But in the House his advantage was much greater, for among the members of the Opposition was the most brilliant array of great orators ever assembled in a single Congress. John Quincy Adams had reëntered public life as a Representative from Quincy—as full of fire and pepper as ever in his youth; Edward Everett, the most scholarly and polished orator of his generation; Rufus Choate, the greatest forensic orator the Republic has produced; Richard Henry Wilde, who combined the qualities of a graceful poet, a vigorous debater and eloquent orator, and a sound scholar; Tom Corwin, the wit and the slashing master of polemics; and greater perhaps than all, as a congressional orator, the fiery and indomitable George McDuffie of South Carolina.

And against this combination the best the Administration could do was to put forth the commonplace plodder James K. Polk, assisted by Churchill C. Cambreleng of New York.

If Jackson had the advantage of position, Clay had all the prestige of genius on his side. Thus the two parties faced each other for the battle.

III

A less provocative Message than that with which Jackson opened the Congress could hardly have been penned. It was conciliatory and in good taste. But Clay’s voice was for war. It was his determination that something should “turn up,” if he had to turn it up, for the purposes of the election, and he had instilled his spirit into his followers. Instantly the gage of battle was thrown down in the consideration of the nomination of Van Buren as Minister to England. A pettier piece of party politics is scarcely found in the history of the Senate. Among all the Opposition Senators, there were probably none who doubted his capacity or questioned his integrity. With the Calhoun faction it was personal spite; with Clay, Webster, and Clayton it was partisan spleen. Six months before, Van Buren had ridden out of Washington with Jackson by his side, and had sailed for England. In London he was at once received into the most brilliant society. He became an intimate of the Duke of Wellington, and Talleyrand, Ambassador from France, cultivated him, while Rogers, the poet, entertained him frequently at his famous breakfasts. He had been charged with an important mission—nothing less than the negotiation of an agreement that would prevent the recurrence of the causes of estrangement between the two peoples growing out of the occurrences incidental to England’s participation in European wars.[385] Welcomed to the most exclusive drawing-rooms, cultivated by the most powerful of English statesmen, with the prestige in London of having adjusted, while in the State Department, the long-standing differences relative to the West Indian trade, he was in position to achieve triumphs for his country when his nomination was sent to the Senate.

And there, Clay, Webster, and Calhoun eagerly awaited its coming. They had been busily engaged for weeks in preparing the attack. Each drew all his particular friends into the conspiracy, many of them entering reluctantly rather than incur their displeasure. The charges against Van Buren were transparently political. The Calhoun faction were prepared to contend that he had engineered the quarrel of the President and the Vice-President and had disrupted the Cabinet. Clay’s special point was to be that he had introduced the policy of proscription, destined to destroy American institutions, and he was to join with Webster in viciously assailing him for his instructions to our Minister to England in the negotiations on the West Indian trade.

The latter reason for refusing to confirm the nomination of Van Buren was the only one that rose to the dignity of a pretense. For some time the United States had been negotiating with London for the opening of trade in American vessels between this country and the British possessions, but without success. During the preceding Administration, while Clay was Secretary of State, extravagant claims were advanced by the American Government, and, by angering England, had only served to make a settlement more remote. When Van Buren became Secretary of State, and McLane was sent to London, he was charged with the duty of reopening negotiations, and was given certain instructions for his guidance. Among these was the abandonment of the untenable claims of Clay, and the concession of the British point of view upon them. This was denounced as a weakness and a surrender, and as an intentional reflection upon the previous Administration for party purposes. As a matter of record, the instructions furnished McLane by Van Buren were predicated upon the report submitted to Clay, after the failure of the preceding negotiations, by Albert Gallatin, the Minister to England under Adams.[386] It consequently follows that when Clay, thoroughly familiar with his own Minister’s report to him, and with the fact that Van Buren had merely followed it in his preparation of the instructions, vehemently denounced the latter for deliberately and maliciously reflecting upon the previous Administration, he was tricking the Senate and the country. He, at least, knew better. And the mere fact that McLane was further instructed to stress the fact that the preceding Administration had been repudiated by the people at the polls, and the new régime should not be held accountable for the mistakes of the old, while in doubtful taste, was scarcely an offense so heinous as to justify the proposed humiliation of Van Buren.[387] The other charges had less substance. It has never been convincingly shown that Van Buren had any part in engineering the quarrel between Jackson and Calhoun, and years after retiring from the Presidency, Jackson solemnly exonerated him from any complicity.[388] Equally unproved, and unprovable, was the claim that he had precipitated the Cabinet crisis, and the charge that he had introduced the policy of proscription might well have emanated from some one other than Clay.

The clear intent of the conspiracy was to destroy Van Buren and his prospects for the Presidency.

When the nomination reached the Senate, nothing was done for five weeks. Meanwhile the leaders of the conspiracy were carefully preparing their speeches for publication and wide distribution. On the submission of the report, the venom behind the remarkable procrastination was revealed in a resolution, entrusted to one of the lesser lights,[389] to recommit the nomination with instructions to investigate the disruption of the Cabinet and whether Van Buren had “participated in any practices disreputable to the national character.” This, offered as a weak contribution to the attempt to blacken Van Buren’s reputation, having served its purpose, was withdrawn without action. Then the orators began. One after another, with a cheap simulation of sorrowful regret over the necessity of injuring an amiable man, poured forth his protest against the nomination. Clay, of course, made a slashing onslaught. Webster confined himself to attacking the victim because of his instructions to McLane. Clayton and Ewing, Hayne and seven others recited their elaborately prepared partisan harangues under the approving eye of Calhoun in the chair.

The principal reply, and only four were made, was that of Senator John Forsyth, the accomplished floor leader of the Administration, and one of the most eloquent and resourceful of men. He vigorously protested against a partisan crucifixion, and sarcastically commended the fine public spirit of Senators who could voluntarily bring such distress upon themselves to serve the public good. This fling went home to many. Hayne, in later years, admitted that he had spoken and voted against his judgment at the behest of party,[390] and John Tyler, who was incapable of a pose, voted for the confirmation, “not that I liked the man overmuch,” but because he could find no principle to justify his rejection, and did not care to join “the notoriously factious opposition ... who oppose everything favored by the Administration.”[391] Indeed, the cooler and wiser heads among the enemies of the Administration considered the attack a serious political blunder. Adams, on learning of the plan, warned that “to reject the nomination would bring him [Van Buren] back with increased power to do mischief here.”[392] And Thurlow Weed, of the “Albany Journal,” uncannily wise and prophetic, sounded a solemn warning through his editorial columns that such persecution of Van Buren “would change the complexion of his prospects from despair to hope.” The plan persisted in, and “he would return home as a persecuted man, and throw himself upon the sympathy of the party, be nominated for Vice-President, and huzzahed into office at the heels of General Jackson.”[393]