Джон Апдайк - Memories of the Ford Administration

[Buchanan’s insistence on submitting the technically legal but unrepresentative pro-slavery Lecompton Constitution to Congress for approval as condition of Kansas’s admission to statehood splits Douglas off from Southern body of the party and results, after numerous strenuous and corrupt efforts of suasion, in return of Kansas to territorial status under terms of the English Bill compromise, passed April 30, 1858—Lecompton struggle generates impression that Buchanan is captive to pro-Southern “Directory” consisting of Secretary of Treasury Howell Cobb of Georgia, Secretary of the Interior Jacob Thompson from Mississippi, and Senator John Slidell of Louisiana, Senate whip and mastermind of the President’s nomination and election — Howell Cobb once allegedly replies, when asked why he seemed troubled, Oh, it’s nothing much; only Buck is opposing the Administration — at outset of the Lecompton affair Pierce’s secretary, B. B. French, writes to his brother, I had considerable hopes of Mr. Buchanan — I really thought he was a statesman — but I have now come to the settled conclusion that he is just the d — dest old fool that has ever occupied the Presidential chair —

[April 1858 “Mormon War” ends happily as Buchanan, having dispatched troops under Colonel Albert Sidney Johnson, permits Philadelphian Thomas L. Kane to travel to Salt Lake City and reach peaceful agreement with Brigham Young, who submits to authority of federal government and the newly appointed territorial governor Alfred Cumming — in August Buchanan dispatches nineteen warships up La Plata River to win redress for Paraguayan wrongs against U.S. citizens — responds courteously to first official message over Atlantic cable, from Queen Victoria, despite patriotic furor in press over rude brevity of message, shortened in transmission by cable failure — in warming atmosphere of British-American relations, British abandon right of search of vessels on high seas —

[Summer of 1858, Lincoln-Douglas debates in Illinois Senatorial campaign keep national attention on slavery issue and widen Douglas-Buchanan rift — 1858 election returns spell defeat for administration Democrats and rise of Republicans, though Douglas wins in Illinois — Buchanan writes to Harriet, Well! we have met the enemy & we are theirs. This I have anticipated for three months & was not taken by surprise except as to the extent of our defeat. I am astonished at myself for bearing it with so much philosophy — contentious Congress stymies Buchanan’s foreign and domestic initiatives, failing by March 3, 1859, to pass routine Treasury bills — Postmaster General Aaron Brown dies four days after losing battle to win appropriation to cover postal deficit — Elizabeth C. Craig, widow and reputedly most beautiful woman in Athens, Georgia, who had come to Washington (with Cabinet wife Mary Ann Cobb) declaring her determination to snare the President, departs after living in White House for two months — Buchanan confesses to Howell Cobb he has spent restless nights dreaming of her —

[Spring of 1859, Southern excursion excites public ovations and newspaper report of President as gay and frisky as a young buck — takes annual summer fortnight in Pennsylvania’s Bedford Springs with wealthy grass widow, a Mrs. Bass from Virginia, and her three daughters — they are placed in rooms next to JB’s archenemy Senator Simon Cameron, and abolitionists persuade Mrs. Bass’s black servant girl to run away — October 16–18th, John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry is put down by forces under Colonel Robert E. Lee — [Spring of 1860, at Charleston, Democratic convention collapses when Southerners, angered by Douglas’s refusal to promise protection of “property” (e.g., slaves) in territories, walk out — in May, border-state moderates organize Constitutional Union party and nominate John Bell of Tennessee, and Republicans in Chicago nominate Abraham Lincoln of Illinois — in June Democrats re-meet in Baltimore and split again, Douglas nominated in main hall and seceders in separate hall nominating John C. Breckinridge, Buchanan’s Vice-President — March — June, Covode Committee, established in March of 1859 to investigate solicitation of Congressional votes in support of English Bill, hears parade of anti-administration witnesses, though Buchanan in spirited rebuttal on June 22nd says, I have passed triumphantly through this ordeal. My vindication is complete. The committee have reported no resolution looking to an impeachment against me; no resolution of censure; not even a resolution pointing out any abuses in any of the executive departments of the Government to be corrected by legislation. This is the highest commendation which could be bestowed on the heads of these departments — also on June 22nd JB vetoes the Homestead Bill on grounds that This bill, which proposes to give him [“the honest poor man,” earlier evoked] land at an almost nominal price, out of the property of the Government, will go far to demoralize the people, and repress this noble spirit of independence. It may introduce among us those pernicious social theories which have proved so disastrous in other countries — large delegation of Japanese to sign first commercial treaty between Japan and U.S. captivates Washington society and presents Buchanan with largest porcelain bowl in world — in August, at Bedford Springs, Buchanan approaches the Reverend William M. Paxton, rector of New York City’s First Presbyterian Church, and questions him as closely as a lawyer would question a witness upon all the points connected with regeneration, atonement, repentance, and faith . At end of session says, “ Well, sir, I hope I am a Christian. I think I have much of the experience which you describe, and as soon as I retire, I will unite with the Presbyterian Church , explaining, I must delay for the honor of religion. If I were to unite with the church now, they would say “ hypocrite ” from Maine to Georgia —

[In early October 1860, the nineteen-year-old Prince of Wales, travelling incognito as Baron Renfrew, visits the White House and at a state dinner JB permits card playing afterwards, for the first time in his administration — then the President discovers that all the White House beds have been taken by the royal party and he must sleep on a sofa — Abraham Lincoln wins November elections, polling a million fewer votes than his three opponents combined, and fifty-seven more electoral votes — in Columbia, South Carolina, Laurence Keitt orates, South Carolina will either leave the Union or else throw her arms around the pillars of the Constitution and involve all the States in common ruin — John Slidell writes Buchanan from Louisiana, I deeply regret the embarrassments which will surround you during the remainder of your term —

[ Retrospect eds.: Speaking of embarrassment, what follows is fragmentary, unsatisfactory. After my break with Genevieve, I realized that my attempt to complete my book and my attempt to marry her had been aspects of a single vain effort to change my life.]

“Mr. Floyd, are you going to send recruits to Charleston to strengthen the forts?”

For a long time, things had not been right with Secretary of War John Floyd, whose middle name was Buchanan. A former Governor of Virginia, son of another governor, he had, like many men who have been born into a patrician eminence, that faint sleepwalking air of those who have not fully earned their lives. Dandified in dress, he wore his hair long, so it protruded from his balding skull in two crimped wings; his eyelids had a mournful droop and his mouth a maiden-auntish pucker; his furrowed and dry-skinned face testified to recurrent illnesses and intervals of exhaustion. A mere fifty at the time that Buchanan — on the advice of Slidell and his other friends Senator Bright and Governor Wise, all three of whom had declined Cabinet posts in deference to their own ambitions — had appointed him, Floyd had remained youthful in the President’s old eyes, and forgivably susceptible to the influence of harder, hungrier men than himself.