The Life of Franklin Pierce

"The dangers of a concentration of all power in the general government of a confederacy so vast as ours are too obvious to be disregarded. You have a right, therefore, to expect your agents in every department to regard strictly the limits imposed upon them by the Constitution of the United States. The great scheme of our constitutional liberty rests upon a proper distribution of power between the State and Federal authorities, and experience has shown that the harmony and happiness of our people must depend upon a just discrimination between the separate rights and responsibilities of the States and your common rights and obligations under the General Government; and here, in my opinion, are the considerations which should form the true basis of future concord in regard to the questions which have most seriously disturbed public tranquillity. If the Federal Government will confine itself to the exercise of powers clearly granted by the Constitution, it can hardly happen that its action upon any question should endanger the institutions of the States or interfere with their right to manage matters strictly domestic according to the will of their own people" (Excerpt taken from Pierce's Presidential Inaugural Address). In his inaugural address, Franklin Pierce spoke much of the constitution, and the limits placed upon the Federal Government. And thus he was able to preserve the Union for the time being from the Civil War that would follow soon after. But what kind of a man was he? Well, in this book you will experience the richness of Hawthorne's writing as he presents to you the democrat candidate for the presidency of 1852, just as he did to the people of that time so long ago. This book was written by Hawthorne prior to the election of 1852, as a portrayal for the American people to see who Franklin Pierce was. And it is in this book you will be introduced to a man who was in every respect admired, cherished, and beneficial to the people of his time.