Thread by @Jeff_Jacoby

Each #PresidentsDay I write a column about a 19th-century president most Americans never learn about in school. This year's topic: Zachary Taylor, a war-hero-turned-president. His death just 16 months into his term may have made the Civil War inevitable.
bit.ly/2vxdFrW

For #PresidentsDay 2019, I wrote about Benjamin Harrison.
He had perhaps the noblest political lineage in US history and was a highly gifted speaker. Yet in person he was highly off-putting — even supporters called him "the human iceberg."
bit.ly/2BFhag9

In 2018 I described Chester Arthur, a hack who was named vice president to balance the ticket — only to become president when James Garfield was murdered. Amazingly, Arthur became a genuine reformer, turning against the spoils system he had long embraced.
bit.ly/2ttgm9r

One of our least admirable presidents was Millard Fillmore, the last Whig in the White House and the subject of my 2017 column. He was a thin-skinned bigot, a Northerner who appeased Southern slave interests, and avidly enforced the Fugitive Slave Act.
bit.ly/2kNg32D

John Tyler, my 2016 topic, became president when "Tippecanoe" Harrison died. But he refused to support Whig Party policies — so Whig leaders excommunicated him! Tyler was the first incumbent not to seek reelection, and the first to have a veto overridden.
bit.ly/1PVl9GB

In 2015, I wrote about my favorite Democratic president, Grover Cleveland. Renowned for integrity & backbone, Cleveland was incorruptible, and vetoed hundreds of bills that wasted public funds. Rarely has the WH been occupied by a leader of such character.
bit.ly/1CwMHay

My presidential series began with a 2014 column about James Garfield, who rose from poverty to the White House without ever thrusting himself forward as a candidate. I "despise a man who blows his own horn," he said. Try to imagine such a politician today!
bostonglobe.com/opinion/2014/0…