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Benton championed the expansionist movement, a political cause that became known as Manifest Destiny. The expansionists believed that the North American continent, from one end to the other, north and south, east and west, should belong to the United States. They believed it was the nation's destiny to control the continent.
A President who was in tune with this notion was James K. Polk. Allied with Benton on this issue, Polk supported Benton's push for national surveys of the Oregon Trail (1842), the Oregon Territory (1844), the Great Basin, and Sierra Mountains to California (1845). Through his power and influence, Benton obtained for Frémont the position of leading each of these expeditions, with his famous scout Kit Carson.
In late 1846 Frémont, acting under orders from Commodore Robert F. Stockton, led a military expedition of 300 men to capture Santa Barbara, California, during the Mexican-American War. Frémont led his unit over the Santa Ynez Mountains at San Marcos Pass in a rainstorm on the night of December 24, 1846. In spite of losing many of his horses, mules and cannons, which slid down the muddy slopes during the rainy night, his men regrouped in the foothills the next morning, and captured the presidio without bloodshed. A few days later Frémont led his men southeast toward Los Angeles, accepting the surrender of the leader Andres Pico and signing the Treaty of Cahuenga on January 13, 1847, which ended the war in upper California.
On January 16, 1847, Commodore Stockton appointed Frémont military governor of California following the Treaty of Cahuenga. However, U.S. Army Brig. Gen. Stephen Watts Kearny, who outranked Frémont said he had orders from the President Polk to serve as governor. He asked Frémont to give up the governorship, which the latter stubbornly refused to do for a time. When they arrived at Fort Leavenworth in August 1847, Kearny arrested Frémont and brought him to Washington, for court martial. Frémont was convicted of mutiny, disobedience of a superior officer and military misconduct. While approving the court's decision, President Polk commuted Frémont's sentence of dishonorable discharge due to his services. Frémont resigned his commission and settled in California. Polk's refusal to overturn the court martial caused friction in Polk's relationship with Senator Benton.
In 1856, Frémont ran as the first anti-slavery Republican nominee versus Democrat James Buchanan. He ran on the slogan "Free Soil, Free Men, and Frémont". The Democrats told voters that a victory by Frémont would bring civil war. They also raised a host of issues, alleging Frémont was a Catholic and had a poor military record. Frémont's powerful father-in-law, Senator Benton, praised Frémont but announced his support for the Democratic candidate James Buchanan. Fremont placed second to James Buchanan in a three-way election. He did not carry the state of California.
Frémont later served as a major general in the American Civil War, including a controversial term as commander of the Army's Department of the West from May to November 1861. Frémont ordered his Gen. Nathaniel Lyon to formally bring Missouri into the Union cause. This upset President Abraham Lincoln, who feared that the order would tip Missouri (and other border states) to the southern cause. Lincon asked Frémont to revise the order, but Frémont refused to do so, and sent his wife to plead the case. Lincoln responded by publicly revoking the proclamation and relieving Frémont of command on November 2, 1861.
Early in June 1862 Frémont pursued the Confederate Gen. Stonewall Jackson for eight days, finally engaging him at Battle of Cross Keys on June 8. Jackson slipped away after the battle, saving his army. When the Army of Virginia was created June 26, to include Gen. Frémont's corps, with John Pope in command, Frémont declined to serve on the grounds that he was senior to Pope and for personal reasons. He then went to New York where he remained throughout the war, expecting a command, but none was given to him.
The Radical Republicans were a group of hard-line abolitionists who were upset with Lincoln's positions on the issue of slavery. On May 31, 1864, they nominated Frémont for president. This schism in the Republican Party split the party into two factions: the anti-Lincoln Radical Republicans, who nominated Frémont, and the pro-Lincoln Republicans. Frémont abandoned his political campaign in September 1864, after he brokered a political deal in which Lincoln removed Postmaster General Montgomery Blair from office.
Frémont died in New York City on July 13, 1890 (121 years ago today) of peritonitis at the age of 77.