Campaign and Election of 1808

Thomas Jefferson followed the precedent of George Washington and retired from the presidency after two terms, though not constitutionally obliged to do so at the time. Political observers knew that Jefferson intended his close friend and political partner James Madison to succeed him into the office. Other Republicans hesitated to accept Madison as the heir-apparent.

At the time, the parties remained so underdeveloped that they had no nationwide primary system for nominating candidates. Rather, party leaders—usually congressmen—held caucuses to determine who would carry their party standard. At the Republican caucus, Madison met opposition from New Yorkers, who promoted the candidacy of Vice President George Clinton, and from some Virginians who preferred James Monroe. Despite strenuous objections from those camps, the Republican caucus overwhelmingly selected Madison, and Clinton had to settle for another term as vice president.

Federalists nominated Charles C. Pinckney of South Carolina and Rufus King of New York. Their strategy consisted of riling up Americans against the Embargo Act. The embargo hit the Federalist stronghold of the Northeast particularly hard given the region’s reliance on overseas trade. Federalists accused Madison of imposing the embargo to punish them for their political views. Because the embargo had a lopsided effect against Britain, given America’s greater volume of trade with that nation, Federalists depicted Madison as Napoleon’s patsy, implementing the embargo at the emperor’s orders. Though most Americans hardly believed such claims, most Americans did know that the embargo had devastated the US economy.

Despite internal divisions in his party, the vitriol of Federalists, and the deadweight of the unpopular embargo, Madison raced to victory in the Electoral College. When Congress counted the votes on February 8, 1809, Madison claimed 122 votes to second-place Pinckney’s 47. Six New York electors bucked their party nominee and voted for Clinton. With Madison’s victory, a Virginian had won the presidency for the fifth time in six presidential election cycles.

Campaign and Election of 1812

War and politics were inextricably linked in 1812. Madison had spent most of his first term trying various modes of forcing Britain and France to cease their violations of US neutrality and sovereignty. Problems with Britain continued to fester, exacerbated by the rebirth of a British-Native American confederacy in the Ohio Valley. As the nation crept closer to war in the early months of 1812, Republicans began the process of renominating Madison. In mid-May, 83 congressional Republicans met in the Senate chamber and unanimously voted for Madison’s renomination.

The unanimity belied divisions within the party. Fifty Republican Congressmen had not attended the nominating caucus. Some Republicans thought Madison too hesitant to call for war, while others considered him too hawkish. Just two weeks after the nomination, Madison sent Congress a message detailing British abuses, implying they should declare war. On June 17, the US Senate heeded the call, and the next day, President Madison signed the war declaration, making the 1812 election the nation’s first amid a declared war.

As the election heated up, Madison came under fire for using public money to purchase documents he thought would prove a conspiracy between inveterate Federalists and Britain. In 1809, a British spy named John Henry had traveled to New England with instructions to probe Federalists loyalties and determine whether New Englanders might secede and ally with Britain. By 1812, a French con artist had persuaded Henry to sell his documents to the Madison administration. Madison purchased the documents for the enormous sum of $50,000, convinced that they would prove collusion between Federalists and Britain. The papers failed to show criminal conduct on the part of Federalists, and Madison’s critics accused him of misusing public funds to try and embarrass Federalists and boost his reelection chances. Madison insisted that the documents at least showed British intrigue, and he added Henry’s mission to his list of grievances against Britain in his war message to Congress.

The mayor of New York City and George Clinton’s nephew, DeWitt Clinton, took up New York’s Clintonian, anti-war, anti-Madison mantle. Federalists decided that they stood better chances of beating Madison by backing Clinton than nominating their own candidate. Clinton faced a messaging crisis, trying to collect support from a variety of anti-Madison elements including Federalists, pro-war but anti-Madison Republicans, anti-war and anti-Madison Republicans, Northerners tired of Virginia presidents, and Southerners suspicious of Madison’s nationalist impulses. The disparate elements failed to coalesce, and Madison won reelection with 128 electoral votes to Clinton’s 89.