What Is Millard Fillmore Famous For ?
Millard Fillmore was the 13th US president from 1850 to 1853. He was the vice president under Zachary Taylor, and took over the office when Taylor died. He was the last Whig Party member to hold the office of the president. |
When Fillmore took over the position, he replaced the entire cabinet. This was something that Taylor was anyway going to do as there cabinet was steeped in scandals. The new cabinet members that Fillmore appointed, other than Treasury Secretary Thomas Corwin, were all in favor of the Compromise of 1850.
During his presidency, the Whig Party started facing a lot of division. Fillmore spent considerable amount of time to unite his party by pointing the difference between his party and the Democrats. In addition, Fillmore wanted to protect the Union from the strong debate about slavery.
When Henry Clay proposed the bill to allow California to be admitted into the Union, there was a big uproar over it. However, Fillmore realized that the bill was the best way to end the debate on this issue. It would allow California to be a free state of the Union, impose stronger fugitive slave law and abolish slave trade from Washington DC. Taking this into consideration, Fillmore announced his support for the Compromise of 1850.
In addition, in August 1850, Fillmore recommended to the Congress that Texas should be paid to give up its claim on parts of New Mexico. He sent 700 federal troops to New Mexico and this helped many of the northern Whigs to leave their insistence of the Wilmot Proviso, which stated that the entire land that was won during the Mexican War should not be allowed for slavery.
Ultimately the original bill presented by Clay was broken down into five separate bills and presented to the Senate. These bills were as follows:
- Admitting California into the Union as free state
- Settle the boundary dispute with Texas over New Mexico and paying Texas compensation for the land it loses
- Give territorial status to New Mexico
- Give slaveholders access to federal officers if they were looking for escaped slaves under the Fugitive Slave Act
- Abolish slave trade from Washington DC, but not slavery
The above bills were signed into law by Fillmore, but the northern Whigs were unhappy about the bills and this led to the in-fighting within the party and subsequent loss of many elections.
Fillmore then was faced with another challenge on how to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act without showing favoritism to the South. He did this by enforcing the law in the North and enforcing a law in the South that forbid the South from having anything to do with Cuba.
Fillmore was instrumental in sending Commodore Mathew Perry to Japan to open the country for western trade. Though Perry did not reach Japan until Franklin Pierce was the president, it was Fillmore who initiated this.
Millard Fillmore is also famous for having started a library in the White House along with his wife Abigail.
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