Millard Fillmore served as a Member of Congress in the 1830s and 1840s, long before he became President. In the House, Fillmore aspired to the Speakership. Thwarted in that effort, he took up the chairmanship of the Ways and Means Committee. This portrait depicts Fillmore during his presidential years. A faint curved shadow near the top of the canvas indicates that it originally had an arched frame, a popular style of the mid-1800s.
