An important part of James Buchanan’s political views was his neutrality regarding slavery, but one day he discovered that his sister was keeping two slaves.
This could harm him politically, so Buchanan bought the slaves from his sister and turned them into indentured servants in his own house. They were not slaves anymore but had contracts that kept them from leaving his employ.
Millard Fillmore
Millard Fillmore was the last president from the barely remembered Whig Party before it disbanded. He grew up poor but managed to gain an education and rose in the ranks to the position of vice president to Zachary Taylor’s president. When President Taylor passed away from cholera, Fillmore became President in 1850. However, soon after Taylor’s death, all the White House cabinet members resigned, leaving the brand new 13th president to form an entirely new cabinet on his own.
Fillmore signed the Compromise of 1850 in an attempt to stop the growing divide between the South and the North, but sadly the attempt failed. He also helped build a relationship between the United States and Japan, who had previously refused all interactions including international trade. This gave the US the option of docking American ships in Japan during an emergency.
Harrison’s Untimely Passing
Harrison is well known for his surprisingly long inauguration speech, which lasted a whole two hours! He died of pneumonia from a cold he got on his inauguration day.
Some people claimed that his illness was caused by him refusing to wear a warm jacket while riding a horse on the cold and rainy day and then delivering his speech.
Chester Arthur
The 21st president of the United States, Chester Arthur, was born in Vermont to a pair of Irish immigrants. Although some people claimed that he “looked like a president,” he only became one after James Garfield was assassinated in 1881 while Arthur held the role of vice president. He was in office between 1881 and 1885 and one of his most outstanding achievements was formally passing the Pendleton Act which made federal job allocation merit-based for the first time.
The Pendleton Civil Service Reform ensured that people were awarded federal jobs due to their qualifications and not their political affiliations and started the practice of mandatory examinations during the application process for government jobs. During his time as president, Arthur also signed the first federal immigration law, meant to keep “paupers, criminals, and lunatics” from coming to America.
John Tyler
John Tyler became America’s 10th president, following the death of former President William Henry Harrison. He was the first person to hold office after replacing a president who had died in office and was therefor the first president who was not elected by the people. Tyler served from 1841 to 1845. He weighed in on the issue of slavery, proclaiming that each state should make its own decision on the matter, similarly to other local issues. Tyler made himself some enemies in Congress because he refused to be a “passive” alternate president and earned the nickname “His Accidency.”
He was also the first president in American history whose detractors tried to have impeached, although they failed. As part of his foreign policy agenda, Tyler negotiated treaties with China and Britain. In his private life, he holds another record as the president with the largest number of children with a whopping 15.