PIERCE, FRANKLIN, the fourteenth president of the United States of America, wash in Hillsborough, N. IL, Nov. 23, 1804. His father. gen. Benjamin Pierce. was a soldier of the war of independence, and governor of New Hampshire. Franklin Pierce wasedu gated at Dowdoin college, Maine, and was an officer in a college military company, in which his biographer, Nathaniel Hawthorne, was a private. Ile spent his first vacation in teaching a country school, studied law with Levi governor and senator, was admitted to the bar in 1827, became speaker of the state house of representatives in 1S29. and was elected to the 33d congress, a democrat of the school of Jackson. In 18:37 lie was elected to the U. S. senate, of which he was the youngest member. He declined the office of attorney-general, offered him by president Polk, and refused the nomination for governor of New Hampshire; and at the commencement of the Mexican war volunteered as a private, but was appointed brig.gen., and led his brigade in the
battles of Contreras and Churubusco. In 1852, in consequence of the conflicting claims of the leaders of the de/timer:die party at the Baltimore convention, he was nominated as a compromise candidate for the presidency, against gen. Scott, the wing nominee, and received the votes of all but four states. He appointed an able cabinet, including jeffer• son Davis as secretary of war. During his administration, the Missouri compromise was repealed; the treaty for reciprocity of trade with the British American colonies was made; an:1 a treaty with japan; and the Kansas, difficulties which then arose, with the growing animosity bAween the north and south, fed to secession, and the war of 1861. At the (lase of his term of office in 1837 lie traveled in Europe, and, having no sympathy with the which subsequently came into power, he took no part in politics. He died in 1839.