Year: 1861

The happiest man the American continent
to day is the Old Public Functonary, otherwise
known as James Buchanan. Within the last three
months he has suffered more mental anxiety and
agony we doubt not, than could be compensated
for by life times peaceful enjoyment of tie
honors and enouments Of the @Presdential Office
He has seen, under Ills administration, Tie party
which elected him 70 to pieces, the treasury Of the
nation made, bankrupt, and, worse than all, the
Union dissolved and two Confederacies existing
where he only found one. How far he is RESPONSE
BILE for all this impartial history will determine.
Five wears aeo, when he was nominated for the
Presidency. we recorded our estimate of him in the
columns of this paper, and it has undergone no
change Our own opinion of him was precisely
that of Andrew Jackson, when he advised Pres
i1ent Polk not to appoint him to a seat in his Cab
met. 1t was that of Daniel Webster, who said
Buchanan was a politician, but not Statesman.
The men who knew him best, from Mr.. Clay down,
had no confidence in his political integrity-and he
was supported and advanced mainly by those who
were ignorant of his character, or had personal
ends to reach by his elevation. He attained the
great object of his lifelong ambition, the Pres
dency only to estrange most OF his old friends and
to make no new ores. He ought to be sad man





Union which he leaves behind hn-and he would
be if he had the sensbiIities which belong to most
of the human race. We dislike to be under the
necessity of saying such things of the retiring
President. mindful as we are of the good Old rule
which requires US to say no i'll of the dcada rule
which applies as well to those who are politically
dead as those who are physically so. Bat we sup
pose instead of being sad, he will escort his
30 +T,o TO ifnT;
face and p beamipg coQntenance-pleased with the
idea that he is at last relieved Of the responsibility
nndor which he has been so long shivering and
nuaI;inp like sick man in the wintry blast.


The new President. who succeeds to the re-
nainder of the old Union will find his Presidential
path less Rowery, even than that of his predeces-
sor. The Union which commenced crnmbing to
pieces when Buchanan was President, will undergo,
still MORE the process of dsintegration. State by
State, the South will gradually become consoli-
dated into a homogeneous political community
and long before his term expires Lincoln will be
President of the North alone. The Southern
States now in the Union will from the necessities
of their position, be compelled to abandon the
Northern Confederacy, repudiate the unnatural
and degrading alliance, and come where they
properlv belong, and will be warmly welcomed,
into the Confederacy of the South The cid Union,
already deeply in debt and with but little prospect
of raising the revenue necessary for the ordinary
administration of its government, will be cmbar-
ragsod at the beginning Of Lncoln's term and will
be still more 60 wear after year. If, as Edmund
Bnrke truly said " tic revenue is the State" the
future Of the Northern Union will be gloomy iu-
deed, And vet its President, en- route to his Capt.
tai, cracks Jokes with the popuace, induges in