St. Murse shook his virtual fist at Zachary Taylor in a comment on last year's Presidents' Day post, so I thought that would be a good starting point for this year's celebration. But what I found was a mixed bag: "Old Rough and Ready" was a blunt, near-illiterate mess who owned slaves and would not commit to many of the issues of the day.
Still, even though he himself owned slaves, he held a moderate stance on the issue, and his handling of the statehood petitions for California and New Mexico caused those states to be admitted to the union as non-slaveholding states.
My extremely shallow research on the matter seems indicates that Taylor's maneuverings were more a politically practical attempt to avoid exacerbating tensions between the North and South than some great moral stance, but still, he did it, and he also showed military skill and great bravery in the War of 1812 and the Mexican-American War (the arrogance and evil inherent in the pursuit of Manifest Destiny notwithstanding).
Oh, hell. Perhaps after eight Presidents' Days I am running out of truly crappy presidents--well, there's still Nixon and a few others, I'm sure--or maybe in my advancing age I am less prone to see things in black and white.
But! Nuance schmuance, the dude owned slaves and only served for 16 months before succumbing to an undoubtedly undignified bout with gastroenteritis. So, hey, President Taylor, congratulations on being the eighth president in our series of lame, crappy, or boring presidents!
Previous years' honorees: