James Buchanan

Dear god, the hair. And what's with the look on his face? Is he coming on to us?

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Not to be confused with James M. Buchanan, who was an antidemocratic bastard in his own way.

“”As a nation, we began by declaring that "all men are created equal." We now practically read it "all men are created equal, except Negroes." When the Know Nothings get control, it will read "all men are created equal, except Negroes, foreigners, and Catholics." When it comes to this I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretense of loving liberty — to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocrisy.

—from Abraham Lincoln's letter arguing against bigotry, indirectly giving the middle finger to Buchanan's "Neutrality"

James Buchanan Jr. (1791–1868) was an American traitor who was a flaming state rights doughface and the 15th U.S. President, serving from 1857 to 1861. Originally a member of the deceased Federalist Party, he later joined the Democratic Party.

What you might notice immediately about James Buchanan is that almost everyone who knows about his presidency says outright, or strongly hints, that he was the "Worst US President Ever". American history enthusiasts can assure you that this title is 100% deserved. Buchanan inflicted more damage on his own country than any other president, damage so severe that it took until 1865 and 2021 to even find two competitors, and the adverse impacts of his failures (and his severely defective sense of morality) are still felt today.

He was way worse than Dubya, Saint Reagan, Tricky Dick, Professor Wilson, and even his godawful predecessor and cowardly doughface, Franklin Pierce. The only two competitors he has for the dishonor of being the worst president are Andrew Johnson, who bungled Reconstruction, allowed a stab-in-the-back myth to take hold in the former territory of a racist breakaway nation that formed because of Buchanan, and ended up scaling back Civil Rights for a century, and Donald Trump, who mishandled the COVID-19 pandemic, told many lies, and incited an armed insurrection after a divisive election in which there were fears of civil unrest, but Buchanan is still far worse than even the racist tailor from Tennessee and the man with a tan from New York. "Why is he so bad?", you ask? Simple. His incompetence, passivity, corruption, and pro-slavery sympathies brought about the American Civil War, one of the bloodiest conflicts in the country's history, leaving at least 620,000 Americans dead, an unimaginable death toll placed indirectly on his record. At a time when the country needed stability and order, he blatantly favored the interests of slavers despite claiming neutrality, digging the trenches early between the North and South. If he wasn't enough of a hypocrite, he blamed the abolitionists for blocking the solution to the slavery issue. He then proceeded to insist the slaves were treated with "kindness and humanity", which is an absurd defense for perhaps the worst of America's crimes against humanity and was so stupidly false that it leaves one wondering if Buchanan had defenestrated his common sense. Although he debatably tried to prevent the American Civil War, many of his policies ended up dividing the Union further. Buchanan's passivity on the slavery issue and being frankly evil to the Northern states and territories, is considered by the majority of historians to have been one of the leading causal factors in the outbreak of the American Civil War.

Overall, the Democratic reasoning behind the choice of Buchanan, as the "let's all get along guy", is a lie. He was not only a dyed-in-the-wool racist, but was also very authoritarian and corrupt as president, was all over slavery at any moment you looked, and he left the United States to kick and scream their way through all manner of demons. Sadly, most historians will talk about "how gay he was, and his secret affair with one William Rufus King". The damage done by the toxic presidency of this evil dictator is a topic so underdiscussed, that it is frankly avoided, even when the nation desperately needed to uproot and acknowledge the nation's domestic and racial extremism, that has been caused over generations because of his evil and toxic legacy.

Calm before the storm

Despite what you might think, on paper, Buchanan was remarkably qualified to hold the highest office of Government. He was a member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, was in both houses of Congress, served as Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Minister to Russia, Secretary of State AND Minister to the United Kingdom. Dubya would be crying for such qualifications. Maybe Bush II would be a good President if he had this portfolio. This, however, belies his own personal beliefs, which are remarkably important for being a president. It's weirdly congruent with Nixon: Qualified guy who was a crook and an asshole. Still, he did a lot of quite notable things, good or not. He helped to organize the boy band of Andrew Jackson into the Democratic Party, and was one of his biggest cheerleaders himself. Mentor to student, Jackson's fervent racism and anti-abolitionist beliefs got reflected right onto Buchanan. Perhaps it did not help that Jackson reeeeallyyyyy cozied up to Buchanan ("lol he must be gay then"), and appointed him Minister to Russia. Soon, he was serving in the Senate, where he even stamped on his own clock voting against John C. Calhoun when he attempted to press a gag rule for anti-slavery petitioning. However, he only really opposed it believing it would only further strengthen the abolitionists, and blamed them, as usual, for "making slavery an issue".

Just before his election, he served under the utterly awful doughface from New Hampshire, Franklin Pierce as ambassador to the UK. Early signs of awfulness began to slip onto the surface as he became ever more determined to purchase and annex Cuba. The Pierce administration managed to fuck that up for themselves, pretty much writing that the Spanish should seize it by force if it were not handed over. Along with the rabid controversy caused by the Kansas–Nebraska Act (he literally begged Congress to admit Kansas as a slave state); this utterly failed, as the US does NOT, in fact, have Cuba.^{[citation NOT needed]} Buchanan would never get the chance during his presidency, so his imperialistic racism would have to be put on hold in that regard. Still, when it came down to it, he pretty much thought God had declared the USA had every right to take over the North American continent.

A close observer (perhaps you) may be thinking "How in the name of any deity is this your 'neutral' president?" Well, that's precisely the point. James Buchanan was so obviously pro-slavery, it is rather insulting to call him as such. Then again, the Democratic Party was EXTREMELY stupid in its years of youth. Nevertheless, there's no time to rest on this point, because it is…

Time for an Election!

[*Facepalm*] Oh dear, dear, dear.

The absolute worst part about this all is that Buchanan didn't even desire fully to be president, regardless not discouraging the movement behind him. His lovely platform for election had such wonderful views such as supporting the Fugitive Slave Law, the USA swiping the Gulf of Mexico, and… not being Pierce?? The Democrats nominated him anyway, by the blessing that his foreign tasks meant he wasn't present for the debate on the Kansas–Nebraska Act. Because, of course, not being present means you know the answers,^{Do You Believe That?} and nobody bothered to ask for Buchanan's opinions upon his return. The biggest threat to his victory was the Republican Party, but they were new enough that it was unlikely to be their victory, and people thought the Democratic ideas of benevolent slavery and "popular sovereignty" would solve the slavery issue.

Alas, we know how this ends. But in case you were not aware and were wondering how he became president, Buchanan won. It's hardly a victory to speak of, though. He only won the plurality of the popular vote (to be precise, 45.3% of American men who met their home state's property and racial qualifications took leave of their senses). Had Millard Fillmore or John C. Frémont come out on top in a few key states, there would have been a contingent election. Republicans couldn't even get on the ballot in Southern states. The country was still divided. Regardless of how close it was, Buchanan was about to tear apart the United States barehandedly over a period of four years, so retroactively we can term this a dark, dark day for the United States of America.

"Presidency"

Dred Scott, a man legally declared to be property.

“”There is no such person running as James Buchanan. He is dead of lock-jaw. Nothing remains but a platform and a bloated mass of political putridity.

—Thaddeus Stevens.

Not even more than President-Elect at this point of scribe, Buchanan managed to spit in the face of unity...

Dred Scott case

See the main article on this topic: Dred Scott v. Sandford

Buchanan spearheaded the Dred Scott versus Sandford case as political leverage, and aligned with flaming racist (and former slave owner) Chief Justice Roger Taney, hellbent on using it to settle the slavery issue for good. First, he wrote to Justice John Catron about whether it would be settled before his inaguration. This wasn't enough for Buchanan; he then engaged in a Trump-tier of bullying, by squeezing Justice Robert Cooper Grier, who was from the same state, until he joined the majority in the decision. Even for the time, such actions were extremely unethical. Remember, the entire point of the Supreme Court is to check and balance the actions of the other two branches of government, and if the Executive Branch is actively pressuring then it loses its place as an independent force upholding the Constitution. If one considers that Dred Scott marks the second time in American history that the Supreme Court used its power to nullify a law of Congress through declaring it unconstitutional, this could also be seen as Buchanan using his power to assert authority over the Legislative Branch of government through pressuring the Judicial Branch to overrule them.

Buchanan pretty much revealed that he de facto wanted to destroy the Republican brand in his inaugural address, claiming the Supreme Court would "speedily and finally settle" the matter. In one of the most abhorrent and vile judicial decisions made in the United States ANY country, the Supreme Court basically ruled that black people were not citizens, and "had no rights which the white man was bound to respect". Instead of destroying the Republicans, it caused them to dig their heels hard into the dirt and become even more determined, while the Democratic Party became sharply divided.

He managed to make the list of the worst presidents with his actions, before he had even started doing anything as president.

"Oh, I'm sure it will be better after a while"

Slave states, free states, and territories, with Kansas in question (1856).

“”Violence reached the floor of the United States Senate, where Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina savagely beat Abolitionist Senator Charles Sumner with his cane. Southern sympathizers sent Brooks new canes. Members began carrying knives and pistols into the Chamber. Meanwhile, the Nation's Chief Executive, James Buchanan, did nothing.

—David McCullough narrating The Civil War by Ken Burns.

Now that Buchanan had struck a fissure in the United States with Supreme Court meddling, it was time to do even more damage.

Only half a year into his presidency came the Panic of 1857, which collapsed 1,400 state banks and 5,000 businesses. Thanks to a basis in agriculture, the South got out with minimal repercussion, whereas the North suffered pretty badly in comparison. Rather than offer any measure of support, he joined the South in blaming the North for being greedy capitalists with serious overspeculation issues. Naturally, the people of the Northern states were even more pissed off and suffered while the economy took several years to recover.

While fucking up things in the Utah Territory, he started meddling with the Kansas Territory, in order to further collapse any sense of unity in the Democratic party. He did everything he could to make sure Kansas could only be admitted as a slave state. When he pushed the Lecompton Constitution, it got crushed in the House. Instead of giving up, he pushed the 1858 English Bill, which said "Look, we'll give Kansas statehood and loads of land, ONLY if they come as a slave state". Kansas destroyed this one TOO in a referendum, which widened the split between Northern and Southern Democrats (the Northerners rallied behind Stephen Douglas, who took the belief that it was up to states to determine if they were would allow slavery in their boarders). He was continuously battling from then on to weaken the influence of Douglas, which is just a terrible state to be in. Simply, Buchanan was the President, while Douglas was not.

A painful, agonising last two years

James Buchanan's already terrible presidency went from bad to worse in 1858. He really, really wanted Douglas to lose his seat in the Senate, and did everything in his power to stop him from attaining re-election. He was so obsessed with getting Douglas ousted, hated him so fervently, that he missed the real threat to his entire pro-slavery platform: Abraham Lincoln. Despite losing the opportunity to be in the Senate, Lincoln had become a star, and had equally, convincingly secured anti-abolitionist credentials that he used only to win the presidency in 1860. Not that Buchanan realized the magnitude of the man he let be unleashed, as he was pissed off enough that Douglas was able to hold onto his seat in the Senate. It gets better worse: the Democrats got ruined in the House, as the Republicans swiftly took a massive plurality of 116 seats. It truly was an incredible triumph, as now they had the power to block Buchanan's disgusting agenda, preventing him from doing much of anything.

Instead of taking his loss like a president should and having some sympathy for the Republican cause, the Dark Lord Buchanan ramped up his aggression, and over the next two years would veto seven bills from the Republicans, rather than trying anything bipartisan. He certainly wasn't capable of that, not by any means, all while the South grew more extreme by the month week day hour minute second. The debate about Buchanan's gayness is nothing compared to asking whether he'd love up the South if they were a person,^[WTF?!] because that's what he spent 99% of his time doing.

Buchanan was pretty much crippled at this point, all while tensions got worse and the United States of America shredded itself in front of his eyes. He responded to this predicament by doing nothing. No really,^{[citation NOT needed]} because there is literally no goddamn source on Planet Earth that even gives a whippet of any action by Buchanan to keep the Union … well, united. Ol' Jimmy thought more slavery legislation was much more important, because he just hadn't had enough of that, apparently. In essence, Southern radicals wanted to pass a federal slave code to protect slavery in the territories. They equally declared they'd leave the party if their 1860 platform included popular sovereignty. Douglas and supporters fired back by saying they'd bolt the party if the platform included the slave code. Only Buchanan could reunite the party at this time of division, but he threw away neutrality for cozying up to the Southern extremism. Thanks in all part to being so shit, the Covode Committee was even set up to investigate his administration for corruption, treason, and incompetence, possibly for potential impeachment and they were successful in uprooting many issues of this kind. Despite no grounds for impeachment, they agreed his administration was the most corrupt since the adoption of the Constituion. (I mean, wouldn't your administration be corrupt as fuck, too, if you only appointed loyalists? Even Jackson didn't sink to Buchanan's level in this regard, despite his plague of cabinet infighting.)

Buchanan had utterly succeeded in festering an unhallowed, chilling, and frankly depraved division in the entire United States. He constantly blamed the North and the anti-abolitionists for ruining everything, while having a country-wide house party with a South so far to the right that they fell off the political spectrum.

ATTENTION! CIVIL WAR INEVITABLE!

Don't tell us that Breckinridge doesn't look like a Sith Lord.

By the dawn of the 1860 presidential election, the Democratic division became a tangible reality. While he said he wouldn't run for a second term, it's not as if he'd have ever stood a snowball's chance in hell of getting nominated. Upon Douglas winning the nomination for President, the Southern Democrats did a modern-day GOP, and refused to accept a result like this. They nominated Buchanan's VP, John C. Breckinridge, as a "Southern Democratic nominee". Despite Lincoln not being able to get on the ballot in the Southern states, he utterly pwned the competition. With Abraham Lincoln now the President-Elect of the United States, secession became a reality, thereby forming the Confederate States of America. Instead of realizing how apeshit insane the South was, he blamed the North again in his State of the Union address, for bullying the poor Southerners. He also de facto stated in such address that the federal government didn't have the power to prevent secession. So, the federal government CAN strong arm Supreme Court justices, meddle directly in territories, veto bills like you throw out wrapping paper, and just generally abuse power, but could not be bothered to help the North out with the Panic of 1857, or do anything to try and prevent states from seceding? That's priorities, not "lacking power".

Along with the gift of leaving the presidency in disgrace, he left Lincoln with some other gifts, like an outrageous deficit of $17 million and, even worse, a ticking time bomb, units away from detonating into the bloodiest and most disgusting war in the history of the United States. Notwithstanding the fact that the country has not recovered from the full magnitude of that war. What a happy ending… Luckily, the brave and heroic Abraham Lincoln was just a total legend when it came to dealing with a threat of such immense caliber by taking most proactive (and pragmatic) decisions and cleaning up the mess of this nation that was left by the evil Buchanan.

Legacy

Harper's Weekly lambasts "Old Mother Buchanan's" political cowardice and inaction in the lead-up to the Civil War, 1862.

“”Americans have conveniently misled themselves about the presidency of James Buchanan, preferring to classify him as indecisive and inactive… In fact Buchanan's failing during the crisis over the Union was not inactivity, but rather his partiality for the South, a favoritism that bordered on disloyalty in an officer pledged to defend all the United States. He was that most dangerous of chief executives, a stubborn, mistaken ideologue whose principles held no room for compromise. His experience in government had only rendered him too self-confident to consider other views. In his betrayal of the national trust, Buchanan came closer to committing treason than any other president in American history.

—Jean H. Baker, American historian and biographer.

Buchanan's legacy is just so unbelievable. He managed to wreck the United States more than even the worst presidents after, with the possible exceptions of Andrew Johnson and Donald Trump, and did something that no other President could ever dream of. He nearly destroyed the United States and divided the country even further! No amount of True Christianity, dreams, or ideals could undo what James Buchanan wrought upon the country. So, to put the seal on this article, it's good to recap and summarize everything we discussed about this evil and diabolical traitor to America:

• Managed to be so extremely racist that he was even more of a total racist for his time than Andrew Jackson was, even by today's standards.
  • His presumption of unity and neutrality, only attained by a convenient accident, was squandered by being so pro-South it insults his home state and every other Northern state. A doughface until the end.
• Didn't even want to be President.
• Constantly and blatantly coerced the Supreme Court Justices into supporting the "worst Supreme Court decision ever", according to many accounts.
  • This broke the Democratic Party into two distinct, mutually bitter and hostile, factions.
  • Instead of weakening the Republican Party as he wanted, the party was now unstoppable.
• Refused to even speak a kind word to the North during the Panic of 1857.
• Gave the Mormons in Utah territory an absolute nightmare.
• Bullied Kansas into admittance only as a slave state.
• During midterm elections, instead of being President, he tried extremely hard to block Douglas from winning back his seat in Illinois.
• He vetoed the Morrill Land Grant College Act and Homestead Act that the Senate failed to override.
  • He therefore gave rise to Abraham Lincoln, because he was too focused on hating Douglas.
• Terrible loss in the House of Representatives, to which he responded by vetoing any Republican bills.
• Did not get along or compromise with the Republicans or Congress.
• Did nothing to keep the Union intact.
• Did nothing to pursue peace and avoid the Civil War.
• Did nothing to stop the South from leaving the Union.
• Got titled by the Covode Committee as the most corrupt administration and the most corrupt pre-Civil War president since the formation of the Constitution.
  • Because he tried to buy votes from one of the Republican Congressmen, this led to him to accomplish the dishonor of becoming the second president after John Tyler to be threatened with a serious impeachment investigation; in his case, it was for corruption in his administration. Sadly for the Covode Committee, they could not find enough evidence to help support this allegation that would have proposed the resolution to rightfully impeach, convict, and fire this traitor.
• And through every single screw-up he made, he immediately pissed off the North and the abolitionists by blaming them for everything.

And how could we forget:

• Because of his incompetence and pro-slavery sympathies, he caused the American Civil War through all of this, costing over 620,000 lives, which also leads to:
  • The Confederacy and, post-Confederacy, continued racism and extremism from the South, which has continued to get worse.
  • The Southern Strategy, which resulted from such.
  • The polarization of US politics, stemming from a piss-poor zero attempt at unity.
  • And finally, the magnification of other dire issues such as the Religious Right and anti-intellectualism.
• To make matters worse, he got off scot-free with all the atrocities he committed to this nation!!!

Nothing more needs to be said other than that all these corrupt actions severely ruined his own reputation and career. Except for the fact that on his deathbed, the man had the flagrant, unbelievable gall to declare "History will vindicate my memory from every unjust aspersion." As we can all see, it did no such thing and he was super dead wrong. To add to that, he would never have any chances to redeem himself to the public, as he passed away in June 1868, due to complications from pneumonia and respiratory failure.

Non-exhaustive list. Is there anything good to say?

Well, he did sign the Pacific Telegraph Act, negotiated a trade treaty with China and gave rise to the man who is considered by many to be the best US president ever, Abraham Lincoln, who proved to be the opposite of Buchanan. And hey, at least Joe Biden got an easy road to the title "Best President from Pennsylvania", managing to achieve such in a single day, since Buchanan was such a liability — yyyyeahhh.

So, yes, James Buchanan Jr. is the absolute worst President in United States history. Bar none.

See also

• Abraham Lincoln, his much better successor and arguably the best US president ever. He had no choice but to clean up the whole mess Buchanan left for him by defeating the South in the Civil War in order to reunite the union, ban slavery, and declare freedom for the slaves.
• Andrew Jackson, his genocidal mentor.
• John Tyler, yet another American traitor and a flaming racist state’s rights advocate who was also threatened with an impeachment investigation and infamously supported the traitorous South.
• Andrew Johnson, yet another terrible president who was also a despicable racist. If James Buchanan was the one who broke and divided the Union, then Andrew Johnson was the one that prevented it from being fixed by being abysmally authoritarian around his opponents.
• Joe Biden, another US president from Pennsylvania.
• Woodrow Wilson, yet another terrible president who was a despicable racist and authoritarian as well.
• Donald Trump, yet another terrible president who was a despicable racist and brazenly contemptuous of the concept of civic unity.

References

Presidents of the United States

v - t - e

Washington (I) - J. Adams (Fed.) - Jefferson (Dem-Rep) - Madison (Dem-Rep) - Monroe (Dem-Rep) - J.Q. Adams (Dem-Rep) - Jackson (D) - Van Buren (D) - W.H. Harrison (Whig) - Tyler (Whig) - Polk (D) - Taylor (Whig) - Fillmore (Whig) - Pierce (D) - Buchanan (D) - Lincoln (R) - A. Johnson (D*) - Grant (R) - Hayes (R) - Garfield (R) - Arthur (R) - Cleveland (D) - B. Harrison (R) - Cleveland (D) again - McKinley (R) - T. Roosevelt (R) - Taft (R) - Wilson (D) - Harding (R) - Coolidge (R) - Hoover (R) - F.D. Roosevelt (D) - Truman (D) - Eisenhower (R) - Kennedy (D) - L.B. Johnson (D) - Nixon (R) - Ford (R) - Carter (D) - Reagan (R) - G.H.W. Bush (R) - Clinton (D) - G.W. Bush (R) - Obama (D) - Trump (R) - Biden (D) (incumbent)
*Ran for VP on the "National Union" ticket together with Lincoln but was otherwise a lifelong Democrat