The bride's family were staunch Whigs, a party largely formed to oppose Andrew Jackson, whom Pierce revered. Socially, Jane Pierce was reserved and shy, the polar opposite of her new husband. Above all, she was a committed devotee of the temperance movement.  She detested Washington and usually refused to live there, even after Franklin Pierce became a U.S. Senator in 1837.

^ Wallner 2004, pp. 79–80

^ Wallner 2004, pp. 241–244

^ Wallner 2004, pp. 47–57

^ Jump up to: a b Wallner 2004, pp. 57–59

^ Wallner 2004, p. 92

^ Wallner 2004, pp. 71–72

^ Wallner 2004, p. 67

^ Lamb, Brian; Wallner, Peter (October 25, 2004). "Interview with Peter Wallner: Franklin Pierce: New Hampshire's Favorite Son". C-SPAN. 00:55:56. He also thought - and he sincerely believed this - that if the North hadn't attacked the South so much for being for this moral sin of slavery, that the South eventually over time would have ended slavery on its own, that he felt that the Civil War was unnecessary. And he always said that, and he never took that back, even at the height of the war itself. 