Winfield Scott

Pierce Elected in Slave Power Landslide as Whig Party Collapses Over Slavery

1852-11-02 00:00:00 +0000 UTC | Importance: 8/10

Franklin Pierce won the presidency on November 2, 1852, in a devastating landslide with 254 electoral votes to Winfield Scott’s 42, as divisions within the Whig Party over slavery enforcement came to a catastrophic head. Pierce ran as a pro-slavery Northern Democrat—a “doughface” …

Franklin Pierce Winfield Scott Democratic Party Whig Party institutional-capture slave-power party-realignment democratic-erosion electoral-politics

Trail of Tears Forced Removal Begins as 7,000 Troops Round Up 16,000 Cherokee at Gunpoint

1838-05-26 00:00:00 +0000 UTC | Importance: 10/10

U.S. troops under General Winfield Scott begin forcibly removing the Cherokee Nation from their ancestral homelands in Georgia, Tennessee, North Carolina, and Alabama, starting a process that becomes known as the Trail of Tears. President Martin Van Buren, enforcing the fraudulent 1835 Treaty of New …

Martin Van Buren Winfield Scott Cherokee Nation John Ross U.S. Army +1 more ethnic-cleansing trail-of-tears indian-removal state-violence military-force +1 more