James Buchanan

James Buchanan was born on April 23, 1791, at Cove Gap, near Mercersburg, PennsylvaniaPennsylvaniaPennsylvania (officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania) is a Middle Atlantic state of the United States; its capital is Harrisburg, and Philadelphia and Pittsburgh are its two great metropolitan areas. One of the original 13 states, it ratified the U.S. Constitution on December 12, 1787, the second state to do so. Its population in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020) was 13,002,700.Open the full entry.⁠[1][2]

His father, also named James Buchanan, immigrated to the United States in 1783 and worked as a storekeeper; his mother was Elizabeth Speer. Both came of Scottish Presbyterian stock from the north of Ireland.⁠[3]

In 1789 his father had bought a local trading post, Tom’s Trading Place, renaming it Stony Batter after the family home in northern Ireland; when James was six, the family moved the business to Mercersburg.⁠[1]

Buchanan attended Mercersburg Academy until 1807, when, at 16, he entered the junior class of Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. During the fall vacation of 1808 he was expelled for bad behavior, and he was readmitted after pledging good conduct to a trustee, Dr. John King.⁠[4][3]

He graduated with honors in 1809.⁠[5]

After graduating, Buchanan studied law in Lancaster, Pennsylvania; he was admitted to the Pennsylvania bar on November 17, 1812, and built a successful law practice in Lancaster.⁠[4][3]

During the War of 1812 he served in a reserve unit and saw no combat.⁠[5]

Buchanan was elected to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in 1814 and again in 1815 as a Federalist; he declined a third term and returned to the law.⁠[6][4]

Buchanan was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1820 and served from 1821 to 1831, sitting on the House Judiciary Committee.⁠[4][5]

When the Federalists disintegrated in the 1820s he joined the emerging Democratic Party, and he helped Andrew JacksonAndrew JacksonAndrew Jackson (1767–1845) was an American soldier and politician who served as President of the United States from 1829 to 1837, after leading U.S. forces to victory at the Battle of New Orleans in the War of 1812.Open the full entry carry Pennsylvania in the presidential elections of 1828 and 1832.⁠[3][5]

Andrew Jackson appointed Buchanan envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary to Russia, and the Senate confirmed him on January 12, 1832; he spent two years in St. Petersburg and returned in 1833.⁠[7][4][5]

Buchanan entered the U.S. Senate to fill a vacancy, taking his seat on December 6, 1834; he was reelected in 1837 and 1843 and served until 1845, sitting on and eventually chairing the Foreign Relations Committee.⁠[6][4][5]

In 1844 he sought the Democratic presidential nomination and then backed James K. PolkJames K. PolkJames K. Polk (1795–1849) was an American politician who served as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives and governor of Tennessee, and as the 11th president of the United States from 1845 to 1849. During his presidency the United States annexed Texas, settled the Oregon boundary with Britain and, through the Mexican-American War, acquired a vast territory in what is now the American Southwest.Open the full entry.⁠[3]

President James K. Polk appointed Buchanan secretary of state on March 6, 1845; he took up the post on March 10 and left it on March 7, 1849.⁠[7]

During his tenure the United States annexed TexasTexasTexas is a U.S. state in the south-central United States, with its capital at Austin and its largest city Houston. It was admitted to the Union on December 29, 1845, as the 28th state, and the 2020 census (April 1, 2020) counted 29,145,505 residents.Open the full entry and fought the Mexican–American War, in which BritannicaEncyclopædia BritannicaEncyclopædia Britannica is a general English-language encyclopedia first published in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1768; the name also refers to its publisher, Chicago-based Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. (which presents itself as The Britannica Group). The print edition ended in 2012, and the company’s main businesses since then have been the online encyclopedia Britannica.com, digital education products for schools and libraries, and Merriam-Webster dictionaries.Open the full entry describes his role as limited. The OregonOregonOregon (officially the State of Oregon) is a state on the Pacific coast of the western United States; its capital is Salem and its largest city is Portland. It was admitted to the Union on February 14, 1859, as the 33rd state. Its population in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020) was 4,237,256.Open the full entry boundary dispute with Britain was settled peacefully by treaty in 1846, and the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo followed in 1848.⁠[3][7]

In 1848 Buchanan bought Wheatland, an estate near Lancaster, Pennsylvania, for $6,750; after leaving the State Department in March 1849, he moved in with his household.⁠[8]

He failed to win the Democratic presidential nomination in 1848 and stayed out of public office until 1853; he sought the nomination again, without success, in 1852.⁠[3][7]

In 1853, at President Franklin PierceFranklin PierceFranklin Pierce (1804–1869) was an American Democratic politician who represented New Hampshire in the U.S. House and Senate and served as the 14th president of the United States from 1853 to 1857.Open the full entry’s request, Buchanan became U.S. minister to Great Britain; he presented his credentials on August 23, 1853, and served until 1856.⁠[6][4][7]

While in London he played a large part in drafting the Ostend Manifesto of October 18, 1854, which recommended that the United States acquire Cuba from Spain.⁠[3]

Buchanan won the Democratic presidential nomination in 1856. In the election of November 4, 1856, he received 174 electoral votes to 114 for the Republican John C. Frémont and 8 for Millard FillmoreMillard FillmoreMillard Fillmore (1800–1874) was an American Whig politician who served as the 12th vice president (1849–1850) and the 13th president of the United States (1850–1853).Open the full entry of the American Party.⁠[3][4]

He carried only five Northern states but every Southern state except MarylandMarylandMaryland is a Middle Atlantic state of the United States, deeply indented by Chesapeake Bay and bordered by Pennsylvania, Delaware, Virginia, the District of Columbia and West Virginia; its capital is Annapolis and its largest city is Baltimore. One of the original 13 states, it ratified the U.S. Constitution on April 28, 1788, as the seventh state to do so, and had a population of 6,177,224 in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020).Open the full entry; 112 of his 174 electoral votes came from the South.⁠[5]

Buchanan was inaugurated on March 4, 1857, with Chief Justice Roger B. Taney administering the oath.⁠[3][9]

His original cabinet comprised Secretary of State Lewis Cass, Secretary of the Treasury Howell Cobb, Secretary of War John Buchanan Floyd, Secretary of the Navy Isaac Toucey, Attorney General Jeremiah Sullivan Black and Secretary of the Interior Jacob Thompson.⁠[3]

Before taking office, Buchanan began corresponding with Justice John Catron on February 3, 1857, and on February 23 Justice Robert Grier tipped him off about the coming decision. The American Battlefield Trust biography judges this a violation of presidential ethics.⁠[5]

In his inaugural address Buchanan called the territorial question “happily, a matter of but little practical importance,” said that the Supreme Court would settle it “speedily and finally,” and declared that he would “cheerfully submit to that decision.”⁠[10][5]

On March 6, 1857, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney announced the Dred Scott decision, which held that Black Americans lacked citizenship rights and that neither Congress nor territorial governments could restrict slavery in the territories. Southerners were delighted, and the ruling caused a furor in the North.⁠[5][10]

Critics including William H. Seward and Abraham LincolnAbraham LincolnAbraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the 16th president of the United States (1861–1865). Born to a frontier farming family in Kentucky, he had less than a year of formal schooling, taught himself law, and served in the Illinois legislature and the U.S. House of Representatives before winning the presidency as the Republican candidate in 1860. During the Civil War he preserved the Union, issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 and pushed the Thirteenth Amendment abolishing slavery through Congress. He was shot by John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s Theatre in Washington on April 14, 1865, and died the next day.Open the full entry accused Buchanan and the Court of a conspiracy; the American Battlefield Trust biography notes that there is no explicit evidence of such a plot.⁠[5]

The economic panic of 1857 added to the national turmoil, and financial improprieties within the administration weakened Buchanan’s position.⁠[3]

Buchanan firmly backed KansasKansasKansas is a state of the United States bordered by Nebraska to the north, Missouri to the east, Oklahoma to the south, and Colorado to the west; its capital is Topeka and its largest city is Wichita. It was admitted to the Union on January 29, 1861, as the 34th state, and its population in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020) was 2,937,880.Open the full entry’s proslavery Lecompton Constitution and used presidential authority to press for Kansas’s admission as a slave state, angering Republicans and alienating members of his own party.⁠[5][10]

Senator Stephen A. Douglas opposed the constitution and helped block it in the House; Buchanan rejected a compromise offered by Northern Democrats that would have allowed Kansans to amend their constitution sooner. The constitution failed, and Kansas remained a territory until 1861.⁠[5]

In the 1858 midterm elections almost half of the Northern Democratic seats went to Republicans, who gained control of the House. Thereafter significant bills failed because of Southern votes in the Senate or presidential vetoes, leaving the federal government at a stalemate.⁠[5][10]

In mid-October 1859 the abolitionist John Brown raided the arsenal at Harpers Ferry, VirginiaVirginiaVirginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a U.S. state whose capital is Richmond. It entered the Union on June 25, 1788, as the 10th state, and had a population of 8,631,393 in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020).Open the full entry.⁠[5][3]

Buchanan had vowed before his inauguration to serve only one term and did not seek the 1860 nomination. The Democrats split, nominating Stephen A. Douglas and Vice President John C. Breckinridge, which opened the way for the election of the Republican Abraham Lincoln.⁠[5][3]

Buchanan denied that states had a legal right to secede but held that the federal government could not legally prevent secession; in his annual message of December 1860 he recommended a new constitutional convention, which never took place.⁠[10][5]

South CarolinaSouth CarolinaSouth Carolina (officially the State of South Carolina) is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Ocean bordering Georgia and North Carolina; its capital is Columbia and its most populous city is Charleston. One of the original 13 states, it ratified the U.S. Constitution on May 23, 1788, the eighth state to do so. Its population in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020) was 5,118,425.Open the full entry declared its secession on December 20, 1860, and seven Southern states had seceded by February 1861. Buchanan denounced secession but said he had “no authority” to decide the federal government’s relations with South Carolina.⁠[3]

Between December 1860 and January 1861 several cabinet members resigned, and Buchanan appointed Northerners: Jeremiah Sullivan Black became secretary of state on December 17, 1860, Edwin McMasters Stanton attorney general on December 22, and John A. Dix secretary of the treasury on January 15, 1861.⁠[4][10][3]

In January 1861 Buchanan ordered reinforcements sent to Fort Sumter. The supply ship Star of the West was fired on by shore batteries and turned back, and by January 9, 1861, it was far away; a second relief effort came too late.⁠[3][10]

Buchanan left office on March 4, 1861, departed Washington the following day and retired to Wheatland.⁠[3][4]

Congress, the Republican Party, Lincoln, the military and national newspapers criticized his handling of Fort Sumter and secession; the Senate drafted a resolution to condemn him, and his portrait was removed from the Capitol rotunda to prevent its defacement.⁠[3]

In 1866 Buchanan published Mr. Buchanan’s Administration on the Eve of Rebellion, a memoir defending his presidency; LancasterHistory describes it as the first memoir written and published by a sitting or former president.⁠[6][5][9]

Buchanan died in his bedchamber at Wheatland at 8:30 a.m. on June 1, 1868, aged 77, of respiratory failure.⁠[8][5]

He was buried in Woodward Hill Cemetery in Lancaster.⁠[2][4]

Britannica states that Buchanan died confident that posterity would vindicate him.⁠[3]

Buchanan never married and is the only president who remained a lifelong bachelor.⁠[10]

After the death of his sister he became the guardian of her daughter, Harriet Lane, then 12; Harriet Lane (1830–1903) served as White House hostess during his presidency. The Wheatland household also included James Buchanan Henry and Esther Parker.⁠[3][8][9]

Harriet Lane married Henry Elliot Johnston on January 11, 1866; she inherited Wheatland in 1868, used it as a summer residence and sold it in 1884.⁠[8]

The Wheatland mansion was built in 1828 for William Jenkins, a lawyer and bank president. In 1936 the Junior League of Lancaster raised more than $50,000 to buy the estate, which was then run by the James Buchanan Foundation for the Preservation of Wheatland and opened to the public on May 5, 1936. Wheatland was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.⁠[8]

In May 2009 the James Buchanan Foundation merged with the Lancaster County Historical Society to form LancasterHistory, which owns and operates Wheatland today. On October 5, 2020, LancasterHistory launched the James Buchanan Presidential Library, with more than 3,500 digitized items.⁠[8][11]

In her 1895 will Harriet Lane set aside $100,000 for the James Buchanan Monument Fund. The stone pyramid at Stony Batter, his birthplace, designed by Wyatt & Nolting of Baltimore, was completed on November 15, 1907, measuring 38 feet square and 31 feet high; in 1911 the Pennsylvania legislature authorized the commonwealth to accept the 18.5-acre James Buchanan Monument, now Buchanan’s Birthplace State Park.⁠[1]

In Washington, D.C., Congress passed a resolution for a Buchanan statue on June 18, 1918; the 9.5-foot bronze statue was unveiled on June 26, 1930, and accepted by President Herbert Hoover.⁠[1]

The White House biography judges that Buchanan “grasped inadequately” the political realities of his time. Britannica’s essay judges that, despite his legal knowledge and government experience, he lacked the soundness of judgment and conciliatory personality needed to ease the sectional crisis over slavery. The House Divided biography holds that the attack on Fort Sumter cemented the historical view of him as one of the least effective presidents despite being one of the best prepared.⁠[10][3][4]

President James Buchanan’s Wheatland: Official website: https://www.lancasterhistory.org/places/wheatland (opens in a new window).⁠[11]

Buchanan’s Birthplace State Park: Official website: https://www.pa.gov/agencies/dcnr/recreation/where-to-go/state-parks/find-a-park/buchanans-birthplace-state-park/history (opens in a new window).⁠[1]