Elbridge Gerry

• Vice President to:       James Madison - Democratic-Republican, from Virginia.
  
  
• Dates Served: Gerry served as Vice President from 1813 - 1814.
  
• Political Party: Gerry was a Democratic-Republican, from Massachusetts.
  
• Born: 1744.
  
• Died: 1814, while in office, at the age of 70.
  
• The presidential opponent during the 1812 campaign was:
  
  
  • DeWitt Clinton - Federalist - New York Mayor
    (The last name isn't a coincidence. DeWitt Clinton was a nephew of the previous Vice President, George Clinton)
    
    
• Campaign issues in 1812:
  
  
  • The War of 1812 dominated the campaign this year, which was only a few months old and was, at that time, being lost by the US, which was being trounced on by the British Navy who were eager to settle the score from 1776. Despite the Federalists calling it "Madison's War", Madison won anyway.
    
    
  
  
• Notable Facts about Elbridge Gerry:
  
  
  • Religious affiliation: Elbridge was an Episcopalian. His only public comments on religion were in the context of his belief in the seperation of Church and State.
    
    
  • Elbridge Gerry served in the Continental Congress from 1776 - 1785, and signed the Declaration of Independence.
    
    
  • He served in the US House of Representatives, representing Massachusetts from 1789 - 1793.
    
    
  • In 1797 he was part of the US delegation, along with Charles Pinckney, to France which was involved in the XYZ Affair.
    
    
  • He served as Governor of Massachusetts from 1810 - 1812, prior to becoming Vice President.
    
    
  • While Governor, he approved a redistricting scheme that resulted in the dominance of the Democratic-Republican party in the state. One of the districts, when drawn on a map, looked sort of like a salamander, which prompted one of the Boston newspapers to coin the term "gerrymander", which referred to the act of redistricting a population for the purpose of partisan dominance. The term is part of political lingo to this day.
    
    
  • He was nominated for Vice President after the death of George Clinton, and was seen as adding Northern balance to Madison's Southern tilt. Also, he was 68 years old, which was considered a safe age to not stand in the way of Secretary of State James Monroe's presidential aspirations, Madison's heir-apparent. They were right, since Gerry died in office just like his predecessor did. He had suffered a stroke a year earlier, but kept up his social duties as VP up until the end.
    

Notable events during his Vice Presidency:

• Canned food is invented, by Peter Durand for the British Navy, in 1813. The first can-opener won't be patented for another 45 years, when Ezra Warner of Waterbury, Connecticut invents one in 1858. Prior to this, cans are opened with a hammer and chisel.
  
  
• The Treaty of Ghent, in December of 1814. The Napoleonic Wars had come to an end and Britain could now focus its resources on fighting the Americans, but the war was dragging on and everyone was getting tired so both sides signed what was essentially no more than a cease-fire. No territory was gained on either side, and the main issue of impressment was left unresolved.
  
  
• The Battle of New Orleans, in 1815. News of the Treaty of Ghent hadn't gotten around yet and in 1815 a British force still fighting the war tried to invade the port-town of New Orleans. The town was defended by a local militia led by General Andrew Jackson who managed to kill over 2,000 British soldiers, while loosing only 21 American lives. The British got whooped and a new American war hero was born.
  
  
• The Hartford Convention, 1814 - 1815. Federalists in New England who opposed the war met in Hartford, Connecticut to voice their concerns, with some calling for the New England states to secede from the Union. But it all died out under the excitement over the news of Andrew Jackson's routing of the British at New Orleans.
  
  
• Photography is invented in April, 1826, by Joseph-Nicephore Niepce in Chalon-sur-Saône, France. Cameras had been used since the 1500's but he was the first to use film. (Artists had long used pin-hole boxes, calling them "camera obscura", to project images onto canvases, upside down, which they would paint over). While playing with lithography techniques one day Niepce wiped some silver chloride on a piece of paper, then put it in the back of his camera, opened the shutter and left it open for 8 hours, with the pin-hole aimed out of his living room window. When he came back he saw imprinted on the piece of paper a blurry image of the rooftops visible from his window: the world's first photograph. It would take decades to reduce the required exposure time, which long remained in the hours instead of seconds. Cameras were to become to paintings what Napster is to music companies.
  
  
• Indiana was admitted into the Union, in 1816.