It was at the last session of the fifteenth Congress, in the winter of 1820-21, when the famous Compromise measure, known as the Missouri Compromise, was effected. A portion of that winter was spent by the writer at Washington. Congress was then composed of the first intellects of the nation, and the measure was causing great excitement throughout the entire country.
Missouri, in obedience to a permissory statute, had framed a constitution, and demanded admission into the Union as a State. By this constitution slavery was recognized as an institution of the State. Objection was made to this clause on the part of the Northern members, which led to protracted and sometimes acrimonious debate. At the first session of the Congress the admission of the State had been postponed, and during the entire second session it had been the agitating question; nor was it until the very end of the session settled by this famous compromise.
The debates were conducted by the ablest men in Congress, in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. In the Senate, William Pinkney, of Maryland; Rufus King, of New York; Harrison Gray Otis, of Massachusetts; James Barbour, of Virginia; William Smith, of South Carolina, and Freeman Walker, of Georgia, were most conspicuous. In the House were John Randolph, of Virginia; William Lowndes, of South Carolina; Louis McLean, of Delaware; Thomas W. Cobb, of Georgia, and Louis Williams, of North Carolina, and many others of less note. Henry Clay, of Kentucky, was Speaker of the House during the first session of the Congress; but resigned before the meeting of the succeeding Congress, and John Taylor, of New York, was elected to preside as Speaker for the second session. Mr. Clay was absent from his seat during the early part of this session; and notwithstanding the eminent men composing the Congress, there seemed a want of some leading and controlling mind to master the difficulty, and calm the threatening excitement which was intensifying as the debate progressed. Mr. Randolph was the leader in the debates of the House, and occupied the floor frequently in the delivery of lengthy and almost always very interesting speeches. These touched every subject connected with the Government, its history, and its powers. They were brilliant and beautiful; full of classical learning and allusion, and sparkling as a casket of diamonds, thrown upon, and rolling along, a Wilton carpet. It seemed to be his pleasure to taunt the opposition to enforce an angry or irritable reply, and then to launch the arrows of his biting wit and sarcasm at whoever dared the response, in such rapid profusion, as to astonish the House, and overwhelm his antagonist.
His person was as unique as his manner. He was tall and extremely slender. His habit was to wear an overcoat extending to the floor, with an upright standing collar which concealed his entire person except his head, which seemed to be set, by the ears, upon the collar of his coat. In early morning it was his habit to ride on horseback. This ride was frequently extended to the hour of the meeting of Congress. When this was the case, he always rode to the Capitol, surrendered his horse to his groom—the ever-faithful Juba, who always accompanied him in these rides—and, with his ornamental riding-whip in his hand, a small cloth or leathern cap perched upon the top of his head, (which peeped out, wan and meagre, from between the openings of his coat-collar,) booted and gloved, he would walk to his seat in the House—then in session—lay down upon his desk his cap and whip, and then slowly remove his gloves. If the matter before the House interested him, and he desired to be heard, he would fix his large, round, lustrous black eyes upon the Speaker, and, in a voice shrill and piercing as the cry of a peacock, exclaim: "Mr. Speaker!" then, for a moment or two, remain looking down upon his desk, as if to collect his thoughts; then lifting his eyes to the Speaker would commence, in a conversational tone, an address that not unfrequently extended through five hours, when he would yield to a motion for adjournment, with the understanding that he was to finish his speech the following day.
He had but few associates. These were all from the South, and very select. With Mr. Macon, Mr. Crawford, Louis Williams, and Mr. Cobb, he was intimate. He was a frequent visitor to the family of Mr. Crawford, then Secretary of the Treasury, where occasionally he met Macon and Cobb, with other friends of Crawford. Macon and Crawford were his models of upright men. He believed Mr. Crawford to be the first intellect of the age, and Mr. Macon the most honest man. The strict honesty of Macon captivated him, as it did most men. His home-spun ideas, his unaffected plainness of dress, and primitive simplicity of manner, combined with a wonderful fund of common sense, went home to the heart of Randolph, and he loved Macon in sincerity.
Macon and Crawford humored his many eccentricities, and would always deferentially listen to him when the humor was on him to talk. It was at such times that Randolph was most interesting. He had read much, and to great advantage; he had travelled, and with an observant eye; he knew more, and he knew it more accurately, than any other man of his country, except, perhaps, that wonderful man, William Lowndes. In his talking moods all the store-house of his information was drafted into service. His command of language was wonderful. The antithetical manner of expressing himself gave piquancy and vim to his conversation, making it very captivating. He was too impatient, and had too much nervous irritability and too rapid a flow of ideas, to indulge in familiar and colloquial conversation. He would talk all, or none. He inaugurated a subject and exhausted it, and there were few who desired more than to listen when he talked. Two or three evenings in the week there would assemble at Mr. Crawford's a few gentlemen, members of Congress. This was especially the case pending the Missouri question, when Mr. Randolph, Mr. Macon, Mr. McLean, Mr. Holmes, of Maine, (a great admirer of Mr. Crawford,) Mr. Lowndes, and sometimes one or two gentlemen from Pennsylvania, would be present. At these meetings this question was the first and principal topic, and Mr. Randolph would engross the entire conversation for an hour, when he would almost universally rise, bid good-night, and leave. At other times he would listen attentively, without uttering a word, particularly when Crawford or Lowndes were speaking. These, then, almost universally, did all the talking. The diversity of opinion scarcely ever prompted reply or interruption. In these conversations the great powers of Crawford's mind would break out, astonishing and convincing every one.
It was upon one of these occasions, when discussing in connection with the Missouri question, the subject of slavery, its influences, and its future, that Mr. Crawford remarked: "If the Union is of more importance to the South than slavery, the South should immediately take measures for the gradual emancipation of the slaves, fixing a period for its final extinction. But if the institution of slavery is of more vital importance than the perpetuation of the Union to the South, she should at once secede and establish a government to protect and preserve this institution. She now has the power to do so without the fear of provoking a war. Her people should be unanimous, and this agitation has made them so—I believe. I know the love of the Union has been paramount to every other consideration with the Southern people; but they view, as I do, this attempt to arrest the further spread of slavery as aggressive on the part of Congress, and discover an alarming state of the Northern mind upon this subject. This with an increasing popular strength may grow into proportions which shall be irresistible, and the South may be ultimately forced to do, what she never will voluntarily do—abolish at once the institution." It was urged by Mr. Holmes that the Constitution guaranteed slavery to the States, that its control and destiny was alone with the States, and there was no danger that the North would ever violate the Constitution to interfere with what they had no interest in.
"Never violate the Constitution!" said Randolph, in an excited and querulous tone. "Mr. Holmes, you perhaps know the nature of your people better than I do. But I know them well enough not to trust them. They stickle at nothing to accomplish an end; and their preachers can soon convince them that slavery is a sin, and that they are responsible for its existence here, and that they can only propitiate offended Deity by its abolition. You are a peculiar people, Holmes, prone to fanaticism upon all subjects, and this fanaticism concentrated as a religious duty—the Constitution will only prove a barrier of straw. No, sir; I am unwilling to trust them. They want honesty of purpose, have no sincerity, no patriotism, no principle. Your dough-faces will profess, but at a point will fly the track, sir; they can't stand, sir; they can't stand pressing. Interest, interest, sir, is their moving motive. Do you not see it in their action in this matter? Missouri is a fertile and lovely country; they want it for the purpose of settlement with their own people. Prohibit slavery to the inhabitants, and no Southern man will go there; there will be no competition in the purchase of her land. Your people will have it all to themselves; they will flock to it like wild geese, and very soon it is a Northern State in Northern interest; and, step after step, all the Western territory will be in your possession, and you will create States ab libitum. You know the Constitution permits two-thirds of the States to amend or alter it: establish the principle that Congress can exclude slavery from a territory, contrary to the wishes of her people expressed in a constitution formed by them for their government, and how long will it be, before two-thirds of the States will be free? Then you can change the Constitution and place slavery under the control of Congress—and, under such circumstances, how long will it be permitted to remain in any State?
"Your people are too religious, sir; eminently practical, inventive, restless, cold, calculating, malicious, and ambitious; invent curious rat-traps, and establish missions. I don't want to be trapped, sir; I am too wary a rat for that; and think with Mr. Crawford, now is the time for separation, and I mean to ask Clay to unite with us. Yet, sir, I have not spoken to the fellow for years, sir; but I will to-morrow; I will tell him I always despised him, but if he will go to his people, I will to mine, and tell them now is the time for separation from you; and I will follow his lead if he will only do so, if it leads me to perdition. I never did follow it, but in this matter I will. I bid you good night, gentlemen." He waited for no reply, but taking his hat and whip, hurriedly left the room.
"Can Mr. Randolph be in earnest?" asked several.