CHAPTER 10
I have learned more of the depravity of my fellow man than I ever before knew.
—GOVERNOR GEARY, ON HIS TIME IN KANSAS
Buchanan ~ Tyler ~ Pierce ~ Fillmore
A month before his sixty-fifth birthday, James Buchanan had finally ascended to the most distinguished destination on his course of honor—the presidency. Two days after his inauguration came an eagerly awaited Supreme Court decision in the case of Dred Scott v.Sandford. The case and its controversy had originated in Jackson’s second term, when an army surgeon from Missouri took his slave, Dred Scott, from that state to his post in Illinois, and from there to Fort Snelling, in the Louisiana Territory north of the Missouri Compromise line. While at Snelling, Scott married another slave, Harriet, and together they had two children. In the second year of Van Buren’s presidency, the Scott family were removed by their owner to Missouri. Unsuccessfully attempting to purchase his freedom in 1846, Scott resorted to legal action under the theory that his previous presence in free territory had ended his status as a slave. After a series of unsuccessful proceedings in the lower courts, Scott’s case was appealed to the Supreme Court in 1854. What followed was a complicated series of decisions featuring different combinations of justices, sometimes a plurality and sometimes a majority, coming together or apart over the various issues involved. Of the many purported holdings of the case, only three received a majority. By a vote of 7–2, the court ruled that Scott was still a slave. Five slaveholding justices ruled that the Missouri Compromise itself was unconstitutional. The same five declared that slaves were like any other property, and therefore could be brought to any territory of the United States, regardless of laws to the contrary. Four justices, a plurality, held that Congress had no power to regulate slavery in the territories. The decision caused an immediate national schism. No issue in American history had been more divisive than the expansion of slavery, which had been at the heart of the Missouri Compromise, the Wilmot Proviso, the Compromise of 1850, and the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Now the Supreme Court claimed to have removed the issue from the political realm, where voters through their elected representatives could determine the outcome.
In his inaugural address, Buchanan reported that this question was now before the Court, and that he would “cheerfully submit” to its result. But Buchanan, who had corresponded with friends on the Supreme Court, not only knew the probable result, but had lobbied them for a more expansive decision, which he believed would settle the slavery issue once and for all.
Kansas’s governor, John Geary, perhaps looking for Buchanan’s affirmation or recognizing his prerogative to name his own candidate, tendered his resignation, hopeful of reappointment. Instead Buchanan chose Robert Walker, a Pennsylvanian who had made his life in Mississippi and served as secretary of the treasury under Polk. A committed Unionist, he seemed to be exactly the man to succeed where his three predecessors had failed. But he failed in his efforts to convince free staters to vote for delegates to the Constitutional Convention at Lecompton, with only an estimated 10 percent turnout.
With America’s future shrouded in uncertainty, John Tyler spoke at the 250th anniversary of the Jamestown settlement, noting, “A small body of men planted on this spot the seed of a mighty empire.” After reciting a long history of Virginia and the United States, he took note of the problems of the country, closing by saying, “we renew our pledges to those principles of self-government, which have been consecrated by their examples through two hundred and fifty years; and implore that great Being who so often and signally preserved them through trials and difficulties, to continue to our country His protecting guardianship and care.”
Franklin and Jane Pierce headed for the island of Madeira, conveyed by the steamship Powhatan, which President Buchanan had put at their disposal.* From there they traveled throughout Europe, as Fillmore and Van Buren had done before them, summering at Lake Geneva, Switzerland. Pierce did not give up on politics, observing from afar the travails of his successor with abundant schadenfreude. He had been baffled by the presidency, but his seasoned successor appeared to manage the affairs of state with no greater effect. Pierce wrote, “considering the promise of what large experience and statesmanship, at the helm, were to accomplish—the change for the better—the palpable improvement, which was to be at once apparent,” yet nowhere to be found, “is quite notable.”
* The Powhatan would later figure prominently in Lincoln’s plan to resupply Fort Sumter.
In October, Kansas held elections for the legislature, the first election in three years in which both sides participated. The military was able to keep the peace, which is not to say the election was fair. One example of the tainted vote was the poll book of the 1,601 alleged voters in Oxford, Kansas, who had all signed in using the exact same handwriting and voted in alphabetical order (corresponding exactly to the Cincinnati Directory). But Governor Walker would not accept this fraud, personally visiting Oxford to see six houses, and found no witnesses to the 1,600 voters who had allegedly come and gone. The free staters had triumphed and would dominate the upcoming legislature. But this still left open the problem of the Lecompton Constitution, drafted a month earlier by pro-slavery delegates after a thoroughly fraudulent election. Knowing they would lose a referendum on the constitution, they were reluctantly persuaded to allow the voters to choose between the constitution “with slavery” or “without slavery.” Even this distinction was qualified; the vote would not affect slaves currently living in the territory. Walker returned to Washington to convince Buchanan that the choice was unacceptable.
That fall, Edward Ruffin* visited his friend John Tyler at Sherwood Forest. Julia appeared “young and blooming . . . though now the mother of six children.”
* Ruffin would fire one of the first shots on Fort Sumter and committed suicide when the Civil War ended.
Tyler was more “thin, or gaunt, than formerly, but still is ruddy, and seems hale and hearty . . . It is to me no subject for surprise, but it would be to every stranger, to see the man who once occupied the station and wielded the power of a Constitutional King—as truly does a President of the United States—to be since, the plain and unassuming country gentleman and farmer, pretending not in the least to anything in position or appearance, because of his former place and power.” Which is not to say that Tyler was not watching developments outside Sherwood Forest. “I do not think we differ much as to the expediency of a separation of the Union,” Ruffin wrote in his diary.
On December 7, the first freely elected Kansas legislature convened, reflecting the free state beliefs of its people. They quickly scheduled a second ratification vote on the Lecompton Constitution for January 4, an up or down measure on the entire document, not just the slavery components. Incredibly, Buchanan fired the territorial secretary, the man who had been acting as governor while Walker had traveled to Washington, and who had signed off on the measure.
That same week, Senator Stephen Douglas arrived at the White House to see President Buchanan. Pro-slavery forces had made an absolute mockery of his cherished popular sovereignty. He had carried their water at great political expense, and all the tragedy that had followed was attributable to their crimes. Now, he would do whatever it took to oppose the admission of Kansas under Lecompton, the very fruits of their actions. As he would later tell a journalist, “In making the fight against this power, I was enabled to stand off and view the men with whom I had been acting; that I was ashamed I had ever been caught in such company; they were a set of unprincipled demagogues, bent upon perpetuating slavery, and by the exercise of that unequal and unfair power, to control the government or break up the Union; and I intend to prevent their doing either.” Despite Douglas’s intentions, the president fancied that he could bring him into line.
During a visit at the White House, Buchanan reminded Douglas of the many powers at his command, including the power of patronage, and the influence of administration-controlled newspapers. “No Democrat ever broke with a Democratic administration without being crushed,” he warned, reflecting on the methods by which Andrew Jackson had brought dissenters to heel.
“Mr. President,” Douglas replied, “I wish to remind you that General Jackson is dead.”
In his first annual message, Buchanan blamed the free staters for Lecompton, as though he had no idea why they might have boycotted the elections that produced the constitution. He pronounced the upcoming referendum on “slavery” or “no slavery” perfectly sufficient, despite the lack of effect it would have on slaves already present. Governor Walker resigned, accusing the president of malfeasance.
One week later, Tyler wrote words of advice to an ambitious young politician. “So much of the future of the country is overcast, that the future of political pursuit becomes a mere myth. Is it worth the pursuit?” he asked. “A long political life opens me to this truth, that those who pursue political advancement are almost always disappointed. Who ever ran the chase with more eagerness than Clay, Calhoun, and Webster? And the goal, always in view, was never reached . . . I have come to the conclusion, therefore, that the surest means of advancement is to discharge faithfully the duties of the position which you may be, and leave the future to take care of itself.” Stephen Douglas could just as easily have written this letter, having pursued the presidency for so long, having previously come so close, and at age forty-four being the front-runner for the 1860 nomination. He would now risk everything to defend the freedom of Kansas.
On December 18, Douglas proposed a bill to scrap both the free state Topeka Constitution and the pro-slavery Lecompton Constitution and to start afresh. Three days later came the scheduled vote in Kansas on the Lecompton Constitution, with pro-slavery forces winning 6,226 to 569 in an election boycotted by free staters. The free state election, held January 4, saw 10,226 voting to reject the Lecompton Constitution entirely while 138 supported it without slavery and 24 with slavery.
Also held that day were elections to offices under the Lecompton Constitution. Once again there were allegations of fraud, with one election judge adding a “5” in front of “35” and 900 voters being accounted for at one location when the real number was closer to 250. Names found in the poll books included those of famous actors, Horace Greeley, and James Buchanan. An investigation was made impossible by the disappearance of polling books shortly after the election. A search discovered three hundred forged ballots buried like treasure. Buchanan’s newly appointed governor, James Denver, told the president that absent the fraud, the free state party had won control of government. Denver proposed a new election of delegates to a new constitutional convention. But on February 2 Buchanan transmitted the application of Kansas to Congress with a proposal for admission as a state under Lecompton. Three months of debate would follow. According to Nevins, “About fifty set speeches were delivered, which changed not one vote in Congress and not a thousand outside.”
The Senate voted first, on March 23, sustaining the administration 33–25. Douglas had held his ground, delivering powerful speeches and voting “no,” but party discipline prevailed, and Douglas was joined by only three northern Democratic senators. All but two southern senators of either party voted “yes.”
But Buchanan would not have the same success in the House, despite a Democratic majority. A compromise fashioned by Senator John Crittenden, which would have admitted Kansas but scheduled a new vote on the constitution, carried 120–112. Lecompton was effectively dead. Many were eager for a face-saving resolution. When applying for statehood, a territory must request a grant of public land. Compromisers supported sending the bill back to Kansas for revision and revote on the pretext that they had requested too much land. Allowing everyone to claim victory, the tactic prevented an embarrassing defeat. When finally before the people of Kansas in a fair election, the Lecompton Constitution was crushed, 11,812–1,926.
Though retaliation could achieve nothing, Buchanan was determined to make good on his threat to Douglas. The president attacked the senator in the administration newspapers, and removed his supporters from federal jobs. He also ordered government employees to attend state nominating conventions to send anti-Douglas delegates to the national presidential convention.
The Buchanan-Douglas feud, initiated by the president to impose a fraudulent pro-slavery constitution upon an unwilling people, and continued out of revenge, would ultimately result in the fall of the Democratic Party. The last truly national organization, with supporters in all parts of the country, its collapse would mean uncharted waters for the United States. But what would rise to fill the void?