In Defense of General Pierce

In 1852, Franklin Pierce was nominated for the presidency by the Democratic Party.  As the Whigs had nominated General Winfield Scott, attacks on Pierce's military service became a popular topic.  Democrat newspapers soon responded to the attacks by publishing the accounts of fellow soldiers who held Pierce in the highest regard for his military service during the Mexican War.  Fellow veterans Major Isaac Stevens, Colonel Noah Smith, Colonel J F H Claiborne, Major General James Shields, Major Oscar Winship, General Gideon Pillow, Colonel Francis Wynkoop, Lt. Richard Drum, Lt. George Bowers, and Lt. Col. Benjamin Roberts each provided an account of Pierce's gallantry and meritorious service in Mexico. 

Though Pierce had not been a soldier beyond serving in the New Hampshire state militia, he volunteered for the Mexican War even though it was unpopular in New England.  He was briefly the commanding Colonel of the 9th Infantry Regiment, but President Polk elevated him to Brigadier General.  He arrived in Vera Cruz in June 1847 and, in July, he led 2500 soldiers to meet General Scott at Puebla.  He handily overcame the guerrillas that sought to impede his column's progress, even having his hat shot off his head during an engagement at the National Bridge.  Upon reaching Puebla, he proved popular among his fellow officers and worked well with General Scott.  In August, the army moved into the Valley of Mexico.

During the Battle of Contreras, Pierce led his men through a rocky and uneven area - a lava field - when his horse startled from Mexican artillery.  The horse fell on him, injuring his leg and knocking him unconscious.  General Scott suggested that he refrain from leading his men the following day and instead recover.  Pierce refused.  Believing that it might be the last battle of the war, he needed to be present to offset his embarrassing horse fall.

During the Battle of Churubusco, he had himself tied to his horse and set out to cut off the Mexican retreat.  His horse was soon stuck in a ditch.  Getting free of the horse, Pierce hobbled toward the objective but, overcome by pain, he feinted again.  That he was not laid low from gunfire, shrapnel, lance, or sword but rather his own inadequate horsemanship led to the nickname of 'Fainting Frank.'  He did not partake in later battles of the war.

There is no questioning Pierce's bravery.  He had demonstrated his willingness to expose himself to enemy fire and ride into combat.  His great misfortune was how he was injured.  Would the Whigs be able to convince the nation that Pierce was a coward?  Not by a longshot.  In the 1852 election, Pierce crushed General Scott, winning 27 states to Scott's 4.  Sadly, Franklin Pierce proved to be a better general than president.

Presidential Rankings - The Terrible Ones

These are the presidential disasters, highly-negative leaders who clearly damaged the well-being of the nation.

Franklin Pierce: An unknown politician unprepared for the presidency.  His last surviving child died shortly before Pierce assumed the presidency, sending him into alcohol and grief.  He pandered to slave owners and vilified abolitionists.  The Gadsden Purchase took place during his presidency.

James Buchanan: Most impressive resume prior to George H W Bush, but twiddled his thumbs as the country descended into Civil War.  Did nothing as the South seceded after the election but before Lincoln's inauguration.

Andrew Johnson: Lincoln's greatest mistake.  A pro-slavery demagogue who was entirely unsuited to the task of healing a nation in the aftermath of the Civil War.

Woodrow Wilson: Worst racist in presidential history.  Reversed racial progress rather than accept the status quo.  Set the stage for the rise of the Nazis and WWII.  Imprisoned political opponents, notably Eugene Debs.  Held constitutional limits in low regard, ignored civil liberties, refused to negotiate with Senate Republicans in foreign policy (which killed his League of Nations), and hid his debilitating stroke for more than a year at the end of his term.

Herbert Hoover: Tragic figure.  Brilliant, accomplished, and well-meaning.  However, he was a compulsive busybody whose efforts to fix the economy only worsened the Great Depression.  Began many of the New Deal policies that FDR adopted; they were all bad.

Jimmy Carter: Economic incompetence, foreign affairs disasters, angering allies and fawning over enemies.  Responsible for the rise of the Iranian mullahs.  Emboldened Islamic terrorists for decades thereafter by showing such astonishing weakness.  The malaise speech, the misery index, inability to get along with Congressional Democrats, let alone the Republicans.  Acted to undermine virtually every successor, regardless of party.

Yes, I can agree with this bunch.  Franklin Pierce wasn't even considered as the candidate until the 35th ballot.  The big guns - Lewis Cass, James Buchanan, Stephen Douglas, and William Marcy - could not assemble two-thirds of the delegates to capture the nomination.  Pierce was a dark horse who was enough of a blank slate that he won the nomination on the 49th ballot.  Is it any wonder he was not ready for the job.  The Democrats saw their error from 1852 and did not renominate Pierce in 1856, instead choosing Buchanan.  Despite a tremendous resume, he too failed miserably.  Like George H W Bush, Buchanan was groomed for a foreign policy presidency and was unsuited to domestic issues.  Andrew Johnson was a Tennessean who favored the Union.  Straddling both sides, one would think he would be ideal in the wake of the war.  Instead, he paved the way for Jim Crow rather than racial equality.  Wilson did not like the Constitution or the Republic it established.  He was indeed a horrible president.  Hoover had been part of the Harding Administration when Secretary of Treasury Andrew Mellon deftly turned Wilson's post-war depression into nearly a decade of prosperity.  Instead of trying to duplicate that, he tinkered and meddled, transforming a downturn into the Great Depression.  I would guess that Graboyes had first-hand experience with the Carter presidency based on the laundry list of failings.  I've always viewed Carter in much the way he paints Hoover: a well-meaning man who inadvertently did far more harm than good.

Responding to a comment regarding his rankings, Graboyes said that the six terribles led to hell: Pierce & Buchanan to the Civil War, Johnson to Jim Crow, Wilson to Nazism, Hoover to Depression, and Carter to Jihadism.  He also speculates that it might have been better to have 7 tiers rather than 5.

The Know Nothing Speaker

In 1855, President Franklin Pierce had managed to infuriate the public.  Not only did he sign the Kansas-Nebraska Act that led to Bleeding Kansas, he had also floated the idea of purchasing Cuba from Spain to allow the South to expand.  In fact, if Spain didn't sell, maybe the US should just seize it!  The Missouri Compromise of 1820 was officially dead.  The Whigs, who were not an abolitionist party, couldn't really take advantage of this situation.  Throughout the country, different parties opposed the Democrats.

In the election, the Democrats were clobbered.  Though they retained control of the Senate, they had lost 74 seats in the House, going from 156 representatives to 82.  It should be noted that there were only 234 seats at the time.  The American Party - also called the Know Nothing Party - captured 51 seats, which made it the second largest block.  A variety of other parties (the Constitutional Union Party, the nascent Republican Party, and the remaining Whigs in the process of reformation, anti-slavery Democrats, etc.) organized themselves as the Opposition Party and caucused with the Know Nothings.  With this jumbled multi-party majority - a first in American history, the problem of selecting a Speaker of the House arose.  

While it took 4 days and 15 votes in the House to confirm Kevin McCarthy as Speaker in 2023, that is nothing compared to 1855-56.  It took 2 months and 133 votes to select Nathaniel Banks as the Speaker of the House on February 2, 1856.  Though he had long been a Democrat - albeit from Massachusetts, the Kansas-Nebraska Act led him to leave the party and join the American Party.  He eventually became a Republican and fought for the Union during the Civil War.

General Pierce's March

In 1852, noted author Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote a glowing biography of Franklin Pierce, then a candidate for president.  Pierce was a successful New Hampshire lawyer, a stalwart Democrat, and had been a Brigadier General during the Mexican War.  Hawthorne dedicates two chapters of the biography to Pierce's war service, which proves to be as hagiographic as the rest of the biography.  However, the most interesting part was that Hawthorne included Pierce's war journal.

The war journal begins when Pierce arrived in Vera Cruz at the end of June, 1847, when yellow fever was in full bloom.  He camped outside the city to avoid the disease and spent his days trying to gather the needed mules to transport his reinforcement army to Puebla, where he was to rendezvous with General Winfield Scott.  Though expecting to only take a few days, it was nearly 3 weeks before his troops departed, and then at a snail's pace.  Throughout the march, his army was repeatedly harassed by guerillas.  The guerillas would vanish into the countryside when the Americans sought to counterattack.  At the National Bridge, the guerillas setup a blockade and looked to be prepared for a battle.  Once again, when the Americans leapt the barricades, the guerillas fled.  The next bridge, an old Spanish stone bridge that had spanned a deep crevasse for more than a century, had been blasted apart.  Were the Americans now stuck?  No, Pierce declared that Yankee ingenuity would overcome and by the following day they had built their own route a few hundred yards further down the water way.  Named for the man that engineered it, Captain Caldwell Road saw Pierce's Brigade back on track with only a day's delay.  Pierce camped near Xalapa for a few days before continuing to Perote Castle.  There, he met Captain Samuel Walker, Texas Ranger.  It was the first of August.

Though only about halfway to Puebla, the journal ends here.  Perhaps this was as much of it as Pierce provided to Hawthorne.  Despite my extensive reading of the Mexican-American War, this is the only account I have found of Pierce's march inland.  Despite many skirmishes with hundreds of guerillas at a time, Pierce was never able to pin them down to have a proper battle.  Thus, his march is largely forgotten by historians.  Or I just haven't found the book that details it yet.

Only for the hardcore history nerds.