The Whig Party Riot refers to a violent protest that erupted just outside the White House on the evening of August 16, 1841 in response to President John Tyler's veto [1] of the Fiscal Bank Bill [2] passed by the 27th United States Congress that would have reestablished a Bank of the United States. This riot began when incensed, drunk members of the Whig Party gathered outside the White House to express their disapproval of President Tyler, who was then a member of the Whig Party, that degenerated into a violent demonstration where a crowd of protesters threw stones at the White House, fired guns into the air and burned an effigy of President Tyler. No less enraged some weeks later, the Whig Party expelled President Tyler as a member while at the same time all of his Whig Party cabinet members resigned in protest.

Partially in response to the Whig Party Riot, the Congress formed the Auxiliary Guard, the forerunner to the Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia, to protect against incendiaries and enforce the police regulations of the City of Washington, D.C.. [3]