Excerpt from Mr. Buchanan's Administration on the Eve of the Rebellion The following historical narrative of the events preceding the late rebellion was prepared soon after its outbreak, substantially in the present form. It may be asked, Why, then, was it not published at an earlier period? The answer is, that the publication was delayed to avoid the possible imputation, unjust as this would have been, that any portion of it was intended to embarrass Mr. Lincoln's administration in the vigorous prosecution of pending hostilities. The author deemed it far better to suffer temporary injustice than to expose himself to such a charge. lie never doubted the successful event of the war, even during its most gloomy periods. Having drawn his first breath soon after the adoption of the Federal Constitution and the Union which it established, and having been an eye-witness of the blessed effects of these, in securing liberty and prosperity at home, and in presenting an example to the oppressed of other lands, he felt an abiding conviction that the American people would never suffer the Great Charter of their rights to be destroyed. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

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As James Buchanan took office in 1857, the United States found itself at a crossroads. Dissolution of the Union had been averted and the Democratic Party maintained control of the federal government, but the nation watched to see if Pennsylvania's first president could make good on his promise to calm sectional tensions. Despite Buchanan's central role in a crucial hour in U.S. history, few presidents have been more ignored by historians. In assembling the essays for this volume, Michael Birkner and John Quist have asked leading scholars to reconsider whether Buchanan’s failures stemmed from his own mistakes or from circumstances that no president could have overcome. Buchanan's dealings with Utah shed light on his handling of the secession crisis. His approach to Dred Scott reinforces the image of a president whose doughface views were less a matter of hypocrisy than a thorough identification with southern interests. Essays on the secession crisis provide fodder for debate about the strengths and limitations of presidential authority in an existential moment for the young nation. Although the essays in this collection offer widely differing interpretations of Buchanan's presidency, they all grapple honestly with the complexities of the issues faced by the man who sat in the White House prior to the towering figure of Lincoln, and contribute to a deeper understanding of a turbulent and formative era.

A compact, pithy guide to the most popular form of life-writing, Memoir: An Introduction provides a primer to the ubiquitous literary form and its many subgenres.