Thank Heaven! thus far, at least, these advocates of availability have been disappointed. The soup societies and the fuss and feather clubs have yet produced but little impression on the public mind. They have failed even to raise enthusiastic shouts among the Whigs, much less to make any apostates from the Democratic ranks.
What a subject it is for felicitation in every patriotic heart, that the days have passed away, I trust, forever, when mere military services, however distinguished, shall be a passport to the chief civil magistracy of the country!
I would lay down this broad and strong proposition, which ought in all future time to be held sacred as an article of Democratic faith, that no man ought ever to be transferred by the people from the chief command of the army of the United States to the highest civil office within their gift. The reasons for this rule of faith to guide the practice of a Republican people are overwhelming.
The annals of mankind, since the creation, demonstrate this solemn truth. The history of all the ruined republics, both of ancient and modern times, teaches us this great lesson. From Cæsar to Cromwell, and from Cromwell to Napoleon, this history presents the same solemn warning,—beware of elevating to the highest civil trust the commander of your victorious armies. Ask the wrecks of the ruined republics scattered all along the tide of time, what occasioned their downfall; and they will answer in sepulchral tones, the elevation of victorious generals to the highest civil power in the State. One common fate from one common cause has destroyed them all. Will mankind never learn wisdom from the experience of past generations? Has history been written in vain? Mr. Clay, in his Baltimore speech of 1827, expressed this great truth in emphatic terms, when he implored the Almighty Governor of the world, “to visit our favored land with war, with pestilence, with famine, with any scourge other than military rule, or a blind and heedless enthusiasm for a military renown.” He was right in the principle, wrong in its application. The hero, the man of men to whom it applied, was then at the Hermitage,—a plain and private farmer of Tennessee. He had responded to the call of his country when war was declared against Great Britain, and had led our armies to victory; but when the danger had passed away, he returned with delight to the agricultural pursuits of his beloved Hermitage. Although, like Franklin Pierce, he had never sought civil offices and honors, yet he was an influential and conspicuous member of the convention which framed the constitution of Tennessee, was their first Representative and their first Senator in Congress,—afterwards a Judge of their Supreme Court,—then again a Senator in Congress, which elevated station he a second time resigned, from a love of retirement. He was brought almost literally from the plough, as Cincinnatus had been, to assume the chief civil command. The same observations would apply to the illustrious and peerless Father of his Country, as well as to General Harrison. They were soldiers, only in the day and hour of danger, when the country demanded their services; and both were elevated from private life, from the shades of Mount Vernon and the North Bend, to the supreme civil magistracy of the country. Neither of them was a soldier by profession, and both had illustrated high civil appointments. General Taylor, it is true, had been a soldier, and always a soldier, but had never risen to the chief command. It remained for the present Whig party to select as their candidate for the Presidency the commanding General of the army, who had been a man of war, and nothing but a man of war from his youth upwards. This party is now straining every nerve to transfer him from the headquarters of the army, to the chair of state, which has been adorned by Washington, Jefferson, Madison and Jackson, without even a momentary resignation of his present high office,—without the least political training,—without any respite, without any breathing time between the highest military and the highest civil honor. With what tremendous force does the solemn warning of Mr. Clay apply to the case of General Scott!
Far be it from me to say or to insinuate that General Scott would have either the ability or the will to play the part of Cæsar, of Cromwell, or of Bonaparte. Still, the precedent is dangerous in the extreme. If these things can be done in the green tree, what will be done in the dry? If the precedent can be established in the comparative infancy and purity of our institutions, of elevating to the Presidency a successful commander-in-chief of our armies, what may be the disastrous consequences when our population shall number one hundred millions, and when our armies in time of war may be counted by hundreds of thousands. In those days, some future military chieftain, desirous of obtaining supreme power by means of an election to the Presidency, may point back to such a precedent and say, that in the earlier and purer days of the Republic, our ancestors did not fear to elevate the commander of their conquering armies to this, the highest civil station. Let us not forge chains in advance for our descendants.
The fathers of the Republic were deeply alive to these great truths. They were warned by the experience of past times that liberty is Hesperian fruit, and can only be preserved by watchful jealousy. Hence in all their constitutions of government, and in all their political writings, we find them inculcating, in the most solemn manner, a jealousy of standing armies and their leaders, and a strict subordination of the military to the civil power. But even if there were no danger to our liberties from such a precedent, the habit of strict obedience and absolute command acquired by the professional soldier throughout a long life, almost necessarily disqualifies him for the administration of our Democratic Republican Government. Civil government is not a mere machine, such as a regular army. In conducting it, allowance must be made for that love of liberty and spirit of independence which characterize our people. Such allowances can never be made,—authority can never be tempered with moderation and discretion, by a professional soldier, who has been accustomed to have his military orders obeyed with the unerring certainty of despotic power.
Again:—What fatal effects would it not have on the discipline and efficiency of the army to have aspirants for the Presidency among its principal officers? How many military cliques would be formed—how much intriguing and electioneering would exist in a body which ought to be a unit, and have no other object in view except to obey the lawful command of the President and to protect and defend the country? If all the political follies of General Scott’s life were investigated, and these are not few, I venture to say that nearly the whole of them have resulted from his long continued aspirations for the Presidency. At last, he has obtained the Whig nomination. He has defeated his own constitutional commander-in-chief. The military power has triumphed over the civil power. The Constitution declares that “the President shall be commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United States,” but the subordinate, the actual commander of the army, has supplanted his superior. What a spectacle is this; and how many serious reflections might it inspire! In times of war and of danger, what fatal consequences might result to the country from the fact, that the President and the commanding General of the army are rival and hostile candidates for the Presidency! But I shall not pursue this train of remark. It is my most serious conviction, that General Scott would have stood far higher, both before the present generation and posterity, had he never been a candidate for the Presidency. The office which he now holds, and deservedly holds, ought to satisfy the ambition of any man. This the American people will determine by a triumphant majority on the first Tuesday of November next. This will prove to be one of the most fortunate events in our history—auspicious at the present time, and still more auspicious for future generations. It will establish a precedent, which will, I trust, prevent future commanders-in-chief of the American army from becoming candidates for the Presidential office.
Again:—To make the army a hot bed for Presidential aspirants will be to unite the powerful influence of all its aspiring officers in favor of foreign wars, as the best means of acquiring military glory, and thus placing themselves in the modern line of safe precedents, as candidates for the Presidency and for other high civil offices. The American people are sufficiently prone to war without any such stimulus. But enough of this.
I shall now proceed to discuss more minutely the civil qualifications of General Scott for the Presidency. It is these which immediately and deeply concern the American people, and not his military glory. Far be it from me, however, to depreciate his military merits. As an American citizen, I am proud of them. They will ever constitute a brilliant page in the historical glory of our country. The triumphant march of the brave army under his command, from Vera Cruz to the city of Mexico, will be ever memorable in our annals. And yet he can never be esteemed the principal hero of the Mexican war. This distinction justly belongs to General Taylor. It was his army which at Palo Alto, Resaca de la Palma, and Monterey, first broke the spirit of the Mexican troops; and the crowning victory of Buena Vista completely disorganized the Mexican army. There Santa Anna, with 20,000 men, the largest, the best and the bravest army which Mexico has ever sent into the field, was routed by less than five thousand of our troops. To the everlasting glory of our volunteer militia, this great, this glorious victory, was achieved by them, assisted by only four hundred and fifty-three regulars. The Mexican army was so disorganized—the spirit of the Mexican people was so subdued, by the unparallelled victory of Buena Vista, that the way was thus opened for the march from Vera Cruz to Mexico. Yet God forbid that I should, in the slightest degree, detract from the glory so justly due to Scott’s army and its distinguished commander in the battles which preceded their triumphant entry into the capital of Mexico.
But I repeat, my present purpose is to deal with General Scott as a civilian—as a candidate for the Presidency, and not as a military commander.