Zachery Taylor
Born: November 24, 1784
Died: July 9, 1850
Term in Office: 1849-1850
The ugly subject of slavery, the debate over which was discussed at length in the previous post (Franklin Pierce), again pretty much took center stage for this administration, gaining steam in the years that followed until there was no choice but for the country to debate it with guns and cannons on the battlefields of the Civil War.
Zachery Taylor, president more than a decade before the war between the states, was the last U.S. president to own slaves while in the Oval Office, though he generally supported banning slavery in territories and states that were new to the Union. His family owned slaves, as many as 300 at one time, during his entire life. He backed the 1850 Compromise which brought California in as a free state and abolished slavery in Washington D.C. but left the slavery decision up to local officials in the other territories that were taken in the war with Mexico in 1846, a war in which Taylor gained national notoriety as a general. He died before he could sign the Compromise, just 16 months after taking office.
Taylor went to a July 4th celebration and was taken ill shortly after returning to the White House that day. Most historians agree that he died of cholera, contracted in the city – Washington – which many have declared was built on a swamp (more than one guy in office has promised to "drain" that swamp, only to make the place a little swampier). There are some who have speculated, conspiracy-theory-like, that old Zach was poisoned by factions who could not stomach his support for the 1850 Compromise. Whatever the cause of his collapse, he died five days after falling ill, unable to show what kind of president he might have been.
Peace to all, and watch how you party.
Note: only three more of these rogues to put up on this blog. I hope to get them all done by the end of next week.
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