Presidency of James Buchanan
| The Buchanan Cabinet | ||
|---|---|---|
| Office | Name | Term |
| President | James Buchanan | 1857–1861 |
| Vice President | John C. Breckinridge | 1857–1861 |
| Secretary of State | Lewis Cass | 1857–1860 |
| Jeremiah S. Black | 1860–1861 | |
| Secretary of Treasury | Howell Cobb | 1857–1860 |
| Philip Francis Thomas | 1860–1861 | |
| John Adams Dix | 1861 | |
| Secretary of War | John B. Floyd | 1857–1860 |
| Joseph Holt | 1860–1861 | |
| Attorney General | Jeremiah S. Black | 1857–1860 |
| Edwin M. Stanton | 1860–1861 | |
| Postmaster General | Aaron V. Brown | 1857–1859 |
| Joseph Holt | 1859–1860 | |
| Horatio King | 1861 | |
| Secretary of the Navy | Isaac Toucey | 1857–1861 |
| Secretary of the Interior | Jacob Thompson | 1857–1861 |
The presidency of James Buchanan began on March 4, 1857, when James Buchanan was inaugurated as President of the United States, and ended on March 4, 1861. Buchanan, a Democrat from Pennsylvania, took office as the 15th United States president after defeating former President Millard Fillmore of the American Party, and John C. Frémont of the Republican Party in the 1856 presidential election.
Buchanan was nominated by the Democratic Party at its 1856 convention, where he defeated both the incumbent President Franklin Pierce and Illinois Senator Stephen A. Douglas. Throughout most of Pierce's presidency, Buchanan had been stationed in London as minister to the Court of St James's and so was not involved in the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which had divided the country and the Democratic Party. However, despite his deep background in foreign affairs, Buchanan was unable to calm the growing sectional crisis that would divide the nation at the close of his term.
Prior to taking office, Buchanan lobbied the Supreme Court to issue a broad ruling in Dred Scott v. Sandford. He also allied with the South in attempting to gain the admission of Kansas to the Union as a slave state under the Lecompton Constitution. Buchanan, ever conciliatory, tried not to alienate anyone—either secessionist or unionist—but pleased no one. He was often called a "doughface," a Northerner with Southern sympathies, and he fought with Douglas, the leader of the popular sovereignty faction, for control of the Democratic Party. In the midst of the growing chasim between slave states and free states, the Panic of 1857 struck the nation, causing widespread business failures and high unemployment. There was also a protracted armed confrontation between Mormon pioneers in Utah Territory and the army, that lasted from May 1857 to July 1858.
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