George M. Dallas
Dallas decided to use his position to lower tariffs and make the country bigger. Dallas used to support the tariff policy that his state's coal and iron companies wanted. But as vice president, he agreed to do anything necessary to realize that goal. Dallas thought that the vice president's power to break tied votes in the Senate was similar to the president's power to veto acts of Congress. At the end of his term, Dallas said that he had cast thirty tie-breaking votes during his four years in office. Dallas talked about this achievement in his farewell address to the Senate. However, Dallas wanted to avoid having to break a tied vote on the tariff issue, and lobbied senators during the debate over Treasury Secretary Walker's tariff bill in the summer of 1846.