CHAPTER 7
My only object is to save the country [and] to save the Whig party, if possible.
—MILLARD FILLMORE
Fillmore ~ Tyler ~ Pierce ~ Buchanan ~ Van Buren
From his perch as presiding officer of the Senate, Vice President Fillmore had a unique vantage point of the mess he was about to inherit. In the wake of the 30th Congress, the country continued to divide along sectional lines. With the encouragement of President Taylor, California was preparing to apply for admission as a free state, without any offsets for the South. Texas claimed a significant part of New Mexico as its own, threatening military force against its territorial neighbor. The South was clamoring for an expansion of slave territory and furious over the increasing refusal of northern states to surrender fugitive slaves.
Buchanan noted with trepidation the increasingly toxic feeling throughout the South. “They are preparing for the impending struggle with far more unanimity, determination, and intensity of purpose than they have ever yet displayed.”
Despite another presidential defeat, Henry Clay had returned to the Senate with one final service left to render. As he had with the Missouri Compromise and the Compromise of 1833, he put together a proposal to prevent catastrophe. His plan called for the admission of California as a free state; organization of the remainder of the Mexican cession without any reference to slavery; to fix Texas’s western border without any new territory, and in exchange Texas’s debts would be assumed by the national government; to end the slave trade in the District of Columbia but to maintain the legality of slavery there for as long as Maryland did so; a pronouncement by Congress that it had no power to interfere with the interstate slave trade; and a stronger fugitive slave law.
On March 4, a gravely ill John C. Calhoun reappeared in the Senate after some time away. His mind still sharp but his body otherwise, the task of delivering his address fell to Senator John Mason of Virginia. The South was faced with a choice between abolition and secession, he argued. There was no compromise to make. The South had nothing left to give. Calhoun had once toasted, “The Union—next to our liberty most dear.” Nothing could save that Union now, he argued, but for slavery in the territories, a stronger fugitive slave law, and for the North to cease agitating the slavery issue. With weeks to live, these words served as a coda to a career that had begun under President James Madison.
“Calhoun’s speech does him no credit,” Tyler thought. “It is too ultra, and his ultimata impracticable.” Even Tyler, opponent of the Missouri Compromise, would publicly lend his support to Clay’s proposals, giving critical cover to southern members who wished to vote in favor.
But what would the North say? On March 7, the leading voice of that region weighed in for Clay’s compromise. Senator Daniel Webster of Massachusetts argued that since the climate of the New Mexico Territory would never permit slavery, why “reenact the will of God?” To adopt the Wilmot Proviso over land where slavery was impossible was a gratuitous insult to the South. His speech was a candid acknowledgment of the bad feelings that pervaded the country. It was an honest prediction of the horrors that would result in the event of secession. And it was a masterful case for the advantages that all regions enjoyed from being in one Union. Webster’s speech was widely discussed throughout the country. His credibility was the product of decades of opposition to slavery. The three most influential senators of the past twenty years, Clay, Calhoun, and Webster, had now all spoken. Calhoun’s “all or nothing” tack sounded even more discordant after Webster’s generous address.
The leading northern voice against compromise would be William Seward, now a senator from New York. He called for the immediate admission of California, the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, and the Wilmot Proviso for the territories. He spoke of a “higher law” than the Constitution, a terrifying prospect to southerners who believed that document provided the surest protection for slavery.
President Taylor was stridently opposed to any compromise. His firmness threatened to break the presidential mold, which called for mollifying the South. A delegation from Dixie lobbied Taylor at the White House, to no avail. Southern political leaders called for a June convention in Nashville to consider secession. Taylor promised to raise an army and personally ride at its head to put down any rebellion in the South. Matters seemed destined for a collision.
Fillmore told Taylor that if required to break a tie in the Senate, he would support the compromise. “I wished him to understand,” Fillmore wrote, “that it was not out of any hostility to him or his administration but the vote would be given, because I deemed it for the interests of the country.”
On July 9, Fillmore was presiding over the Senate when a messenger came from the White House—the president was deathly sick. The day Zachary Taylor died, Millard Fillmore passed the only sleepless night of his life, consumed by the enormous responsibility that would now devolve on him. Eighteen months earlier, he had been the comptroller of New York. That night he was president of the United States, facing the most formidable threat that had ever been presented to the Union.
The cabinet offered their resignations; Fillmore accepted them all. Taylor’s cabinet had been far from effective; several were about to be fired over a conflict of interest scandal. President Fillmore moved quickly to surround himself with high-caliber men representing different regions of the country. For the first position he chose Daniel Webster, who had fulfilled the role of secretary of state for Harrison and Tyler.
The death of Taylor may well have created the most abrupt about face of presidential policy in history. Would his opposition to the compromise have brought Civil War a decade earlier? Would the South have been unified in secession? Would the popular, southern slaveholding general have seen off the crisis, preventing the Civil War entirely? Such things can never be known. But with Taylor’s passing the presidential tradition of conciliation remained intact. Fillmore favored the compromise; now it was a matter of getting it to his desk. Due to Taylor’s veto threat, Clay had been forced to combine his proposals in a single bill, in the hopes that he could be induced to sign it. Extreme factions north and south working together succeeded in killing the legislation. Clay, exhausted after seventy speeches over six months, took a leave of absence. Into the void stepped Stephen Douglas of Illinois. With a supportive president, the legislation could move in pieces, with the sectional blocs voting for or against bills as they pleased, but with a core group of centrists providing the majority for every measure. This strategy would require a careful sequencing of bills, but it was the only way.
While the tactics of compromise were being worked out, Texas moved aggressively to establish civil authority over New Mexico. In a message to Congress, Fillmore promised to respond to this for what it was—a criminal invasion. He underscored his words by dispatching 750 additional troops to the region.
Bill by bill, the compromise measures passed, in substantially the same form that Clay proposed, and Fillmore rapidly signed them into law—all but one, where he hesitated. The requirement that runaway slaves be returned to their masters can be found in the Constitution and was critical in securing southern ratification. The particulars were left to Congress, which passed the first Fugitive Slave Act in 1793. Ultimately, the northern states resisted, withholding the use of their police and jails, and adopting “personal liberty laws,” guaranteeing jury trials for accused slaves, who were likely to be acquitted. A tougher fugitive slave law was an indispensible component of the compromise. Years later, Fillmore replied to an autograph seeker who asked for a sentiment on the measure, revealing his thoughts as the bill sat on his desk. “Permit me to speak frankly,” he answered. “I am and ever have been opposed to slavery and nothing but a conviction of Constitutional obligation could have induced me to give my sanction to a law for the reduction of fugitive slaves. I knew that when I signed it I signed my political death warrant, and by its execution arranged against myself the most fanatical hostility . . . but that man is not worthy of public confidence, who hesitates to perform his official duty, regardless of all consequences to himself.” The new act required federal law enforcement to assist in the capture of runaway slaves; it prohibited jury trials for accused slaves, and made it a federal crime to interfere with a slave capture. Fillmore hated the bill, but he hated the prospect of civil war more. A month earlier, Fillmore had solicited funds for his coachman to purchase the freedom of his wife and children, even contributing his own money to the project. But his private sentiments would yield to what he saw as the national interest.
Resistance to the new fugitive slave law was widespread throughout the North. Committees of Vigilance were established to protect runaway slaves. One of these groups freed an alleged fugitive from a Boston courtroom and from the custody of federal marshals. In September a slaveowner from Maryland arrived near Buchanan’s home in Pennsylvania, looking for two of his slaves. The master was killed, and his son gravely injured. In western New York, an armed mob broke into the building where an accused slave was awaiting trial, freeing him and sending him on his way to Canada.
Certain elements of the South believed that they had been on the losing end of the compromise. Fillmore learned that extremists in South Carolina planned on seizing federal installations at Charleston. As he had with Texas, Fillmore acted decisively, inviting General Winfield Scott to cabinet meetings. He poured federal troops into South Carolina and positioned others in North Carolina that could strike if necessary. The South Carolina legislature, through their governor, demanded an explanation. Fillmore, through his State Department, made clear that he was the commander-in-chief of the army and navy, that the decision to direct troops was entirely within his discretion, and that he was not answerable to the governor, the legislature, or anyone else. In his first year in office, Fillmore had successfully pushed for the Compromise of 1850, which had settled the threat of civil war, and responded with authority to military action threatened by two different states. Fillmore had not entered national politics as a supporter of Andrew Jackson, like Franklin Pierce, or advanced his career as an ally of Jackson, like Buchanan, Polk, or Van Buren. Fillmore, as an Anti-Mason and Whig, had always been a political opponent of Jackson. Tyler, in his war on the bank and pursuit of Texas, may be said to have served out Jackson’s third term. Nor was Fillmore a general, like Harrison or Taylor. But by finding the right balance of firmness and flexibility, Fillmore had prevented civil war and ironically was the most Jacksonian of any president of the era.
Historian Allen Nevins once remarked, “Ideas rule the world, and ideas conjoined with art make the swiftest conquest of men.” Harriet Beecher Stowe, encouraged by her husband, had for ten years struggled in literary pursuits, to no great effect. Her fortunes changed in March 1852 with the publication of her first book, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. By 1853, “300,000 copies had been sold and eight power presses were running night and day to keep pace with the demand.” Stowe’s depiction of slavery horrified readers throughout the North and around the world, and was ultimately published in half of all known languages. The Duchess of Sutherland, joined by other British women with similar titles, wrote “The Stafford House Address,” a plea to the ladies of the South to help bring about slavery’s demise. Julia Tyler responded, in what the New York Times referred to as the extension of the Monroe Doctrine from our shores to our institutions. “If you wish a suggestion as to the suitable occupation of your idle hours,” Julia wrote, “I will point you to the true field of your philanthropy—the unsupplied wants of your own people of England. In view of your palaces, there is misery and suffering enough to excite your most active sympathies. . . . The negro of the South,” Tyler argued, “lives sumptuously in comparison with the 100,000 of the white population of London.” She reminded slavery’s English critics of the plight of Ireland. “Spare from the well fed negroes of these states one drop of your superabounding sympathy, to pour into that bitter cup which is overrunning with sorrow and with tears.”
Despite Julia’s charges of hypocrisy against slavery’s critics, Uncle Tom’s Cabin would have an immeasurable effect on the country, increasing support for abolition in the North and defensiveness of the institution in the South.
For ten years, Franklin Pierce had acceded to his wife’s wishes, focusing on his family and the practice of law in Concord (his military exploits in Mexico excepted). As the Democratic Party searched for a candidate to take back the White House in 1852, his friends were interested in putting him forward. Formidable candidates such as Douglas and Buchanan were the names most mentioned, but with the front-runners engaged in a pitched battle and the 2/3 rule for nomination in place, all signs pointed to another compromise candidate. Pierce had been reticent, but finally gave his supporters what they needed, writing in April that if “the success of the cause” could be promoted by his nomination, “then you must judge for me in view of all the circumstances.” Pierce signed off on the strategy of presenting his name after the leading candidates had bloodied each other for several rounds.
On an otherwise ordinary day, Pierce and his wife were out in their carriage when a fast-riding messenger overtook them. “Mr. Pierce, you’ve been nominated for United States President.” Jane, who had married an ambitious young congressman only to push him out of politics, was now looking at his potential return, at the highest level of government. She fainted at the news. The plan of Pierce and his supporters had worked out; Pierce, whose name did not appear until the thirty-fifth ballot, was the nominee on the forty-ninth.
John Tyler felt it was “obvious . . . from an early hour . . . that none of those who had been most prominently spoken of could be selected.
“While I hold all the gentlemen whose names were before the convention in the highest respect, yet I must say, without disparagement to any, that the nomination which has been made is destined to carry with it quite as much, if not more, influence in the election than any other that could have been made,” he said, predicting Pierce’s election “as next to certain.” This letter was published nationally in support of Pierce’s candidacy.
From his fellow Whigs, Fillmore received support north and south for another bid. Conventions throughout the South nominated him for re-election. He had even won a deathbed endorsement from Henry Clay. But Fillmore had resolved not to seek another term. His desire for a peaceful retirement had twice been disturbed, first by Whigs in his home state and then by the 1848 convention. After his turbulent time in office, no one could begrudge his return to private life. He also doubted whether he could win, since the Compromise of 1850 had been tough medicine for both North and South. Fillmore had planned to announce his retirement in his annual message, but was dissuaded by supporters in Virginia, where he was popular, in order to help the Whigs win the upcoming state elections. On two other occasions, Fillmore was deterred from bowing out. Supporters of the compromise believed he was the only Whig who could win. While refusing to rule himself out, Fillmore did nothing to promote his candidacy, despite control of patronage, or to check the efforts of Daniel Webster, his secretary of state, who was running again despite having only months to live. Webster, who believed himself a failure for not having won the presidency, was running for this reason, rather than because of any serious support. The same could not be said for Winfield Scott, commanding general of the army. Scott won support from those who opposed the compromise as well as those who believed that, yet again, a general presented the best chance for victory. Seward hoped to nominate Scott, driving southerners from the Whigs, and creating a new northern party that would then elect him to the presidency in 1856. Fillmore, who had determined to save his country by any means necessary and his party if possible, could have had the nomination if he had only grasped for it. But he did not. On the first ballot, he won 133 delegates to 131 for Winfield Scott and 29 for Daniel Webster. Scott prevailed on the fifty-third ballot. The Whigs were finished; Fillmore would be successful only in saving his country.
Pierce’s defeated rival, James Buchanan, had become good friends with Robert Tyler, the former president’s son, who had moved north and become a prominent Philadelphian. Buchanan, who had been talked about for national office for two decades, was sanguine about the Pierce nomination, writing “For the first time I have had a fair trial and have been fairly defeated.”
Buchanan wrote, “General Pierce is a sound radical Democrat of the old Jeffersonian school, and possesses highly respectable abilities. I think he is firm and energetic, without which no man is fit to be President.” Buchanan went out on the stump for Pierce, who came under fire for his actions in Mexico. “Frank Pierce a coward! That man a coward, who, when his country was involved in a foreign war, abandoned a lucrative and honorable profession and all the sweets and comforts of domestic life in his own happy family, to become a private volunteer soldier in the ranks! How preposterous!” Pierce’s friend from college days, Nathaniel Hawthorne, now the bestselling author of The Scarlet Letter, wrote a campaign biography on his behalf.* Martin Van Buren, returned from his Free Soil dalliance, endorsed Pierce in a letter.
* Nathaniel Hawthorne was appointed consul at Liverpool by President Pierce. The position paid a good salary and accrued to its holder a fee from every ship heading to or from the United States, while giving him time to write. The product of this trip, Our Old Home, would later be the subject of much controversy regarding Pierce.
Pierce prevailed in a landslide, winning 254–42 in the Electoral College, and carrying twenty-seven states to Scott’s four. Buchanan watched yet another of his colleagues overtake him, this one thirteen years younger. With the presidency seeming forever out of reach, Buchanan focused on his niece, who was making the rounds in Philadelphia society. She wrote him after “an elegant dinner,” where she met a former president. “Mr. Van Buren treated me with marked attention—drank wine with me first at table—talked a great deal of you, & thinks you treated him shabbily last summer, by passing so near without stopping to see him. I tell you these things, as I think they show a desire on his part to meet you.” The next day Harriet was headed to dinner at Robert Tyler’s.
Buchanan wrote her back, saying “your sentences ran into each other without proper periods,” admonishing her on her writing and reminding her to mind her social etiquette.
Franklin Pierce, president-elect of the United States, sat toward the front of the train car, his wife Jane to his side, his boy Benny in front of him. Surrounded by his family, he steamed out of Andover. He was on his way to New Hampshire to put some affairs in order. From there, he would proceed to Washington to be sworn in. Without warning the train was off the tracks hurtling toward a cliff. Pierce grabbed Jane with one arm and reached forward for Benny in the seat ahead. As his arm swept forward for his son, the car slammed on its side and slipped over the edge. The fifteen-foot fall must have seemed an eternity, ended by the crashing of the train on the rocks below. The sixty passengers quickly moved to assess the damage, perhaps shocked to be alive and mostly unhurt. Butthe window next to Benny had fallen upon a giant rock, the impact of which removed the top part of his head. Before their very eyes, the Pierces lost their only child.
A journey that had begun with such bright prospects had ended in tragedy.