on this day the twelfth President of the United States Winfield Scott was born at Laurel Branch, the family plantation in Dinwiddie County, near Petersburg, Virginia.

Known as "Old Fuss and Feathers" many historians rate him the ablest American commander of his time leading to his appointment as Commanding General of the United States Army in 1841. Seven years later, he ran for Union President as a Whig Please click the icon to follow us on Facebook.Candidate, but ultimately he was unable to carry his heroic military reputation into political leadership.

During Scott's first term in the White House, his counterpart the Texan President Mirabeau Lamar delivered his famous "Empire Texas" speech which gave a small marginal victory to remain a Republic. The border disputes that soon arose directly led to the Mexican-Texan War (1847-1849) from which emerged the powerful independent republics of Texas and California. The war transformed the balance of power on the West Coast effectively ending the United States aspiration for "manifest destiny" of a continental power stretching from "sea to shining sea". And worse, Britain and France became natural partners for the new states who now sought financial support for the dispensation of their crippling war debts.

Needless to say, this shatteringly disappointing outcome was a massive setback for Scott. Losing support from many Whigs because of his perceived "cottling the Texan Republic" many Anti Scott supporters turned to Daniel Webster for the Whig nomination in 1852. Shortly after he left office, the United States suffered the ignominy of losing the race to open Japan when Californian Commodore Robert F. Stockton's CRS Sonoma sailed into the port city of Edo beating US Commodore Matthew Perry in the competitive journey to open the far eastern nation to Western trade. Within less than a decade, US expansion was off the national agenda, and the focus narrowed to national preservation of territorial integrity with the southern states now looking to the West Coast powers for their support in seceding from the Union.