The couple had no children. Whig politics Before the Civil War, Borie had a slight connection to politics. He championed Whig Party policies and favored protectionist international trade. In 1843, Borie was consul to Belgium. When the Whig Party dissolved in the mid-1850s, Borie became a Republican. Civil War In 1860, Borie supported Republican candidate Abraham Lincoln during the presidential election of 1860. At the outbreak of the Civil War Borie ardently supported the Union cause and Lincoln's presidency. He was a founding member and one-time vice-president of Philadelphia's Union League, and guided the recruiting and equipping of several regiments, inspiring Unionist sentiment. The Philadelphia Union League assumed national importance and inspired other cities to create similar organizations to support the Union war effort against the Confederacy. During the war, Borie became an intimate of Union General Ulysses S. Grant. Secretary of Navy 1869 On March 5, 1869, now-President Grant nominated Borie to be Secretary of the Navy. Grant often appointed people who were non-elected or personal friends. For his first cabinet, Grant did not seek advice from Senators in his selections, partly out of national unity, and partly out of his military training to choose cabinet members as subordinates. A few of his nominees were exceptional in their service, most notably his effective Secretary of State Hamilton Fish, Secretary of the Treasury Benjamin Bristow, and Attorney General Alphonso Taft. But, in his initial stages of choosing his 1869 cabinet, it was a hit-or-miss matter. Borie had been very friendly to Grant on a visit to Philadelphia that he chaired. Grant, considering that he owed something to Borie and to the Republicans in the Keystone State announced that there would be a man from Pennsylvania in his cabinet. When pressed for details ("was it a member of the Republican machine under Simon Cameron?") Grant's sense of humor took over and he became mysterious, talking about a "man from Philadelphia". The question of who was this "man from Philadelphia" bothered the public, but the revelation it was Borie was met with amazement. Nobody had ever heard of him outside of Philadelphia. Borie had little interest in public office, and freely admitted that Admiral David Dixon Porter was the actual manager. Renaming ships controversy Borie disliked the Native American Indian names borne by so many United States Navy ships of the post-American Civil War era, and during his very short term as