Martin Van Buren (December 5, 1782 – July 24, 1862) was the eighth president of the United States. He was the first president born after the United States Declaration of Independence, making him the first president who was born as a U.S. citizen after 1776.
Van Buren was born in Kinderhook, New York, in 1782. Van Buren studied law by working for Francis Sylvester and later became a lawyer in 1803. In 1821 he was elected as a member of the United States Senate, representing New York. President Andrew Jackson selected him as the Secretary of State in 1827. In 1832, he became vice President of the United States of America for Jackson, and in 1836, he became the 8th president of the United States. During most of the time he was president, the economy was in very bad shape, and he was blamed for it. He was the first president to have been born a United States citizen, since all of his predecessors were born British subjects before the American Revolution.
Van Buren lost the next presidential election in 1840 to William Henry Harrison. In 1848, he ran again to be president as a part of the Free Soil Party, but he did not win. Van Buren died on July 24, 1862, of heart failure after suffering from an asthma attack, on his Lindenwald estate.