1856
The 1856 U.S. presidential election was won by James Buchanan (Democratic) with 174 of 296 electoral votes, defeating John C. Frémont (Republican). Electoral vote margin: 60 EV, popular-vote margin +12.2%; turnout 79.4%. The cycle falls in the Antebellum Crisis era of American electoral history.
James Buchanan and the 1856 map
Democrat James Buchanan won over the new Republican Party's first presidential candidate, John C. Frémont. The American (Know-Nothing) Party ran former president Millard Fillmore, who won Maryland but drew significant votes nationally. The Republicans ran on the anti-slavery-expansion slogan 'Free soil, free speech, free men, Frémont' and showed impressive strength in the North despite losing. Buchanan's failure to resolve the slavery crisis would push the nation toward civil war.
Bleeding Kansas; slavery expansion; nativist immigration concerns
First Republican presidential candidate ran; Know-Nothing Party won Maryland's electoral votes
States · 31 reporting
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