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Don Wildman
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- [01:35]
Don Wildman
The ladies bless the lovely band Our country's joy and pride they go for Harry hand in hand Maid, matron, belle and bride to gain protection for themselves they'll marry and marry away and tell their lovers and husbands and sons to vote for Henry Clay. The rich, the poor, the bowed, the free through all our noble land to bring the nation's jubilee will lend a helping hand they'll pull together all as one and shout and work away Together, together, together, together. Huzzah for Henry Clay. The Whig Party election campaign is in full swing. It's 1844 and the top issues are enslavement, westward expansion and the annexation of Texas. James K. Polk is running on the Democratic ticket and on the Whig ticket. As you've heard, it's Henry Clay unanimously nominated to run back in May and is assumed by many to be the obvious winner, Polk being a relative nobody. So why is the name Henry Clay not better known because despite running for presidential election three times, he never once made it to the White House. Folks, this is American history hit. I'm Don Wildman. We're glad you're listening. If you've been around the block a few times in life, you know this much about US Presidential politics. It's complicated. The modern candidate has to be a charismatic personality at the very same time as lucid and articulate on economic issues or all the while projecting a tough as nails mastery of national security matters. You must dominate the campaign across the map and the media or you're considered distant and aloof. Oh, and it's good if you have a resume that qualifies you to run the largest organization human civilization has ever conceived. If you have all that to offer, you might make it past the primaries. Compare that with running for the office in, say, 1824, 1832 or 44, which is when Kentuckian Henry Clay ran for president. One of the most successful and pivotal politicians ever to serve in our government, Clay was a state and U.S. senator. A longtime member of the House of Representatives. At 34, one of the youngest House speakers ever elected, he was on the team to negotiate the Treaty of Ghent, ending the War of 1812. He was central to the Missouri Compromise of 1820, Secretary of State in the John Quincy Adams administration. He ushered in a new system of party politics. And along the way, over a period of two decades, he thrice ran for president and lost every single time. Now, it's a stretch to compare modern US politics to anything in the early half of the 19th century, but there are similarities that make it a worthy lens, one we'll gaze through today with public historian Eric Brooks, currently curator at Ashland, the Henry Clay estate, located just outside of Lexington, Kentucky, where he has worked since 2002, previously serving at other esteemed historic sites, such as Theodore Roosevelt's Sagamore Hill in New York. Mr. Brooks has been the president of the board at the Historical Confederation of Kentucky and the Kentucky Museum and Heritage Alliance. Eric Brooks, welcome to American History Hit.
- [05:04]
Eric Brooks
Don, it's great to be here. I very much appreciate the opportunity.
- [05:07]
Don Wildman
My goodness, there is a lot of history to Henry Clay. The man has an endless political biography. But today we are intentionally focusing on his presidential aspirations because in those losses, we can find success in understanding the challenges inherent in all US Presidential campaigns. Just as we earlier, in an earlier episode, covered FDR to learn how to win the presidency, Henry Clay, mostly for factors beyond his control, demonstrate what it sometimes means to lose.
- [05:37]
Eric Brooks
Yes, very definitely. So the greatest disappointment of his life was not becoming president. Despite that, he, he ends up becoming one of the most pivotal figures of his time period, and in many ways is far more consequential than the people who were president during that timeframe. Just looking at the two people his party put into the White House, they are among the least pivotal presidents in all of American history, sharing the same signature accomplishment. Dying in office.
- [06:09]
Don Wildman
Yes.
- [06:10]
Eric Brooks
So in many ways, although he never becomes president, he uses the platform that he has as a legislator to become far more important and have far greater impact on our country and the development of our country than he might have had had he become president.
- [06:28]
Don Wildman
Yeah, it's almost a shame he had such a huge aspiration to be president because he was so good at the other stuff. Let's talk briefly about the life that brings him to politics. Born in Virginia, April 12, 1777. One of nine children born to a slave holding Baptist minister father who died when Henry was 4. His mother, Elizabeth Clay, remarries and has seven more kids. Lord, 16 children. This woman had his farming stepfather. She marries, she remarries, moves the family to Kentucky in 1791. But a young Henry stays behind in Virginia, reads law clerks, eventually joins the Virginia Bar eight years later, age 20. How does he land then in Kentucky? Politics. What brings him there?
- [07:11]
Eric Brooks
He comes to Kentucky because having received a law license in 1797, it is the place of greatest opportunity. It is the new frontier. The city of Lexington has become or is becoming the Athens of the West. So it's where people are going to seek opportunity, who find that Virginia has become crowded, that there is so much competition there, that this is a place where you can go and there are lots of opportunities. And for a young lawyer, Kentuckians were good at a lot of things. Colonizing land, developing land. They weren't really good at creating legal title to said land. And so Henry Clay found a lot of business sorting those sorts of things out. So he goes to Kentucky to do that and in fairly short order finds himself in the political sphere, in state politics. And very early on, he is asked to take over the unexpired terms of two Kentucky senators. He serves those terms and then in 1810, still a very young man, he is elected to the House of Representatives. So he very quickly enters the sphere of politics. And once he does, while law continues to be the way he pays the bills, that becomes the focus of his life.
- [08:30]
Don Wildman
I think his story, as we'll explore here, has a lot to do with personality, doesn't it? I mean, he must have Been an extraordinary character really to be able to do what he has done in his lifetime. And people don't really give that enough credit. We study these presidential candidates like with microscopes for the time they run for president. But we don't know the personalities necessarily of these Congress people, these people who are running the, the government behind the scenes a little more. And Henry Clay is one of the most significant of those types who's able to bring together and coalesce votes and so forth. He goes back and forth between Kentucky and Washington, as you mentioned, filling in with expired Senate terms. In those days, Senators were elected by the legislatures. It wasn't a voted thing for the, for the general populace. And so they often placed people in Washington, I imagined, in order to groom them. I guess they were know favorite sons and all that. So he gets twice on that circuit. He has the rare quality of being a western politician with a great familiarity with Washington, doesn't he?
- [09:31]
Eric Brooks
Yes, very much so. He becomes very, very familiar with and integrated into Washington politics, into the system of governance very early on. And one of the things that makes him, would seem to make him such a great candidate for the presidency is that he builds up so many years of experience at an early age. I mean by the time he runs in 1824, he's already served in both houses of Congress. He's done that for 14 years. He served, like you said, negotiating the Treaty of G. So he's done diplomatic work abroad. There just aren't many people who build the resume he builds as quickly as he builds it and gain the understanding of how government works like he does. And he has sort of a natural ability to do that. He, more than most people seems to grasp how to go about building consensus or getting people to understand the need perhaps to come together about certain issues or that achieving something is better than nothing. He seems very skilled at that. He's a very charismatic man. You may not always agree with him and many didn't, but very few didn't love him. He was someone that in a social setting was hard to ignore. You couldn't be in his fear and not know it. There's a great story about a young man who comes to Washington and joins Congress and a senior legislator takes him to a party and says that's Henry Clay over there. Would you like to meet Henry Clay? And he says, oh no, no, I should not want to come into or under the influence of Mr. Clay because he feels concerned that he being maybe of a different viewpoint or party, he doesn't want to get turned from his viewpoint or his party that he's been elected to represent by getting to know Clay, because he knows Clay is charismatic and that he will come to like him and have a hard time resisting him. When you have that kind of ability, it makes it possible to build relationships which you can then utilize to accomplish political goals.
- [11:35]
Don Wildman
It's the X factor of life, isn't it?
- [11:37]
Eric Brooks
Absolutely.
- [11:38]
Don Wildman
That quality of certain men and women who have persuasive capabilities. And he is top of the list here in our history. He runs for the U.S. house in 1810, becomes the youngest House speaker I mentioned before. At that time, he's 34 and faces all of what becomes the War of 1812, the anti British feeling in this country. But by the time he runs for president, and this is a decade later, more than that, 1824, he's been through that war with the British under Madison, which included having his place of work burned down the Capitol building. He's negotiated the treaty out of that war in the company of heavyweights like Albert Galantin and John Quincy Adams. He. I'm bringing this up in order to sort of talk about the issues at hand in this country by the time he runs for president and to demonstrate that he's been through a lot of governance before this moment. There are new ideas, what's called the American system of tariffs. There's also a great deal of talk about infrastructure. How are we going to expand the country through canals and road building and all this stuff. He has got his finger on the pulse of these new issues in America. And that has a lot to do with him wanting to be chief executive, right?
- [12:52]
Eric Brooks
Yeah, very much so. Clay lives in the West. He lives a great distance from Washington. He has a plantation. He is growing hemp. That is his cash crop. He's trying to bring that to market. He sees clearly the challenges that people face far away from the gears of government. I mean, people who are not able necessarily always to communicate those things clearly and effectively to people who are living much closer to the Capitol and don't see those problems firsthand. So he knows what it's like to spend two weeks traveling, assuming everything goes right on rough roads, on riverboats, et cetera, just to get to the Capitol to do the work he's there to do. And many times it takes much longer, a month just to get to Washington, just to do the simple act of getting himself to the place where he is to do the job he's to do. So it becomes critically important to him to address these issues. These aren't just ideas. These aren't just things that maybe people are interested in. They're things that personally matter to Clay, that he's experienced in that way. And so I think it becomes clear to him that these are important. He develops a plan for the country. Very few other politicians at that time have such a plan. They respond to issues as they arise. Clay is thinking ahead. He's saying, what do we need to become the nation we want to be? How do we need to act? What things do we need to do to make it possible to continue expanding westward, to continue to prosper, and to overcome the divisive issue of slavery that is threatening to break the nation apart? A strong national economy is key to that idea. That is what Clay is trying to affect in the American system.
- [14:42]
Don Wildman
You bring up the subject, enslavement of this in Kentucky. This is a border state. That's going to be a big factor later on in the Civil War. At this time, Henry Clay is a bit on the fence of this. He's a. He wants the gradual abolition of slavery, as I understand it. But he's also an enslaver himself. He has over 100 enslaved people on his estate. Is that right?
- [15:02]
Eric Brooks
Clay enslaved about 144 people, as far as we know at the present time. That's what our list is. Today. That number is evolving. We are doing lots of research to try to find those people, understand those people, learn their lives, and what all of that was about. At any given time, he enslaved 40 to 60 people, which in the state of Kentucky was a lot of people. The average slaveholder in Kentucky enslaved about 5, and many enslaved less. So for him, he's enslaving as many as almost anyone in the state. I mean, he would be in the very top few percent of enslavers in the state of Kentucky. Now, there are states in the south where there are much larger numbers on much larger plantations. But nonetheless, he is a slaveholder. He knows his personal economy is tied directly to enslaving these people. And really, at no point in his life does he ever have that epiphany that some people do that says, I need to emancipate all these people. This is not right politically. He sees the issue and realizes unequivocally that it threatens to tear the country apart, that there are great divisions in the way people see the issue between the north and the south, et cetera. And he wants to find a way to bring the nation together and move it forward. So he does advocate for gradual emancipation coupled with colonization. To Liberia, a colony on the west coast of Africa acquired by an entity called the American Colonization Society, the acs, and the purpose of which is to be a place where these now emancipated enslaved people can go. But this is a plan designed by white people to solve the problems of white people. It's about dealing with emancipated, formerly enslaved people that they see as a threat to those remaining in enslavement. It's about dealing with the issue of creating demand for enslaved people. It's about doing something that maybe those who are somewhat opposed to slavery can buy into and maybe to reduce some of that. So it's not really about enslaved people per se at all. It is the thing Clay will hang his hat on as the plan the nation should adopt to deal with the issue of slavery, and it becomes in many respects his great failed compromise.
- [17:21]
Don Wildman
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- [18:42]
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- [20:24]
Don Wildman
He is a compromiser. That will emerge in this story as his greatest attribute and perhaps his failing as a presidential candidate. So let's move on to 1824. This accomplished politician, at the end of James Monroe's second term, decides to run for election. The contest is between three members of James Monroe's Cabinet. John Quincy Adams, who was Secretary of State, Treasury Secretary William Crawford, and War Secretary John C. Calhoun against Henry Clay. But also entering the race is General Andrew Jackson. Let's talk about this very complicated race in the days before primaries. How does this work?
- [21:04]
Eric Brooks
Well, that was a problem. The fact of the matter is, how it worked was changing. In many states, electors were selected for the Electoral College. And the 12th Amendment to the United States Constitution was added in the wake of the Aaron Burr situation earlier in the 19th century. But the Electoral College had already been established. So Electoral College electors are selected by state legislatures, in some states by caucus. But that system is starting to fade. There are states where they are popularly elected, but even that is somewhat chaotic. There are states where not all the candidates appear on the ballot. So it's a case where it's hard to know what the popular will was, because the popular will is not what is selecting the president for the most part. So you got five candidates who are jockeying for electoral votes at that point. Calhoun thinks he can gain votes in Pennsylvania. When that doesn't work out, he drops out as a presidential candidate. He becomes vice presidential candidate. That leaves four candidates in the race for the presidency. And those four candidates are, as you mentioned, John Quincy Adams, William Crawford, Andrew Jackson, and Henry Clay. Three of Those candidates have significant political experience. Jackson is the one that does not. But Jackson has immense popularity because of his actions in the War of 1812, winning the battle of New Orleans, even though it was won after the war was officially over. He gains tremendous popularity from that and is riding the crest of that wave. He also is advocating many populist ideas, which, especially in the west and in the south, are gaining popularity. He wants to turn power over to the people. That is something that resonates in those areas. So he has a base to work from. Many people think William Crawford will end up winning the election because he has sort of been in waiting for the presidency. He steps aside so that James Monroe can become president in 1816. So he has positioned himself as next man up, as it were. And that might have happened had it not been for the fact that he suffered paralytic strokes. Oh, my goodness, rendering him so sick that there was question as to whether he could even survive to be sworn in, let alone serve. John Quincy Adams has served in a variety of capacities. Certainly seems to be a man positioned again for the presidency. He has served as Secretary of State, which at this time is the springboard to the presidency. This is an issue that will become very important in this election, one that will dog Henry Clay for the rest of his life as a result of what happens. So by the end of it, come November, when the election happens, no candidate achieves an electoral majority, or for that matter, a popular majority. Jackson has a popular and electoral plurality, but not a majority. This means the 12th amendment comes into play. So what happens? The election goes to the House of Representatives. That would seem to be a good thing for Henry Clay and would have been. If he had been one of the top three vote getters in the Electoral College. Then he would have gone to the House where he was speaker. He had control over that body and probably could have used that control to eventually make himself president. But he finishes fourth by four electoral votes, four fewer than William Crawford. So he is out as a candidate, but he is still the speaker, so he is still kingmaker. The three candidates remaining are John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson, and William Crawford. Henry Clay knows that William Crawford is sick, so that leaves Adams and Jackson. Clay is not necessarily completely aligned with either one. He and Jackson have had enmity for a time, some of which stems from Jackson's actions. After the War of 1812, he leads a military campaign against indigenous people that results in him crossing the border into Florida, a Spanish colony, where he captures two British citizens and executes them for assisting indigenous People. So now he's managed to kill two foreign nationals on foreign soil in a yet other country. This is bad all the way around, and Clay chastises him for it. On the floor of the legislature, he has made an enemy. He and Jackson just also stand opposed on many of the issues. Further, Clay has a belief that a military chieftain, a general like Jackson, could take power as president, and because he commands the military and has the military in his hands, could become a dictator. And he has great fear of this. He has expressed this fear previously. So he is concerned about electing a military man of any stripe because of the potential of him using the military to become a dictator.
- [26:12]
Don Wildman
Sure.
- [26:12]
Eric Brooks
Well, that leaves Adams. He and Adams know each other well. They serve together as negotiators in Ghent. They are polar opposites as people. Clay is gregarious. He is friendly. He is outgoing. He likes to party. He is social. He plays cards, he gambles. He'll work all day, party all night, and has no problem with that. John Quincy Adams, on the other hand, is very much the Puritan. He rises very early in the morning, he reads his Bible, he goes to work, he works all day, he goes to bed. He is a man who can be very prickly. He is a man many see as haughty or arrogant. He's very intellectual. He is a man who in some ways is groomed for the presidency from birth because he is born to a president. He is his father. John Adams is our second president. So it's assumed that that is his goal and will ultimately be the position that he holds. And it is. He ultimately does. So they're very different people. But Clay knows he can work with Adams, knows that Adams has respect for him. So Clay advocates for Adams even against the wishes of his own state. The wishes of the state legislature of Kentucky are to vote for Jackson. Clay won't do that. So even in face of that, he advocates for Adams.
- [27:25]
Don Wildman
This becomes what's known as the corrupt bargain that, yes, Clay makes with John Quincy Adams. Whether true or not, this is his reputation, that he gets a bump in his career thanks to supporting John Quincy Adams.
- [27:37]
Eric Brooks
Yes, the corrupt bargain becomes a charge that will follow Clay the rest of his life. And his opponents will never let it die. So what happens is, late in the going before the election in the House, Clay has a meeting with John Quincy Adams, and basically Adams offers Clay the position of Secretary of State, which is the springboard to the presidency. Clay accepts that offer, which is a generous offer. Clay's opponents, particularly Jackson, will see that as a Bargain. You give me the Secretary of State, I'll deliver you the presidency in the House. That's not what happened. There was never any evidence for that. They just didn't consider the optics. If they had done it differently, it probably would never have been a problem. They just didn't think about it. It just occurred to them that this could be a problem. And it became a huge problem.
- [28:32]
Don Wildman
Clay loathes Jackson, fair to say.
- [28:35]
Eric Brooks
I would say Jackson loathes Clay far more than Clay loathes Jackson. They weren't friends. They didn't socialize. I think Clay could have gotten along with Jackson, particularly in a social setting, if Jackson had been willing to do so. Jackson was the sort that once you made an enemy of Jackson, there was no going back. There was never an opportunity to undo that. And everything that Clay did just kept compounding. So he. The corrupt bargain comes along, that makes things worse. Then 1828 happens, and something happens that really wasn't Clay's fault, but Jackson blames him for it. And that just ends any opportunity for any reconciliation. And that thing is that a really salacious and ugly rumor has spread during that campaign that Jackson and his wife marry before she is divorced from her first husband. And there was not much truth to any of that. But it's Rachel Jackson dies not long after the election. And Andrew blames Henry Clay and the people spreading this rumor for the death of his wife.
- [29:41]
Don Wildman
Doesn't get more personal than that.
- [29:42]
Eric Brooks
That's an unforgivable thing that can happen.
- [29:43]
Don Wildman
Yeah. Let's talk about the burning Henry Clay question of that time, the advent of the Whig Party. For my reference point, maybe this will be helpful to the audience. I always write this down. Democratic Republicans split into Democrats and National Republicans. National Republicans become the Whigs. Whigs then become the Republicans. It's a real play. At this point in the middle of the 19th century, leading up to the Civil War, what does Henry Clay hope to accomplish through the founding of a new party, the Whig Party? Is this more of a coalition building? What's the point?
- [30:16]
Eric Brooks
Well, first of all, up to a certain point, parties were not an important factor in the political landscape. And in fact, the Founding Fathers worried a great deal about the possibility of parties coming to exist and loyalty to party, exceeding loyalty to the nation. And to some extent, I think their fears were justified and have come to play in our political party system. I don't know that Henry Clay personally set out to create parties. He just became one of the two polarizing figures around which those parties coalesce. He is one, Jackson is the other. And the parties form for the purposes of supporting these two candidates. They certainly begin to form. And that really starts in 1832. That's when you get two candidates and sort of two parties and the first conventions of parties are in that year. So that's when that really all starts in earnest.
- [31:10]
Don Wildman
And that is 1832, the next of his elections that he runs for against Andrew Jackson. So you've got the Whig party versus the Democrats. And this is a really important standoff here. Does he really expect to defeat such a popular incumbent? I mean, wouldn't be the wisest choice politically, in my opinion.
- [31:26]
Eric Brooks
Clay always had a hard time imagining that he couldn't win or that he might not win. And this was something that became a problem for him and sometimes cost him because he couldn't see sometimes things that were in his way that he needed to see in order to successfully win an election. I think he thought he could win. I think there were a lot of people who thought he couldn't and told him that. And it's always hard to defeat an incumbent, particularly a popular incumbent, somebody who has done things that are resonating in significant parts of the country. And Jackson certainly did that. His support of Manifest Destiny, Indian Removal, those kinds of policies are popular in the south and in the West. And so he builds a large coalition of popularity. And Clay just really never has a chance in that election to make up the ground to be since he's significantly competitive.
- [32:19]
Don Wildman
Well, in the first election I'd say he was. He fell into the trap of the compromise of making a political choices in chess playing.
- [32:26]
Eric Brooks
He just to an extent. I think the first election the problem was there were four candidates. Three of them were from the south and West. So the places where Clay would have most likely had support were divided amongst these three candidates.
- [32:39]
Don Wildman
Right.
- [32:39]
Eric Brooks
Clay generated some support from places like New York, but then John Quincy Adams is taking most of that. So he becomes a man without a base of support to some degree because it's divided amongst so many candidates.
- [32:53]
Don Wildman
Right. So that takeaway is make sure your base of support is solid before you run for president if you don't want to lose. Second election is don't run against a popular incumbent. It's pretty obvious there. But he does that choice. How much does his skill and reputation as the great compromiser walking the lines he can do undercut his presidential runs, in your opinion?
- [33:15]
Eric Brooks
Some. There were people who felt that compromise was a sign of weakness, that if you didn't stick adamantly to a particular position, that it showed you weren't firm in it, that you were willing to do whatever was necessary to become president. This would become a bigger issue in the last of his three major campaigns, but it certainly had an impact. There were people, I think, who looked at it and thought it showed that he wasn't sure what he truly believed or that he was willing to compromise belief just to achieve office, which was not the case.
- [33:50]
Don Wildman
I'll be back with more American History after this short break.
- [33:58]
Matt Lewis
I'm Matt Lewis. And I'm Dr. Eleanor Yanaga. And in Gone Medieval, we get into the greatest mysteries, the gobsmacking details, and latest groundbreaking research from the greatest millennium in human history. We're talking Vikings, Normans, kings and popes who were rarely the best of friends, murder, rebellions and crusades. Find out who we really were by subscribing to Gone Medieval From History, hit on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [34:27]
US Cellular Representative
Gifting is hard, but here's a hint. Give the gift of connection from US Cellular. Not sure what that means. Here's a slightly more specific hint. You can choose four free phones and get four lines for $90 a month from US Cellular. Your family wants new phones. How do we know? They told us. The good news is that compared to wrapping presents, you're great at getting hints. So take the hint and get them four free phones and four lines for $90 a month US Cellular built for us.
- [35:06]
Don Wildman
I mentioned in the opening of this episode how much presidential candidates personality matters these days. A lot of that has to do with media. A ton of it has to do with media, which was not the case in these days. Back in the 19th century, presidents didn't even campaign for themselves. That was seen as an unseemly thing to do. That aspect of a presidential candidate wasn't so important. But it begins to become that as we move on, doesn't it?
- [35:31]
Eric Brooks
Yes. And that is true. In Clay's time, in earlier times, from the beginning of our nation up to, well, probably really, 1824 through 24, it was considered unseemly to campaign for the presidency. If you were offered that or elected to that, accepting it was fine. I mean, that's what you should do. But you didn't campaign for it. I will serve if asked, but I will not seek the office, so to speak.
- [35:55]
Don Wildman
Right.
- [35:55]
Eric Brooks
That begins to evolve. Jackson certainly seeks the office. Clay will strongly seek the office. As things become more partisan as we get the parties, that changes and media becomes a real factor. By 1844, that will be a real and Significant part of that campaign. So that what we see is a change in the way campaigns exist and operate that mirrors much more what is happening today. It's an evolution to a more modern system of campaign. Obviously there's a lot more evolution that occurs. But we go from this non party system, caucus appointed electors and all of that, to popular vote, active campaigning, people seeking office and all of that.
- [36:42]
Don Wildman
Yeah. So build your base of support, don't run against a popular incumbent and hire a good media coach. That's where we're getting to here. 1844, you mentioned the last of his three elections. He runs against, surprisingly to him, James K. Polk, who only had planned on running for vice president. He ends up in this, in the miasma of those days of those kinds of elections, he ends up by default being the presidential candidate of the Democratic Party. How did that exactly happen?
- [37:12]
Eric Brooks
Well, the Democratic convention went on for a while and there were a number of votes for candidates. Martin Van Buren was thought perhaps to be the candidate they would select. And ultimately they really couldn't agree on one. And James K. Polk was, I guess, the least of the evils. And he was young Hickory. He was sort of endorsed by the second coming of Andrew Jackson. He was a Tennessean like Jackson, supported Jackson's policies, carried Jackson's policies out, carried the banner of Jackson. Jackson by this time was a very old man, but he supports Polk. So all of those things lead to him becoming the nominee for the presidency. And when he does, Clay and his people will use a slogan which is, who is James K. Polk? Basically, why are we voting for this? Why would you vote for this man if you don't know who he is? If he's so untested, inexperienced, unknown that you have to ask this question, why would you vote for him?
- [38:16]
Don Wildman
So why do you think, Eric, that he lost to Polk? What issues were at hand there?
- [38:21]
Eric Brooks
One of the biggest issues at that time was the annexation of the territory of Texas into the United States. As part of an evolutionary process. You have the Texian war. In the 1830s, it becomes an independent republic. Many Americans have settled there. They want to join the United States. In 1840, William Henry Harrison is elected president. He delivers the longest inaugural address in American history at two and a half hours in a rain, in cold March day in Washington without a hat. He refuses to wear a hat. He thinks that doesn't look good and then promptly catches pneumonia and dies 30 days later, having accomplished nothing as president. His vice president, John Tyler, becomes president. John Tyler becomes known as his accidency As a result, and will almost immediately essentially become a Democrat. He is a Whig. He turns himself to Democratic ideas and policies, becomes the enemy of his own party. One of the things that he will take up is the annexation of Texas. He wants to do this. He advocates for it. This is something that is happening as the 1844 campaign really ramps up. Clay delivers a speech in Raleigh, North Carolina, writes a letter that is published. And in that letter he says, I am opposed to this idea, not because I'm opposed necessarily to Texas being a state, but because annexation of Texas will move us in a direction that will result in upsetting the apple cart with regard to slavery and in particular the power of the slave states versus the non slave states in Washington. It will result in a massive tilt towards slavery. This will result in unrest. This will result in dissension, division, and potentially secession and war. He advocates very strongly against this annexation. As time passes, it becomes apparent to him that this could be problematic, that there are those who are arguing staunchly against this. And he's trying to build a greater coalition of support, trying to appeal to a wider base. So he begins to vacillate. He writes letters from Alabama where he vacillates on this. I'm not all that opposed to annexation. I'm just concerned about the issue of slavery. So as long as we can address that, I'm okay with annexation. Well, now it creates the opportunity for Polk and his party to say, we don't know what this guy's position is. Now he's arguing all sorts of things. We have no idea what he really wants. He'll say anything to get elected. So it becomes an albatross that hangs upon him and it becomes an issue from which he cannot escape in the election. That is one of the major reasons his views on slavery. He is a slaveholder. Abolitionists find that problematic and find that electing someone like him can be hypocritical to their position. It doesn't help that there is a third party candidate who is an abolitionist, a stated abolitionist. While he won't win any electoral votes, he siphons votes in a few states that potentially tilt those states to Polk instead of Clay. So he has an impact. So that also is an issue in that particular campaign.
- [41:38]
Don Wildman
I think that the big takeaway is timing, isn't it? I mean, timing is everything. And understanding the. It's sort of a luck of the draw thing, unless you're a guy like these people who run for president alone, who really just see themselves in that role and plot accordingly, which is a much more modern phenomenon. Really. Back then you have Henry Clay, who's this career politician who's sort of walking through the entirety of the US Government in order to become what he sees his due right to become the presidency. And perhaps correctly so. Nonetheless, he could have read the tea leaves a little bit better. Persistence isn't everything. In his case, timing would have been a better choice. But I want to understand one thing we haven't even mentioned here. Henry Clay's influence on a future president, Abraham Lincoln was profound. Lincoln was a major supporter of Henry Clay throughout his presidential campaigns. Made speeches for his candidacies, ends up eulogizing him in his passing, in which Clay was the first American to lie in state in the U.S. capitol. It might be the most fitting final statement on his career. He lived and died as a congressman who dreamed of becoming president. But in the end, none less than Abraham Lincoln says goodbye. What is his greatest legacy? Henry Clay, in your opinion?
- [42:53]
Eric Brooks
Well, certainly Lincoln is one of them. I mean, he's a legacy that is not often spoken about. Lincoln calls Clay, quote, my beau ideal of a statesman for whom I have fought all my humble life. And he does. He votes for Clay, cast his first vote for the presidency in 1832 for Clay, will be an elector for Clay in 1844. Unfortunately, Illinois does not go for Clay, so he doesn't get to cast a vote in the electoral college and Clay doesn't win the election. He will adopt many of Clay's policies and ideologies, even his policies relative to slavery. And that's a pretty amazing thing considering that Lincoln grows up in an anti slavery household, never enslaves anyone, and is morally opposed to the institution from the beginning. But he sees the possibility that Clay is right in trying to find a stance that will appeal to a wider percentage of the population, that some compromise emancipation in some way. Gradual emancipation and colonization might be the way to go. So he supports that. That, I think, is evidence of the great influence Clay has there. But I think Clay's greatest legacy is that he takes the nation from the founding Fathers, shepherds it through the era of massive growth, allows it to grow and develop in ways that when the Civil War, which becomes inevitable eventually comes, the nation emerges from that war intact and united. So that I think is his greatest legacy. Now it's important to understand that the economy he builds that makes that possible is built on the backs of people of color. It's built on enslaved people who remain enslaved, who provide the labor that make the economy operate. It's built on Indigenous people who are removed from most of the eastern United States during Clay's lifetime or exterminated in some cases. So it is important to understand that Clay has this great legacy that is built, unfortunately, on this reality that the nation is built on the backs of people of color who have no choice in the matter.
- [44:55]
Don Wildman
Eric, how does loss become such a theme of his presidential aspirations, in your opinion?
- [45:01]
Eric Brooks
It's an interesting question. It's a complicated question. There is at least one whole book just on that question alone. Fate and destiny, in a lot of ways. I mean, it just didn't seem to be in the cards for him to win. Inability sometimes to see what was in front of him and the issues at hand and how he might lose if he didn't deal with them correctly. Timing, like you said, he was a victim of timing in some respects. So it's the defining question, in many ways of his life, how could one man be so successful and influential and never achieve his greatest goal? And, you know, there are a variety of reasons for that. Like I say, I think in some ways it may have just been divine providence. He was meant to be where he was. Consider for a moment, for example. He loses in 1832. The next year, he effects a compromise which staves off a war between Andrew Jackson and John C. Calhoun over the issue of a tariff and the nullification of that tariff by the state of South Carolina. He loses 1844, comes back to Congress in 1849 in the Senate, and is able to affect the Compromise of 1850, which perhaps keeps the Civil War happening for another decade and holds it off until the Union is in a position to successfully prosecute it. He is where he needs to be. He is the person we needed him to be. This is something Lincoln observes and notes in his eulogy. He is the man the nation needed at the time. We would not have been what we are or what we could be without him. And that, I think, is an important reality to think about and understand.
- [46:42]
Don Wildman
Did he write a memoir? Did he ever talk about how he felt personally about this issue?
- [46:47]
Eric Brooks
He writes lots of letters which are published. The University Press of Kentucky published the Papers of Henry Clay. They started that project in the 1950s, and the last volume wasn't published until 1994. So it took forever. Became a far larger project, I think, than they ever thought it would be. There are 11 volumes. Those volumes include tens of thousands of pages. And he writes extensively in his letters about how disappointed he is, to some extent, what he thought it might have gone wrong. I think he was really, really deeply shocked. I mean, it's apparent that he just didn't ever believe, especially in 1844, that he was going to lose. When he had lost earlier, I think he always thought, well, I'll have another shot at this, and that's fine. But in 1844, I think a, he just couldn't believe he would lose. He couldn't imagine how anyone could be more qualified, better prepared, more ready to be president. And he thought everything was going in his favor. And in many ways, that was true. He just couldn't see the rise of Polk and understand how Polk could assemble a coalition and adopt policies that would get him over the finish line. So I think it came as a real shock. And I think he knew in many ways that was it. That was the end. That was the last shot he tried in 1848 to get nominated, but he was just too old. Even Lincoln at that point knew that Clay was too old, that he couldn't win, and backed Zachary Taylor.
- [48:13]
Don Wildman
Wow.
- [48:13]
Eric Brooks
A man who was as inexperienced as possible.
- [48:16]
Don Wildman
There you go. The big takeaway, in my opinion, is, you know, sometimes you lose and sometimes you win. Fate played a big hand in this man's career, but the real tribute is that he just got back on his horse and kept going in what he did best, which was running the government pretty much. Thank you so much, Eric. Nice to talk to you. Eric Brooks is a curator at Ashland, the Henry Clay estate. Hey, where can people find out about that?
- [48:39]
Eric Brooks
Our website is www.henryclay.org. you can find all sorts of information about Clay, about the estate. You can look at our collection catalog and see our artifacts. You can book tours. We do tours currently, right now, this time of the year, six days a week, we welcome you to visit. You learn lots more about Henry Clay's life and career, and you can see the actual artifacts of that life and career. We have an amazing collection.
- [49:02]
Don Wildman
Thank you so much, Eric. Nice to meet you.
- [49:04]
Eric Brooks
Thank you.
- [49:06]
Don Wildman
Hey, thanks for listening to American history hit. You know, every week we release new episodes, two new episodes dropping Mondays and Thursdays. All kinds of content from mysterious missing colonies to powerful political movements to some of the biggest battles across the centuries. Don't miss an episode by hitting like and follow. You help us out, which is great. But you'll also be reminded when our shows are on. And while you're at it, share it with a friend. American history hit with me, Don Wildman. So grateful for your support.
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Eric Brooks
It's perfect.
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