[Jung Ji-Hoon]

Franklin Pierce: Nice Guy, Terrible President

Franklin Pierce, the 14th President of the U.S., is widely regarded as one of the nation's worst presidents, dividing rather than uniting people as the nation hurtled toward the Civil War conflict over slavery and states' rights to have it.

By opening Kansas and Nebraska as territories with the right to decide whether they wanted slavery, he created a battleground where the north and south fought a proxy battle for the future of the midwest.

His personal life, while free of scandal, was beset by tragedy, as he lost all three children at young ages, including one in a terrible train accident to which he was a witness.

Though a Northerner, his Southern sympathies made him especially unable to deal with the growing split in philosophies leading up to the Civil War.

Upon leaving office, he said "All that's left is to drink & die", which he did, and died of cirrhosis of the liver.