I collect 19th century presidential campaign tokens. They were issued before the pollical button was invented. More than 20 years ago, I went through the reference book, American Political Badges and Medalets 1789 – 1892 by Edmond Sullivan. I made a list of pieces that I would like to find and have been working on since then. This week I found this Martin Van Buren piece, which is listed as MVB 1836-1. Some collectors view the pieces that are listed as #1 for a candidate as something special. They almost always the largest tokens, but not necessarily the rarest. This piece is not rare, but as every collector knows, sometimes it just does not work for some items. I bid on two of these pieces in Heritage auctions and came it second. Another time a dealer I know well had one, but the piece had a scratch on the reverse that I knew would bug me. Therefore I passed. This time I won the Heritage Auction. Martin Van Buren was a protege of Andrew Jackson. He was Jackson’s hand-picked successor. He easily won the 1836 presidential election, but was slammed with the Panic of 1837 almost as soon as he took office. That economic depression ruined his presidency and led to his defeat for re-election in 1840. Van Buren was a presidential hopeful in 1844, but as soon as he came out against admitted Texas as a slave state, the Democrats dropped him and ended up nominating James K. Polk instead. He ran as a third party, Free Soil, anti-slavery, candidate in 1848 and finish well out of the money. This piece was sold by the Heritage Americana department, not the numismatic area. The pictures were way over exposed, and it was hard for me to evaluate them. I down loaded them and mess with the images with my software, but I was still not sure what I was bidding upon. When I got the piece, I was pleasantly surprised.
As Sullivan writes in his book, when a presidential candidate runs for more than one time, it is sometimes hard to attribute a piece to an exact campaign. This piece has been assigned to 1836, which was a year in which few campaign pieces were issued. It may have been issued in 1840. Only those who were alive at the time could know for sure. One of the easier candidates to attribute is Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln did not grow a beard until he was elected president. He was clean shaven through out the 1860 election cycle. One rare piece that was issued after he was elected shows him with a beard; the others do not. Therefore if he does not have a beard, it's an 1860 piece. If he has one, it's 1864. From 1860 From 1864
FYI: Did you know why Lincoln grew a beard? The story is that a young girl wrote to him and told him that he would look much better with a beard. The rest is history.
The reverse of this piece is called "The Temple of Liberty." It features farming tools, instruments of commerce and a sailing ship. Henry Clay, one of Van Buren's political opponents, issued something similar in 1844 with a factory building instead of a gazebo. .
