The 1856 Democratic National Convention, held at Smith & Nixon's Hall in Cincinnati was the first national party nominating convention to be held outside the original thirteen states. Called to order at Noon on Monday June 2 by National Committee chair Robert McLane, Samuel Medary

Samuel Medary

Samuel Medary Born and raised in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, he settled in Ohio in 1825. After a term in the Ohio House of Representatives and the Ohio State Senate as a Jackson Democrat, he purchased a newspaper in Columbus that became the Ohio Statesman, which he edited until 1857...

 was made the temporary president. The first day, the convention did little more than appoint committees on credentials, organization, and resolutions (platform). On the second day the organization committee (John L. Dawson chair) report was adopted and John Elliot Ward of Georgia was made the convention's President. The committee on credentials (James A. Bayard chair) settled a dispute on Missouri delegations, but needed more time for the thorny problem of New York's competing delegations. June 4 saw the adoption of a platform (former National Committee chair Benjamin F. Hallett

Benjamin F. Hallett

Benjamin Franklin Hallett was a Massachusetts lawyer and Democratic Party activist, most notable as the first chairman of the Democratic National Committee....

 headed the committee on resolutions); The domestic portions unanimously, the foreign policy planks by large margins. A separatly reported plank on a Pacific road was tabled (killed) by a vote of 154 to 120. On June 5, after the New York problem was finally settled by splitting the vote down the middle, nominations for President saw four men who at one time or another were nominated by the party. James Buchanan

James Buchanan

James Buchanan, Jr. was the 15th President of the United States . He is the only president from Pennsylvania, the only president who remained a lifelong bachelor and the last to be born in the 18th century....

 (1856), President Franklin Pierce

Franklin Pierce

Franklin Pierce was the 14th President of the United States and is the only President from New Hampshire. Pierce was a Democrat and a "doughface" who served in the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate. Pierce took part in the Mexican-American War and became a brigadier general in the Army...

 (1852), Senator Stephen A. Douglas

Stephen A. Douglas

Stephen Arnold Douglas was an American politician from the western state of Illinois, and was the Northern Democratic Party nominee for President in 1860. He lost to the Republican Party's candidate, Abraham Lincoln, whom he had defeated two years earlier in a Senate contest following a famed...

 (1860), and Senator Lewis Cass

Lewis Cass

Lewis Cass was an American military officer and politician. During his long political career, Cass served as a governor of the Michigan Territory, an American ambassador, a U.S. Senator representing Michigan, and co-founder as well as first Masonic Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Michigan...

 (1848) were all put forward. On the first ballot, Buchanan led with 135½, President Pierce 122½, Douglas 33, and Cass 5 (4 from the unhappy California delegation). The fourteen ballots taken that day saw the President's totals fall, mostly to the benefit of Sen. Douglas. On June 6, President Pierce's name was withdrawn and two more ballots taken without result (two-thirds majority being necessary). William A. Richardson

William Alexander Richardson

William Alexander Richardson was a prominent Illinois Democrat politician before and during the American Civil War....

, who had nominated Douglas, withdrew the Senator's candidacy and Buchanan was the nominee. When it came time to nominate a running-mate, eleven names were placed in nomination; but the convention chose former Congressman John C. Breckinridge

John C. Breckinridge

John Cabell Breckinridge was an American lawyer and politician. He served as a U.S. Representative and U.S. Senator from Kentucky and was the 14th Vice President of the United States , to date the youngest vice president in U.S...

 even though he had withdrawn his name when nominated. As Vermont's David Allen Smalley

David Allen Smalley

David Allen Smalley Born in Middlebury, Vermont, Smalley read law and practiced in Jericho, Vermont where he was postmaster from 1831 to 1836. Moving first to Lowell, Vermont he settled in Burlington, Vermont in 1836...

 stated, "...no Democrat has a right to refuse his services when his country calls,.." Second in total votes at the conclusion of a first ballot; the stampede was on in the second as state after state voted for Mr. Breckinridge. Eleven days later, the Republican Party

Republican Party (United States)

The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...

would meet in its first nominating convention.