#15 FACTS:
--Buchanan served as James K. Polk's Secretary of State, and so far remains the last former Secretary of State to become President. Born in 1791, he was also the last President born in the 18th century.
--Buchanan regularly tops the list of a lot of "Worst Presidents" rankings. Like Franklin Pierce before him he was a Northerner with apparent Southern sympathies, and his efforts to maintain a peaceful status quo between the North and the South alienated both sides and, combined with Abraham Lincoln's election, helped to move the Southern states to declare succession a few months before Buchanan left office.
Buchanan both denied the legal right of states to secede and also held that the Federal Government legally could not prevent them. Furthermore, he placed the blame for the crisis solely on "intemperate interference of the Northern people with the question of slavery in the Southern States." Buchanan's specific, last-ditch solution to the crisis was that the Congress call for a constitutional convention which would give the people of the country the opportunity to vote specifically on an amendment to the constitution regarding the slavery issue. However, there was no ability to reach agreement on this approach as a solution to be pursued.
--Buchanan remains the only Presidential bachelor. When his ex-fiancee, Ann Coleman, died (of hysteria, how weird is that?), Buchanan vowed to never marry. He lived in Washington D.C. with Alabama senator William King for fifteen years, until King, who was elected as Franklin Pierce's VP, died suddenly of tuberculosis. Both Buchanan and King's nieces burned the two men's correspondence after Buchanan's death, and many have claimed that the two were a couple (it was a popular rumor at the time, in fact--many spoke of them as "Buchanan and his wife" and Andrew Jackson often referred to King and Buchanan as "Miss Nancy" and "Aunt Fancy"), and that, therefore, Buchanan was the first gay President. However, there's not enough evidence to definitively say one way or the other.
--When you Google 'James Buchanan' the 4th thing that comes up is a "Gothic Gay Erotic Romance" website. So...now you know that.
2 comments:
It also appears he wasn't allowed to attend Ann Coleman's funeral, not due to being gay but because of his drinking problem. The letter, his request, was turned away at the door of her father's estate.
That I believe is kind of cold.
Apparently the letter mentioned how both he and Ms Coleman had suffered abuse of some form or another, and was all very cryptic.
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