Presidential Audits — Volume 3
Van Buren to Grant
This volume contains the completed presidential audits from Martin Van Buren through Ulysses S. Grant, covering the years 1837 to 1877: economic crisis, expansion, slavery, sectional collapse, Civil War, emancipation, Reconstruction, and the survival of the Union.
What This Volume Covers
Volume 3 examines the presidencies that carried the United States from the aftermath of Jacksonian democracy into the country’s greatest constitutional and moral crisis. This period begins with the Panic of 1837 and the limits of party democracy, then moves through territorial expansion, intensifying slavery conflict, the collapse of compromise, secession, Civil War, emancipation, presidential assassination, Reconstruction, and the contested effort to rebuild the Union.
This is one of the most consequential volumes in the Presidential Audits project. Several presidencies in this period cannot be evaluated mainly by ordinary policy success or failure. The central questions are larger: Did the president preserve the Union? Did the president confront or protect slavery? Did the president strengthen constitutional government or deepen democratic collapse? Did executive action advance freedom, delay justice, or obstruct Reconstruction?
Volume 3 shows why the five-score framework matters. Some presidents achieved major expansion while increasing democratic damage. Some preserved constitutional forms while failing morally. One president, Abraham Lincoln, becomes central to the survival of the Union and the destruction of slavery, while later presidents struggled over whether emancipation would become meaningful citizenship and equal protection.
Included Presidential Audits
Martin Van Buren
1837–1841
Disciplined party-builder and constitutional politician whose presidency was overwhelmed by the Panic of 1837 and morally compromised by continued Indian removal, slavery politics, racial exclusion, and limited crisis relief.
William Henry Harrison
1841
Historically significant but presidentially minimal figure. His brief term produced little direct policy record, but his death forced the first constitutional succession test and revealed the growing power of mass campaigning.
John Tyler
1841–1845
Established the practical precedent that the vice president becomes president after a presidential death, but governed as an isolated executive whose annexation politics helped intensify slavery expansion and sectional conflict.
James K. Polk
1845–1849
Highly effective expansionist president whose achievements were large and durable, but whose war and territorial gains intensified slavery conflict and added major democratic and moral liabilities.
Zachary Taylor
1849–1850
Short presidency with limited enacted achievement, but meaningful national-union significance because Taylor resisted sectional disunion pressure and opposed allowing slavery politics to dominate western statehood.
Millard Fillmore
1850–1853
Presided over the Compromise of 1850 and attempted sectional stabilization, but the Fugitive Slave Act and enforcement of slaveholding claims imposed serious democratic and moral damage.
Franklin Pierce
1853–1857
Deeply damaging sectional presidency. Pierce’s support for the Kansas-Nebraska Act and pro-slavery political settlement accelerated national division and weakened democratic stability.
James Buchanan
1857–1861
Catastrophically failed presidency before the Civil War. Buchanan’s inability to confront secession and his pro-slavery constitutional posture contributed to democratic collapse and national disunion.
Abraham Lincoln
1861–1865
Central Union-preserving and emancipation presidency. Lincoln led the nation through Civil War, preserved constitutional government under extreme crisis, and made slavery’s destruction a defining national achievement.
Andrew Johnson
1865–1869
One of the most damaging Reconstruction presidencies. Johnson obstructed equal-citizenship gains, empowered ex-Confederate restoration, clashed with Congress, and weakened the promise of emancipation.
Ulysses S. Grant
1869–1877
Major Reconstruction and civil-rights presidency with serious administration-corruption liabilities. Grant defended Black citizenship and federal enforcement, but his administration suffered from significant corruption scandals.
Period Themes
This volume tracks the breakdown of compromise over slavery, the rise of mass party conflict, territorial expansion, Civil War, emancipation, presidential assassination, Reconstruction, civil-rights enforcement, and the contested effort to define freedom after slavery.
The central tension of the period is whether the United States would remain a constitutional republic, and if so, whether that republic would become merely restored or genuinely more democratic.
How to Use This Volume
Use this volume to review the source-dense audit record for the presidencies most directly connected to slavery crisis, national collapse, Civil War, emancipation, and Reconstruction. The individual web pages provide public summaries and live scorecard tables, while the full PDF preserves the longer audit text, source notes, evidence context, and category-by-category analysis.
Readers should be especially careful not to collapse this period into one vague judgment about “success” or “failure.” Some presidents achieved major territorial or institutional results while increasing democratic damage. Others preserved constitutional forms while failing the moral demands of the moment. The five-score structure helps keep those distinctions visible.
Volume 1 explains the scoring framework. Volume 3 applies that framework to the most severe constitutional crisis period in American presidential history.
Full Volume Review
This page is the public overview. The full Volume 3 PDF remains the detailed review document for the Van-Buren-to-Grant audit period.