CHAPTER I.

1791–1820.

BIRTH AND PARENTAGE—EARLY EDUCATION AND COLLEGE LIFE—STUDY OF THE LAW—ADMISSION TO THE BAR—SETTLES IN LANCASTER—A VOLUNTEER IN THE WAR OF 1812—ENTERS THE LEGISLATURE OF PENNSYLVANIA—EARLY DISTINCTION—PROFESSIONAL INCOME—RETIRES FROM PUBLIC LIFE—DISAPPOINTMENT IN LOVE—RE-ENTERS PUBLIC LIFE—ELECTED TO CONGRESS.

Autobiography, when it exists, usually furnishes the most interesting and reliable information of at least the early life of any man. Among the papers of Mr. Buchanan, there remains a fragment of an autobiography, without date, written however, it is supposed, many years before his death. This sketch, for it is only a sketch, ends with the year 1816, when he was at the age of twenty-five. I shall quote from it, in connection with the events of this part of his life, adding such further elucidations of its text as the other materials within my reach enable me to give.

The following is the account which Mr. Buchanan gives of his birth and parentage:

“My father, James Buchanan, was a native of the county Donegal, in the kingdom of Ireland. His family was respectable; but their pecuniary circumstances were limited. He emigrated to the United States before the date of the Definitive Treaty of Peace with Great Britain; having sailed from —— in the brig Providence, bound for Philadelphia, in 1783. He was then in the twenty-second year of his age. Immediately after his arrival in Philadelphia, he proceeded to the house of his maternal uncle, Mr. Joshua Russel, in York county. After spending a short time there, he became an assistant in the store of Mr. John Tom, at Stony Batter, a country place at the foot of the North Mountain, then in Cumberland (now in Franklin county.)

“He commenced business for himself, at the same place, about the beginning of the year 1788; and on the 16th of April, in the same year, was married to Elizabeth Speer. My father was a man of practical judgment, and of great industry and perseverance. He had received a good English education, and had that kind of knowledge of mankind which prevented him from being ever deceived in his business. With these qualifications, with the facility of obtaining goods on credit at Baltimore at that early period, and with the advantages of his position, it being one of a very few spots where the people of the western counties came with pack horses loaded with wheat to purchase and carry home salt and other necessaries, his circumstances soon improved. He bought the Dunwoodie farm for £1500 in 1794, and had previously purchased the property on which he resided at the Cove Gap.

“I was born at this place on the 23d of April, 1791, being my father’s second child. My father moved from the Cove Gap to Mercersburg, a distance of between three and four miles, in the autumn of 1796, and began business in Mercersburg in the autumn of 1798. For some years before his death, which occurred on the 11th of June, 1821, he had quite a large mercantile business, and devoted much of his time and attention to superintending his farm, of which he was very fond. He was a man of great native force of character. He was not only respected, but beloved by everybody who approached him. In his youth, he held the commission of a justice of the peace; but finding himself so overrun with the business of this office as to interfere with his private affairs, he resigned his commission. A short time before his death, he again received a commission of the peace from Governor Hiester. He was a kind father, a sincere friend, and an honest and religious man.

“My mother, considering her limited opportunities in early life, was a remarkable woman. The daughter of a country farmer, engaged in household employment from early life until after my father’s death, she yet found time to read much, and to reflect deeply on what she read. She had a great fondness for poetry, and could repeat with ease all the passages in her favorite authors which struck her fancy. These were Milton, Pope, Young, Cowper, and Thomson. I do not think, at least until a late period of her life, she had ever read a criticism on any one of these authors, and yet such was the correctness of her natural taste that she had selected for herself, and could repeat, every passage in them which has been admired.

“She was a sincere and devoted Christian from the time of my earliest recollection, and had read much on the subject of theology; and what she read once, she remembered forever. For her sons, as they successively grew up, she was a delightful and instructive companion. She would argue with them, and often gain the victory; ridicule them in any folly or eccentricity; excite their ambition, by presenting to them in glowing colors men who had been useful to their country or their kind, as objects of imitation, and enter into all their joys and sorrows. Her early habits of laborious industry, she could not be induced to forego—whilst she had anything to do. My father did everything he could to prevent her from laboring in her domestic concerns, but it was all in vain. I have often, during the vacations at school or college, sat in the room with her, and whilst she was (entirely from her own choice) busily engaged in homely domestic employments, have spent hours pleasantly and instructively in conversing with her. She was a woman of great firmness of character and bore the afflictions of her later life with Christian philosophy. After my father’s death, she lost her two sons, William and George Washington, two young men of great promise, and a favorite daughter. These afflictions withdrew her affections gradually more and more from the things of this world—and she died on the 14th of May, 1833, at Greensburg, in the calm but firm assurance that she was going home to her Father and her God. It was chiefly to her influence that her sons were indebted for a liberal education. Under Providence, I attribute any little distinction which I may have acquired in the world to the blessing which He conferred upon me in granting me such a mother.”

The parents of Mr. Buchanan were both of Scotch-Irish descent, and Presbyterians. At what time this branch of the Buchanan family emigrated from Scotland to Ireland is not known; but John Buchanan, the grandfather of the President, who was a farmer in the county of Donegal in Ireland, married Jane Russel, about the middle of the last century. She was a daughter of Samuel Russel, who was also a farmer of Scotch-Presbyterian descent in the same county. James Buchanan, their son, and father of the President, was brought up by his mother’s relatives. Elizabeth Speer, the President’s mother, was the only daughter of James Speer, who was also of Scotch-Presbyterian ancestry, and who emigrated to Pennsylvania in 1756. James Speer and his wife (Mary Patterson) settled at first on a farm ten miles from Lancaster, and afterwards at the foot of the South Mountain between Chambersburg and Gettysburg. It is told in some memoranda which now lie before me, that in 1779, James Speer left the “Covenanted Church,” on account of difficulties with Mr. Dobbins, his pastor, and was afterwards admitted to full communion in the Presbyterian congregation under the care of the Rev. John Black. This incident sufficiently indicates the kind of religious atmosphere in which Mrs. Buchanan grew up; and the letters of both parents to their son, from which I shall have occasion to quote frequently, afford abundant evidence of that deep and peculiar piety which characterized the sincere Christians of their denomination. They were married on the 16th of April, 1788, when Mrs. Buchanan was just twenty-one, and her husband twenty-seven. Eleven children were born to them between 1789 and 1811. James, the future President, was born April 23d, 1791.

Of his early education and his college life, he gives this account:

“After having received a tolerably good English education, I studied the Latin and Greek languages at a school in Mercersburg. It was first kept by the Rev. James R. Sharon, then a student of divinity with Dr. John King, and afterwards by a Mr. McConnell and Dr. Jesse Magaw, then a student of medicine, and subsequently my brother-in-law. I was sent to Dickinson College in the fall of 1807, where I entered the junior class.

“The college was in a wretched condition; and I have often regretted that I had not been sent to some other institution. There was no efficient discipline, and the young men did pretty much as they pleased. To be a sober, plodding, industrious youth was to incur the ridicule of the mass of the students. Without much natural tendency to become dissipated, and chiefly from the example of others, and in order to be considered a clever and a spirited youth, I engaged in every sort of extravagance and mischief in which the greatest proficients of the college indulged. Unlike the rest of this class, however, I was always a tolerably hard student, and never was deficient in my college exercises.

“A circumstance occurred, after I had been a year at college, which made a strong and lasting impression upon me. During the September vacation, in the year 1808, on a Sabbath morning, whilst I was sitting in the room with my father, a letter was brought to him. He opened it, and read it, and I observed that his countenance fell. He then handed it to me and left the room, and I do not recollect that he ever afterwards spoke to me on the subject of it. It was from Dr. Davidson, the Principal of Dickinson College. He stated that, but for the respect which the faculty entertained for my father, I would have been expelled from college on account of disorderly conduct. That they had borne with me as best they could until that period; but that they would not receive me again, and that the letter was written to save him the mortification of sending me back and having me rejected. Mortified to the soul, I at once determined upon my course. Dr. John King was at the time pastor of the congregation to which my parents belonged. He came to that congregation shortly after the Revolution, and continued to be its pastor until his death. He had either married or baptized all its members. He participated in their joys as well as their sorrows, and had none of the gloomy bigotry which too often passes in these days for superior sanctity. He was, I believe, a trustee of the college, and enjoyed great and extensive influence wherever he was known. To him I applied with the greatest confidence in my extremity. He gave me a gentle lecture—the more efficient on that account. He then proposed to me, that if I would pledge my honor to him to behave better at college than I had done, he felt such confidence in me that he would pledge himself to Dr. Davidson on my behalf, and he did not doubt that I would be permitted to return. I cheerfully complied with this condition; Dr. King arranged the matter, and I returned to college, without any questions being asked; and afterwards conducted myself in such a manner as, at least, to prevent any formal complaint. At the public examination, previous to the commencement, I answered without difficulty every question which was propounded to me. At that time there were two honors conferred by the college. It was the custom for each of the two societies to present a candidate, and the faculty decided which of them should have the first honor, and the second was conferred upon the other candidate as a matter of course. I had set my heart upon obtaining the highest, and the society to which I belonged unanimously presented me as their candidate. As I believed that this society, from the superior scholarship of its members, was entitled to both, on my motion we presented two candidates to the faculty. The consequence was, that they rejected me altogether, gave the first honor to the candidate of the opposite society, and the second to Mr. Robert Laverty, now of Chester county, assigning as a reason for rejecting my claims that it would have a bad tendency to confer an honor of the college upon a student who had shown so little respect as I had done for the rules of the college and for the professors.

“I have scarcely ever been so much mortified at any occurrence of my life as at this disappointment, nor has friendship ever been manifested towards me in a more striking manner than by all the members of the society to which I belonged. Mr. Laverty, at once, in the most kind manner, offered to yield me the second honor, which, however, I declined to accept. The other members of the society belonging to the senior class would have united with me in refusing to speak at the approaching commencement, but I was unwilling to place them in this situation on my account, and more especially as several of them were designed for the ministry. I held out myself for some time, but at last yielded on receiving a kind communication from the professors. I left college, however, feeling but little attachment towards the Alma Mater.”

In regard to the danger of his expulsion from the college, which Mr. Buchanan has frankly recorded in his autobiographical fragment, I find no other reference to it. But I have seen in the note-books of his studies and in the notes which he kept of lectures that he attended, abundant proof that he was, as he says, “a tolerably hard student.” He seems to have had a strong propensity to logic and metaphysics, and of these studies there are copious traces in his own handwriting. The incident which he relates concerning his disappointment in not receiving one of the highest of the college honors at his graduating “commencement,” is thus touched upon in a letter from his father:

MERCERSBURG, September 6, 1809.

DEAR SON:—

Yours is at hand (though without date) which mortifies us very much for your disappointment, in being deprived of both honors of the college, especially when your prospect was so fair for one of them, and more so when it was done by the professors who are acknowledged by the world to be the best judges of the talents and merits of the several students under their care. I am not disposed to censure your conduct in being ambitious to have the first honors of the college; but as it was thought that Mr. F. and yourself were best entitled to them, you and he ought to have compounded the matter so as to have left it to the disposition of your several societies, and been contented with their choice. The partiality you complain of in the professors is, no doubt, an unjust thing in them, and perhaps it has proceeded from some other cause than that which you are disposed to ascribe to them.

Often when people have the greatest prospects of temporal honor and aggrandizement, they are all blasted in a moment by a fatality connected with men and things; and no doubt the designs of Providence may be seen very conspicuously in our disappointments, in order to teach us our dependency on Him who knows all events, and they ought to humble our pride and self-sufficiency...... I think it was a very partial decision, and calculated to hurt your feelings. Be that as it will, I hope you will have fortitude enough to surmount these things. Your great consolation is in yourself, and if you can say your right was taken from you by a partial spirit and given to those to whom it ought not to be given, you must for the present submit. The more you know of mankind, the more you will distrust them. It is said the knowledge of mankind and the distrust of them are reciprocally connected......

I approve of your conduct in being prepared with an oration, and if upon delivery it be good sense, well spoken, and your own composition, your audience will think well of it whether it be spoken first, or last, or otherwise......

We anticipate the pleasure of seeing you shortly, when I hope all these little clouds will be dissipated.

From your loving and affectionate father,

JAMES BUCHANAN.

Following Mr. Buchanan’s sketch of his early life, we come to the period immediately after he graduated from Dickinson College.

I came to Lancaster to study law with the late Mr. Hopkins, in the month of December, 1809, and was admitted to practice in November, 1812. I determined that if severe application would make me a good lawyer, I should not fail in this particular; and I can say, with truth, that I have never known a harder student than I was at that period of my life. I studied law, and nothing but law, or what was essentially connected with it. I took pains to understand thoroughly, as far as I was capable, everything which I read; and in order to fix it upon my memory and give myself the habit of extempore speaking, I almost every evening took a lonely walk, and embodied the ideas which I had acquired during the day in my own language. This gave me a habit of extempore speaking, and that not merely words but things. I derived great improvement from this practice.

It would seem that young Buchanan remained at home with his parents after he had graduated until the month of December, when he went to Lancaster and entered himself as a student at law, in the office of Mr. Hopkins. The following letters from his parents give all that I am able to glean respecting the period of his law pupilage, and the choice of a permanent residence after he had been admitted to practice, which was, it seems, in November, 1812.

[FROM HIS FATHER.]

March 12, 1810.

...... I am very glad to hear you are so well pleased with Lancaster, and with the study of the law.

...... I hope you will guard against the temptations that may offer themselves in this way, or any other, knowing that without religion all other things are as trifles, and will soon pass away...... Your young acquaintances often talk of you, and with respect and esteem. Go on with your studies, and endeavor to be eminent in your profession.

Mr. Buchanan was admitted to the bar in the year which saw the commencement of the war with Great Britain, under the Presidency of Mr. Madison. His early political principles were those of the Federalists, who disapproved of the war. Yet, as the following passages in his autobiography show, he was not backward in his duty as a citizen:[1]

The first public address I ever made before the people was in 1814, a short time after the capture of Washington by the British. In common with the Federalists, generally, of the Middle and Southern States, whilst I disapproved of the declaration of war under the circumstances in which it was made, yet I thought it was the duty of every patriot to defend the country, whilst the war was raging, against a foreign enemy. The capture of Washington lighted up a flame of patriotism which pervaded the whole of Pennsylvania. A public meeting was called in Lancaster for the purpose of adopting measures to obtain volunteers to march for the defence of Baltimore. On that occasion I addressed the people, and was among the first to register my name as a volunteer. We immediately formed a company of dragoons, and elected the late Judge Henry Shippen our captain. We marched to Baltimore, and served under the command of Major Charles Sterret Ridgely, until we were honorably discharged. This company of dragoons was the _avant courier_ of the large force which rushed from Pennsylvania to the defence of Baltimore.

Mr. Buchanan’s entrance into public life is thus described by himself:

In October, 1814, I was elected a member of the House of Representatives, in the Legislature, from the county of Lancaster. The same principles which guided my conduct in sustaining the war, notwithstanding my opposition to its declaration, governed my course after I became a member of the Legislature. An attack was threatened against the city of Philadelphia. The General Government was nearly reduced to a state of bankruptcy, and could scarcely raise sufficient money to maintain the regular troops on the remote frontiers of the country. Pennsylvania was obliged to rely upon her own energies for the defence, and the people generally, of all parties, were ready to do their utmost in the cause.

Two plans were proposed. The one was what was called the Conscription Bill, and similar to that which had been rejected by Congress, reported in the [State] Senate by Mr. Nicholas Biddle, by which it was proposed to divide the white male inhabitants of the State above the age of eighteen into classes of twenty-two men each, and to designate one man by lot from the numbers between the ages of eighteen and forty-five of each class, who should serve one year, each class being compelled to raise a sum not exceeding two hundred dollars, as a bounty to the conscript. This army was to be paid and maintained at the expense of the State, and its estimated cost would have been between three and three and one-half million of dollars per annum. The officers were to be appointed by the Governor, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate.

The other was to raise six regiments under the authority of the State, to serve for three years, or during the war, and to pass efficient volunteer and militia laws.

[_Here the narrative changes to the third person._]

“On the 1st of February, 1815, Mr. Buchanan delivered his sentiments in regard to the proper mode of defending the Commonwealth, on the bill entitled ‘An act for the encouragement of volunteers for the defence of this Commonwealth.’ He said: ‘Since, then, the Congress have deserted us in our time of need, there is no alternative but either to protect ourselves by some efficient measures, or surrender up that independence which has been purchased by the blood of our forefathers. No American can hesitate which of these alternatives ought to be adopted. The invading enemy must be expelled from our shores; he must be taught to respect the rights of freedom.’

“Again, speaking of the Conscription Bill, he said: ‘This law is calculated to be very unjust and very unequal in its effects. Whilst it will operate as a conscription law upon the poor man in the western parts of the State, where property is not in danger, it will be but a militia law with the rich man in the eastern part of the State, whose property it contemplates defending. The individuals in each class are, to be sure, to pay the two hundred dollars in proportion to their comparative wealth, as a bounty to the substitute or conscript. It will, therefore, be just in its operation among the individuals composing each class, but how will it be with respect to entire classes? Twenty-two men in the city of Philadelphia, whose united fortunes would be worth two million dollars, would be compelled to pay no more than twenty-two men in the western country, who may not be worth the one-thousandth part of that sum.’

“After Mr. Buchanan had stated that he would have voted for the Enlistment Bill, had he not been necessarily absent when it passed the House, he said: ‘After all, I must confess, that in my opinion an efficient volunteer and militia bill, together with the troops which can be raised under the Voluntary Enlistment Bill, will be amply sufficient for the defence of the city of Philadelphia. We need not be afraid to trust to the patriotism or courage of the people of this country when they are invaded. Let them have good militia officers, and they will soon be equal to any troops of the world. Have not the volunteers and militia on the Niagara frontier fought in such a manner as to merit the gratitude of the nation? Is it to be supposed that the same spirit of patriotism would animate the man who is dragged out by a conscription law to defend his country, that the volunteer or militiaman would feel? Let us, then, pass an efficient militia law, and the Volunteer Bill which is now before us. Let us hold out sufficient inducement to our citizens to turn out, as volunteers. Let their patriotism be stimulated by self-interest, and I have no doubt that in the day of trial there will be armies of freemen in the field sufficiently large for our protection. Your State will then be defended at a trifling comparative expense, the liberties of the people will be preserved, and their willingness to bear new burdens be continued.’

“The bill having passed the Senate, was negatived in the House, on the 3d of February, 1815, by the decisive vote of 51 to 36. It was entitled ‘An act to raise a military force for the defence of this Commonwealth.’ The Senate and the House thus differed in regard to the best mode of defending the Commonwealth; the one being friendly to the Conscription Bill, and the other to the Voluntary Enlistment and Volunteer Bill. All agreed upon the necessity of adopting efficient means for this purpose. Before any final action was had upon the subject, the news of peace arrived, and was officially communicated by Governor Snyder to the Legislature on the 17th February, 1815.”

So open and decided was I in my course in favor of defending the country, notwithstanding my disapproval of the declaration of war, that I distinctly recollect that the late William Beale, the shrewd, strong-minded, and influential Democratic Senator from Mifflin county, called upon me, and urged me strongly during the session to change my [political] name, and be called a Democrat, stating that I would have no occasion to change my principles. In that event, he said he would venture to predict that, should I live, I would become President of the United States. He was mistaken, for although I was friendly to a vigorous prosecution of the war, I was far from being a “Democrat” in principle.

[FROM HIS FATHER.]

September 22, 1814.

DEAR SON:—

I received your letter of the 9th ult. from Baltimore, which stated that you were then honorably discharged. This news was very gratifying, as at that moment we received accounts that the British were making their attack on Baltimore, both by sea and land, and consequently our forebodings with respect to your fate were highly wound up......

You say you are in nomination for the Assembly. I am not certain that it will be to your advantage, as it will lead you off from the study and practice of the law. If by your industry and application you could become eminent at the bar, that would be preferable to being partly a politician and partly a lawyer. However, you must now be directed by circumstances and the counsel of your friends.

...... The Assembly has passed a law for the benefit of the poor, which in fact prevents them from paying any debts, as they hold all under cover of the reserve made them in the law. So much for popularity at the expense of justice.

October 21, 1814.

DEAR SON:—

I received yours by Mr. Evans, informing me you were elected to the Assembly. The circumstances of your being so popular amongst your neighbors as to give you a majority over Isaac Wayne, who, I suppose, was one of the highest on your ticket, is very gratifying to me, and I hope your conduct will continue to merit their approbation. But above all earthly enjoyments, endeavor to merit the esteem of heaven; and that Divine Providence who has done so much for you heretofore, will never abandon you in the hour of trial. Perhaps your going to the Legislature may be to your advantage, and it may be otherwise. I hope you will make the best of the thing now. The feelings of parents are always alive to the welfare of their children, and I am fearful of this taking you from the bar at a time when perhaps you may feel it most......

There is now every prospect of a continuation of the war. The terms offered us by the British are such that no true American could comply with, or submit to them...... News has just come to this place that Lord Hill has arrived with 16,000 men.

From your loving father,

J. B.

January 20, 1815.

...... I am glad to find you are well pleased at being a member of the Legislature. Perhaps it may have the effect you mention, that of increasing your business hereafter. I am glad to hear that you mean to proceed with caution, and speak only when you are well prepared for the subject you mean to speak upon. You are young, consequently deficient in experience; therefore you must supply that defect by watchfulness and application, never forgetting that every gift you may possess flows from that Being who has always been your friend, and will continue to be so, if you are in your duty.

February 24, 1815.

DEAR SON:—

I expect you are now engaged in repealing many of those laws which have been enacted for prosecuting the war with vigor. As the olive-branch has been presented to us, it will change all our plans, and we will again be permitted to return in peace to our different occupations, and ought to thank heaven for the blessing. This night we are to illuminate this place in consequence of peace. Those who have seen the treaty say it is dishonorable to America; that there are none of those points gained for which we declared war.

June 23, 1815.

...... You appear to hesitate about going to the Legislature again, and I am both unable and unwilling to advise you on that point; but as it appears your business has not decreased by being there last winter, I would have no objection to your going another session, as it would afford you another opportunity of improvement, and perhaps the people of your district may some time elect you to Congress. Could you not get an active young man as a student that could keep your office open in your absence, and do a little business for you?......

You may expect to have many difficulties and dangers to encounter in your passage through life, especially as your situation becomes enviable; but I hope you will always depend upon the protection of that kind Providence, who has dealt so kindly with you, to shield you from the shafts of malicious enemies.

Your mother and the family send their kind love to you, and believe me your loving father,

J. B.

The next event in his life of which I find any mention in his autobiography, was the delivery of an oration before the Washington Society of Lancaster, July 4, 1815, of which he speaks as follows:

On the 4th of July, 1815, I delivered the oration before the Washington Association of Lancaster, which has been the subject of much criticism. There are many sentiments in this oration which I regret; at the same time it cannot be denied that the country was wholly unprepared for war, at the period of its declaration, and the attempt to carry it on by means of loans, without any resort to taxation, had well nigh made the Government bankrupt. There is, however, a vein of feeling running throughout the whole oration—of which, as I look back to it, I may be excused for being proud—which always distinguishes between the conduct of the administration and the necessity for defending the country. Besides, it will be recollected that this oration was not delivered until after the close of the war. I said: “Glorious it has been, in the highest degree, to the American character, but disgraceful in the extreme to the administration. When the individual States discovered that they were abandoned by the General Government, whose duty it was to protect them, the fortitude of their citizens arose with their misfortunes. The moment we were invaded, the genius of freedom inspired their souls. They rushed upon their enemies with a hallowed fury which the hireling soldiers of Britain could never feel. They taught our foe that the soil of freedom would always be the grave of its invaders.”

I spoke with pride and exultation of the exploits of the navy, and also of the regular army during the last year of the war. The former “has risen triumphant above its enemies at home, and has made the proud mistress of the ocean tremble. The people are now convinced that a navy is their best defence.”[2]

In the conclusion there is a passage concerning foreign influence which must be approved by all. “Foreign influence has been, in every age, the curse of Republics. Her jaundiced eye sees all things in false colors. The thick atmosphere of prejudice, by which she is forever surrounded, excludes from her sight the light of reason; whilst she worships the nations which she favors for their very crimes, she curses the enemies of that nation, even their virtues. In every age she has marched before the enemies of her country, ‘proclaiming peace, when there was no peace,’ and lulling its defenders into fatal security, whilst the iron hand of despotism has been aiming a death-blow at their liberties.” And again, “We are separated from the nations of Europe by an immense ocean. We are still more disconnected from them by a different form of government, and by the enjoyment of true liberty. Why, then, should we injure ourselves by taking part in the ambitious contests of foreign despots and kings?”

[FROM HIS FATHER.]

July 14, 1815.

No doubt you will have many political enemies to criticise your oration, but you must take the consequences now. It is a strong mark of approbation to have so many copies of it published. I hope to see one of them.

I am busily engaged with my harvest. I am very glad I did not purchase goods as I proposed, as they have fallen greatly in price.

September 1, 1815.

...... Myself and the family are very anxious to see you, yet I am glad that your business is so good that you cannot, with propriety, leave it, yet you must always make your calculations to come as often as you can. Have you agreed to your nomination for the Legislature another session? You know your own situation best. If you think proper to take another seat, it has my approbation. I have read your oration, and I think it well done. Perhaps it is a little too severe, and may hurt the feelings of some of your friends, who have been friendly, independent of politics. I have lent it to a few people who have asked for it, and they all speak well of your performance.

Oct. 19, 1815.

...... It appears from the Lancaster Journal, you are again elected. I wish you may end the next session with the same popularity as a statesman that you gained in the last session.

Mr. Buchanan’s own account of his second term of service in the Legislature is thus given:

I was again elected a member of the House of Representatives in the State Legislature in October, 1815. The currency at that period was in great disorder throughout the Middle, Western, and Southern States, in consequence of the suspension of specie payments occasioned by the war. On the 20th of December, 1815, a resolution was adopted by the House of Representatives, instructing the Committee on Banks, “to inquire into the causes of the suspension of specie payments by the banks within this Commonwealth; and also, whether any or what measures ought to be adopted by the Legislature on this subject.” This committee was composed of Mr. McEuen, of the city; Milliken, of Mifflin; Stewart, of Fayette; and Dysart, of Crawford. On the 12th of January, 1816, Mr. McEuen made a report which concluded with a recommendation that a law should be passed, obliging the banks to pay interest on balances to each other monthly, at the rate of six per cent. per annum, after the 1st of March; also, obliging the banks refusing to pay specie for their notes after the 1st of January, 1817, to pay interest at the rate of eighteen per cent. per annum from the time of demand; and forfeiting the charters of such banks as should refuse to redeem their notes in specie after the 1st of January, 1818. A bare majority of the committee had concurred in the report. The minority had requested me to prepare a substitute for it, and offer it as soon as the report was read. This substitute concluded with a resolution, “that it is inexpedient at this time for the Legislature to adopt any compulsory measures relative to the banks.” The original report and the substitute were postponed, and no action was ever had afterwards upon either.

The substitute states the following to have been the causes of the suspension of specie payments in Pennsylvania:

1. The blockade by the enemy of the Middle and Southern seaports, the impossibility of getting their productions to market, and the consequent necessity imposed upon them to pay in specie to New England the price of the foreign merchandise imported into that portion of the Union.

2. The large loans made by banks and individuals of this and the adjacent States to the Government to sustain the war, and the small comparative loans made in New England, which were paid by an extravagant issue of bank notes. These latter bore but a small proportion to the money expended there. To make up this deficiency, the specie of the Middle and Southern States was drawn from the vaults of these banks, and was used by the New England people in commerce, or smuggled to the enemy.

3. The great demand for specie in England.

4. The recent establishment of a number of new banks throughout the interior of Pennsylvania, which drew their capital chiefly from the banks in Philadelphia and thereby weakened them, compelled them first to suspend specie payments. These new banks, in self-defence, were therefore obliged to suspend.

5. The immense importation of foreign goods at the close of the war, and the necessity of paying for them in specie, have continued the suspension.

During this session, and whilst the debates on the subject were proceeding in Congress, I changed my impression on the subject of a Bank of the United States, and became decidedly hostile to such an institution. In this opinion I have never since wavered, and although I have invested much of the profits of my profession in stocks, and was often advised by friends to buy stock in this bank, I always declined becoming a stockholder. Whilst the bill was pending in Congress, I urged Mr. Holgate and other influential Democrats in the House to offer instructions against the measure, but could not prevail with them. I recollect Mr. H. told me that it was unnecessary, as our Democratic Senators in Congress would certainly vote against the measure without any instructions.

Mr. Buchanan appears to have left the Legislature at the end of the session of 1815–16, with a fixed determination to devote himself exclusively to the practice of his profession. He says:

After my second session in the Legislature, I applied myself with unremitting application to the practice of the law. My practice in Lancaster and some of the adjoining counties was extensive, laborious, and lucrative. It increased rapidly in value from the time I ceased to be a member of the Legislature. During the year ending on the 1st of April, 1819, I received in cash for professional services $7,915.92, which was, down to that time, the best year I ever experienced.[3]

Among his professional employments at this period, I find the following modest allusion to a cause in which he gained great distinction:

During the session of the Legislature of 1816–17 I alone defended the Hon. Walter Franklin and his associates on articles of impeachment against them before the Senate; and during the session of 1817–18, I defended the same judges on other articles, and had for associates Mr. Condy and Mr. Hopkins. I never felt the responsibility of my position more sensibly than, when a young man between 25 and 26 years of age, I undertook alone to defend Judge Franklin; and although he was anxious I should, again the next year, undertake his cause without assistance, yet I insisted upon the employment of older and more experienced counsel.

As the impeachment case referred to in the close of this sketch was the occasion of Mr. Buchanan’s early distinction at the bar, a brief account of it may be here given. It was a prosecution instituted from political motives, and was a lamentable exhibition of party asperity. Judge Franklin was the president judge of the court of common pleas for a judicial district composed of the counties of Lancaster, Lebanon, and York. His associates were not lawyers. At a period of great political excitement, which had continued since the close of the war with Great Britain, there arose a litigation in Judge Franklin’s court which grew out of one of the occurrences of the war. In July, 1814, the President had made a requisition on the Governor of Pennsylvania for the services of certain regiments of militia. The troops were called and mustered into the Federal service. Houston, a citizen of Lancaster, refused to serve; he was tried by a court-martial, held under the authority of the State, convicted, and sentenced to pay a fine. For this he brought an action in the common pleas against the members of the court-martial and its officer who had collected the fine. On the trial, Judge Franklin ruled that when the militia had been mustered into the service of the United States, the control of the State and its power to punish were ended. The plaintiff, therefore, recovered a verdict. Judge Franklin was subjected to this impeachment for ruling a point of law on which the Judges of the Supreme Court of the United States afterwards differed.

In a diary kept by a gentleman who watched this impeachment with the deepest interest, I find the following allusion to Mr. Buchanan’s argument:

“This argument was conducted with great ingenuity, eloquence, and address. It made a deep impression. It will tend very much to raise and extend the reputation of Mr. Buchanan, and will have, I hope, a favorable effect upon his future prospects as a lawyer and a politician.”

The impression produced by Mr. Buchanan’s argument was so strong, that the managers of the impeachment asked for an adjournment before they replied to it. His defence was made upon the sound doctrine that “impeachment” of a judge for a legal opinion, when no crime or misdemeanor has been committed, is a constitutional solecism. The respondent was acquitted, and his advocate acquired a great amount of reputation for so young a man.

With an honorable and distinguished professional career thus opening before him, a favorite in society both from his talents and his character, young, high-spirited and full of energy, it seemed that happiness had been provided for him by his own merits and a kind Providence. But there now occurred an episode in his life which cast upon him a never-ending sorrow. He became engaged to be married to a young lady in Lancaster, who has been described to me, by persons who knew her, as a very beautiful girl, of singularly attractive and gentle disposition, but retiring and sensitive. Her father, Robert Coleman, Esq., a wealthy citizen of Lancaster, entirely approved of the engagement. After this connection had existed for some time, she suddenly wrote a note to her lover and asked him to release her from the engagement. There is no reason to believe that their mutual feelings had in any degree changed. He could only reply that if it was her wish to put an end to their engagement, he must submit. This occurred in the latter part of the summer of 1819. The young lady died very suddenly, while on a visit to Philadelphia, on the 9th of the December following, in the twenty-third year of her age. Her remains were brought to her father’s house in Lancaster, on the next Saturday, just one week from the day on which she left home. “The funeral,” says the diary already quoted from, “took place the next day, and was attended by a great number of the inhabitants, who appeared to feel a deep sympathy with the family on this distressing occasion.”

From the same source, I transcribe a little obituary notice, which was published in a Lancaster paper on the 11th of December, and which the diary states was written by Mr. Buchanan:

“Departed this life, on Thursday morning last, in the twenty-third year of her age, while on a visit to her friends in the city of Philadelphia, Miss Anne C. Coleman, daughter of Robert Coleman, Esquire, of this city. It rarely falls to our lot to shed a tear over the mortal remains of one so much and so deservedly beloved as was the deceased. She was everything which the fondest parent or fondest friend could have wished her to be. Although she was young and beautiful, and accomplished, and the smiles of fortune shone upon her, yet her native modesty and worth made her unconscious of her own attractions. Her heart was the seat of all the softer virtues which ennoble and dignify the character of woman. She has now gone to a world where in the bosom of her God she will be happy with congenial spirits. May the memory of her virtues be ever green in the hearts of her surviving friends. May her mild spirit, which on earth still breathes peace and good-will, be their guardian angel to preserve them from the faults to which she was ever a stranger—

“‘The spider’s most attenuated thread Is cord, is cable, to man’s tender tie On earthly bliss—it breaks at every breeze.’”

The following letter, written by Mr. Buchanan to the father of the young lady, is all that remains of written evidence, to attest the depth of his attachment to her:

[JAMES BUCHANAN TO ROBERT COLEMAN, ESQ.]

LANCASTER, December 10, 1819.

MY DEAR SIR:

You have lost a child, a dear, dear child. I have lost the only earthly object of my affections, without whom life now presents to me a dreary blank. My prospects are all cut off, and I feel that my happiness will be buried with her in the grave. It is now no time for explanation, but the time will come when you will discover that she, as well as I, have been much abused. God forgive the authors of it. My feelings of resentment against them, whoever they may be, are buried in the dust. I have now one request to make, and, for the love of God and of your dear, departed daughter whom I loved infinitely more than any other human being could love, deny me not. Afford me the melancholy pleasure of seeing her body before its interment. I would not for the world be denied this request.

I might make another, but, from the misrepresentations which must have been made to you, I am almost afraid. I would like to follow her remains to the grave as a mourner. I would like to convince the world, and I hope yet to convince you, that she was infinitely dearer to me than life. I may sustain the shock of her death, but I feel that happiness has fled from me forever. The prayer which I make to God without ceasing is, that I yet may be able to show my veneration for the memory of my dear departed saint, by my respect and attachment for her surviving friends.

May Heaven bless you, and enable you to bear the shock with the fortitude of a Christian.

I am, forever, your sincere and grateful friend,

JAMES BUCHANAN.

There is among Mr. Buchanan’s papers a letter written to him by one of his friends, shortly after the death of Miss Coleman, which shows how this affliction immediately affected him, and how it was regarded by persons of high social standing in Pennsylvania, who were not prejudiced by erroneous beliefs in regard to the circumstances which led to the breaking of the engagement.

[AMOS ELLMAKER TO MR. BUCHANAN.]

December 20, 1819.

DEAR SIR:—

I hear you have left Lancaster, and have not heard where you have gone to; but I take it for granted the absence will be short. I am writing, I know not why, and perhaps had better not. I write only to speak of the awful visitation of Providence that has fallen upon you, and how deeply I feel it. The thought of your situation has scarcely been absent from my mind ten days. I trust your restoration to your philosophy and courage, and to the elasticity of spirits natural to most young men. Yet time, the sovereign cure of all these, must intervene before much good can be done. The sun will shine again—though a man enveloped in gloom always thinks the darkness is to be eternal. Do you remember the Spanish anecdote? A lady, who had lost a favorite child, remained for months sunk in sullen sorrow and despair. Her confessor, one morning, visited her, and found her, as usual, immersed in gloom and grief. “What!” says he; “have you not forgiven God Almighty?” She rose, exerted herself, joined the world again, and became useful to herself and friends.

Might I venture to hint advice? It would be to give full scope (contrary to common advice on similar occasions), I say to give full vent and unrestrained license to the feelings and thoughts natural in the case for a time—which time may be a week, two weeks, three weeks, as nature dictates—without scarcely a small effort during that time to rise above the misfortune; then, when this time is past, to rouse, to banish depressing thoughts, as far as possible, and engage most industriously in business. My opinion is that too early an effort to shake off a very heavy affliction is often, if not always, dangerous. An early effort is futile, and worse—an unavailing struggle renders the mind cowardly, and sinks the spirits deeper in gloom. The true way to conquer is to run away at first. The storm which uproots the firmest oak passes harmlessly over the willow.

Forgive all this talk; it opens in my own bosom a wound which a dozen years have not cicatrized, and brings to my recollection a dark period of my own days, the remembrance of which yet chills me with horror.

Two of your cases here may be tried. If they are, I will endeavor to assist your colleague, Mr. Elder, for you, and for your benefit. This is our court week for the civil list......

Mrs. E—— talks much of you, and if she knew I was writing, would have me add her kindest message—indicative of the interest she feels. Farewell.

AMOS ELLMAKER.

In the course of Mr. Buchanan’s long subsequent political career, this incident in his early life was often alluded to in partisan newspapers, and in that species of literature called “campaign documents,” accompanied by many perversions and misrepresentations. These publications are each and all unworthy of notice. On one occasion, after he had retired to Wheatland, and when he had passed the age of seventy, he was shown by a friend a newspaper article, misrepresenting, as usual, the details of this affair. He then said, with deep emotion, that there were papers and relics which he had religiously preserved, then in a sealed package in a place of deposit in the city of New York, which would explain the trivial origin of this separation.[4] His executors found these papers inclosed and sealed separately from all others, and with a direction upon them in his handwriting, that they were to be destroyed without being read. They obeyed the injunction, and burnt the package without breaking the seal. It happened, however, that the original of the letter addressed by Mr. Buchanan to the young lady’s father, before her funeral, was not contained in this package. It was found in his private depositaries at Wheatland; and it came there in consequence of the fact that it was returned by the father unread and unopened.

It is now known that the separation of the lovers originated in a misunderstanding, on the part of the lady, of a very small matter, exaggerated by giddy and indiscreet tongues, working on a peculiarly sensitive nature. Such a separation, the commonest of occurrences, would have ended, in the ordinary course, in reconciliation, when the parties met, if death had not suddenly snatched away one of the sufferers, and left the other to a life-long grief. But under the circumstances, I feel bound to be governed by the spirit of Mr. Buchanan’s written instruction to his executors, and not to go into the details of a story which show that the whole occurrence was chargeable on the folly of others, and not on either of the two whose interests were involved.

Among the few survivors of the circle to which this young lady belonged, the remembrance of her sudden death is still fresh in aged hearts. The estrangement of the lovers was but one of those common occurrences that are perpetually verifying the saying, hackneyed by everlasting repetition, that “the course of true love never did run smooth.”

But it ran, in this case, pure and unbroken in the heart of the survivor, through a long and varied life. It became a grief that could not be spoken of; to which only the most distant allusion could be made; a sacred, unceasing sorrow, buried deep in the breast of a man who was formed for domestic joys; hidden beneath manners that were most engaging, beneath strong social tendencies, and a chivalrous old-fashioned deference to women of all ages and all claims. His peculiar and reverential demeanor towards the sex, never varied by rank, or station, or individual attractions, was doubtless in a large degree caused by the tender memory of what he had found, or fancied, in her whom he had lost in his early days by such a cruel fate. If her death had not prevented their marriage, it is probable that a purely professional and domestic life would have filled up the measure alike of his happiness and his ambition. It is certain that this occurrence prevented him from ever marrying, and impelled him again into public life, after he had once resolved to quit it. Soon after this catastrophe, he was offered a nomination to a seat in Congress. He did not suppose that he could be elected, and did not much desire to be. But he was strongly urged to accept the candidacy, and finally consented, chiefly because he needed an innocent excitement that would sometimes distract him from the grief that was destined never to leave him.[5] Great and uninterrupted, however, as was his political and social success, he lived and died a widowed and a childless man. Fortunately for him, a sister’s child, left an orphan at an early age, whom he educated with the wisest care, filled to him the place of a daughter as nearly and tenderly as such a relative could supply that want, adorning with womanly accomplishments and virtues the high public stations to which he was eventually called.

Footnote 1:

Under the date of September 13, 1813, Mr. Buchanan’s father writes to him: “Yesterday the fast day was kept here pretty unanimously. Mr. Elliot gave us an excellent sermon, and spoke of the war as a judgment, and the greatest calamity that could befall a people. He showed it to be worse than the famine or the pestilence. In the two latter cases, he said God acted as the immediate agent: in that of war he acted by subordinate agents; therefore the calamity was the greater.” This was the tone of many Federalist sermons.

Footnote 2:

“There is extant, according to the best of my recollection in the National Intelligencer, though not in Everett’s edition of his works, a speech of Mr. Webster in 1814, in the House of Representatives, on the ‘Conduct of the War.’ It is very severe on the military operations, especially in Canada (which no doubt, as a general thing, deserved all that was said of them), but he dwells with pride on our naval exploits. ‘However,’ says he, ‘we may differ as to what has been done or attempted on land, our differences cease at the water’s edge.’” (Note by Mr. Buchanan.)

Footnote 3:

I find a memorandum in Mr. Buchanan’s handwriting of his professional emoluments during his years of active practice.

1813 $938│1821–2 $11,297 1814 $1,096│ 1823 $7,243 1815 $2,246│ 1825 $4,521 1816 $3,174│ 1826 $2,419 1817 $5,379│ 1827 $2,570 1818 $7,915│ 1828 $2,008 1819 $7,092│ 1829 $3,362 1820 $5,665│

Footnote 4:

These and other papers of importance were sent by Mr. Buchanan from Wheatland to a bank in New York during the Civil War, when Pennsylvania was threatened with an invasion by the Confederate troops.

Footnote 5:

Conversing once in London with an intimate friend, very much younger than himself (Mr. S. L. M. Barlow of New York), Mr. Buchanan said: “I never intended to engage in politics, but meant to follow my profession strictly. But my prospects and plans were all changed by a most sad event which happened at Lancaster when I was a young man. As a distraction from my great grief, and because I saw that through a political following I could secure the friends I then needed, I accepted a nomination.”