A Biography of Henry Clay, the Senator from Kentucky / Containing Also, a Complete Report of All His Speeches; Selections From His Private Correspondence; Eulogies in the Senate and House; and a Poem, by George D. Prentice, Esq.

by Unknown

Is the fact, then, of a plurality to have no weight? Far from it. Here are twenty-four communities united under a common government. The expression of the will of any one of them is entitled to the most respectful attention. It ought to be patiently heard and kindly regarded by the others; but it cannot be admitted to be conclusive upon them. The expression of the will of ninety-nine out of two hundred and sixty-one electors, is entitled to very great attention, but that will cannot be considered as entitled to control the will of the one hundred and sixty-two electors who have manifested a different will. To give it such controlling influence, would be a subversion of the fundamental maxim of the republic—that the majority should govern. The will of the ninety-nine can neither be allowed rightfully to control the remaining one hundred and sixty-two, nor any one of the one hundred and sixty-two electoral votes. It may be an argument, a persuasion, addressed to all and to each of them, but it is binding and obligatory upon none. It follows, then, that the fact of a plurality was only one among the various considerations which the house wascalled upon to weigh, in making up its judgment. And the weight of the consideration ought to have been regulated by the extent of the plurality. As between general Jackson and Mr. Adams, the vote standing in the proportions of ninety-nine to eighty-four, it was entitled to less weight; as between the general and Mr. Crawford, it was entitled to more, the vote being as ninety-nine to forty-one. The concession may even be made that, upon the supposition of an equality of pretensions between competing candidates, the preponderance ought to be given to the fact of a plurality.

With these views of the relative state of the vote with which the three returned candidates entered the house, I proceeded to examine the other considerations which belonged to the question. For Mr. Crawford, who barely entered the house, with only four votes more than one candidate not returned, and upon whose case, therefore, the argument derived from the fact of plurality operated with strong, though not decisive force, I have ever felt much personal regard. But I was called upon to perform a solemn public duty, in which my private feelings, whether of affection or aversion, were not to be indulged, but the good of my country only consulted. It appeared to me that the precarious state of that gentleman’s health, although I participated with his best friends in all their regrets and sympathies on account of it, was conclusive against him, to say nothing of other considerations of a public nature, which would have deserved examination if, happily, in that respect he had been differently circumstanced. He had been ill near eighteen months; and, although I am aware that his actual condition was a fact depending upon evidence, and that the evidence in regard to it, which had been presented to the public, was not perfectly harmonious, I judged for myself upon what I saw and heard. He may, and I ardently hope will, recover; but I did not think it became me to assist in committing the executive administration of this great republic, on the doubtful contingency of the restoration to health of a gentleman who had been so long and so seriously afflicted. Moreover, if, under all the circumstances of his situation, his election had been desirable, I did not think it practicable. I believed, and yet believe, that, if the votes of the western states, given to Mr. Adams, had been conferred on Mr. Crawford, the effect would have been to protract in the house the decision of the contest, to the great agitation and distraction of the country, and possibly to defeat an election altogether; the very worst result, I thought, that could happen. It appeared to me, then, that, sooner or later, we must arrive at the only practical issue of the contest before us, and that was between Mr. Adams and general Jackson, and I thought that the earlier we got there, the better for the country, and for the house.

In considering this only alternative, I was not unaware of your strong desire to have a western president; but I thought that Iknew enough of your patriotism and magnanimity, displayed on so many occasions, to believe that you could rise above the mere gratification of sectional pride, if the common good of the whole required you to make the sacrifice of local partiality. I solemnly believed it did, and this brings me to the most important consideration which belonged to the whole subject—that arising out of the respective fitness of the only two real competitors, as it appeared to my best judgment. In speaking of general Jackson, I am aware of the delicacy and respect which are justly due to that distinguished citizen. It is far from my purpose to attempt to disparage him. I could not do it if I were capable of making the attempt; but I shall nevertheless speak of him, as becomes me, with truth. I did not believe him so competent to discharge the various, intricate, and complex duties of the office of chief magistrate, as his competitor. He has displayed great skill and bravery, as a military commander, and his own renown will endure as long as the means exist of preserving a recollection of human transactions. But to be qualified to discharge the duties of president of the United States, the incumbent must have more than mere military attainments—he must be a STATESMAN. An individual may be a gallant and successful general, an eminent lawyer, an eloquent divine, a learned physician, or an accomplished artist; and doubtless the union of all these characters in the person of a chief magistrate would be desirable, but no one of them, nor all combined, will qualify him to be president, unless he superadds that indispensable requisite of being a statesman. Far from meaning to say that it is an objection to the elevation to the chief magistracy of any person, that he is a military commander, if he unites the other qualifications, I only intend to say that, whatever may be the success or splendor of his military achievements, if his qualifications be only military, that is an objection, and I think a decisive objection, to his election. If general Jackson has exhibited, either in the councils of the union, or in those of his own state, or in those of any other state or territory, the qualities of a statesman, the evidence of the fact has escaped my observation. It would be as painful as it is unnecessary, to recapitulate some of the incidents, which must be fresh in your recollection, of his public life. But I was greatly deceived in my judgment if they proved him to be endowed with that prudence, temper, and discretion, which are necessary for civil administration. It was in vain to remind me of the illustrious example of Washington. There was in that extraordinary person, united, a serenity of mind, a cool and collected wisdom, a cautious and deliberate judgment, a perfect command of the passions, and, throughout his whole life, a familiarity and acquaintance with business, and civil transactions, which rarely characterize any human being. No man was ever more deeply penetrated than he was, with profound respect for the safeand necessary principle of the entire subordination of the military to the civil authority. I hope I do no injustice to general Jackson when I say, that I could not recognise, in his public conduct, those attainments, for both civil government and military command, which contemporaries and posterity have alike unanimously concurred in awarding as yet only to the father of his country. I was sensible of the gratitude which the people of this country justly feel towards general Jackson, for his brilliant military services. But the impulses of public gratitude should be controlled, as it appeared to me, by reason and discretion, and I was not prepared blindly to surrender myself to the hazardous indulgence of a feeling, however amiable and excellent that feeling may be, when properly directed. It did not seem to me to be wise or prudent, if, as I solemnly believe, general Jackson’s competency for the office was highly questionable, that he should be placed in a situation where neither his fame nor the public interests would be advanced. General Jackson himself would be the last man to recommend or vote for any one for a place for which he thought him unfit. I felt myself sustained by his own reasoning, in his letter to Mr. Monroe, in which, speaking of the qualifications of our venerable Shelby for the department of war, he remarked: ‘I am compelled to say to you, that the acquirements of this worthy man are not competent to the discharge of the multiplied duties of this department. I therefore hope he may not accept the appointment. I am fearful, if he does, he will not add much splendor to his present well-earned standing as a public character.’ Such was my opinion of general Jackson, in reference to the presidency. His conviction of governor Shelby’s unfitness, by the habits of his life, for the appointment of secretary of war, were not more honest nor stronger than mine were of his own want of experience, and the necessary civil qualifications to discharge the duties of a president of the United States. In his elevation to this office, too, I thought I perceived the establishment of a fearful precedent; and I am mistaken in all the warnings of instructive history, if I erred in my judgment. Undoubtedly there are other and many dangers to public liberty, besides that which proceeds from military idolatry; but I have yet to acquire the knowledge of it, if there be one more perilous, or more frequent.

Whether Mr. Adams would or would not have been my choice of a president, if I had been left freely to select from the whole mass of American citizens, was not the question submitted to my decision. I had no such liberty; but I was circumscribed, in the selection I had to make, to one of the three gentlemen whom the people themselves had thought proper to present to the house of representatives. Whatever objections might be supposed to exist against him, still greater appeared to me to apply to his competitor. Of Mr. Adams, it is but truth and justice to say, that he is highlygifted, profoundly learned, and long and greatly experienced in public affairs, at home and abroad. Intimately conversant with the rise and progress of every negotiation with foreign powers, pending or concluded; personally acquainted with the capacity and attainments of most of the public men of this country, whom it might be proper to employ in the public service; extensively possessed of much of that valuable kind of information which is to be acquired neither from books nor tradition, but which is the fruit of largely participating in public affairs; discreet and sagacious; he would enter upon the duties of the office with great advantages. I saw in his election the establishment of no dangerous example. I saw in it, on the contrary, only conformity to the safe precedents which had been established in the instances of Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Madison, and Mr. Monroe, who had respectively filled the same office from which he was to be translated.

A collateral consideration of much weight, was derived from the wishes of the Ohio delegation. A majority of it, during the progress of the session, made up their opinions to support Mr. Adams, and they were communicated to me. They said, ‘Ohio supported the candidate who was the choice of Kentucky. We failed in our common exertions to secure his election. Now, among those returned, we have a decided preference, and we think you ought to make some sacrifice to gratify us.’ Was not much due to our neighbor and friend?

I considered, with the greatest respect, the resolution of the general assembly of Kentucky, requesting the delegation to vote for general Jackson. That resolution, it is true, placed us in a peculiar situation. Whilst every other delegation, from every other state in the union, was left by its legislature entirely free to examine the pretensions of all the candidates, and to form its unbiased judgment, the general assembly of Kentucky thought proper to interpose, and request the delegation to give its vote to one of the candidates, whom they were pleased to designate. I felt a sincere desire to comply with a request emanating from a source so respectable, if I could have done so consistently with those paramount duties which I owed to you and to the country. But, after full and anxious consideration, I found it incompatible with my best judgment of those duties, to conform to the request of the general assembly. The resolution asserts, that it was the wish of the people of Kentucky, that their delegation should vote for the general. It did not inform me by what means that body had arrived at a knowledge of the wish of the people. I knew that its members had repaired to Frankfort before I departed from home to come to Washington. I knew that their attention was fixed on important local concerns, well entitled, by their magnitude, exclusively to engross it. No election, no general expression of the popular sentiment, had occurred since that in November, whenelectors were chosen, and at that the people, by an overwhelming majority, had decided against general Jackson. I could not see how such an expression against him, could be interpreted into that of a desire for his election. If, as is true, the candidate whom they preferred was not returned to the house, it is equally true that the state of the contest, as it presented itself here to me, had never been considered, discussed, and decided by the people of Kentucky, in their collective capacity. What would have been their decision on this new state of the question, I might have undertaken to conjecture, but the certainty of any conclusion of fact, as to their opinion, at which I could arrive, was by no means equal to that certainty of conviction of my duty to which I was carried by the exertion of my best and most deliberate reflections. The letters from home, which some of the delegation received, expressed the most opposite opinions, and there were not wanting instances of letters from some of the very members who had voted for that resolution, advising a different course. I received from a highly respectable portion of my constituents a paper, instructing me as follows:

‘We, the undersigned voters in the congressional district, having viewed the instruction or request of the legislature of Kentucky, on the subject of choosing a president and vice-president of the United States, with regret, and the said request or instruction to our representative in congress from this district being without our knowledge or consent, we, for many reasons known to ourselves, connected with so momentous an occasion, hereby instruct our representative in congress to vote on this occasion agreeably to his own judgment, and the best lights he may have on the subject, with or without the consent of the legislature of Kentucky.’

This instruction came both unexpectedly and unsolicited by me, and it was accompanied by letters assuring me that it expressed the opinion of a majority of my constituents. I could not, therefore, regard the resolution as conclusive evidence of your wishes.

Viewed as a mere request, as it purported to be, the general assembly doubtless had the power to make it. But, then, with deference, I think it was worthy of serious consideration, whether the dignity of the general assembly ought not to have induced it to forbear addressing itself, not to another legislative body, but to a small part of it, and requesting the members who composed that part, in a case which the constitution had confided to them, to vote according to the wishes of the general assembly, whether those wishes did or did not conform to their sense of duty. I could not regard the resolution as an instruction; for, from the origin of our state, its legislature has never assumed or exercised the right to instruct the representatives in congress. I did not recognise the right, therefore, of the legislature, to instruct me. I recognised that right only when exerted by you. That the portion of the public servants who made up the general assembly, have no right to instruct that portion of them who constituted the Kentucky delegationin the house of representatives, is a proposition too clear to be argued. The members of the general assembly would have been the first to behold as a presumptuous interposition, any instruction, if the Kentucky delegation could have committed the absurdity to issue, from this place, any instruction to them to vote in a particular manner on any of the interesting subjects which lately engaged their attention at Frankfort. And although nothing is further from my intention than to impute either absurdity or presumption to the general assembly, in the adoption of the resolution referred to, I must say, that the difference between an instruction emanating from them to the delegation, and from the delegation to them, is not in principle, but is to be found only in the degree of superior importance which belongs to the general assembly.

Entertaining these views of the election on which it was made my duty to vote, I felt myself bound, in the exercise of my best judgment, to prefer Mr. Adams; and I accordingly voted for him. I should have been highly gratified if it had not been my duty to vote on the occasion; but that was not my situation, and I did not choose to shrink from any responsibility which appertained to your representative. Shortly after the election, it was rumored that Mr. Kremer was preparing a publication, and the preparations for it which were making excited much expectation. Accordingly, on the twenty-sixth of February, the address, under his name, to the ‘electors of the ninth congressional district of the state of Pennsylvania,’ made its appearance in the Washington City Gazette. No member of the house, I am persuaded, believed that Mr. Kremer ever wrote one paragraph of that address, or of the plea, which was presented to the committee, to the jurisdiction of the house. Those who counselled him, and composed both papers, and their purposes, were just as well known as the author of any report from a committee to the house. The first observation which is called for by the address is the place of its publication. That place was in this city, remote from the centre of Pennsylvania, near which Mr. Kremer’s district is situated, and in a paper having but a very limited, if any circulation in it. The time is also remarkable. The fact that the president intended to nominate me to the senate for the office which I now hold, in the course of a few days, was then well known, and the publication of the address was, no doubt, made less with an intention to communicate information to the electors of the ninth congressional district of Pennsylvania, than to affect the decision of the senate on the intended nomination. Of the character and contents of that address of Messrs. George Kremer & Co., made up, as it is, of assertion without proof, of inferences without premises, and of careless, jocose, and quizzing conversations of some of my friends, to which I was no party, and of which I had never heard, it is not my intention to say much. It carried its own refutation, and the parties concerned saw its abortivenature the next day, in the indignant countenance of every unprejudiced and honorable member. In his card, Mr. Kremer had been made to say, that he held himself ready ‘to prove, to the satisfaction of unprejudiced minds, enough to satisfy them of the accuracy of the statements which are contained in that letter, to the extent that they concerned the course of conduct of H. Clay.’ The object for excluding my friends from this pledge has been noticed. But now the election was decided, and there no longer existed a motive for discrimination between them and me. Hence the only statements that are made, in the address, having the semblance of proof, relate rather to them than to me; and the design was, by establishing something like facts upon them, to make those facts react upon me.