James Monroe, 5Th President I

JAMES MONROE, 5TH PRESIDENT I : James Monroe 17^8-1831 President of the United States of America 1817-1825 THE TOURIST who makes a pilgrimage to James Monroe's two Virginia homes, Ash Lawn in Charlottesville and Oak Hill in Leesburg, carries away a sense of serenity, dignity and decent accomplishment. In the nation's folklore Monroe figures as one of the Virginia Dynasty, the fourth of five Presidents to come from the Old Dominion. He is associated with the Monroe Doctrine. His eight years in the White House are recalled as the "era of good feelings"—a period almost free from political strife. According to legend Monroe would have received a unanimous electoral vote when he was re-elected in 1820, except that a single elector who plumped for John Quincy Adams did so merely in order to reserve the H unique distinction of unanimity for George Washington. In actuality Monroe's career was much less comfortable. As a diplomat in Europe he offended both President Washington and President Jefferson. He irritated Madison by offering himself as a rival candidate for the Presidency in 1808. Though he made a good enough record in Madison's Administration as Secretary of State, later also managing to carry out the duties of Secretary of War, he was not the universal favorite among the Republicans for the presidential nomination in 1816. Severe in manner and in dress, he was a less attractive figure than the big, handsome William H. Crawford of Georgia. Some politicos grumbled that it was time to look outside Virginia. Nor was his wife, the daughter of an officer in the British Army, a match for Dolley Madison in natural vivacity. The Monroes went to considerable expense to redecorate the White House—badly needed after the British raid of 1814. They entertained ambitiously. But Elizabeth Kortright Monroe suffered increasingly from migraines and depression. There was plenty in the Washington scene to give headaches to the White House. Gossip soon 132 Burke's Presidential Families of the United States dismissed Monroe as a dull, mediocre person, nowhere near as politically successful as Jefferson and less intellectually gifted than Madison. With an eye to their own presidential chances, his Secretary of State (J. Q. Adams) and his Secretary of the Treasury (Crawford) began 10 provoke one another. Monroe could assert himself neither with his cabinet nor with Congress. The Administration, Adams sourly noted in his journal, "is at war with itself, both in the Executive, and between the Executive and the Legislature". Much of the initiative for the Monroe Doctrine (a section of the President's annual message to Congress in 1823) came from Adams. Monroe was almost a cipher in his second term. In the words of the powerful Congressman Henry Clay, "there was nothing further to be expected by him or from him". Worse still for Monroe, his re-election coincided with an economic depression. There was little he could do to remedy matters. But his apparent indifference to business failures and out-of-work operatives made him seem still more impotent, unhkeable and irrelevant. His own salary of $25,000 a year (a sum fixed in 1789, and to remain fixed until it was doubled in 1873) looked opulent in comparison with the Vice-President's $5,000 or the niggardly $3,500 paid to heads of executive departments. His expenses however were heavy, and nineteenth-century Presidents did not receive a pension. When he retired from office in 1825, with six years still to live, Monroe's finances were in disastrous shape. Like Jefferson and Madison before him, he was on the brink of ruin when he died. Indeed, Mount Vernon, Monticello, Montpelier and Ash Lawn are all in better condition today, thanks to careful restoration, than when their owners were laid to rest. This sounds like a gloomy verdict on Monroe—in colors as dark as the formal clothes he wore. If it is true, why was he nevertheless selected in 1816, and again in 1820 ? One of the axioms of presidential politics is that a depression kills the chances of re-election. Van Buren was to be punished in this way in 1840, and Herbert Hoover in 1932. Another general rule is that those who follow in the wake of strong Presidents usually face a counter-attack from Congress. And from a twentieth-century perspective, one would not expect the nation to accept a sequence of Presidents from the same state. The main explanation is that the political circumstances of Monroe's era were different from ours, and still seeking firm definition. It looked as though the route to the Presidency would run from, the Vice-Presidency or the Secretaryship of State. Monroe had strong claims to the White House. He had served his country or his state almost continuously ever since his enlistment in the Continental Army at the age of eighteen. He had been a member of the Continental Congress, a leader of the US Senate, and twice Governor of Virginia. He was an experienced if not a dazzlingly successful diplomat. Perhaps most important of all, he had been closely connected politically m. With an 3. Adams) •ovoke one :t nor with irnal, "is at ive and the a section of )m Adams, ards of the rther to be n economic rs. But his operatives it. His own i fixed until i with the of executive nth-century fice in 1825, shape. Like jin when he sh Lawn are a when their is dark as the s selected in litics is that a be punished sneral rule is sually face a perspective, sidents from ELIZABETH KORTRIGHT, MRS MONROE of Monroe's . It looked as Presidency or iVhite House. bver since his ^e had been a ite, and twice ;ly successful :ly connected 134 Burke's Presidential Families of the United States with Jefferson ever since 1780. A cynic might have said that Monroe was a veteran professional patriot. A fairer comment is that he was a thoroughly deserving public figure, untouched by scandal, who was given his due reward—the ultimate, highest office in the land. In a sense he was lucky to be nominated in 1816, and again in 1820. He was chosen because he was there, the most obvious person for the Republican caucus to pick, and because the rival Federalist party was in collapse. He was renominate'd and re-elected not out of positive enthusiasm but in the absence of any viable alternative. (Incidentally, the New Hampshire elector who cast a solitary vote for Adams did so simply because he preferred Adams: he had no idea he was the only dissenter.) Monroe was unlucky, though, in other respects. It was not his fault that the Presidency had fallen into partial eclipse, overshadowed by Congress. Much of the political bad feeling that in fact marred the supposed era of good feeling was a consequence of the temporary blurring of party lines. Americans had not yet come to regard a two-party system as a desirable arrangement. According to the conventional wisdom of the period, which Monroe shared, "party" was a sign of corruption and crisis. He and his contemporaries were baffled by the rancorous mood in Washington, when the United States as a whole was clearly prospering. Monroe's situation, rather than any personal deficiencies, is the reason why his leadership was so indecisive. Deprived of a political organization, including the reinforcement of patronage, he was a general without an army. He had the trappings of authority but not its weaponry. As President he did what he could—doggedly, decently, a little dismally. The last of the Jeffersonians, at least he contrived to die on the same day as his great mentor, 4 July, five years after Jefferson, as if to remind his countrymen that he too belonged in the Revolutionary pantheon. Monroe was a >a thoroughly given his due in in 1820. He srson for the Chronology list party was it of positive :identally, the did so simply 1758 Born at Monroe's Creek, Westmoreland County, Virginia 28 April. ily dissenter.) 1770-74 Attended the Rev Archibald Campbell's private School in \\estmoreland s not his fault County. •shadowed by 1774 Entered William and Mary College 20 June. :t marred the orary blurring 1776 Left William and Mary College; Cadet in 3rd \irginia Regt under Col Hugh Mercer; commissioned Lieut and ordered to main Armv under Gen larty system as Washington; fought in Battles of Harlem Heights (16 Sept) and\e Plains (28 wisdom of the Oct); retreated with Army through New Jersey; wounded at Battle of Trenton :ion and crisis, (26 Dec) and promoted Capt for his service there. rous mood in ADC to C-in-C William Alexander (styled Earl of Stirling) July; fought in ly prospering. Battles of Brandywine (11 Sept) and Germantown (4 Oct); promoted Major , is the reason 20 Nov. I organization, Served with Washington and Alexander at Valley Forge; fought in Battle of 'al without an Monmouth 28 June; returned to Virginia and on Washington's recommendation weaponry. As was apptd Lt-Col of a command to be raised in Virginia, but the exhausted ittle dismally, finances of the state prevented this; re-entered William and Mary College. tie same day as 1780-83 Studied law under Thomas Jefferson at Williamsburg. to remind his 1780 Visited Southern Army as Military Commissioner (with rank of Lt-Col) from intheon. Virginia. 1782 Elected to House of Delegates from King George County and appointed member of Executive Council by Virginia Assembly. 1783 Elected delegate from Virginia to Continental Congress 6 June for three-year term beginning 3 Nov; ratification of peace treaty with Great Britain at Annapolis 13 Dec.

Load more