James K. Polk, Volume II: Continentalist

Princeton Legacy Library

By: Charles Grier Sellers

Narrated by: Tim Welch

This definitive biography of James K. Polk covers the most important years of Polk's political career - from a twice-defeated gubernatorial candidate in Tennessee to dark-horse candidate for the presidency and one of the most successful first 18 months of any American president.

The months of Polk’s administration covered here contain the bulk of his expansionist program - the annexation of Texas, the settlement of the Oregon boundary with Great Britain, and the war with Mexico that led to the acquisition of California and New Mexico. This period also covers the first session of the 29th Congress, which produced under Polk’s guidance the most important domestic legislation of any congress of the century.

Originally published in 1966.

©1966 Charles Grier Sellers (P)2019 Charles Grier Sellers

Good Read

I throughly enjoyed listening to both volumes. I do wish the author would have extended his story beyond Polk’s Presidency as he returned to Tennessee even though it was a short period of time.

Is there a Volume III?

Enjoyed the narration by Tim Welch. Lots of details about Polk's administration. Maybe too much detail. Lots of names of people that appear once but are never seen again. My biggest complaint was that the book ended rather abruptly. In fact it ended before the end of Polk's term in office. The author all of a sudden wrapped it up with about 5 or 6 sentences about how Polk's administration was one of the most consequential to date. No mention of how his term ended. No mention of how the Mexican / American war ended. No mention of his death shortly after leaving office. Left me thinking that I missed Volume III but I could not find it anywhere. Other than that I enjoyed the book.

incredibly in depth

this is one of the most detailed biographies I've ever read. The author presents as if he's a newspaper editor delivering day by day headlines, which I love. That being said, this is not a casual biography; it is incredibly intricate and assumes the reader has a good knowledge of that era

Informative and Interesting

My initial thought about the audiobook is that it would be boring, but I was mistaken. The storyteller grabbed my attention with his tone and pitch of voice. I usually do not listen to Audio podcasts because of my short attention span, but I enjoyed this. I learned a lot about the U.S government, especially the banking system in the US, and democracy. The storyteller's narrative voice was interactive and made the audio interesting. For example, when he reads a sentence made by the character, he changes his voice to fit into the character he describes. I would recommend, especially to students who have to prepare for U.S government exams but arent enthusiastic about reading the textbooks because the storyteller makes it interesting to listen too.

Incomplete story that takes a long time

In the 2nd part of this 40-hour biography, we spend virtually the entire time with the men holding lower offices who are being manipulated by Polk. Unfortunately, it does not even continue to the end of his presidency, or even the war with Mexico. In addition, the editing is extremely poor, with virtually each section containing redundant narrations that were not removed during editing. Overall extremely poorly done and disappointing on every axis.