Political Career
Buckner had a keen interest in politics and friends had been urging him to run for governor since 1867, even while terms of his surrender confined him to Louisiana. Unwilling to violate these terms, he instructed a friend to withdraw his name from consideration if it was presented. In 1868, he was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention that nominated Horatio Seymour for president. Though Buckner had favored George H. Pendleton, he loyally supported the party's nominee throughout the campaign.
In 1883, Buckner was a candidate for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination. Other prominent candidates included Congressman Thomas Laurens Jones, former congressman J. Proctor Knott, and Louisville mayor Charles Donald Jacob. Buckner consistently ran third in the first six ballots, but withdrew his name from consideration before the seventh ballot. The delegation from Owsley County switched their support to Knott, starting a wave of defections that resulted in Jones' withdrawal and Knott's unanimous nomination. Knott went on to win the general election and appointed Buckner to the board of trustees for the Kentucky Agricultural and Mechanical College (later the University of Kentucky) in 1884. At that year's state Democratic convention, he served on the committee on credentials.
On June 10, 1885, Buckner married Delia Claiborne of Richmond, Virginia. Buckner was 62; Claiborne was 28. Their son, Simon Bolivar Buckner, Jr., was born on July 18, 1886.
Read more about this topic: Simon Bolivar Buckner
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“He knows nothing and thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)