Van Buren, saying that he could not be trusted to protect Southern interests and accusing the sitting Vice President of affiliating with abolitionists. [5] Van Buren defeated Harrison by a margin of 51.4% to 48.6% in the North, and he defeated White by a similar margin of 50.7% to 49.3% in the South.

Disputes

A dispute similar to that of Indiana in 1817 and Missouri in 1821 arose during the counting of the electoral votes. Michigan only became a state on January 26, 1837, and had cast its electoral votes for president before that date. Anticipating a challenge to the results, Congress resolved on February 4, 1837, that during the counting four days later the final tally would be read twice, once with Michigan and once without Michigan. The counting proceeded in accordance with the resolution. The dispute had no bearing on the final result: either way, Van Buren was elected, and either way no candidate had a majority for vice-president. [6]

Results

22.4% of the voting age population and 56.5% of eligible voters participated in the election. [7]

The Whigs' strategy narrowly failed to prevent Van Buren's victory in the Electoral College, though he earned a somewhat lower share of the popular vote and fewer electoral votes than Andrew Jackson had in either of the previous two elections. The key state in this election was ultimately Pennsylvania, which Van Buren won from Harrison with a narrow majority of just 4,222 votes or 2.4%. Had Harrison won the state, Van Buren would have been left eight votes short of an Electoral College majority - despite receiving a majority (50.48%) in the popular vote - and the Whig goal to force the election into the House of Representatives (per the Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution) would have succeeded. Thus, the 11.8% difference between the margin in the tipping point state of Pennsylvania and the margin in the national popular vote, is the largest gap in American history.

In a contingent election, the House would have been required to choose between Van Buren, Harrison, and White as the three candidates with the most electoral votes. Jacksonians controlled enough state delegations (14 out of 26) and enough Senate seats (31 out of 52) to win both the presidency and the vice presidency in a contingent election.

This was the last election in which the Democrats won Connecticut, Rhode Island, and North Carolina until 1852. This was also the only election where South Carolina voted for the Whigs, and the last time it voted against the Democrats until 1868. It was also the last time that a Democrat was elected to the U.S. presidency succeeding a Democrat who had served two terms as U.S. president. [8]

Electoral College 1836.svg

Presidential candidatePartyHome statePopular vote(a)Electoral vote
CountPercentage
Martin Van Buren Democratic New York 764,17650.83%170
William Henry Harrison Whig Ohio 550,81636.63%73
Hugh Lawson White Whig Tennessee 146,1079.72%26
Daniel Webster Whig Massachusetts 41,2012.74%14
Willie Person Mangum Whig North Carolina (b)11
Other1,2340.08%0
Total1,503,534100.0%294
Needed to win148

Source (Popular Vote):Leip, David. "1836 Presidential Election Results". Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections. Retrieved July 27, 2005.Source (Electoral Vote): "Electoral College Box Scores 1789–1996". National Archives and Records Administration . Retrieved July 31, 2005.

(a)The popular vote figures exclude South Carolina where the electors were chosen by the state legislature rather than by popular vote.
(b)Mangum received his electoral votes from South Carolina where the electors were chosen by the state legislatures rather than by popular vote.

Popular vote
Van Buren
50.83%
Harrison
36.63%
White
9.72%
Webster
2.74%
Others
0.08%
Electoral vote
Van Buren
57.82%
Harrison
24.83%
White
8.84%
Webster
4.76%
Mangum
3.74%
Vice presidential candidatePartyStateElectoral vote
Richard M. Johnson Democratic Kentucky 147
Francis Granger Whig New York 77
John Tyler Whig Virginia 47
William Smith Democratic South Carolina 23
Total294
Needed to win148

Source: "Electoral College Box Scores 1789–1996". National Archives and Records Administration . Retrieved July 31, 2005.

Geography of results

Results by state

Source: Data from Walter Dean Burnham, Presidential ballots, 1836-1892 (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1955) pp 247–57.

States/districts won by Van Buren/Johnson
States/districts won by a Whig candidate
Martin Van Buren
Democratic
William H. Harrison
Whig
Hugh L. White
Whig
Daniel Webster
Whig
Willie Person Mangum
Whig
MarginTotal
Stateelectoral
votes
Votes cast %electoral
votes
Votes cast %electoral
votes
Votes cast %electoral
votes
Votes cast %electoral
votes
electoral
votes
#%#
Alabama 720,63855.347no ballots16,65844.660no ballotsno ballots3,98010.6837,296AL
Arkansas 32,38064.083no ballots1,33435.920no ballotsno ballots1,04628.163,714AR
Connecticut 819,29450.65818,79949.350no ballotsno ballotsno ballots4951.3038,093CT
Delaware 34,15446.7004,73653.243no ballotsno ballotsno ballots-582-6.548,895DE
Georgia 1122,77848.200no ballots24,48151.8011no ballotsno ballots-1,703-3.6047,259GA
Illinois 518,36954.69515,22045.310no ballotsno ballotsno ballots3,1499.3833,589IL
Indiana 932,47844.03041,28155.979no ballotsno ballotsno ballots-8,803-11.9473,759IN
Kentucky 1533,22947.41036,86152.5915no ballotsno ballotsno ballots-3,632-5.1870,090KY
Louisiana 53,84251.745no ballots3,58348.260no ballotsno ballots2593.487,425LA
Maine 1022,82558.921014,80338.210no ballotsno ballotsno ballots8,02220.7138,740ME
Maryland 1022,26746.27025,85253.7310no ballotsno ballotsno ballots-3,585-7.4648,119MD
Massachusetts 1433,48644.810no ballotsno ballots41,20155.1314no ballots-7,715-10.3274,687MA
Michigan 37,12256.2235,54543.780no ballotsno ballotsno ballots1,57712.4412,667MI
Mississippi 410,29751.284no ballots9,78248.720no ballotsno ballots5152.5620,079MS
Missouri 410,99559.984no ballots7,33740.020no ballotsno ballots3,65819.9618,332MO
New Hampshire 718,69775.0176,22824.990no ballotsno ballotsno ballots12,46950.0224,925NH
New Jersey 825,59249.47026,13750.538no ballotsno ballotsno ballots-545-1.0651,729NJ
New York 42166,79554.6342138,54845.370no ballotsno ballotsno ballots28,2479.26305,343NY
North Carolina 1526,63153.1015no ballots23,52146.900no ballotsno ballots3,1106.2050,153NC
Ohio 2196,23847.560104,95851.8721no ballotsno ballotsno ballots-8,720-4.31202,333OH
Pennsylvania 3091,45751.183087,23548.820no ballotsno ballotsno ballots4,2222.36178,692PA
Rhode Island 42,96452.2442,71047.760no ballotsno ballotsno ballots2544.485,674RI
South Carolina 11no popular voteno popular voteno popular voteno popular vote11--0SC
Tennessee 1526,17042.080no ballots36,02757.9215no ballotsno ballots-9,857-15.8462,197TN
Vermont 714,03740.07020,99459.937no ballotsno ballotsno ballots-6,957-19.8635,031VT
Virginia 2330,55656.6423no ballots23,38443.350no ballotsno ballots7,17213.2953,945VA
TOTALS:294763,29150.79170549,90736.5973146,1079.722641,2012.741411213,38414.201,502,811US
TO WIN:148

States that flipped from National Republican to Whig

States that flipped from National Republican to Democratic

States that flipped from Anti-Masonic to Whig

States that flipped from Democratic to Whig

States that flipped from Nullifer to Whig

Close states

States where the margin of victory was under 5%:

  1. New Jersey 1.06% (545 votes)
  2. Connecticut 1.3% (495 votes)
  3. Pennsylvania 2.36% (4,222 votes) (tipping point state for a Van Buren victory)
  4. Mississippi 2.56% (515 votes)
  5. Louisiana 3.48% (259 votes)
  6. Georgia 3.6% (1,703 votes)
  7. Ohio 4.31% (8,720 votes)
  8. Rhode Island 4.48% (254 votes)

States where the margin of victory was under 10%:

  1. Kentucky 5.18% (3,632 votes)
  2. North Carolina 6.2% (3,110 votes)
  3. Delaware 6.54% (582 votes)
  4. Maryland 7.46% (3,585 votes)
  5. New York 9.26% (28,247 votes) (tipping point state for a Harrison victory)
  6. Illinois 9.38% (3,149 votes)

Breakdown by ticket

CandidateTotalMartin Van Buren
Democratic
William H. Harrison
Whig
Hugh L. White
Whig
Daniel Webster
Whig
Willie P. Mangum
Whig
Electoral Votes for President29417073261411
For Vice President, Richard Mentor Johnson147147    
For Vice President, Francis Granger77 63 14 
For Vice President, John Tyler47 1026 11
For Vice President, William Smith2323    

1837 Contingent election for Vice-President

In an unusual turn of events, Virginia's 23 electors, who were all pledged to Van Buren and his running mate Richard Mentor Johnson, became faithless electors due to dissension related to Johnson's interracial relationship with a slave [9] and refused to vote for Johnson, instead casting their vice-presidential votes for former South Carolina senator William Smith.

This left Johnson one electoral vote short of an Electoral College majority. Since no vice presidential candidate received a majority of electoral votes, for the only time in American history, the Senate decided a vice presidential race in a contingent election. [10]

On February 8, 1837, Johnson was elected on the first ballot by a vote of 33 to 16; the vote proceeded largely along party lines, albeit with three Whigs voting for Johnson, one Democrat voting for Granger, and three abstentions (Hugh L. White declined to vote out of respect for his own running-mate, John Tyler, while the two Nullifier Party senators refused to back either candidate). [11]

1837 Contingent United States vice presidential election
February 8, 1837
PartyCandidateVotes %
Democratic Richard M. Johnson 33
Whig Francis Granger 16
   Not voting3
Total membership52100
Votes necessary27>50
Members voting for:
JohnsonGranger

  Thomas H. Benton of Missouri
  John Black of Mississippi
  Bedford Brown of North Carolina
  James Buchanan of Pennsylvania
  Alfred Cuthbert of Georgia
  Judah Dana of Maine
  William Lee D. Ewing of Illinois
  William S. Fulton of Arkansas
  Felix Grundy of Tennessee
  William Hendricks of Indiana
  Henry Hubbard of New Hampshire
  William R. King of Alabama
  John P. King of Georgia
  Lewis F. Linn of Missouri
  Lucius Lyon of Michigan
  Samuel McKean of Pennsylvania
  Gabriel Moore of Alabama
  Thomas Morris of Ohio
  Alexandre Mouton of Louisiana
  Robert C. Nicholas of Louisiana
  John M. Niles of Connecticut
  John Norvell of Michigan
  John Page of New Hampshire
  Richard E. Parker of Virginia
  William C. Rives of Virginia
  John M. Robinson of Illinois
  John Ruggles of Maine
  Ambrose H. Sevier of Arkansas
  Robert Strange of North Carolina
  Nathaniel P. Tallmadge of New York
  John Tipton of Indiana
  Robert J. Walker of Mississippi
  Silas Wright of New York

  Richard H. Bayard of Delaware
  Henry Clay of Kentucky
  Thomas Clayton of Delaware
  John J. Crittenden of Kentucky
  John Davis of Massachusetts
  Thomas Ewing of Ohio
  Joseph Kent of Maryland
  Nehemiah R. Knight of Rhode Island
  Samuel Prentiss of Vermont
  Asher Robbins of Rhode Island
  Samuel L. Southard of New Jersey
  John Selby Spence of Maryland
  Benjamin Swift of Vermont
  Gideon Tomlinson of Connecticut
  Garret D. Wall of New Jersey
  Daniel Webster of Massachusetts

Members not voting:

  John C. Calhoun of South Carolina
  William C. Preston of South Carolina
  Hugh L. White of Tennessee

Sources: [12] [13]

Electoral college selection

Method of choosing electorsState(s)
Each Elector appointed by state legislatureSouth Carolina
Each Elector chosen by voters statewide(all other States)

See also

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References

  1. "National General Election VEP Turnout Rates, 1789-Present". United States Election Project. CQ Press.
  2. Murse, Tom (December 16, 2020). "Last Time Consecutive Democratic Presidents Were Elected". ThoughtCo. You'd have to go back even further in history to find the most recent instance of a Democrat being elected to succeed a two-term president from the same party. The last time that happened was in 1836 when voters elected Martin Van Buren to follow Andrew Jackson.
  3. Cole, Donald B. (1984). Martin Van Buren and the American Political System. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. p. 279. ISBN   0-691-04715-4 . Retrieved March 23, 2017.
  4. 1 2 3 National Party Conventions, 1831-1976. Congressional Quarterly. 1979.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 Deskins, Donald Richard; Walton, Hanes; Puckett, Sherman (2010). Presidential Elections, 1789-2008: County, State, and National Mapping of Election Data. University of Michigan Press. pp. 106–107.
  6. United States Congress (1837). Senate Journal. 24th Congress, 2nd Session, February 4. pp. 203–204. Archived from the original on April 4, 2015. Retrieved August 20, 2006.
  7. Abramson, Aldrich & Rohde 1995, p. 99.
  8. Murse, Tom (December 16, 2020). "Last Time Consecutive Democratic Presidents Were Elected". ThoughtCo. Archived from the original on June 3, 2021. Retrieved July 6, 2021.
  9. Burke, Window To The Past
  10. Norton, Mary Beth (2015). A People and a Nation: A History of the United States (10th ed.). Wadsworth Publishing. p. 344.
  11. "The Senate Elects a Vice President". Washington, D.C.: Office of the Secretary of the Senate. Retrieved August 11, 2019.
  12. "Cong. Globe, 24th Cong., 2nd Sess. 166(1837)". A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: U.S. Congressional Documents and Debates, 1774–1875. Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress . Retrieved August 8, 2019.
  13. "24th Congress Senate Vote 334 (1837)". voteview.com. Los Angeles, California: UCLA Department of Political Science and Social Science Computing. Retrieved August 8, 2019.

Works cited

Further reading