Only about 5 feet, 6 inches
tall, but trim and erect, Martin Van Buren dressed fastidiously. His impeccable
appearance belied his amiability--and his humble background. Of Dutch descent,
he was born in 1782, the son of a tavern keeper and farmer, in Kinderhook, New
York.
As a young lawyer he became
involved in New York politics. As leader of the "Albany Regency," an effective
New York political organization, he shrewdly dispensed public offices and bounty
in a fashion calculated to bring votes. Yet he faithfully fulfilled official
duties, and in 1821 was elected to the United States Senate.
By 1827 he had emerged as the
principal northern leader for Andrew Jackson. President Jackson rewarded Van
Buren by appointing him Secretary of State. As the Cabinet Members appointed at
John C. Calhoun's recommendation began to demonstrate only secondary loyalty to
Jackson, Van Buren emerged as the President's most trusted adviser. Jackson
referred to him as, "a true man with no guile."
The rift in the Cabinet became
serious because of Jackson's differences with Calhoun, a Presidential aspirant.
Van Buren suggested a way out of an eventual impasse: he and Secretary of War
Eaton resigned, so that Calhoun men would also resign. Jackson appointed a new
Cabinet, and sought again to reward Van Buren by appointing him Minister to
Great Britain. Vice President Calhoun, as President of the Senate, cast the
deciding vote against the appointment--and made a martyr of Van Buren.
The "Little Magician" was
elected Vice President on the Jacksonian ticket in 1832, and won the Presidency
in 1836.
Van Buren devoted his Inaugural
Address to a discourse upon the American experiment as an example to the rest of
the world. The country was prosperous, but less than three months later the
panic of 1837 punctured the prosperity.
Basically the trouble was the
19th-century cyclical economy of "boom and bust," which was following its
regular pattern, but Jackson's financial measures contributed to the crash. His
destruction of the Second Bank of the United States had removed restrictions
upon the inflationary practices of some state banks; wild speculation in lands,
based on easy bank credit, had swept the West. To end this speculation, Jackson
in 1836 had issued a Specie Circular requiring that lands be purchased with hard
money--gold or silver.
In 1837 the panic began.
Hundreds of banks and businesses failed. Thousands lost their lands. For about
five years the United States was wracked by the worst depression thus far in its
history.
Programs applied decades later
to alleviate economic crisis eluded both Van Buren and his opponents. Van
Buren's remedy--continuing Jackson's deflationary policies--only deepened and
prolonged the depression.
Declaring that the panic was due
to recklessness in business and overexpansion of credit, Van Buren devoted
himself to maintaining the solvency of the national Government. He opposed not
only the creation of a new Bank of the United States but also the placing of
Government funds in state banks. He fought for the establishment of an
independent treasury system to handle Government transactions. As for Federal
aid to internal improvements, he cut off expenditures so completely that the
Government even sold the tools it had used on public works.
Inclined more and more to oppose
the expansion of slavery, Van Buren blocked the annexation of Texas because it
assuredly would add to slave territory--and it might bring war with Mexico.
Defeated by the Whigs in 1840
for reelection, he was an unsuccessful candidate for President on the Free Soil
ticket in 1848. He died in 1862.