Could James Buchanan have prevented the Civil War?

ben0628

Banned
On a pol chat thread, a lot of people said Buchanan was the worst US president for not trying to prevent the American Civil War.

My question is, is there anything the man could have realistically done to try to prevent southern sucession and solve the issue of slavery?
 
"Prevent Southern secession"? Yes. He could have repudiated the pro-slavery Lecompton Constitution for Kansas, instead of trying to force it on the settlers. He could have backed Douglas for the Democrat nomination in 1860. Both positions would have offended the Southern 'Fire-Eaters', but a firm stance that, realistically, pro-slavery policies cannot be forced on the North, would have isolated the 'Fire-Eaters'. In that situation, Douglas could have been elected President in 1860, and that means no secession.

"Solve the issue of slavery"? No. That was beyond the power of any President of the era. Lincoln "solved it" only because the South started a war that gave Lincoln war powers he could use against slavery and made nearly all the rest of the country want slavery abolished (because it had caused the war).
 
He took a complete hands off approach in the months between the election and Lincoln's inaugural, and did nothing during the election to prepare for any secessionist actions in anticipation that Lincoln might win. This was clear dereliction of duty. Obvious things he could have done:

Reassign military commanders so that forts and garrisons in the south were held by northerners or other loyalists.

Secure Federal arsenals and assets from being easily seized, perhaps even transfer critical items like artillery to safer locations.

Initiate correspondence and action with Southern Unionists to prepare for potential secessionist platforms in order thwart them after the election. That might have prevented or delayed some of the states from seceding.

In other words, anticipate what the secessionists might do and proactively try to neutralize them. Instead, he did practically nothing and displayed no leadership whatsoever.
 

Wallet

Banned
When South Carolina threatened to secede during Andrew Jackson's Presidency and the Nullification crisis, he threatened to ride into South Carolina and personally hang every traitor at the nearest tree. He sent ships into the harbors to collect tariffs and mobilized the army. South Carolina quickly backed down.

Buchanan should have showed strength. One letter and that's it. Then he marches the army straight into the south before they have a chance to mobilize.
 
When South Carolina threatened to secede during Andrew Jackson's Presidency and the Nullification crisis, he threatened to ride into South Carolina and personally hang every traitor at the nearest tree. He sent ships into the harbors to collect tariffs and mobilized the army. South Carolina quickly backed down.

Buchanan should have showed strength. One letter and that's it. Then he marches the army straight into the south before they have a chance to mobilize.

while I agree with some of that I am not entirely sure but I think the South Carolina militia outnumbered by a significant amount the Regular Army troops immediately available east of the Mississippi. Marching into South Carolina might not be an option.
 

Wallet

Banned
while I agree with some of that I am not entirely sure but I think the South Carolina militia outnumbered by a significant amount the Regular Army troops immediately available east of the Mississippi. Marching into South Carolina might not be an option.
I agree. South Carolina seceded December 20th. Mississippi seceded January 9th. The rest went day by day. It's impossible to occupy the entire Deep South. It's critical to make South Carolina an example.

Of course, this might make the mid south and even the upper south secede
 
I will defend Old Buck, though in fact I agree that his historical performance was pretty horrible.

The fact was that in 1860, the consensus position was that any state had every right to secede. The Constitution as it existed in 1860 is of course perfectly silent on the issue, the one Supreme Court decision on the subject post Civil War is remarkably unpersuasive on the subject, and many states when they ratified the Constitution (yes, including northern states) had inserted clauses asserting their right to secede later.

Since Buchanan had taken an oath to defend the Constitution, and the Constitution as understood by just about everyone -and this includes people like Seward and Garrison- allowed secession, he couldn't invade the Confederacy and compel it to submit to the federal government by force. Even Lincoln had to do several somersaults to do that.

Plus, the initial Confederate States of America consisted of only six of the thirteen slave states. The worse case scenario that didn't involve trying to conquer the six by force would have meant a majority of the slave states remaining in the Union, and with a successful operation to conquer Canada (not certain but it was proposed and plausible) the USA would have wound up in a stronger position than in 1860. This was pretty much Seward's plan.

Also, Lincoln's public statements before he took office in late March, which amounted to that the Southern elites were bluffing, were less than helpful.

Now what Buchanan should have done would have been to fire every senior Southern federal office holder as of January 1st (but would this have included Scott and Breckenridge? or Thomas and Farragut?), transferred every weapon in every southern arsenal to the North, and evacuated and destroyed every army/ navy post in the six seceding states. He should have mobilized the army and stated negotiations with the Confederate commissioners backed by the threat of that. But note that Lincoln (!) didn't do any of this. Lincoln provoked a with the CSA under conditions that it mobilized and lots of other states joined it, and then sort of mobilized the remaining northern states.

So yeah I agree that Old Buck could have done better but the entire Northern leadership, possibly excepting Seward, was pretty clueless at the time, not just him.
 
Basically both sides thought the other was bluffing. Most Northerners didn't think the South would really secede. and most Southerners didn't believe that the North would fight if they did. So Buchanan made few preparations for something he did not expect to happen.
 
It is possible that Buchanan could have delayed the sectional crisis by not coming out in favor of the Lecompton Constitution, as I argued in an old soc.history.what-if post at
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/soc.history.what-if/LRuzFWfhRic/HMFfkVWv7HsJ

***

Kenneth M. Stampp in *America in 1857: A Nation on the Brink* (all quotes in
this post are from that book, unless otherwise indicated) argues that before
the Buchanan administration made its support for Lecompton clear, Southern
opinion was by no means unanimous on the matter. Yes, there were threats
that if Lecompton were defeated because of failure to submit the entire
constitution for ratification, the Union would be in danger, but:

"Nevertheless, Southerners, in their reaction to the Lecompton constitution,
as in their reaction to the Kansas territorial election, were not nearly as
united as Northerners. Some doubted that the fate of the South depended upon
the future of slavery in Kansas; others had no taste for the tactics of the
Lecompton convention. Whig Congressman John A. Gilmer of North Carolina
believed that slavery would have only a brief and feeble life in Kansas in
any case; and Governor Thomas Bragg opposed any drastic measures if the
constitution should be rejected. Governor Wise of Virginia, in a public
letter to the *Enquirer,* took issue with Senator Hunter and called on
Congress to demand a vote on the Lecompton constitution before admitting
Kansas to statehood.

"The southern press also had its prominent dissenters. In support of Wise,
the Richmond *Enquirer* asked whether it was 'in accordance with Democratic
principles that the will of a minority should control . . . Can it be claimed
that a Constitution expresses the wishes and opinion of *the people* of
Kansas, when there are thousands of those people who have never voted even
for the men who framed it?' In the Deep South the New Orleans *Picayune*
conceded that the free-state party had a commanding majority and argued that
southern interests could not be advanced by 'continuing to urge a lost
cause.' To attempt to protect slavery 'by artifice, or fraud, or denial of
popular rights' would be 'a grave blunder in policy, and a fatal error in
principle.' If Kansas were lost to the South, 'let us at least preserve
dignity and honor to the end.' The Louisville *Democrat*, showing no sympathy
for the many proslavery Kentuckians in the Lecompton convention, could think
of no reason for refusing to submit the constitution other than a fear that
the people would reject it. 'The policy proposed is a most infallible way to
make Kansas . . . not only a free State, but a violent anti-slavery State--a
shrieking State after the model of Massachusetts. Such a policy would fill
the Black Republicans with ecstacy.'" (pp. 280-281)

It was only *after* Buchanan made it clear that he was backing Lecompton
(through editorials in the administration organ, the Washington *Union*) that
"most southern critics of the Lecompton convention fell into line and agreed
that the slavery issue had been fairly presented to the Kansas voters." For
the Richmond *Enquirer* the switch was obviously painful; it said that it
still believed that it would have been better to submit the entire
constitution for ratification, but it urged critics of Lecompton to accept
the President's policy in order to avoid "a renewal of civil strife in
Kansas, and increasing the bitterness of the sectional conflict."

Note by the way that in 1857 Douglas was not the great bugbear of the
southern Democrats. When he argued after *Dred Scott* that the people of the
territories could still in practice keep slavery out by failing to pass laws
to protect it, there was (contrary to popular belief, which, as so often,
reads *later* sentiments back into an earlier time) actually more praise for
that stance from the South than condemnation. Jefferson Davis after all said
the same thing:

"If the inhabitants of any Territory should refuse to enact such laws and
police regulations as would give security to their property . . . it would be
rendered more or less valueless. . . In the case of property in the labor of
man . . . the insecurity would be so great that the owner could not
ordinarily retain it . . . The owner would be practically debarred . . . from
taking slave property into a Territory. . . . So much for the oft-repeated
fallacy of forcing slavery upon any community . . ." (Quoted in Avery
Craven, *The Coming of the Civil War*, Phoenix Book edition 1966, p. 395)

It was only after Douglas broke with Buchanan on Lecompton that Southerners
became violently opposed to him (and suddenly discovered that his "Freeport
Doctrine," which he had actually expressed long before the debates with
Lincoln, was heretical.) If Buchanan had come out against Lecompton,
Douglas's opposition would attract no special notice; virtually all Northern
Democrats and a considerable number of Southerners would after all follow
Buchanan in that event. In that case, Douglas would still not be the first
choice of most southern Democrats for the Presidency, but his nomination
would probably not be considered so bad as to be sufficient cause for
splitting the Democratic party by any but the most extreme Southerners.
Conversely, he would not be such a hero to *northern* Democrats, and as in
1856 many of them might eschew him in 1860 for a less controversial
candidate.

As of 1857, the Democratic party was in reasonably good shape in the North.
In two states which Fremont had carried in 1856--Wisconsin and Ohio--it came
very close to winning the gubernatorial races. In Pennsylvania, the Democrat
William F. Packer easily defeated Republican David Wilmot for governor. I
don't think there is any doubt that Lecompton and the Buchanan-Douglas split
helped pave the way for the Democratic defeats of 1858 and 1860 and therefore
for the ACW. This is not just retrospective wisdom, btw. Many people saw it
at the time. At the end of 1857 the Louisville *Democrat* argued that "The
South never made a worse move" and that "A blunder, it is said, is worse than
a crime; but this is both a blunder and a crime. . . It is calculated to
break down the only national party in one section of the Union. A contest
for President purely sectional will be the result, and we know how that will
end; and then the object of the disunionists will be near its
accomplishment." (p. 330)

Stampp concludes (p. 330):

"Could all of this have been avoided--would the course of the sectional
controversy have been significantly altered--if Buchanan had remained true to
his pledge and demanded the submission of the whole Lecompton constitution to
the voters of Kansas? This is a question no historian can answer. It is
doubtful that a firm stand by Buchanan would have resulted in southern
secession, because the provocation would not have been sufficient to unite
even the Deep South behind so drastic a response. Nor would it have been
sufficient to produce a major split in the national Democratic party.
Accordingly, without a divided and demoralized national Democracy, Republican
success in the elections of 1858 and 1860 would have been a good deal more
problematic." (Stampp might have added that Buchanan's policies helped the
Republicans not only by splitting the Democratic party but by making Seward's
and Lincoln's allegations of a conspiracy to nationalize slavery seem a lot
more plausible. Indeed, I am not certain that the "Irrepressible Conflict"
and "House Divided" speeches would even have been made if Buchanan had come
out against Lecompton.)

Thus far Stampp's conclusion seems similar to Nevins' [1] but the next
paragraph (pp. 330-1) introduces a note of caution:

"Yet, contrary to the optimists of 1857, removing the Kansas question from
national politics, although eliminating a serious irritant, would not have
assured a lasting settlement of the sectional conflict. The possibilities for
other crises over slavery were far too numerous. Sooner or later, any one of
them, like Lecompton, might have disrupted the Democratic party" and as in
1860 led to the election of a "Black" Republican and subsequent secession.

True enough, but who knows? If the Republicans had lost in 1860 and whatever
Democrat won that year avoided anything to unnecessarily agitate the slavery
issue, it is possible that by 1864 or 1868 or whenever the Republicans
finally would get in control of the White House. they would have become so
much more conservative that their victory would not have been considered
sufficient cause for secession, even in the Deep South.

[1] One respect in which Stampp differs from Nevins: he rejects the idea
that Buchanan was controlled by a southern cabal. "The conclusion seems
warranted that Buchanan's policy, while pleasing to most Southerners, was
nevertheless *his* policy, not one forced upon him by others." (p. 285) And
one also cannot say that Buchanan's Lecompton decision was a sign of
Buchanan's inability to resist pressure; after all, there was plenty of
pressure on him by *northern* Democrats to stand by his commitment to full
submission of the constitution to the Kansas voters. (p. 284)
 
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I will defend Old Buck, though in fact I agree that his historical performance was pretty horrible.

The fact was that in 1860, the consensus position was that any state had every right to secede.

The Constitution as it existed in 1860 is of course perfectly silent on the issue...

Except for the supremacy clause, which implicitly denies any right of secession.

... the one Supreme Court decision on the subject post Civil War is remarkably unpersuasive on the subject,

Perhaps to Confederate sympathizers and fanatic libertarians.

...and many states when they ratified the Constitution (yes, including northern states) had inserted clauses asserting their right to secede later.

Absoulutely and completely false. No state made any such claim in its resolution of ratification. The nearest any state came to such an assertion is in the Virginia ratfication. which states that the powers granted to the Federal government are the gift of "the people", and that "the people" have the right to withdraw them.

Since Buchanan had taken an oath to defend the Constitution, and the Constitution as understood by just about everyone -and this includes people like Seward and Garrison- allowed secession...

Rubbish. I defy anyone to find any statement by Seward that the Constitution allows secession. Garrison possibly, but Garrison didn't really care what the Constitution said - he called it a "compact with Hell" for allowing slavery. Many abolitionists welcomed secession for taking slavery out of the U.S. - and were denounced for that.

Heck, I defy anyone to find a statement by Buchanan acknowledging a right of state secession. In the two months between South Carolina's declaration of secession and Lincoln's inauguration, Buchanan did nothing to conform with such a belief. He did not order U.S. troops in "seceding" states to surrender their posts to the rebels, nor did he start negotiations for the transfer of Federal property in those states to the rebel governments - something the rebels demanded as a matter of course.

If, in fact, Buchanan held such a belief. it would have been his Constitutional and moral duty to recognize secession, evacuate all U.S. troops, hand over Federal power, and initiate, if not complete, negotiations for Federal property. By doing so he could very likely prevent Lincoln from initiating war against the rebels, which would be enormously bloody and destructive and probably futile, and of course illegal.

Plus, the initial Confederate States of America consisted of only six of the thirteen slave states.
Seven of fifteen. When basic facts like this are misstated, further interpretations have little persuasiveness.

The worse case scenario that didn't involve trying to conquer the six by force would have meant a majority of the slave states remaining in the Union, and with a successful operation to conquer Canada (not certain but it was proposed and plausible) the USA would have wound up in a stronger position than in 1860. This was pretty much Seward's plan.

Again, rubbish. Seward at no time proposed or suggested recongnizing secession. He wanted to evacuate Fort Sumter and avoid an open fight with the rebels that they would win. But he opposed withdrawal from Fort Pickens, which legally was the same as Fort Sumter, but which the rebels could not effectively attack. This could lead to a similar confrontation, but on much more favorable terms, at a much later date. In the meantime...

Like most Northerners, Seward believed that the 'Fire-Eaters' had stampeded the Deep South during a fit of panic at the prospect of a Republican President. Once Lincoln was in office and did nothing to justify the panic, it would ebb. The Upper South and Border states would recoil from secession. Lincoln would appoint new Federal officials in the Upper South and Border - postmasters, tariff and excise collectors, district attorneys, marshals - as any President would, taking care to pick highly respected local men, but establishing his authority as President. The Deep South would be isolated. A futile effort to storm Fort Pickens would get them nothing except ridicule, and eventually the whole enterprise would collapse.

He certainly did not contemplate an invasion of Canada. He did talk of confronting Spain over Spain's takeover of its former colony in Santo Domingo, with the suggestion that a foreign war would rally Southerners to "the old flag". But no one considered this seriously, least of all Lincoln.
 
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I will defend Old Buck, though in fact I agree that his historical performance was pretty horrible.

The fact was that in 1860, the consensus position was that any state had every right to secede.

It is not true that that was a "consensus" position, and in fact it was explicitly rejected by Buchanan himself:

"In that mighty struggle between the first intellects of this or any other country it never occurred to any individual, either among its opponents or advocates, to assert or even to intimate that their efforts were all vain labor, because the moment that any State felt herself aggrieved she might secede from the Union. What a crushing argument would this have proved against those who dreaded that the rights of the States would be endangered by the Constitution. The truth is, that it was not until many years after the origin of the federal government that such a proposition was first advanced...It was intended to be perpetual, and not to be annulled at the pleasure of any one of the contracting parties. The old articles of confederation were entitled " Articles of confederation and perpetual union between the States ;" and by the thirteenth article it is expressly declared that '' the articles of this confederation shall be inviolably observed by every State, and the union shall be perpetual." The preamble to the Constitution of the United States having express reference to the articles of confederation, recites that it was established "in order to form a more perfect union." And yet it is contended that this " more perfect union" does not include the essential attribute of perpetuity..." https://books.google.com/books?id=g5Y-AAAAYAAJ&pg=PA141

Indeed, not even all the secessionists believed that there was a legal "right" to secede, and some acknowledged that secession was an act of revolution. Senator Iverson of Georgia said:

"The President [Buchanan] may be right when he asserts the fact that no State has a constitutional right to secede from the Union. I do not myself place the right of a State to secede from the Union upon constitutional grounds. I admit that the Constitution has not granted that power to a State. It is exceedingly doubtful even whether the right has been reserved. Certainly it has not been reserved in express terms. I therefore do not place the expected action of any of the Southern States, in the present contingency, upon the constitutional right of secession; and I am not prepared to dispute therefore, the, position which the President has taken upon that point.

"I rather agree with the President that the secession of a State is an act of revolution taken through that particular means or by that particular measure....But, sir, while a State has no power, under the Constitution, conferred upon it to secede from the Federal Government or from the Union, each State has the right of revolution, which all admit. Whenever the burdens of the government under which it acts become so onerous that it cannot bear them, or if anticipated evil shall be so great that the State believes it would be better off--even risking the perils of secession--out of the Union than in it, then that State, in my opinion, like all people upon earth has the right to exercise the great fundamental principle of self-preservation, and go out of the Union--though, of course, at its own peril--and bear the risk of the consequences..." https://books.google.com/books?id=19chAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA199

What puzzles people is that Buchanan, while maintaining that secession was illegal, also maintained that the federal government could not "coerce" a state to remain in the Union--yet also said it had the right to enforce the laws and defend federal property! I tried to explain that in an old soc.history.what-if post:

***


This puzzling distinction between "coercion of states" and "enforcement of the laws" was widespread at the time--Republicans as well as Democrats used it. "Coercion" meant marching an army into the South to compel the states to rescind their ordinances of secession, return their Representatives and Senators to Congress, haul down their flags, etc.; "enforcement of the laws" meant the US government holding its own forts and other property and collecting the tariffs. Furthermore, it was held that enforcement of the laws did not mean using force against states, because federal laws acted upon individuals (however numerous, and even if they included the governor, the state legislators, etc.) not states.

For an example of a Republican using the same distinction, see Senator Lyman Trumbull:

"This phrase, 'coerce a state,' is a phrase calculated to mislead the public mind...Nobody proposes to declare war against a State. That would admit at once that the State was out of the Union--a foreign Government. Of course, we cannot declare war against a State. Nobody proposes to coerce a State or to convict a State of treason. You cannot arraign a State for trial; you cannot convict it or punish it; but you can punish individuals...The Government has the power to coerce and to punish individuals who violate its laws." http://www.constitution.org/cmt/mclaughlin/chus.htm

So Buchanan here is at worst guilty of a sophistry--if that is what it was--[2] shared by Northern Democrats and Republicans alike (and by some Southerners; Senator Andrew Johnson of Tennessee made remarks to the same effect). Of course, the Republicans didn't see it that way because they viewed his words in the context of four years of a blatantly pro-Southern administration--and also in the context of the rest of the speech, where Buchanan put the whole blame for the development of sectional conflict on the North for its agitation of the slavery question.

(Though I think Buchanan was clear enough, I must acknowledge that some distinguished scholars disagree. Andrew McLaughlin in his *Constitutional History of the United States* writes "If, as has been asserted, President Buchanan made a distinction between coercing states and enforcing the execution of the laws on persons, he succeeded in clothing his utterances with obscurity." http://www.constitution.org/cmt/mclaughlin/chus.htm)

https://groups.google.com/d/msg/soc.history.what-if/LRuzFWfhRic/Yr-jGa2YJzsJ
 
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Short answer: No.
Long answer: The US was in a geographically polarized situation, and had been for 20 to 30 years by the time of the ACW. Could the war have happened 4 years later? Sure. Could the war have been avoided completely? No. The North was totally fed up with kowtowing to the South, and discontent was growing on both sides. The North was growing in wealth and population and industry. The South wasn't. The situation was unsustainable.
I see two possible ways to avoid a Civil War: 1) let the South go without war and 2) the US devolves into a dysfunctional governmental system where Congress can't do anything significant, and either the Federal government becomes irrelevant, or an Executive President assumes dictatorial powers.
 
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