MARTIN VAN BUREN (D) - 1837-1841
The 8th President had an impressive pedigree. Secretary of State and then Vice-President under Pres. Jackson, he was also Jackson's personal choice to carry on his legacy. A dramatic deflation in his first year in office crippled the economy his entire, and therefore only, term.
To set himself up as his own man, Van Buren went against many of Jackson's old policies, and his political calculations added up to nothing. In the case over the Amistad, he sided with Spain to try to give the kidnapped men back as slaves. In the case of the Extermination Order in Missouri, where the governor made it legal to murder Mormons, he refused to interfere for fear to do so would mean losing Missouri's vote in his re-election bid.
While in office, he believed slavery was morally wrong but fiercely defended it on Constitutional grounds. Eight years after leaving office, he tried a re-election bid under the Free Soil party, which had an anti-slavery platform, but came in a distant third.
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