Before this time, Colonel Adam L. Bingaman, of Adams County, had been the acknowledged leader of this party. He was a man of rare qualifications for a popular leader—highly gifted by nature in mind and personal appearance, which was most splendid and commanding, with a polished education and fascinating manners, and by nature an orator. Added to these advantages, he was a native of the State, the representative of great wealth, and with extensive family influence. These two met as friends personally and politically in the Legislature.
Prentiss—though known as a great lawyer and a powerful advocate at the Bar—had until now taken but little part in politics. None knew of his proficiency as a politician or as a popular political orator, and, long accustomed to the eloquence and the debating abilities of Bingaman, the lead was accorded to him as usual. Party excitement was fierce, and involved every one. The Democracy, armed with numbers and men of great abilities, felt secure in their position. They had no fears that any powers possessed by any man or set of men could operate a change in public opinion dangerous to their supremacy in the State.
Socially, Prentiss knew no party distinction. With all who were gentlemen he mingled, not as a partisan, but as a man. The kindness of his nature won upon all equally, and it was soon discovered that a personal favor to Prentiss would sometimes override party allegiance. His personal friends were all gentlemen, and once within the magic influence of his social circle was enough to bind him to the heart of every one. The session had made but little progress before his powers as an orator were beginning to be felt.
During an exciting debate, in which Bingaman had, as usual, taken the lead, when all the ablest of the Democracy had, as they supposed, exhausted the argument and demolished the position of their adversaries, and the House seemed impatient for the question, Prentiss rose, and claimed the attention of the chair. His clear and succinct statement of the pending question put a new phase upon it, and the House seemed surprised.
He proceeded then to debate the question; and very soon he was in medias res, and his bold and lucid argument won the attention of every one. The position of the Democracy was dissected to the separation of every fibre; its character and future effects denounced and exposed in a strain of invective eloquence which thrilled to every heart. Turning from this to the national policy of the Democracy, then in power, and which the measure under consideration was intended to aid and sustain, his powers seemed to expand with the magnitude of the subject, as he went on to analyze the policy and the measures of the Government, and to demonstrate the disastrous consequences which must follow these remotely, if not immediately, corrupting, undermining, and ultimately destroying the Constitution, and, of consequence, the Government. He spoke for three hours; his peroration was so grandly eloquent as to bring down the House and galleries in a round of applause.
From that day forward, Prentiss was the great man of the House and of the State. A fire in a prairie never spread or ran faster than his fame; it was on every tongue, in every newspaper. Such fame from one speech had never been won by any man in America, save Patrick Henry. Single-speech Hamilton, of the British Parliament, astonished England; but he was never afterward heard of, and is known to this day as "single-speech Hamilton." As with Henry, this was but the beginning of a fame which was to grow and expand into giant proportions. Prentiss was now a national man. Soon after this, he visited Boston and New York during an exciting political campaign. Throughout the North, wherever he appeared and spoke, he bore the palm from every rival.
The speech of Prentiss in Faneuil Hall will long be remembered as perhaps the finest specimen of oratory ever listened to in that venerable hall. It was at the time said by the men of the North to surpass the best efforts of Fisher Ames. Subsequently he spoke in New York, and for three hours held spell-bound an immense audience.
The writer was informed by a venerable judge, of New Jersey, that he had never believed any man possessed such powers of oratory as to interest him and chain his attention for that length of time. Hearing this young man from the wilds of Mississippi could do so, he embraced the first opportunity of hearing him. When he reached the place, he found the assemblage very great, and with difficulty he succeeded in reaching a point where he might hear well. He was unable to procure a seat, and was compelled to stand, thoroughly jammed by the crowd. He took out his watch to time him, as he commenced, and noting the minute, he essayed to replace his watch: something said arrested his attention and his hands from their work of putting the watch in its fob.
"There was something, sir, in his eye," said he, "which startled me, and then the words came bubbling up spontaneously as spring water, so full of power, so intensely brilliant, and his figures so bold, original, and illustrating, and the one following the other in such quick succession; the flights of imagination, so new, so eloquent, and so heart-searching—that I found it impossible to take my eyes from his face, or my ears from drinking in every word. At one time, so intense were my feelings under the effect of his words and the powerful impression they were making on my mind, that I thought I should faint. I forgot the presence of the crowd, and, though seventy years of age, felt no fatigue from my standing position. In truth, sir, I was unconscious of the time—equally so of the presence of any one but the speaker. I perceived that his physical man was failing under his effort, and so intense was my sympathy that I found myself breathing rapidly and painfully; and yet, when he exclaimed, 'My powers fail!' and sank into his seat completely exhausted, I regretted the necessity which compelled him to stop. It was not until then that I found my hand still holding my watch at the opening of its pocket, where, in my excitement, I had forgotten to deposit it. I looked, and I had been standing unmoved in the same position and intently listening for three hours and fifteen minutes. Near me stood one old as myself—a friend, a neighbor, and a minister of the gospel; he was livid with excitement, and his lips trembled as he said to me: 'Will you ever doubt again that God inspires man?'"
Notwithstanding the immense Democratic majority in the State, the Whigs determined to run Prentiss for Congress: the election, at that time, was by general ticket, and there were two members to be elected: the Whig nomination was Prentiss and Wood; the Democratic, Claiborne and Gholson.