Passed Vice Presidents - # 14 – John C. Breckinridge

Grave of John Breckinridge (12 July 2023)

Served under James Buchanan

4 March 1857 – 4 March 1861

Preceded by # 13 – Rufus R. King

Succeeded by # 15 – Hannibal Hamlin

Born – 16 January 1821

Died – 17 May 1875 (age 54)

Buried – Lexington Cemetery, Lexington, KY

Date Visited – 12 July 2023

The Breckinridge Family has been prominent in Kentucky civic life since the founding of the nation. Especially in the 19th century when six members served in the U.S. House, two in the Senate and one, John Cabel Breckinridge, at age 36, was our 14th and youngest-ever vice president.

The summer 2023 road trip took me from one end of Kentucky (Chief Justice # 13 in Louisa) to the other (VP # 35 in Paducah). In between, in the City of Lexington, a fine old cemetery holds Henry Clay, one of our nation’s most esteemed legislators, a bunch of Confederates and James Buchanan’s VP, John Breckinridge.

Tomb of Henry Clay

Lexington Cemetery (12 July 2023)

Breckenridge honed his political rep in the Kentucky House of Representatives where he was a staunch states’ rights, pro-slavery advocate. This helped propel him to the U.S. House where he allied with Illinois Senator Steven A. Douglas to give us the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854. Signed into law by another perennial ‘bottom-five’ president, Franklin Pierce, the law nullified the earlier Missouri Compromise that prohibited slavery in the new western territories north of a certain latitude. Instead, the new act allowed the settlers of the new territories to determine if they preferred to be enslavers or not. They didn’t call the period that followed ‘Bleeding Kansas’ for nothing.

Now it’s 1856 and Pennsylvania Democrat James Buchanan needs a running mate to balance the ticket. The plan worked and the Kentucky Kid is vice president. We understand better how the two weak ineffectual northern presidents, Pierce and Buchanan’s ineptitude, greased the skids for the inevitable rebellion. Here are the last few years of Breckenridge’s political career.

Vice President John C. Breckinridge

(By Mathew Benjamin Brady – Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division)

President Buchanan stated at his inauguration that he would not seek a second term. Good thing, since the nation was falling apart. This meant that his and Breckenridge’s term would be up on March 4, 1861. That’s OK. The Kid had plans. He ran for president against that upstart new Republican candidate Lincoln. However, by this time, the Democrats were too divided. The Kid led the “Slavery? Hell Yes!” faction of the party that won the eleven Dixie states that didn’t even put Lincoln on the ballot.

John Bell was another candidate who was neutral on slavery and won three states. And there was Steven Douglas whose position on slavery is still being debated and he won one state. Bottom line – Lincon wins.

Not to worry. The Kid has a job since Kentucky already appointed him to the Senate to begin serving the same day his vice presidency ended...March 4, 1861. However, by then, seven southern states had already seceded from the union. What to do?

The Breckinridge Family Graves

Lexington Cemetery, Lexington, KY (12 July 2023)

Things were coming to a head and while Breckenridge professed (mild) pro-Union ideals, he was more outspoken in his states’ rights southern sympathies. By the end of 1861, he enlisted in the Confederate Army and was expelled by the U.S. Senate.

Another Rebel

Lexington Cemetery (12 July 2023)

No shortage of ‘Lost Cause’ imagery in this border state cemetery.

During the war, he rose to the rank of major general and in 1865, was appointed the Confederate Secretary of War...two months before the war ended. With Richmond about to be overrun, General Lee surrendered and Breckinridge escaped to Cuba, then Europe, then Canada. He feared prosecution as a traitor and did not return until 1869 after President Johnson issued an amnesty that prevented prosecution of the rebels. He lived out his days in beloved Kentucky and currently resides in the family plot in Lexington’s grand old burial ground.

Statue of General John Hunt Morgan,

Lexington Cemetery, Lexington, KY (12 July 2023)

The Confederate general, shot in the back by a Union private

in 1864 as he tried to escape capture, is also buried in this cemetery.

During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the former Confederate states reasserted their White supremacy, Jim Crow ways and reinstituted government segregation and oppression. To cement that dominance, statues to their ‘Lost Cause’ heroes were erected all over the South and beyond. This statue of General Morgan, the ‘Thunderbolt of the Confederacy,’ was dedicated on the Fayette County Courthouse grounds in Lexington in 1911. What better place given that the site was also where slave auctions were held. It took another century for civic leaders to come to their senses. In 2018, the statue was relocated to Lexington Cemetery where the general is buried.

 

Statue of John C. Breckinridge

Lexington Cemetery, Lexington, KY (12 July 2023)

This statue of the former vice president, Confederate general and Secretary of War was also on the grounds of the Fayette County Courthouse. Erected there in 1887, it was moved in 2018 to the Breckinridge Family section in Lexington Cemetery.

Since I was less than thirty miles from Frankfort, we scored another VP before the day ended. The story of # 9 is even more interesting.