lk was inaugurated as the eleventh President of the
United States on the 4th of March, 1845, a rainy, unpleasant day.
Had any method of contesting a Presidential election been provided
by the Constitution or the laws, the fraudulent means by which his
election was secured, would have been brought forward to prevent
his taking his seat. But the Constitution had made no such provision,
and Congress had not been disposed to interfere; so Mr. Polk was
duly inaugurated with great pomp, under the direction of the dominant
party. A prominent place was assigned in the inaugural procession
for the Democratic associations of Washington and other cities.
The pugilistic Empire Club from New York, led by Captain Isaiah
Rynders, had with it a small cannon, which was fired at short
intervals as the procession advanced.

The Chief Marshal of the procession having issued orders that no
carriages should enter the Capitol grounds, the diplomats were
forced to alight at a side gate in the rain, and to walk through
the mud to the Senate entrance, damaging their feathered chapeaux
and their embroidered uniforms, to their great displeasure.
Conspicuous in the group around the President was Vice-President
Dallas, tall, erect, and dignified, with long, snow-white hair
falling over his shoulders. The President-elect read his inaugural,
which few heard, and when he had concluded Chief Justice Taney
administered the oath of office. As Mr. Polk reverentially kissed
the Bible, the customary salutes boomed forth at the Navy Yard and
at the Arsenal. The new President was then escorted to the White
House, the rain having made Pennsylvania Avenue so slippery with
mud that not a few of the soldiers fell ingloriously on the march.

The cry, "Who is James K. Polk?" raised by the Whigs when he was
nominated, was unwarranted, for he was not an unknown man. He had
been a member of the House from 1825 to 1839, Speaker from 1835 to
1837, and chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means during a
portion of his membership. He had been a Jackson leader in the
House, and as such he had manifested not only zeal and skill as a
party manager, but also substantial qualities of a respectable
order. It seems certain that Polk was selected by the Southern
Democracy some time before the Convention met in 1844, and that he
was heartily in sympathy with the movement for conquering a portion
of Mexico to be made into slave States. Polk entered heartily into
this bu