Touring Wheatland

You would think that the "inevitability of war" doctrine would work in favor of Buchanan's reputation:

I asked Patrick Clarke, director of James Buchanan's Wheatland, what he thought of Buchanan's being on the worst-president list. Clarke said that nobody elected in 1856 could have averted the war.

Despite the iron grip of the inevitables on Civil War historiography, Buchanan reaps no gain.