A Gentlemen’s Agreement at the White House

[Gerald]

Five Southern gentlemen came calling, anxious to speak with the president of what was, as far as they were concerned, on the brink of becoming a foreign country. For the moment, they all remained American citizens – and members of Congress, no less. But that was a mere technicality. As they strode up the steps to James Buchanan’s second-floor office, they carried themselves with a dignity befitting the founding fathers of a new nation: the independent Republic of South Carolina.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/07/a-gentlemens-agreement-at-the-white-house/?src=me&ref=opinion