The story
The 1812 election was the first presidential vote held during a declared war. President James Madison, who had signed the declaration of war against Britain in June, won a second term with 128 electoral votes. His opponent, DeWitt Clinton, the mayor of New York City and a nephew of the late Vice President George Clinton, was a Democratic-Republican who ran with Federalist backing and won 89 votes.
The vote split along regional lines over the war. New England and much of the mid-Atlantic, dependent on trade with Britain, opposed what critics called 'Mr. Madison's War,' and Clinton carried every New England state except Vermont, plus New York, New Jersey and Delaware. The South and West, eager to stop British seizures of ships, the impressment of American sailors and British support for Native resistance in the Northwest, backed Madison. Pennsylvania, with 25 electoral votes, went for Madison and decided the outcome.
Why it mattered
- Kept Madison in office to see the War of 1812 through to the Treaty of Ghent.
- Deepened New England's opposition, which led to the Hartford Convention and the Federalists' collapse.
- Set up the one-sided 1816 race that opened the Era of Good Feelings.
Sources
- 1812 Electoral College Results National Archives
- The Election of 1812 American Battlefield Trust
Drafted by AI (Claude) from the sources above and checked against them by AI; no historian has reviewed this page. Spot a mistake? Suggest a correction. How pages are made
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