War and Peace

Military Credentials

The military credentials of various candidates were to prove important throughout U.S. history. The War of 1812 resulted in the rise to prominence of Andrew lack-son, who was elected president in 1828; William Henry Harrison, elected president in 1840; and Zachary Taylor, elected president in 1848. lackson had been the hero who defeated the British at the Battle of New Orleans in 1815; Harrison had also served in the War of 1812; and Taylor was certainly a great military hero, having fought in the War of 1812, the Black Hawk War of 1832, and the defeat of the Mexicans in 1845.

In 1856 the first Republican Party candidate for the presidential election was John C. Fremont, who distinguished himself in the Mexican War, although his role as an explorer was far more important. Four years later, Abraham Lincoln, who had no war experience, was elected as president, and was to preside over the country during five years of war. The threat of war as a possible resolution to the issue of slavery was so important that John C. Bell of the Constitutional Union was able to run for election with a newly established party and managed to capture 12.6 percent of the vote, and 39 Electoral College seats. Lincoln's re-election in 1864, during the Civil War, was the first presidential election where the overriding issue of the election was war. Lincoln was able to easily defeat General George B. McClellan. The election of Ulysses S. Grant, in 1868, was largely because of his role as a Union commander in the Civil War.

During the latter part of the 19th century, the “opening up” of the United States, with the dispossession of the Native Americans, saw wars against the Indians. The creation of many new states began to affect the presidential elections, because the “frontier” states were important, electorally. The Spanish-American War of 1898 led to the choice of Theodore Roosevelt as the vice presidential candidate in 1900, and his presidency in September 1901, following the assassination of William

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