[00:00:27.560] [music] [00:00:36.360] 1753, [00:00:39.840] the foot paths and forest trails leading into piedmont Carolina [00:00:41.840] were becoming wilderness highways for thousands [00:00:44.920] of American settlers, farmers, and tradesmen, [00:00:48.160] German, Scotch-Irish, and English. [00:00:50.680] They left the middle colonies to seek better and cheaper land. [00:00:54.760] These restless people would finally settle in the gently rolling [00:00:57.600] Carolina foothills to raise large, [00:01:00.520] prosperous, and equally restless families. [00:01:04.520] [music] [00:01:31.280] Having traveled down the Great Wagon Road from Pennsylvania, [00:01:34.600] one man did not stop at any of the settlements in central [00:01:37.400] North Carolina, but crossed the Yadkin River [00:01:40.120] and continued southwestward. [00:01:42.929] [music] [00:01:56.880] Finally, Thomas Polk reached the banks [00:01:59.400] of Sugar Creek near the colony's southern boundary. [00:02:03.400] [music and nature sounds] [00:02:15.429] [nature sounds] [00:02:15.480] Soon his father, brothers, [00:02:18.120] and many Pennsylvania neighbors moved south to join him. [00:02:22.120] [music] [00:02:33.360] Stern, industrious Presbyterians, [00:02:36.360] the Scotch-Irish Polks and their fellow settlers [00:02:38.880] changed wilderness into farmland. [00:02:41.960] They organized a county called Mecklenburg [00:02:44.600] with a little village of Charlotte as the county seat. [00:02:48.600] [music] [00:02:53.640] But the shadow cast by British rule grew longer and larger, [00:02:56.720] and Mecklenburg citizens resisted. [00:03:00.720] [music] [00:03:08.560] They would be counted among America's revolutionary heroes [00:03:12.000] in such battles as King's Mountain and Cowpens. [00:03:15.880] While the uncomfortable British would call Mecklenburg [00:03:19.000] a hornet's nest. [00:03:21.357] [music] [00:03:24.157] [fire crackling] [00:03:35.720] The War for Independence was won, and [00:03:38.240] at last North Carolina stood among the newly United States. [00:03:42.720] The Polks returned to their farms. [00:03:45.800] Ezekiel Polk had been only six years old when the [00:03:47.840] first of his family moved south. [00:03:52.240] Now he watched his son Samuel marry Jane Knox [00:03:55.320] and settle on Little Sugar Creek. [00:03:59.080] November 2, 1795, [00:04:01.880] Sam and Jenny's first child was born. [00:04:05.480] The boy was named James Knox Polk [00:04:08.400] in memory of Jenny's father. [00:04:11.840] Jimmy Polk was to spend his first eleven years in Mecklenburg. [00:04:15.840] [music] [00:05:02.680] Sam and his family left Little Sugar Creek, traveling [00:05:05.440] five hundred miles across the Appalachian Mountains [00:05:08.120] to a new home in a new state. [00:05:10.114] [music] [00:05:15.400] Central Tennessee, the Duck River Valley, [00:05:18.840] Maury County, a village called Columbia. [00:05:22.720] Sam Polk prospered as a surveyor and real estate agent, [00:05:26.600] but for all his prosperity, his oldest son's [00:05:29.320] health was a constant concern. [00:05:32.040] Jim Polk, never robust, now suffered [00:05:34.760] repeated attacks of grinding abdominal pain. [00:05:38.000] [music] [00:05:44.160] At the age of seventeen, he was taken to the Kentucky office of the famous [00:05:47.800] Dr. McDowell where a, then dangerous, [00:05:50.400] gallstone operation was performed. [00:05:58.800] The successful operation brought Jim new new health. [00:06:02.800] [music] [00:06:11.080] Now his father tried to interest him in store keeping, [00:06:14.640] but after a few unhappy weeks of dull routine [00:06:17.280] Jim was admitted to Columbia's Zion Church Academy. [00:06:21.280] [music] [00:06:27.120] A year passed and Polk was now [00:06:29.640] so advanced that he was sent to a larger school in Murfreesboro, [00:06:33.080] a town about fifty miles from Columbia. [00:06:41.440] In 1816, the young man went back east, [00:06:44.240] admitted to the sophomore class [00:06:46.760] of the University of North Carolina. [00:06:50.160] The university, with a faculty of five professors, consisted [00:06:53.040] of a few small buildings set along a ridge called Chapel Hill. [00:06:59.000] Students follow the classical course, Greek, [00:07:02.040] Latin, philosophy, and mathematics. [00:07:05.160] During one of his three years of study, James Polk [00:07:07.800] served as president of the Dialectic Society. [00:07:10.760] And in this important debating group, he learned much [00:07:13.480] about public speaking and writing. [00:07:16.560] He was graduated from the university with a first honor of his class. [00:07:22.120] Polk developed a political [?] at Chapel Hill, [00:07:24.520] and so returning to Tennessee [00:07:26.320] he began law studies with a famous Nashville attorney. [00:07:30.040] Law and politics joined naturally for the young man. [00:07:33.520] Lawyer, clerk of the Tennessee legislature, [00:07:36.600] member of the State House of Representatives. [00:07:39.280] His political idol and hero was another [00:07:42.000] Carolina-born Tennessean, General Andrew Jackson. [00:07:46.680] Old Hickory was already famous as a soldier, [00:07:49.520] now as a politician, following the principles of Thomas Jefferson, [00:07:53.400] the General spread his own ideas of a Jacksonian democracy. [00:07:58.280] America should have a common man's governor. [00:08:00.857] [music] [00:08:20.600] Plowing and planting and a hard days work [00:08:23.240] were the important things, [00:08:25.760] not banks or industry or fancy government schemes [00:08:28.400] for canals and roads. [00:08:30.960] Freedom and equality should be as simple and as broad as the Western Frontier. [00:08:34.957] [music] [00:08:46.520] Jim Polk listened eagerly for he had heard [00:08:49.320] these same ideas as a boy in Mecklenburg [00:08:51.720] and he believed in them. [00:08:54.720] The Tennessee legislature met in Murfreesboro [00:08:57.280] and Representative Polk found time to court the daughter of a local merchant. [00:09:01.280] [music] [00:09:06.760] Sarah Childress had attended the female academy [00:09:09.320] at Salem, North Carolina, and was an accomplished young lady. [00:09:11.960] On New Year's Day, 1824, [00:09:16.720] she became Mrs. James Knox Polk. [00:09:19.640] John Quincy Adams defeated Andrew Jackson in the presidential race of [18]24. [00:09:24.960] Meanwhile, using the speaking skills learned at Chapel Hill, [00:09:28.320] Jim Polk became known throughout central Tennessee [00:09:31.280] as Napoleon of the Stump. [00:09:33.840] He was elected U.S. congressman from the sixth district [00:09:36.800] and would be re-elected for six more terms. [00:09:40.800] In Congress, Polk aligned himself with other Jackson followers [00:09:43.480] in the Democratic Republican Party. [00:09:45.840] These men would be called Democrats. [00:09:49.143] [music] [00:09:55.520] The people spoke again and Old Hickory [00:09:58.280] was soon on his way to the White House. [00:10:00.686] [music] [00:10:02.960] As president, Jackson moved to destroy the Second [00:10:05.720] Bank of the United States by removing its governmental support. [00:10:09.720] [music] [00:10:12.760] He succeeded largely through the work of James Polk, [00:10:16.040] the new Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. [00:10:18.943] [music] [00:10:27.400] For his efforts, Polk won Jackson's everlasting admiration. [00:10:32.160] The congressman was nominated for Speaker of the House, [00:10:35.200] but was narrowly defeated by John Bell, [00:10:38.200] a fellow Tennessean and hated political rival. [00:10:41.914] [music] [00:10:45.840] Polk was elected speaker but his beloved [00:10:48.600] Tennessee was now controlled by a new party, the Whigs. [00:10:52.600] [music] [00:11:02.080] Nationally, the Jacksonian Democrats, sometimes [00:11:04.800] called the loco folkos, were becoming unpopular. [00:11:08.080] A financial depression affected the entire country by 1837 [00:11:12.160] and the Whigs found nothing [00:11:13.440] easier than to blame the Democrats and their bank meddling [00:11:16.480] for all the troubles. [00:11:18.314] [music] [00:11:25.840] Still, Martin Van Buren, a Democrat, [00:11:28.520] was elected president [00:11:30.120] and James Polk retired from his congressional post [00:11:33.000] going home to rescue Tennessee. [00:11:35.400] [music] [00:11:41.760] He was elected governor for an uneventful two year term [00:11:45.280] then a homespun Whig called Lean Jimmy Jones [00:11:48.040] defeated him not once, but twice. [00:11:51.786] [music] [00:11:57.920] The Whigs put William Henry Harrison in the White House. [00:12:00.360] Harrison died after only a month in office [00:12:06.600] and Vice President John Tyler assumed the presidency. [00:12:10.400] Polk, who had tried and failed to win his party's vice presidential nomination [00:12:14.480] seemed a political has been, [00:12:17.160] but the end of Tyler's lackluster administration [00:12:19.880] signaled the beginning of the Texas question. [00:12:23.320] The New Republic of Texas was free of both Mexico and the United States [00:12:30.000] Many citizens wanted to make the Lone Star Republic a state by annexation. [00:12:34.400] Others, fearful of war with Mexico, [00:12:36.960] or the possible extension of slavery, [00:12:38.880] opposed Texas entry into the union. [00:12:42.880] [music] [00:12:45.360] The Whig presidential hopeful was Henry Clay [00:12:48.360] and the Democrats front runner was once again Martin Van Buren. [00:12:53.920] Clay had not yet declared his stand on the Texas question, [00:12:57.040] but just before the Whig Nominating Convention met, [00:13:00.080] he wrote a public letter against Texas statehood. [00:13:04.080] [music] [00:13:07.560] But perhaps more than coincidence [00:13:09.120] Van Buren agreed with Clay. [00:13:04.080] [music] [00:13:14.000] On May 1st, the Whigs met in Baltimore [00:13:16.520] and unanimously nominated Clay as their candidate for president. [00:13:20.680] Twenty-nine days later, the Democrats [00:13:23.360] met in the same city. [00:13:25.640] Van Buren's Texas stand angered the party's southern wing [00:13:29.520] and from retirement in Tennessee, Old Hickory [00:13:32.240] tried to unify the party, [00:13:34.680] but Van Buren was doomed. [00:13:36.280] At the very start of the convention [00:13:38.120] a two thirds majority rule was adopted for nomination. [00:13:43.280] Van Buren only held only a simple majority. [00:13:45.920] And so the convention went through several candidates and [00:13:48.520] seven ballots apparently deadlocked. [00:13:53.040] On the evening following the seventh ballot [00:13:55.280] a select group of men went from delegation to delegation, [00:13:58.480] calmly but forcefully proposing a compromise candidate. [00:14:02.029] [music] [00:14:06.880] The next morning, New Hampshire formally presented [00:14:09.560] that candidate, James Knox Polk. [00:14:12.800] He offered something to all factions. [00:14:16.040] A friend of Old Hickory, he stood squarely in support [00:14:18.560] of Texas annexation. By the ninth ballot [00:14:21.200] he was the convention's unanimous choice. [00:14:24.640] Senator George M. Dallas was selected as his running mate. [00:14:27.320] Thus Polk became the first dark horse candidate [00:14:29.760] in the history of U.S. presidential campaigns. [00:14:33.200] The new candidate pledged to seek only one term in office [00:14:36.560] and the race was underway. [00:14:38.360] Whigs were overjoyed at the Democrat's choice. [00:14:40.829] [music] [00:15:24.360] An anti-slavery group, the Liberty Party, [00:15:27.800] took votes away from Clay since Gentlemen [00:15:30.520] Harry was now trying to change his stand on the Texas question. [00:15:34.520] [music] [00:15:53.400] It was a close race and not until the votes of [00:15:55.960] New York state were counted [00:15:57.560] could the Whig's taunting question be answered. [00:16:00.100] [music] [00:16:13.560] On a cold and rainy March 4th, 1845, [00:16:16.720] the man now called Young Hickory took the oath of office. [00:16:20.440] In his inaugural address, Polk outlined [00:16:23.040] two important aims of his foreign policy. [00:16:25.720] First, he would settle a longstanding quarrel with Britain [00:16:28.640] over the Oregon territory [00:16:30.920] and he expressed a wish that America acquire [00:16:33.640] the Mexican territory of California. [00:16:36.720] Texas was no longer a question. [00:16:38.720] The Lone Star Republic had been invited to join the union [00:16:41.440] just one day before his inauguration. [00:16:44.171] [music] [00:16:51.520] The new president, following Jacksonian ideals, [00:16:54.400] saw America expanding her borders. [00:16:57.560] As one Democrat proudly wrote, [00:17:00.400] "Our Manifest Destiny is to overspread [00:17:03.400] and to possess the whole of the continent [00:17:06.080] which Providence has given us for the development of the great [00:17:12.160] experiment of liberty and federated self-government entrusted to us." [00:17:12.600] [music] [00:17:16.120] Polk's determination was immediately tested by a dispute. [00:17:19.786] [music] [00:17:26.600] Which map parallel should divide British Canada [00:17:29.640] from the United States Oregon territory? [00:17:34.240] "Fifty-four forty or fight!" cried some, [00:17:35.800] but Polk offered a compromise, forty-nine degrees. [00:17:38.520] A line the British immediately rejected. [00:17:41.960] [music] [00:17:45.480] Playing a dangerous game of bluff, with the world's then [00:17:48.080] mightiest naval power, Polk responded with fifty-four forty. [00:17:51.160] More diplomatic [00:17:53.680] maneuverings and the British offered [00:17:56.200] the forty-nine degree compromise. [00:17:58.920] A treaty was immediately ratified. [00:18:01.160] America was already at war with Mexico. [00:18:04.171] [music] [00:18:07.680] Both the new state of Texas and Mexico [00:18:10.240] had claimed the territory between the Nueces and Rio Grande Rivers, [00:18:13.040] but diplomacy failed to settle this dispute. [00:18:17.200] It was now impossible for the United States to purchase [00:18:19.720] much desired California [00:18:21.760] or peaceably settle old claims against the Mexican government. [00:18:26.040] While President Polk considered military moves [00:18:28.880] a company of American dragoons scouting the disputed territory [00:18:31.560] was attacked by Mexican forces. [00:18:56.840] [music] [00:18:41.640] On May 13th the United Stated declared war on Mexico. [00:18:45.500] [music] [00:18:54.000] The initial attack by Mexico generated widespread [00:18:57.040] war fever, but as casualties mounted, [00:19:00.240] so did nationwide opposition to Mr. Polk's war. [00:19:04.880] Still, the American military answered well for itself [00:19:07.600] against the larger Mexican forces. [00:19:11.680] July 4th, 1848, [00:19:13.160] a peace treaty was signed. [00:19:16.200] By the terms of this treaty, the United States gained [00:19:18.960] over five hundred thousand square miles of new territory, [00:19:22.240] magnificent ports, and the mineral and agricultural wealth [00:19:25.200] that was later to come from the far west, [00:19:28.720] but the country lost thirteen thousand men [00:19:31.560] and twelve thousand of these men died from disease [00:19:35.560] rather than battle. [00:19:36.440] Monetary costs alone amounted to over ninety-seven million dollars. [00:19:41.840] And it was war hero worship that made General Zachary Taylor, a Whig, [00:19:46.480] the new president elect. [00:19:48.157] [music] [00:19:50.657] [applause] [00:19:53.400] The General was inaugurated in March. [00:19:56.200] Former President Polk returned to Tennessee [00:19:58.840] by a round about public tour. [00:20:01.520] Already weakened by his presidential duties, [00:20:03.800] the speeches, banquets, and cheering crowds [00:20:06.400] of this final triumphant tour completely destroyed his health. [00:20:12.080] On June 15th, [00:20:13.720] less than four months out of office, [00:20:16.000] James Knox Polk died in Nashville. [00:20:20.680] He was fifty-three years old. [00:20:24.200] The eleventh President of the United States was an educated [00:20:27.320] frontier politician. [00:20:29.560] His rise to the White House might be seen as a whim of fate, [00:20:32.960] yet determination and purpose always marked the man. [00:20:36.680] As a president who personally controlled all the decisions of his administration, [00:20:41.120] Polk believed in carrying out the will of the people, [00:20:44.120] and the people he knew best were his neighbors in [00:20:46.720] North Carolina and Tennessee. [00:20:49.320] Far from his rural world, a new industrial age [00:20:52.160] had already begun, [00:20:54.720] bringing with it the fundamental argument over states' rights and slavery. [00:20:58.229] [music] [00:21:03.200] Polk never really understood the quarrel, [00:21:06.240] nor could he imagine his beloved union shattered because of it. [00:21:09.800] He would be the last president strong enough to control the [00:21:12.320] sectional rivalries leading to civil war, [00:21:15.320] and with this control he would achieve national [00:21:17.920] goals in both foreign and domestic affairs. [00:21:21.400] James Knox Polk entered the presidency with a plan for his country [00:21:25.680] and he made every point of that plan work. [00:21:28.240] [music] [00:21:32.080] Who is Polk? [00:21:33.720] A shy young lawyer with piercing eyes, [00:21:37.600] a tired president going home to die, [00:21:40.680] a man with determination and [?] [00:21:43.120] who moves through his own time and into [00:21:45.800] our heritage. [00:21:46.920] [birds calling]