就职演讲

马丁·范布伦（Martin Van Buren，1782年－），第八任副总统（1833年－1837年）及第八任（1837年－1841年）。他是《美国独立宣言》正式签署后出生的第一位总统。

What can be more gratifying than such a retrospect as this?
有什么能比如此的回顾更让人心悦？
We look back on obstacles avoided and dangers overcome, on expectations more than realized and prosperity perfectly secured.
我们看到以往的障碍已被避免，危险被克服。看到期望不仅仅被实现，繁荣也完全得以保证。
To the hopes of the hostile,the fears of the timid, and the doubts of the anxious actual experience has given the conclusive reply.
对于敌人的妄想，懦夫的惧怕，和虑者的疑惑事实经历已作出完满的答复。
We have seen time gradually dispel every unfavorable foreboding, and our Constitution surmount every adverse circumstance dreaded at the outset as beyond control.
我们已看到时间逐渐排除每一个不利的预兆。并且，我们的宪法克服了那些在当初被认为是我们所无能为力而畏惧的每一个不利处境。
Present excitement will at all times magnify present dangers, but true philosophy must teach us that none more threatening than the past can remain to be overcome; and we ought (for we have just reason)to entertain an abiding confidence in the stability of our institutions and an entire conviction that if administered in the true from, character,and spirit in which they were established they are abundantly adequate to preserve to us, and our children the rich blessings already derived from them, to make our beloved land for a thousand generations that spot where happiness springs from a perfect equality of political rights.
当前的兴奋将在任何时候增大当前的危险。但真正的哲理一定会告诉我们，没有比以往更有威胁性的仍要去克服；并且我们应该保持对我们的机构的坚定信心，并深信只要以其创建时的真正形式，特点和精神来管理，它们将完全足够为我们，和我们的儿女保证那以往由它们所带来的丰富祝福。并把我们可爱的土地变成因完全平等政治权利而充满幸福的之处而持续千秋万代。
For myself,therefore,I desire to declare that the principle that will govern me in the high duty to which my country calls me is a strict adherence to the letter, and spirit of the Constitution as it was designed by those who framed it.
而我自己，我想宣布，那些将在我的祖国召唤我的这崇高职责上指导我的原则，必须严格依照，如同其构造者所设想的宪法的文字和精神。
Looking back to it as a sacred instrument carefully and not easily framed; remembering that it was throughout a work of concession and compromise; viewing it as limited to national objects; regarding it was leaving to the people and the States all power not explicitly parted with, I shall endeavor to preserve,protect,and defend it by anxiously referring to its provision for direction in every action.
我们回头把它看作一个仔细而艰难构造的神圣工具。牢记它经过一个让步和妥协的过程；把它看为仅限于国家事宜；认为它留给人民和各州所有不能明显分开的权力，我将努力通过在每一行动中，急切地参考其条款来寻求方向，来维持，保护和守卫它。
To matters of domestic concernment which it has intrusted to the Federal Government, and to such as relate to our intercourse with foreign nations I shall zealously devote myself; beyond those limits I shall never pass.
我将以极度热心投入到那些委托给联邦政府的国内事务，以及我们同外国交往有关的事务中；而我将决不逾越这些界限。
To enter on this ocasion into a further or more minute exposition of my views on the various questions of domestic policy would be as obtrusive as it is probably unexpected.
在此时进一步详细叙述我对各种国内政策的观点将显得冒失而可能意外。
Before the suffrages of my countrymen were condferred upon me I submitted to them, with great precision,my opinions on all the most prominent of these subjects.
在同胞们把参政权授予我之前，我已经非常准确地向他们提供了我关于这中间所有最显要的问题的观点。
Those opinions I shall endeavor to carry out with my utmost ability.
我将努力尽我所能来实施这些观点。
Our course of foreign policy has been so uniform and intelligible as to constitute a rule of Executive conduct which leaves little to my discretion.
我们的外交政策路线是如此一致和清晰，以至其所构成的行政行为规则留给我很少斟酌余地。
unless,indeed,I were willing to run counter to the lights of experience and the know opinions of my constituents.
除非我真地想同历史教训及我的选民的意愿背道而驰。
We sedulously cultivate the friendship of all nations as the conditions most compatible with our welfare and the principles of our Government.
在和我们的福利和政府原则最协调的条件下，我们勤勉地培养同所有国家的友谊。
We decline alliances as adverse to our peace.
我们谢绝对我们的和平有损的联盟。
We desire commercial relations on equal terms, being ever willing to give a fair equivalent for advantages received.
我们渴望平等条件下的商贸关系。一直愿意以公平相等来回报所受利益。
We endeavor to conduct our intercourse with equivalent for advantages received.
我们努力以开放，
We endeavor to conduct our intercourse with openness and sincerity, promptly avowing our objects and seeking to establish that mutual frankness which is as beneficial in the dealings of nations as of men.
和诚恳来进行我们的交往。合时宣布我们的目的，并寻求建立在与国或与人交往中都有益的相互之间的坦诚。
We have no disposition and we disclaim all right to meddle in disputes, whether internal or foreign,that may molest other countries, regarding them in their actual state as social communities, and preserving a strict neutrality in all their controversies.
我们没有意向放弃此权利，去干涉那些可能扰乱他国的，内部或外部的争执；我们把现实情况的他们看作社会群体，并在所有争执中保持严格的中立。
Well knowing the tried valor of our people and our exhaustless resources, we neither anticipate nor fear any designed aggression; and in the consciousness of our own just conduct we feel a security that we shall never be called upon to exert our determination never to permit an invasion of our rights without punishment or redress.
坚信我们深受考验的英勇人民和我们无尽的资源。我们既不预期也不惧怕任何有意侵略；以我们自己公正行为的良知，我们会因行使我们的决定，永不放过一个侵犯我们权利的行为进行惩罚和纠正，而感到安全。
In approaching,then,in the presence of my assembled countrymen, to make the solenm promise that yet remains, and to pledge myself that I will faithfully execute the office I am about to fill, I bring with me a settled purpose to maintain the institutions of my country, which I trust will atone for the errors I commit.
于是，在同胞们集会的面前，即将作出庄严的允诺，并保证我将忠心地行使我将要上任的职责，我带着一个既定目标来维持我国的机构组织，我相信其会对我犯的错误作出弥补。
In receiving from the people the sacred trust twice confided to my illustrious predecessor, and which he has discharged so faithfully and so well, I know that I can not expect to perform the arduous task with equal ability and success.
受到人民两次寄予我的显赫的前任的神圣信任，而他是如此忠心和出色地履行之，我知道我不能期望以相同的能力和功绩来执行这艰难的任务。
But united as I have been in his counsels, a daily witness of his exclusive and unsurpassed devotion to his country's welfare, agreeing with him in sentiments which his countrymen have warmly supported, and permitted to partake largely of his confidence, I may hope that somewhat of the same cheering approbation will be found to attend upon my path.
但是，如同我得到他的建议，每日目睹他专一而无比贡献于国家的福利事业，和他同享他的同胞热情拥护的思想，并允许分享他的信任，我也许可希望同样欢心的赞赏会多少出现在我的道路上。
For him I but express with my own the wishes of all, that he may yet long live to enjoy the brilliant evening of his well_spent life; and for myself,conscious of but one desire,faithfully to serve my country, I throw myself without fear on its justice and its kindness.
对他我只表达我自己的愿望，愿他仍能长寿以享受其光辉一生的灿烂晚年：对我自己，只知一个愿望，忠心为祖国服务。我无惧地把自己置于它的公正和仁慈之下。
Beyond that I only look to the gracious protection of the Divine Being whose strengthening support I humbly solicit, and whom I fervently pray to look down upon us all.
在此之外，我仅期望圣上帝的仁慈保护，我谦卑地请求他的强力支持。我热心祷告向下照看我们全部。
May it be among the dispensations of His providence to bless our beloved country with honors and with length of days.
愿他的眷顾包含对我们可爱祖国的光辉而长久的祝福。
May her ways be ways of pleasantness and all her paths be peace!
愿她的道路充满喜悦和和平！

演讲全文

　　Inaugural Address of Martin Van Buren

　　SATURDAY, MARCH 4, 1837

　　Fellow-Citizens:

　　The practice of all my predecessors imposes on me an obligation I cheerfully fulfill--to accompany the first and solemn act of my public trust with an avowal of the principles that will guide me in performing it and an expression of my feelings on assuming a charge so responsible and vast. In imitating their example I tread in the footsteps of illustrious men, whose superiors it is our happiness to believe are not found on the executive calendar of any country. Among them we recognize the earliest and firmest pillars of the Republic--those by whom our national independence was first declared, him who above all others contributed to establish it on the field of battle, and those whose expanded intellect and patriotism constructed, improved, and perfected the inestimable institutions under which we live. If such men in the position I now occupy felt themselves overwhelmed by a sense of gratitude for this the highest of all marks of their country's confidence, and by a consciousness of their inability adequately to discharge the duties of an office so difficult and exalted, how much more must these considerations affect one who can rely on no such claims for favor or forbearance! Unlike all who have preceded me, the Revolution that gave us existence as one people was achieved at the period of my birth; and whilst I contemplate with grateful reverence that memorable event, I feel that I belong to a later age and that I may not expect my countrymen to weigh my actions with the same kind and partial hand.

　　So sensibly, fellow-citizens, do these circumstances press themselves upon me that I should not dare to enter upon my path of duty did I not look for the generous aid of those who will be associated with me in the various and coordinate branches of the Government; did I not repose with unwavering reliance on the patriotism, the intelligence, and the kindness of a people who never yet deserted a public servant honestly laboring their cause; and, above all, did I not permit myself humbly to hope for the sustaining support of an ever-watchful and beneficent Providence.

　　To the confidence and consolation derived from these sources it would be ungrateful not to add those which spring from our present fortunate condition. Though not altogether exempt from embarrassments that disturb our tranquillity at home and threaten it abroad, yet in all the attributes of a great, happy, and flourishing people we stand without a parallel in the world. Abroad we enjoy the respect and, with scarcely an exception, the friendship of every nation; at home, while our Government quietly but efficiently performs the sole legitimate end of political institutions--in doing the greatest good to the greatest number-- we present an aggregate of human prosperity surely not elsewhere to be found.

　　How imperious, then, is the obligation imposed upon every citizen, in his own sphere of action, whether limited or extended, to exert himself in perpetuating a condition of things so singularly happy! All the lessons of history and experience must be lost upon us if we are content to trust alone to the peculiar advantages we happen to possess. Position and climate and the bounteous resources that nature has scattered with so liberal a hand--even the diffused intelligence and elevated character of our people--will avail us nothing if we fail sacredly to uphold those political institutions that were wisely and deliberately formed with reference to every circumstance that could preserve or might endanger the blessings we enjoy. The thoughtful framers of our Constitution legislated for our country as they found it. Looking upon it with the eyes of statesmen and patriots, they saw all the sources of rapid and wonderful prosperity; but they saw also that various habits, opinions and institutions peculiar to the various portions of so vast a region were deeply fixed. Distinct sovereignties were in actual existence, whose cordial union was essential to the welfare and happiness of all. Between many of them there was, at least to some extent, a real diversity of interests, liable to be exaggerated through sinister designs; they differed in size, in population, in wealth, and in actual and prospective resources and power; they varied in the character of their industry and staple productions, and existed domestic institutions which, unwisely disturbed, might endanger the harmony of the whole. Most carefully were all these circumstances weighed, and the foundations of the new Government laid upon principles of reciprocal concession and equitable compromise. The jealousies which the smaller States might entertain of the power of the rest were allayed by a rule of representation confessedly unequal at the time, and designed forever to remain so. A natural fear that the broad scope of general legislation might bear upon and unwisely control particular interests was counteracted by limits strictly drawn around the action of the Federal authority, and to the people and the States was left unimpaired their sovereign power over the innumerable subjects embraced in the internal government of a just republic, excepting such only as necessarily appertain to the concerns of the whole confederacy or its intercourse as a united community with the other nations of the world.

　　This provident forecast has been verified by time. Half a century, teeming with extraordinary events, and elsewhere producing astonishing results, has passed along, but on our institutions it has left no injurious mark. From a small community we have risen to a people powerful in numbers and in strength; but with our increase has gone hand in hand the progress of just principles. The privileges, civil and religious, of the humblest individual are still sacredly protected at home, and while the valor and fortitude of our people have removed far from us the slightest apprehension of foreign power, they have not yet induced us in a single instance to forget what is right. Our commerce has been extended to the remotest nations; the value and even nature of our productions have been greatly changed; a wide difference has arisen in the relative wealth and resources of every portion of our country; yet the spirit of mutual regard and of faithful adherence to existing compacts has continued to prevail in our councils and never long been absent from our conduct. We have learned by experience a fruitful lesson--that an implicit and undeviating adherence to the principles on which we set out can carry us prosperously onward through all the conflicts of circumstances and vicissitudes inseparable from the lapse of years.

　　The success that has thus attended our great experiment is in itself a sufficient cause for gratitude, on account of the happiness it has actually conferred and the example it has unanswerably given But to me, my fellow-citizens, looking forward to the far-distant future with ardent prayers and confiding hopes, this retrospect presents a ground for still deeper delight. It impresses on my mind a firm belief that the perpetuity of our institutions depends upon ourselves; that if we maintain the principles on which they were established they are destined to confer their benefits on countless generations yet to come, and that America will present to every friend of mankind the cheering proof that a popular government, wisely formed, is wanting in no element of endurance or strength. Fifty years ago its rapid failure was boldly predicted. Latent and uncontrollable causes of dissolution were supposed to exist even by the wise and good, and not only did unfriendly or speculative theorists anticipate for us the fate of past republics, but the fears of many an honest patriot overbalanced his sanguine hopes. Look back on these forebodings, not hastily but reluctantly made, and see how in every instance they have completely failed.

　　An imperfect experience during the struggles of the Revolution was supposed to warrant the belief that the people would not bear the taxation requisite to discharge an immense public debt already incurred and to pay the necessary expenses of the Government The cost of two wars has been paid, not only without a murmur; but with unequaled alacrity. No one is now left to doubt that every burden will be cheerfully borne that may be necessary to sustain our civil institutions or guard our honor or welfare. Indeed, all experience has shown that the willingness of the people to contribute to these ends in cases of emergency has uniformly outrun the confidence of their representatives.

　　In the early stages of the new Government, when all felt the imposing influence as they recognized the unequaled services of the first President, it was a common sentiment that the great weight of his character could alone bind the discordant materials of our Government together and save us from the violence of contending factions. Since his death nearly forty years are gone. Party exasperation has been often carried to its highest point; the virtue and fortitude of the people have sometimes been greatly tried; yet our system, purified and enhanced in value by all it has encountered, still preserves its spirit of free and fearless discussion, blended with unimpaired fraternal feeling.

　　The capacity of the people for self-government, and their willingness, from a high sense of duty and without those exhibitions of coercive power so generally employed in other countries, to submit to all needful restraints and exactions of municipal law, have also been favorably exemplified in the history of the American States. Occasionally, it is true, the ardor of public sentiment, outrunning the regular progress of the judicial tribunals or seeking to reach cases not denounced as criminal by the existing law, has displayed itself in a manner calculated to give pain to the friends of free government and to encourage the hopes of those who wish for its overthrow. These occurrences, however, have been far less frequent in our country than in any other of equal population on the globe, and with the diffusion of intelligence it may well be hoped that they will constantly diminish in frequency and violence. The generous patriotism and sound common sense of the great mass of our fellow-citizens will assuredly in time produce this result; for as every assumption of illegal power not only wounds the majesty of the law, but furnishes a pretext for abridging the liberties of the people, the latter have the most direct and permanent interest in preserving the landmarks of social order and maintaining on all occasions the inviolability of those constitutional and legal provisions which they themselves have made.

　　In a supposed unfitness of our institutions for those hostile emergencies which no country can always avoid their friends found a fruitful source of apprehension, their enemies of hope. While they foresaw less promptness of action than in governments differently formed, they overlooked the far more important consideration that with us war could never be the result of individual or irresponsible will, but must be a measure of redress for injuries sustained voluntarily resorted to by those who were to bear the necessary sacrifice, who would consequently feel an individual interest in the contest, and whose energy would be commensurate with the difficulties to be encountered. Actual events have proved their error; the last war, far from impairing, gave new confidence to our Government, and amid recent apprehensions of a similar conflict we saw that the energies of our country would not be wanting in ample season to vindicate its rights. We may not possess, as we should not desire to possess, the extended and ever-ready military organization of other nations; we may occasionally suffer in the outset for the want of it; but among ourselves all doubt upon this great point has ceased, while a salutary experience will prevent a contrary opinion from inviting aggression from abroad.

　　Certain danger was foretold from the extension of our territory, the multiplication of States, and the increase of population. Our system was supposed to be adapted only to boundaries comparatively narrow. These have been widened beyond conjecture; the members of our Confederacy are already doubled, and the numbers of our people are incredibly augmented. The alleged causes of danger have long surpassed anticipation, but none of the consequences have followed. The power and influence of the Republic have arisen to a height obvious to all mankind; respect for its authority was not more apparent at its ancient than it is at its present limits; new and inexhaustible sources of general prosperity have been opened; the effects of distance have been averted by the inventive genius of our people, developed and fostered by the spirit of our institutions; and the enlarged variety and amount of interests, productions, and pursuits have strengthened the chain of mutual dependence and formed a circle of mutual benefits too apparent ever to be overlooked.

　　In justly balancing the powers of the Federal and State authorities difficulties nearly insurmountable arose at the outset and subsequent collisions were deemed inevitable. Amid these it was scarcely believed possible that a scheme of government so complex in construction could remain uninjured. From time to time embarrassments have certainly occurred; but how just is the confidence of future safety imparted by the knowledge that each in succession has been happily removed! Overlooking partial and temporary evils as inseparable from the practical operation of all human institutions, and looking only to the general result, every patriot has reason to be satisfied. While the Federal Government has successfully performed its appropriate functions in relation to foreign affairs and concerns evidently national, that of every State has remarkably improved in protecting and developing local interests and individual welfare; and if the vibrations of authority have occasionally tended too much toward one or the other, it is unquestionably certain that the ultimate operation of the entire system has been to strengthen all the existing institutions and to elevate our whole country in prosperity and renown.
　　The last, perhaps the greatest, of the prominent sources of discord and disaster supposed to lurk in our political condition was the institution of domestic slavery. Our forefathers were deeply impressed with the delicacy of this subject, and they treated it with a forbearance so evidently wise that in spite of every sinister foreboding it never until the present period disturbed the tranquillity of our common country. Such a result is sufficient evidence of the justice and the patriotism of their course; it is evidence not to be mistaken that an adherence to it can prevent all embarrassment from this as well as from every other anticipated cause of difficulty or danger. Have not recent events made it obvious to the slightest reflection that the least deviation from this spirit of forbearance is injurious to every interest, that of humanity included? Amidst the violence of excited passions this generous and fraternal feeling has been sometimes disregarded; and standing as I now do before my countrymen, in this high place of honor and of trust, I can not refrain from anxiously invoking my fellow-citizens never to be deaf to its dictates. Perceiving before my election the deep interest this subject was beginning to excite, I believed it a solemn duty fully to make known my sentiments in regard to it, and now, when every motive for misrepresentation has passed away, I trust that they will be candidly weighed and understood. At least they will be my standard of conduct in the path before me. I then declared that if the desire of those of my countrymen who were favorable to my election was gratified I must go into the Presidential chair the inflexible and uncompromising opponent of every attempt on the part of Congress to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia against the wishes of the slaveholding States, and also with a determination equally decided to resist the slightest interference with it in the States where it exists. I submitted also to my fellow-citizens, with fullness and frankness, the reasons which led me to this determination. The result authorizes me to believe that they have been approved and are confided in by a majority of the people of the United States, including those whom they most immediately affect It now only remains to add that no bill conflicting with these views can ever receive my constitutional sanction. These opinions have been adopted in the firm belief that they are in accordance with the spirit that actuated the venerated fathers of the Republic, and that succeeding experience has proved them to be humane, patriotic, expedient, honorable, and just. If the agitation of this subject was intended to reach the stability of our institutions, enough has occurred to show that it has signally failed, and that in this as in every other instance the apprehensions of the timid and the hopes of the wicked for the destruction of our Government are again destined to be disappointed. Here and there, indeed, scenes of dangerous excitement have occurred, terrifying instances of local violence have been witnessed, and a reckless disregard of the consequences of their conduct has exposed individuals to popular indignation; but neither masses of the people nor sections of the country have been swerved from their devotion to the bond of union and the principles it has made sacred. It will be ever thus. Such attempts at dangerous agitation may periodically return, but with each the object will be better understood. That predominating affection for our political system which prevails throughout our territorial limits, that calm and enlightened judgment which ultimately governs our people as one vast body, will always be at hand to resist and control every effort, foreign or domestic, which aims or would lead to overthrow our institutions.

　　What can be more gratifying than such a retrospect as this? We look back on obstacles avoided and dangers overcome, on expectations more than realized and prosperity perfectly secured. To the hopes of the hostile, the fears of the timid, and the doubts of the anxious actual experience has given the conclusive reply. We have seen time gradually dispel every unfavorable foreboding and our Constitution surmount every adverse circumstance dreaded at the outset as beyond control. Present excitement will at all times magnify present dangers, but true philosophy must teach us that none more threatening than the past can remain to be overcome; and we ought to entertain an abiding confidence in the stability of our institutions and an entire conviction that if administered in the true form, character, and spirit in which they were established they are abundantly adequate to preserve to us and our children the rich blessings already derived from them, to make our beloved land for a thousand generations that chosen spot where happiness springs from a perfect equality of political rights.

　　For myself, therefore, I desire to declare that the principle that will govern me in the high duty to which my country calls me is a strict adherence to the letter and spirit of the Constitution as it was designed by those who framed it. Looking back to it as a sacred instrument carefully and not easily framed; remembering that it was throughout a work of concession and compromise; viewing it as limited to national objects; regarding it as leaving to the people and the States all power not explicitly parted with, I shall endeavor to preserve, protect, and defend it by anxiously referring to its provision for direction in every action. To matters of domestic concernment which it has intrusted to the Federal Government and to such as relate to our intercourse with foreign nations I shall zealously devote myself; beyond those limits I shall never pass.

　　To enter on this occasion into a further or more minute exposition of my views on the various questions of domestic policy would be as obtrusive as it is probably unexpected. Before the suffrages of my countrymen were conferred upon me I submitted to them, with great precision, my opinions on all the most prominent of these subjects. Those opinions I shall endeavor to carry out with my utmost ability.

　　Our course of foreign policy has been so uniform and intelligible as to constitute a rule of Executive conduct which leaves little to my discretion, unless, indeed, I were willing to run counter to the lights of experience and the known opinions of my constituents. We sedulously cultivate the friendship of all nations as the conditions most compatible with our welfare and the principles of our Government. We decline alliances as adverse to our peace. We desire commercial relations on equal terms, being ever willing to give a fair equivalent for advantages received. We endeavor to conduct our intercourse with openness and sincerity, promptly avowing our objects and seeking to establish that mutual frankness which is as beneficial in the dealings of nations as of men. We have no disposition and we disclaim all right to meddle in disputes, whether internal or foreign, that may molest other countries, regarding them in their actual state as social communities, and preserving a strict neutrality in all their controversies. Well knowing the tried valor of our people and our exhaustless resources, we neither anticipate nor fear any designed aggression; and in the consciousness of our own just conduct we feel a security that we shall never be called upon to exert our determination never to permit an invasion of our rights without punishment or redress.

　　In approaching, then, in the presence of my assembled countrymen, to make the solemn promise that yet remains, and to pledge myself that I will faithfully execute the office I am about to fill, I bring with me a settled purpose to maintain the institutions of my country, which I trust will atone for the errors I commit.

　　In receiving from the people the sacred trust twice confided to my illustrious predecessor, and which he has discharged so faithfully and so well, I know that I can not expect to perform the arduous task with equal ability and success. But united as I have been in his counsels, a daily witness of his exclusive and unsurpassed devotion to his country's welfare, agreeing with him in sentiments which his countrymen have warmly supported, and permitted to partake largely of his confidence, I may hope that somewhat of the same cheering approbation will be found to attend upon my path. For him I but express with my own the wishes of all, that he may yet long live to enjoy the brilliant evening of his well-spent life; and for myself, conscious of but one desire, faithfully to serve my country, I throw myself without fear on its justice and its kindness. Beyond that I only look to the gracious protection of the Divine Being whose strengthening support I humbly solicit, and whom I fervently pray to look down upon us all. May it be among the dispensations of His providence to bless our beloved country with honors and with length of days. May her ways be ways of pleasantness and all her paths be peace!

总统介绍

马丁·范布伦（Martin Van Buren，1782年12月5日－1862年7月24日）

美国第八任副总统（1833年－1837年）及第八任总统（1837年－1841年）

他是《美国独立宣言》正式签署后出生的第一位总统

他于1782年12月5日生于纽约州肯德胡克，祖籍荷兰。是第一位荷兰裔美国总统。14岁，他当了律师助手，后来成为县法官，州参议员。

1821年，范布伦当选为美国参议员，后又担任帝十一任纽约州州长。杰克逊总统第一任时，范布伦进入内阁任国务卿。1832年范布伦被提名为克逊的副总统（第八任美国副总统），并于1835年被提名为总统候选人。

1836年，范布伦击败辉格党(现共和党前身)的四名对手，当选为总统。四年后竞选连任未成。范布伦从杰克逊手中接下来的麻烦比荣譬更多。他忠实地执行他前任的政策，但是得到的却是令人头疼的经济萧条。

1 8 3 7 年范布伦上台后，美国爆发了严重的经济危机。他提出独立国库制度等措施。在他四年任期内，美国和加拿大边界发生严重冲突，最后签订了《韦伯斯特—阿斯伯顿条约》。由于严重的经济萧条延续多年，人民对范布伦失去信心。1 8 4 0 年他竞选连任时，败于哈里森。后来又两度参加竞选，都遭到失败，从此退出政坛，影息故乡。

1862年7月24日，他于肯德胡克附近自己的庄园中去世。