John Tyler - The Accidental President

Edward P. Crapol

reviewed May 2016

Having a bucket list to read at least one biography of every U.S. President can be a bit challenging when you get to one of the lesser known, obscure leaders. There is an “American Presidents” series that covers all presidents, so if you get desperate, you can turn there. ‘Desperate’ may be too harsh a word. They’re not that bad, just a tad brief.

I was happy to see that there was a ‘legitimate’ book on John Tyler, the nation’s 10th president, but once I was into it, I realized it wasn’t, in the strictest sense, a ‘biography’. This is one of those books about a historical figure that mainly covers a certain portion of their life. In this case, it focuses mainly on the time when John Tyler became president. More specifically, when he became the country’s very first ‘accidental’ president. John Tyler had the distinction of being the very first vice-president to take over as commander-in-chief when the current President died in office.

The president who died was William Henry Harrison who has the record of smallest tenure ever as president. He lasted one month. So John Tyler basically gets a full term handed to him. It was interesting to read that since the country was still rather young, no one was quite sure how the transition would occur, and even if it would occur at all. But, as history as shown us time and time again, the good ol’ U.S. of A. always handles these incidents without too much turmoil.

Sadly, John Tyler is the very first president who I can safely say, after reading this book, that I did not like. That sentiment seemed to be shared by many. Many have accused the author of slinging a bit too much mud, but I found his observations to be quite balanced. He gives credit in the rare instances where credit is due, but for the most part, we’re left not liking the man.

It seems as though 75% of this book talks about the issue of slavery. That itself shouldn’t be much of a shock since it was a very hot issue at the time (1840). It seems as though we read about it in too much detail. Tyler was pro-slavery. Like many pro-slavery people, he seemed to wrestle with the fact that even though the institution could be cruel, he felt it somewhat necessary for the country to maintain an economic advantage even at a high cost. Hindsight shows how misguided such individuals were.

Although the author treats his subject fairly, he does seem to have some limitations in his writing. One example: He can’t seem to refer to ‘slavery’ as ‘slavery’. He refers to it again and again and again as “The South’s peculiar institution”. I swear I must have read those four words about 75 times within these pages. I imagine an English Teacher would have knocked his grade down a letter for this infraction.

Another example: John Tyler was a big fan of expanding the boundaries of the United States, as were as predecessors James Madison and James Monroe. So EVERY time the author brings up Tyler’s expansionist tendencies, he throws the names ‘James Madison’ and ‘James Monroe’ in the sentence. Didn’t this author have an editor?? So, yes, such infractions did become cumbersome after a while.

Because Tyler was an expansionist, he played a key pivotal role in the eventual annexation of what is now the State of Texas. This is looked at as one of his more memorable and favorable achievements, yet we’re led to believe that Tyler’s main motive for Texas was to, again, expand slavery.

Then we learn that Tyler has the infamous distinction of being the only ‘traitor’ in the nation’s history several years after he left office. When the southern states seceded from the Union that led to the Civil war in 1861, Tyler was hollering and screaming right along with them. Although Tyler dies in 1862, he became one of the key figures in the renegade government. Again, one must be careful when judging history. I believe, for example, that had Thomas Jefferson been alive, he probably would have done the same thing.

Since Tyler died a traitor, much of his estate and memoirs were ransacked and burned, meaning that we don’t know as much about the man as we probably wish. This might be the reason why the author doesn’t provide us much about his upbringing, his romances, or anything about his personal life. This means that this book is shorter than most, but it still should have been shorter. Again, the author is a bit too long-winded in some areas. It also doesn’t help that the entire retrospective is divided into only about eight chapters, which doesn’t give the reader much time to breathe.

Still, though, I learned an awful lot about the man, which leads me to conclude that although this book had many shortcomings, I would still recommend for someone wanting to learn about John Tyler.

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