The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1868-06-02
JAMES BUCHANAN AND his TINE.


to the great questions. national or domestic,
which agitated the country and divided par
ties. II is not our purpose to enter into the
details of his public career, since that is
part of history, and the functions of jour-
nalist are distinct from those Of historian.
But, when death has removed so distinguished
a person, and left his name and his record to
speak for themselves, it is proper, and IN
structive, and interesting to glance respect
fully yet impartially, over this record in
order to weigh the value and understand the
Specification of that name. And this we
shall endeayor to do at once concisely and
comprehensively.
Mr.. Buchanan was born in Franklin county,
Pennsylvania, April %, 1871, and died at his
home near Lancaster, Pennsylvania, June l,
1868, in the second month of the seventy
eighth year of his age. His father was OF
Irish nativity, and his mother was the daugh-
ter Of Pennsylvania farmer. Fortune smll-
ing on the paternal industry and thrift, the
son was able to enjoy collegiate education,
which, with a practical facility that never
deserted him throughout his subsequent life,
he Immediately turned to account in the dill
gent study of the law. He was admitted to
the bar at the age of twenty-one, and soon
acquired a reputation and practice as a
lawyer surpassed by no one in his State, and
in his fortieth year he retired from his profess
sion with an ample competency. Though he
played conspicuous part in the Pennsylvania
legislature, to which he was first elected in
1914, the public career of Mr.. Buchanan, in
its national aspect, cannot be said to have
commenced before 1926, when he became a
member of Congress. Up to this time he
had been a Federalist, and in his first speech
in Congress he took occasion to dispute the
Democratic theory of the limitation of federal
authority. But he gradually glided away
from his original position, until he was at
length found on the side of General Jackson
and his Democratic supporters in 1925.
1t was about this time that Mr.. Buchanan
developed ideas regarding the interests of the
United States with respect to the Spanish
American republics, especially Mexico, and
the Spanish American islands, especially
Cuba, which he never relinquished and was
always disposed to express practically in the
foreign policy of the United States He
evinced his skepticism as to the success of
free institutions in Mexico, and the new re-
publics south of her, by opposing the Panama
mission; and he was in favor of enlarging the
protest of the United States against an Euro
pean domination over Cuba other than that of
Spain SO as to apply to the seizure of the same
| island by Mexico OF Colombia each of which
had designs upon it. The views which he
then expressed were manifested years after
wards in his support of Texas annexation and
of the consequent war with Mexico, and in his
diplomatic endeayors to obtain Cuba for the
United States by purchase.
In relation to the slavery question, the
course of Mr.. Buchanan became marked,
Characteristic and prominent not long after
his return from o three years mission to St
Petersburg, in 1888, and his election in the
same year to the United States Senate. A
| politician whose utmost zeal and activity
were usually qualified by certain amount Of
constitutional phlegm, he either could not, or
would not, conceal the extreme vividness OF
his apprehensions on the subject of the abo-
lition propaganda in Europe and America. He
was well aware that it had its origin with
English and continental enemies Of republi'
| can government, who wished to throw SOP
to the popular Cerberus in Europe, and tc
subvert free institutions in America, by Dor
rowing a cry from the Jacobins and raising
the standard of liberty and equality in behal
of the negroes He proposed that Congress
should treat abolition petitions in such way
as to nip the political agitation of the DANCE
rous question in the bud.
1t is needless to refer to the vigor with which
he supported, almost alone in the Senate, tn
leading measures of Mr. Van Buren's admin
istration, against Clay, Webster, and othe
antagonists, or to his contests in debate wit
the same men during Mr.. Tyler's term. Hi
principal act as secretary of state under Pres
ident Polk was the settlement of the north
western boundary question on the basis c
the 49th degree. The loss of the bay and th
island of Vancouver by this treaty was el
cused by Mr.. Buchanan on the ground ths
his predecessor had committed the govern
ment TO this basis.
Having retired to private life at the end {
Mr.. Folks term, little was heard from Mr.. Bu
cbanan until 1850, when he expressed himse
strongly in favor Of the compromise meal
ures OF Clay, Webster, Cass, and others, bot
Wings and Democrats, in the two Houses
Apart from the episode of the Ostend confe
ence, his mission to England was uneventfu
His return from it, in 1856, was the signal fC
his nomination as Presidential candidate b
the D1IuUCratIv National COuvvutivn, ut Oh
cinnati, in June of that year. There WI
still enough national cohesion in the Dem'
cratic party to elect him President
How this cohesion soon afterwards faile'
is too fresh in memory to need to be here T
counted.
Mr. Buchanan was the last Of the Pres
dents elected by votes in both sections of Il
; country, and who could be called, In virtue
= their electoral constituency, Presidents.