ADemocrat, King was aUnionist and his contemporaries considered him to be a moderate on the issues of sectionalism, slavery, and westward expansion, which contributed to theAmerican Civil War. He helped draft theCompromise of 1850.[1] King is the only United States vice president to take the oath of office on foreign soil, and was inaugurated inCuba, due to his poor health. He died oftuberculosis 45 days later, becoming the third vice president to die in office. OnlyJohn Tyler andAndrew Johnson, both of whom succeeded to the presidency, have hadshorter tenures. King was the only U.S. vice president from Alabama.
King entered politics and was elected as a member of theNorth Carolina House of Commons, where he served from 1807 to 1809, and he became city solicitor ofWilmington, North Carolina, in 1810. He was elected to the Twelfth, Thirteenth, and FourteenthCongresses, serving from March 4, 1811, until November 4, 1816, when he resigned to become Secretary of theLegation forWilliam Pinkney during Pinkney's appointment asMinister to Russia and to a special diplomatic mission inNaples. King was only 24 years old when he became a congressman for the first time. He did not reach the constitutional age of 25 for service in theHouse of Representatives until after the term began, but the Twelfth Congress did not convene until November 4, 1811, and King was not sworn in until then.
When he returned to the United States in 1818, King joined the westward migration of the cotton culture to the Deep South, purchasing property at what would later be known as "King's Bend" between present-daySelma andCahaba on theAlabama River inDallas County of the newAlabama Territory, which had been recently separated fromMississippi. He developed a large cottonplantation based on slave labor, calling the property "Chestnut Hill". King and his relatives formed one of the state's largestslaveholding families, collectively owning as many as 500 people.[citation needed]
He was appointedMinister to France and served from 1844 to 1846. After his return, King resumed serving in the Senate and was appointed and subsequently elected to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation ofArthur P. Bagby. He held his seat from July 1, 1848, until his resignation on December 20, 1852, because of ill health and his having been elected vice president of the United States.[5]
During the conflicts leading up to theCompromise of 1850, King supported the Senate'sgag rule against debate on antislavery petitions and opposed proposals to abolish slavery in theDistrict of Columbia, which Congress administered. King supported a pro-slavery position, arguing that theConstitution protected the institution of slavery in both the Southern states and thefederal territories. He opposed both theabolitionists' efforts to abolish slavery in the territories as well as theFire-Eaters' calls for Southernsecession.[6]
The claim for King'shomosexuality has been put forward by biographer Jean Baker.[7] It has been supported (to an extent) by Shelley Ross,James W. Loewen, andRobert P. Watson. It focuses essentially on his close and intimate relationship with PresidentJames Buchanan. The two men lived together for 13 years, from 1840 until King's death in 1853. Buchanan referred to the relationship as a "communion",[8] and the two often attended official functions together. Contemporaries also noted and commented on the unusual closeness.Andrew Jackson mockingly called them "Miss Nancy" and "Aunt Fancy" (the former being a 19th-century euphemism for an effeminate man[9]), while RepresentativeAaron V. Brown referred to King as Buchanan's "better half".[10]
However, historian Lewis Saum has pointed out, "Customs and expressions were different in the mid-1800s than they are today... "Miss Nancy" was "a fairly common designation for people who wore clean clothes and had good manners". He also noted that Aaron Brown was a political rival of King.[11]
Loewen has described Buchanan and King as "Siamese twins". Sol Barzman, a biographer of vice presidents, wrote that King's "fastidious habits and conspicuous intimacy with the bachelor Buchanan gave rise to some cruel jibes." Buchanan adopted King's mannerisms and romanticized southern culture. Both had strong political ambitions, and in 1844, they planned to run as president and vice president.[8] They spent some time apart while King was on overseas missions in France, and their letters remain cryptic and avoid revealing any personal feelings at all. In May 1844, Buchanan wrote to Cornelia Roosevelt:
I am now 'solitary and alone', having no companion in the house with me. I have gone a wooing to several gentlemen, but have not succeeded with any one of them. I feel that it is not good for man to be alone, and [I] should not be astonished to find myself married to some old maid who can nurse me when I am sick, provide good dinners for me when I am well, and not expect from me any very ardent or romantic affection.
After King died on April 18, 1853, aged 67, Buchanan described him as "among the best, the purest, and most consistent public men I have known".[8]
Baker concluded that while some of their correspondence was destroyed by family members, the length and intimacy of the surviving letters illustrate "the affection of a special friendship" between King and Buchanan, with no way to know for certain whether it was a romantic relationship.[12]
Pierce and King defeated theWhig candidates,Winfield Scott and William Alexander Graham. Because King was ill with tuberculosis and had traveled toCuba in an effort to regain his health, he was not able to be in Washington to take his oath of office on March 4, 1853. By a special Act ofCongress passed on March 2,[13] he was allowed to take the oath outside the United States, and was sworn in on March 24, 1853, nearMatanzas, by the U.S. consul to Cuba,William L. Sharkey.[6][14][15] King is the first and, to date, only vice president or president of the United States to take the oath of office on foreign soil.[16]
Shortly afterward, King made the journey to return to Chestnut Hill. He died within two days of his arrival on April 18, 1853, aged 67, of tuberculosis. He was interred in a vault on the plantation and later reburied inSelma'sOld Live Oak Cemetery.[17][18] King never carried out any duties of the office.[19]
Following King's death, the office of vice president was vacant untilJohn C. Breckinridge was inaugurated with PresidentJames Buchanan in March 1857.
Engraving of Chestnut Hill, published following King's death in theIllustrated News, New York, April 30, 1853. The house was destroyed by fire during the 1920s.
Crypt of William R. King in Live Oak Cemetery, Selma, Alabama.
An 1830 portrait of King is held at New East Hall in the Philanthropic Chambers of theDialectic and Philanthropic Societies, a debating society which he had joined during college.
King was a co-founder ofSelma, Alabama, which he named after theOssianic poem "The Songs of Selma".[1] After his death, city officials and some of King's family wanted to move his body to Selma. Other family members wanted his body to remain at Chestnut Hill. In 1882, the Selma City Council appointed a committee to select a new plot for King's body. His remains were then reinterred in the city'sLive Oak Cemetery under a white marble mausoleum erected by the city.[25]
^King was inaugurated—nearMatanzas, in theSpanish colony ofCuba—twenty days after his term began (March 4) due to poor health. He was the first and only vice president of the United States to be sworn in on foreign soil.
^abDaniel Fate Brooks (2003)."The Faces of William R. King"(PDF).Alabama Heritage.69 (Summer). University of Alabama, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Alabama Department of Archives and History:14–23. Archived fromthe original(PDF) on March 21, 2012. RetrievedMay 3, 2013.
^Bennett, Jim (April 2014)."Alabamians With National Aspirations".JCHA Newsletter. Birmingham, Alabama: Jefferson County Historical Association. Archived fromthe original on June 2, 2018. RetrievedJune 1, 2018.
^Wilson, Scott.Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons, 3d ed.: 2 (Kindle Locations 25688-25689). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. Kindle Edition.
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