don't feel too bad for james buchanan. he lobbied the supreme court to reach a sweeping decision in dred scott and knew we -- ahead of time. we will have the court fined for one of the most extreme sides which is basically the decision that one way could prevent slavery anywhere in the country to bring them anywhere in the country. and people genuinely believe with some reason that a decision turning all of the slaves states into free states was in the offing so this would enslave the country and give great vigor to the new republican party. in 1858 another important senate race that revolves around what happens in kansas and what happens with dred scott and that is illinois. "the new york times" said until this it would be the most interesting place in the union politically speaking. abraham lincoln, the first and only choice of the republicans of illinois versus stephen douglas of the internationally famous u.s. senator. they had known each other for a long time in the illinois politics. lincoln considered douglas's succ

so james buchanan wins. his presidency is not going to be a happy one. he spends his life seeking the office, finally gets it. no with the second oldest president ever to get in. two days later the dread scott decision is reached by the supreme court. don't feel too bad. he actually lobbied the supreme court to reach a sweeping decision. he actually knew about the out, at a time. this is great. we will take the most controversial issue of the democratic process and have a court fined for one of the most extreme science which is basically a decision that one way could permit slavery anywhere in the country, people could bring their slaves and were. and people were genuinely going to believe some reason that a decision turning all the free states and the slave states was in the office. so this case will actually enflame the country. it will give great figure to the new york republican party. and in 1858 a rather important senators herrenvolk around what happened in kansas. and what happens with dread scott. and that is in illinois. the new york times said

james buchanan will write an import and op-ed talking about the oath of the army officer who has resigned to go join. franklin pierce, a southerner at heart opposes the war effort. he gives speech saying that if the south can't be convinced on their own we cannot pursue them militarily. it is a fool's errand will be completely disagrees. he will give speeches denouncing lincoln and his policy on his courses and his suspension of civil liberty. he will campaign throughout the war. campaign manager for the new hampshire state legislature who will oppose linking. so he will remain a thorn in the side. franklin pierce will give a speech on my very important day, july 121863 talking about how the war is to be thailand cannot be one and that lincoln is to be defeated for reelection and his policies need to be discontinued reno on july 4th robert e. lee is retreating from the pennsylvania battlefield where his army had lost its offensive capability, heading back toward virginia. in this city of the expert giving them union control of the messes of the roadway and dividing the confederacy. very,

lincoln response to the civil war not like his predecessor james buchanan who most historian expertsthink of is the worst president in american history. james buchanan i think what bruce would recommend i should ask congress what to do about this secession crisis and congress for those of you who have worked there as i have few can predict what congress did. congress set up a special committee. i think they're still meeting in the basement of the capital right now. president lincoln comes into office. he read his presidential powers broadly may be more broadly than many that people in the south wanted. he sent into combat in the south and put up a blockade in the cell and most notably he issued the emancipation proclamation two years later freeing all the slaves under his commander-in-chief authority not with support of congress. congress actually never authorized or approved of the emancipation proclamation and for those of you who get your history to movies as you saw in the movie link and it required the 13th amendment to validate it. the last example i will give you as franklin r

in james buchanan's time, they were cursing each other across the dinner table.had to invite people of pro or antisentiments. he had to be very careful in that sense. the music scholar elise kirk who is one of us at the association, provides a history of frequent musical performance at the white house performances to draw people. in support of the lively house paper hangers, drapers, upholsterers worked continually behind the scenes. their invoices at the archives n suggest the place was in a state of constant improvement. constant patching might better describe it. for congress contributed little to the decor and does not today. symbolism was at every turn inserted into the larger symbol, the house, to personalize it. jefferson set up in the entrance hall to display artifacts from the various western expeditions. he even housed two grizzly bears from the rocky mountains in an enclosure on the driveway outside. a great show was made by adams and monroe of the visits of general lafayette. andrew jackson's portrait was a more pronounced symbol, maybe more a monumen

grant or james buchanan, he was always viewed with a slight mediocrity. madison's reputation has been rising. if you look at current presidential rankings, you'll see now that madison would head 44 prisons to date. madison is now at the top 20. he's not way down there like before. recently, i saw a poll that said madison is number 6. i'm not quite sure how to explain this. i'm just going to ask you to take my word for it at the moment because such a poll does exist. i do want to say something about how we might explain this. and i say this without flattery, i think it does something to the appearance of films in the second half of the century. we have a much clearer idea than in previous generations what medicine contributed to the m p american public and how it might be compared to its others. he was sometimes referred to as found chic when, in fact, madison generally had this image burnished along the wall of his contemporaries. i might even be tempted to suspect that we've become more satisfied with prisons since the 1960s, there is more competition am

the war she had access to democratic politicians and she'd actually been an advisor to general james buchanan and since the election of lincoln all of the disappeared and she was desperate to regain the position of the society and the influence that she had wielded. would you be interested in washington, d.c. in the federal capital she disregarded the danger of that insight of course of course i want to do that. she immediately began cultivating sources by cultivating i been sleeping with a. the chairman of the committee on military affairs you can imagine the that the talk was quite interesting. the neighbors watched them come and go and called her why you rose. rose know what she was doing and was very curious about her intent to help the confederate army. >> how did they first learned about rose because in a way they kind of want to be rose. >> she went to school in washington, d.c. and she had her societal view. rose at that time before the war broke out rose was still the leading lady of washington society and her invitations were the most coveted in town and they knew about all of the p

grant or james buchanan, he was always viewed with a slight mediocrity.son's reputation has been rising. if you look at current presidential rankings, you'll see now that madison would head 44 prisons to date. madison is now at the top 20. he's not way down there like before. recently, i saw a poll that said madison is number 6. i'm not quite sure how to explain this. i'm just going to ask you to take my word for it at the moment because such a poll does exist. i do want to say something about how we might explain this. and i say this without flattery, i think it does something to the appearance of films in the second half of the century. we have a much clearer idea than in previous generations what medicine contributed to the m p american public and how it might be compared to its others. he was sometimes referred to as found chic when, in fact, madison generally had this image burnished along the wall of his contemporaries. i might even be tempted to suspect that we've become more satisfied with prisons since the 1960s, there is more competition among t

being vice president under james buchanan, and the confederates are feeling good.e vice presidency and then the senate. as they get more and more influenced by what they are drinking, they boast, tomorrow we'll march down massachusetts avenue and we'll escort general breckenridge into the capitol, into the senate chamber, which he had presided over and place him back there. well, the president is going to pay a visit out here again on the wealth. he's going to arrive out here and he's going to bring mary with him. now mary and he, there have been causalities out here, and close to the walls of fort stevens is a hospital. they go in and visit several wounded union soldiers there and then mary sits down. out here also is the secretary of state. the secretary of state, of course, is william seward. soon to arrive is going to be gideon wells, secretary of the navy, and his wife. now mary gets the one cabinet member that mary gets along well with, mrs. wells. she doesn't get along with others. the president will go up and stand on that paraben, where in the 1960s they'l

where he's representing a congressional district near the mason dixon line that had produced james buchanan. this is not a place where he's immune to popular pressure. he says i shit on the people, he says that, he wouldn't do that in real life. lincoln and stevens had known each other for years. i could document that in a way that would be really special at a symposium like this because they first met in the summer of 1848, and they met when abraham lincoln was a congressman. he served in congress for one term, and during that one term, he spent almost his entire service in congress trying to get zachary taylor elected as president. that was his ambition. and he goes to the whig national convention in philadelphia and he meets stevens who had at to time was a lawyer from lancaster, but who was about to become a candidate for congress and about to enter congress as a whig, and lincoln writes him a letter in september, right before he's about to leave. it's so revealing and it shows them, i think, in such a rich light that it's worth reminding ourselves about. he writes him on september 3rd,

. >> i'm not convinced that barack obama like james buchanan before the civil war broke out, all righttomach for the fight. he doesn't seem to be passionate enough. if i'm the president, i say, look, i'm going to kill every one of these bastards and i'm ininto the going to tell you how. i'm going to kill them. they want to kill us and they already have killed american citizens. they are out to put the world in a very very bad place. i'm going it use american power to kill as many as i can. thank you, good night. go watch your entertainment program. >> you know and i know it's not going it happen because i think you are right. he views war and he views our involvement in the middle east as something far different than george bush did, far different than other people have, and the threat level of isis. death. my son before he went to college dad, should i be worried about isis? absolutely not. if my kid can't go to college -- do you believe for a second we can't keep these -- these guys, once we put some missiles on them and kurds have got some guns they are running like dogs. >> takes f

harriet lane johnston was the ward of james buchanan, our only bachelor president, and she served as his hostest. she was very, very popular in washington during the years of 1856 to 1860. it is also said that she helped sbrubse francis cleveland into the ways of washington when francis married are grover cleveland but i don't want to get ahead of my story. so look at harriet's portrait and look really carefully at that dress. and then keep in mind this dress. it is said that mary todd lincoln saw that dress on harriet lane, liked it so much, that she asked her dress maker to please copy it. this is the dress that mary lincoln wore at lincoln's first inaugural. from the beginning, mary was very concerned about her appearance. it is said that she told her dress maker that the eyes of the american public are going to be upon her and she had to be very, very careful about what she wore. well, indeed, they were -- their eyes were on her but once again, our somewhat conservative american public didn't like that low neckline. they called her a somewhat weak-minded woman who exposed her bos

so, he wrote a letter to his eminent friend james buchanan who became president just before lincoln andlined everything he had done, that memorable 24th of august, 1814, and he said, i could have been rewarded by thousands of pound sterling by the british if i'd given them the documents and i didn't. and the letter is in the papers in the library of congress. now, i was always upset by the condition of president's grave. i had been to congressional cemetery many times, about a mile behind the u.s. capitol. and it was at an angle and you couldn't read his name too well so i held a fund raising walk to restore the tombstone. and we walked from the capitol to the white house. as we passed the national archives, i was telling stories all the time from the war of 1812 and i said, if it were not for stephen pleasanton you probably would not be able to see those documents in the national archives today. and of course, i raised the money and we got an expert and restored the tombstone. up right now and the man got the credit so long overdue. now, i want to tell you about a woman who was equally

so, he wrote a letter to his eminent friend james buchanan who became president just before lincoln andhe outlined everything he had done, that memorable 24th of august, 1814, and he said, i could have been rewarded by thousands of pound sterling by the british if i'd given them the documents and i didn't. and the letter is in the papers in the library of congress. now, i was always upset by the condition of president's grave. i had been to congressional cemetery many times, about a mile behind the u.s. capitol. and it was at an angle and you couldn't read his name too well so i held a fund raising walk to restore the tombstone. and we walked from the capitol to the white house. as we passed the national archives, i was telling stories all the time from the war of 1812 and i said, if it were not for stephen pleasanton you probably would not be able to see those documents in the national archives today. and of course, i raised the money and we got an expert and restored the tombstone. up right now and the man got the credit so long overdue. now, i want to tell you about a woman who was e

so he wrote a letter to his eminent friend james buchanan who became president just before lincoln, andhad done that memorable 24th of august 1814. he said, i could have been rewarded with thousands of pounds sterling by the british if i had given them the documents and i didn't. and the letter is in the papers in the library of congress. now, i was always upset by the condition of congressional graves. i've been to congressional cemeteries many times about a mile behind the u.s. capitol. it was an angle and you couldn't read his name too well. i heard a fund-raising walk to restore the tombstone. and we walked from the capitol to the white house. as we passed the national archives, i was telling stories all the time from the war of 1812. i said if it were not for steven pleasonton, you probably would not be able to see those documents in the national archives today. and, of course, i raised the money, and we got an expert, and he restored the tombstone, it's upright now. i want to tell you about a woman who was equally as brave and fearless and disregarded the safety of her own life. h

administration and in those day yos you had to know people, so he wrote a letter to his eminent friend james buchananwho became president just before lincoln. and he outlined everything he had done that memorable 24th of august, 1814, and he said, i could have been rewarded by thousands of pound sterling by the british if i had given them the documents, and i didn't. and the letter is in the paper in the library of congress. now, i was always upset by the condition of president's grave. i've been to congressional cemetery many times about a mile behind the u.s. capitol and it was at an angle and you couldn't read his name too well. so i hold a fund-raising walk to restore the tombstone and we walked from the capitol to the white house as we passed an national archives. i was telling stories all the time on the war on 1812 and i said, if it were not for stephen pleasonton you probably would not be able to see those documents in the national archives today. and of course i raised the money and we got an expert and he restored the tombstone. it's up right now and the man has got the credit that is so lo

in james buchanan's time, they were cursing each other across the dinner table.d to invite people of pro or antisentiments. he had to be very careful in that sense. the music scholar elise kirk who is one of us at the association, provides a history of frequent musical performance at the white house performances to draw people. in support of the lively house paper hangers, drapers, upholsterers worked continually behind the scenes. their invoices at the archives n suggest the place was in a state of constant improvement. constant patching might better describe it. for congress contributed little to the decor and does not today. symbolism was at every turn inserted into the larger symbol, the house, to personalize it. jefferson set up in the entrance hall to display artifacts from the various western expeditions. he even housed two grizzly bears from the rocky mountains in an enclosure on the driveway outside. a great show was made by adams and monroe of the visits of general lafayette. andrew jackson's portrait was a more pronounced symbol, maybe more a monument.

link in response to the civil war not like his predecessor james buchanan who most to most historianexperts think of as the worst president in american history. he said i should ask congress what to do about the secession congress and congress for those of you who have worked there as i have you can predict what congress did. congress said that the special committee to study the problem. i think they are still meeting in the basement of the capital right now. president lincoln comes into office and what did he do? he read his presidential powers broadly may be broader than some people and certainly many in the south. he raised an army and sent into combat against the south. he put up a blockade of the south and most notably he issued the emancipation proclamation two years later praying under the slaves under his commander-in-chief authority not with supportive commission of congress. congress actually never approved of the emancipation proclamation. for those of us who get our history from the movies it took lincoln to validate the fraying of the slaves. he did it under his executiv

and actually i did some research and what i found was that democrat james buchanan failed for deal withcession, abraham lincoln fixed that and freed the slaves and registered blacks to vote and that was repealed by andrew johnson and the democrats shortly after his death. number two was world war ii or world war i and that was woodrow wilson who was a democrat and he dropped the bombs on japan and started the cold war and initiated the korean war and ratified the u.n. and the construction came up of vietnam and pigs and carter with the i ran revolution got them from free iran coming to muslim security. >> pam from alabama, hello you are on. >> i would like to talk for a minute about the move to amend a bill that was the senate tried to vote on it i believe last week and, you know, for most americans i don't know if they are aware of what this move means. when the supreme court voted that corporations are people and money is speech, that absolutely takes the democracy out of our government. politicians are bought and paid for. and the republicans, not one of them loaded in the senate, i

buchanan was a pulitzer prize-winning crime reporter for the "miami herald." >> an outstanding reporter, one of the best i've ever known. i wanted to tell her what the story i had was for james kept calling me. he'd been a source of mine over the years. he said he had found a case where he was convinced a man on death row was innocent. i was dubious because if the wrong person is convicted it is usually someone who is poor, minorities, not a white cop. and i kept saying, well, how sure are you? and he was saying, 115% sure this guy is innocent. so it didn't seem likely but so many cases in miami and in south florida and the whole state, you know, sometimes it is like the twilight zone. and rod sterling is the governor. you never just say, it can't be because often it is. >> with frank's help in 2003, edna buchanan wrote three front-page stories for the "miami herald" about duckett's possible innocence. >> she started writing the stories and i started getting all these media requests. i mean, from tvs and newspapers and "48 hours" and "primetime live." they were just flooding in my cell. >> as publicity grew around duckett's case, marshall frank was finally able to convince b