1812 United States Presidential Election

United States presidential election, 1812

← 1808 October 30 – December 2, 1812 1816 →
All 217 electoral votes of the Electoral College 109 electoral votes needed to win
Nominee James Madison DeWitt Clinton Party Democratic-Republican Democratic-Republican Home state Virginia New York Running mate Elbridge Gerry Jared Ingersoll Electoral vote 128 89 States carried 11 7 Popular vote 140,431 132,781 Percentage 50.4% 47.6%
Presidential election results map. Green denotes states won by Madison, burnt orange denotes states won by Clinton. Numbers indicate the number of electoral votes allotted to each state.
President before election James Madison Democratic-Republican Elected President James Madison Democratic-Republican

James Madison
Democratic-Republican

James Madison
Democratic-Republican

The United States presidential election of 1812 was the seventh quadrennial presidential election. It was held from Friday, October 30 to Wednesday, December 2, 1812, and took place in the shadow of the War of 1812. It featured an intriguing competition between incumbent Democratic-Republican President James Madison and a dissident Democratic-Republican, DeWitt Clinton, nephew of Madison's late Vice President, George Clinton. The Federalist opposition threw their support behind Clinton. Nonetheless, Madison was re-elected with 50.4 percent of the popular vote to his opponent's 47.6%, making the 1812 election the closest election up to that point for the popular vote. This was the first presidential election to be held during a major war involving the United States.

Residual military conflict resulting from the Napoleonic Wars in Europe had been steadily worsening throughout James Madison's first term, with the British and the French both ignoring the neutrality rights of the United States at sea by seizing American ships and looking for supposed British deserters in a practice known as impressment. The British provided additional provocations by impressing American seamen, maintaining forts within United States territory in the Northwest, and supporting American Indians at war with the United States in both the Northwest and Southwest.