Franklin Pierce: Ineffective

富兰克林·皮尔斯：无能

VOA Learning English presents America’s Presidents.
美国之音慢速英语介绍美国总统栏目。

Today we are talking about Franklin Pierce, the 14th president of the United States. He took office in 1853 at age 48. At that time, he was the youngest person elected to the White House.
今天，我们来谈论下美国第14届总统富兰克林·皮尔斯。他于1853年48岁的时候就职。当时，他是最年轻的总统。

Pierce was known for being social – and for his good looks. But his personal life was full of tragedy, and he was not an effective chief executive.
皮尔斯以善于交际而闻名，他的英俊也让他声名远扬。但是他的个人生活充满悲剧，他不是一位有能力的总统。

Over time, he has come to be remembered as one of the country’s worst presidents.
久而久之，皮尔斯逐渐以美国最差的总统之一而被人记住。

Early life 早年生活

Franklin Pierce was born in the northern state of New Hampshire. He was one of eight children.
富兰克林·皮尔斯出生于北方新罕布什尔州，他是八个孩子中的一个。

He attended school regularly as a child, and he went on to Bowdoin College in Maine. There, he developed his skills as an excellent public speaker. He also became an able lawyer.
孩童时期，他正常上了学，后来继续读了缅因州的鲍登学院。在那儿，他开发了卓越的公众演讲才能。他也成为了一名优秀的律师。

Pierce’s abilities carried him far. But his personal connections helped, too.
皮尔斯的能力对他帮助很大，然而他个人的关系也帮助了很多。

His father became the governor of New Hampshire. Shortly after, Pierce was elected to the state legislature. He soon became a member of the U.S. Congress – first as a member of the House of Representatives, and then as a senator.
他的父亲是新罕布什尔州的州长。不久之后，皮尔斯入选州立法机构。他很快就成为了国会的议员 —— 起初是众议员，然后是参议员。

Several important things happened in Pierce’s personal life during those years in Washington, DC. He married Jane Means Appleton. They soon had a son, but the child died after only three days. The couple went on to have two more boys.
在华盛顿的那几年，皮尔斯的个人生活发生了几件重要的事情。他和简·米恩斯·阿普尔顿结婚，很快就有了一个儿子，但三天后就夭折了。这对夫妻后来又有了两个儿子。

In Washington, Franklin Pierce also developed friendships with many people from the South. They defended the right of states to permit slavery. Although he was from the North, Pierce came to share the opinions of his Southern friends. He grew to dislike anti-slavery activists, who were known as abolitionists.
在华盛顿，富兰克林·皮尔斯与许多南方人士发展了友谊。他们捍卫允许奴隶制的权利。尽管皮尔斯来自北方，他开始分享他南方朋友的观点。他逐渐讨厌禁奴积极分子，也就是废奴主义者。

As a politician, Pierce was a member of the Democratic Party and strongly supported the ideas of President Andrew Jackson. But politics did not appeal to his wife. She also did not like her husband’s habit of drinking alcohol with his friends. Jane Pierce belonged to the temperance movement, which urged Americans to avoid the use of alcoholic drinks.
作为一名政客，皮尔斯是一名民主党人士，并且强烈支持安德鲁·杰克逊总统的理念。但是他的妻子对政治不感兴趣。他也不喜欢他丈夫和朋友喝酒的习惯。简·皮尔斯支持禁酒运动，这项运动旨在推进美国人避免使用酒精饮料。

So Pierce resigned his job in the Senate and moved back to New Hampshire.
所以，皮尔斯辞去了参议员的职位，回到了新罕布什尔州。

There, he stopped drinking alcohol and earned fame as a lawyer and public speaker. But tragedy struck again: his second son became sick and died.
回去后，他不再喝酒，并且作为一名律师和公众发言人赢得了一些声誉。但是悲剧再次降临：他的第二个儿子生病死亡。

Fainting Frank 昏厥的富兰克林

Pierce remained active in politics in New Hampshire. He helped the Democratic candidate for president at the time, James K. Polk, win votes in the state.
在新罕布什尔，皮尔斯仍旧活跃在政治舞台。当时，他帮助民主党总统候选人詹姆斯·诺克斯·波尔克赢取了该州的选票。

When Polk entered the White House, he gave Pierce a position as a general in the Mexican-American War.
当波尔克入主白宫后，在美墨战争中，他给了皮尔斯一个将军的职位。

Pierce did not earn the respect of his troops. In one battle, he passed out after he fell off his horse and crushed his leg. Some of his men, seeing what happened, fled the battlefield. Others called him “Fainting Frank.”
皮尔斯没有获得军队的尊敬。在一场战役中，他从马背上摔下来压断了腿，然后就晕厥过去。一些士兵看到了眼前发生的事后就逃离了战场。其他一些人称他为“晕厥的富兰克林”。

Although Pierce had his critics, he returned to New Hampshire as a leader in the state’s Democratic Party. Yet no one expected him to become president of the United States.
尽管富兰克林受到了批评，他还是作为一位民主党领袖（退役）回到了新罕布什尔州。然而，没有人希望他成为美国总统。

Pierce’s nomination came during the Democratic national convention in 1852. Party leaders could not agree on a candidate. They were split among the three top choices.
1852年民主党全国代表大会上，皮尔斯获得提名。党内领袖就总统候选人无法达成一致，他们有三个竞争候选人。

So the party turned to Pierce. They liked the fact that he was not well known or had taken any strong positions as a lawmaker. As a result, fewer people could object to him, they reasoned.
所以，民主党的目光移到了皮尔斯身上。他们喜欢他不是很出名而且作为议员没有供职于任何重要职位的事实。最后，他们推断，很少会有人反对他。

Pierce did very little during the election campaign. He did not need to. Many voters, especially in the South, did not like his opponent.
皮尔斯在大选中几乎没做什么事情。他也不需要。许多选民，尤其是南方选民，不喜欢他的竞争对手。

When the election was held, Pierce won easily.
当选举大会举行时，皮尔斯很轻松地赢取大选。

But before he took office, another terrible thing happened. Franklin and Jane Pierce were traveling by train with their youngest son Benjamin, who was 11-years-old. The train went off the rails. Bennie was killed instantly in front of his parents.
但在皮尔斯任职前，发生了另一件可怕的事情。富兰克林和简·皮尔斯带着他们11岁的小儿子本杰明乘坐火车出行。火车脱轨了，本尼在他的父母面前当场死亡。

Neither Franklin nor Jane Pierce ever really recovered. Jane believed their son’s death was a punishment from God for her husband becoming president.
富兰克林和简·皮尔斯从来没有真正从儿子的死去中恢复过来。简认为他们儿子的死亡是上帝对他丈夫当选总统的惩罚。

Presidency 总统任期

As president, Pierce faced an extremely difficult situation. The country’s ongoing dispute about whether and where to permit slavery was becoming more intense. Under Pierce, the dispute centered on the areas of Kansas and Nebraska.
作为总统，皮尔斯面临着非常严峻的形势。国内关于是否以及在哪允许奴隶制的争论愈演愈烈。皮尔斯时期，争论的焦点在于堪萨斯和内布拉斯加区域。

At the time, both areas were considered territories, not states. And each territory was above the line of the Missouri Compromise of 1820. That act, approved by lawmakers nearly 35 years before Pierce took office, banned slavery in northern areas, including what would become Kansas and Nebraska.
当时，这两个区域都被视为领土而不是州。每个领土都在1820年密苏里妥协案规定的分界线之上。这一分界线是在皮尔斯执政时期大约35年前由国会批准的，它禁止了北方蓄奴，自然就包括了即将成为堪萨斯州以及内布拉斯加州的区域。

But pro-slavery settlers demanded that Kansas and Nebraska voters – a group comprised of white men – decide the issue for themselves. A majority of U.S. lawmakers agreed.
但是奴隶主要求堪萨斯和内布拉斯加一群由白人组成的选民自己来决定是否允许奴隶制。美国大多数国会议员都同意了。

Under pressure, President Pierce signed the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854.
压力之下，1854年皮尔斯总统签署了《堪萨斯-内布拉斯加法案》。

The measure was one of the most important in U.S. history. It overturned the Missouri Compromise and cancelled the ban on slavery. It incited years of intense of violence between pro-slavery and anti-slavery activists. And it pushed a divided nation even further apart.
这项美国历史上最重要的举措之一，推翻了密苏里妥协法案，取消了奴隶制的禁止。它刺激了蓄奴和禁奴分子之间数年的紧张暴力局势，并且整个国家被进一步推向分裂。

The troubles also showed Pierce to be an ineffective president. He could not ease the tensions over slavery, nor unite the country behind the Kansas-Nebraska Act.
动乱也显现了皮尔斯是一位无能的总统。他没能够缓解奴隶制的紧张局势，也没能在《堪萨斯-内布拉斯加法案》下统一国家。

And he delayed using his power to stop the violence in Kansas until it was far too late.
在他使用总统权力去阻止堪萨斯暴力的时候已经太晚了。

Finally, his sympathy for pro-slavery groups angered many in the North, including people in his own party.
最终，他对于奴隶制团体的同情惹怒了许多北方人，包括自己的党派。

The Democrats did not nominate him again at the next election.
民主党人士没有再次提名他作为下届总统选举的候选人。

Legacy 遗产

After four years as president, Pierce returned to New Hampshire. He rarely socialized and began drinking alcohol again.
卸任总统后，皮尔斯返回了新罕布什尔州。他很少社交并且再次开始酗酒。

After his wife died in 1863, Pierce seemed to disappear from public life. Americans heard little about him until his death in 1869.
皮尔斯的妻子逝世于1863年，之后他似乎就消失于公众之中。直到1869年去世前，人们很少能够听到关于他的消息。

But he lived to see the ultimate tragedy of the Civil War that he – like other presidents before him – had failed to prevent.
但他一直活着并目睹了最终的悲剧内战 —— 他和几位前任总统都无法阻止的悲剧。

I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.

Kelly Jean Kelly wrote this story for Learning English. George Grow was the editor.

Words in This Story

chief executive - 行政长官；董事长；美国总统；（美国的）州长

regularly - adv. on a regular basis - 定期地；有规律地

habit - n. something that a person does often in a regular and repeated way - 习惯

pass out - phrasal verb. to become unconscious or fall asleep - 晕厥

faint - v. to suddenly become unconscious - 晕厥

instantly - adv. immediately - 立即，立刻

ultimate - adj. greatest or most extreme - 终极的；最终的