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Franklin Pierce

Franklin Pierce (November 23, 1804 – October 8, 1869) was the 14th president of the United States, serving from 1853 to 1857. A northern Democrat who believed that the abolitionist movement was a fundamental threat to the nation's unity, he alienated anti-slavery groups by signing the Kansas–Nebraska Act and enforcing the Fugitive Slave Act. Conflict between North and South continued after Pierce's presidency, and, after Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860, the Southern states seceded, resulting in the American Civil War.

Franklin Pierce
Portrait by Mathew Brady, c. 1855–1865
14th President of the United States
In office
March 4, 1853 – March 4, 1857
Vice President
Preceded byMillard Fillmore
Succeeded byJames Buchanan
United States Senator
from New Hampshire
In office
March 4, 1837 – February 28, 1842
Preceded byJohn Page
Succeeded byLeonard Wilcox
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives
from New Hampshire's at-large district
In office
March 4, 1833 – March 3, 1837
Preceded byJoseph Hammons
Succeeded byJared W. Williams
Speaker of the
New Hampshire House of Representatives
In office
January 5, 1831 – January 2, 1833
Preceded bySamuel C. Webster
Succeeded byCharles G. Atherton
Member of the
New Hampshire House of Representatives
from Hillsborough
In office
January 7, 1829 – January 2, 1833
Preceded byThomas Wilson
Succeeded byHiram Monroe
Personal details
Born(1804-11-23)November 23, 1804
Hillsborough, New Hampshire, U.S.
DiedOctober 8, 1869(1869-10-08) (aged 64)
Concord, New Hampshire, U.S.
Resting placeOld North Cemetery
Concord, New Hampshire, U.S.
Political partyDemocratic
Spouse
(m. 1834; died 1863)
Children3
Parent
RelativesBenjamin Kendrick Pierce (brother)
Education
Profession
  • Politician
  • lawyer
Signature
Military service
Branch/service
Years of service
  • 1831–1847 (Militia)
  • 1847–1848 (Army)
Rank
Battles/wars

Pierce was born in New Hampshire, the son of state governor Benjamin Pierce. He served in the House of Representatives from 1833 until his election to the Senate, where he served from 1837 until his resignation in 1842. His private law practice was a success, and he was appointed New Hampshire's U.S. Attorney in 1845. Pierce took part in the Mexican–American War as a brigadier general in the United States Army. Democrats saw him as a compromise candidate uniting Northern and Southern interests, and nominated him for president on the 49th ballot at the 1852 Democratic National Convention. He and running mate William R. King easily defeated the Whig Party ticket of Winfield Scott and William A. Graham in the 1852 presidential election.

As president, Pierce attempted to enforce neutral standards for civil service while also satisfying the Democratic Party's diverse elements with patronage, an effort that largely failed and turned many in his party against him. He was a Young America expansionist who signed the Gadsden Purchase of land from Mexico and led a failed attempt to acquire Cuba from Spain. He signed trade treaties with Britain and Japan and his Cabinet reformed its departments and improved accountability, but political strife during his presidency overshadowed these successes. His popularity declined sharply in the Northern states after he supported the Kansas–Nebraska Act, which nullified the Missouri Compromise, while many Southern whites continued to support him. The act's passage led to violent conflict over the expansion of slavery in the American West. Pierce's administration was further damaged when several of his diplomats issued the Ostend Manifesto calling for the annexation of Cuba, a document that was roundly criticized. He fully expected the Democrats to renominate him in the 1856 presidential election, but they abandoned him and his bid failed. His reputation in the North suffered further during the American Civil War as he became a vocal critic of President Abraham Lincoln.

Pierce was popular and outgoing, but his family life was difficult; his three children died young and his wife, Jane Pierce, suffered from illness and depression for much of her life.[1] Their last surviving son was killed in a train accident while the family was traveling, shortly before Pierce's inauguration. A heavy drinker for much of his life, Pierce died in 1869 of cirrhosis. As a result of his support of the South, as well as failing to hold the Union together in time of strife, historians and scholars generally rank Pierce as one of the worst[2] as well as least memorable U.S. presidents.

Early life and family

 
The Franklin Pierce Homestead in Hillsborough, New Hampshire, where Pierce grew up, is now a National Historic Landmark.[3] He was born in a nearby log cabin as the homestead was being completed.[note 2]

Childhood and education

Franklin Pierce was born on November 23, 1804, in a log cabin in Hillsborough, New Hampshire. He was a sixth-generation descendant of Thomas Pierce, who had moved to the Massachusetts Bay Colony from Norwich, Norfolk, England in about 1634. His father Benjamin was a lieutenant in the American Revolutionary War who moved from Chelmsford, Massachusetts to Hillsborough after the war, purchasing 50 acres (20 ha) of land. Pierce was the fifth of eight children born to Benjamin and his second wife Anna Kendrick; his first wife Elizabeth Andrews died in childbirth, leaving a daughter. Benjamin was a prominent Democratic-Republican[note 3] state legislator, farmer, and tavern-keeper. During Pierce's childhood, his father was deeply involved in state politics, while two of his older brothers fought in the War of 1812; public affairs and the military were thus a major influence in his early life.[6]

Pierce's father ensured that his sons were educated, and placed Pierce in a school at Hillsborough Center in childhood and sent him to the town school in Hancock at age 12.[note 4] Not fond of schooling, Pierce grew homesick and walked 12 miles (19 km) back to his home one Sunday. His father fed him dinner and drove him part of the distance back to school before ordering him to walk the rest of the way in a thunderstorm. Pierce later cited this moment as "the turning-point in my life".[8] Later that year, he transferred to Phillips Exeter Academy to prepare for college. By this time, he had built a reputation as a charming student, sometimes prone to misbehavior.[8]

 
Novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne, a lifelong friend of Pierce, wrote the biography The Life of Franklin Pierce in support of Pierce's 1852 presidential campaign.[9]

In fall 1820, Pierce entered Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, one of 19 freshmen. He joined the Athenian Society, a progressive literary society, alongside Jonathan Cilley (later elected to Congress) and Nathaniel Hawthorne, with whom he formed lasting friendships. He was the last in his class after two years, but he worked hard to improve his grades and graduated in fifth place in 1824[10] in a graduating class of 14.[11] John P. Hale enrolled at Bowdoin in Pierce's junior year; he became a political ally of Pierce's and then his rival. Pierce organized and led an unofficial militia company called the Bowdoin Cadets during his junior year, which included Cilley and Hawthorne. The unit performed drill on campus near the president's house, until the noise caused him to demand that it halt. The students rebelled and went on strike, an event that Pierce was suspected of leading.[12] During his final year at Bowdoin, he spent several months teaching at Hebron Academy in rural Hebron, Maine, where he earned his first salary and his students included future Congressman John J. Perry.[13][14]

Pierce read law briefly with former New Hampshire Governor Levi Woodbury, a family friend in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.[15] He then spent a semester at Northampton Law School in Northampton, Massachusetts, followed by a period of study in 1826 and 1827 under Judge Edmund Parker in Amherst, New Hampshire. He was admitted to the New Hampshire bar in late 1827 and began to practice in Hillsborough.[16] He lost his first case, but soon proved capable as a lawyer. Despite never being a legal scholar, his memory for names and faces served him well, as did his personal charm and deep voice.[17] In Hillsborough, his law partner was Albert Baker, who had studied law under Pierce and was the brother of Mary Baker Eddy.[18]

Hillsborough and State politics

By 1824, New Hampshire was a hotbed of partisanship, with figures such as Woodbury and Isaac Hill laying the groundwork for a party of Democrats in support of General Andrew Jackson. They opposed the established Federalists (and their successors, the National Republicans), who were led by sitting President John Quincy Adams. The work of the New Hampshire Democratic Party came to fruition in March 1827, when their pro-Jackson nominee, Benjamin Pierce, won the support of the pro-Adams faction and was elected governor of New Hampshire essentially unopposed. While the younger Pierce had set out to build a career as an attorney, he was fully drawn into the realm of politics as the 1828 presidential election between Adams and Jackson approached. In the state elections held in March 1828, the Adams faction withdrew their support of Benjamin Pierce, voting him out of office,[note 5] but Franklin Pierce won his first election, a one-year term as Hillsborough's town meeting moderator, a position to which he was reelected five times.[19]

Pierce actively campaigned in his district on behalf of Jackson, who carried both the district and the nation by large margins in the November 1828 election, even though he lost New Hampshire. The outcome further strengthened the Democratic Party, and Pierce won his first legislative seat the following year, representing Hillsborough in the New Hampshire House of Representatives. Pierce's father was elected again as governor, retiring after that term. The younger Pierce was appointed as chairman of the House Education Committee in 1829 and the Committee on Towns the following year. By 1831 the Democrats held a legislative majority, and Pierce was elected Speaker of the House. The young Speaker used his platform to oppose the expansion of banking, protect the state militia, and offer support to the national Democrats and Jackson's re-election effort. At 27, he was a star of the New Hampshire Democratic Party. Though attaining early political and professional success, in his personal letters he continued to lament his bachelorhood and yearned for a life beyond Hillsborough.[20]

Like all white males in New Hampshire between the ages of 18 and 45, Pierce was a member of the state militia, and was appointed aide de camp to Governor Samuel Dinsmoor in 1831. He remained in the militia until 1847, and attained the rank of colonel before becoming a brigadier general in the Army during the Mexican–American War.[21][22] Interested in revitalizing and reforming the state militias, which had become increasingly dormant during the years of peace following the War of 1812, Pierce worked with Alden Partridge, president of Norwich University, a military college in Vermont, and Truman B. Ransom and Alonzo Jackman, Norwich faculty members and militia officers, to increase recruiting efforts and improve training and readiness.[23][24] Pierce served as a Norwich University trustee from 1841 to 1859, and received the honorary degree of LL.D. from Norwich in 1853.[25]

In late 1832, the Democratic Party convention nominated Pierce for one of New Hampshire's five seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. This was tantamount to election for the young Democrat, as the National Republicans had faded as a political force, while the Whigs had not yet begun to attract a large following. Democratic strength in New Hampshire was also bolstered by Jackson's landslide re-election that year.[26] New Hampshire had been a marginal state politically, but from 1832 through the mid-1850s became the most reliably Democratic state in the Northern United States, boosting Pierce's political career.[27] Pierce's term began in March 1833, but he would not be sworn in until Congress met in December, and his attention was elsewhere. He had recently become engaged and bought his first house in Hillsborough. Franklin and Benjamin Pierce were among the prominent citizens who welcomed President Jackson to the state on his visit in mid-1833.[26]

Marriage and children

 
Pious and reserved, Jane Pierce was her husband's opposite in many ways.[28][29][30]

On November 19, 1834, Pierce married Jane Means Appleton (March 12, 1806 – December 2, 1863), a daughter of Congregational minister Jesse Appleton and Elizabeth Means. The Appletons were prominent Whigs, in contrast with the Pierces' Democratic affiliation. Jane Pierce was shy, devoutly religious, and pro-temperance, encouraging Pierce to abstain from alcohol. She was somewhat gaunt, and constantly ill from tuberculosis and psychological ailments. She abhorred politics and especially disliked Washington, DC, creating a tension that would continue throughout Pierce's political ascent.[28][29][30]

Jane Pierce disliked Hillsborough as well, and in 1838, the Pierces relocated to the state capital, Concord, New Hampshire.[31] They had three sons, all of whom died in childhood. Franklin Jr. (February 2–5, 1836) died in infancy, while Frank Robert (August 27, 1839 – November 14, 1843) died at the age of four from epidemic typhus. Benjamin (April 13, 1841 – January 6, 1853) died at the age of 11 in a train accident.[32]

Congressional career

U.S. House of Representatives

Pierce departed in November 1833 for Washington, D.C., where the Twenty-third United States Congress convened its regular session on December 2. Jackson's second term was under way, and the House of Representatives had a strong Democratic majority, whose primary focus was to prevent the Second Bank of the United States from being rechartered. The Democrats, including Pierce, defeated proposals supported by the newly formed Whig Party, and the bank's charter expired. Pierce broke from his party on occasion, opposing Democratic bills to fund internal improvements with federal money. He saw both the bank and infrastructure spending as unconstitutional, with internal improvements the responsibility of the states. Pierce's first term was fairly uneventful from a legislative standpoint, and he was easily re-elected in March 1835. When not in Washington, he attended to his law practice, and in December 1835 returned to the capital for the Twenty-fourth Congress.[33]

As abolitionism grew more vocal in the mid-1830s, Congress was inundated with petitions from anti-slavery groups seeking legislation to restrict slavery in the United States. From the beginning, Pierce found the abolitionists' "agitation" to be an annoyance, and saw federal action against slavery as an infringement on southern states' rights, even though he was morally opposed to slavery itself.[34] He was also frustrated with the "religious bigotry" of abolitionists, who cast their political opponents as sinners.[35] "I consider slavery a social and political evil," Pierce said, "and most sincerely wish that it had no existence upon the face of the earth."[36] Still, he wrote in December 1835, "One thing must be perfectly apparent to every intelligent man. This abolition movement must be crushed or there is an end to the Union."[37] After the Civil War, Pierce believed that if the North had not aggressively agitated against Southern slavery, the South would have eventually ended slavery on its own and that the conflict had been "brought upon the nation by fanatics on both sides".[38]

When Rep. James Henry Hammond of South Carolina looked to prevent anti-slavery petitions from reaching the House floor, however, Pierce sided with the abolitionists' right to petition. Nevertheless, Pierce supported what came to be known as the gag rule, which allowed for petitions to be received, but not read or considered. This passed the House in 1836.[34] He was attacked by the New Hampshire anti-slavery Herald of Freedom as a "doughface", which had the dual meaning of "craven-spirited man" and "northerner with southern sympathies".[39] Pierce had stated that not one in 500 New Hampshirites were abolitionists; the Herald of Freedom article added up the number of signatures on petitions from that state, divided by the number of residents according to the 1830 census, and suggested the actual number was one-in-33. Pierce was outraged when South Carolina Senator John C. Calhoun read the article on the Senate floor as "proof" that New Hampshire was a hotbed of abolitionism. Calhoun apologized after Pierce replied to him in a speech which stated that most signatories were women and children, who could not vote, which therefore cast doubt on the one-in-33 figure.[40]

U.S. Senate

 
Pierce in 1852

The resignation in May 1836 of Senator Isaac Hill, who had been elected governor of New Hampshire, left a short-term opening to be filled by the state legislature, and with Hill's term as senator due to expire in March 1837, the legislature also had to fill the six-year term to follow. Pierce's candidacy for the Senate was championed by state Representative John P. Hale, a fellow Athenian at Bowdoin. After much debate, the legislature chose John Page to fill the rest of Hill's term. In December 1836, Pierce was elected to the full term, to commence in March 1837, and at age 32, was at the time one of the youngest members in Senate history. The election came at a difficult time for Pierce, as his father, sister, and brother were all seriously ill, while his wife also continued to suffer from chronic poor health. As senator, he was able to help his old friend Nathaniel Hawthorne, who often struggled financially, procuring for him a sinecure as measurer of coal and salt at the Boston Customs House that allowed the author time to continue writing.[41]

Pierce voted the party line on most issues and was an able senator, but not an eminent one; he was overshadowed by the Great Triumvirate of Calhoun, Henry Clay, and Daniel Webster, who dominated the Senate.[42] Pierce entered the Senate at a time of economic crisis, as the Panic of 1837 had begun. He considered the depression a result of the banking system's rapid growth, amidst "the extravagance of overtrading and the wilderness of speculation".[43] So that federal money would not support speculative bank loans, he supported newly elected Democratic president Martin Van Buren and his plan to create an independent treasury, a proposal which split the Democratic Party. Debate over slavery continued in Congress, and abolitionists proposed its end in the District of Columbia, where Congress had jurisdiction. Pierce supported a resolution by Calhoun against this proposal, which Pierce considered a dangerous stepping stone to nationwide emancipation.[43] Meanwhile, the Whigs were growing in congressional strength, which would leave Pierce's party with only a small majority by the end of the decade.[44]

One topic of particular importance to Pierce was the military. He challenged a bill which would expand the ranks of the Army's staff officers in Washington without any apparent benefit to line officers at posts in the rest of the country. He took an interest in military pensions, seeing abundant fraud within the system, and was named chairman of the Senate Committee on Military Pensions in the Twenty-sixth Congress (1839–1841). In that capacity, he urged the modernization and expansion of the Army, with a focus on militias and mobility rather than on coastal fortifications, which he considered outdated.[45]

Pierce campaigned vigorously throughout his home state for Van Buren's re-election in the 1840 presidential election. The incumbent carried New Hampshire but lost the election to the Whig candidate, military hero William Henry Harrison. The Whigs took a majority of seats in the Twenty-seventh Congress. Harrison died after a month in office, and Vice President John Tyler succeeded him. Pierce and the Democrats were quick to challenge the new administration, questioning the removal of federal officeholders, and opposing Whig plans for a national bank. In December 1841 Pierce decided to resign from Congress, something he had been planning for some time.[46] New Hampshire Democrats insisted that their state's U. S. senators be limited to one six-year term, so he had little likelihood of re-election. Also, he was frustrated at being a member of the legislative minority and wished to devote his time to his family and law practice.[47] His last actions in the Senate in February 1842 were to oppose a bill distributing federal funds to the states – believing that the money should go to the military instead – and to challenge the Whigs to reveal the results of their investigation of the New York Customs House, where the Whigs had probed for Democratic corruption for nearly a year but had issued no findings.[48]

Party leader

Lawyer and politician

 
The Concord, New Hampshire house where Pierce lived from 1842 to 1848 is now known as the Pierce Manse. The house was restored in the 1970s and is now maintained as a historic attraction.[49]

Despite his resignation from the Senate, Pierce had no intention of leaving public life. The move to Concord had given him more opportunities for cases, and allowed Jane Pierce a more robust community life.[50] Jane had remained in Concord with her young son Frank and her newborn Benjamin for the latter part of Pierce's senate term, and this separation had taken a toll on the family. Pierce, meanwhile, had begun a demanding but lucrative law partnership with Asa Fowler during congressional recesses.[51] Pierce returned to Concord in early 1842, and his reputation as a lawyer continued to flourish. Known for his gracious personality, eloquence, and excellent memory, Pierce attracted large audiences in court. He would often represent poor people for little or no compensation.[52]

Pierce remained involved in the state Democratic Party, which was split by several issues. Governor Hill, who represented the commercial, urban wing of the party, advocated the use of government charters to support corporations, granting them privileges such as limited liability and eminent domain for building railroads. The radical "locofoco" wing of his party represented farmers and other rural voters, who sought an expansion of social programs and labor regulations and a restriction on corporate privilege. The state's political culture grew less tolerant of banks and corporations after the Panic of 1837, and Hill was voted out of office. Pierce was closer to the radicals philosophically, and reluctantly agreed to represent Hill's adversary in a legal dispute regarding ownership of a newspaper—Hill lost, and founded his own paper, of which Pierce was a frequent target.[53]

In June 1842 Pierce was named chairman of the State Democratic Committee, and in the following year's state election he helped the radical wing take over the state legislature. The party remained divided on several issues, including railroad development and the temperance movement, and Pierce took a leading role in helping the state legislature settle their differences. His priorities were "order, moderation, compromise, and party unity", which he tried to place ahead of his personal views on political issues.[54] As he would as president, Pierce valued Democratic Party unity highly, and saw the opposition to slavery as a threat to that.[55]

Democratic James K. Polk's dark horse victory in the 1844 presidential election was welcome news to Pierce, who had befriended the former Speaker of the House while both served in Congress. Pierce had campaigned heavily for Polk during the election, and in turn Polk appointed him as United States Attorney for New Hampshire.[56] Polk's most prominent cause was the annexation of Texas, an issue which caused a dramatic split between Pierce and his former ally Hale, now a U.S. Representative. Hale was so impassioned against adding a new slave state that he wrote a public letter to his constituents outlining his opposition to the measure.[57] Pierce responded by re-assembling the state Democratic convention to revoke Hale's nomination for another term in Congress.[58] The political firestorm led to Pierce severing ties with his longtime friend, and with his law partner Fowler, who was a Hale supporter.[59] Hale refused to withdraw, and as a majority vote was needed for election in New Hampshire, the party split led to deadlock and a vacant House seat. Eventually, the Whigs and Hale's Independent Democrats took control of the legislature, elected Whig Anthony Colby as governor and sent Hale to the Senate, much to Pierce's anger.[60]

Mexican–American War

 
Pierce in his brigadier general's uniform

Active military service was a long-held dream for Pierce, who had admired his father's and brothers' service in his youth, particularly his older brother Benjamin's, as well as that of John McNeil Jr., husband of Pierce's older half-sister Elizabeth. As a legislator, he was a passionate advocate for volunteer militias. As a militia officer himself, he had experience mustering and drilling bodies of troops. When Congress declared war against Mexico in May 1846, Pierce immediately volunteered to join, although no New England regiment yet existed. His hope to fight in the Mexican–American War was one reason he refused an offer to become Polk's Attorney General. General Zachary Taylor's advance slowed in northern Mexico, and General Winfield Scott proposed capturing the port of Vera Cruz and driving overland to Mexico City. Congress passed a bill authorizing the creation of ten regiments, and Pierce was appointed commander and colonel of the 9th Infantry Regiment in February 1847, with Truman B. Ransom as lieutenant colonel and second-in-command.[61]

 
Pierce's brief term as a general in the Mexican–American War boosted his public image.[62]

On March 3, 1847, Pierce was promoted to brigadier general, and took command of a brigade of reinforcements for General Scott's army, with Ransom succeeding to command of the regiment. Needing time to assemble his brigade, Pierce reached the already-seized port of Vera Cruz in late June, where he prepared a march of 2,500 men accompanying supplies for Scott. The three-week journey inland was perilous, and the men fought off several attacks before joining with Scott's army in early August, in time for the Battle of Contreras.[63] The battle was disastrous for Pierce: his horse was suddenly startled during a charge, knocking him groin-first against his saddle. The horse then tripped into a crevice and fell, pinning Pierce underneath and debilitating his knee.[64] The incident made it look like he had fainted, causing one soldier to call for someone else to take command, "General Pierce is a damned coward."[65] Pierce returned for the following day's action, but re-injured his knee, forcing him to hobble after his men; by the time he caught up, the battle was mostly won.[65]

As the Battle of Churubusco approached, Scott ordered Pierce to the rear to convalesce. He responded, "For God's sake, General, this is the last great battle, and I must lead my brigade." Scott yielded, and Pierce entered the fight tied to his saddle, but the pain in his leg became so great that he passed out on the field. The Americans won the battle and Pierce helped negotiate an armistice. He then returned to command and led his brigade throughout the rest of the campaign, eventually taking part in the capture of Mexico City in mid-September, although his brigade was held in reserve for much of the battle.[66] For much of the Mexico City battle, he was in the sick tent, plagued with acute diarrhea.[65] Pierce remained in command of his brigade during the three-month occupation of the city; while frustrated with the stalling of peace negotiations, he also tried to distance himself from the constant conflict between Scott and the other generals.[66]

Pierce was finally allowed to return to Concord in late December 1847. He was given a hero's welcome in his home state, and submitted his resignation from the Army, which was approved on March 20, 1848. His military exploits elevated his popularity in New Hampshire, but his injuries and subsequent troubles in battle led to accusations of cowardice which would long shadow him. He had demonstrated competence as a general, especially in the initial march from Vera Cruz, but his short tenure and his injury left little for historians to judge his ability as a military commander.[62]

Ulysses S. Grant, who had the opportunity to observe Pierce firsthand during the war, countered the allegations of cowardice in his memoirs, written several years after Pierce's death: "Whatever General Pierce's qualifications may have been for the Presidency, he was a gentleman and a man of courage. I was not a supporter of him politically, but I knew him more intimately than I did any other of the volunteer generals."[67]

Return to New Hampshire

 
By the 1850s, Pierce had become a de facto leader of the New Hampshire Democratic Party.[68]

Returning to Concord, Pierce resumed his law practice; in one notable case he defended the religious liberty of the Shakers, the insular sect threatened with legal action over accusations of abuse. His role as a party leader, however, continued to take up most of his attention. He continued to wrangle with Senator Hale, who was anti-slavery and had opposed the war, stances that Pierce regarded as needless agitation.[68]

The large Mexican Cession of land divided the United States politically, with many in the North insisting that slavery not be allowed there (and offering the Wilmot Proviso to ensure it), while others wanted slavery barred north of the Missouri Compromise line of 36°30′ N. Both proposals were anathema to many Southerners, and the controversy split the Democrats. At the 1848 Democratic National Convention, the majority nominated former Michigan senator Lewis Cass for president, while a minority broke off to become the Free Soil Party, backing former president Van Buren. The Whigs chose General Zachary Taylor, a Louisianan, whose views on most political issues were unknown. Despite his past support for Van Buren, Pierce supported Cass, turning down the quiet offer of second place on the Free Soil ticket, and was so effective that Taylor, who was elected president, was held in New Hampshire to his lowest percentage in any state.[69]

Senator Henry Clay, a Whig, hoped to put the slavery question to rest with a set of proposals that became known as the Compromise of 1850. These would give victories to North and South, and gained the support of his fellow Whig, Webster. With the bill stalled in the Senate, Illinois Senator Stephen A. Douglas led a successful effort to split it into separate measures so that each legislator could vote against the parts his state opposed without endangering the overall package. The bills passed, and were signed by President Millard Fillmore (who had succeeded Taylor after the president's death earlier in 1850).[70] Pierce strongly supported the compromise, giving a well-received speech in December 1850 pledging himself to "The Union! Eternal Union!"[71] The same month, the Democratic candidate for governor, John Atwood, issued a letter opposing the Compromise, and Pierce helped to recall the state convention and remove Atwood from the ticket.[71] The fiasco compromised the election for the Democrats, who lost several races; still, Pierce's party retained its control over the state, and was well positioned for the upcoming presidential election.[72]

Election of 1852

 
Campaign poster for the Pierce/King ticket

As the 1852 presidential election approached, the Democrats were divided by the slavery issue, though most of the "Barnburners" who had left the party with Van Buren to form the Free Soil Party had returned. It was widely expected that the 1852 Democratic National Convention would result in deadlock, with no major candidate able to win the necessary two-thirds majority. New Hampshire Democrats, including Pierce, supported his old teacher, Levi Woodbury, by then an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, as a compromise candidate, but Woodbury's death in September 1851 opened up an opportunity for Pierce's allies to present him as a potential dark horse in the mold of Polk. New Hampshire Democrats felt that, as the state in which their party had most consistently gained Democratic majorities, they should supply the presidential candidate. Other possible standard-bearers included Douglas, Cass, William Marcy of New York, James Buchanan of Pennsylvania, Sam Houston of Texas, and Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri.[73][74]

Despite home state support, Pierce faced obstacles to his nomination, since he had been out of office for a decade, and lacked the front-runners' national reputation. He publicly declared that such a nomination would be "utterly repugnant to my tastes and wishes", but given the desire of New Hampshire Democrats to see one of their own elected, he knew his future influence depended on his availability to run.[75] Thus, he quietly allowed his supporters to lobby for him, with the understanding that his name would not be entered at the convention unless it was clear none of the front-runners could win. To broaden his potential base of southern support as the convention approached, he wrote letters reiterating his support for the Compromise of 1850, including the controversial Fugitive Slave Act.[75][76]

The convention assembled on June 1 in Baltimore, and the deadlock occurred as expected. On the first ballot of the 288 delegates, held on June 3, Cass claimed 116, Buchanan 93, and the rest were scattered, without a single vote for Pierce. The next 34 ballots passed with no winner even close, and still no votes for Pierce. The Buchanan team then had their delegates vote for minor candidates, including Pierce, to demonstrate Buchanan's inevitability, and unite the convention behind him. This novel tactic backfired after several ballots as Virginia, New Hampshire, and Maine switched to Pierce; the remaining Buchanan forces began to break for Marcy, and Pierce was soon in third place. After the 48th ballot, North Carolina Congressman James C. Dobbin delivered an unexpected and passionate endorsement of Pierce, sparking a wave of support for the dark horse candidate. On the 49th ballot, Pierce received all but six of the votes, and thus gained the Democratic nomination for president. Delegates selected Alabama Senator William R. King, a Buchanan supporter, as Pierce's running mate, and adopted a platform that rejected further "agitation" over the slavery issue and supported the Compromise of 1850.[77][78]

When word reached New Hampshire of the result, Pierce found it difficult to believe, and his wife fainted. Their son Benjamin wrote to his mother hoping that Franklin's candidacy would not be successful, as he knew she would not like to live in Washington.[79]

 
This anti-Pierce political cartoon depicts him as weak and cowardly.

The Whig candidate was General Scott, Pierce's commander in Mexico; his running mate was Secretary of the Navy William A. Graham. The Whigs could not unify their factions as the Democrats had, and the convention adopted a platform almost indistinguishable from that of the Democrats, including support of the Compromise of 1850. This incited the Free Soilers to field their own candidate, Senator Hale of New Hampshire, at the expense of the Whigs. The lack of political differences reduced the campaign to a bitter personality contest and helped to dampen voter turnout to its lowest level since 1836; according to biographer Peter A. Wallner, it was "one of the least exciting campaigns in presidential history".[80][81] Scott was harmed by the lack of enthusiasm of anti-slavery northern Whigs for him and the platform; New-York Tribune editor Horace Greeley summed up the attitude of many when he said of the Whig platform, "we defy it, execrate it, spit upon it".[82]

 
Electoral map of the 1852 presidential election

Pierce kept quiet so as not to upset his party's delicate unity, and allowed his allies to run the campaign. It was the custom at the time for candidates to not appear to seek the office, and he did no personal campaigning.[83][84][85] Pierce's opponents caricatured him as an anti-Catholic coward and alcoholic ("the hero of many a well-fought bottle").[86][84] Scott, meanwhile, drew weak support from the Whigs, who were torn by their pro-Compromise platform and found him to be an abysmal, gaffe-prone public speaker.[84] The Democrats were confident: a popular slogan was that the Democrats "will pierce their enemies in 1852 as they poked [that is, Polked] them in 1844."[87] This proved to be true, as Scott won only Kentucky, Tennessee, Massachusetts and Vermont, finishing with 42 electoral votes to Pierce's 254. With 3.2 million votes cast, Pierce won the popular vote with 50.9 to 44.1 percent. A sizable block of Free Soilers broke for Pierce's in-state rival, Hale, who won 4.9 percent of the popular vote.[88][89] The Democrats took large majorities in Congress.[90]

Presidency (1853–1857)

Transition and train crash

 
Jane Pierce and "Benny", whose death cast a shadow over Pierce's term in office[91]

Pierce began his presidency in mourning. Weeks after his election, on January 6, 1853, the President-elect and his family were traveling from Boston by train when their car derailed and rolled down an embankment near Andover, Massachusetts. Both Franklin and Jane Pierce survived, but their only remaining son, 11-year-old Benjamin, was crushed to death in the wreckage, his body nearly decapitated. Pierce was not able to hide the gruesome sight from his wife. They both suffered severe depression afterward, which likely affected Pierce's performance as president.[91][92] Jane Pierce wondered if the train accident was divine punishment for her husband's pursuit and acceptance of high office. She wrote a lengthy letter of apology to "Benny" for her failings as a mother.[91] She avoided social functions for much of her first two years as First Lady, making her public debut in that role to great sympathy at the annual public reception held at the White House on New Year's Day, 1855.[93]

When Franklin Pierce departed New Hampshire for the inauguration, Jane Pierce chose not to accompany him. Pierce, then the youngest man to be elected president, chose to affirm his oath of office on a law book rather than swear it on a Bible, as all his predecessors except John Quincy Adams, who swore on a book of law,[94] had done. He was the first president to deliver his inaugural address from memory.[95] In the address he hailed an era of peace and prosperity at home and urged a vigorous assertion of U.S. interests in its foreign relations, including the "eminently important" acquisition of new territories. "The policy of my Administration", said the new president, "will not be deterred by any timid forebodings of evil from expansion." Avoiding the word "slavery", he emphasized his desire to put the "important subject" to rest and maintain a peaceful union. He alluded to his own personal tragedy, telling the crowd, "You have summoned me in my weakness, you must sustain me by your strength."[96]

Administration and political strife

 
BEP-engraved portrait of Pierce as president

In his Cabinet appointments, Pierce sought to unite a party that was squabbling over the fruits of victory. Most in the party had not originally supported him for the nomination, and some had allied with the Free Soil party to gain victory in local elections. Pierce decided to allow each of the party's factions some appointments, even those that had not supported the Compromise of 1850.[97]

All of Pierce's cabinet nominations were unanimously and immediately confirmed by the Senate.[98] Pierce spent the first few weeks of his term sorting through hundreds of lower-level federal positions to be filled. This was a chore, as he sought to represent all factions of the party, and could fully satisfy none of them. Partisans found themselves unable to secure positions for their friends, which put the Democratic Party on edge and fueled bitterness between factions. Before long, northern newspapers accused Pierce of filling his government with pro-slavery secessionists, while southern newspapers accused him of abolitionism.[98]

Factionalism between the pro- and anti-administration Democrats ramped up quickly, especially within the New York Democratic Party. The more conservative Hardshell Democrats or "Hards" of New York were deeply skeptical of the Pierce administration, which was associated with Marcy (who became Secretary of State) and the more moderate New York faction, the Softshell Democrats or "Softs".[99]

 
Vice President William R. King died a little more than one month into his term, leaving a vacancy that could not be filled.

Buchanan had urged Pierce to consult Vice President-elect King in selecting the Cabinet, but Pierce did not do so—Pierce and King had not communicated since they had been selected as candidates in June 1852. By the start of 1853, King was severely ill with tuberculosis, and went to Cuba to recuperate. His condition deteriorated, and Congress passed a special law, allowing him to be sworn in before the American consul in Havana on March 24. Wanting to die at home, he returned to his plantation in Alabama on April 17 and died the next day. The office of vice president remained vacant for the remainder of Pierce's term, as the Constitution then had no provision for filling the vacancy. This extended vacancy meant that for nearly the entirety of Pierce's presidency the Senate President pro tempore, initially David Atchison of Missouri, was next in line to the presidency.[100]

Pierce sought to run a more efficient and accountable government than his predecessors.[101] His Cabinet members implemented an early system of civil service examinations, a forerunner to the Pendleton Act passed three decades later, which mandated that most positions in the U.S. government should be awarded on the basis of merit, not patronage.[102] The Interior Department was reformed by Secretary Robert McClelland, who systematized its operations, expanded the use of paper records, and pursued fraud.[103] Another of Pierce's reforms was to expand the role of the U.S. attorney general in appointing federal judges and attorneys, which was an important step in the eventual development of the Justice Department.[101] There was a vacancy on the Supreme Court—Fillmore, having failed to get Senate confirmation for his nominees, had offered it to newly elected Louisiana Senator Judah P. Benjamin, who had declined. Pierce also offered the seat to Benjamin, and when the Louisianan persisted in his refusal,[104] nominated instead John Archibald Campbell, an advocate of states' rights; this would be Pierce's only Supreme Court appointment.[105]

Economic policy and internal improvements

 
Indian Peace Medal depicting Pierce

Pierce charged Treasury Secretary James Guthrie with reforming the Treasury, which was inefficiently managed and had many unsettled accounts. Guthrie increased oversight of Treasury employees and tariff collectors, many of whom were withholding money from the government. Despite laws requiring funds to be held in the Treasury, large deposits remained in private banks under the Whig administrations. Guthrie reclaimed these funds and sought to prosecute corrupt officials, with mixed success.[106]

Secretary of War Jefferson Davis, at Pierce's request, led surveys by the Corps of Topographical Engineers of possible transcontinental railroad routes throughout the country. The Democratic Party had long rejected federal appropriations for internal improvements, but Davis felt that such a project could be justified as a Constitutional national security objective. Davis also deployed the Army Corps of Engineers to supervise construction projects in the District of Columbia, including the expansion of the United States Capitol and building of the Washington Monument.[107]

Foreign and military affairs

The Pierce administration aligned with the expansionist Young America movement, with Marcy leading the charge as Secretary of State. Marcy sought to present to the world a distinctively American, republican image. He issued a circular recommending that U.S. diplomats wear "the simple dress of an American citizen" instead of the elaborate diplomatic uniforms worn in the courts of Europe, and that they only hire American citizens to work in consulates.[108][109] Marcy received international praise for his 73-page letter defending Austrian refugee Martin Koszta, who had been captured abroad in mid-1853 by the Austrian government despite his intention to become a U.S. citizen.[110][111]

Davis, an advocate of a southern transcontinental route, persuaded Pierce to send rail magnate James Gadsden to Mexico to buy land for a potential railroad. Gadsden was also charged with re-negotiating the provisions of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo which required the U.S. to prevent Native American raids into Mexico from New Mexico Territory. Gadsden negotiated a treaty with Mexican President Antonio López de Santa Anna in December 1853, purchasing a large swath of land to America's southwest. Negotiations were nearly derailed by William Walker's unauthorized expedition into Mexico, and so a clause was included charging the U.S. with combating future such attempts.[112][113] Congress reduced the Gadsden Purchase to the region now comprising southern Arizona and part of southern New Mexico; the price was cut from $15 million to $10 million. Congress also included a protection clause for a private citizen, Albert G. Sloo, whose interests were threatened by the purchase. Pierce opposed the use of the federal government to prop up private industry and did not endorse the final version of the treaty, which was ratified nonetheless.[114][113] The acquisition brought the contiguous United States to its present-day boundaries, excepting later minor adjustments.[115]

Relations with Great Britain needed resolution, as American fishermen were upset at the British Royal Navy's increasing enforcement of Canadian territorial waters. Marcy completed a trade reciprocity agreement with British minister to Washington, John Crampton, which reduced the need for British coastline enforcement. Buchanan was sent as minister to London to pressure the British government, which was slow to support a new treaty. A favorable reciprocity treaty was ratified in August 1854, which Pierce saw as a first step towards the American annexation of Canada.[116][117] While the administration negotiated with Britain over the Canada–United States border, U.S. interests were also an issue in Central America, where the Clayton–Bulwer Treaty of 1850 had failed to keep Great Britain from expanding its influence in the region. Gaining the advantage over Britain in the region was a key part of Pierce's expansionist goals.[118][119]

British consuls in the United States sought to enlist Americans for the Crimean War in 1854, in violation of neutrality laws, and Pierce eventually expelled minister Crampton and three consuls. To the President's surprise, the British did not expel Buchanan in retaliation. In his December 1855 State of the Union message to Congress, Pierce had set forth the American case that Britain had violated the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty. The British, according to Buchanan, were impressed by the message and were rethinking their policy. Nevertheless, Buchanan was not successful in getting the British to abandon their Central American possessions. The Canadian treaty was ratified by Congress, the British parliament, and by the colonial legislatures in Canada.[120]

Pierce's administration aroused sectional apprehensions when three U.S. diplomats in Europe drafted a proposal to the president to purchase Cuba from Spain for $120 million (USD), and justify the "wresting" of it from Spain if the offer were refused. The publication of the Ostend Manifesto, which had been drawn up at the insistence of Secretary of State Marcy, provoked the scorn of northerners who viewed it as an attempt to annex a slave-holding possession to bolster Southern interests. It helped discredit the expansionist policy of Manifest Destiny the Democratic Party had often supported.[121][122]

Pierce favored expansion and a substantial reorganization of the military. Secretary of War Davis and Navy Secretary James C. Dobbin found the Army and Navy in poor condition, with insufficient forces, a reluctance to adopt new technology, and inefficient management.[123] Under the Pierce administration, Commodore Matthew C. Perry visited Japan (a venture originally planned under Fillmore) in an effort to expand trade to the East. Perry wanted to encroach on Asia by force, but Pierce and Dobbin pushed him to remain diplomatic. Perry signed a modest trade treaty with the Japanese shogunate which was successfully ratified.[124][125] The 1856 launch of the USS Merrimac, one of six newly commissioned steam frigates, was one of Pierce's "most personally satisfying" days in office.[126]

Bleeding Kansas

 
The Kansas–Nebraska Act organized Kansas (in pink) and Nebraska Territory (yellow).

The greatest challenge to the country's equilibrium during the Pierce administration was the passage of the Kansas–Nebraska Act. Organizing the largely unsettled Nebraska Territory, which stretched from Missouri to the Rocky Mountains, and from Texas north to what is now the Canada–United States border, was a crucial part of Douglas's plans for western expansion. He wanted a transcontinental railroad with a link from Chicago to California, through the vast western territory. Organizing the territory was necessary for settlement as the land would not be surveyed nor put up for sale until a territorial government was authorized. Those from slave states had never been content with western limits on slavery, and felt it should be able to expand into territories procured with blood and treasure that had come, in part, from the South. Douglas and his allies planned to organize the territory and let local settlers decide whether to allow slavery. This would repeal the Missouri Compromise of 1820, as most of it was north of the 36°30′ N line the Missouri Compromise deemed "free". The territory would be split into a northern part, Nebraska, and a southern part, Kansas, and the expectation was that Kansas would allow slavery and Nebraska would not.[127][128][129] In the view of pro-slavery Southern politicians, the Compromise of 1850 had already annulled the Missouri Compromise by admitting the state of California, including territory south of the compromise line, as a free state.[130]

Pierce had wanted to organize the Nebraska Territory without explicitly addressing the matter of slavery, but Douglas could not get enough Southern votes to accomplish this.[131] Pierce was skeptical of the bill, knowing it would result in bitter opposition from the North. Douglas and Davis convinced him to support the bill regardless. It was tenaciously opposed by northerners such as Ohio Senator Salmon P. Chase and Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner, who rallied public sentiment in the North against the bill. Northerners had been suspicious of the Gadsden Purchase, moves towards Cuba annexation, and the influence of slaveholding Cabinet members such as Davis, and saw the Nebraska bill as part of a pattern of southern aggression. The result was a political firestorm that did great damage to Pierce's presidency.[127][128][129]

Pierce and his administration used threats and promises to keep most Democrats on board in favor of the bill. The Whigs split along sectional lines; the conflict destroyed them as a national party. The Kansas–Nebraska Act was passed in May 1854 and ultimately defined the Pierce presidency. The political turmoil that followed the passage saw the short-term rise of the nativist and anti-Catholic American Party, often called the Know Nothings, and the founding of the Republican Party.[127][128][129]

 
Northerners resented Pierce's attempted expansion of slavery through Kansas–Nebraska and Cuba.[132][133] In this 1856 cartoon, a Free Soiler is held down by Pierce, Buchanan, and Cass while Douglas shoves "Slavery" (depicted as a black man) down his throat.

Even as the act was being debated, settlers on both sides of the slavery issue poured into the territories so as to secure the outcome they wanted in the voting. The passage of the act resulted in so much violence between groups that the territory became known as Bleeding Kansas. Thousands of pro-slavery Border Ruffians came across from Missouri to vote in the territorial elections although they were not resident in Kansas, giving that element the victory. Pierce supported the outcome despite the irregularities. When Free-Staters set up a shadow government, and drafted the Topeka Constitution, Pierce called their work an act of rebellion. The president continued to recognize the pro-slavery legislature, which was dominated by Democrats, even after a Congressional investigative committee found its election to have been illegitimate. He dispatched federal troops to break up a meeting of the Topeka government.[134][135]

Passage of the act coincided with the seizure of escaped slave Anthony Burns in Boston. Northerners rallied in support of Burns, but Pierce was determined to follow the Fugitive Slave Act to the letter, and dispatched federal troops to enforce Burns's return to his Virginia owner despite furious crowds.[136][137]

The midterm congressional elections of 1854 and 1855 were devastating to the Democrats (as well as to the Whig Party, which was on its last legs). The Democrats lost almost every state outside the South. The administration's opponents in the North worked together to return opposition members to Congress, though only a few northern Whigs gained election. In Pierce's New Hampshire, hitherto loyal to the Democratic Party, the Know-Nothings elected the governor, all three representatives, dominated the legislature, and returned John P. Hale to the Senate. Anti-immigrant fervor brought the Know-Nothings their highest numbers to that point, and some northerners were elected under the auspices of the new Republican Party.[132][133]

1856 election

 
Partisan violence spilled into Congress in May 1856 when Free Soil Senator Charles Sumner was assaulted with a walking cane by Democratic Rep. Preston Brooks in the Senate chamber.[138]

Pierce fully expected to be renominated by the Democrats. In reality, his chances of winning the nomination (let alone the general election) were slim. The administration was widely disliked in the North for its position on the Kansas–Nebraska Act, and Democratic leaders were aware of Pierce's electoral vulnerability. Nevertheless, his supporters began to plan for an alliance with Douglas to deny James Buchanan the nomination. Buchanan had solid political connections and had been safely overseas through most of Pierce's term, leaving him untainted by the Kansas debacle.[139][140][141]

When balloting began on June 5 at the convention in Cincinnati, Ohio, Pierce expected a plurality, if not the required two-thirds majority. On the first ballot, he received only 122 votes, many of them from the South, to Buchanan's 135, with Douglas and Cass receiving the rest. By the following morning fourteen ballots had been completed, but none of the three main candidates were able to get two-thirds of the vote. Pierce, whose support had been slowly declining as the ballots passed, directed his supporters to break for Douglas, withdrawing his name in a last-ditch effort to defeat Buchanan. Douglas, only 43 years of age, believed that he could be nominated in 1860 if he let the older Buchanan win this time, and received assurances from Buchanan's managers that this would be the case. After two more deadlocked ballots, Douglas's managers withdrew his name, leaving Buchanan as the clear winner. To soften the blow to Pierce, the convention issued a resolution of "unqualified approbation" in praise of his administration and selected his ally, former Kentucky Representative John C. Breckinridge, as the vice-presidential nominee.[139][140][141] This loss marked the only time in U.S. history that an elected president who was an active candidate for reelection was not nominated by his political party for a second term.[note 6][142]

Pierce endorsed Buchanan, though the two remained distant; he hoped to resolve the Kansas situation by November to improve the Democrats' chances in the general election. He installed John W. Geary as territorial governor, who drew the ire of pro-slavery legislators.[143] Geary was able to restore order in Kansas, though the electoral damage had already been done—Republicans used "Bleeding Kansas" and "Bleeding Sumner" (the brutal caning of Charles Sumner by South Carolina Representative Preston Brooks in the Senate chamber) as election slogans.[144] The Buchanan/Breckinridge ticket was elected, but the Democratic percentage of the popular vote in the North fell from 49.8 percent in 1852 to 41.4 in 1856 as Buchanan won only five of sixteen free states (Pierce had won fourteen), and in three of those, Buchanan won because of a split between the Republican candidate, former California senator John C. Frémont and the Know Nothing, former president Fillmore.[145]

Pierce did not temper his rhetoric after losing the nomination. In his final message to Congress, delivered in December 1856, he vigorously attacked Republicans and abolitionists. He took the opportunity to defend his record on fiscal policy, and on achieving peaceful relations with other nations.[146][147] In the final days of the Pierce administration, Congress passed bills to increase the pay of army officers and to build new naval vessels, also expanding the number of seamen enlisted. It also passed a tariff reduction bill he had long sought.[148] Pierce and his cabinet left office on March 4, 1857, the only time in U.S. history that the original cabinet members all remained for a full four-year term.[149]

Post-presidency (1857–1869)

 
Portrait by George Peter Alexander Healy. Pierce, seen here in 1858, remained a vocal political figure after his presidency.[150]

After leaving the White House, the Pierces remained in Washington for more than two months, staying with former Secretary of State William L. Marcy.[151] Buchanan altered course from the Pierce administration, replacing all his appointees. The Pierces eventually moved to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, where Pierce had begun to speculate in property. Seeking warmer weather, he and Jane spent the next three years traveling, beginning with a stay in Madeira and followed by tours of Europe and the Bahamas.[150] In Rome, he visited Nathaniel Hawthorne; the two men spent much time together and the author found the retired president as buoyant as ever.[152]

Pierce never lost sight of politics during his travels, commenting regularly on the nation's growing sectional conflict. He insisted that northern abolitionists stand down to avoid a southern secession, writing that the bloodshed of a civil war would "not be along Mason and Dixon's line merely", but "within our own borders in our own streets".[150] He also criticized New England Protestant ministers, who largely supported abolition and Republican candidates, for their "heresy and treason".[150] The rise of the Republican Party forced the Democrats to defend Pierce; during his debates with Republican Senate candidate Abraham Lincoln in 1858, Douglas called the former president "a man of integrity and honor".[153]

As the Democratic Convention of 1860 approached, some asked Pierce to run as a compromise candidate that could unite the fractured party, but Pierce refused. As Douglas struggled to attract southern support, Pierce backed Cushing and then Breckinridge as potential alternatives, but his priority was a united Democratic Party. The split Democrats were soundly defeated for the presidency by the Republican candidate, Lincoln. In the months between Lincoln's election, and his inauguration on March 4, 1861, Pierce looked on as several southern states began plans to secede. He was asked by Justice Campbell to travel to Alabama and address that state's secession convention. Due to illness he declined, but sent a letter appealing to the people of Alabama to remain in the Union, and give the North time to repeal laws against southern interests and to find common ground.[154]

Civil War

After efforts to prevent the Civil War ended with the firing on Fort Sumter, Northern Democrats, including Douglas, endorsed Lincoln's plan to bring the Southern states back into the fold by force. Pierce wanted to avoid war at all costs, and wrote to Van Buren, proposing an assembly of former U.S. presidents to resolve the issue, but this suggestion was not acted on. "I will never justify, sustain or in any way or to any extent uphold this cruel, heartless, aimless, unnecessary war," Pierce wrote to his wife.[154] Pierce publicly opposed President Lincoln's order suspending the writ of habeas corpus, arguing that even in a time of war, the country should not abandon its protection of civil liberties. This stand won him admirers with the emerging Northern Peace Democrats, but others saw the stand as further evidence of Pierce's southern bias.[155]

In September 1861, Pierce traveled to Michigan, visiting his former Interior Secretary, McClelland, former senator Cass, and others. A Detroit bookseller, J. A. Roys, sent a letter to Lincoln's Secretary of State, William H. Seward, accusing the former president of meeting with disloyal people, and saying he had heard there was a plot to overthrow the government and establish Pierce as president. Later that month, the pro-administration Detroit Tribune printed an item calling Pierce "a prowling traitor spy", and intimating that he was a member of the pro-Confederate Knights of the Golden Circle. No such conspiracy existed, but a Pierce supporter, Guy S. Hopkins, sent to the Tribune a letter purporting to be from a member of the Knights of the Golden Circle, indicating that "President P." was part of a plot against the Union.[156][157] Hopkins intended for the Tribune to make the charges public, at which point Hopkins would admit authorship, thus making the Tribune editors seem overly partisan and gullible. Instead, the Tribune editors forwarded the Hopkins letter to government officials. Seward then ordered the arrest of possible "traitors" in Michigan, which included Hopkins. Hopkins confessed authorship of the letter and admitted the hoax, but despite this, Seward wrote to Pierce demanding to know if the charges were true. Pierce denied them, and Seward hastily backtracked. Later, Republican newspapers printed the Hopkins letter in spite of his admission that it was a hoax, and Pierce decided that he needed to clear his name publicly. When Seward refused to make their correspondence public, Pierce publicized his outrage by having a Senate ally, California's Milton Latham, read the letters between Seward and Pierce into the Congressional record, to the administration's embarrassment.[156][157]

The institution of the draft and the arrest of outspoken anti-administration Democrat Clement Vallandigham further incensed Pierce, who gave an address to New Hampshire Democrats in July 1863 vilifying Lincoln. "Who, I ask, has clothed the President with power to dictate to any one of us when we must or when we may speak, or be silent upon any subject, and especially in relation to the conduct of any public servant?", he demanded.[158][159] Pierce's comments were ill-received in much of the North, especially as his criticism of Lincoln's aims coincided with the twin Union victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg. Pierce's reputation in the North was further damaged the following month when the Mississippi plantation of the Confederate president, Jefferson Davis, was seized by Union soldiers. Pierce's correspondence with Davis, all pre-war, revealing his deep friendship with Davis and predicting that civil war would result in insurrection in the North, was sent to the press. Pierce's words hardened abolitionist sentiment against him.[158][159]

Jane Pierce died of tuberculosis in Andover, Massachusetts in December 1863; she was buried at Old North Cemetery in Concord, New Hampshire. Pierce was further grieved by the death of his close friend Nathaniel Hawthorne in May 1864; he was with Hawthorne when the author died unexpectedly. Hawthorne had controversially dedicated his final book to Pierce. Some Democrats tried again to put Pierce's name up for consideration as the 1864 presidential election unfolded, but he kept his distance; Lincoln easily won a second term. When news spread of Lincoln's assassination in April 1865, a mob gathered outside Pierce's home in Concord, demanding to know why he had not raised a flag as a public mourning gesture. Pierce grew angry, expressing sadness over Lincoln's death but denying any need for a public gesture. He told them that his history of military and public service proved his patriotism, which was enough to quiet the crowd.[160]

Final years and death

Pierce's drinking impaired his health in his last years, and he grew increasingly spiritual. He had a brief relationship with an unknown woman in mid-1865. During this time, he used his influence to improve the treatment of Davis, now a prisoner at Fort Monroe in Virginia. He also offered financial help to Hawthorne's son Julian, as well as to his own nephews. On the second anniversary of Jane's death, Pierce was baptized into his wife's Episcopal faith at St. Paul's Church in Concord. He found this church to be less political than his former Congregational denomination, which had alienated Democrats with anti-slavery rhetoric. He took up the life of an "old farmer", as he called himself, buying up property, drinking less, farming the land himself, and hosting visiting relatives.[161] He spent most of his time in Concord and his cottage at Little Boar's Head on the coast, sometimes visiting Jane's relatives in Massachusetts. Still interested in politics, he expressed support for Andrew Johnson's Reconstruction policy and supported the president's acquittal in his impeachment trial; he later expressed optimism for Johnson's successor, Ulysses S. Grant.[162]

Pierce's health began to decline again in mid-1869; he resumed heavy drinking despite his deteriorating physical condition. He returned to Concord that September, suffering from severe cirrhosis of the liver, knowing he would not recover. A caretaker was hired; none of his family members were present in his final days. He died at 4:35 am on Friday, October 8, 1869, at the age of 64. President Grant, who later defended Pierce's service in the Mexican-American War, declared a day of national mourning. Newspapers across the country carried lengthy front-page stories examining Pierce's colorful and controversial career. Pierce was interred next to his wife and two of his sons in the Minot enclosure at Concord's Old North Cemetery.[163]

In his last will, which he signed January 22, 1868, Pierce left a large number of specific bequests such as paintings, swords, horses, and other items to friends, family, and neighbors. Much of his $72,000 estate (equal to $1,580,000 today) went to his brother Henry's family, and to Hawthorne's children and Pierce's landlady. Henry's son Frank Pierce received the largest share.[164]

Sites, memorials, and honors

 
Statue of Franklin Pierce at the New Hampshire State House in Concord.

In addition to his LL.D. from Norwich University, Pierce received honorary doctorates from Bowdoin College (1853) and Dartmouth College (1860).[165]

Two places in New Hampshire have been listed on the National Register of Historic Places specifically because of their association with Pierce. The Franklin Pierce Homestead in Hillsborough is a state park and a National Historic Landmark, open to the public.[3] The Franklin Pierce House in Concord, where Pierce died, was destroyed by fire in 1981, but is nevertheless listed on the register.[166] The Pierce Manse, his Concord home from 1842 to 1848, is open seasonally and maintained by a volunteer group, "The Pierce Brigade".[49] A statue of Pierce by Augustus Lukeman, dedicated in 1914,[167] stands on the grounds of the New Hampshire State House. New Hampshire Historical Markers #65, #80, #125, and #216 commemorate Pierce and his family around New Hampshire.[168]

Several institutions and places have been named after Pierce, many in New Hampshire:

Legacy

 
 
Pierce's image has been used on a U.S. postage stamp (1938) and a Presidential Dollar Coin (2010).

After his death, Pierce mostly passed from the American consciousness, except as one of a series of presidents whose disastrous tenures led to civil war.[175] Pierce's presidency is widely regarded as a failure; he is often described as one of the worst presidents in American history.[note 7] The public placed him third-to-last among his peers in C-SPAN surveys (2000 and 2009).[180] Part of his failure was in allowing a divided Congress to take the initiative, most disastrously with the Kansas–Nebraska Act. Although he did not lead that fight—Senator Douglas did—Pierce paid the cost in damage to his reputation.[181] The failure of Pierce, as president, to secure sectional conciliation helped bring an end to the dominance of the Democratic Party that had started with Jackson, and led to a period of over seventy years when the Republicans mostly controlled national politics.[182]

Historian Eric Foner says, "His administration turned out to be one of the most disastrous in American history. It witnessed the collapse of the party system inherited from the Age of Jackson".[183]

Biographer Roy F. Nichols argues:[184][185]

As a national political leader Pierce was an accident. He was honest and tenacious of his views but, as he made up his mind with difficulty and often reversed himself before making a final decision, he gave a general impression of instability. Kind, courteous, generous, he attracted many individuals, but his attempts to satisfy all factions failed and made him many enemies. In carrying out his principles of strict construction he was most in accord with Southerners, who generally had the letter of the law on their side. He failed utterly to realize the depth and the sincerity of Northern feeling against the South and was bewildered at the general flouting of the law and the Constitution, as he described it, by the people of his own New England. At no time did he catch the popular imagination. His inability to cope with the difficult problems that arose early in his administration caused him to lose the respect of great numbers, especially in the North, and his few successes failed to restore public confidence. He was an inexperienced man, suddenly called to assume a tremendous responsibility, who honestly tried to do his best without adequate training or temperamental fitness.

Despite a reputation as an able politician and a likable man, during his presidency Pierce served only as a moderator among the increasingly bitter factions that were driving the nation towards civil war.[186] To Pierce, who saw slavery as a question of property rather than morality,[182] the Union was sacred; because of this, he saw the actions of abolitionists, and the more moderate Free Soilers, as divisive and as a threat to the constitutionally-guaranteed rights of southerners.[187] Although he criticized those who sought to limit or end slavery, he rarely rebuked southern politicians who took extreme positions or opposed northern interests.[188]

David Potter concludes that the Ostend Manifesto and the Kansas–Nebraska Act were "the two great calamities of the Franklin Pierce administration  ... Both brought down an avalanche of public criticism."[189] More important, says Potter, they permanently discredited Manifest Destiny and "popular sovereignty" as political doctrines.[189] Historian Kenneth Nivison, writing in 2010, takes a more favorable view of Pierce's foreign policy, stating that his expansionism prefaced those of later presidents William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt, who served at a time when America had the military might to make her desires stick. "American foreign and commercial policy beginning in the 1890s, which eventually supplanted European colonialism by the middle of the twentieth century, owed much to the paternalism of Jacksonian Democracy cultivated in the international arena by the Presidency of Franklin Pierce."[190]

Historian Larry Gara, who authored a book on Pierce's presidency, wrote in the former president's entry in American National Biography Online:[191]

He was president at a time that called for almost superhuman skills, yet he lacked such skills and never grew into the job to which he had been elected. His view of the Constitution and the Union was from the Jacksonian past. He never fully understood the nature or depth of Free Soil sentiment in the North. He was able to negotiate a reciprocal trade treaty with Canada, to begin the opening of Japan to western trade, to add land to the Southwest, and to sign legislation for the creation of an overseas empire [the Guano Islands Act]. His Cuba and Kansas policies led only to deeper sectional strife. His support for the Kansas–Nebraska Act and his determination to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act helped polarize the sections. Pierce was hard-working and his administration largely untainted by graft, yet the legacy from those four turbulent years contributed to the tragedy of secession and civil war.

Historian and biographer Peter A. Wallner notes that:[192]

History has accorded to the Pierce administration a share of the blame for policies that incited the slavery issue, hastened the collapse of the second party system, and brought on the Civil War.  ... It is both an inaccurate and unfair judgment. Pierce was always a nationalist attempting to find a middle ground to keep the Union together.  ... The alternative to attempting to steer a moderate course was the breakup of the Union, the Civil War and the deaths of more than six hundred thousand Americans. Pierce should not be blamed for attempting throughout his political career to avoid this fate.

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Vice President King died in office. As this was prior to the adoption of the Twenty-fifth Amendment in 1967, a vacancy in the office of vice president was not filled until the next ensuing election and inauguration.
  2. ^ Some local accounts suggest he was born in the Homestead. The National Register of Historic Places cites the log cabin as the more likely birthplace,[4] and historian Peter A. Wallner asserts this is conclusively so.[5]
  3. ^ This was called the Republican or Jeffersonian Republican Party at the time; it soon became known as the Democratic-Republican Party. Modern writers prefer this term to distinguish it from the modern-day Republican Party.
  4. ^ The two-story school building burned some years later, and Hancock Academy was founded in 1836 to fill its place.[7]
  5. ^ The governor of New Hampshire was then elected annually; see also List of governors of New Hampshire.
  6. ^ Four other presidents—John Tyler, Millard Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, and Chester Arthur—failed to be nominated for re-election by their respective parties; however, each of those four presidents had been elected vice president and had assumed the presidency after their respective predecessors had died in office.[142]
  7. ^ Wallner writes: "It is doubtful if any former president was as reviled in later life as Franklin Pierce was, and his reputation has hardly improved in the century and a half since his death. If anything, he has been forgotten and relegated to a footnote in history books—as an amiable nonentity who had no business being president and who reached that lofty position purely by the accident of circumstance."[176][177][178][179]

References

  1. ^ Coker, Jeffrey W. (2002). Presidents from Taylor Through Grant, 1849–1877: Debating the Issues in Pro and Con Primary Documents. Greenwood. p. 54. ISBN 978-0-3133-1551-0. Attractive, polished, and outgoing, he was remembered by classmates more for his social skills than his scholarship... he married Jane Means Appleton, the daughter of Bowdoin College's president... Jane was a frail, somewhat sickly, and erratic woman who suffered from bouts of tuberculosis and deep depression... the two enjoyed a successful, if at time difficult, marriage.
  2. ^ "Presidential Historians Survey 2021". C-SPAN. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  3. ^ a b . National Park Service. Archived from the original on March 9, 2015. Retrieved June 29, 2014.
  4. ^ "Nomination Form: Franklin Pierce". National Register of Historic Places. 1976. p. 8. Retrieved June 29, 2014.
  5. ^ Wallner 2004, p. 3
  6. ^ Wallner 2004, pp. 1–8
  7. ^ Hurd, D. Hamilton (1885). History of Hillsborough County, New Hampshire. Philadelphia: J.W. Lewis & Co. p. 350.
  8. ^ a b Wallner 2004, pp. 10–15
  9. ^ Gara 1991, pp. 35–36
  10. ^ Wallner 2004, pp. 16–21
  11. ^ Holt 2010, 229
  12. ^ Wallner, Peter A. (Spring 2005). (PDF). Historical New Hampshire. New Hampshire Historical Society: 24. Archived from the original (PDF) on August 17, 2015. Within the student body, Pierce's influence was widespread. Besides heading the Athenian Society, he also formed the only military company in the history of the college. "Captain" Pierce, in an attempt to provide recreation and instruction for his fellow students, led the Bowdoin Cadets in their daily drills on the grounds in front of the President's house. The Reverend William Allen, the college's president, objected to the noise and ordered a halt to the activity. When Pierce refused to comply with Allen's order, animosity grew between the students and the college authorities resulting in the junior class going on strike. Pierce was accused of leading the rebellion, but the college records do not acknowledge the event. Pierce's father took note of his son's role, however, and in a rare letter, admonished him about his behavior. In later years, classmates fondly recalled the strike and Pierce's key role.
  13. ^ Boulard 2006, p. 23
  14. ^ Waterman, Charles E. (March 7, 1918). "The Red Schoolhouse in Action". The Journal of Education. New England Publishing Company. 87–88 (10): 265. doi:10.1177/002205741808701007. S2CID 188507307.
  15. ^ Holt 2010, 230
  16. ^ Wallner 2004, pp. 28–32
  17. ^ Holt 2010, 258
  18. ^ Wallner 2004, p. 56
  19. ^ Wallner 2004, pp. 28–33
  20. ^ Wallner 2004, pp. 33–43
  21. ^ John Farmer, G. Parker Lyon, editors, The New-Hampshire Annual Register, and United States Calendar, 1832, p. 53.
  22. ^ Brian Matthew Jordan, Triumphant Mourner: The Tragic Dimension of Franklin Pierce, 2003, p. 31.
  23. ^ Betros, Lance (2004). West Point: Two Centuries and Beyond. McWhiney Foundation Press. p. 155. ISBN 978-1-893114-47-0. Retrieved August 30, 2014.
  24. ^ Ellis, William Arba (1911). Norwich University, 1819–1911; Her History, Her Graduates, Her Roll of Honor, Volume 1. Capital City Press. pp. 87, 99. Retrieved August 30, 2014.
  25. ^ Ellis, William Arba (1911). Norwich University, 1819–1911; Her History, Her Graduates, Her Roll of Honor, Volume 2. Capital City Press. pp. 14–16. Retrieved August 30, 2014.
  26. ^ a b Wallner 2004, pp. 44–47
  27. ^ Holt 2010, locs. 273–300.
  28. ^ a b Wallner 2004, pp. 31–32, 77–78.
  29. ^ a b Gara 1991, pp. 31–32.
  30. ^ a b Baker, Jean H. . American President: An Online Reference Resource. University of Virginia. Archived from the original on December 17, 2010. Retrieved January 16, 2019. Franklin and Jane Pierce seemingly had little in common, and the marriage would sometimes be a troubled one. The bride's family were staunch Whigs, a party largely formed to oppose Andrew Jackson, whom Pierce revered. Socially, Jane Pierce was reserved and shy, the polar opposite of her new husband. Above all, she was a committed devotee of the temperance movement. She detested Washington and usually refused to live there, even after Franklin Pierce became a U.S. Senator in 1837.
  31. ^ Wallner 2004, pp. 79–80
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  38. ^ Lamb, Brian; Wallner, Peter (October 25, 2004). "Interview with Peter Wallner: Franklin Pierce: New Hampshire's Favorite Son". C-SPAN. 00:55:56. He also thought - and he sincerely believed this - that if the North hadn't attacked the South so much for being for this moral sin of slavery, that the South eventually over time would have ended slavery on its own, that he felt that the Civil War was unnecessary. And he always said that, and he never took that back, even at the height of the war itself. He always believed the Civil War was unnecessary, and it was brought upon the nation by fanatics on both sides.
  39. ^ Wallner 2004, pp. 59–61
  40. ^ Holt 2010, 362–375
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  55. ^ Holt 2010, 431
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  57. ^ Wadleigh 1913, p. 249: "Jan.7.-Hon. John P. Hale's letter to his constituents against the annexation of Texas, published".
  58. ^ Wadleigh 1913, p. 249: "John P. Hale, who had been nominated for re-election to Congress by the Democratic party, was at this election dropped from the ticket, and John Woodbury substituted, in consequence of Mr. Hale's refusal to go with the party in voting for the annexation of Texas. A portion of the party, consisting of those who approved of his opposition to the extension of slavery, voted for him, and succeeded in defeating his opponent, leaving a vacancy in the delegation".
  59. ^ Wallner 2004, pp. 111–122
  60. ^ Holt 2010, 447
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  94. ^ Liptak, Adam (January 17, 2009). "The Oath". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved January 1, 2022.
  95. ^ Hurja, Emil (1933). History of Presidential Inaugurations. New York Democrat. p. 49.
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  104. ^ Butler 1908, pp. 118–119
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  109. ^ Gara 1991, p. 128
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  115. ^ Holt 2010, 872
  116. ^ Wallner 2007, pp. 27–30, 63–66, 125–126
  117. ^ Gara 1991, p. 133
  118. ^ Wallner 2007, pp. 26–27
  119. ^ Gara 1991, pp. 139–140
  120. ^ Holt 2010, 902–917
  121. ^ Wallner 2007, pp. 131–157
  122. ^ Gara 1991, pp. 149–155
  123. ^ Wallner 2007, pp. 40–43
  124. ^ Wallner 2007, p. 172
  125. ^ Gara 1991, pp. 134–135
  126. ^ Wallner 2007, p. 256
  127. ^ a b c Wallner 2007, pp. 90–102, 119–122
  128. ^ a b c Gara 1991, pp. 88–100
  129. ^ a b c Holt 2010, 1097–1240
  130. ^ Davis, Jefferson (1881). The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government. Hachette Books. p. 25. ISBN 978-0-306-80418-2.
  131. ^ Etchison 2004, p. 14
  132. ^ a b Wallner 2007, pp. 158–167
  133. ^ a b Gara 1991, pp. 99–100
  134. ^ Wallner 2007, pp. 195–209
  135. ^ Gara 1991, pp. 111–120
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  137. ^ Gara 1991, pp. 107–109
  138. ^ Gara 1991, pp. 120–121
  139. ^ a b Wallner 2007, pp. 266–270
  140. ^ a b Gara 1991, pp. 157–167
  141. ^ a b Holt 2010, 1515–1558
  142. ^ a b Rudin, Ken (July 22, 2009). "When Has A President Been Denied His Party's Nomination?". NPR. Retrieved February 15, 2017. When was the last time, if ever, that a sitting president was not nominated by his party for a second term? It only happened once to an elected president. That was Franklin Pierce... Four other presidents were denied the nomination of their party, but none of these were elected in their own right. They were: John Tyler, Whig, 1844... Millard Fillmore, Whig, 1852... Andrew Johnson, Democrat, 1868... Chester Arthur, Republican, 1884.
  143. ^ Wallner 2007, pp. 272–280
  144. ^ Holt 2010, 1610
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  159. ^ a b Boulard 2006, pp. 109–123
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  164. ^ Wallner 2007, p. 374
  165. ^ Dartmouth College (1900). General Catalogue. Dartmouth College. p. 405. Retrieved August 30, 2014. Franklin Pierce LL.D. dartmouth.
  166. ^ "Franklin Pierce House". National Register of Historic Places. Retrieved June 29, 2014.
    "Franklin Pierce Home Burns". The New York Times. Associated Press. September 18, 1981.
  167. ^ Pride, Mike. “Franklin Pierce statue was criticized even before its creation”. Concord Monitor. Published June 16th, 2020. Accessed March 20th, 2023.
  168. ^ ”New Hampshire Highway Historical Markers”. New Hampshire Division of Historical Resources. Published January 18th, 2023. Accessed March 20th, 2023.
  169. ^ "History". Franklin Pierce University. Retrieved June 29, 2014.
  170. ^ "Franklin Pierce Center for IP". University of New Hampshire. Retrieved June 29, 2014.
  171. ^ . Mount Washington Observatory. Archived from the original on November 5, 2013. Retrieved June 29, 2014.
  172. ^ . Pierceton, Indiana. Archived from the original on July 14, 2014. Retrieved June 29, 2014.
  173. ^ Rochester, Junius (November 10, 1998). "King County, Founding of". HistoryLink.org. Retrieved January 31, 2017.
  174. ^ Guss, John Walter (2001). Pierce County, Georgia. Charleston, SC: Arcadia Publishing. p. 9. ISBN 978-0-7385-1387-4.
  175. ^ Gara 1991, p. 180
  176. ^ Wallner 2007, pp. 377–379
  177. ^ Wallner 2007, pp. xi–xii: "History has accorded to the Pierce administration a share of the blame for policies that incited the slavery issue, hastened the collapse of the second party system, and brought on the Civil War.  ... It is both an inaccurate and unfair judgment. Pierce was always a nationalist attempting to find a middle ground to keep the Union together.  ... The alternative to attempting to steer a moderate course was the breakup of the Union, the Civil War and the deaths of more than six hundred thousand Americans. Pierce should not be blamed for attempting throughout his political career to avoid this fate."
  178. ^ Gara 1991, pp. 180–184: "Those who play the presidential ratings game have always assigned to Franklin Pierce a below-average score.  ... In light of subsequent events, the Pierce administration can be seen only as a disaster for the nation. Its failure was as much a failure of the system as a failure of Pierce himself, whom Roy Franklin Nichols has skillfully portrayed as a complex and tragic figure."
  179. ^ U.S. News & World Report, "Worst Presidents: Franklin Pierce" October 2, 2013, at the Wayback Machine (2007): "His fervor for expanding the borders helped set the stage for the Civil War."
  180. ^ . C-SPAN. 2009. Archived from the original on July 22, 2014. Retrieved June 30, 2014.
  181. ^ Gara 1991, p. 182
  182. ^ a b Crockett, David A. (December 2012). "The Historical Presidency: The Perils of Restoration Politics: Nineteenth-Century Antecedents". Presidential Studies Quarterly. 42 (4): 881–902. doi:10.1111/j.1741-5705.2012.04023.x.
  183. ^ Foner, Eric (2006). Give Me Liberty!: An American History. Vol. 1. New York: W. W. Norton & Company. p. 413.
  184. ^ Roy F. Nichols, "Franklin Pierce", Dictionary of American Biography (1934) Capace, Nancy (2001). Encyclopedia of New Hampshire. Somerset Publishers. pp. 268–69. ISBN 978-0-403-09601-5.
  185. ^ Flagel, Thomas R. (2012). History Buff's Guide to the Presidents. Nashville, Tennessee: Cumberland House. p. 404. ISBN 978-1-4022-7142-7.
  186. ^ Robert Muccigrosso, ed., Research Guide to American Historical Biography (1988) 3:1237
  187. ^ Gara 1991, p. 181
  188. ^ Gara, Larry (September 2005). "Franklin Pierce: New Hampshire's Favorite Son [book review]". Journal of American History. 92 (2): 612. doi:10.2307/3659320. JSTOR 3659320.
  189. ^ a b Potter 1976, p. 192
  190. ^ Nivison, Kenneth (March 2010). "Purposes Just and Pacific: Franklin Pierce and the American Empire". Diplomacy & Statecraft. 21 (1): 17. doi:10.1080/09592290903577668. S2CID 154406060.
  191. ^ Gara, Larry (February 2000). "Pierce, Franklin". American National Biography Online.(subscription required)
  192. ^ Wallner 2007, pp. xi–xii.

Works cited

  • Boulard, Garry (2006). The Expatriation of Franklin Pierce: The Story of a President and the Civil War. iUniverse, Inc. ISBN 978-0-595-40367-7.
  • Butler, Pierce (1908). Judah P. Benjamin. American Crisis Biographies. George W. Jacobs & Company. OCLC 664335.
  • Etchison, Nicole (2004). Bleeding Kansas: Contested Liberty in the Civil War Era. University Press of Kansas. ISBN 978-0-7006-1287-1.
  • Gara, Larry (1991). The Presidency of Franklin Pierce. University Press of Kansas. ISBN 978-0-7006-0494-4.
  • Holt, Michael F. (2010). Franklin Pierce. The American Presidents (Kindle ed.). Henry Holt and Company, LLC. ISBN 978-0-8050-8719-2.; also see online book review
  • Nichols, Roy F. "Franklin Pierce," Dictionary of American Biography (1934) Capace, Nancy (2001). Encyclopedia of New Hampshire. Somerset Publishers. pp. 262–69. ISBN 978-0-403-09601-5.
  • Potter, David M. (1976). The Impending Crisis, 1848–1861. Harper & Row. ISBN 978-0-06-013403-7.
  • Wallner, Peter A. (2004). Franklin Pierce: New Hampshire's Favorite Son. Plaidswede. ISBN 978-0-9755216-1-8.
  • Wallner, Peter A. (2007). Franklin Pierce: Martyr for the Union. Plaidswede. ISBN 978-0-9790784-2-2.
  • Wadleigh, George (1913). Notable Events in the History of Dover, New Hampshire. Dover, NH: G. H. Wadleigh. p. 249.
  • Boertlein, John (2010). Presidential Confidential. Clerisy Press. ISBN 978-1-57860-362-6.
External videos
  Booknotes interview with Peter Wallner on Franklin Pierce: New Hampshire`s Favorite Son, November 28, 2004, C-SPAN

Further reading

  • Allen, Felicity (1999). Jefferson Davis, Unconquerable Heart. University of Missouri Press. ISBN 978-0-8262-1219-1.
  • Barlett, D. W. (1852). The life of Gen. Frank. Pierce, of New Hampshire, the Democratic candidate for president of the United States. Derby & Miller. OCLC 1742614.
  • Brinkley, A.; Dyer, D. (2004). The American Presidency. Houghton Mifflin Company. ISBN 978-0-618-38273-6.
  • Hamilton, Neil (2010). Presidents: A Biographical Dictionary. Infobase. ISBN 978-1-4381-2751-4.
  • Hawthorne, Nathaniel (1852). . Ticknor, Reed and Fields. OCLC 60713500. Archived from the original on April 9, 2017. Retrieved September 2, 2002.
  • Nevins, Allan. Ordeal of the Union: Vol. 2: A House Dividing, 1852–1857 (1947) online
  • Nichols, Roy Franklin (1923). The Democratic Machine, 1850–1854. Columbia University Press. OCLC 2512393.
  • Nichols, Roy Franklin (1931). Franklin Pierce, Young Hickory of the Granite Hills. University of Pennsylvania Press. OCLC 426247.
  • Silbey, Joel H. (2014). A Companion to the Antebellum Presidents 1837–1861. Wiley. ISBN 978-1-118-60929-3. pp 345–96
  • Taylor, Michael J. C. (2001). "Governing the Devil in Hell: 'Bleeding Kansas' and the Destruction of the Franklin Pierce Presidency (1854–1856)". White House Studies. 1: 185–205.
  • Williamson, Richard Joseph. "Friendship, politics, and the literary imagination: The impact of Franklin Pierce on Hawthorne's work" (PhD dissertation, University of North Texas, ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 1996. 9638512).

External links

franklin, pierce, this, article, about, president, united, states, other, people, with, same, name, disambiguation, november, 1804, october, 1869, 14th, president, united, states, serving, from, 1853, 1857, northern, democrat, believed, that, abolitionist, mov. This article is about the president of the United States For other people with the same name see Franklin Pierce disambiguation Franklin Pierce November 23 1804 October 8 1869 was the 14th president of the United States serving from 1853 to 1857 A northern Democrat who believed that the abolitionist movement was a fundamental threat to the nation s unity he alienated anti slavery groups by signing the Kansas Nebraska Act and enforcing the Fugitive Slave Act Conflict between North and South continued after Pierce s presidency and after Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 the Southern states seceded resulting in the American Civil War Franklin PiercePortrait by Mathew Brady c 1855 186514th President of the United StatesIn office March 4 1853 March 4 1857Vice PresidentWilliam R King Mar Apr 1853 None 1853 1857 note 1 Preceded byMillard FillmoreSucceeded byJames BuchananUnited States Senatorfrom New HampshireIn office March 4 1837 February 28 1842Preceded byJohn PageSucceeded byLeonard WilcoxMember of the U S House of Representatives from New Hampshire s at large districtIn office March 4 1833 March 3 1837Preceded byJoseph HammonsSucceeded byJared W WilliamsSpeaker of theNew Hampshire House of RepresentativesIn office January 5 1831 January 2 1833Preceded bySamuel C WebsterSucceeded byCharles G AthertonMember of theNew Hampshire House of Representativesfrom HillsboroughIn office January 7 1829 January 2 1833Preceded byThomas WilsonSucceeded byHiram MonroePersonal detailsBorn 1804 11 23 November 23 1804Hillsborough New Hampshire U S DiedOctober 8 1869 1869 10 08 aged 64 Concord New Hampshire U S Resting placeOld North CemeteryConcord New Hampshire U S Political partyDemocraticSpouseJane Appleton m 1834 died 1863 wbr Children3ParentBenjamin Pierce father RelativesBenjamin Kendrick Pierce brother EducationBowdoin College BA Northampton Law SchoolProfessionPoliticianlawyerSignatureMilitary serviceBranch serviceNew Hampshire Militia United States ArmyYears of service1831 1847 Militia 1847 1848 Army RankColonel Militia Brigadier General Army Battles warsMexican American War Battle of Contreras Battle of Churubusco Battle of Molino del Rey Battle of Chapultepec Battle for Mexico CityPierce was born in New Hampshire the son of state governor Benjamin Pierce He served in the House of Representatives from 1833 until his election to the Senate where he served from 1837 until his resignation in 1842 His private law practice was a success and he was appointed New Hampshire s U S Attorney in 1845 Pierce took part in the Mexican American War as a brigadier general in the United States Army Democrats saw him as a compromise candidate uniting Northern and Southern interests and nominated him for president on the 49th ballot at the 1852 Democratic National Convention He and running mate William R King easily defeated the Whig Party ticket of Winfield Scott and William A Graham in the 1852 presidential election As president Pierce attempted to enforce neutral standards for civil service while also satisfying the Democratic Party s diverse elements with patronage an effort that largely failed and turned many in his party against him He was a Young America expansionist who signed the Gadsden Purchase of land from Mexico and led a failed attempt to acquire Cuba from Spain He signed trade treaties with Britain and Japan and his Cabinet reformed its departments and improved accountability but political strife during his presidency overshadowed these successes His popularity declined sharply in the Northern states after he supported the Kansas Nebraska Act which nullified the Missouri Compromise while many Southern whites continued to support him The act s passage led to violent conflict over the expansion of slavery in the American West Pierce s administration was further damaged when several of his diplomats issued the Ostend Manifesto calling for the annexation of Cuba a document that was roundly criticized He fully expected the Democrats to renominate him in the 1856 presidential election but they abandoned him and his bid failed His reputation in the North suffered further during the American Civil War as he became a vocal critic of President Abraham Lincoln Pierce was popular and outgoing but his family life was difficult his three children died young and his wife Jane Pierce suffered from illness and depression for much of her life 1 Their last surviving son was killed in a train accident while the family was traveling shortly before Pierce s inauguration A heavy drinker for much of his life Pierce died in 1869 of cirrhosis As a result of his support of the South as well as failing to hold the Union together in time of strife historians and scholars generally rank Pierce as one of the worst 2 as well as least memorable U S presidents Contents 1 Early life and family 1 1 Childhood and education 1 2 Hillsborough and State politics 1 3 Marriage and children 2 Congressional career 2 1 U S House of Representatives 2 2 U S Senate 3 Party leader 3 1 Lawyer and politician 3 2 Mexican American War 3 3 Return to New Hampshire 4 Election of 1852 5 Presidency 1853 1857 5 1 Transition and train crash 5 2 Administration and political strife 5 3 Economic policy and internal improvements 5 4 Foreign and military affairs 5 5 Bleeding Kansas 5 6 1856 election 6 Post presidency 1857 1869 6 1 Civil War 6 2 Final years and death 7 Sites memorials and honors 8 Legacy 9 See also 10 Notes 11 References 11 1 Works cited 12 Further reading 13 External linksEarly life and family nbsp The Franklin Pierce Homestead in Hillsborough New Hampshire where Pierce grew up is now a National Historic Landmark 3 He was born in a nearby log cabin as the homestead was being completed note 2 Childhood and education Franklin Pierce was born on November 23 1804 in a log cabin in Hillsborough New Hampshire He was a sixth generation descendant of Thomas Pierce who had moved to the Massachusetts Bay Colony from Norwich Norfolk England in about 1634 His father Benjamin was a lieutenant in the American Revolutionary War who moved from Chelmsford Massachusetts to Hillsborough after the war purchasing 50 acres 20 ha of land Pierce was the fifth of eight children born to Benjamin and his second wife Anna Kendrick his first wife Elizabeth Andrews died in childbirth leaving a daughter Benjamin was a prominent Democratic Republican note 3 state legislator farmer and tavern keeper During Pierce s childhood his father was deeply involved in state politics while two of his older brothers fought in the War of 1812 public affairs and the military were thus a major influence in his early life 6 Pierce s father ensured that his sons were educated and placed Pierce in a school at Hillsborough Center in childhood and sent him to the town school in Hancock at age 12 note 4 Not fond of schooling Pierce grew homesick and walked 12 miles 19 km back to his home one Sunday His father fed him dinner and drove him part of the distance back to school before ordering him to walk the rest of the way in a thunderstorm Pierce later cited this moment as the turning point in my life 8 Later that year he transferred to Phillips Exeter Academy to prepare for college By this time he had built a reputation as a charming student sometimes prone to misbehavior 8 nbsp Novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne a lifelong friend of Pierce wrote the biography The Life of Franklin Pierce in support of Pierce s 1852 presidential campaign 9 In fall 1820 Pierce entered Bowdoin College in Brunswick Maine one of 19 freshmen He joined the Athenian Society a progressive literary society alongside Jonathan Cilley later elected to Congress and Nathaniel Hawthorne with whom he formed lasting friendships He was the last in his class after two years but he worked hard to improve his grades and graduated in fifth place in 1824 10 in a graduating class of 14 11 John P Hale enrolled at Bowdoin in Pierce s junior year he became a political ally of Pierce s and then his rival Pierce organized and led an unofficial militia company called the Bowdoin Cadets during his junior year which included Cilley and Hawthorne The unit performed drill on campus near the president s house until the noise caused him to demand that it halt The students rebelled and went on strike an event that Pierce was suspected of leading 12 During his final year at Bowdoin he spent several months teaching at Hebron Academy in rural Hebron Maine where he earned his first salary and his students included future Congressman John J Perry 13 14 Pierce read law briefly with former New Hampshire Governor Levi Woodbury a family friend in Portsmouth New Hampshire 15 He then spent a semester at Northampton Law School in Northampton Massachusetts followed by a period of study in 1826 and 1827 under Judge Edmund Parker in Amherst New Hampshire He was admitted to the New Hampshire bar in late 1827 and began to practice in Hillsborough 16 He lost his first case but soon proved capable as a lawyer Despite never being a legal scholar his memory for names and faces served him well as did his personal charm and deep voice 17 In Hillsborough his law partner was Albert Baker who had studied law under Pierce and was the brother of Mary Baker Eddy 18 Hillsborough and State politics By 1824 New Hampshire was a hotbed of partisanship with figures such as Woodbury and Isaac Hill laying the groundwork for a party of Democrats in support of General Andrew Jackson They opposed the established Federalists and their successors the National Republicans who were led by sitting President John Quincy Adams The work of the New Hampshire Democratic Party came to fruition in March 1827 when their pro Jackson nominee Benjamin Pierce won the support of the pro Adams faction and was elected governor of New Hampshire essentially unopposed While the younger Pierce had set out to build a career as an attorney he was fully drawn into the realm of politics as the 1828 presidential election between Adams and Jackson approached In the state elections held in March 1828 the Adams faction withdrew their support of Benjamin Pierce voting him out of office note 5 but Franklin Pierce won his first election a one year term as Hillsborough s town meeting moderator a position to which he was reelected five times 19 Pierce actively campaigned in his district on behalf of Jackson who carried both the district and the nation by large margins in the November 1828 election even though he lost New Hampshire The outcome further strengthened the Democratic Party and Pierce won his first legislative seat the following year representing Hillsborough in the New Hampshire House of Representatives Pierce s father was elected again as governor retiring after that term The younger Pierce was appointed as chairman of the House Education Committee in 1829 and the Committee on Towns the following year By 1831 the Democrats held a legislative majority and Pierce was elected Speaker of the House The young Speaker used his platform to oppose the expansion of banking protect the state militia and offer support to the national Democrats and Jackson s re election effort At 27 he was a star of the New Hampshire Democratic Party Though attaining early political and professional success in his personal letters he continued to lament his bachelorhood and yearned for a life beyond Hillsborough 20 Like all white males in New Hampshire between the ages of 18 and 45 Pierce was a member of the state militia and was appointed aide de camp to Governor Samuel Dinsmoor in 1831 He remained in the militia until 1847 and attained the rank of colonel before becoming a brigadier general in the Army during the Mexican American War 21 22 Interested in revitalizing and reforming the state militias which had become increasingly dormant during the years of peace following the War of 1812 Pierce worked with Alden Partridge president of Norwich University a military college in Vermont and Truman B Ransom and Alonzo Jackman Norwich faculty members and militia officers to increase recruiting efforts and improve training and readiness 23 24 Pierce served as a Norwich University trustee from 1841 to 1859 and received the honorary degree of LL D from Norwich in 1853 25 In late 1832 the Democratic Party convention nominated Pierce for one of New Hampshire s five seats in the U S House of Representatives This was tantamount to election for the young Democrat as the National Republicans had faded as a political force while the Whigs had not yet begun to attract a large following Democratic strength in New Hampshire was also bolstered by Jackson s landslide re election that year 26 New Hampshire had been a marginal state politically but from 1832 through the mid 1850s became the most reliably Democratic state in the Northern United States boosting Pierce s political career 27 Pierce s term began in March 1833 but he would not be sworn in until Congress met in December and his attention was elsewhere He had recently become engaged and bought his first house in Hillsborough Franklin and Benjamin Pierce were among the prominent citizens who welcomed President Jackson to the state on his visit in mid 1833 26 Marriage and children nbsp Pious and reserved Jane Pierce was her husband s opposite in many ways 28 29 30 On November 19 1834 Pierce married Jane Means Appleton March 12 1806 December 2 1863 a daughter of Congregational minister Jesse Appleton and Elizabeth Means The Appletons were prominent Whigs in contrast with the Pierces Democratic affiliation Jane Pierce was shy devoutly religious and pro temperance encouraging Pierce to abstain from alcohol She was somewhat gaunt and constantly ill from tuberculosis and psychological ailments She abhorred politics and especially disliked Washington DC creating a tension that would continue throughout Pierce s political ascent 28 29 30 Jane Pierce disliked Hillsborough as well and in 1838 the Pierces relocated to the state capital Concord New Hampshire 31 They had three sons all of whom died in childhood Franklin Jr February 2 5 1836 died in infancy while Frank Robert August 27 1839 November 14 1843 died at the age of four from epidemic typhus Benjamin April 13 1841 January 6 1853 died at the age of 11 in a train accident 32 Congressional careerU S House of Representatives Pierce departed in November 1833 for Washington D C where the Twenty third United States Congress convened its regular session on December 2 Jackson s second term was under way and the House of Representatives had a strong Democratic majority whose primary focus was to prevent the Second Bank of the United States from being rechartered The Democrats including Pierce defeated proposals supported by the newly formed Whig Party and the bank s charter expired Pierce broke from his party on occasion opposing Democratic bills to fund internal improvements with federal money He saw both the bank and infrastructure spending as unconstitutional with internal improvements the responsibility of the states Pierce s first term was fairly uneventful from a legislative standpoint and he was easily re elected in March 1835 When not in Washington he attended to his law practice and in December 1835 returned to the capital for the Twenty fourth Congress 33 As abolitionism grew more vocal in the mid 1830s Congress was inundated with petitions from anti slavery groups seeking legislation to restrict slavery in the United States From the beginning Pierce found the abolitionists agitation to be an annoyance and saw federal action against slavery as an infringement on southern states rights even though he was morally opposed to slavery itself 34 He was also frustrated with the religious bigotry of abolitionists who cast their political opponents as sinners 35 I consider slavery a social and political evil Pierce said and most sincerely wish that it had no existence upon the face of the earth 36 Still he wrote in December 1835 One thing must be perfectly apparent to every intelligent man This abolition movement must be crushed or there is an end to the Union 37 After the Civil War Pierce believed that if the North had not aggressively agitated against Southern slavery the South would have eventually ended slavery on its own and that the conflict had been brought upon the nation by fanatics on both sides 38 When Rep James Henry Hammond of South Carolina looked to prevent anti slavery petitions from reaching the House floor however Pierce sided with the abolitionists right to petition Nevertheless Pierce supported what came to be known as the gag rule which allowed for petitions to be received but not read or considered This passed the House in 1836 34 He was attacked by the New Hampshire anti slavery Herald of Freedom as a doughface which had the dual meaning of craven spirited man and northerner with southern sympathies 39 Pierce had stated that not one in 500 New Hampshirites were abolitionists the Herald of Freedom article added up the number of signatures on petitions from that state divided by the number of residents according to the 1830 census and suggested the actual number was one in 33 Pierce was outraged when South Carolina Senator John C Calhoun read the article on the Senate floor as proof that New Hampshire was a hotbed of abolitionism Calhoun apologized after Pierce replied to him in a speech which stated that most signatories were women and children who could not vote which therefore cast doubt on the one in 33 figure 40 U S Senate nbsp Pierce in 1852The resignation in May 1836 of Senator Isaac Hill who had been elected governor of New Hampshire left a short term opening to be filled by the state legislature and with Hill s term as senator due to expire in March 1837 the legislature also had to fill the six year term to follow Pierce s candidacy for the Senate was championed by state Representative John P Hale a fellow Athenian at Bowdoin After much debate the legislature chose John Page to fill the rest of Hill s term In December 1836 Pierce was elected to the full term to commence in March 1837 and at age 32 was at the time one of the youngest members in Senate history The election came at a difficult time for Pierce as his father sister and brother were all seriously ill while his wife also continued to suffer from chronic poor health As senator he was able to help his old friend Nathaniel Hawthorne who often struggled financially procuring for him a sinecure as measurer of coal and salt at the Boston Customs House that allowed the author time to continue writing 41 Pierce voted the party line on most issues and was an able senator but not an eminent one he was overshadowed by the Great Triumvirate of Calhoun Henry Clay and Daniel Webster who dominated the Senate 42 Pierce entered the Senate at a time of economic crisis as the Panic of 1837 had begun He considered the depression a result of the banking system s rapid growth amidst the extravagance of overtrading and the wilderness of speculation 43 So that federal money would not support speculative bank loans he supported newly elected Democratic president Martin Van Buren and his plan to create an independent treasury a proposal which split the Democratic Party Debate over slavery continued in Congress and abolitionists proposed its end in the District of Columbia where Congress had jurisdiction Pierce supported a resolution by Calhoun against this proposal which Pierce considered a dangerous stepping stone to nationwide emancipation 43 Meanwhile the Whigs were growing in congressional strength which would leave Pierce s party with only a small majority by the end of the decade 44 One topic of particular importance to Pierce was the military He challenged a bill which would expand the ranks of the Army s staff officers in Washington without any apparent benefit to line officers at posts in the rest of the country He took an interest in military pensions seeing abundant fraud within the system and was named chairman of the Senate Committee on Military Pensions in the Twenty sixth Congress 1839 1841 In that capacity he urged the modernization and expansion of the Army with a focus on militias and mobility rather than on coastal fortifications which he considered outdated 45 Pierce campaigned vigorously throughout his home state for Van Buren s re election in the 1840 presidential election The incumbent carried New Hampshire but lost the election to the Whig candidate military hero William Henry Harrison The Whigs took a majority of seats in the Twenty seventh Congress Harrison died after a month in office and Vice President John Tyler succeeded him Pierce and the Democrats were quick to challenge the new administration questioning the removal of federal officeholders and opposing Whig plans for a national bank In December 1841 Pierce decided to resign from Congress something he had been planning for some time 46 New Hampshire Democrats insisted that their state s U S senators be limited to one six year term so he had little likelihood of re election Also he was frustrated at being a member of the legislative minority and wished to devote his time to his family and law practice 47 His last actions in the Senate in February 1842 were to oppose a bill distributing federal funds to the states believing that the money should go to the military instead and to challenge the Whigs to reveal the results of their investigation of the New York Customs House where the Whigs had probed for Democratic corruption for nearly a year but had issued no findings 48 Party leaderLawyer and politician nbsp The Concord New Hampshire house where Pierce lived from 1842 to 1848 is now known as the Pierce Manse The house was restored in the 1970s and is now maintained as a historic attraction 49 Despite his resignation from the Senate Pierce had no intention of leaving public life The move to Concord had given him more opportunities for cases and allowed Jane Pierce a more robust community life 50 Jane had remained in Concord with her young son Frank and her newborn Benjamin for the latter part of Pierce s senate term and this separation had taken a toll on the family Pierce meanwhile had begun a demanding but lucrative law partnership with Asa Fowler during congressional recesses 51 Pierce returned to Concord in early 1842 and his reputation as a lawyer continued to flourish Known for his gracious personality eloquence and excellent memory Pierce attracted large audiences in court He would often represent poor people for little or no compensation 52 Pierce remained involved in the state Democratic Party which was split by several issues Governor Hill who represented the commercial urban wing of the party advocated the use of government charters to support corporations granting them privileges such as limited liability and eminent domain for building railroads The radical locofoco wing of his party represented farmers and other rural voters who sought an expansion of social programs and labor regulations and a restriction on corporate privilege The state s political culture grew less tolerant of banks and corporations after the Panic of 1837 and Hill was voted out of office Pierce was closer to the radicals philosophically and reluctantly agreed to represent Hill s adversary in a legal dispute regarding ownership of a newspaper Hill lost and founded his own paper of which Pierce was a frequent target 53 In June 1842 Pierce was named chairman of the State Democratic Committee and in the following year s state election he helped the radical wing take over the state legislature The party remained divided on several issues including railroad development and the temperance movement and Pierce took a leading role in helping the state legislature settle their differences His priorities were order moderation compromise and party unity which he tried to place ahead of his personal views on political issues 54 As he would as president Pierce valued Democratic Party unity highly and saw the opposition to slavery as a threat to that 55 Democratic James K Polk s dark horse victory in the 1844 presidential election was welcome news to Pierce who had befriended the former Speaker of the House while both served in Congress Pierce had campaigned heavily for Polk during the election and in turn Polk appointed him as United States Attorney for New Hampshire 56 Polk s most prominent cause was the annexation of Texas an issue which caused a dramatic split between Pierce and his former ally Hale now a U S Representative Hale was so impassioned against adding a new slave state that he wrote a public letter to his constituents outlining his opposition to the measure 57 Pierce responded by re assembling the state Democratic convention to revoke Hale s nomination for another term in Congress 58 The political firestorm led to Pierce severing ties with his longtime friend and with his law partner Fowler who was a Hale supporter 59 Hale refused to withdraw and as a majority vote was needed for election in New Hampshire the party split led to deadlock and a vacant House seat Eventually the Whigs and Hale s Independent Democrats took control of the legislature elected Whig Anthony Colby as governor and sent Hale to the Senate much to Pierce s anger 60 Mexican American War nbsp Pierce in his brigadier general s uniformActive military service was a long held dream for Pierce who had admired his father s and brothers service in his youth particularly his older brother Benjamin s as well as that of John McNeil Jr husband of Pierce s older half sister Elizabeth As a legislator he was a passionate advocate for volunteer militias As a militia officer himself he had experience mustering and drilling bodies of troops When Congress declared war against Mexico in May 1846 Pierce immediately volunteered to join although no New England regiment yet existed His hope to fight in the Mexican American War was one reason he refused an offer to become Polk s Attorney General General Zachary Taylor s advance slowed in northern Mexico and General Winfield Scott proposed capturing the port of Vera Cruz and driving overland to Mexico City Congress passed a bill authorizing the creation of ten regiments and Pierce was appointed commander and colonel of the 9th Infantry Regiment in February 1847 with Truman B Ransom as lieutenant colonel and second in command 61 nbsp Pierce s brief term as a general in the Mexican American War boosted his public image 62 On March 3 1847 Pierce was promoted to brigadier general and took command of a brigade of reinforcements for General Scott s army with Ransom succeeding to command of the regiment Needing time to assemble his brigade Pierce reached the already seized port of Vera Cruz in late June where he prepared a march of 2 500 men accompanying supplies for Scott The three week journey inland was perilous and the men fought off several attacks before joining with Scott s army in early August in time for the Battle of Contreras 63 The battle was disastrous for Pierce his horse was suddenly startled during a charge knocking him groin first against his saddle The horse then tripped into a crevice and fell pinning Pierce underneath and debilitating his knee 64 The incident made it look like he had fainted causing one soldier to call for someone else to take command General Pierce is a damned coward 65 Pierce returned for the following day s action but re injured his knee forcing him to hobble after his men by the time he caught up the battle was mostly won 65 As the Battle of Churubusco approached Scott ordered Pierce to the rear to convalesce He responded For God s sake General this is the last great battle and I must lead my brigade Scott yielded and Pierce entered the fight tied to his saddle but the pain in his leg became so great that he passed out on the field The Americans won the battle and Pierce helped negotiate an armistice He then returned to command and led his brigade throughout the rest of the campaign eventually taking part in the capture of Mexico City in mid September although his brigade was held in reserve for much of the battle 66 For much of the Mexico City battle he was in the sick tent plagued with acute diarrhea 65 Pierce remained in command of his brigade during the three month occupation of the city while frustrated with the stalling of peace negotiations he also tried to distance himself from the constant conflict between Scott and the other generals 66 Pierce was finally allowed to return to Concord in late December 1847 He was given a hero s welcome in his home state and submitted his resignation from the Army which was approved on March 20 1848 His military exploits elevated his popularity in New Hampshire but his injuries and subsequent troubles in battle led to accusations of cowardice which would long shadow him He had demonstrated competence as a general especially in the initial march from Vera Cruz but his short tenure and his injury left little for historians to judge his ability as a military commander 62 Ulysses S Grant who had the opportunity to observe Pierce firsthand during the war countered the allegations of cowardice in his memoirs written several years after Pierce s death Whatever General Pierce s qualifications may have been for the Presidency he was a gentleman and a man of courage I was not a supporter of him politically but I knew him more intimately than I did any other of the volunteer generals 67 Return to New Hampshire nbsp By the 1850s Pierce had become a de facto leader of the New Hampshire Democratic Party 68 Returning to Concord Pierce resumed his law practice in one notable case he defended the religious liberty of the Shakers the insular sect threatened with legal action over accusations of abuse His role as a party leader however continued to take up most of his attention He continued to wrangle with Senator Hale who was anti slavery and had opposed the war stances that Pierce regarded as needless agitation 68 The large Mexican Cession of land divided the United States politically with many in the North insisting that slavery not be allowed there and offering the Wilmot Proviso to ensure it while others wanted slavery barred north of the Missouri Compromise line of 36 30 N Both proposals were anathema to many Southerners and the controversy split the Democrats At the 1848 Democratic National Convention the majority nominated former Michigan senator Lewis Cass for president while a minority broke off to become the Free Soil Party backing former president Van Buren The Whigs chose General Zachary Taylor a Louisianan whose views on most political issues were unknown Despite his past support for Van Buren Pierce supported Cass turning down the quiet offer of second place on the Free Soil ticket and was so effective that Taylor who was elected president was held in New Hampshire to his lowest percentage in any state 69 Senator Henry Clay a Whig hoped to put the slavery question to rest with a set of proposals that became known as the Compromise of 1850 These would give victories to North and South and gained the support of his fellow Whig Webster With the bill stalled in the Senate Illinois Senator Stephen A Douglas led a successful effort to split it into separate measures so that each legislator could vote against the parts his state opposed without endangering the overall package The bills passed and were signed by President Millard Fillmore who had succeeded Taylor after the president s death earlier in 1850 70 Pierce strongly supported the compromise giving a well received speech in December 1850 pledging himself to The Union Eternal Union 71 The same month the Democratic candidate for governor John Atwood issued a letter opposing the Compromise and Pierce helped to recall the state convention and remove Atwood from the ticket 71 The fiasco compromised the election for the Democrats who lost several races still Pierce s party retained its control over the state and was well positioned for the upcoming presidential election 72 Election of 1852Main articles 1852 Democratic National Convention and 1852 United States presidential election nbsp Campaign poster for the Pierce King ticketAs the 1852 presidential election approached the Democrats were divided by the slavery issue though most of the Barnburners who had left the party with Van Buren to form the Free Soil Party had returned It was widely expected that the 1852 Democratic National Convention would result in deadlock with no major candidate able to win the necessary two thirds majority New Hampshire Democrats including Pierce supported his old teacher Levi Woodbury by then an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court as a compromise candidate but Woodbury s death in September 1851 opened up an opportunity for Pierce s allies to present him as a potential dark horse in the mold of Polk New Hampshire Democrats felt that as the state in which their party had most consistently gained Democratic majorities they should supply the presidential candidate Other possible standard bearers included Douglas Cass William Marcy of New York James Buchanan of Pennsylvania Sam Houston of Texas and Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri 73 74 Despite home state support Pierce faced obstacles to his nomination since he had been out of office for a decade and lacked the front runners national reputation He publicly declared that such a nomination would be utterly repugnant to my tastes and wishes but given the desire of New Hampshire Democrats to see one of their own elected he knew his future influence depended on his availability to run 75 Thus he quietly allowed his supporters to lobby for him with the understanding that his name would not be entered at the convention unless it was clear none of the front runners could win To broaden his potential base of southern support as the convention approached he wrote letters reiterating his support for the Compromise of 1850 including the controversial Fugitive Slave Act 75 76 The convention assembled on June 1 in Baltimore and the deadlock occurred as expected On the first ballot of the 288 delegates held on June 3 Cass claimed 116 Buchanan 93 and the rest were scattered without a single vote for Pierce The next 34 ballots passed with no winner even close and still no votes for Pierce The Buchanan team then had their delegates vote for minor candidates including Pierce to demonstrate Buchanan s inevitability and unite the convention behind him This novel tactic backfired after several ballots as Virginia New Hampshire and Maine switched to Pierce the remaining Buchanan forces began to break for Marcy and Pierce was soon in third place After the 48th ballot North Carolina Congressman James C Dobbin delivered an unexpected and passionate endorsement of Pierce sparking a wave of support for the dark horse candidate On the 49th ballot Pierce received all but six of the votes and thus gained the Democratic nomination for president Delegates selected Alabama Senator William R King a Buchanan supporter as Pierce s running mate and adopted a platform that rejected further agitation over the slavery issue and supported the Compromise of 1850 77 78 When word reached New Hampshire of the result Pierce found it difficult to believe and his wife fainted Their son Benjamin wrote to his mother hoping that Franklin s candidacy would not be successful as he knew she would not like to live in Washington 79 nbsp This anti Pierce political cartoon depicts him as weak and cowardly The Whig candidate was General Scott Pierce s commander in Mexico his running mate was Secretary of the Navy William A Graham The Whigs could not unify their factions as the Democrats had and the convention adopted a platform almost indistinguishable from that of the Democrats including support of the Compromise of 1850 This incited the Free Soilers to field their own candidate Senator Hale of New Hampshire at the expense of the Whigs The lack of political differences reduced the campaign to a bitter personality contest and helped to dampen voter turnout to its lowest level since 1836 according to biographer Peter A Wallner it was one of the least exciting campaigns in presidential history 80 81 Scott was harmed by the lack of enthusiasm of anti slavery northern Whigs for him and the platform New York Tribune editor Horace Greeley summed up the attitude of many when he said of the Whig platform we defy it execrate it spit upon it 82 nbsp Electoral map of the 1852 presidential electionPierce kept quiet so as not to upset his party s delicate unity and allowed his allies to run the campaign It was the custom at the time for candidates to not appear to seek the office and he did no personal campaigning 83 84 85 Pierce s opponents caricatured him as an anti Catholic coward and alcoholic the hero of many a well fought bottle 86 84 Scott meanwhile drew weak support from the Whigs who were torn by their pro Compromise platform and found him to be an abysmal gaffe prone public speaker 84 The Democrats were confident a popular slogan was that the Democrats will pierce their enemies in 1852 as they poked that is Polked them in 1844 87 This proved to be true as Scott won only Kentucky Tennessee Massachusetts and Vermont finishing with 42 electoral votes to Pierce s 254 With 3 2 million votes cast Pierce won the popular vote with 50 9 to 44 1 percent A sizable block of Free Soilers broke for Pierce s in state rival Hale who won 4 9 percent of the popular vote 88 89 The Democrats took large majorities in Congress 90 Presidency 1853 1857 Main article Presidency of Franklin Pierce Transition and train crash nbsp Jane Pierce and Benny whose death cast a shadow over Pierce s term in office 91 Pierce began his presidency in mourning Weeks after his election on January 6 1853 the President elect and his family were traveling from Boston by train when their car derailed and rolled down an embankment near Andover Massachusetts Both Franklin and Jane Pierce survived but their only remaining son 11 year old Benjamin was crushed to death in the wreckage his body nearly decapitated Pierce was not able to hide the gruesome sight from his wife They both suffered severe depression afterward which likely affected Pierce s performance as president 91 92 Jane Pierce wondered if the train accident was divine punishment for her husband s pursuit and acceptance of high office She wrote a lengthy letter of apology to Benny for her failings as a mother 91 She avoided social functions for much of her first two years as First Lady making her public debut in that role to great sympathy at the annual public reception held at the White House on New Year s Day 1855 93 When Franklin Pierce departed New Hampshire for the inauguration Jane Pierce chose not to accompany him Pierce then the youngest man to be elected president chose to affirm his oath of office on a law book rather than swear it on a Bible as all his predecessors except John Quincy Adams who swore on a book of law 94 had done He was the first president to deliver his inaugural address from memory 95 In the address he hailed an era of peace and prosperity at home and urged a vigorous assertion of U S interests in its foreign relations including the eminently important acquisition of new territories The policy of my Administration said the new president will not be deterred by any timid forebodings of evil from expansion Avoiding the word slavery he emphasized his desire to put the important subject to rest and maintain a peaceful union He alluded to his own personal tragedy telling the crowd You have summoned me in my weakness you must sustain me by your strength 96 Administration and political strife See also List of federal judges appointed by Franklin Pierce nbsp BEP engraved portrait of Pierce as president In his Cabinet appointments Pierce sought to unite a party that was squabbling over the fruits of victory Most in the party had not originally supported him for the nomination and some had allied with the Free Soil party to gain victory in local elections Pierce decided to allow each of the party s factions some appointments even those that had not supported the Compromise of 1850 97 All of Pierce s cabinet nominations were unanimously and immediately confirmed by the Senate 98 Pierce spent the first few weeks of his term sorting through hundreds of lower level federal positions to be filled This was a chore as he sought to represent all factions of the party and could fully satisfy none of them Partisans found themselves unable to secure positions for their friends which put the Democratic Party on edge and fueled bitterness between factions Before long northern newspapers accused Pierce of filling his government with pro slavery secessionists while southern newspapers accused him of abolitionism 98 Factionalism between the pro and anti administration Democrats ramped up quickly especially within the New York Democratic Party The more conservative Hardshell Democrats or Hards of New York were deeply skeptical of the Pierce administration which was associated with Marcy who became Secretary of State and the more moderate New York faction the Softshell Democrats or Softs 99 nbsp Vice President William R King died a little more than one month into his term leaving a vacancy that could not be filled Buchanan had urged Pierce to consult Vice President elect King in selecting the Cabinet but Pierce did not do so Pierce and King had not communicated since they had been selected as candidates in June 1852 By the start of 1853 King was severely ill with tuberculosis and went to Cuba to recuperate His condition deteriorated and Congress passed a special law allowing him to be sworn in before the American consul in Havana on March 24 Wanting to die at home he returned to his plantation in Alabama on April 17 and died the next day The office of vice president remained vacant for the remainder of Pierce s term as the Constitution then had no provision for filling the vacancy This extended vacancy meant that for nearly the entirety of Pierce s presidency the Senate President pro tempore initially David Atchison of Missouri was next in line to the presidency 100 Pierce sought to run a more efficient and accountable government than his predecessors 101 His Cabinet members implemented an early system of civil service examinations a forerunner to the Pendleton Act passed three decades later which mandated that most positions in the U S government should be awarded on the basis of merit not patronage 102 The Interior Department was reformed by Secretary Robert McClelland who systematized its operations expanded the use of paper records and pursued fraud 103 Another of Pierce s reforms was to expand the role of the U S attorney general in appointing federal judges and attorneys which was an important step in the eventual development of the Justice Department 101 There was a vacancy on the Supreme Court Fillmore having failed to get Senate confirmation for his nominees had offered it to newly elected Louisiana Senator Judah P Benjamin who had declined Pierce also offered the seat to Benjamin and when the Louisianan persisted in his refusal 104 nominated instead John Archibald Campbell an advocate of states rights this would be Pierce s only Supreme Court appointment 105 Economic policy and internal improvements nbsp Indian Peace Medal depicting PiercePierce charged Treasury Secretary James Guthrie with reforming the Treasury which was inefficiently managed and had many unsettled accounts Guthrie increased oversight of Treasury employees and tariff collectors many of whom were withholding money from the government Despite laws requiring funds to be held in the Treasury large deposits remained in private banks under the Whig administrations Guthrie reclaimed these funds and sought to prosecute corrupt officials with mixed success 106 Secretary of War Jefferson Davis at Pierce s request led surveys by the Corps of Topographical Engineers of possible transcontinental railroad routes throughout the country The Democratic Party had long rejected federal appropriations for internal improvements but Davis felt that such a project could be justified as a Constitutional national security objective Davis also deployed the Army Corps of Engineers to supervise construction projects in the District of Columbia including the expansion of the United States Capitol and building of the Washington Monument 107 Foreign and military affairs The Pierce administration aligned with the expansionist Young America movement with Marcy leading the charge as Secretary of State Marcy sought to present to the world a distinctively American republican image He issued a circular recommending that U S diplomats wear the simple dress of an American citizen instead of the elaborate diplomatic uniforms worn in the courts of Europe and that they only hire American citizens to work in consulates 108 109 Marcy received international praise for his 73 page letter defending Austrian refugee Martin Koszta who had been captured abroad in mid 1853 by the Austrian government despite his intention to become a U S citizen 110 111 Davis an advocate of a southern transcontinental route persuaded Pierce to send rail magnate James Gadsden to Mexico to buy land for a potential railroad Gadsden was also charged with re negotiating the provisions of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo which required the U S to prevent Native American raids into Mexico from New Mexico Territory Gadsden negotiated a treaty with Mexican President Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna in December 1853 purchasing a large swath of land to America s southwest Negotiations were nearly derailed by William Walker s unauthorized expedition into Mexico and so a clause was included charging the U S with combating future such attempts 112 113 Congress reduced the Gadsden Purchase to the region now comprising southern Arizona and part of southern New Mexico the price was cut from 15 million to 10 million Congress also included a protection clause for a private citizen Albert G Sloo whose interests were threatened by the purchase Pierce opposed the use of the federal government to prop up private industry and did not endorse the final version of the treaty which was ratified nonetheless 114 113 The acquisition brought the contiguous United States to its present day boundaries excepting later minor adjustments 115 The Pierce cabinetOfficeNameTermPresidentFranklin Pierce1853 1857Vice PresidentWilliam R King1853None1853 1857Secretary of StateWilliam L Marcy1853 1857Secretary of the TreasuryJames Guthrie1853 1857Secretary of WarJefferson Davis1853 1857Attorney GeneralCaleb Cushing1853 1857Postmaster GeneralJames Campbell1853 1857Secretary of the NavyJames C Dobbin1853 1857Secretary of the InteriorRobert McClelland1853 1857Relations with Great Britain needed resolution as American fishermen were upset at the British Royal Navy s increasing enforcement of Canadian territorial waters Marcy completed a trade reciprocity agreement with British minister to Washington John Crampton which reduced the need for British coastline enforcement Buchanan was sent as minister to London to pressure the British government which was slow to support a new treaty A favorable reciprocity treaty was ratified in August 1854 which Pierce saw as a first step towards the American annexation of Canada 116 117 While the administration negotiated with Britain over the Canada United States border U S interests were also an issue in Central America where the Clayton Bulwer Treaty of 1850 had failed to keep Great Britain from expanding its influence in the region Gaining the advantage over Britain in the region was a key part of Pierce s expansionist goals 118 119 British consuls in the United States sought to enlist Americans for the Crimean War in 1854 in violation of neutrality laws and Pierce eventually expelled minister Crampton and three consuls To the President s surprise the British did not expel Buchanan in retaliation In his December 1855 State of the Union message to Congress Pierce had set forth the American case that Britain had violated the Clayton Bulwer Treaty The British according to Buchanan were impressed by the message and were rethinking their policy Nevertheless Buchanan was not successful in getting the British to abandon their Central American possessions The Canadian treaty was ratified by Congress the British parliament and by the colonial legislatures in Canada 120 Pierce s administration aroused sectional apprehensions when three U S diplomats in Europe drafted a proposal to the president to purchase Cuba from Spain for 120 million USD and justify the wresting of it from Spain if the offer were refused The publication of the Ostend Manifesto which had been drawn up at the insistence of Secretary of State Marcy provoked the scorn of northerners who viewed it as an attempt to annex a slave holding possession to bolster Southern interests It helped discredit the expansionist policy of Manifest Destiny the Democratic Party had often supported 121 122 Pierce favored expansion and a substantial reorganization of the military Secretary of War Davis and Navy Secretary James C Dobbin found the Army and Navy in poor condition with insufficient forces a reluctance to adopt new technology and inefficient management 123 Under the Pierce administration Commodore Matthew C Perry visited Japan a venture originally planned under Fillmore in an effort to expand trade to the East Perry wanted to encroach on Asia by force but Pierce and Dobbin pushed him to remain diplomatic Perry signed a modest trade treaty with the Japanese shogunate which was successfully ratified 124 125 The 1856 launch of the USS Merrimac one of six newly commissioned steam frigates was one of Pierce s most personally satisfying days in office 126 Bleeding Kansas Main articles Kansas Nebraska Act and Bleeding Kansas nbsp The Kansas Nebraska Act organized Kansas in pink and Nebraska Territory yellow The greatest challenge to the country s equilibrium during the Pierce administration was the passage of the Kansas Nebraska Act Organizing the largely unsettled Nebraska Territory which stretched from Missouri to the Rocky Mountains and from Texas north to what is now the Canada United States border was a crucial part of Douglas s plans for western expansion He wanted a transcontinental railroad with a link from Chicago to California through the vast western territory Organizing the territory was necessary for settlement as the land would not be surveyed nor put up for sale until a territorial government was authorized Those from slave states had never been content with western limits on slavery and felt it should be able to expand into territories procured with blood and treasure that had come in part from the South Douglas and his allies planned to organize the territory and let local settlers decide whether to allow slavery This would repeal the Missouri Compromise of 1820 as most of it was north of the 36 30 N line the Missouri Compromise deemed free The territory would be split into a northern part Nebraska and a southern part Kansas and the expectation was that Kansas would allow slavery and Nebraska would not 127 128 129 In the view of pro slavery Southern politicians the Compromise of 1850 had already annulled the Missouri Compromise by admitting the state of California including territory south of the compromise line as a free state 130 Pierce had wanted to organize the Nebraska Territory without explicitly addressing the matter of slavery but Douglas could not get enough Southern votes to accomplish this 131 Pierce was skeptical of the bill knowing it would result in bitter opposition from the North Douglas and Davis convinced him to support the bill regardless It was tenaciously opposed by northerners such as Ohio Senator Salmon P Chase and Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner who rallied public sentiment in the North against the bill Northerners had been suspicious of the Gadsden Purchase moves towards Cuba annexation and the influence of slaveholding Cabinet members such as Davis and saw the Nebraska bill as part of a pattern of southern aggression The result was a political firestorm that did great damage to Pierce s presidency 127 128 129 Pierce and his administration used threats and promises to keep most Democrats on board in favor of the bill The Whigs split along sectional lines the conflict destroyed them as a national party The Kansas Nebraska Act was passed in May 1854 and ultimately defined the Pierce presidency The political turmoil that followed the passage saw the short term rise of the nativist and anti Catholic American Party often called the Know Nothings and the founding of the Republican Party 127 128 129 nbsp Northerners resented Pierce s attempted expansion of slavery through Kansas Nebraska and Cuba 132 133 In this 1856 cartoon a Free Soiler is held down by Pierce Buchanan and Cass while Douglas shoves Slavery depicted as a black man down his throat Even as the act was being debated settlers on both sides of the slavery issue poured into the territories so as to secure the outcome they wanted in the voting The passage of the act resulted in so much violence between groups that the territory became known as Bleeding Kansas Thousands of pro slavery Border Ruffians came across from Missouri to vote in the territorial elections although they were not resident in Kansas giving that element the victory Pierce supported the outcome despite the irregularities When Free Staters set up a shadow government and drafted the Topeka Constitution Pierce called their work an act of rebellion The president continued to recognize the pro slavery legislature which was dominated by Democrats even after a Congressional investigative committee found its election to have been illegitimate He dispatched federal troops to break up a meeting of the Topeka government 134 135 Passage of the act coincided with the seizure of escaped slave Anthony Burns in Boston Northerners rallied in support of Burns but Pierce was determined to follow the Fugitive Slave Act to the letter and dispatched federal troops to enforce Burns s return to his Virginia owner despite furious crowds 136 137 The midterm congressional elections of 1854 and 1855 were devastating to the Democrats as well as to the Whig Party which was on its last legs The Democrats lost almost every state outside the South The administration s opponents in the North worked together to return opposition members to Congress though only a few northern Whigs gained election In Pierce s New Hampshire hitherto loyal to the Democratic Party the Know Nothings elected the governor all three representatives dominated the legislature and returned John P Hale to the Senate Anti immigrant fervor brought the Know Nothings their highest numbers to that point and some northerners were elected under the auspices of the new Republican Party 132 133 1856 election Main article 1856 Democratic National Convention nbsp Partisan violence spilled into Congress in May 1856 when Free Soil Senator Charles Sumner was assaulted with a walking cane by Democratic Rep Preston Brooks in the Senate chamber 138 Pierce fully expected to be renominated by the Democrats In reality his chances of winning the nomination let alone the general election were slim The administration was widely disliked in the North for its position on the Kansas Nebraska Act and Democratic leaders were aware of Pierce s electoral vulnerability Nevertheless his supporters began to plan for an alliance with Douglas to deny James Buchanan the nomination Buchanan had solid political connections and had been safely overseas through most of Pierce s term leaving him untainted by the Kansas debacle 139 140 141 When balloting began on June 5 at the convention in Cincinnati Ohio Pierce expected a plurality if not the required two thirds majority On the first ballot he received only 122 votes many of them from the South to Buchanan s 135 with Douglas and Cass receiving the rest By the following morning fourteen ballots had been completed but none of the three main candidates were able to get two thirds of the vote Pierce whose support had been slowly declining as the ballots passed directed his supporters to break for Douglas withdrawing his name in a last ditch effort to defeat Buchanan Douglas only 43 years of age believed that he could be nominated in 1860 if he let the older Buchanan win this time and received assurances from Buchanan s managers that this would be the case After two more deadlocked ballots Douglas s managers withdrew his name leaving Buchanan as the clear winner To soften the blow to Pierce the convention issued a resolution of unqualified approbation in praise of his administration and selected his ally former Kentucky Representative John C Breckinridge as the vice presidential nominee 139 140 141 This loss marked the only time in U S history that an elected president who was an active candidate for reelection was not nominated by his political party for a second term note 6 142 Pierce endorsed Buchanan though the two remained distant he hoped to resolve the Kansas situation by November to improve the Democrats chances in the general election He installed John W Geary as territorial governor who drew the ire of pro slavery legislators 143 Geary was able to restore order in Kansas though the electoral damage had already been done Republicans used Bleeding Kansas and Bleeding Sumner the brutal caning of Charles Sumner by South Carolina Representative Preston Brooks in the Senate chamber as election slogans 144 The Buchanan Breckinridge ticket was elected but the Democratic percentage of the popular vote in the North fell from 49 8 percent in 1852 to 41 4 in 1856 as Buchanan won only five of sixteen free states Pierce had won fourteen and in three of those Buchanan won because of a split between the Republican candidate former California senator John C Fremont and the Know Nothing former president Fillmore 145 Pierce did not temper his rhetoric after losing the nomination In his final message to Congress delivered in December 1856 he vigorously attacked Republicans and abolitionists He took the opportunity to defend his record on fiscal policy and on achieving peaceful relations with other nations 146 147 In the final days of the Pierce administration Congress passed bills to increase the pay of army officers and to build new naval vessels also expanding the number of seamen enlisted It also passed a tariff reduction bill he had long sought 148 Pierce and his cabinet left office on March 4 1857 the only time in U S history that the original cabinet members all remained for a full four year term 149 Post presidency 1857 1869 nbsp Portrait by George Peter Alexander Healy Pierce seen here in 1858 remained a vocal political figure after his presidency 150 After leaving the White House the Pierces remained in Washington for more than two months staying with former Secretary of State William L Marcy 151 Buchanan altered course from the Pierce administration replacing all his appointees The Pierces eventually moved to Portsmouth New Hampshire where Pierce had begun to speculate in property Seeking warmer weather he and Jane spent the next three years traveling beginning with a stay in Madeira and followed by tours of Europe and the Bahamas 150 In Rome he visited Nathaniel Hawthorne the two men spent much time together and the author found the retired president as buoyant as ever 152 Pierce never lost sight of politics during his travels commenting regularly on the nation s growing sectional conflict He insisted that northern abolitionists stand down to avoid a southern secession writing that the bloodshed of a civil war would not be along Mason and Dixon s line merely but within our own borders in our own streets 150 He also criticized New England Protestant ministers who largely supported abolition and Republican candidates for their heresy and treason 150 The rise of the Republican Party forced the Democrats to defend Pierce during his debates with Republican Senate candidate Abraham Lincoln in 1858 Douglas called the former president a man of integrity and honor 153 As the Democratic Convention of 1860 approached some asked Pierce to run as a compromise candidate that could unite the fractured party but Pierce refused As Douglas struggled to attract southern support Pierce backed Cushing and then Breckinridge as potential alternatives but his priority was a united Democratic Party The split Democrats were soundly defeated for the presidency by the Republican candidate Lincoln In the months between Lincoln s election and his inauguration on March 4 1861 Pierce looked on as several southern states began plans to secede He was asked by Justice Campbell to travel to Alabama and address that state s secession convention Due to illness he declined but sent a letter appealing to the people of Alabama to remain in the Union and give the North time to repeal laws against southern interests and to find common ground 154 Civil War After efforts to prevent the Civil War ended with the firing on Fort Sumter Northern Democrats including Douglas endorsed Lincoln s plan to bring the Southern states back into the fold by force Pierce wanted to avoid war at all costs and wrote to Van Buren proposing an assembly of former U S presidents to resolve the issue but this suggestion was not acted on I will never justify sustain or in any way or to any extent uphold this cruel heartless aimless unnecessary war Pierce wrote to his wife 154 Pierce publicly opposed President Lincoln s order suspending the writ of habeas corpus arguing that even in a time of war the country should not abandon its protection of civil liberties This stand won him admirers with the emerging Northern Peace Democrats but others saw the stand as further evidence of Pierce s southern bias 155 In September 1861 Pierce traveled to Michigan visiting his former Interior Secretary McClelland former senator Cass and others A Detroit bookseller J A Roys sent a letter to Lincoln s Secretary of State William H Seward accusing the former president of meeting with disloyal people and saying he had heard there was a plot to overthrow the government and establish Pierce as president Later that month the pro administration Detroit Tribune printed an item calling Pierce a prowling traitor spy and intimating that he was a member of the pro Confederate Knights of the Golden Circle No such conspiracy existed but a Pierce supporter Guy S Hopkins sent to the Tribune a letter purporting to be from a member of the Knights of the Golden Circle indicating that President P was part of a plot against the Union 156 157 Hopkins intended for the Tribune to make the charges public at which point Hopkins would admit authorship thus making the Tribune editors seem overly partisan and gullible Instead the Tribune editors forwarded the Hopkins letter to government officials Seward then ordered the arrest of possible traitors in Michigan which included Hopkins Hopkins confessed authorship of the letter and admitted the hoax but despite this Seward wrote to Pierce demanding to know if the charges were true Pierce denied them and Seward hastily backtracked Later Republican newspapers printed the Hopkins letter in spite of his admission that it was a hoax and Pierce decided that he needed to clear his name publicly When Seward refused to make their correspondence public Pierce publicized his outrage by having a Senate ally California s Milton Latham read the letters between Seward and Pierce into the Congressional record to the administration s embarrassment 156 157 The institution of the draft and the arrest of outspoken anti administration Democrat Clement Vallandigham further incensed Pierce who gave an address to New Hampshire Democrats in July 1863 vilifying Lincoln Who I ask has clothed the President with power to dictate to any one of us when we must or when we may speak or be silent upon any subject and especially in relation to the conduct of any public servant he demanded 158 159 Pierce s comments were ill received in much of the North especially as his criticism of Lincoln s aims coincided with the twin Union victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg Pierce s reputation in the North was further damaged the following month when the Mississippi plantation of the Confederate president Jefferson Davis was seized by Union soldiers Pierce s correspondence with Davis all pre war revealing his deep friendship with Davis and predicting that civil war would result in insurrection in the North was sent to the press Pierce s words hardened abolitionist sentiment against him 158 159 Jane Pierce died of tuberculosis in Andover Massachusetts in December 1863 she was buried at Old North Cemetery in Concord New Hampshire Pierce was further grieved by the death of his close friend Nathaniel Hawthorne in May 1864 he was with Hawthorne when the author died unexpectedly Hawthorne had controversially dedicated his final book to Pierce Some Democrats tried again to put Pierce s name up for consideration as the 1864 presidential election unfolded but he kept his distance Lincoln easily won a second term When news spread of Lincoln s assassination in April 1865 a mob gathered outside Pierce s home in Concord demanding to know why he had not raised a flag as a public mourning gesture Pierce grew angry expressing sadness over Lincoln s death but denying any need for a public gesture He told them that his history of military and public service proved his patriotism which was enough to quiet the crowd 160 Final years and death Pierce s drinking impaired his health in his last years and he grew increasingly spiritual He had a brief relationship with an unknown woman in mid 1865 During this time he used his influence to improve the treatment of Davis now a prisoner at Fort Monroe in Virginia He also offered financial help to Hawthorne s son Julian as well as to his own nephews On the second anniversary of Jane s death Pierce was baptized into his wife s Episcopal faith at St Paul s Church in Concord He found this church to be less political than his former Congregational denomination which had alienated Democrats with anti slavery rhetoric He took up the life of an old farmer as he called himself buying up property drinking less farming the land himself and hosting visiting relatives 161 He spent most of his time in Concord and his cottage at Little Boar s Head on the coast sometimes visiting Jane s relatives in Massachusetts Still interested in politics he expressed support for Andrew Johnson s Reconstruction policy and supported the president s acquittal in his impeachment trial he later expressed optimism for Johnson s successor Ulysses S Grant 162 Pierce s health began to decline again in mid 1869 he resumed heavy drinking despite his deteriorating physical condition He returned to Concord that September suffering from severe cirrhosis of the liver knowing he would not recover A caretaker was hired none of his family members were present in his final days He died at 4 35 am on Friday October 8 1869 at the age of 64 President Grant who later defended Pierce s service in the Mexican American War declared a day of national mourning Newspapers across the country carried lengthy front page stories examining Pierce s colorful and controversial career Pierce was interred next to his wife and two of his sons in the Minot enclosure at Concord s Old North Cemetery 163 In his last will which he signed January 22 1868 Pierce left a large number of specific bequests such as paintings swords horses and other items to friends family and neighbors Much of his 72 000 estate equal to 1 580 000 today went to his brother Henry s family and to Hawthorne s children and Pierce s landlady Henry s son Frank Pierce received the largest share 164 Sites memorials and honors nbsp Statue of Franklin Pierce at the New Hampshire State House in Concord In addition to his LL D from Norwich University Pierce received honorary doctorates from Bowdoin College 1853 and Dartmouth College 1860 165 Two places in New Hampshire have been listed on the National Register of Historic Places specifically because of their association with Pierce The Franklin Pierce Homestead in Hillsborough is a state park and a National Historic Landmark open to the public 3 The Franklin Pierce House in Concord where Pierce died was destroyed by fire in 1981 but is nevertheless listed on the register 166 The Pierce Manse his Concord home from 1842 to 1848 is open seasonally and maintained by a volunteer group The Pierce Brigade 49 A statue of Pierce by Augustus Lukeman dedicated in 1914 167 stands on the grounds of the New Hampshire State House New Hampshire Historical Markers 65 80 125 and 216 commemorate Pierce and his family around New Hampshire 168 Several institutions and places have been named after Pierce many in New Hampshire The Franklin Pierce University in Rindge New Hampshire was chartered in 1962 169 The University of New Hampshire School of Law was founded in 1973 as the Franklin Pierce Law Center When the school was renamed in 2010 a Franklin Pierce Center for Intellectual Property was established 170 There is a Mt Pierce in the Presidential Range of New Hampshire s White Mountains renamed from Mt Clinton in 1913 171 The small town of Pierceton Indiana was founded in the 1850s and honors President Pierce 172 Pierce County Washington the second most populous county in the state is named in honor of President Pierce 173 Pierce County Georgia established in 1857 is also named in honor of President Pierce 174 Legacy nbsp nbsp Pierce s image has been used on a U S postage stamp 1938 and a Presidential Dollar Coin 2010 After his death Pierce mostly passed from the American consciousness except as one of a series of presidents whose disastrous tenures led to civil war 175 Pierce s presidency is widely regarded as a failure he is often described as one of the worst presidents in American history note 7 The public placed him third to last among his peers in C SPAN surveys 2000 and 2009 180 Part of his failure was in allowing a divided Congress to take the initiative most disastrously with the Kansas Nebraska Act Although he did not lead that fight Senator Douglas did Pierce paid the cost in damage to his reputation 181 The failure of Pierce as president to secure sectional conciliation helped bring an end to the dominance of the Democratic Party that had started with Jackson and led to a period of over seventy years when the Republicans mostly controlled national politics 182 Historian Eric Foner says His administration turned out to be one of the most disastrous in American history It witnessed the collapse of the party system inherited from the Age of Jackson 183 Biographer Roy F Nichols argues 184 185 As a national political leader Pierce was an accident He was honest and tenacious of his views but as he made up his mind with difficulty and often reversed himself before making a final decision he gave a general impression of instability Kind courteous generous he attracted many individuals but his attempts to satisfy all factions failed and made him many enemies In carrying out his principles of strict construction he was most in accord with Southerners who generally had the letter of the law on their side He failed utterly to realize the depth and the sincerity of Northern feeling against the South and was bewildered at the general flouting of the law and the Constitution as he described it by the people of his own New England At no time did he catch the popular imagination His inability to cope with the difficult problems that arose early in his administration caused him to lose the respect of great numbers especially in the North and his few successes failed to restore public confidence He was an inexperienced man suddenly called to assume a tremendous responsibility who honestly tried to do his best without adequate training or temperamental fitness Despite a reputation as an able politician and a likable man during his presidency Pierce served only as a moderator among the increasingly bitter factions that were driving the nation towards civil war 186 To Pierce who saw slavery as a question of property rather than morality 182 the Union was sacred because of this he saw the actions of abolitionists and the more moderate Free Soilers as divisive and as a threat to the constitutionally guaranteed rights of southerners 187 Although he criticized those who sought to limit or end slavery he rarely rebuked southern politicians who took extreme positions or opposed northern interests 188 David Potter concludes that the Ostend Manifesto and the Kansas Nebraska Act were the two great calamities of the Franklin Pierce administration Both brought down an avalanche of public criticism 189 More important says Potter they permanently discredited Manifest Destiny and popular sovereignty as political doctrines 189 Historian Kenneth Nivison writing in 2010 takes a more favorable view of Pierce s foreign policy stating that his expansionism prefaced those of later presidents William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt who served at a time when America had the military might to make her desires stick American foreign and commercial policy beginning in the 1890s which eventually supplanted European colonialism by the middle of the twentieth century owed much to the paternalism of Jacksonian Democracy cultivated in the international arena by the Presidency of Franklin Pierce 190 Historian Larry Gara who authored a book on Pierce s presidency wrote in the former president s entry in American National Biography Online 191 He was president at a time that called for almost superhuman skills yet he lacked such skills and never grew into the job to which he had been elected His view of the Constitution and the Union was from the Jacksonian past He never fully understood the nature or depth of Free Soil sentiment in the North He was able to negotiate a reciprocal trade treaty with Canada to begin the opening of Japan to western trade to add land to the Southwest and to sign legislation for the creation of an overseas empire the Guano Islands Act His Cuba and Kansas policies led only to deeper sectional strife His support for the Kansas Nebraska Act and his determination to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act helped polarize the sections Pierce was hard working and his administration largely untainted by graft yet the legacy from those four turbulent years contributed to the tragedy of secession and civil war Historian and biographer Peter A Wallner notes that 192 History has accorded to the Pierce administration a share of the blame for policies that incited the slavery issue hastened the collapse of the second party system and brought on the Civil War It is both an inaccurate and unfair judgment Pierce was always a nationalist attempting to find a middle ground to keep the Union together The alternative to attempting to steer a moderate course was the breakup of the Union the Civil War and the deaths of more than six hundred thousand Americans Pierce should not be blamed for attempting throughout his political career to avoid this fate See also nbsp New Hampshire portalList of deaths through alcohol New Hampshire Historical Marker No 80 Franklin Pierce 1804 1869Notes Vice President King died in office As this was prior to the adoption of the Twenty fifth Amendment in 1967 a vacancy in the office of vice president was not filled until the next ensuing election and inauguration Some local accounts suggest he was born in the Homestead The National Register of Historic Places cites the log cabin as the more likely birthplace 4 and historian Peter A Wallner asserts this is conclusively so 5 This was called the Republican or Jeffersonian Republican Party at the time it soon became known as the Democratic Republican Party Modern writers prefer this term to distinguish it from the modern day Republican Party The two story school building burned some years later and Hancock Academy was founded in 1836 to fill its place 7 The governor of New Hampshire was then elected annually see also List of governors of New Hampshire Four other presidents John Tyler Millard Fillmore Andrew Johnson and Chester Arthur failed to be nominated for re election by their respective parties however each of those four presidents had been elected vice president and had assumed the presidency after their respective predecessors had died in office 142 Wallner writes It is doubtful if any former president was as reviled in later life as Franklin Pierce was and his reputation has hardly improved in the century and a half since his death If anything he has been forgotten and relegated to a footnote in history books as an amiable nonentity who had no business being president and who reached that lofty position purely by the accident of circumstance 176 177 178 179 References Coker Jeffrey W 2002 Presidents from Taylor Through Grant 1849 1877 Debating the Issues in Pro and Con Primary Documents Greenwood p 54 ISBN 978 0 3133 1551 0 Attractive polished and outgoing he was remembered by classmates more for his social skills than his scholarship he married Jane Means Appleton the daughter of Bowdoin College s president Jane was a frail somewhat sickly and erratic woman who suffered from bouts of tuberculosis and deep depression the two enjoyed a successful if at time difficult marriage Presidential Historians Survey 2021 C SPAN Retrieved March 7 2023 a b Pierce Franklin Homestead National Park Service Archived from the original on March 9 2015 Retrieved June 29 2014 Nomination Form Franklin Pierce National Register of Historic Places 1976 p 8 Retrieved June 29 2014 Wallner 2004 p 3 Wallner 2004 pp 1 8 Hurd D Hamilton 1885 History of Hillsborough County New Hampshire Philadelphia J W Lewis amp Co p 350 a b Wallner 2004 pp 10 15 Gara 1991 pp 35 36 Wallner 2004 pp 16 21 Holt 2010 229 Wallner Peter A Spring 2005 Franklin Pierce and Bowdoin College Associates Hawthorne and Hale PDF Historical New Hampshire New Hampshire Historical Society 24 Archived from the original PDF on August 17 2015 Within the student body Pierce s influence was widespread Besides heading the Athenian Society he also formed the only military company in the history of the college Captain Pierce in an attempt to provide recreation and instruction for his fellow students led the Bowdoin Cadets in their daily drills on the grounds in front of the President s house The Reverend William Allen the college s president objected to the noise and ordered a halt to the activity When Pierce refused to comply with Allen s order animosity grew between the students and the college authorities resulting in the junior class going on strike Pierce was accused of leading the rebellion but the college records do not acknowledge the event Pierce s father took note of his son s role however and in a rare letter admonished him about his behavior In later years classmates fondly recalled the strike and Pierce s key role Boulard 2006 p 23 Waterman Charles E March 7 1918 The Red Schoolhouse in Action The Journal of Education New England Publishing Company 87 88 10 265 doi 10 1177 002205741808701007 S2CID 188507307 Holt 2010 230 Wallner 2004 pp 28 32 Holt 2010 258 Wallner 2004 p 56 Wallner 2004 pp 28 33 Wallner 2004 pp 33 43 John Farmer G Parker Lyon editors The New Hampshire Annual Register and United States Calendar 1832 p 53 Brian Matthew Jordan Triumphant Mourner The Tragic Dimension of Franklin Pierce 2003 p 31 Betros Lance 2004 West Point Two Centuries and Beyond McWhiney Foundation Press p 155 ISBN 978 1 893114 47 0 Retrieved August 30 2014 Ellis William Arba 1911 Norwich University 1819 1911 Her History Her Graduates Her Roll of Honor Volume 1 Capital City Press pp 87 99 Retrieved August 30 2014 Ellis William Arba 1911 Norwich University 1819 1911 Her History Her Graduates Her Roll of Honor Volume 2 Capital City Press pp 14 16 Retrieved August 30 2014 a b Wallner 2004 pp 44 47 Holt 2010 locs 273 300 a b Wallner 2004 pp 31 32 77 78 a b Gara 1991 pp 31 32 a b Baker Jean H Franklin Pierce Life Before the Presidency American President An Online Reference Resource University of Virginia Archived from the original on December 17 2010 Retrieved January 16 2019 Franklin and Jane Pierce seemingly had little in common and the marriage would sometimes be a troubled one The bride s family were staunch Whigs a party largely formed to oppose Andrew Jackson whom Pierce revered Socially Jane Pierce was reserved and shy the polar opposite of her new husband Above all she was a committed devotee of the temperance movement She detested Washington and usually refused to live there even after Franklin Pierce became a U S Senator in 1837 Wallner 2004 pp 79 80 Wallner 2004 pp 241 244 Wallner 2004 pp 47 57 a b Wallner 2004 pp 57 59 Wallner 2004 p 92 Wallner 2004 pp 71 72 Wallner 2004 p 67 Lamb Brian Wallner Peter October 25 2004 Interview with Peter Wallner Franklin Pierce New Hampshire s Favorite Son C SPAN 00 55 56 He also thought and he sincerely believed this that if the North hadn t attacked the South so much for being for this moral sin of slavery that the South eventually over time would have ended slavery on its own that he felt that the Civil War was unnecessary And he always said that and he never took that back even at the height of the war itself He always believed the Civil War was unnecessary and it was brought upon the nation by fanatics on both sides Wallner 2004 pp 59 61 Holt 2010 362 375 Wallner 2004 pp 64 69 Wallner 2004 pp 68 91 92 a b Wallner 2004 pp 69 72 Wallner 2004 p 80 Wallner 2004 pp 78 84 Wallner 2004 pp 84 90 Holt 2010 419 Wallner 2004 pp 91 92 a b The Pierce Manse Archived from the original on August 16 2010 Retrieved June 29 2014 Wallner 2004 p 79 Wallner 2004 p 86 Wallner 2004 pp 98 101 Wallner 2004 pp 93 95 Wallner 2004 pp 103 110 Holt 2010 431 Wallner 2004 pp 131 132 Wadleigh 1913 p 249 Jan 7 Hon John P Hale s letter to his constituents against the annexation of Texas published Wadleigh 1913 p 249 John P Hale who had been nominated for re election to Congress by the Democratic party was at this election dropped from the ticket and John Woodbury substituted in consequence of Mr Hale s refusal to go with the party in voting for the annexation of Texas A portion of the party consisting of those who approved of his opposition to the extension of slavery voted for him and succeeded in defeating his opponent leaving a vacancy in the delegation Wallner 2004 pp 111 122 Holt 2010 447 Wallner 2004 pp 131 135 a b Wallner 2004 pp 154 157 Holt 2010 490 Wallner 2004 pp 144 147 a b c Holt 2010 505 a b Wallner 2004 pp 147 154 Grant Ulysses S 1892 1885 Personal Memoirs of U S Grant Vol 1 C L Webster pp 146 147 a b Wallner 2004 pp 157 161 Holt 2010 pp 549 565 Gara 1991 pp 21 22 a b Holt 2010 608 Wallner 2004 pp 173 180 Wallner 2004 pp 181 84 Gara 1991 pp 23 29 a b Wallner 2004 pp 184 97 Gara 1991 pp 32 33 Wallner 2004 pp 197 202 Gara 1991 pp 33 34 Gara 1991 p 34 Wallner 2004 pp 210 213 Gara 1991 pp 36 38 Holt 2010 724 Wallner 2004 p 231 a b c Gara 1991 p 38 Holt 2010 725 Wallner 2004 p 206 Wallner 2004 p 203 Wallner 2004 pp 229 230 Gara 1991 p 39 Holt 2010 740 a b c Wallner 2004 pp 241 249 Gara 1991 pp 43 44 Boulard 2006 p 55 Liptak Adam January 17 2009 The Oath The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved January 1 2022 Hurja Emil 1933 History of Presidential Inaugurations New York Democrat p 49 Wallner 2004 pp 249 255 Holt 2010 767 a b Wallner 2007 pp 5 24 Wallner 2007 pp 15 18 Wallner 2007 pp 21 22 a b Wallner 2007 p 20 Wallner 2007 pp 35 36 Wallner 2007 pp 36 39 Butler 1908 pp 118 119 Wallner 2007 p 10 Wallner 2007 pp 32 36 Wallner 2007 pp 40 41 52 Wallner 2007 pp 25 32 Gara 1991 p 128 Wallner 2007 pp 61 63 Gara 1991 pp 128 129 Wallner 2007 pp 75 81 a b Gara 1991 pp 129 133 Wallner 2007 pp 106 108 Holt 2010 872 Wallner 2007 pp 27 30 63 66 125 126 Gara 1991 p 133 Wallner 2007 pp 26 27 Gara 1991 pp 139 140 Holt 2010 902 917 Wallner 2007 pp 131 157 Gara 1991 pp 149 155 Wallner 2007 pp 40 43 Wallner 2007 p 172 Gara 1991 pp 134 135 Wallner 2007 p 256 a b c Wallner 2007 pp 90 102 119 122 a b c Gara 1991 pp 88 100 a b c Holt 2010 1097 1240 Davis Jefferson 1881 The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government Hachette Books p 25 ISBN 978 0 306 80418 2 Etchison 2004 p 14 a b Wallner 2007 pp 158 167 a b Gara 1991 pp 99 100 Wallner 2007 pp 195 209 Gara 1991 pp 111 120 Wallner 2007 pp 122 125 Gara 1991 pp 107 109 Gara 1991 pp 120 121 a b Wallner 2007 pp 266 270 a b Gara 1991 pp 157 167 a b Holt 2010 1515 1558 a b Rudin Ken July 22 2009 When Has A President Been Denied His Party s Nomination NPR Retrieved February 15 2017 When was the last time if ever that a sitting president was not nominated by his party for a second term It only happened once to an elected president That was Franklin Pierce Four other presidents were denied the nomination of their party but none of these were elected in their own right They were John Tyler Whig 1844 Millard Fillmore Whig 1852 Andrew Johnson Democrat 1868 Chester Arthur Republican 1884 Wallner 2007 pp 272 280 Holt 2010 1610 Holt 2010 1610 24 Wallner 2007 pp 292 296 Gara 1991 pp 177 179 Wallner 2007 pp 303 304 Wallner 2007 p 305 a b c d Wallner 2007 pp 309 327 Boulard 2006 p 20 Boulard 2006 pp 55 56 Boulard 2006 pp 65 66 a b Wallner 2007 pp 327 338 Wallner 2007 pp 337 343 a b Wallner 2007 pp 341 343 a b Boulard 2006 pp 85 100 a b Wallner 2007 pp 343 357 a b Boulard 2006 pp 109 123 Wallner 2007 pp 357 362 Wallner 2007 pp 363 366 Wallner 2007 pp 366 371 Wallner 2007 pp 369 373 Wallner 2007 p 374 Dartmouth College 1900 General Catalogue Dartmouth College p 405 Retrieved August 30 2014 Franklin Pierce LL D dartmouth Franklin Pierce House National Register of Historic Places Retrieved June 29 2014 Franklin Pierce Home Burns The New York Times Associated Press September 18 1981 Pride Mike Franklin Pierce statue was criticized even before its creation Concord Monitor Published June 16th 2020 Accessed March 20th 2023 New Hampshire Highway Historical Markers New Hampshire Division of Historical Resources Published January 18th 2023 Accessed March 20th 2023 History Franklin Pierce University Retrieved June 29 2014 Franklin Pierce Center for IP University of New Hampshire Retrieved June 29 2014 Mountains of the Presidential Range Mount Washington Observatory Archived from the original on November 5 2013 Retrieved June 29 2014 History Pierceton Indiana Archived from the original on July 14 2014 Retrieved June 29 2014 Rochester Junius November 10 1998 King County Founding of HistoryLink org Retrieved January 31 2017 Guss John Walter 2001 Pierce County Georgia Charleston SC Arcadia Publishing p 9 ISBN 978 0 7385 1387 4 Gara 1991 p 180 Wallner 2007 pp 377 379 Wallner 2007 pp xi xii History has accorded to the Pierce administration a share of the blame for policies that incited the slavery issue hastened the collapse of the second party system and brought on the Civil War It is both an inaccurate and unfair judgment Pierce was always a nationalist attempting to find a middle ground to keep the Union together The alternative to attempting to steer a moderate course was the breakup of the Union the Civil War and the deaths of more than six hundred thousand Americans Pierce should not be blamed for attempting throughout his political career to avoid this fate Gara 1991 pp 180 184 Those who play the presidential ratings game have always assigned to Franklin Pierce a below average score In light of subsequent events the Pierce administration can be seen only as a disaster for the nation Its failure was as much a failure of the system as a failure of Pierce himself whom Roy Franklin Nichols has skillfully portrayed as a complex and tragic figure U S News amp World Report Worst Presidents Franklin Pierce Archived October 2 2013 at the Wayback Machine 2007 His fervor for expanding the borders helped set the stage for the Civil War C SPAN Survey C SPAN 2009 Archived from the original on July 22 2014 Retrieved June 30 2014 Gara 1991 p 182 a b Crockett David A December 2012 The Historical Presidency The Perils of Restoration Politics Nineteenth Century Antecedents Presidential Studies Quarterly 42 4 881 902 doi 10 1111 j 1741 5705 2012 04023 x Foner Eric 2006 Give Me Liberty An American History Vol 1 New York W W Norton amp Company p 413 Roy F Nichols Franklin Pierce Dictionary of American Biography 1934 Capace Nancy 2001 Encyclopedia of New Hampshire Somerset Publishers pp 268 69 ISBN 978 0 403 09601 5 Flagel Thomas R 2012 History Buff s Guide to the Presidents Nashville Tennessee Cumberland House p 404 ISBN 978 1 4022 7142 7 Robert Muccigrosso ed Research Guide to American Historical Biography 1988 3 1237 Gara 1991 p 181 Gara Larry September 2005 Franklin Pierce New Hampshire s Favorite Son book review Journal of American History 92 2 612 doi 10 2307 3659320 JSTOR 3659320 a b Potter 1976 p 192 Nivison Kenneth March 2010 Purposes Just and Pacific Franklin Pierce and the American Empire Diplomacy amp Statecraft 21 1 17 doi 10 1080 09592290903577668 S2CID 154406060 Gara Larry February 2000 Pierce Franklin American National Biography Online subscription required Wallner 2007 pp xi xii Works cited Boulard Garry 2006 The Expatriation of Franklin Pierce The Story of a President and the Civil War iUniverse Inc ISBN 978 0 595 40367 7 Butler Pierce 1908 Judah P Benjamin American Crisis Biographies George W Jacobs amp Company OCLC 664335 Etchison Nicole 2004 Bleeding Kansas Contested Liberty in the Civil War Era University Press of Kansas ISBN 978 0 7006 1287 1 Gara Larry 1991 The Presidency of Franklin Pierce University Press of Kansas ISBN 978 0 7006 0494 4 Holt Michael F 2010 Franklin Pierce The American Presidents Kindle ed Henry Holt and Company LLC ISBN 978 0 8050 8719 2 also see online book review Nichols Roy F Franklin Pierce Dictionary of American Biography 1934 Capace Nancy 2001 Encyclopedia of New Hampshire Somerset Publishers pp 262 69 ISBN 978 0 403 09601 5 Potter David M 1976 The Impending Crisis 1848 1861 Harper amp Row ISBN 978 0 06 013403 7 Wallner Peter A 2004 Franklin Pierce New Hampshire s Favorite Son Plaidswede ISBN 978 0 9755216 1 8 Wallner Peter A 2007 Franklin Pierce Martyr for the Union Plaidswede ISBN 978 0 9790784 2 2 Wadleigh George 1913 Notable Events in the History of Dover New Hampshire Dover NH G H Wadleigh p 249 Boertlein John 2010 Presidential Confidential Clerisy Press ISBN 978 1 57860 362 6 External videos nbsp Booknotes interview with Peter Wallner on Franklin Pierce New Hampshire s Favorite Son November 28 2004 C SPANFurther readingAllen Felicity 1999 Jefferson Davis Unconquerable Heart University of Missouri Press ISBN 978 0 8262 1219 1 Barlett D W 1852 The life of Gen Frank Pierce of New Hampshire the Democratic candidate for president of the United States Derby amp Miller OCLC 1742614 Brinkley A Dyer D 2004 The American Presidency Houghton Mifflin Company ISBN 978 0 618 38273 6 Hamilton Neil 2010 Presidents A Biographical Dictionary Infobase ISBN 978 1 4381 2751 4 Hawthorne Nathaniel 1852 The Life of Franklin Pierce Ticknor Reed and Fields OCLC 60713500 Archived from the original on April 9 2017 Retrieved September 2 2002 Nevins Allan Ordeal of the Union Vol 2 A House Dividing 1852 1857 1947 online Nichols Roy Franklin 1923 The Democratic Machine 1850 1854 Columbia University Press OCLC 2512393 Nichols Roy Franklin 1931 Franklin Pierce Young Hickory of the Granite Hills University of Pennsylvania Press OCLC 426247 Silbey Joel H 2014 A Companion to the Antebellum Presidents 1837 1861 Wiley ISBN 978 1 118 60929 3 pp 345 96 Taylor Michael J C 2001 Governing the Devil in Hell Bleeding Kansas and the Destruction of the Franklin Pierce Presidency 1854 1856 White House Studies 1 185 205 Williamson Richard Joseph Friendship politics and the literary imagination The impact of Franklin Pierce on Hawthorne s work PhD dissertation University of North Texas ProQuest Dissertations Publishing 1996 9638512 External linksFranklin Pierce at Wikipedia s sister projects nbsp Media from Commons nbsp Quotations from Wikiquote nbsp Texts from Wikisource United States Congress Franklin Pierce id P000333 Biographical Directory of the United States Congress Works by Franklin Pierce at Project Gutenberg Works by Franklin Pierce at LibriVox public domain audiobooks nbsp Works by or about Franklin Pierce at Internet Archive Essays on Franklin Pierce and his presidency from the Miller Center of Public Affairs Franklin Pierce A Resource Guide from the Library of Congress Franklin Pierce Bicentennial Archived June 18 2022 at the Wayback Machine Life Portrait of Franklin Pierce from C SPAN s American Presidents Life Portraits June 14 1999 Franklin Pierce Personal Manuscripts Exterior Statues and Memorials N H Division of Historical Resources 2018 article on the 14th US President Portals nbsp Biography nbsp United States nbsp Politics nbsp Law Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Franklin Pierce amp oldid 1185928548, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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