President of the United States for a single day

Ah … politics! If you’re a responsible American, as I often pretend to be, you’ll have watched and read and listened to as much hogwash on every side of every question ad nauseum, and we’ll all troop to the polls, read the names and say “Is this the best you guys can do for candidates?”

And then we’ll vote, anyway. And that’s why I’d like to suggest March 4 as a new national holiday, it being the entire term of the only non-toxic President of the United States.

His name was David Rice Atchison, who later on had Atchison, Kansas named for him, along with one third of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad.

Never heard of him? Well, he was a pro-slavery Democrat who never met a bottle of booze he didn’t like. But back in 1849, when Atchison became President for an entire day, some people knew how to throw parties. And Atchison spent his entire term as President sleeping off a dandy drunk. (You can always turn here for the real skinny on history, of course).

Here’s what happened. At noon on March 4, 1849, the term of President James Polk ended. At that very moment, the term of incoming President John Taylor was scheduled to begin. But Taylor was a religious man, and March 4 was on a Sunday, you see, so he said he’d wait until noon on Monday to be sworn in.

This left a 24-hour period where the United States didn’t have a President. Normally, the vice president would take over, but his term expired at Sunday noon, just like Polk’s.

So we look on the list of successors and who do we find? David Rice Atchison of Missouri, who was president pro-tem of the Senate.

His headstone says “President of the United States for one day” too.

But we should set March 4 aside in honor of this man, because he was the only leader of this nation who didn’t get at least half the country mad at him.

For the rest of his life, Atchison enjoyed polishing this historical hiccup, describing his presidency as “the honestest administration this country ever had.”

May his example shine forever.

— Slim Randles is a country columnist. Email him at [email protected].