Page:The Presidents of the United States, 1789-1914, v. II.djvu/95

 JOHN TYLER 67 reason and a more liberal use of clap-trap than in any other presidential contest in our history. Borne upon a great wave of popular excitement, &quot;Tippecanoe, and Tyler too,&quot; were carried to the White House. By the death of President Har rison, April 4, 1841, just a month after the in auguration, Mr. Tyler became president of the United States. The situation thus developed was not long in producing startling results. Although no platform had been adopted in the nominating convention, it soon appeared that Mr. Clay and his friends intended to use their victory in support of the old National Republican policy of a national bank, a high tariff, and internal improvements. Unquestionably many people who voted for Har rison did so in the belief that his election meant the victory of Clay s doctrines and the re-establishment of the United States bank. Mr. Clay s own course, immediately after the inauguration, showed so plainly that he regarded the election as his own victory that Gen. Harrison felt called upon to ad minister a rebuke to him. &quot;You seem to forget, sir,&quot; said he, &quot;that it is I who am president.&quot; Tyler, on the other hand, regarded the Whig triumph as signifying the overthrow of what he considered a corrupt and tyrannical faction led by Jackson, Van Buren, and Benton; he professed to regard the old National Republican doctrines as virtually postponed by the alliance between them