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James K. Polk

James Knox Polk (/pk/;[1] November 2, 1795 – June 15, 1849) was the 11th president of the United States, serving from 1845 to 1849. He also served as the 13th speaker of the House of Representatives from 1835 to 1839 and the ninth governor of Tennessee from 1839 to 1841. A protégé of Andrew Jackson, he was a member of the Democratic Party and an advocate of Jacksonian democracy. Polk is known for extending the territory of the United States through the Mexican–American War during his presidency, annexing the Republic of Texas, the Oregon Territory, and the Mexican Cession after winning the Mexican–American War.

"James Polk" redirects here. For other people with the same name, see James Polk (disambiguation).

James K. Polk

James Knox Polk

(1795-11-02)November 2, 1795
Pineville, North Carolina, U.S.

June 15, 1849(1849-06-15) (aged 53)
Nashville, Tennessee, U.S.

(m. 1824)

  • Politician
  • lawyer

Cursive signature in ink

  • Young Hickory
  • Napoleon of the Stump

1821 - 1825

Maury County Cavalry

After building a successful law practice in Tennessee, Polk was elected to its state legislature in 1823 and then to the United States House of Representatives in 1825, becoming a strong supporter of Jackson. After serving as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, he became Speaker of the House in 1835, the only person to serve both as Speaker and U.S. president. Polk left Congress to run for governor of Tennessee, winning in 1839 but losing in 1841 and 1843. He was a dark-horse candidate in the 1844 presidential election as the Democratic Party nominee; he entered his party's convention as a potential nominee for vice president but emerged as a compromise to head the ticket when no presidential candidate could gain the necessary two-thirds majority. In the general election, Polk defeated Henry Clay of the Whig Party.


After a negotiation fraught with the risk of war, Polk reached a settlement with Great Britain over the disputed Oregon Country, with the territory for the most part divided along the 49th parallel. He oversaw victory in the Mexican–American War, resulting in Mexico's cession of the entire American Southwest. He secured a substantial reduction of tariff rates with the Walker tariff of 1846. The same year, he achieved his other major goal, reestablishment of the Independent Treasury system. True to his campaign pledge to serve only one term (one of the few U.S. presidents to make and keep such a pledge), Polk left office in 1849 and returned to Tennessee, where he died of cholera soon afterward.


Though he is relatively obscure today, scholars have ranked Polk favorably for his ability to promote and achieve the major items on his presidential agenda. He has also been criticized for leading the country into a war with Mexico that exacerbated sectional divides. A property owner who used slave labor, he kept a plantation in Mississippi and increased his slave ownership during his presidency. Polk's policy of territorial expansion saw the nation reach the Pacific coast and almost all its contiguous borders. He helped make the U.S. a nation poised to become a world power, but with divisions between free and slave states gravely exacerbated, setting the stage for the Civil War.

Reestablish the  – the Whigs had abolished the one created under Van Buren.

Independent Treasury System

Reduce .

tariffs

Acquire some or all of the .

Oregon Country

Acquire California and its harbors from Mexico.

Burials[edit]

Polk's remains have been moved twice.[254] After his death, he was buried in what is now Nashville City Cemetery, due to a legal requirement related to his infectious disease death. Polk was then moved to a tomb on the grounds of Polk Place (as specified in his will) in 1850.[255]


Then, in 1893, the bodies of James and Sarah Polk were relocated to their current resting place on the grounds of the Tennessee State Capitol in Nashville. In March 2017, the Tennessee Senate approved a resolution considered a "first step" toward relocating the Polks' remains to the family home in Columbia. Such a move would require approval by state lawmakers, the courts, and the Tennessee Historical Commission.[255][256] A year later, a renewed plan to reinter Polk was defeated by Tennessee lawmakers before being taken up again and approved, and allowed to go through by the non-signature of Tennessee governor Bill Haslam.[257][258] The state's Capitol Commission heard arguments over the issue in November 2018, during which the THC reiterated its opposition to the tomb relocation, and a vote was delayed indefinitely.[259]

Presidents of the United States on U.S. postage stamps