(2022) Presidential Silver Medal - Franklin Pierce

Coin Details

Auction Record

$51 MS69 10-27-2024 eBay

Description

The 2022 Franklin Pierce "1853" silver matte finish medal honors the fourteenth President of the United States in the Presidential Silver Medal Program. Pierce's presidency (1853-1857) is generally regarded as one of the least successful, as his attempts to maintain national unity through accommodation of Southern interests on slavery backfired catastrophically. His support for the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, which repealed the Missouri Compromise and opened Northern territories to slavery through popular sovereignty, triggered the "Bleeding Kansas" violence and accelerated the nation's march toward civil war. Pierce entered office under a personal cloud of tragedy — his eleven-year-old son Benjamin was killed in a train accident two months before the inauguration, witnessed by both parents. His wife Jane Pierce, devastated by the loss, spent much of the administration in mourning and largely withdrew from public life. Pierce himself turned increasingly to alcohol, a struggle that had dogged him throughout his career. Franklin Pierce (1804-1869) was a New Hampshire lawyer, congressman, senator, and Mexican-American War veteran who won the 1852 Democratic nomination as a compromise candidate on the forty-ninth ballot. He was the only elected president to seek and be denied renomination by his own party. Despite his political failings, Pierce was personally charming and widely liked — his college friend Nathaniel Hawthorne dedicated a book to him. The silver matte finish medal preserves Pierce's handsome features in the program's characteristic soft luster finish.

Rarity Notes

Part of the 2022 release cycle in the Presidential Silver Medal Program. Produced during a defined mintage period. Available in the secondary market.

Cross References

PCGS #911651