Welcome to Tennessee's State Capital Building here in downtown Nashville.

Mounting the marble stairs that scale the terraced grounds of Capitol Hill,

we see the structure's classical facade high above us, as if poised upon a pedestal.

Grand Corinthian columns support the gable pediment, its roof capped with a central tower.

To the right of the building, beyond the statue of President Andrew Jackson perched on a steed,

we discover the final resting place of the final president in the Jacksonian era, James

K. Polk.

It is a site of austere grandeur. Today visitors wander the grounds, workers eat their lunches in the shade, and one man in a dark suit stands alone by himself, contemplating the tomb. For a moment he is there and in another

he's gone. It gives us pause. That was odd. Did we imagine him? Was he there and then not? Was he anything at all? Or maybe he was a

ghost, the ghost of James K Pulk, or his legacy perhaps, stubbornly living on. Oh, It is America's right to stretch from sea to shining sea.

Not only do we have a responsibility to our citizens to gain valuable natural resources we also have a responsibility to

civilize this beautiful land. Hello and welcome back to American History Hit President's series with me Don Wildman.

Glad to have you. Today we're going to be introduced to the 11th President of the United States,

the last and possibly most dedicated of the Jacksonians.

Young Hickory, he was called, James K. Polk.

I am joined for this conversation by the inimitable Amy Greenberg from Penn State University to explore the

Polk story a complicated one. On one hand he is the president most associated

with you know sea to shining sea manifest destiny oversaw a tremendous expansion of American territory in his time.

But while he served, he was also known as a warmonger and a liar.

A workaholic, certainly.

Polk was possibly the only president to have

fulfilled every one of his election promises.

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