James K. Polk

James K. Polk was the eleventh president of the United States. He served one busy term, from 1845 to 1849, and did not run again. He was a Democrat from Tennessee — the Democratic Party — and a follower of Andrew Jackson. People called him Young Hickory. He was not expected to win his party's nomination. That kind of surprise candidate is called a dark horse. Polk came out of a deadlocked convention.

Polk set four big goals and did them all: gain California, settle Oregon with Britain at the 49th parallel, restore the Independent Treasury, and lower tariffs. What did he do about tariffs? He lowered them. Congress passed the Walker Tariff during his term. He had promised one term and kept his word. The Mexican-American War was fought from 1846 to 1848. Victory carried the American flag to the Pacific.

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the war in 1848. Mexico ceded a huge stretch of land, including California, Nevada, Utah, and more. Polk also settled the Oregon boundary with Britain at the 49th parallel, the line that still separates much of the United States from Canada. After Polk, the United States stretched from the Atlantic to the Pacific — sea to shining sea. He completed the continent to the Pacific. Gold turned up at Sutter's Mill in California in 1848, just as his term ended. He kept a detailed diary. The hard term wore him out, and he died in June 1849, a few months after going home to Tennessee.