Today, James Buchanan is pretty much universally disliked by anyone with at least a passing interest in Presidential history. His weakness in preventing the secession of states, coupled with his refusal to take a strong stance one way or the other regarding slavery and its expansion whilst in office contributing to his rather lacklustre legacy. Your challenge today is to fix that; make James Buchanan one of the most beloved and well-regarded Presidents in US history. He can be elected at any time or in any manner that you please (as well as assassinated if you so wish); however, he must be able to complete at least one full term of office before anything were to happen to him.
AHC: The Beloved James Buchanan
- Thread starter Morraw
- Start date
An old soc.history.what-if post of mine:
***
Was James Buchanan a great or only a near-great president? Historians
continue to debate the question, but it would be foolish to underrate his
accomplishments.
Let's review how Buchanan was elected president: In 1844 Van Buren had a
majority of delegates nominally supporting him at the Democratic national
convention but enough of them voted to re-impose the two-thirds rule that
he had no chance to gain the nomination. Lewis Cass, a Westerner, ardent
expansionist, and favorite of the "soft money" Democrats, was the obvious
alternative, but because it was the Cass men who had initiated the drive
to block Van Buren with the two-thirds rule, the Van Burenites were
bitterly determined that he not be nominated. For a while, there was some
talk of nominating a "dark horse," James Knox Polk of Tennessee, but Polk,
who was a loyal Van Buren supporter despite his disappointment with Van
Buren's stance on Texas, refused to be a candidate. (I have often
wondered if Polk and the convention might have decided differently if
General Jackson, known to be a Polk supporter, had not died earlier that
year.) Eventually the convention turned to James Buchanan of
Pennsylvania, who like Cass was a bit too conservative on economic issues
for hard-core, hard-money Van Burenites, but won their support by agreeing
to revive the Independent Treasury. In any event, despite his having been
a Federalist in his youth, he was less obnoxious to the Van Burenites than
Cass was. In the general election, Buchanan, promising the "reoccupation
of Oregon and the re-annexation of Texas, at the earliest practicable
period" narrowly defeated the Whig candidate Henry Clay. (Buchanan did
lose a few Southern states which a Southern Democratic candidate might
have carried--notably Georgia and Louisiana--but narrowly carried the key
Northern states of New York and Pennsylvania. In New York, he was helped
by the Liberty Party splitting the anti-Texas vote, and by the Van
Burenite Silas Wright's gubernatorial candidacy. In Pennsylvania, of
course, he was helped by his "native son" status; indeed I am by no means
certain that any other Democratic presidential candidate would have
carried the state.)
Buchanan's most important accomplishments as president are too familiar to
require extended discussion: the compromise that divided Oregon, and the
Mexican War which got the US the Southwest. There are, however, some
other decisions of his that deserve attention, because they show his
political shrewdness. He resisted the cries of dogmatic "strict
constructionists" to veto the rivers and harbors bill; he knew that to do
so would only further enrage Northwesterners disappointed by his
"timidity" on Oregon. He also resisted cries by some Southern free
traders for a massive reduction in the tariff; as a Pennsylvanian he knew
that this would hurt the Democrats badly in that state. The result was
that in the 1846 elections, despite some dissatisfaction with the war, the
Democrats were able to maintain control of both houses of Congress.
Perhaps the most unappreciated aspect of Buchanan's presidency was his
resolution of the problem of the status of slavery in the newly acquired
Mexican cession. Buchanan at an early stage came out in favor of
extending the Missouri Compromise line to the Pacific. (In this, he
disagreed with Secretary of State Cass, who instead favored something
called "popular sovereignty" under which the people of each territory
would themselves decide the status of slavery. Buchanan thought that this
would merely encourage conflicts between pro- and anti-slavery settlers in
each territory. A handful of squatters had no right to determine
something that was of interest to the nation as a whole.) Southerners--
whether Democrats or Whigs--almost unanimously agreed with Buchanan's
policy in this area. (True, a few thought that government prohibition of
slavery in *any* territories was unconsitutional, but for the most part
they dismissed this as a purely abstract question, since they didn't
expect slavery to flourish north of 36° 30' anyway, and since extension of
the line would set a precedent for having slavery in any future territory
the US might acquire in Latin America or the Caribbean.) Getting 36° 30'
through the Senate was relatively easy, but in the Northern-majority
House, Buchanan had to use all the patronage and pressure at his disposal
to convince just enough Northern Democrats (in combination with a
virtually solid South) to pass his plan.
So why did historians once tend to rank him as only a near-great rather
than a great president? Well, some of them had been brainwashed by the
Whig and Abolitionist propaganda about the Mexican War being an evil war
of aggression. (Though I notice that few people who argue this way
actually want to give San Francisco or Los Angeles or Santa Fe or
Monterrey back to the Mexicans.) And of course some people still argue
that Buchanan's policies gave slavery a new lease on life, enabling it to
last until 1900 (and black "apprenticeships" to last a couple of decades
longer). But realistically, how could slavery have been abolished much
earlier (except perhaps through a bloody civil war, but nobody really
advocates *that*, and anyway I can't see how the North could win such a
war, since Great Britain was so dependent on Southern cotton that she
would be sure to intervene)?
Buchanan was of course way too controversial to be re-nominated in 1848
under the two-thirds rule but today we should appreciate him--as an
increasing number of historians do--as one of America's truly great
presidents.
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/soc.history.what-if/-68iurHBur0/tHCcUE1bD-UJ
***
In that post, I had Buchanan nominated and elected instead of Polk (my POD is having Polk's most important supporter, Andrew Jackson, die early), and had him choose policies similar to Polk's but with two exceptions: (1) he doesn't alienate the North by vetoing the rivers and harbors bill https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rivers_and_Harbors_Bill or by decreasing the tariff as much as Polk did in OTL; and (2) he comes out squarely in favor of territorial division on the Missouri Compromise Line (something he advocated as Secretary of State in OTL) and manages to implement it (I'll admit that getting it through the House will be hard, but if he manages to retain a Democratic majority there and to use patronage adroitly it is not inconceivable--he *almost* got the Lecompton Constitution through an even more northern-majority House years later in OTL, after all) so that the doctrine of "popular sovereignty" which bore such disastrous results in Kansas, never becomes widespread...
(Note that I also have the US expand a little further into Mexico than in OTL, with my reference to Monterrey.)
***
Was James Buchanan a great or only a near-great president? Historians
continue to debate the question, but it would be foolish to underrate his
accomplishments.
Let's review how Buchanan was elected president: In 1844 Van Buren had a
majority of delegates nominally supporting him at the Democratic national
convention but enough of them voted to re-impose the two-thirds rule that
he had no chance to gain the nomination. Lewis Cass, a Westerner, ardent
expansionist, and favorite of the "soft money" Democrats, was the obvious
alternative, but because it was the Cass men who had initiated the drive
to block Van Buren with the two-thirds rule, the Van Burenites were
bitterly determined that he not be nominated. For a while, there was some
talk of nominating a "dark horse," James Knox Polk of Tennessee, but Polk,
who was a loyal Van Buren supporter despite his disappointment with Van
Buren's stance on Texas, refused to be a candidate. (I have often
wondered if Polk and the convention might have decided differently if
General Jackson, known to be a Polk supporter, had not died earlier that
year.) Eventually the convention turned to James Buchanan of
Pennsylvania, who like Cass was a bit too conservative on economic issues
for hard-core, hard-money Van Burenites, but won their support by agreeing
to revive the Independent Treasury. In any event, despite his having been
a Federalist in his youth, he was less obnoxious to the Van Burenites than
Cass was. In the general election, Buchanan, promising the "reoccupation
of Oregon and the re-annexation of Texas, at the earliest practicable
period" narrowly defeated the Whig candidate Henry Clay. (Buchanan did
lose a few Southern states which a Southern Democratic candidate might
have carried--notably Georgia and Louisiana--but narrowly carried the key
Northern states of New York and Pennsylvania. In New York, he was helped
by the Liberty Party splitting the anti-Texas vote, and by the Van
Burenite Silas Wright's gubernatorial candidacy. In Pennsylvania, of
course, he was helped by his "native son" status; indeed I am by no means
certain that any other Democratic presidential candidate would have
carried the state.)
Buchanan's most important accomplishments as president are too familiar to
require extended discussion: the compromise that divided Oregon, and the
Mexican War which got the US the Southwest. There are, however, some
other decisions of his that deserve attention, because they show his
political shrewdness. He resisted the cries of dogmatic "strict
constructionists" to veto the rivers and harbors bill; he knew that to do
so would only further enrage Northwesterners disappointed by his
"timidity" on Oregon. He also resisted cries by some Southern free
traders for a massive reduction in the tariff; as a Pennsylvanian he knew
that this would hurt the Democrats badly in that state. The result was
that in the 1846 elections, despite some dissatisfaction with the war, the
Democrats were able to maintain control of both houses of Congress.
Perhaps the most unappreciated aspect of Buchanan's presidency was his
resolution of the problem of the status of slavery in the newly acquired
Mexican cession. Buchanan at an early stage came out in favor of
extending the Missouri Compromise line to the Pacific. (In this, he
disagreed with Secretary of State Cass, who instead favored something
called "popular sovereignty" under which the people of each territory
would themselves decide the status of slavery. Buchanan thought that this
would merely encourage conflicts between pro- and anti-slavery settlers in
each territory. A handful of squatters had no right to determine
something that was of interest to the nation as a whole.) Southerners--
whether Democrats or Whigs--almost unanimously agreed with Buchanan's
policy in this area. (True, a few thought that government prohibition of
slavery in *any* territories was unconsitutional, but for the most part
they dismissed this as a purely abstract question, since they didn't
expect slavery to flourish north of 36° 30' anyway, and since extension of
the line would set a precedent for having slavery in any future territory
the US might acquire in Latin America or the Caribbean.) Getting 36° 30'
through the Senate was relatively easy, but in the Northern-majority
House, Buchanan had to use all the patronage and pressure at his disposal
to convince just enough Northern Democrats (in combination with a
virtually solid South) to pass his plan.
So why did historians once tend to rank him as only a near-great rather
than a great president? Well, some of them had been brainwashed by the
Whig and Abolitionist propaganda about the Mexican War being an evil war
of aggression. (Though I notice that few people who argue this way
actually want to give San Francisco or Los Angeles or Santa Fe or
Monterrey back to the Mexicans.) And of course some people still argue
that Buchanan's policies gave slavery a new lease on life, enabling it to
last until 1900 (and black "apprenticeships" to last a couple of decades
longer). But realistically, how could slavery have been abolished much
earlier (except perhaps through a bloody civil war, but nobody really
advocates *that*, and anyway I can't see how the North could win such a
war, since Great Britain was so dependent on Southern cotton that she
would be sure to intervene)?
Buchanan was of course way too controversial to be re-nominated in 1848
under the two-thirds rule but today we should appreciate him--as an
increasing number of historians do--as one of America's truly great
presidents.
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/soc.history.what-if/-68iurHBur0/tHCcUE1bD-UJ
***
In that post, I had Buchanan nominated and elected instead of Polk (my POD is having Polk's most important supporter, Andrew Jackson, die early), and had him choose policies similar to Polk's but with two exceptions: (1) he doesn't alienate the North by vetoing the rivers and harbors bill https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rivers_and_Harbors_Bill or by decreasing the tariff as much as Polk did in OTL; and (2) he comes out squarely in favor of territorial division on the Missouri Compromise Line (something he advocated as Secretary of State in OTL) and manages to implement it (I'll admit that getting it through the House will be hard, but if he manages to retain a Democratic majority there and to use patronage adroitly it is not inconceivable--he *almost* got the Lecompton Constitution through an even more northern-majority House years later in OTL, after all) so that the doctrine of "popular sovereignty" which bore such disastrous results in Kansas, never becomes widespread...
(Note that I also have the US expand a little further into Mexico than in OTL, with my reference to Monterrey.)
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unprincipled peter
Donor
this is like asking Louis XVI to magically become a great statesman.
Or Napoleon to quit while he's ahead.
Or Hitler to not be racist and looking to take over the world.
You have to change the personality, ability, and beliefs of Buchanon in order to make him a good president. In other words, a guy whose name is the same, but nothing else.
Alternatively, had the south won the war, they'd have considered B to be a great president
Or Napoleon to quit while he's ahead.
Or Hitler to not be racist and looking to take over the world.
You have to change the personality, ability, and beliefs of Buchanon in order to make him a good president. In other words, a guy whose name is the same, but nothing else.
Alternatively, had the south won the war, they'd have considered B to be a great president
Not necessarily. An awful lot hangs on opportunity.
I've often pondered this, but usually the other way round - how (if at all)would FDR be remembered had he somehow become POTUS in the 1920s - or Lincoln had he not reached the White House until 1876? I suspect neither would be much more than a footnote.
But of course it works the other way as well. Had the South seceded in 1850/1, Millard Fillmore might be remembered now as the man who won the Civil War. And had Buchanan left the White House in 1849, when Bleeding Kansas was still well in the future if it still took place at all - then he might well be remembered as a perfectly good President, even if not necessarily great.
unprincipled peter
Donor
Mike,
I agree that opportunity is required to be considered a great. Lincoln could very well have been a footnote in history - considered middle of the road - if he didn't have the opportunity to preside over keeping the Union intact.
However, Buchanan is reviled because he did have opportunity (not as glaring as secession) and he just muddled along and let the country sink to the point of a civil war. That might be a bit unfair because the rift between north and south was great and many see the war as being inevitable. Transport Buchanan to another time and he might be seen as mediocre. Nevermind that the OP wants him to be considered great. But, he was the wrong man at the time. The country needed a president to step up to the plate, and B struck out.
Sometimes, times of great need produce a great leader. Sometimes you get Charles IV and Godoy for Spain or Louis XVI for France or Buchanan for the US.
I agree that opportunity is required to be considered a great. Lincoln could very well have been a footnote in history - considered middle of the road - if he didn't have the opportunity to preside over keeping the Union intact.
However, Buchanan is reviled because he did have opportunity (not as glaring as secession) and he just muddled along and let the country sink to the point of a civil war. That might be a bit unfair because the rift between north and south was great and many see the war as being inevitable. Transport Buchanan to another time and he might be seen as mediocre. Nevermind that the OP wants him to be considered great. But, he was the wrong man at the time. The country needed a president to step up to the plate, and B struck out.
Sometimes, times of great need produce a great leader. Sometimes you get Charles IV and Godoy for Spain or Louis XVI for France or Buchanan for the US.
What counts as "great"?
Was Polk great? He was probably the closest thing to it between Jackson and Lincoln, though historians seem to shy away from giving him that label, probably (as already noted) because of distaste for the Mexican War. If elected in 1844, Buchanan could well manage to be at least as great as Polk was.
TinyTartar
Banned
Polk was great from the standpoint of his leadership of the US during the period, the expansion of the country from the Mexican War and the land deal with the British that ensured that the US would have relatively good relations with the British for much of the century over the issue of the Canadian border. The economy did fine under Polk, as well.
Morally, people have issues with the fact that he launched a war of expansion and won.
From the standpoint of greatness, however, I think that he fits the bill.
It tells you something that through much of the late 19th century, he was held up on the same level as Andrew Jackson, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and Henry Clay as one of the best statesmen and Americans. People named their children James Polk "____" and his painting was in many of the saloons of the new towns in the West.
I'll take a flyer at this. As one possible "high trajectory" future, Polk or alt president gets Oregon territory in reasonable deal with British, maybe even part of British Columbia, giving the U.S. a plenty big enough Pacific coastline. We have a future with a prosperous Mexico who's a major trading partner. Both nations become richer. And into the 21st century, San Francisco or Los Angeles or even Monterrey for that matter are exotic cities American couples sometimes like to honeymoon at.
Now, one problem is that during the 1800s, I think Mexico viewed Texas and the American southwest as relative backwaters.
TinyTartar
Banned
They viewed it that way because they put no effort into developing the areas at all, really. It was almost more of a burden than anything, as the cost of defending the sparse settlements from Indians outweighed the tax revenue they got in return.
As a country that already had an east and west coast, the thought of Manifest Destiny was taken for granted as already achieved. The US saw expansion to the west idealistically but also practically, as being able to link the west and east coasts would increase America's economic power substantially.
As for the Pacific Coast idea, its not a terrible one, as the California Coast was by no means seen as all that great as of yet; now, had this debate happened past 1848 and the gold rush, that obviously changes. But there is plenty of the Mexican Cession that Polk and many Americans wanted already that had nothing to do with the Pacific Coast. Colorado was resource rich and Americans had already set up shop in certain areas there, and getting all of Texas was seen as a big deal to Texans and the slavery lobby.
We could combine this with another PoD; maybe a more extensive Oregon cession(more of Oregon and more of BC) combined with an alt-Mexican war that's less crushing for the US resulting in fewer territorial concessions(Texas and parts of Colorado and Utah, say, but none of Arizona or New Mexico and none of or only part of California). So we have a large and powerful US(if slightly less large and powerful now) and a well-off Mexico that is an important trading partner and tourist destination for the US. While LA is a backwater town, San Francisco is a large and important port, popular with tourists for its cosmopolitan atmosphere and historical Spanish Colonial and Mexican National* architecture, and Mexico City is one of the major metropolises and an important business destination. Meanwhile, Mexico does much business with the US and the exotic flora and fauna of the northern Rockies and the pacific Northwest make it a popular honeymoon destination for middle-class Mexicans.
*alt-timeline name for the style of architecture developed in the early decades of Mexican independence, roughly analogous to the Federal style and the early phases of Greek Revival in the US.
unprincipled peter
Donor
1800 mexico had a lot of potential. unfortunately, the Spanish were not all that good at developing the potential. Good at exploiting silver mines for the enrichment of the mother country, but not much else.
Whereas the US went through a horribly bloody war of independence and then set about building a country that could grow, the Spanish colonist, pretty much around the globe, went through varying degrees of bloodiness in wars of independence, and then almost universally set about creating as much civil strife as possible.
Not saying Mexico was doomed to failure, but they needed things to break a lot differently in order for a stable, prosperous country to emerge. Unfortunately, stable required the conservative half of the country, while prosperous required the liberal half of the country and there wasn't much moderate ground between the two.
Whereas the US went through a horribly bloody war of independence and then set about building a country that could grow, the Spanish colonist, pretty much around the globe, went through varying degrees of bloodiness in wars of independence, and then almost universally set about creating as much civil strife as possible.
Not saying Mexico was doomed to failure, but they needed things to break a lot differently in order for a stable, prosperous country to emerge. Unfortunately, stable required the conservative half of the country, while prosperous required the liberal half of the country and there wasn't much moderate ground between the two.
unprincipled peter
Donor
also, there's nothing wrong with a land grab...if it succeeds. The US was mostly built on land grabs: the colonists wanted the northwest territory. a young US tried, and failed, to grab Canada. they bullied Spanish Louisiana/Florida/Mexico mercilessly. They bullied and grabbed mercilessly against the native Americans. they threatened to take New Orleans by force. They threatened to take Oregon region by force. They took Puerto Rico/Phillipines by force in the quest for a splendid little war. They employed gunboat diplomacy ad nauseum in central America. The cold war was practically a breeding ground for abusing countries for our own gain.
If you're against land grabs, you're against the US as it is/was ever since 1776 (and probably from the minute the first white guy set foot on the continent).
Somehow the Mexican-American war sticks in people's throats? puhleeze. For some reason, people had/have a moral conscience about this one.
If you're against land grabs, you're against the US as it is/was ever since 1776 (and probably from the minute the first white guy set foot on the continent).
Somehow the Mexican-American war sticks in people's throats? puhleeze. For some reason, people had/have a moral conscience about this one.
Oh, yes, that's the other side of the equation. Mexican couples honeymooning in 'exotic' U.S. cities.
This is quite a challenge you present for us. I'll bite on the last point.
The cold war could have played out where the U.S. and USSR competed on who could do a better job at genuine economic development for Third World countries. So, for example, we compete on who can provide trade deals to Kenya, and to Myanmar. Maybe the USSR really makes headway on selling Nigerian students that Russian universities provide the best engineering programs, then maybe the U.S. hits upon the idea of recruiting and welcoming older students who can leverage their life experience and more quickly step into managerial positions, etc, etc. The virtuous upward circle. And maybe the occasional controversy is that something is too much a sweetheart deal. That you're just using accounting tricks to show a profit, when what you're really after is public relations and a chance to tout your system.
Think how much better things would have been for developing countries ever since WWII!
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