The Whig Party is a political party of the United States that existed in 1832-1856. The party emerged as an opposition to Andrew Jackson and the Democratic Party on the basis of a coalition of the National Republican Party , the Anti-Masonic Party and other smaller anti- Jackson parties. In particular, the Whigs supported Congressional supremacy over the executive branch and promoted a program of modernization and economic protectionism . For a long time, the party occupied a place in the bipartisan system of American politics.
| Whig Party | |
|---|---|
| Whig party | |
 Campaign poster for Zachary Taylor and Millard Fillmore ( 1848 election ) | |
| Leader | Henry Clay |
| Founder | , and |
| Established | 1832 |
| Dissolution date | 1856 |
| Headquarters | |
| Ideology | parliamentarism , liberalism , agrarianism , economic nationalism |
The name of the party goes back to the nickname of the American patriots during the American Revolution , who fought against the British metropolis when the Whigs (from the name of the British Whig Party ) called people who opposed authoritarian rule. Prominent members of the Whig party included Daniel Webster , William Henry Harrison, and their permanent leader, Henry Clay . Abraham Lincoln was the Whig leader in Illinois .
Whig Party Presidents
The Whig Party belonged to two elected US Presidents: William Harrison (won the 1840 election ) and Zachary Taylor (won the 1848 election ). Both were major military leaders, whose names were associated with outstanding victories, and if Harrison was active in political life for many years, for Taylor the presidential election was actually a political debut. By coincidence, both died as president after a short reign. Harrison died a month after his inauguration in April 1841, and Vice President John Tyler took his place, but was expelled from the party. Hero of the US-Mexican War, Zachary Taylor, was president for just over a year (from March 1849 to July 1850). After his death, the vice president of the Whig Millard Fillmore became president, but was not nominated for the Whigs in the next election of 1852 .
As a result of the internal party split in connection with the question of expanding slavery in the new American territories, the Whigs did not nominate Fillmore, but General Winfield Scott, who was defeated by the democratic candidate Franklin Pierce . After the defeat, many Whigs took the side of the Democrats or joined the newly created Republican Party . The rest created the Know Nothing party, which unsuccessfully nominated Fillmore in the 1856 election .
Formally, the Whig party was not dissolved and continued to exist. The last known Whigs were recorded in the 1980s. in the city of Moreivia , the birthplace of President Millard Fillmore.
See also
- Anti-Masonic Party
Links
- Great Americans of the Whig Party, 1832-1856 Biographies of American Whigs.
- The American Presidency Project , contains the text of the national platforms that were adopted by the national conventions (1844-1856)
- Whig Party in Virginia in Encyclopedia Virginia
- Grand Valley State University digital collections - Papers of Whig political appointee Nathan Sargent, 1832–1874