Monroe’s return to the paths of promotion had been steady and even rapid. In 1808 he was the rival candidate for the Presidency, on the ground that he leaned toward reconciliation with England, while Madison leaned toward France. Without wholly abandoning this attitude, Monroe was invited to become the Republican governor of Virginia; and when attacked for his want of sympathy with Madison, he made explanations, both public and private, which so much irritated his old friend John Randolph as to draw from him a letter, Jan. 14, 1811,[285] telling Monroe of reports industriously circulated, “that in order to promote your election to the chief magistracy of this Commonwealth, you have descended to unbecoming compliances with the members of the Assembly, not excepting your bitterest personal enemies; that you have volunteered explanations to them of the differences heretofore subsisting between yourself and the Administration which amount to a dereliction of the ground which you took after your return from England, and even of your warmest personal friends.” The charge was never answered to Randolph’s satisfaction.[286] Monroe could not publicly avow that he had made a succession of mistakes, partly under Randolph’s influence, which he wished to correct and forget; but on this tacit understanding he was elected governor of Virginia, and for the rest of his life became to John Randolph an object of little esteem considering the confidence and admiration he had so long inspired.
More than most men, Randolph could claim the merits of his own defects. If he was morbidly proud and sensitive, he was at least quick to understand when he had lost a friend. Of him Monroe rid himself without trouble; but Monroe labored under the misfortune that his other oldest and best friends were of the same political stamp. Chief among these, the Mentor of Virginia politics, was John Taylor of Caroline,—a man whose high character, consistent opinions, and considerable abilities made him a valuable ally. Another was Littleton Walker Tazewell. To them, after the rupture with Randolph, Monroe wrote, excusing his course in becoming the Republican candidate for governor, and reasserting in sufficiently strong terms his want of confidence in President Madison:[287]—
“I fear, if the system of policy which has been so long persevered in, after so many proofs of its dangerous tendency, is still adhered to, that a crisis will arise the dangers of which will require all the virtue, firmness, and talents of our country to avert. And that it will be persevered in seems too probable while the present men remain in power.... And if the blame of improvident and injudicious measures is ever to attach to them among the people, it must be by leaving to the authors of those measures the entire responsibility belonging to them.”
Within six weeks after this letter had been written, Monroe was asked to join the men in power, and to share the blame of those “improvident and injudicious measures,” the responsibility for which ought, as he conceived, to be left entirely to their authors. He wrote at once to Colonel Taylor for advice; and the reply threw much light on the personal and public motives supposed to guide the new Secretary of State. Colonel Taylor advised Monroe to accept the President’s invitation, for several reasons.[288] Assuming that Monroe was to succeed Madison as the next Republican candidate for the Presidency, he took for granted that Monroe was to follow the lines of his old opinions, and to correct Madison’s leanings toward France.
“Our foreign relations,” continued Taylor, “seem to be drawing to a crisis, and you ought to be in the public eye when it happens, for your own sake, independently of the services you can render your country. It is probable that this crisis will occur on a full discovery that France will not do our commerce any substantial good without an equivalent which would amount to its destruction. So soon as this discovery is made, the Government, in all its departments, will alter its policy, and your occupancy of a conspicuous station will shed upon you the glory of its having come round to your opinion.”
Colonel Taylor gave no thought to the opposite possibility that Monroe might come round to the opinion of the Government; yet his argument seemed to place Monroe in a position where, if he could not convert Madison, he would have no choice but to let Madison convert him.
“This offer to you is an indication of a disposition in Mr. Madison to relieve himself of the burden [of certain persons and measures]; and if you suffer yourself to lose the benefit of this disposition, another will gain it to your inestimable injury. Suppose this other should be a competitor for the Presidency, will it not be a decisive advantage over you? General Armstrong is probably taking measures for this object.... One consideration of great weight is that the public think you an honest man. If this opinion is true, the acceptance seems to be a duty toward relieving it from the suspicion that there are too many avaricious or ambitious intriguers of apparent influence in the government. I suppose the President and Gallatin (whom I know) to be wholly guided by what they think to be the public good; and should you happen to concur with them, it will abate much of the jealousy (though I hope it will never be smothered) with which Executive designs are viewed; and to moderate it, under the perilous situation of the country, is in my view desirable.”
The country reached a perilous pass when John Taylor of Caroline made plans to strengthen the Executive; but he could not have calculated on Monroe’s readiness to follow this course so far as it ended in leading him. Taylor’s advice threw Monroe into the full current of Executive influence. Alliance with Madison and Gallatin, rupture with France, antagonism to the Smiths and Clintons, jealousy of Armstrong, and defiance of Duane were sound policy, and united honesty with self-interest; but their success depended on elements that Taylor could not measure.
That Monroe shared these views, that they were in fact the common stock of his personal party, might be seen not only in his previous letters, but even more in his reply to Senator Brent,[289] written March 18.
“You intimate,” said Monroe to Brent, “that the situation of the country is such as to leave me no alternative. I am aware that our public affairs are far from being in a tranquil and secure state. I may add that there is much reason to fear that a crisis is approaching of a very dangerous tendency,—one which menaces the overthrow of the whole Republican party. Is the Administration impressed with this sentiment, and prepared to act on it? Are things in such a state as to allow the Administration to take the whole subject into consideration, and to provide for the safety of the country and of free government by such measures as circumstances may require, and a comprehensive view of them suggest? Or are we pledged by what is already done to remain spectators of the interior movement, in the expectation of some change abroad as the ground on which we are to act? I have no doubt, from my knowledge of the President and Mr. Gallatin,—with the former of whom I have been long and intimately connected in friendship, and for both of whom, in great and leading points of character, I have the highest consideration and respect,—that if I came into the Government the utmost cordiality would subsist between us, and that any opinions which I might entertain and express respecting our public affairs would receive, so far as circumstances would permit, all the attention to which they might be entitled; but if our course is fixed, and the destiny of our country dependent on arrangements already made, I do not perceive how it would be possible for me to render any service at this time in the general government.”