The Worst Inauguration Speeches Ever
James Buchanan
Had he been alive then, James Buchanan would have been an excellent addition in the 90s cinematic masterpiece “Clueless”. Channeling Cher Horowitz in his 1857 inaugural address in terms of sheer ineptitude and real-world disconnectedness, Buchanan spent a large portion of his uninspired oratory discussing slavery as one would their chronic (and unsuccessful) battles against irritable bowel syndrome. Described as an “agitation” that hadn’t had any intermission for more than 20 years, Buchanan spent most of his 2,834-word address musing about how he wished Kansas would just stop bleeding so that Americans could focus on other matters “of more pressing and practical importance.” Like, you know, not slavery. Suffice it to say, Supreme Court Justice Taney delivered his abominable majority opinion on Dred Scott V. Stanford in the following days, and four years later the Civil War would begin its bloody trajectory on American soil. Sound like presidential leadership? “As if!”
