Like many young men, Breckinridge wanted to make something of himself and loosen the apron strings that tied him to his prominent family. Breckinridge was all of twenty years old.

In February 1841, he graduated and was found fit to practice law. After six months under Owsley’s tutelage, Breckinridge wrote his uncle: “I am much pleased with the study of law, and having worked the science with something like shape and symmetry, in my mind, I begin to apprehend with some clearness, the leanings of one part of it upon another, and the great principles which govern the system.” A year studying law at Lexington’s Transylvania University followed. Owsley worked him hard, making him read all four volumes of Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England-twice. Upon completing his four years, Breckinridge’s uncle Robert arranged for him to study at the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University) for six months.īreckinridge had decided to read law and began his studies at Princeton, continuing them upon his return to Kentucky under the direction of Judge William Owsley, a prominent Whig jurist and politician. He developed a taste for the classics, committing to memory the orations of Demosthenes, a Greek statesman known for his political rhetoric, and Pericles, general and “first citizen of Athens.” His studies seem to have made a lasting impression, as Breckinridge would gain renown for his oratory. In the fall of 1834, Breckinridge headed to Centre College in Danville, Kentucky, for a more formal education. It is to Davis that a debt is owed for assembling the details of Breckinridge’s life. Davis, author of Breckinridge: Statesman, Soldier, Symbol. “This teary-eyed old lady and her talk of the law and politics and the principles for which her husband had fought so hard had a profound impact on ‘little Breckinridge,’” writes William C. She doted on her grandson, telling him stories of his namesake’s political career, stories that celebrated honor and duty to one’s country.

Polly Breckinridge, nicknamed “Grandma Black Cap” because of her perpetual mourning attire, took her son’s family into her home. Breckinridge’s father also made a mark on Kentucky politics until a sudden illness felled him in September 1823. Senate and served as Thomas Jefferson’s attorney general. Born on January 16, 1821, in Lexington, Kentucky, he was named after his grandfather, who represented Kentucky in the U.S. That John Cabell Breckinridge became a political force was not surprising. Although history is, of course, the study of what did happen, the facts of the 1860 election make it hard to avoid wondering what might have happened instead. And a look at the 1860 election shows a Democratic Party in severe disarray, such that it could not unite to defeat the Republican upstart from Illinois. A look at his career reveals a man with politics in his blood, but whose personal convictions made it difficult to navigate a moderate course in an era of moral and political extremes. He was the youngest vice president ever, elected at the age of thirty-five, and he was the second former vice president, after Aaron Burr, to be accused of treason.

It is surprising that Breckinridge is not better known. But for a split among the Democrats, Abraham Lincoln, who garnered much less than 50 percent of the popular vote, might not have placed first. Breckinridge, the standard-bearer of Southern Democrats. The man who came in second, the candidate who came closest in electoral votes to defeating Lincoln, was John C.

Right wing pro slavery