The 25-Day Vice-President

Alabama's Rufus de Vane King

By: Jeffrey Smith

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

The 25-Day Vice-President: Alabama's Rufus King documents the life and times of an often overlooked 19th Century statesman. Born to wealth and privilege in North Carolina, a well-educated King became an attorney before Tarheel voters elected him to serve in the State Legislator and later the U.S. Congress. From that point forward, he devoted his life to public service.

King eventually migrated to the rapidly growing Alabama Territory and established himself as a leader in the affluent cotton planter aristocracy. He also helped construct a new city, Selma, which King himself named in honor of a favorite Ossian poem. After Alabama was admitted to the Union, King was elected as one of the 22nd state's first United States Senators.

For nearly three decades, King served Alabama during two stints in the U.S. Senate. As President Pro Tempore of the Senate, he twice found himself just a heartbeat away from the Presidency.

A slaveholder, King believed perpetuation of the barbaric institution was a Constitutional right. However, King was a Union loyalist who never allied with the majority faction of Southern "fire-eating" secessionists. He labored to achieve compromise and avoid civil war. As a Moderate Democrat, King was a political anomaly in the Deep South.

While serving as Foreign Minister to France, King played a crucial role in facilitating America's Manifest Destiny agenda. A skilled diplomat, he convinced the French not to align with Great Britain in an attempt to block the United States from annexing the Republic of Texas.

In 1852, King achieved his long-time goal, election as Vice-President of the United States. He was, however, terminally ill with tuberculosis. While seeking palliative care for the incurable illness in Cuba, King became the first and only Vice-President or President to be sworn into office on foreign soil.

In March 1853, just one day after returning from Cuba to his Alabama planation home, Vice-President King died. His 25-day tenure as Vice President was the shortest in American history.

William Rufus de Vane King was no doubt an enigmatic figure. In the course of this narrative, his legislative and diplomatic achievements will be detailed. The controversy surrounding his supposed, and then taboo, sexual orientation will be analyzed under an objective light. More specifically, the exact nature of King's relationship with James Buchanan, fellow statesman and 15th President of the United States, has perhaps been misinterpreted by many of their contemporaries and future historians. The book also details the politics and culture of Antebellum-era, early-to-mid 19th Century America.

The Twenty-Five Day Vice-President is the 21st entry in the author's "Bringing History Alive" series, proving fact is sometimes stranger and more compelling than fiction.