Presidents of the United States
1824-1832: John Q. Adams(Nat. Rep.-Massachusetts)[1]
1832-1840: Martin Van Buren (Democratic-New York)[2]
1840-1848: Henry Clay (New Federalist-Kentucky)[3]
1848-1852: Daniel Webster (Whig-Massachusetts)[4]
1852-1856: William Dayton (Republican-Illinois)[5]
1856-1860: Robert Stockton (Democratic-New Jersey)[6]
1860-1861: Stephen A. Douglas** (Democratic-Indiana)[7]
1861-1868: Lovell Rousseau (Democratic-Kentucky)[8]
1868-1875: Salmon Chase*** (Republican-Michigan)[9]
1875-1876: Benjamin Bristow (Republican-Vermont)[10]
1876-1884: John Sherman (Republican-Illinois)[11]
[1]With Henry Clay deciding to run as an alternative Democratic-Republican spoiler candidate, John Q. Adams manages to squeak by with a second term(He actually came close to winning the electoral vote in our world). He leaves office, however, as one of the most unpopular presidents in U.S. history.
[2]Van Buren was a bit of an unknown compared to Andrew Jackson, but with the war hero running as his Vice-President, he was able to seize a large majority of the electoral vote in the 1832 elections. And the most well-known campaign slogan? "Anyone but Adams".
[3]The Federalist Party would have died out entirely, were it not for the charismatic Henry Clay, and his perseverance. Clay mainly only won out, however, thanks to significant dissatisfaction with the Democrats, and a lack of confidence in the Whigs, and he managed to exploit that quite skillfully. It didn't help the Whigs that Daniel Webster didn't run a terribly good campaign, and Winfield Scott had managed to bungle his own campaign by throwing too many bones to the Jacksonians. Clay managed to scoot by with only 4 more electoral votes than the bare minimum needed to gain office, but it was a genuine win nonetheless(in many respects, this is similar to if Ross Perot had won the 1992 elections in the real world. It was a bit of a long shot, but definitely still possible.).
Clay's main achievement was winning the Mexican-American war, which earned him a good deal of respect, but even he could not save the Federalists from once again falling, and this time, permanently so. Soon, the Whigs would get their chance to shine.
[4]As well respected as Webster was, the Whigs ended up being unable to offer much in the way of any real policy changes, and Clay's favorite strategy of playing the moderate didn't work out as well in 1850 as it had in in the prior decade, and as the country began a slow and painful polarization regarding slavery and states' rights, the Whigs found themselves splitting along ideological lines. And that's where yet another new party would come in.....
[5]Nobody honestly expected the brand new Republican Party to win the White House in 1852. But with Northern concerns over slavery growing, and with the Whigs and the Democrats both suffering from growing infighting, William Dayton, a Congressman from Illinois, managed to take advantage of this and take just enough electoral votes to win the White House, despite only winning about 45 percent of the popular vote.
[6]Robert Stockton would go down in history as perhaps the most forgettable President ever. He did establish relations with Canada, however, and is fondly remembered for this in that nation; he would even have a street named after him in Toronto.
[7]Stephen Douglas was about as ambitious as you could get for a candidate in 1860; he threw bones to fellow Democrats left, right and center, and managed to snag the White House by just a hair, despite East Texas congressman Louis T. Wigfall managing to take Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina, as a spoiler candidate. Unfortunately, he hardly paid any attention to his health, and died in November, 1861(thus, becoming TTL's version of William Henry Harrison).
[8]Lovell Rousseau, Douglas's VP in 1860, had some shoes to fill in. Although once a well-respected Army officer from Kentucky, many hardcore conservative Democrats in the
Deep South viewed him with a fair amount of suspicion, still. Rousseau mainly won in 1864 by appeasing both urban northern Democrats and their less insane southern counterparts, and also because the somewhat radical Republican, Abraham Lincoln, didn't run that good of a campaign; but as a friendly gesture, Lincoln would later be appointed to the Supreme Court by President Rousseau, earning him some respect from many Republicans. His brand of compromise, however, only drove Southern reactionaries to deeper anger, and by 1868, secession was just around the corner.....
[9]Salmon Chase, an Ohio native who had moved to Michigan in the 1840s, was a popular senator and generally respected all around by most. He was also the Republican candidate in the 1868 elections. The Democrats, meanwhile, found themselves on the verge of a total schism, with the so-called "Whiskey" Democrats increasingly becoming popular in the South: the nomination of firebrand William Miles as the Southern candidate only served as the cherry for this proverbial sundae of political extremism. And what's worse was, these same folks even reached out to disaffected *Northern* reactionaries; the Miles ticket actually managed to win as much as 8 percent of the vote in Ohio, of all places. Meanwhile, the likable but ineffectual Horace Greeley was selected by the establishment Democrats as the "normal" candidate.....and Greeley didn't even win his home state, which went 58 percent for Chase.
Chase's term in office(much like that of Lincoln IOTL, though to a slightly lesser degree) was largely consumed by the Civil War, and by 1875, his health had declined to a significant degree; reluctantly, Chase resigned in August, and allowed his Vice-President to take over to finish his second term.
[10]Bristow will be mostly remembered for starting Reconstruction, and the passage of the 14th Amendment[The 13th Amendment was something else here), which began the elimination of slavery in the United States.
[11]John Sherman rode a huge wave of post-Civil War Republican popularity. Slavery ended in 1879 under his administration, and his administration also oversaw the signing of the 15th Amendment, the annexation of Cuba, and bringing the Rio Bravo Republic into a security umbrella with the U.S.; tens of thousands of American settlers immediately began to flood these places, attracted by the climate and the idea of starting over. Sherman also received critical acclaim towards the end of his career for a quick response to the fire, and later, historic record-breaking flood that both devastated Chicago in October, 1884.