United States presidential election, 1852

The United States presidential election of 1852 was held on Tuesday, November 2, 1852, and featured a contest between Democratic candidate Franklin Pierce of New Hampshire and General Winfield Scott of Virginia on the Whig ticket. Pierce won a lopsided victory over Scott in the Electoral College, although the popular vote was much more evenly split.

The incumbent (Whig) President, Millard Fillmore, was not sufficiently popular within the party, due to his support for and enforcement of the Compromise of 1850, which anti-slavery Whigs opposed; both Scott and Pierce were chosen in the hope that they could appeal to the Northern and Southern wings of their respective parties. Prior to the election, neither man had been especially noteworthy politically, nor had they been strongly associated with either side in the sectional conflicts of the day.

The election was the last in which the Whig Party was a serious contender in national politics, as sectional disputes over the westward extension of slavery would soon cause it to break apart. It was also the last presidential election before the appearance of the Republican Party. For this reason, American political historians often mark 1852 as the end of the "Second Party System," which had begun in 1828 with the election of Andrew Jackson.

The results of the election were:

^[1]

1. ↑ A Pictoral History of the U.S. Presidents, by Clare Gibson, Gramercy Books, 2001.