05/12/2023
The Dred Scott Decision
President = James Buchanan
Posted by: James Buchanan
But the political situation was getting worse.
Two days after Buchanan's inauguration, the Supreme Court gave its historic decision in the case of the slave Dred Scott, who sued for his freedom because he had been taken to a nonslave territory.
However, the court decided that Congress could not outlaw slavery was wrong, but unfortunately the Constitution then recognized it.
He hoped the Dred Scott decision would calm the Court's decision.
Thus the North and the South became more divided than ever.
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South Carolina Secedes from the Union
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The crisis came in December 1860.
Abraham Lincoln had just been elected president, but he did not take office until March 1861.
Until that time Buchanan was still president.
When the news of Lincoln's victory reached the South, the state of South Carolina seceded from the Union, declaring that it was no longer a part of the United States.
By February 1861, six more southern states had broken away from the Union.
The split in the nation that Buchanan feared had taken place.
In this crisis Buchanan wanted to keep the remaining slave states loyal to the Union.
He said he would do nothing to provoke a war but he would do nothing to provoke a war but he would try to protect federal property and enforce the laws in the South.
He asked Congress to call a Constitutional Convention and to vote him the men and money needed to enforce the laws.
But Congress refused.
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The Coming of War
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On March 5, 1861, Buchanan left Washington and returned to Wheatland.
He was happy to leave the presidency and hopeful that the president who followed him could maintain peace and restore the Union.
But five weeks after Lincoln's inauguration, the South fired on Fort Sumter and the Civil War began.
Buchanan spent his last years writing a book about his term as presidents.
He died at Wheatland on June 1, 1868, and is buried at Woodward Hill Cemetary in Lancaster.
Could Buchanan have prevented the Civil War?
Historians do not agree.
Some say that a stronger president, one with more imagination, could have prevented the outbreak of the conflict.
Others argue that the Civil War was inevitable:
It would have happened no matter who was president, and if Buchanan had used force against the southern states, the war would only have started earlier.
Buchanan tried to solve the problems of the United States by acting within its laws.
He failed.
Whether any man could have succeeded will never be known.
