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James Buchanan

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Autographs Start Price:NA Estimated At:1,000.00 - 1,500.00 USD
James Buchanan

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Auction Date:2018 Nov 07 @ 18:00 (UTC-5 : EST/CDT)
Location:236 Commercial St., Suite 100, Boston, Massachusetts, 02109, United States
ALS - Autograph Letter Signed
ANS - Autograph Note Signed
AQS - Autograph Quotation Signed
AMQS - Autograph Musical Quotation Signed
DS - Document Signed
FDC - First Day Cover
Inscribed - “Personalized”
ISP - Inscribed Signed Photograph
LS - Letter Signed
SP - Signed Photograph
TLS - Typed Letter Signed
ALS, one page, 7.75 x 10, November 7, 1852. Letter to the Hon. Chapman Neale, in full: "I have this moment received your kind letter & hasten to say that I shall leave home in a few minutes for Philadelphia & do not expect to be here again for a week or ten days. After that I shall be most happy to see you with any friend you may bring along; & you shall both receive a cordial & heartfelt welcome. What a crushing defeat the Whigs have suffered! Our late unexampled triumph has established the finality of the compromise & has pronounced final doom against military chieftains from the regular army. Laus Deo! I write in great haste fearing that you might pay me a visit during my absence which I should greatly regret." In very good to fine condition, with light toning and splitting along the intersecting folds, reinforced on the reverse with archival tape.

Buchanan writes elatedly following the election of 1852, in which the Whig Party's presidential nominee, Winfield Scott, was handily defeated by Democrat Franklin Pierce. The results reinforced the voters' support for the Compromise of 1850, including the Fugitive Slave Act, a plank anathema to most rank-and-file Whigs. With the defeat of the anti-slavery candidate Scott, it was clear that this was the end of the Whig Party, now fatally divided over the issue of slavery. To Buchanan, who would be elected president four years alter, slavery was firmly rooted in the Constitution and therefore not subject to legislation. His ineffectual leadership over the issue led to the eruption of civil war in 1861.