Robert W. Merry, the president and publisher of Congressional Quarterly, Inc., examines how, in a one-term presidency, James K. Polk completed the story of America's Manifest Destiny by expanding its territory across the continent.
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Robert W. Merry, the president and publisher of Congressional Quarterly, Inc., examines how, in a one-term presidency, James K. Polk completed the story of America's Manifest Destiny by expanding its territory across the continent.
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During the presidency of James K. Polk (1795 - 1849), the boundaries of the United States expanded by one-third to stretch from the Atlantic to the Pacific Oceans. The finances of the United States were, after many years, put on a firm footing by the establishment of the Treasury. And the United States enjoyed economic growth and prosperity by Polk's deft handling of the tariff. Yet, Polk fought a difficult two-year war with Mexico and narrowly averted a second war with Great Britain. The territorial expansion strained the uneasy relationship between North and South over slavery and led to the Civil War. In his thoughtful book, "A Country of Vast Designs" Robert Merry examines Polk's life and presidency. The book covers an important period of American history that frequently is overlooked, and it argues for the nature of Polk's accomplishment in the face of recent criticism of his presidency. Merry is the president and editor of the Congressional Quarterly.
A Tennessean and a protegy of Andrew Jackson, Polk served a single term as the eleventh president (1845-1849). He secured the nomination of the Democratic Party in 1844 as a compromise candidate when a deadlock developed among the favored contenders. He narrowly defeated the Whig candidate, Henry Clay. An introverted, dour individual with little charisma or obvious leadership skills, Polk set himself clear goals for his presidency which he achieved by virtue of perseverance, commitment, and maneuver. "I intend myself to be myself President of the U.S." Polk wrote to a political ally shortly after his election. Polk also set himself four goals for his presidency: 1. the settlement of the boundaries of the Oregon Territory with Great Britain, 2. the acquisition of California and other territory from Mexico 3.the reduction of the tariff to make it more a revenue-raising than a protectionist measure and 4. the creation of an independent treasury.
The two domestic goals were important, and Polk achieved them with relative ease. Most of Merry's study involves the former two goals which involved the annexation of Texas began by Polk's predecessor, the settlement of the boundary dispute with Oregon, and ultimately the Mexican War. Lacking skills with people, Polk had a difficult relationship with his Secretary of State, James Buchanan, with his two generals in the Mexican War, Taylor and Scott, and with Congress. He was distrustful and petty and tended to cast aspersions on the motives of his opponents. But Polk had a vision of what came to be called "manifest destiny." He saw the United States as a beacon of individual freedom and opportunity in a world still ruled, for the most part, by despots.
Polk began with a warlike attitude to Britain, but he was able to form attitudes in and out of Congress for a favorable settlement of the Oregon boundary question. The war Polk precipitated with Mexico was controversial in his own day and remains so today. Polk underestimated the difficulty of the war and the extent and character of the opposition to it. Equally important, he failed to understand how the war and the acquired territories would exacerbate tension over slavery. Early in the conflict, a Pennsylvania congressman named Wilmot introduced a famous proviso that bears his name forbidding the extension of slavery into any territories acquired from Mexico. The Wilmot Proviso was the harbinger of the break between North and South.
Merry clearly admires Polk for his persistence and accomplishment. He also attempts to rehabilitate Polk, to a large degree, from the charge brought by many of Polk's contemporaries and still heard today that Polk fought an unjust, aggressive war against Mexico. Merry argues that the war was not fought at the behest of the "Slave Power" but rather had supporters and opponents in both North and South. He suggests that the equities in favor of Mexico in the period leading up to the conflict were not as strong as is sometimes assumed and that the United States had considerable justification for waging war. Finally, Merry suggests that a good deal of political understanding is required in order to avoid an overly-moralizing approach to the conduct of the United States. He writes (p.476):
"The moralistic impulse, when applied to the Mexican War, misses a fundamental reality of history: It doesn't turn on moral pivots but on differentials of power, will, organization, and population. History moves forward with a crushing force and does not stop for niceties of moral suasion or concepts of political virtue. Mexico was a dysfunctional, unstable, weak nation whose population wasn't sufficient to control all the lands within its domain. The United States by contrast was a vibrant, expanding, exuberant experiment in democracy whose burgeoning population thrilled to the notion that it was engaging in something big and historically momentous. The resulting energy .... generated a political compulsion toward expansion into largely unpopulated lands that seemed to beckon with irresistible enticement."
Merry has written a challenging study of Polk's presidency and about the importance of purpose and determination in the achievement of worthwhile political goals. This is a valuable book for readers interested in American history.
