James Buchanan: Fourth Annual Message to Congress

Explanation and Analysis of the Document

Aside from the fiascos of Dred Scott and Lecompton, the Buchanan administration suffered a series of setbacks during its first three years. In 1857 a major economic panic resulted in a serious depression. Republicans achieved major gains in the elections of 1858, to the point that if they could hold on to those gains in 1860, they could claim the presidency. As if fulfilling Buchanan's prophecy of an insurrection, John Brown swept down on the federal armory at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, in October 1859, with the intention of inciting a slave revolt. His capture and later execution did little to reassure those southern whites who were already questioning whether slavery was better protected inside or outside the Union. Republicans launched a series of investigations into the activities of the administration, portraying Buchanan as the willing tool of the southern slave owners, eager to do whatever it took to protect the cause of slavery.

Disaster struck Democratic fortunes in 1860. In April the party convention at Charleston, South Carolina, collapsed when a group of southern delegates walked out. They had no interest in supporting Stephen A. Douglas's bid for the presidency. Each wing of the party nominated its own candidate, with Douglas the nominee of the northern Democrats while Buchanan's own vice president, John C. Breckenridge, headed the southern Democratic ticket. The Republicans nominated Abraham Lincoln of Illinois. Lincoln had battled Douglas to a standstill in 1858 and looked to be best suited to hold on to the party's gains in 1858, which he did against Douglas, Breckenridge, and John Bell of Tennessee, the nominee of the hastily cobbled-together Constitutional Union party. As Lincoln claimed victory, more and more white southerners publicly weighed the prospect of secession in order to protect slavery.

It was in these circumstances that Buchanan delivered his last annual message to Congress in December 1860. Once more he blames “the incessant and violent agitation of the slavery question throughout the North” for the resulting crisis, asserting that it “has at length produced its malign influence on the slaves, and inspired them with vague notions of freedom.” In the discussion that follows one can hear echoes of his speeches of 1836 during the petition controversy. Indeed, he makes explicit reference to that controversy. In order to restore peace, he argues, it is necessary to leave the slave states alone, “permitted to manage their domestic institutions in their own way.” Still, the crisis of the union is at hand: Buchanan sees fit to remind everyone, “I have long foreseen and often forewarned my countrymen of the now impending danger.” Indeed he had. Only by ceasing abolitionist agitation over slavery and recognizing that it is constitutionally protected can a crisis be averted.

However, if the Constitution protects slavery, it does not sanction secession. Buchanan rejects outright the notion that Lincoln's mere election justified disunion, reminding listeners that the Republican candidate's election is perfectly in accord with the process laid out by the Constitution. There exists no cause for secession, no reason for revolution. The federal government has committed no transgression justifying such an extreme step. To claim that such violations are in the offing is unreasonable. Even efforts by northern state legislatures to curtail violations of the Fugitive Slave law of 1850 have no legal viability, as the Supreme Court showed in 1859 when it struck down Wisconsin's efforts to handcuff the recovery of fugitive slaves in Ableman v. Booth. However, if secession violates the Constitution, Buchanan confesses that his reading of the document does not allow him as president to challenge those proceedings by law or by force (a suggestion that General Andrew Jackson was indeed dead, as Jackson never would have reached that conclusion). For the moment Buchanan is reduced to warning Americans of the possible impact of the impending crisis, especially a war that would render a true sectional reconciliation “impossible.” It is time to step back from the abyss and recall the need to preserve the republic of the founders. Buchanan's advice proved unavailing. By the time he left office in March 1861 seven southern states had seceded and formed their own republic. Six weeks later the war came.