pened. For the first time a President died in office, and the Vice-President was called to the head of the government. It was an entirely novel situation, and at first there seemed to be some doubt whether the Vice-President, so promoted, was to be considered a full President at all. The Cabinet ministers, announcing to him President Harrison's death, addressed Tyler as “Vice-President.” Clay, in a letter to a friend, called him a mere “regent.” John Quincy Adams thought his official title should be, not “President,” but “Vice-President acting as President.” But Tyler, as soon as he assumed his new station, styled himself “President of the United States,” and by common consent the title was at once recognized as legitimate, — fortunately so, for it is important in a republic that the title of the supreme executive power should always be full and unqualified.
This, however, was not the only matter of doubt. Much speculation arose as to what kind of a Whig President this Virginian strict-constructionist would make. As Henry A. Wise reports, immediately upon the news of Harrison's death, Tyler's state-rights friends quickly gathered around him with the advice “at once to form a new Cabinet; to hasten a settlement with Great Britain, and, with that view, to retain Mr. Webster at the head of the new Cabinet; to annex Texas as soon as possible; to veto any re-charter of the United States Bank, any tariff for protection, and any bill for the distribution of the proceeds of the sales of the
