James Buchanan Jr is regarded by most as the worst president in U.S History for his absolute failure to stop the Civil War. But does he have to be? Your challenge is to try and find a time, place, and AH scenario where his kind of personality and leadership would have a positive outcome. That he would be somewhere in the Top 15 list compared to ours in OTL. Rules of this are:
* James Buchanan must be in-character to what he was like in that period
* The POD can only go as far back as 1831, 25 years before the OTL election which saw him winning. Any further back and he would be too different a person from his OTL self. He would run for president at minimum in 1836
* No ASB. No offing other historical figures unless it was likely to happen in OTL. One scenario that could work is if Buchanan's VP in Polk's administration instead of Dallas, and Polk's shaky OTL health later on causes him to die and Buchanan to become president in ATL
* If you must assassinate or bump off Buchanan while he's president, don't do it until he's completed 3 years of his first term in ATL. Don't Harrison or Kennedy him
* You don't have to make a cabinet for him, but you're welcome to try
Now, let's see it's plausible for even Buchanan to be a good president somewhere in the multiverse