President James K. Polk was a loner, not an easy guy to get along with but he was one of the hardest working POTUS in history. He came into office with 4 goals to accomplish and after a year he had checkmarks on 3 of the 4. He wanted to reduced tariffs, re-establish an independent treasury, acquire the Oregon Territory from Britain and acquire California from Mexico. They fought a war with Mexico that was controversial to accomplish the later. When the 1848 election season came along Polk was not a popular president and he decided to just go home to Tennessee. He would be dead within months of leaving the presidency. He had been the youngest president up until that time. He was 49 when he took office in 1845.

The POTUS office was wide open with Polk not running for re-election. The Whig Party nominated Mexican War hero General Zachary Taylor who was 64 years old. Taylor’s Vice Presidential candidate would be Milliard Fillmore a former Congressman from New York. The Democrat Party nominated Lewis Cass a former Governor and U.S. Senator from Michigan. His running mate would be General William Butler another Mexican War hero.

Zachary Taylor was an interesting case. He has up until this time been a military man. He had never shown much interest in politics. He had never voted in his life. He was a middle of the road candidate. No one really knew what he was thinking or where he stood on any issue.

There was a third party candidate in 1848. Former President Martin Van Buren ran on the Free Soilers party and got nearly 300,00o votes.

The election was pretty close. Taylor won it with 47.3% of the vote. He won 15 states and 163 electoral votes. Cass came in a close second with 42.5% he also won 15 states and 127 electoral votes. Van Buren had 10.1% of the vote he failed to carry any state.