John Tyler

John Tyler (March 29, 1790 – January 18, 1862) was the 10th president of the United States from 1841 to 1845. He was also the first vice president to become president because his predecessor died^[2] and the first president to be born after the US Constitution was ratified.

Tyler grew up in Virginia and became a lawyer. His father was also a lawyer who later became governor of Virginia. Tyler became a US Representative, and he later also became governor of Virginia like his father.

Tyler started in government as a member of the Democratic Party, but he later changed to the very new Whig Party. He was chosen to run for the Whigs as vice president under William Henry Harrison. Whig Party people used to say "Tippecanoe and Tyler Too" to get people to vote for them. (Harrison was famous for being a general in a battle in a place called Tippecanoe, which was the origin of his nickname.)

Harrison and Tyler won the election, but President Harrison died one month later. Tyler replaced Harrison as president.

Because Tyler had not been elected to hold the office of president, some people thought that he lacked a claim to the position. However, the US Constitution states that the vice president is vested with the responsibilities of the presidency in case of the former's "Death, Resignation or Inability," Tyler said that meant that the position was his to fill. Most of the government agreed, and he was sworn in as the new president. However, the Whig Party did not want Tyler, and many Whigs ended up calling him "the accidental president" or "His Accidency."

Tyler angered the Whigs when he decided to mainly Democrats to work in his government. He wanted to bring the two political parties together, but that instead instead ended up making him unpopular. He also rejected many of the Whigs' ideas such as bringing back a central bank. All that led to the Whigs deciding not to let him be president again and did not renominating him to in 1844

While Tyler was president, Florida became a new U.S. state. In 1836, Texas had won its independence from Mexico during the Texas Revolution and become its own country. Tyler sought to annex Texas and turn it into a new state while he was in office, but opposition in the North to haveing another slave state caused that to happen until a few months after Tyler's term had ended.

His friends in the Democratic Party sometimes asked him for ideas, but it also did not like him enough to be president. Tyler was sometimes called "the President without a party" since both parties did not want him.

During the creation of the Confederate States, Tyler did not want a civil war, but he voted for Virginia to join the Confederacy and was elected to the Confederate States Congress.

Tyler died in Richmond, Virginia, on January 18, 1862 of a stroke. Tyler's death was the only one in presidential history not to be officially recognized in Washington, D.C. because of his loyalty to the Confederacy. His coffin was covered with the Confederate flag. He is the only president ever to be buried and honored ceremoniously under a country flag that is not the American flag.

• [1] Archived 2009-01-15 at the Wayback Machine