Our Presidents and how we make them

by Alexander K. McClure

Resolved, That the Whigs of the United States declare, as a fundamental rule of political faith, an absolute necessity for avoiding geographical parties. The danger so clearly discerned by the Father of his Country has now become fearfully apparent in the agitation now convulsing the nation, and must be arrested at once if we would preserve our Constitution and our Union from dismemberment, and the name of America from being blotted out from the family of civilized nations.

Resolved, That all who revere the Constitution and the Union must look with alarm at the parties in the field in the present Presidential campaign—one claiming only to represent sixteen Northern States, and the other appealing mainly to the passions and prejudices of the Southern States; that the success of either faction must add fuel to the flame which now threatens to wrap our dearest interests in a common ruin.

Resolved, That the only remedy for an evil so appalling is to support a candidate pledged to neither of the geographical sections now arrayed in political antagonism, but holding both in a just and equal regard. We congratulate the friends of the Union that such a candidate exists in Millard Fillmore.

Resolved, That, without adopting or referring to the peculiar doctrines of the party which has already selected Mr. Fillmore as a candidate, we look to him as a well-tried and faithful friend of the Constitution and the Union, eminent alike for his wisdom and firmness; for his justice and moderation in our foreign relations; for his calm and pacific temperament, so well becoming the head of a great nation; for his devotion to the Constitution in its true spirit; his inflexibility in executing the laws; but, beyond all these attributes, in possessing the one transcendant merit of being a representative of neither of the two sectional parties now struggling for political supremacy.

Resolved, That, in the present exigency of political affairs, we are not called upon to discuss the subordinate questions of administration in the exercising of the constitutional powers of the Government. It is enough to know that civil war is raging, and that the Union is imperilled; and we proclaim the conviction that the restoration of Mr. Fillmore to the Presidency will furnish the best if not the only means of restoring peace.

The campaign of 1856 was one of the most desperately fought conflicts in the history of American politics. In some of the Northern States, and particularly in Pennsylvania, that had to be carried against Buchanan in October to give promise of his defeat, the American party, or the supporters of Fillmore and Donelson, were nearly or quite as strong as the distinctive Republicans. Both were opposed to the election of Buchanan, but they were wide apart not only on the slavery issue, but on the questions of citizenship and religious proscription. As the contest warmed up the necessity for some sort of union between these elements was accepted on both sides, and in Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, and some other States the Americans, Republicans, and old Whigs united on State tickets. Illinois, while it gave its electoral vote to Buchanan, elected Colonel Bissell, an antislavery and anti-Buchanan Democrat, Governor, and in Pennsylvania the Democratic ticket was successful in October only by a very small majority.

In several of the States they harmonized on an electoral ticket. They did it by printing two electoral tickets for the two wings of the opposition. On one ticket the first candidate for elector was John C. Fremont, and on the other ticket was the name of Millard Fillmore. The understanding was that if the Union electoral ticket succeeded, the entire vote, less the one lost by using the names of Fillmore and Fremont, should be cast for either candidate if thereby he could be elected, and if such united vote would not elect either candidate the vote was to be divided between Fillmore and Fremont, as the voters indicated by the first name at the head of the ticket.

In common with the great mass of conservative Whigs who were at first greatly disappointed in the nomination of Fremont and the radical attitude of the new Republican party, I gradually drifted into the contest because of the offensive deliverances on slavery made by the Cincinnati platform. I knew Mr. Buchanan personally, and if I could have obeyed my individual preferences as to a candidate, would have voted for him. The slavery issue soon became so sharply defined that the great mass of the Whigs of the North fell in to the support of Fremont. There was considerable defection of prominent Whigs in Buchanan’s State, embracing the Reeds, the Ingersolls, the Whartons, the Randalls, and others of Philadelphia, whose conservative Whig views, with their great personal respect for Buchanan, influenced them to support him. Buchanan was not a magnetic man, not a popular man in the common acceptation of the term, but he was respected by all not only for his ability, but for his integrity and generally blameless reputation. He was a very courteous gentleman, but the multitude did not rush into his arms as it did into the arms of Clay and Blaine, and it is quite probable that his bachelor life, a destiny given him by a devotion with tragic end, doubtless made him less genial than he might have been.

Pennsylvania was the pivotal State in the contest, and Colonel Forney was chairman of the Democratic State Committee. He was thoroughly familiar with the political situation, and greatly impaired his health by his exhaustive efforts to save Buchanan in his home State. His relations with Buchanan were of the closest and most confidential nature, and each implicitly trusted the other. Buchanan knew Forney’s ability in the management of a great political battle, and there was no concealment between them as to the reward Forney should receive if Buchanan succeeded. Forney’s ambition was to continue in journalism, and it was not only understood, but the assurance voluntarily given to Forney by Buchanan, that if Buchanan became President, Forney should conduct the national organ in Washington and receive the Senate printing. What was then known as the Senate printing was an abuse that had grown up from small to large proportions until it became a fortune to any man who received it during the period of an administration. Gales and Seaton, of the National Intelligencer, had enjoyed it for many years, and when Democratic administrations became more distinctly partisan the favoritism was continued and the profits magnified. It was deemed a necessity for each administration to have an organ, and it was accepted in those days as the Democratic oracle of the nation. By making Forney the editor of the administration organ at Washington with the Senate printing, his highest ambition in his journalistic career would have been gratified, with ample fortune added. So intimate were Buchanan and Forney, that Forney’s family spent part of the summer at Wheatland, where Forney would occasionally tarry for a day’s rest and to consult with his chief.

Both parties were very confident of carrying the State in October, but Forney outgeneralled the leaders of the Union ticket by his masterful manipulation of Philadelphia, and the Buchanan State ticket was successful in October by 3500 majority. Had the Buchanan State ticket been defeated, Buchanan’s defeat for President would have been clearly foreshadowed, as it would doubtless have made a successful union on the electoral tickets in New Jersey, Indiana, and Illinois, as had already been done in Pennsylvania. Notwithstanding the loss of Pennsylvania in October, the friends of Fremont and Fillmore made desperate efforts to carry the State in November, and so well did they fight their battle that Buchanan’s majority in the State over the combined vote of Fremont and Fillmore was only 1025. The Fremont and Fillmore people believed that they had been defrauded out of the October election in Pennsylvania, and Forney was denounced with extreme bitterness that had lost none of its intensity in the Senatorial fight of 1857, when the resentments of the opposition made Forney’s defeat for Senator possible in a Democratic Legislature.