The Role of the Buchanan Administration in the Years Leading up to the Civil War

Observe the Pillsbury Doughboy. At first glance he seems like a healthy blob of dough, with many accomplishments in the business of pastry selling. However if one were to touch the Pillsbury Doughboy he would be ridiculously easy to twist and bend in any direction one desired. What seemed like an upstanding Doughboy at first was later realized to be a repulsive corpulent mass of preservatives and sugar. The Doughboy's blind ignorance to his own consistency and the effect it had on the general populace contribute greatly to an obesity epidemic facing his nation. People supported the Doughboy out of short sighted greed and a sense of self preservation- when the alternative was a diet of only vegetables who could blame them? The metaphor may be unclear at first but an analysis of the presidential fiasco that was the Buchanan administration makes it clear that Mr. Buchanan was nothing but a doughface elected by voters who desperately searched for a non-Republican candidate to prevent a civil war. It wasn't until later that his complete lack of perception and understanding of the public became clear and by that time the dreaded Civil War had begun, a conflict that would claim over half a million souls. The stage was set for the incompetence that occurred throughout the Buchanan Administration with its flawed victory on election day but Buchanan's actions regarding the legality of slavery in the territories, financial crisis, misplaced expansionist ideals and an inability to take a decisive stance with the South or deal with sectionalism in general when paired with political infighting and widespread public disapproval ranks James Buchanan's presidency as one of the worst in history due to its inability to stop the bloodbath that was the Civil War.

A closer look at the presidential election of 1856 makes it apparent that Buchanan's victory was nowhere near as decisive or unifying as the electoral count makes it appear. Entering into the election of 1856 three parties was vying to elect their candidate of choice into the White House. The first was the American Party, which consisted of the majority of the remnants Whigs and was considered a vessel of the controversial "Known Nothing Movement." They fed off of the paranoia of the general public and were generally pro-slavery and anti-catholic. While the American Party did have considerable popular support- they polled around 22% of the popular vote, they lacked solid majority in any one area and they only won one state-Maryland ( Bruce430). The American Party candidate was ex-President Millard Fillmore. The next party was the Republicans. The Republicans had started off as a group to protest the Kansas-Nebraska act of 1854. The Republicans were ironically considered an extremely radical and new group in the election of 1856, the Republican Party was a hodgepodge of anti slavery groups and counted an eclectic mix of Northerners from Free Soilers to diehard abolitionists. The Republicans nominated the inexperienced yet charismatic governor of California John Fremont and ran with the slogan "Free Speech, Free Press, Free Soil, Free Men and Fremont to Victory!" The Republicans carried one third of the popular vote and 11 States- an amazing feat for the party's first presidential election (431). However Fremont polled less than 1000 votes in all of the states of the South combined (430). The South threatened immediate succession should the Republicans take power- though many analysts could see that the next election would almost certainly result in a Republican president. The final party was the Democrats, who were more conservative and well organized when compared to the Republicans. The Democrats themselves had varying opinions on slavery personally but were willing to compromise on the issue so the South did not secede. The midterm elections of 1854 had resulted in huge losses in Congress for the Democrats due to fallout from the Kansas Nebraska act, which stated that the settlers of the territories of Kansas and Nebraska would determine the legality of slavery themselves; many abolitionists felt cheated as the Missouri Compromise of 1820 stated both territories were to be free of slavery. The Democrats finally nominated James Buchanan, for not only did his record as a good diplomat increase his popularity, his foreign postings had allowed him to keep his distance from the more politically volatile issues at home such as the debate on slavery (428). The Democratic campaign foreshadowed Buchanan's presidency- it was marred by a lack of decisiveness and commitment on most issues, but Buchanan biographer Phillip Klein believes that despite these issues Buchanan found support in key groups of moderates who would do anything to avoid civil war, enabling his victory (251).

Buchanan's victory on Election Day seemed clear cut. While the Republicans had managed to win the Great Lakes and New England states, Buchanan and his vice president Breckenridge swept all of the Southern states along with California, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Illinois and Indiana to give Buchanan a comfortable electoral victory of 174-114 (Bruce 430). However two key issues surfaced in the election of 1856 that showed how dangerously unstable the country really was. The first was that there was now a majority of electoral votes in Free states. This meant that in theory a president could win only the Free states and win the election. If the Republican Party continued to grow as rapidly as it was in 1856 an anti slavery president elected by only Northern states was a very real possibility (Catton and Catton 129). The second reason is that Buchanan himself only obtained most of his votes because of public fear of a civil war (130). He carried the Southern states only because he was not an abolitionist- those who had voted for him in the south had little loyalty or respect for Buchanan himself and his votes in the North came from moderates fearful of a civil war, yet everyday more and more of those moderates became Republicans as they tired of compromising for the South. There was a growing public discontent towards the South. The vast majority of the population of the United States was against slavery, so why people asked were both Houses of Congress and the President pro-slavery while the people were not? Historian David Bruce writes that "The slavery element was now predominant in the national government... however it did not control the public opinion...a strong tide was running against it (slavery), and each victory it gained only stiffened the ranks of the opposition."(431-432). On March 4, 1857 James Buchanan was sworn in as the 15th president of the barely still United States. To save the Union the country needed a leader with decisiveness and charisma, something that would be near impossible to find the debacle of the Buchanan administration from 1857-1861.

Buchanan's