The Project Gutenberg eBook of The party battles of the Jackson period
Title: The party battles of the Jackson period
Author: Claude G. Bowers
Release date: December 3, 2023 [eBook #72299]
Language: English
Original publication: NYC: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1922
Credits: Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images available at The Internet Archive)
Preface to the Anniversary Edition
Preface
Contents
Illustrations
Index
Books, Papers, and Manuscripts Cited and Consulted
Footnotes
THE PARTY BATTLES
OF THE
JACKSON PERIOD
BY
CLAUDE G. BOWERS
Anniversary Edition
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
The Riverside Press Cambridge
COPYRIGHT, 1922, BY CLAUDE G. BOWERS
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO REPRODUCE
THIS BOOK OR PARTS THEREOF IN ANY FORM
The Riverside Press
CAMBRIDGE · MASSACHUSETTS
PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.
PREFACE TO THE ANNIVERSARY EDITION
This is the hundredth anniversary of the memorable campaign which marked the rising of the people and the election of Andrew Jackson to the Presidency, and it has been thought appropriate to issue an Anniversary edition of “Party Battles of the Jackson Period” uniform with “Jefferson and Hamilton.”
It has not been thought necessary to change the text of the first edition materially. The passing of the century has brought a fairer appraisement of Jackson’s character and career, but he remains, and ever must, a subject of controversy, because he was a crusader for certain fundamentals of government on which men divide honestly. His civic integrity, his flaming patriotism, and his robust Americanism are beyond all controversy, and men of all political persuasions do homage to his memory.
With a world-wide movement against democracy to-day, and with striking manifestations of its existence here, it is well for Americans to ponder the lessons of the struggle for its preservation by Jackson and the masses whom he led with such superb courage and consummate ability. There is little being urged against it now that was not heard during the period of his leadership. It had never been in more deadly danger than when he met its enemies in bitter battle. And now, after a hundred years, there are indications that the battle he fought successfully must be fought again, if the elemental ideas he stood for are to survive in governmental practice.
In some of the reviews of the first edition it was suggested that I had been “hard on John Quincy Adams.” A careful reading convinces me that the conclusion is not justified. Such was not my intention or desire. Though often petty in small things, he was always heroic in big things, and these determine the character of a public man. In the chapters on the French quarrel I have sought to show him at his best, sinking his partisanship in his Americanism, and subordinating his personal prejudices to his patriotism.
Claude G. Bowers
March 16, 1928
PREFACE
It is the purpose of the author to deal, more minutely than is possible in a general history or biography, with the brilliant, dramatic, and epochal party battles and the fascinating personalities of the eight years of Andrew Jackson’s Administrations. From the foundation of the Republic to the last two years of the Wilson Administration, the Nation has never known such party acrimony; nor has there been a period when the contending party organizations have been led by such extraordinary politicians and orators. It was, in a large sense, the beginning of party government as we have come to understand it. It was not until the Jacksonian epoch that we became a democracy in fact. The selection of Presidents then passed from the caucus of the politicians in the capital to the plain people of the factories, fields, and marts. The enfranchisement of thousands of the poor, previously excluded from the franchise, and the advent of the practical organization politicians, wrought the change. Our government, as never before, became one of parties, with well-defined, antagonistic principles and policies. Party discipline and continuous propaganda became recognized essentials to party success.
This period witnessed the origin of modern party methods. The spoils system, instead of being a mere manifestation of some viciousness in Jackson, grew out of the assumed necessity for rewarding party service. The recognition of party government brought the national convention. The new power of the masses necessitated compact and drilled party organizations down to the precincts of the most remote sections, and even the card-index system known to-day was part of the plan of the incomparable politicians of the Kitchen Cabinet. The transfer of authority from the small coterie of politicians to the people in the corn rows imposed upon the leaders the obligation to furnish the rank and file of their followers with political ammunition for the skirmishes at the country stores as well as for the heavy engagements at the polls, and out of this sprang the intense development of the party press, the delivery of congressional speeches for “home consumption,” the party platform, and the keynote speech.
The triumph of the Jacksonians over the Clays, the Websters, and the Calhouns was due, in large measure, to their development of the first great practical politicians—that much-depreciated company sneeringly referred to as the Kitchen Cabinet, to whom all politicians since have paid the tribute of imitation.
With the appearance of Democracy in action came some evils that have persisted through the succeeding years—the penalties of the rule of the people. Demagogy then reared its head and licked its tongue. Class consciousness and hatreds were awakened. And, on the part of the great corporations, intimidation, coercion, and the corrupt use of money to control elections were contributed. These evils are a heritage of the bitter party battles of the Jacksonian period—battles as brilliant as they were bitter.
The purpose of this volume is to describe these mad party struggles, and to picture, as they really were, the great historical figures, “warts and all.” If Henry Clay is here shown as an unscrupulous, selfish, scheming politician, rather than as the mythical figure who “would rather be right than President”; if John C. Calhoun is here described as petty in his personal hates and spites and in his resentment over the failure of personal ambitions; if Daniel Webster, the most admirable of the three during these eight vivid years, is set forth, not only as the great Nationalist who replied to Hayne and sustained Jackson’s Nullification Proclamation, but as the defender of the Bank from which, at the beginning of the fight, he bluntly solicited a “refreshment” of his retainer, it is not through any desire to befoul their fame, but to set down the truth as irrefutably disclosed in the records, and to depict them as they were—intensely human in their moral limitations.
The necessities of history happily call for the featuring of some figures, potent in their generation, attractive in their genius, and necessarily passed over by historians covering much longer periods. No close-up picture of the time can be painted that ignores Edward Livingston, patriot and philosopher; Roger B. Taney, the militant party leader; John Forsyth, the “greatest debater of his time”; John M. Clayton, the real master of both Calhoun and Clay in the Compromise of 1833; George McDuffie, the tempestuous Danton of the Opposition; Hugh Lawson White, the “Cato of the Senate” and the Nemesis of Jacksonian Democracy; William Cabell Preston and Horace Binney, the polished orators, now almost forgotten; Major Lewis, the master of political details; Frank Blair, the slashing journalistic champion of the Administration; and Amos Kendall, the genius of the Kitchen Cabinet.
An analysis of motives and methods has led to some unconventional conclusions. Not only do Clay, Webster, and Calhoun dwindle in moral grandeur, but others, traditionally considered small, loom large. Thus the John Tyler of these eight years stands out in intellectual honesty, courage, and consistency far beyond others to whom history has been more generous.
No apology need be offered for featuring the personalities of the time. They throw light on motives and explain events. The episode of Mrs. Eaton changed the current of political history. The gossip concerning Mrs. White indicates the putridity of political factionalism. The scurrilous biography of Van Buren written by Davie Crockett on the suggestion of Senator White is illuminative of the popular prejudices of the times; and the solemn investigation of the charge that Senator Poindexter had instigated the attempt upon the life of the President at the Capitol discloses the morbidity of the partisan madness. Through the gossip of the drawing-rooms, the jottings of the diaries, the editorial comments of the contemporary press, the social and political intrigues of women, the attempt is made to re-create something of the atmosphere by which the remarkable statesmen and politicians of the Jackson Administrations were affected.
Generations have been taught to respect or reverence the memories of the extraordinary men of the Thirties who rode on the whirlwind to direct the storms; and, their human weaknesses forgotten, their sinister, selfish purposes ignored, their moral or intellectual limitations overlooked, they seem, in the perspective of the years, stern, austere, always sincere, and singularly free from the vices of politicians, as we have come to know them in the leaders of a later day. And yet it would be difficult to find creatures more thoroughly human than these who are usually presented to us as steel engravings, hung high on the wall in a dim light. They move across the page of history scarcely touching or suffering the contamination of the ground. They seem to play their parts upon a stage impressive and imposing, suspended between earth and heaven. That they lived in houses, danced, gambled and drank, flattered and flirted, gossiped and lied, in a Washington of unpaved streets and sticky black mud, made their way to night conferences through dark, treacherous thoroughfares, and played their brilliant parts in a bedraggled, village-like capital, is not apt to occur to one. Thus, in tracing the political drama of this portentous period, an attempt is made to facilitate the realization that they were flesh and blood, and mere men to their contemporaries, not always heroic or even admirable, through the visualization of the daily life they lived in a capital peculiarly crude and filled with grotesque incongruities.
No period in American political history is so susceptible to dramatization. There is grim tragedy in the baffled ambitions of Calhoun and Clay; romance in the rise of Kendall and the fall of Mrs. Eaton; rich comedy, when viewed behind the scenes, in the lugubrious procession of “distress petitioners” trained to tears by the art of Clay and the money of Biddle; and rollicking farce in the early morning flight of a dismissed Cabinet minister, to escape the apprehended chastisement of an erstwhile colleague whose wife’s good name had been assailed.
The drama of party politics, with its motives of love, hate, and vaulting ambition—such is the unidealized story of the epochal period when the iron will of the physically feeble Jackson dominated the life of the Nation, and colored the politics of the Republic for a century.
The Drama—its motives—its actors—such the theme of this history.
CONTENTS
| I. The Washington of the Thirties | 1 |
| The journey from Philadelphia—The first railroad—Communication with the West—First impressions of visitors—Hotels—Looking for lions—Trials of calling—Unpaved streets—Uncouth appearance of town—Impressions of contemporaries—Surroundings of Capitol—Neighboring quagmires—Cows in the streets—Unlighted thoroughfares—Advantages of Georgetown—Drives and walks—Arlington—The Tayloe mansion—The Van Ness mansion—Sight-seeing—The Capitol’s popularity—Society in Senate—In House—In Supreme Court—Manner of living—House rent—Servant hire—Slaves and Southern masters—Boarding-houses—Congressional messes—The Woodbury mess—The law of the mess—Popularity of—Adams a diner-out—Hospitality of the town—Miss Martineau’s triumph—Ignorance of her books—Thomas Hamilton’s experiences—Literary celebrities—First society letters—First Washington correspondents—Crude performances in Washington theater—Booth’s appearances—Fanny Kemble’s—Rules and prices in theater—Weather postpones performances—Traveling circuses—The race-course—Cockfighting—Gambling—Heavy drinking—Moral laxity—A Washington season as a lark—Affectations of fashion—Parisian gowns and hats—Leading shops—Daily routine of a lady of fashion—Party lines in society—Mrs. Livingston’s leadership—Mrs. Stevenson—Mrs. Woodbury—Mrs. Forsyth—Mrs. Tayloe—Men’s styles—Conversationals—Formality—Pictures of Clay, Webster, and Calhoun in society—Day of gossip—Of gallantry—Entertainments—Introduction of ice-cream—The dances—Dense crowds—Incongruous dresses—Diplomats set fast pace—Events at Carusi’s—The quiet Sundays—Unhealthiness—Death-rate—The cholera scourge. | |
| II. The Rising of the Masses | 31 |
| The scurrility of 1828—Slander of Jackson and Adams—Democracy triumphs—Gloom of Whig aristocracy—The faithful march on the capital—The throne room at Gadsby’s—Jackson receives office-seekers—Politics in Cabinet appointments—Calhoun confers on patronage—Jackson ignores Adams—King Mob at the inauguration—The reaction on the Cabinet—Attempts to conciliate the disappointed—The morbid bitterness of Clay—Miniatures of the Cabinet. | |
| III. The Red Terror and the White | 64 |
| Party organization and the spoils system—Demands on Jackson for place—The provocation—Jackson’s attitude—Van Buren’s doubts, and Lewis’s—Kendall’s pain—The harassed Cabinet—Ingham and Van Buren angrily rebuke Hoyt—Terror of the clerks—The exaggerated impression of the dismissals—The “martyrs” who were also criminals—The Senate launches the White Terror—Rejection of the nominations of Jackson’s newspaper friends—John Tyler’s part in it—His personal and political character—Type of anti-Jackson Democrat—The prejudice against “printers”—The cases of Lee, of Noah, of Kendall, and of Hill—Effect on Jackson—Hill sent to Senate that rejected him—Unprecedented party bitterness foreshadowed. | |
| IV. Jackson breaks with Calhoun | 88 |
| Political significance of the Jackson-Calhoun quarrel—Calhoun turns the corner—His previous political character—Effect upon it of the quarrel—Relations of Hayne-Webster debate to quarrel—Latter’s party character—Jackson’s attitude—Livingston speaks for Administration—Nullifiers miscalculate Jackson—The Jefferson dinner—Its purpose—Jackson accepts the challenge—His toast—Effect on Calhoun—Jackson’s dinner to Monroe—Learns of Calhoun’s hostility in Monroe’s Cabinet—Crawford’s statement to Forsyth—Letter of Forsyth is shown Lewis—Jackson hears of it and demands it—Jackson calls on Calhoun for explanation—Latter’s reply—Jackson breaks—Crawford’s character and career—Calhoun’s desperate efforts to extricate himself—Appeals to Adams—Latter’s notations—Calhoun’s pamphlet—Newspaper battle—Calhoun’s ambitions wrecked. | |
| V. Mrs. Eaton demolishes the Cabinet | 116 |
| “Peggy” O’Neal—Marriage to Eaton—Society outraged—Mrs. Eaton cut by Cabinet ladies—Jackson’s indignation and efforts—Van Buren’s advantage in the game—He features “Peggy” at dinners—Cabinet unable to confer—Van Buren proposes resignation—Jackson plans complete reorganization of Cabinet—Mrs. Eaton’s attitude—Jackson’s interview with Branch—How new Cabinet was formed—Branch and Berrien place blame on “Peggy”—Mrs. Ingham tarred by same brush—Eaton’s pursuit of Ingham—Latter’s early morning flight—Portraits of Livingston, Taney, and Cass—A Van Buren Cabinet. | |
| VI. Kitchen Cabinet Portraits | 144 |
| Dominance of Kitchen Cabinet—Portrait of Amos Kendall—Harriet Martineau’s impressions—Portrait of Major Lewis—Of Isaac Hill—Secret of partisan bitterness—The Marat of the Kitchen Cabinet—The establishment of the “Washington Globe”—Portrait of Frank Blair—Relations of the “Globe” to the President—To the National Democracy—Considered the Court Journal by diplomats—Buchanan’s experience with Nesselrode in Russia—The specialties of the Kitchen Cabinet members. | |
| VII. Clay leads the Party Onslaught | 171 |
| Whigs clamor for Senate leadership—Clay responds—Portrait of Clay the politician—Is nominated for President—Doubts success—Hopes to carry Pennsylvania or New York—His battery of genius in the Senate—Whig advantage in ability in the House—The rejection of Van Buren’s nomination as Minister to Great Britain—Its motive—Its stupidity—Flimsy nature of charges—“Kill a Minister to make a Vice-President”—Character of John M. Clayton—He opens attack on Post-Office Department—His open appeal to Calhoun to join Opposition—Clay’s tariff plans—Calls conference at Everett’s—His dogmatic manner—Adams unimpressed—Clay’s great tariff speech—Tyler’s reply—Impressions of public—Failure to involve Jackson as planned—The House battle—The dual reference—Character study of Adams—Of George McDuffie—Adams coöperates with Secretary McLane—Jackson attempts a reconciliation—Cause of failure—McDuffie’s bill and report—His slashing attack on protection—Adams reports bill based on Treasury report—Adams’s bill passes House—Amended out of recognition by Clay protectionists in Senate—Surrender of Senate conferees—The politics in it—Clay’s fury—He fails to make political capital—Tariff eliminated from campaign—Jacksonians take offensive—Embarrass Clay on land question—Political effect in new States—Kitchen Cabinet makes headway. | |
| VIII. Clay finds his Issue | 201 |
| The son of Alexander Hamilton—His intimacy with Jackson—Phrases first attack on National Bank—The inspiration of Jackson’s hostility—The Mason incident—Biddle’s flippant reply to Ingham—Kendall’s editorial in “New York Courier and Enquirer”—Biddle’s alarm—His attempts to conciliate—His contradictory advice and information—The strange attitude of Major Lewis—Clay plans to drag Bank into politics for selfish purposes—Treachery of Livingston and McLane—Clay urges immediate application for recharter—His inconsistency—Jackson prefers to postpone Bank issue—Reasons—McLane’s embarrassing report—Clay presses the Bank to act—Biddle sends agent to Washington to investigate—Cadwalader’s conferences—Sees selfish political aims of Clay and Webster—His conversion to Whig plan—An historical conference—Biddle blackmailed into action by threats of Clay and Webster—Application presented—The House investigates the Bank—Results—Political effects—Biddle takes charge of fight in Congress—Recharter Bill passes—Biddle and Clay expect veto—Plan to make Bank the campaign issue—Effect on Jackson—Authorship of Veto Message—Van Buren’s midnight conference at White House—The Veto as a campaign document—Opinion of Biddle—Of Clay’s organ—Of the “Globe”—Both parties pleased—Senate debate on the Veto—Webster’s speech—Arrays Bank against Jackson in appeal to the people—Hugh Lawson White accepts the issue—Clay’s unworthy performance—Benton’s reply—Clay and Benton exchange the “lie”—The issue goes to the people. | |
| IX. The Dramatic Battle of 1832 | 227 |
| New campaign methods of 1832—Class consciousness aroused by both parties—The intensive use of the press—Biddle subsidizes newspapers and bribes editors—Kendall’s campaign textbook—Clay’s intrigues—Negotiates with the Nullifiers—Calhoun’s strange plan considered—Coalition of Bank, Whigs, and Nullifiers—Blair makes the most of it—Ties the Whigs to Nullification movement—Jackson defies the Nullifiers—Clay intrigues with Anti-Masons—His letters—Nomination of Wirt—Latter’s political relations with Clay—The trick planned for New York—Seward’s testimony—Jacksonians ignore the Anti-Masons—The Bank the issue—Clay’s campaign plans—Bank’s corruption of the press—Bank resorts to intimidation and coercion—Attempts to frighten the timid—Circulation of stories as to Jackson’s health—Blair meets them—Stories of Jackson’s bloodthirstiness revived—The anti-Jackson cartoons—Kitchen Cabinet arouses and organizes the masses—Use of the press—Intensive organization—Monster meetings of Democrats—A Jackson parade in New York—Hickory poles—Glee clubs—Songs—Demonstration for Jackson at Lexington—Personalities—Cholera plays a part—The presidential candidates—Jackson’s confidence—Jacksonians “on the turf”—Notable Jackson victory—Ominous action of South Carolina. | |
| X. The Politics of Nullification | 252 |
| The Nullifiers win in South Carolina—Jackson’s fury—Hastens to the capital—South Carolina’s changed views—Calhoun’s exposition—Cavalier vs. Cavalier—Calhoun’s letter to Hamilton—Joel Poinsett’s part—Jackson energetically prepares for defense—Steps taken—His reliance on public opinion—His caution—His Proclamation—Drama of its preparation—Effect on public—Hayne’s reply—Clay’s criticism—He plays to Nullifiers—Effect on State-Rights Democrats—Ritchie’s straddle in Virginia—Tyler’s despair—Jackson has Cass prepare appeal to Virginia—Purpose to isolate South Carolina—Van Buren’s embarrassment—Also straddles on Proclamation—Calhoun disappointed with Proclamation—His “death march” to Washington—Drawing-room sympathy for him—Takes the oath as Senator—Jackson-Poinsett correspondence—Jackson asks Congress for additional powers—Calhoun’s agitation—The Force Bill—Tyler’s attack—Appeal to Clay—Clay’s interest in Tyler’s reëlection—Whig’s ungracious support of Force Bill—Clayton’s speech—Bitterness of debate—Poindexter and Grundy—Jackson clears decks for action—Webster asked to lead debate for Administration—Livingston’s call upon him—Calhoun’s speech—Webster’s reply—His relations with White House—Jackson’s delight—Jacksonian cultivation of Webster—Calhoun concerned—Whig, Bank, and Nullification combination—Dangers to the tariff—Clayton’s proposal to Clay—The politics in Compromise Tariff of 1833—Calhoun hears from Jackson—Clay’s Tariff Bill—Tyler’s delight—Jackson’s disgust over the unholy alliance—Clay’s frankness—Force Bill passes—Clayton whips Calhoun—Effect of Cass’s letter to Virginia—Nullification Ordinance rescinded—Political effects of fight—The drama of the last night of the session. | |
| XI. Jackson vs. Biddle | 287 |
| Cabinet reorganization—Duane becomes Secretary of Treasury—His reputation and party standing—Jackson’s New England tour—Plans removal of deposits—Consults Hamilton in New York—Conversion of Van Buren—The Bank’s cockiness over accession of Nullifiers—Blair makes the most of the coalition—Kendall’s reasons for immediate action—Conservatives of Cabinet alarmed—Kendall attempts to convince McLane—Van Buren rebuked by Kendall—Jackson polls the Cabinet—Kitchen Cabinet’s continuous sessions—Debate on the time for removal—Kitchen Cabinet favors recess action—Conservatives would postpone until Congress meets—Duane’s strange reticence—Jackson presses him for decision—Kendall’s mission—His experiences with politicians en route—Newspapers open fight—Jackson perfects his plans at Rip Raps—Van Buren hard pressed—Taney moves to Jackson’s side—Jackson’s Paper to the Cabinet—McLane and Cass threaten to resign—Benton’s delight—Duane’s many letters of protest—Is dismissed—Taney assumes command—Webster advises a “disciplining” of the people—The Bank plans a panic—Its methods and results—Clay advises distress meetings and petitions—Political purpose—Jackson and distress committees—Reaction against Bank—New leaders—Benton—Preston—Leigh. | |
| XII. The Battle of the Gods | 322 |
| Bitter battle in Congress—Clay leads onslaught—Calls for Paper read to Cabinet—Forsyth kills the effect—Senate rejects Government directors on Biddle’s demand—Webster reminds Biddle of his retainer—Attempt to exclude Lewis from Senate—Webster appeals to Story for opinion—Latter’s reply—Clay appeals to Tazewell—Is rebuked—Intense interest in congressional battle—Distress oratory—Forsyth’s cynicism—Jacksonians counter with memorials—Whig mob-baiters sent to country to continue the excitement—Clay’s censure resolution—His bitter speech—Speeches of Preston, Benton, Calhoun, Forsyth, and Webster—Clay’s motive—Webster’s disgust over Clay’s plan—Proposes compromise recharter plan—His speech—Calhoun presents another—Bank champions divided—Clay’s fury over Webster’s independent action—Forces Webster to kill his own bill—Forsyth makes the record clear—Clay’s attempt to involve Van Buren—His histrionic appeal—Van Buren makes it ridiculous—Censure passed—Jackson’s spirited Protest—Effect on masses—Reception in Senate—Forsyth’s clever move to pass the issue to the people—Protest rejected—Battle in the House—Adams’s activities—Horace Binney—The debate—Blair’s attack on Judge Hopkinson—Bank investigation ordered—Farcical nature—Clay’s resolution orders restoration of deposits—Debate—Senate rejects nominations of Stevenson and Taney. | |
| XIII. Political Hydrophobia | 354 |
| Whigs determine to win in New York City election—Lewis’s advice to Hamilton—Mayoralty nominees make Bank the issue—Mixed result—Whig celebration at Castle Garden—Democrats celebrate inauguration of anti-Bank mayor—The fall elections—The Whigs take their name—Forsyth’s sharp comment—The hotch-potch combination—Jackson visits the Hermitage—His confidence—Cabinet changes—Whigs impatient of Bank issue—Biddle’s indignation—Jackson’s triumph in New Jersey—Whigs redouble efforts in New York—Liberty poles—Mobs in Philadelphia—The Virginia campaign—Leigh reëlected through a betrayal—Effect—Poindexter defeated in Mississippi—Whigs accept result as defeat—Weed dumps the Bank—Webster abandons it—Clay tired of its troubles—Effect on politics of Bank fight—Bitter congressional session of December, 1834—Attacks on Post-Office Department—Instructions from legislatures to expunge censure—Effect on Whigs—Post-Office scandal—Kendall made Postmaster-General—What he found, and did—Mrs. Eaton tries a bribe—Attempt to assassinate Jackson—Poindexter accused—His character and career—His quarrel with Jackson—Demands an investigation—Is exonerated—Calhoun’s fight on Federal patronage—Its political purpose—Debate—Democrats celebrate wiping out of national debt—Whig Senators refuse to buy paintings for President’s house. | |
| XIV. Whig Disloyalty in the French Crisis | 386 |
| The French indemnity treaty—French indifference to the obligation—Jackson determines to enforce treaty—Portrait of John Forsyth—Livingston sent to Paris—Real cause of difficulty there—Chamber again fails to appropriate—King sends regrets and assurances—Chamber again fails—Livingston advises show of spirit in Presidential Message—Jackson’s Message—Whig embarrassment, and criticism—Message reaches Paris—Livingston presents copy to de Rigny—King recalls French Minister—Livingston’s tact—Whigs plan to isolate Jackson—Whig papers apologize to France—Foreign Relations Committee of Senate packed against Jackson—Blair’s protest—Clay’s report—Circulated as political document to isolate the President—Clay suggests France may ask apology from Jackson—Buchanan explains the Paris state of mind—Defends Message—Senate passes Clay’s resolution—“Intelligencer” calls it to attention of France—Livingston’s spirited reply to de Rigny—Approved by Jackson, Van Buren, and Forsyth—Serurier refused audience by Forsyth—War clouds lower—Strange happenings in French Legation—House considers crisis—Adams’s attitude—Pays tribute to Jackson’s spirit—The amazing debate—Adams protests against tributes to France—Amendment to Fortifications Bill—Whig filibuster against it—The Nation naked to its foe—The Whig jubilation—French Chamber authorizes payment conditional on an apology from Jackson—Livingston leaves Paris—Mrs. Barton and Madame Pageot—Livingston’s tumultuous ovations in New York—Forsyth’s instructions to Barton—Diplomatic relations broken—“Oil or water?”—Livingston advises moderate tone for Message—The Message—Public indignation over failure of Fortifications Bill—Blair fans the flame—Approach of French squadron—Webster defends Senate and attacks House—Adams and Webster—Adams’s spectacular reply—Democrats follow Adams’s lead—English offer of mediation—Terms of acceptance—France recedes—Jackson’s triumph—Effect on America’s prestige in world. | |
| XV. The Battle of the Succession | 423 |
| Van Buren the heir apparent—Senator White’s disaffection—Whig plan to use him—Clay’s plan of campaign—Whig sneers at Mrs. White—Blair’s rebuke—The schism of Tennessee Democrats—Polk leads for Van Buren—White wins—Portrait of White—Kitchen Cabinet’s attack on him—Also determines to retire Bell from Speakership—“Globe’s” attacks on latter—Baltimore Convention—New York and Virginia combination broken—Van Buren’s reconciliation visit to Castle Hill—Whig confusion—Clay sulks—His complaint—Slavery question in campaign—Attempts to turn slave States against Van Buren—Davy Crockett’s biography of Van Buren—Holland’s—Adams’s comment—Van Buren’s serenity—Congress convenes—Bell defeated—Van Buren’s toothache—Whig fight on Taney—Whig Senators harassed by instructions from home—The embarrassment of Virginia Whigs—Ritchie’s mirth—Calhoun’s fight against abolition literature in mail—Purpose to embarrass Van Buren—Latter’s friends “play politics”—Calhoun’s extreme bill—Its partisan motive—Tie votes—Van Buren does not dodge—Calhoun’s bitter reference to Jackson—White’s bitter attack—Calhoun’s insult to Van Buren—Congress adjourns—Issues of 1836—Adams’s contempt for all the candidates—Enthusiasm for Jackson continues—Whig depression—Newspaper battles—Clay’s sulking—His one speech—Jackson’s electioneering—White’s campaign speech—Results of election—Their significance. | |
| XVI. Twilight Triumphs | 457 |
| Jackson’s illness—Whigs attack him while down—He fights back—House Whigs’ last effort against Whitney—Jacksonians turn the tables—Threats of murder—Peyton and Wise—Benton plans to expunge—His speech—Bitter replies—The conference at Boulanger’s—Refreshments in Benton’s committee room—Clay’s theatrical speech—Scenes in Senate Chamber—Webster’s protest—Benton wins—Dramatic situation—The mob in the gallery—Benton’s friends arm—Mrs. Benton’s alarm—The Clay-Benton altercation—Jackson dines his friends—Last days in White House—His Farewell Address—Its real significance—His last reception—Jackson the Man—White House memories and women—The inauguration of Van Buren—Jackson the central figure—Homage of the multitude—Last night in the White House—The last conference at Blair’s—The end of the “Reign.” | |
| Books, Papers, and Manuscripts cited and consulted | 481 |
| Index | 489 |
ILLUSTRATIONS
| Andrew Jackson | Steel engraving frontispiece |
| From a painting by Ralph Earle. | |
| Martin Van Buren | 54 |
| From a photograph by Brady in the collection of Mr. Frederick Hill Meserve. | |
| Thomas Hart Benton | 54 |
| From a photograph by Brady in the collection of Mr. Frederick Hill Meserve. | |
| Mrs. John H. Eaton (Peggy O’Neal) | 118 |
| From a photograph by Brady. | |
| Edward Livingston | 134 |
| From the bust by Ball Hughes. | |
| Amos Kendall | 144 |
| From an engraving in the Democratic Review, 1838. | |
| Francis P. Blair | 162 |
| From an engraving by Sartain in the Democratic Review, 1845, after a painting by T. Sully. | |
| Roger B. Taney | 162 |
| From a photograph in the collection of Mr. Frederick Hill Meserve. | |
| William B. Lewis | 162 |
| From a photograph reproduced in S. G. Heiskell’s Andrew Jackson and Early Tennessee History. | |
| John C. Calhoun | 172 |
| From an engraving in the Democratic Review, 1843, after a miniature by Blanchard. | |
| Henry Clay | 172 |
| From the portrait by Marchant in the State Department, Washington. | |
| Daniel Webster | 172 |
| From the collection of Mr. Frederick Hill Meserve. | |
| Nicholas Biddle | 212 |
| From a painting by Thomas Sully. | |
| John Forsyth | 386 |
| From a lithograph, by courtesy of Mr. Waddy B. Wood, of Washington, D.C. | |
THE PARTY BATTLES
OF THE
JACKSON PERIOD
CHAPTER I
THE WASHINGTON OF THE THIRTIES
The tourist traveling from Philadelphia to Washington in the Thirties anticipated few pleasures and no comforts from the trip that had to be made by coach from Baltimore, over roads intolerably wretched under the best conditions, and all but impassable and not without dangers in inclement weather. The journey from Philadelphia to Baltimore was usually made by boat through the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal, and the entire trip, in winter one of exposure, required the greater part of two days.[1] The fare from Baltimore to Washington was four dollars. Sometimes the ruts in the winter roads would overturn the coach, throwing the passengers into the mire, and occasionally resulting in sprains and broken bones.[2] Later in Jackson’s time, the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad was built, with a branch into Washington, and when the first cars, drawn by horses, reached the country-town capital, the enthusiastic statesmen felt that the problem of transportation had been solved. Urging Butler to accept the attorney-generalship, and stressing the fact that acceptance would not preclude his appearance in personal cases in New York and Albany, Van Buren made much of the fact that “to the former place you will next season be able to go in fifteen hours, and to the latter in a day and a night.”[3] Blair, of the “Globe,” boasted after the election of 1832 that “in eight days and nights after the closing of the polls in Ohio, the result was known in the city of Washington from all the organized counties except three.” This, he declared, “is an instance of rapid communication from the West unparalleled in this country.”[4]
The foreigner, expecting a national capital more or less pretentious and compact, was invariably shocked on entering the environs over miserable mud roads, to find only an occasional drab hut or cottage at wide intervals. Usually, until the Capitol attracted his attention, he was wholly unconscious of his arrival at his destination. One of these, who has left a record of his visit, relates that he was “looking from the window of his coach in a sort of brown study, at fields covered with snow,” when a fellow passenger startled him with the inquiry as to how he liked Washington.
“I will tell you when I see it,” he replied.
“Why, you have been in Washington the last quarter of an hour,” was the rejoinder.[5]
Another famous visitor “was taken by surprise” on finding herself within the shadow of the hall of the lawmakers, “so sordid are the enclosures and houses on its very verge.”[6]
But as the coach wound round the Capitol, and swung with a merry clatter into Pennsylvania Avenue, the houses at more frequent intervals and connected shops disclosed the town. With a characteristic “clatter and clamp,”[7] with a gay cracking of whips, the coach would splash and rumble up to one of the leading hotels, and the cramped and weary tourist would joyously take leave of the conveyance and seek lodgment within.
If well advised, he would instruct the coachman to drop him at Gadsby’s, then the most popular and comfortable hostelry in town, on the Avenue, a short distance from the Capitol.[8] There he would find, not only a clean bed, but excellent service and a lordly hospitality from the host. Gadsby, for his generation, was a genius at his trade. He moved his small army of negro servants with military precision. “Who that ever knew the hospitalities of this gentlemanly and most liberal Boniface,” wrote one who enjoyed them, “can ever forget his urbane manner, his careful attention to his guests, his well-ordered house, his fine old wines, and the princely manner in which he could send his bottle of choice Madeira to some old friend or favored guest at the table?”[9] It was not always, however, that accommodations could be found at Gadsby’s, and then the tourist would seek the Indian Queen at the sign of the luridly painted picture of Pocahontas, where he would be met at the curb by Jesse Brown, the landlord.[10] Here, for a dollar and a quarter a day, he could not only find a pleasant room, but a table loaded with decanters of brandy, rum, gin, at short intervals from the head to the foot. If the host of the Indian Queen lacked the lordly elegance of Gadsby, he made up for it in the homely virtues of hospitality. Wearing a large white apron, he met his guests at the door of the dining-room, and then hastened to the head of the table where he personally carved and helped to serve the principal dish.[11] If this, too, was crowded, the tourist would try Fuller’s near the White House,[12] where a room would be found for him either in the hotel proper, or in one of the two or three houses adjoining, which had been converted into an annex.[13]
Having rested from his journey and removed the stains of travel, if he were a person of some importance, and especially a foreigner, he would be speedily deluged with the cards of callers anxious to make his sojourn pleasant. Day by day the hotel registers were eagerly scanned for the names of visiting celebrities, for the Washington of the Thirties loved its lions and lionesses. No possible person was ever neglected, and real personages were fêted, wined, and dined. But not until he set forth to return the calls would he appreciate the Portuguese Minister’s description of the capital as “a city of magnificent distances.” Inquiring at the hotel how to reach the residences of his callers, he would be not a little puzzled at the nonchalant reply that the coachmen “knew where all the prominent people live.” Engaging a coach, he would set forth gayly, in the confident expectation of leaving his card at from thirty to forty houses in the course of the day. A short drive would take him to the end of the macadamized pavement of the Avenue, and thereafter for hours, pitching and plunging, over the ruts and the mud-holes, through miry lanes, and across vacant lots, shaken in body, and sore in spirit, he would find by evening that he had reached six or seven of the forty houses, and was charged by the coachman at a rate “which would keep a chariot and two posters for twice the time in London.”[14] In the course of a week he would find that he had spent as much as thirty dollars for coach hire—by odds, the most expensive feature of his Washington sojourn. An English visitor, startled at the cost of travel, contracted with a coachman for services from five o’clock to daylight for twenty dollars, but after having attended five parties on the first evening, the morose driver repudiated his contract, and it was necessary to add five dollars to retain his services.[15] “I should imagine [Washington] to be the very paradise of hackney coachmen,” wrote one disgusted visitor. “If these men do not get rich it must be owing to some culpable extravagance, for their vehicles are in continual demand from the hour of dinner[16] till five in the morning, and long distances and heavy charges are all in their favor.”[17]
As the visitor drove about the town he found nothing in the physical aspects of the country-town capital to indicate that L’Enfant ever had a vision or produced a plan for a city beautiful. Because real estate dealers had quarreled over the location of public buildings, the selection of the hill for the Capitol had led to the location of the White House a mile or more to the west, and for three decades the problem of building a compact city between the two had failed. The streets were all unpaved when Jackson was first inaugurated, and only Pennsylvania Avenue between the Capitol and the President’s Mansion had been rescued from the mire when he left office. Hub-deep in mud in inclement weather, these country roads sent forth great clouds of dust on dry and sunny days. With the exception of the Avenue, not a single street approached compactness, the houses on all other streets being occasionally grouped, but generally widely separated, and in some instances so much so as to suggest country houses with their shade trees and vegetable gardens.[18] “It looks as if it had rained naked buildings upon an open plain, and every man had made a street in reference to his own door,” wrote Nathaniel P. Willis, who knew his Washington.[19] Another writer of the day who was impressed with “the houses scattered in straggling groups, three in one quarter, and half a dozen in another,” was moved to compassion for “some disconsolate dwelling, the first or last born of a square or crescent, yet in nebulous suffering like an ancient maiden in the mournful solitude of single blessedness.”[20] Still another contemporary word painter tells us that even on the Avenue “the buildings were standing with wide spaces between, like the teeth of some superannuated crone.”[21]
At the foot of the Capitol, itself beautiful even then, were desolate waste lands being reserved for some ultimate Botanical Gardens, and a few miserable shack-like boarding-houses.[22] “Everybody knows that Washington has a capitol,” wrote a satirical English observer, “but the misfortune is that the capitol wants a city. There it stands, reminding you of a general without an army, only surrounded and followed by a parcel of ragged little dirty boys; for such is the appearance of the dirty, straggling, ill-built houses which lie at the foot of it.”[23] Where the Smithsonian Institution has long stood were innumerable quagmires reeking with miasma.[24] About the President’s Mansion, a few pretentious houses, several still handsome homes after almost a century, had been built, and in this section, and in Georgetown, lived the people of fashion and the diplomats. “The Co’t end,” it was called. At the four corners of the Mansion of the Presidents stood the plain brick buildings occupied by the State, Treasury, War, and Navy Departments. On Capitol Hill a few good houses had been erected, especially on North A and New Jersey Avenue, South. Other than these, and those west of the White House, there was little but pastures and enclosed fields in the eastern, southeastern, and northeastern sections of the town.[25] East of Fourteenth Street, on the north side, but few houses had been built beyond F Street, and the “country home” of William H. Crawford, at the northeast corner of Fourteenth Street and Massachusetts Avenue, was still considered as remote from town as on that winter day after his defeat for the Presidency when no callers were expected because of the heavy snow.[26]
Looking down upon the little town from the skylight of the Capitol, Harriet Martineau could plainly discern the “seven theoretical avenues,” but with the exception of Pennsylvania, all were “bare and forlorn,” and the city which has become one of the most beautiful and impressive in the world could then present to the naked eye only “a few mean houses dotted about, the sheds of the navy yard on one bank of the Potomac, and three or four villas on the other.”[27] With the streets full of ruts, the sidewalks dotted with pools of muddy water, or in places overgrown with grass, with cows pasturing on many of the streets now lined with elegant homes, and challenging the right of way with Marshall or Clay or Jackson, it is not surprising that foreigners, even as late as the Thirties, were moved to imitate the sarcasm of Tom Moore. The difficulties of locomotion kept the pedestrian’s eyes upon the ground, and the inconveniences, in making calls, of crossing ditches and stiles, and walking alternately upon grass and pavement, and striking across fields to reach a street, were more noticeable than the noble trees that lined the avenues.[28] Wretched enough in the daytime, the poorly lighted streets at night were utterly impossible. “As for lights,” wrote a contemporary, “if the pedestrian did not provide and carry his own, he was in danger of discovering every mud-hole and sounding its depths.”[29] More nearly possible to the fastidious were the narrower streets of Georgetown, with its more imposing and interesting houses, and more select society, where many of the statesmen lived, and not a few of the Government clerks, who rode horseback to the departments in the morning.
Even in the Thirties there were many beautiful drives and walks in the vicinity of Washington, and a few houses that were impressive to even the most critical English visitor. Visible for many miles, and easily seen from the town, loomed the pillared white mansion of Arlington, then the home of George Washington Custis, to which many of the aristocrats of the capital frequently found their way. There, during the Jacksonian period, Robert E. Lee, standing in the room, whence, across the river, he could see the Capitol building, was united in marriage to the daughter of the house.[30] Within the city the most imposing mansions were those of John Tayloe, at Eighteenth Street and New York Avenue, designed by Thornton, and even then rich in political and social memories,[31] and the handsome residence of John Van Ness, the work of Latrobe, built at a cost of sixty thousand dollars to make a fit setting for the charm and beauty of Marcia Burns, at the foot of Seventeenth Street, on the banks of the Potomac. From the doorstep the master and his guests could watch the ships from across the sea mooring to the docks of Alexandria, and the merchantmen, bound for the port of Georgetown, laden with the riches of the West Indies.
The tourist in the Washington of the Thirties did not have the opportunity for sight-seeing that means so much to the capital visitor of to-day. Aside from the Capitol and the White House, there were no public buildings of architectural distinction. The churches had “nothing about them to attract attention,” and while St. John’s on Lafayette Square was then summoning to worship, it did not at that time have the virtue of quaintness or the mellowness of historical memories. A visit to the Patent Office was customarily made, and most tourists found something to interest them in the museum of the State Department, with its portraits of the Indian chiefs who had visited Washington.[32] Occasionally the venturesome would ascend to the skylight of the Capitol to survey the straggling and dreary town from the height.[33] But always there was the dignified and stately white building of the lawmakers and of the Supreme Court, and thither tourists and citizens, men and women, daily found their way for the entertainment that never failed. Surrounded by its terraces, its well-kept lawns, its profusion of shrubbery, the visitor reached the entrance over its “beautifully gravelled walks,”[34] and entered the rotunda with its four Trumbull paintings of Revolutionary scenes, to be more impressed with the vacant spaces for four more, and the explanation that “Congress cannot decide on what artist to confer the honor.”[35] He would not fail to be delighted with the classic little Senate Chamber, redolent of the genius of Latrobe, and with the ease with which he might ignore the tiny gallery to find a hearty welcome on the floor. If a foreigner, he would be surprised to find a constant stream of fashionable ladies entering the chamber, crowding the Senators, accepting their seats, and attracting attention with their “waving plumes glittering with all the colors of the rainbow, and causing no little bustle.”[36] There he would see Van Buren or Calhoun in the chair, and on the floor he would want to have Webster, Clay, Benton, Forsyth, Preston, and Ewing pointed out. And perhaps, like Miss Martineau, he would leave with the impression that he had “seen no assembly of chosen men and no company of the high born, invested with the antique dignities of an antique realm, half so imposing to the imagination as this collection of stout-souled, full-grown, original men brought together on the ground of their supposed sufficiency, to work out the will of their diverse constituencies.”[37]
Having seen the Senate, he would seek the House of Representatives. Inquiring his way to the Strangers’ Gallery from the rotunda, he would be directed to a narrow stairs, and, on ascending, would find himself in a large room of many columns, the work of the architect of the Senate, looking down upon the seats of members arranged in concentric rows. Thence he would look down upon the bald head of the venerable Adams, the anæmic figure of Polk, the handsome form of Binney, and the ludicrous conglomeration of garbs representing the diverse tastes of the tailors of New York and the wilderness. If acquainted with one of the members, the visitor might be invited to the corridor behind the Speaker’s desk, fitted with seats and sofas drawn about the fireplace at either end, where members and their guests were wont to lounge and smoke.[38] Having satisfied himself with the chambers of the lawmakers, the visitor would want to see the tribunal of interpretation, said by some to have more power in determining the law of the land than the members of Congress, and to observe the famous Marshall on the Supreme Bench. Descending to the basement of the Capitol, immediately under the Senate, he would be shown into a small plain room with low ceiling, and “a certain cellar-like aspect which is not pleasant,”[39] and would probably be a little shocked at the figure of Justice, “a wooden figure with the eyes unfilleted, and grasping the scales like a groceress.”[40] On cushioned sofas, on either side of the room, he might, if a favorite orator were making an argument, see gayly dressed ladies—for, like the Senate Chamber, the court was one of the fashionable resorts of the Thirties. But there, he would find dignity and quiet and decorum, in striking contrast with most of the American courts of that generation.[41] If fortunate, he might listen to the reading of a decision by Marshall, and observe Butler, the Attorney-General, “his fingers playing among his papers, his thick black eyes and thin, tremulous lips for once fixed, his small face pale with thought,” contrasting with the more composed countenances of Clay and Webster.[42]
In the days of Jackson, comparatively few families had a permanent residence in Washington, and to an English visitor the town had the appearance of a watering-place.[43] Many Senators and Representatives considered it so impossible that they left their families at home.[44] Attorney-General Butler at first refused to consider a position in the Cabinet because “Mrs. Butler did not like the idea of bringing her daughters up here.”[45] When the wives and daughters did accompany the statesmen to the capital, it was the custom, with such as could afford to maintain an establishment, to take a house. These usually purchased, albeit many of the more desirable residences that could be leased were not for sale. An establishment could be maintained at a surprisingly low cost. Houses “suitable for the purposes of genteel people” could be had for from $50 to $300 a year, and even the large mansions, many of them standing and still occupied by fashionable families after almost a century, could be had for from $500 to $800 a year.[46] The servant problem did not exist, for domestics could be employed in abundance for $4 a month.[47] The Southerners, bringing their slaves with them, or buying them in the slave market at Alexandria, were able to entertain with a lavish display which set the pace socially, and made the Southern dominance easy. Foreigners were impressed, after hearing a senatorial orator rhapsodize in the Senate over the blessings of American liberty, to see him driven from the Capitol after his oration by one of his family slaves.[48] Others, not wishing to be burdened with a house, lived in the hotels, where other people’s slaves waited upon them. In these, too, the cost of living was low, the leading hostelries taking guests at $1.75 a day, $10 a week, or $35 a month. Transients sat down to tables fairly groaning with food, and with decanters of brandy and whiskey at their elbows, free at these prices. The guest, in his room, could order real Madeira for $3 a bottle, sherry, brandy, and gin for $1.50, and Jamaica rum for $1. The statesman, leaving his hotel quarters for the Senate or the House, could, if he wished, pause at the bar of the hostelry for a toddy of unadulterated liquor and lump sugar for twelve and a half cents.[49] But the greater part of the public men lived in boarding-houses, and the “Intelligencer,” the “Globe,” and the “Telegraph” filled columns, at the beginning of congressional sessions, with the enticing advertisements of the landladies. Some few of these houses, such as Dawson’s, associated with celebrities, live in history, but the majority were small, shabby, and uncomfortable. In these, however, romances sometimes blossomed, and the barmaid of one presided for a time over the establishment of a Cabinet member, and the landlady of another over the household of a Senator who aspired to the Presidency.[50]
Out of this life in hotels and boarding-houses, during the Jacksonian period, came the custom of statesmen forming themselves and families into “messes,” each “mess” having a table to itself and contracting with the landlady or landlord for a caterer. In this way the lawgivers were socially grouped according to their intellectual and financial standing, and some of these “messes” were famous in their day. Friendships were formed that survived all the vicissitudes of time and political change. One of these, known as the “Woodbury mess,” consisted of such a notable coterie of brilliancy and genius as Calhoun, John Randolph, Tazewell, Burges, and Verplanck. About the table many celebrated measures were conceived and the strategy of many a fight was planned.[51] According to the law of the “mess” a member might invite a guest only with the consent of all the others, and it was understood that a failure to get unanimous consent should not be resented. Occasionally the guests were permitted to contribute something to the usual outlay. Daniel Webster was glad enough to pay his way on such occasions. The venerable Adams, who had a comfortable home on F Street[52] and was not considered a notably social animal, delighted to join his most interesting colleagues at the boarding-house or hotel table. “I dined with John C. Calhoun at Dawson’s,” he recorded. “Mr. Preston, the other Senator from South Carolina, and his wife were there, and Mangum, Southard, Sprague of Maine. Company sat late at table and the conversation was chiefly upon politics. The company was, at this time, adversaries of the present Administration—most of them were adversaries to the last.”[53] Three days later: “Dined with Benj. Gorham and Edward Everett. Calhoun, Preston, Clay, and others were there.”[54] The next evening: “Dined with Colonel Robert B. Campbell of S.C. at his lodgings at Gadsby’s”; thirty people, including Calhoun and Preston, in attendance.[55]