The moment he sank into his seat, Daniel Webster rose.
The relations between Webster and the Administration leaders after the visit of Livingston had been intimate and confidential, and the orator had availed himself of the invitation to make desirable amendments. One stormy day during this period, the great opponent of the Democratic Party might have been seen rolling up to the Capitol in the White House carriage. On the floor, when he rose, were many of the Administration leaders, including Lewis, ready to hasten the news of the speech and its reception to the White House, where Jackson was anxiously, but confidently, waiting. It was late in the evening when the orator concluded his masterful argument on the proposition that “the Constitution is not a compact between sovereign States.” Brushing aside the personalities, scarcely referring to any speech made during the debate, he took the resolutions Calhoun had submitted as embodying his views, and based his argument upon these. Speaking with his accustomed gravity,with more than his usual earnestness, without passion or personal feeling, he took up the sophistries of the Nullification school and crushed them, one by one. Nullification was revolution, and success meant the destruction of the Republic, chaos, the end of American liberty. To prevent these evils was the duty of the National authority; and the Force Bill was necessary for their prevention.
Long before he closed, the lights had been lit in the little Senate Chamber where the crowd was densely packed. With his conclusion the galleries rose and cheered, and Poindexter, outraged at the exhibition of feeling, indignantly demanded an immediate adjournment. The great word had been spoken in the Senate—the Proclamation reiterated on the floor. No one was more delighted with Webster’s triumph than Jackson. “Mr. Webster replied to Mr. Calhoun yesterday,” he wrote Poinsett, “and, it is said, demolished him. It is believed by more than one that Mr. Calhoun is in a state of dementation—his speech was a perfect failure; and Mr. Webster handled him as a child.”[585]
Thus Webster entered upon more intimate relations with the White House, with Jackson personally thanking him for a great public service, and Livingston reiterating expressions of appreciation. The Jackson Senators, Isaac Hill excepted, joined in the assiduous cultivation of the orator, and he was invited to strike from a list of applicants for office the names of all displeasing to himself. Such was the enthusiasm of the President that overtures were unquestionably made to Webster, as set forth by Benton,[586]to gain his adherence to the Administration. It was a crisis in his life and in the politics of the Nation. He was then closer to Jackson’s views on vital matters than to those of either Clay or Calhoun. His antipathy to the latter’s doctrines was as pronounced as that of Jackson; and he had no respect for Clay’s play to theseditious with his compromise tariff. His ideas were not remote from those of Livingston. Had he then broken with his old co-workers, and allied himself with the dominant party, he would have been advanced immeasurably toward the Presidency. Senator Lodge admits[587]that there was much truth in Benton’s theory, but reasonably holds that the coalition would have been wrecked by the inevitable clashing of the conflicting temperaments.
Meanwhile, with the debate dwindling to an anti-climax, Calhoun and his friends were not nearly so indifferent to war as they pretended. It was generally understood that Jackson was ready and eager to strike the moment an overt act was committed. With Hayne urging caution, some irresponsible hothead might at any moment hasten the crisis. Then, all knew, Jackson would place South Carolina under martial law, arrest Calhoun for treason, and turn him over to the courts for trial. Some of the latter’s friends began to interest themselves in a compromise tariff that would open a door of escape. The Whig protectionists, the Nullifiers, and the Bank were rapidly rushing together to make common cause against Jackson. Under Clay’s leadership at the beginning of the session these elements united in electing Duff Green, of the “Telegraph,” printer to the Senate, and Gales, of the “Intelligencer,” to the House. Thus, through Clay, the Nullification organ secured a new lease of life, and flooded the South with circularized appeals for support. “If the people of the South deserve to be free they will not permit this press to go down,” Green wrote—and this was known to Clay. The Bank party looked on approvingly, with John Sargeant writing enthusiastically to Biddle of the new political alignments. “The new state of parties,” he wrote, “will be founded upon a combination of the South,and the leaders of it are friends of the Bank upon principle, and will be more so from opposition to Jackson.”[588]With this alignment in mind, John M. Clayton cynically observed to Clay that “these South Carolinians are acting very badly, but they are good fellows, and it would be a pity to let Jackson hang them.”[589]When Representative Letcher of Kentucky, a boisterous partisan of Clay’s, suggested the compromise plan to his chief, he “received it at first coolly and doubtfully.”[590]Afterwards Clay reconsidered and broached the subject to Webster, who, holding the Jackson view, replied that “it would be yielding great principles to faction; that the time had come to test the strength of the Constitution and the Government.”[591]Thereafter Webster was not included in the consultations.
Perhaps the true story of the compromise tariff of 1833 will never be known. One version credits the initiative to Clayton in calling a meeting of men primarily interested in the tariff, and only incidentally in the Nullification crisis, consisting of but half the New England Senators, and the two from Delaware, with Clay, Webster, and Calhoun all absent.[592]Many years later John Tyler accepted the responsibility. According to his version he “waited on Mr. Clay.” They “conversed about the times.” Clay “saw the danger.” Tyler “appealed to his patriotism,” and “no man appealed so in vain.” The Virginian referred Clay “to another man as the only one necessary to consult, and that man was John C. Calhoun.” It would not only be necessary for Clay to “satisfy his own party,” but to “reconcile an opposite party by large concessions.” Thus Clay and Calhoun “met, consulted and agreed.”[593]This differs in some particulars from the Benton version.[594]Here we have it that Clay prepared his measure and sent it to Calhoun by Letcher, as thetwo negotiators were not, at the time, on speaking terms. Finding some objectionable features which he thought a personal interview would persuade the author to eliminate, Calhoun asked Letcher to arrange a conference, which was held in Clay’s room. The meeting was “cold and distant.” Clay rose, bowed, and asked Calhoun to be seated, and, to relieve the embarrassment, Letcher took his departure. Clay refused to yield.
The story here enters into the melodramatic although there is nothing impossible about it. Letcher, in another conference, this time with Jackson, found the grim old warrior hard set against any sort of a compromise, unwilling to discuss one, and determined to enforce the laws. The Kentuckian related the conversation to McDuffie; he to Calhoun. A little later Letcher was awakened from a sound sleep by Senator Johnston of Louisiana, an intimate friend of Clay, with the startling story that he had heard authoritatively that Jackson would admit of no further delay, and was preparing to arrest Calhoun for treason. It was agreed that the Carolinian should be immediately notified, and in the darkness of the night Letcher hastened to Calhoun’s lodgings. As the gaunt statesman sat up in bed, the Johnston story was told him and “he was evidently disturbed.”[595]That some such incident occurred is corroborated by Perley Poore,[596]who was an observer of events in the Washington of that day. Here we have some embellishments. Calhoun had heard some threats and had sent Letcher to Jackson to ascertain his intentions. The old man’s eyes had been “lighted by an unwonted fire,” and he had told the emissary that with the first overt act, he would try Calhoun for treason and “hang him high as Haman.” Thereupon Letcher made all haste to Calhoun, who received him sitting up in bed, with a cloak thrown around him. “There sat Calhoun,” wrote Perley Poore, “drinking in eagerly every word, and, as Letcher proceeded, he turnedpale as death, and great as he was in intellect, trembled like an aspen leaf, not from fear or cowardice, but from consciousness of guilt.”[597]Here we detect the professional journalist drawing perhaps on his imagination to dramatize the picture.
However, Calhoun, convinced of Jackson’s grim determination, was ready to welcome a way out short of conflict or utter humiliation, and at the same time Clay and Clayton were not happy over the situation. The protective system had brought the country to the very verge of disintegration. With Nullification crushed by force, conservative public opinion might demand a complete reversal of the revenue policy and destroy the “American System.” That Clay at this time was thinking primarily of the preservation of his protective system, and secondarily of currying favor with the extreme State-Rights party, including the Nullifiers, is plainly disclosed in the record. Thus the proposed combination of the Nullifiers and the protectionists to stay the arm of Jackson. In this combination no one was more prominent than John M. Clayton, the brilliant and bibulous, who frankly cared less about saving the Union than of saving the tariff, and who would “pause long before he surrendered it [the tariff] even to save the Union.”[598]He was to prove himself as good as his word a little later.
Thus, in the midst of the discussion of the Force Bill, Clay, Calhoun, Clayton, Letcher, and Tyler were in constant communication on the compromise tariff. Webster was utterly ignored, as was Jackson, these two refusing to “compromise a principle” in any such fashion.[599]The fact that Clay and Calhoun had reached a general agreement was soon known, and it was accepted as an offensive and defensive alliance against Jackson. “They are partners in a contra dance,” wrote Blair in the “Globe.” “For some time they turnedtheir backs on each other. They will make a match of it. In plain English, we have a new coalition.”[600]
In due time the bill was introduced by Clay, much to the delight of Tyler. “I recall the enthusiasm I felt that day,” said Tyler, almost thirty years afterwards. “We advanced to meet each other, and grasped each other’s hands, midway of the chamber.”[601]This measure, differing from Clay’s original plan, provided that for all articles paying more than twenty per cent duty, the surplus above that rate should be gradually reduced, until in 1842 all should disappear. The manufacturers as usual had been summoned and consulted. At first dismayed and outraged, they soon realized that it was to their interest to fall into line. Certain features had been voted down in committee, but here Clayton asserted himself. He announced that these would be introduced as amendments on the floor, and that unless every Nullifier voted for them all, he would kill the bill himself by making the motion to table it. The most objectionable of these, to Calhoun, was that on home valuation.
Such was the situation when Clay presented the bill on February 12th, three days before Calhoun rose to speak on the Force Bill. Webster and Adams, thoroughly disgusted, at once announced their opposition, and Jackson could not restrain his contempt for the unholy alliance, which was almost immediately to become a triple alliance with the Bank as the third party. “I have no doubt,” the President wrote Hamilton, “the people will duly appreciate the motive which led to it.”[602]
In presenting the measure, Clay made no secret of his purpose. “I believe the American System to be in the greatest danger,” he said, “and I believe that it can be placed on a better and a safer foundation at this session than next.” Webster, however, was not impressed. “This may be so, sir,” he replied. “This may be so. But, if it be so, it is because the American people will not sanction the tariff; and if they will not, then, sir, it cannot be sustained at all.” Calhoun heartily approved the object of the bill. “He who loves the Union,” he said, “must desire to see this agitating question brought to a termination.” John Forsyth, representing the Administration, objected to the introduction of the bill fourteen days before the expiration of the Congress. Would it not be better to await the action of the House on the bill before it—the Verplanck Bill? And he objected, properly, on the ground that all revenue measures had to originate in the House. This constitutional objection, raised by Forsyth, was met on February 25th just as the House was about to adjourn for dinner, when the ever handy Letcher arose and moved the substitution of the Clay bill for the one then pending. The motion was carried and the bill passed the lower branch of Congress.[603]
Thus the two measures, the Force Bill and the compromise tariff, were pending in the Senate at the same time, with Clay making every effort, but without avail, to pass his measure first.
On February 24th the Force Bill was called up for final action. With the beginning of the calling of the roll, all the enemies of the measure, with the single exception of John Tyler, arose and filed from the Senate Chamber. Taken by surprise at such conduct, Tyler immediately moved an adjournment. Wilkins called attention to the fact that Calhoun and his followers had just that moment withdrawn, and the motion was defeated. The roll-call proceeded—and only the name of John Tyler appears on the list of the negatives. Such was always the courage of this much-belittled man—a courage which we shall meet again.[604]Five days later the tariff bill was called up, and Clayton offered his amendmentswhich were so offensive to Calhoun and his followers, repeating his threat to kill the bill if Calhoun and all the Nullifiers did not vote for every amendment. Clay and Calhoun consulted, and Clayton was importuned to yield, but the stubborn protectionist was adamant. Thus confronted, Clay and Calhoun accepted the amendments, and, as Clayton presented them, voted for them, one by one, until the last and most distasteful, on home valuation, was reached.
Here the friends of Calhoun balked, and Clayton, never given to idle bluster, immediately made his motion to table the bill. Clay implored, and Clayton set his jaws and shook his head. The measure seemed doomed. Meanwhile, the Nullifiers, greatly alarmed, withdrew to the space behind the Vice-President’s chair for consultation. Finally Clayton was requested to withdraw his motion to give Calhoun and his friends time for consideration. With the understanding that, unless the votes were forthcoming, the motion would be renewed, the request was granted, and the Senate adjourned for the night.
The morning found Clayton confronted with a plan devised during the night to spare Calhoun the humiliation of voting for the hated amendment, provided enough votes were assured to carry it through without his vote. The immovable Clayton sternly shook his head. Calhoun must vote for every amendment and for the bill. When the Senate convened, it was still uncertain what the Carolinian would do. At length, after all of his friends had first stated their objections, and yet reluctantly yielded, Calhoun arose, repeated the performance, and, having voted for the amendment at the dictation of Clayton, voted for the bill.[605]The unhappy plight of Calhoun was not lost upon his enemies, and Blair found in it an inspiration for his sarcasm. “A single night,” he wrote, “was sufficient to change the settled opinion of theprofound reader of the Constitution. We exceedingly doubt whether in the private interview in which Mr. Clay disposed of Mr. Calhoun’s constitutional scruples, a word was uttered in relation to the Constitution.”[606]Thus passed into law, under circumstances deserving of Benton’s reprehension, the measure concocted by a combination of erstwhile foes.[607]The Nullifiers died hard, and Duff Green, the pen of Nullification, made printer to the Senate by this incongruous combination, in performing the hateful official duty of publishing the Force Bill in the “Telegraph,” had the impudence to dress his paper in mourning. “This is the way,” observed a Jacksonian paper, “this ungrateful wretch shows his gratitude to the Senate for his recent appointment.”[608]
Meanwhile, what of South Carolina?
The letter of Cass, published in the “Richmond Enquirer,” had borne fruit, and Virginia had sent Benjamin Watkins Leigh, a lawyer of distinction and an orator of no mean ability, to Charleston to ask a suspension of the Nullification Ordinance until Congress had adjourned. An ardent devotee of State Rights, now a bitter enemy of Jackson, and soon to enter the Senate to make his opposition felt, he had much in his principles and personality to command a respectful hearing from South Carolina. The call of the Nullification Convention was consequently postponed until after the adjournment of Congress, and March 11th was fixed as the day for reassembling. By that time it was all over—the Force Bill in effect. The convention met at Columbia, with Hayne in the chair. Leigh was invited within the bar. The dominating figure of the scene, however, was Calhoun, who had gone post-haste to Carolina to urge the acceptance of the compromise. The tall, thin figure of the great Senator, seated among the delegates on the floor, was the star of theassembly. A committee was named to consider the general course of action; and one week later the Ordinance of Nullification was rescinded, and by a vote of 153 to 4 the convention agreed that the threatened danger was over.
The political effect of the fight was to be felt throughout the period of the generation then living. The Secessionists and Nullifiers paraded, with much flapping of banners, out of the Democratic Party, to be joyously and effusively welcomed by Henry Clay into the Opposition. During the remainder of Jackson’s Administration, the most bitter and persistent of his foes were to be men, once Democrats, who had left the party because Jackson was prepared to preserve the Union with the sword. Calhoun and Preston, McDuffie and Poindexter, Leigh and Tyler—these were to crowd Clay for the leadership of the party that now prepared to enter the lists against Jackson and his Administration, flying the flag, and posing as the real friends of the Republic and the Constitution. If they had been free with their characterizations of Jackson during the Nullification fight as “tyrant,” “despot,” “autocrat,” they were to use the epithets more frequently in opposing him upon the Bank. If during this latter struggle they were to speak with almost convincing eloquence of the destruction of free institutions, they had learned the language when calling upon the people to defend their liberties against the author of the Nullification Proclamation. Out of this alliance, for which Clay had so cunningly planned, was to come a party to oppose the Democratic Party with indifferent success for twenty-two years; and, strangely enough, the only one of its leaders to become a beneficiary of the unholy alliance was John Tyler, who was to reach the White House. Poinsett, after the Nullification fight, retired to his rice plantation, where he lived with his books and enjoying the society of cultivated men and women, until called by Van Buren to enter his Cabinet. Serving throughout the Administration, he returned, at the expirationof his term, to his plantation, where he died ten years before the attack on Sumter.
The passage of the two important measures was not, however, to end the drama of the session—one of the most dramatic in American history. It was on the last night that Jackson, finding many of his friends had left the Capitol, “pocketed” Clay’s Land Bill and his own veto. Naturally enough the session ended in bitter partisan wrangles and with much bad blood on both sides. Uproarious shouts of derision greeted the customary resolution of thanks to the Speaker. Many members were in a state of hopeless drunkenness. It was five o’clock in the morning when Adams invited Edward Everett to ride home with him. The drowsy driver touched the horses, and over the frozen ruts of the Avenue, the carriage jolted homeward. Almost immediately the driver was asleep, and the carriage, striking a rut in front of Gadsby’s, the sleepy statesmen narrowly escaped a plunge into the snow. Soon, however, they reached the “macadamized part of the Avenue,” without more mishaps; and having left Everett at his lodgings, Adams alighted and walked to his own home, with the thermometer registering six below zero. Thus the last figure of that historic and bitter session of whom we catch a glimpse is that of the short, blear-eyed ex-President, trudging homeward through the dark, ill-paved Washington streets at five o’clock on a frigid morning.[609]
Congressadjourned two days before the second inauguration of Jackson, which lacked the spectacular features of the first. His brief inaugural address revealed absolute confidence in the approval of the people. There was nothing on the surface to warn of his purpose to continue an aggressive war upon the Bank. The transfer of Livingston from the State Department to the Legation in Paris necessitated a reorganization of the Cabinet. Louis McLane, unsympathetic toward the President’s Bank policy, was moved from the Treasury to the State Department. This left the secretaryship of the Treasury vacant, and it was of the highest importance that it be filled by one in complete harmony with the Executive plans.
The choice finally fell on William J. Duane of Philadelphia, variously described as “a distinguished lawyer” and as “the bottom of the Philadelphia bar.” His selection had been recommended by Van Buren[610]and urged by McLane, who was Van Buren’s intimate at the time.[611]He was at least known to Jackson as the son of the fighting editor of the “Aurora,” which had led the fight against the Alien and Sedition Laws.[612]Assuming in the son the militant qualities of the father, and actuated partly, perhaps, by the thought that the appointment would strengthen the Administration in its fight upon the Bank, Duane was pressed to enter the Cabinet, and consented. The personality and character of Duane are dim on the page of history. The Democratic press was apparently hard put to explain the appointment. The “Harrisburg Chronicle” described him as possessing “a well disciplined mind, severe habits of business, which, combined with sound Democratic principles and unbending integrity, are the highest recommendations for office in a free popular government.” Thomas Ritchie, of the “Richmond Enquirer,” who made a more studied effort, feared that the appointment would “scarcely be hailed with the feeling of approbation which it so richly deserves.” But Duane understood “the character of the Bank of the United States—its designs and dangers,” and “on that cardinal subject we have no doubt he will deserve and command the confidence of the friends of the Constitution.” The “Pennsylvanian” informed the National Democracy that “Stephen Gerard saw and appreciated his talents,” and that he was “one of the most sagacious men of the age.”[613]It was only after his break with Jackson that the champions of the Bank discovered his many virtues, and Administration circles his utter insignificance. One of Jackson’s enemies, in berating him, referred to Duane as “that other darling whom you fished up from the desk of a dead miser, and the bottom of the Philadelphia bar.”[614]At first, however, Jackson was much impressed with his discovery, and frequently referred to him as “a chip of the old block, sir.”
Having reorganized his Cabinet, Jackson now concentrated on his plans for the invasion of “the enemy’s country”—his New England tour. His remarkable popularity in that quarter, previously so hostile, grew out of his vigorous defense of the Union and his new relations with Webster. In the spring of 1833 these relations were most cordial, and never were to become personally bitter. At that time he was not on speakingterms with either Clay or Calhoun, and when he met Adams on the street, by chance, he bowed stiffly, without a word. But whenever, in his meanderings about the dingy capital, he encountered Webster, the iron man would pause for a hearty greeting. And while Webster never ceased to consider Jackson temperamentally unfit for the Presidency, he never doubted his integrity or whole-hearted patriotism. “His patriotism,” he was wont to say, “is no more to be questioned than that of Washington.”[615]
It was early in June that Jackson set forth in company with Van Buren, Cass, Woodbury, Donelson, Hill, and the artist, Earle, who lived at the White House. From the moment the party reached Baltimore it was one continuous ovation. Received like a conquering hero in Philadelphia, with an enthusiasm bordering on idolatry in New York City,[616]the ovations he received in Massachusetts eclipsed them all. Harvard conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Laws, Everett delivered an address of welcome at the foot of Bunker Hill, and while the multitude went wild at sight of him in the streets and on the Common, the gentry of Beacon Street refused him the homage of appearing at the windows,[617]and the crabbed Adams, hiding at his Quincy home, a few miles away, poured forth his spleen upon his journal and mourned the degradation of his Alma Mater.[618]Under the load of adulation, the old man’s strength finally failed, and during the last part of his progress he dragged himself from his bed to the parade, and from the physician with his barbarous lancet to the master of ceremonies.[619]Throughout the tour his thoughts were centered on the Bank and his plans for the removal of the deposits, and but few suspected that thecourtly old man, whose eyes moistened and beamed at the applause of the crowds, was meditating the step.
When Hamilton called upon him at his hotel in New York, he found him obsessed with the subject. When the son of the father of the first National Bank joined him in the presidential suite to accompany him to the banquet, Jackson placed in his hands papers by several people urging the removal of the deposits, with the request that he examine them carefully and give him an opinion. Promising a careful perusal, Hamilton ventured the suggestion that the proposed step was “a very questionable one” that would “lead to great disturbances in commercial affairs.”[620]Meanwhile, when alone with Van Buren, the President was discussing the project with him to his keen distress.[621]Throughout the tour, sick or well, Jackson found time to work on the Vice-President and favorite, and when, at Concord, he finally won him over to the plan, the frail old man abandoned the tour and hastened back to Washington to begin a new battle.[622]And Adams, learning of the curtailment of the trip, wrote that “President Jackson has been obliged by the feeble state of his health to give up the remainder of his tour.”[623]Just how feeble Jackson was we shall soon see.
Itis impossible definitely to determine the time Jackson decided on the removal of the deposits. The activity of the Bank in the presidential campaign had not been lost upon him, and he probably had it under consideration at that time. The historian of the Bank is convinced that such was the case.[624]Immediately after the election these rumors multiplied, and Biddle was deluged with warnings, but without disturbing the sublime serenity of his conceit. The autocrat of the Bank was satisfied that the Calhoun following would thereafter be arrayed in favor of the recharter. About this time Dr. Thomas Cooper, then president of the College of South Carolina and one of the intellectual leaders of Nullification, wrote him of his allegiance to the cause.[625]Blair had already charged, in the “Globe,” that there was a coalition between the forces of Clay, Calhoun, and Biddle, and made much of the fact that more Bank stock was owned in South Carolina than in all the other States of the Union south of the Potomac and west of the Alleghany Mountains.[626]The Democratic disaffection, together with the temporary alliance between Jackson and Webster, was quite enough to restore confidence to the ever sanguine Biddle,[627]who took no pains to conceal his satisfaction. This was water on the wheel of Blair, who, Iago-like, and always at Jackson’s elbow, kept impressing him with the idea that the Bank planned and expected an ultimate triumph. In this work he was ably seconded by Amos Kendall and James A. Hamilton, who wrote from New York that “a gentleman whose knowledge of the views of the U.S. Bank is only second to that of its President” had informed him that it expected to get a new charter.[628]It was firmly believed by Amos Kendall that the Bank’s purpose in adding $28,000,000 to its discounts, and multiplying its debtors and dependents, was to serve a political end in the campaign of 1836, and with characteristic persistency he urged the removal of the deposits to prevent their use for political purposes.[629]Jackson himself feared the effect of loans and legal retainers to members of the Congress. In all these suspicionsthere was ample justification.[630]It did not require much, knowing as he did the character of the banker, to persuade Jackson that his duty was plain, and during the winter and spring of 1833 he was in frequent consultation with Roger Taney, Amos Kendall, and Frank Blair, the three men responsible for the step he took.
During these days of mysterious conferences, the conservative members of the Cabinet, and Van Buren with the traditional timidity of the candidate, were gravely concerned. To none was the prospect more appalling than to Louis McLane, then Secretary of the Treasury, a conservative, a former Federalist, and a prospective candidate for the Presidency. In his anxiety he sent for Kendall, avowed his doubts, and asked for information. In the end he frankly confessed that he was not satisfied as to the wisdom of the step, but that he would execute the plan if called upon to do so by the President. The interview was friendly, and Kendall returned to his office and prepared, for McLane’s edification, an elaborate argument in favor of the removal. It is characteristic of Kendall that, while the paper lightly touched upon the alleged insecurity of the deposits, the greater part of the paper was a discussion of the political effect. The hostility of the Bank to the Administration, he thought, could not be intensified. If the deposits were placed with the State banks, they would become partisans of the Administration. The people of the Southern and Western States would be pleased, and the New York banks, always jealous of the financial preëminence of Philadelphia, would at least secretly rejoice. The New England States were not concerned, one way or the other, and could be safely ignored. And in the end, Kendall insisted that a failure to remove the deposits would make a recharter certain. That this letter, written March 16, 1833, was promptly placed in the hands of Van Buren, who was McLane’s sponsor in the Administration, there can be no doubt.
The aftermath of the letter came a few days later, when Van Buren, meeting Kendall at a White House dinner, warmly protested against the plans of the Kitchen Cabinet. The genius of that famous group rose from the table in his excitement, declared that failure to remove the deposits made a Whig victory certain in 1836, and that he was prepared to lay down his pen. “I can live under a corrupt despotism,” he exclaimed, “as well as any other man by keeping out of its way, which I shall certainly do.”[631]It was the Vice-President and not the auditor of the Treasury who afterwards apologized.
It was under these conditions that Jackson propounded a series of questions to his Cabinet, with a preliminary statement that he favored the removal. The first count of noses in the official household showed Livingston and Cass for the Bank, Barry and Taney against it, with Woodbury hedging. McLane, having greater responsibility as the head of the Treasury, took two months in the preparation of an exhaustive reply opposing the removal, and his argument was afterwards to be used against the Administration.
A month after Congress had adjourned there was a relaxation of tension in Bank circles and among the conservatives of the Administration party, who assumed that nothing would be done during the congressional recess. The hostility of a majority of the Cabinet had not abated, and Biddle thought that the deposits were safe.
But if the official Cabinet was to hear no more, for months, of the proposed removal, the Kitchen Cabinet went into almost continuous session for the consideration of this one subject. The disposal of the deposits, and the time for making the removal, were the principal subjects discussed during those spring days in the White House, and it required but little discussion to determine upon the time. Hugh Lawson White strongly urged the postponement of action untilCongress convened, but this was instantly overruled by Taney and Kendall, who urged a recess removal for different reasons. The Attorney-General favored such action “because it is desirable that the members should be among their constituents when the measure is announced, and should bring with them when they come here, the feelings and sentiments of the people.”[632]Kendall suggested another reason, also political. The conservatives had made some impression on Jackson’s mind with the warning that, if he removed the deposits, Congress would order them restored, and he appealed to Kendall for his opinion. “If I were certain,” said Kendall, “that Congress would direct them to be restored, still they ought to be removed, and any order by Congress for their restoration disregarded; for it is the only means by which this embodiment of power which aims to govern Congress and the country can be destroyed.” And, to this militant advice, he added his reasons for favoring the removal during the congressional recess. “Let the removal take place so early as to give us several months to defend the measure in the ‘Globe,’ and we will bring up the people to sustain you with a power which Congress dare not resist.”[633]
Meanwhile Duane had reached Washington and assumed his duties. Soon after his arrival, Kendall was surprised to find him loath to discuss the removal, and when the story of this reticence was carried to Jackson, he explained to his Secretary of the Treasury what was wanted. When Duane demurred, he was told to take his time and report on the President’s return from New England. By this time Amos Kendall had assumed the leadership, and he was instructed to interview the head of the Treasury during Jackson’s absence.
At this time Van Buren, waiting in New York to join hischief on his tour, was blissfully ignorant of the embarrassments that awaited him until he received a letter written on the day Jackson set forth on his journey. “The Bank and change of deposits have engrossed my mind much,” he wrote; “it is a perplexing subject, and I wish your opinion before I finally act.” Three days later, while Jackson was receiving the plaudits of the multitude, Kendall made the situation clear, in a letter to Van Buren, announcing that the removal had been determined upon and outlining the tentative plans. Nothing could have been more painful to the Vice-President, who had strongly urged that, with the veto of the recharter bill, the Bank be permitted quietly to go its way to the termination of its charter.
WhileJackson between illnesses and ovations was bringing the power of his compelling personality to bear upon his protégé’s timidity, Kendall was following instructions in Washington in attempting to ascertain the intentions of Duane. In this he was wholly unsuccessful. Time and again the subject was broached only to be brushed aside, and Jackson, constantly informed, had some savage moments while smiling urbanely upon the crowds.
Reaching the capital on July 4th, he immediately summoned Duane to a conference. The Secretary, who had been ill, rose from a sick-bed and presented himself at the White House looking pale and feeble. At the sight of his wan adviser, the impulsive Jackson penitently grasped both his hands, reproved him for venturing forth in such a condition, and kindly postponed the interview until he had recovered.[634]After an absence of eight days Duane appeared at the White House again, with a lengthy letter setting forth his reasons for objecting to the removal until after Congress had been informed. Three days later, or on July 15th, another conference between Jackson and his rebellious Secretary was held with Duane stubbornly holding his ground, and Jackson kindness itself. In truth, it appears that, with the aid of McLane, Duane had succeeded in arousing some misgivings in Jackson’s mind as to the possibility of persuading the State banks to accept the deposits.
“Send me to ask them, and I will settle that question,” said Kendall.
“You shall go,” Jackson replied.
Summoning the unhappy Duane, the President announced a postponement of discussions until the attitude of the State banks could be ascertained. Kendall was to be the agent of the Treasury on a tour of investigation, and Duane was to prepare the necessary instructions.
When these instructions were delivered to Kendall, he was amazed. They merely asked the opinions of the banks on the general question, and, in view of their well-established hostility, it was clear enough what the answer would be. Wrathfully hastening to the White House, Kendall bluntly refused to carry instructions so framed, declaring the sole purpose of the investigation should be to learn whether State banks would accept the deposits. He was told to prepare his own instructions, and thus the head of the Kitchen Cabinet sallied forth on his own terms. About the same time, Jackson, in need of a rest and release from the sultry atmosphere of Washington, went to Rip Raps in Hampton Roads, where he was accustomed to relax in the summer, accompanied by Frank Blair. Thus, with one member of the Kitchen Cabinet making a tour of the banks on his own instructions, another was at Jackson’s elbow in the unconventional environment of Rip Raps.[635]All these various moves were promptly reported to Biddle by some member of the Administration, and on the day Kendall was expected in Philadelphia, thefinancial autocrat was writing to Dr. Cooper, his new ally, in laudation of the firmness of Duane and the viciousness of the Kitchen Cabinet.[636]
Meanwhile, in his visits to the banks of Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, and Boston, Kendall was pulled and hauled and mauled by both the servitors of the Bank and the conservatives of the Administration circle. At Philadelphia it was hinted that a fortune was within his grasp if he would but avail himself of the opportunity.[637]There, too, he fell foul of James Gordon Bennett, then editor of the “Pennsylvanian,” whose mask of cordiality was dropped in the publication of Kendall’s private letters showing hostility to the Bank—as though private letters were necessary to the proof.[638]
But more significant, and politically more important, was Kendall’s interview with Van Buren and McLane in New York City. The three met by chance in the breakfast room of an hotel, and in an interview, then arranged, it was proposed by the hedging politicians that the removal of the deposits be postponed until January when Congress would be in session. This plan originated with McLane, and Kendall, who suspected it was proposed with the hope and expectation that Congress would interpose, replied that he would be satisfied provided McLane, Duane, and the other Bank Democrats would agree to use their personal influence with members of Congress to have the deposits removed.[639]It was agreed that all three should write Jackson at Rip Raps, and, in complying, Kendall said that the proposal was against his judgment, and Jackson instantly rejected it.[640]
Throughout July the Opposition and Bank papers were warning the public of the movement on foot, and the “Intelligencer” was especially alarmed, dwelling at length on the rumor that Kendall was in Philadelphia before he had even left Washington. Blair was moved to mirth. He admitted that Kendall had been seen taking a stage, carrying with him “a large black trunk,” and that, while he “looked charitable, his intent may be wicked.” Worse still, “the Editor of the ‘Globe’ left for the South two days before with baggage enough to last a man a lifetime.” A mysterious, uncanny combination of events, he conceded, that “bodes to owners of U.S. Bank stock, who purchased at 50 per cent, no good.”[641]
This facetiousness enraged and alarmed the Opposition, and its press began to threaten to impeach Duane if he removed the deposits. Kendall was scourged with excoriations, and State banks were warned against taking the deposits on pain of the displeasure of the Biddle institution. Papers under the influence of the Bank, but still posing as Jacksonian, were sure that Jackson “and his able Secretary of the Treasury” would “not be hurried or retarded in his important measure by the violent and indiscreet denunciations and threats of any set of men,” and would “act on the deposits at the proper time and in the proper way.”[642]And Blair, catching the subtle suggestion of Bennett, hastened to assail him as having been “smuggled into the confidence of an unsuspecting Democracy as a friend of the cause” and as a “treacherous instrument of Webb and Biddle,” who had “the impudence to propose by praise to flatter the President and his Cabinet to adopt the views of the Bank.”[643]From his sanctum in the office of the “Albany Journal,” Thurlow Weed, wisest of the Whig journalists, sent forth the threat of panic. “We are impatient for the removal,” he wrote. “Nothing short of a general ruin will cure the people of their delusions, and the sooner it comes, the better.”[644]
MeanwhileJackson at Rip Raps was in daily conference with Frank Blair on the problems of the removal. All this time Blair was creating the impression in the “Globe” that the President’s sole thought was the recovery of his health. The sea air was “proving advantageous,” his appetite better, his strength returning. Nothing was more remote from the thoughts of Jackson. The situation was delicate and politically mixed. The Cabinet was, for the most part, hostile. Conservative Democrats were terrified at the thought of such radical action, and feared the complete disruption of the party and its defeat in 1836. Kendall does not misstate the conditions when he says that “the ambitious politicians who still surrounded General Jackson, trembled in their knees, and were ready to fly,” and that “almost the only fearless and determined supporters he had around him were Mr. Taney, the editor of the ‘Globe,’ and its few contributors.”[645]The brilliant, but ultra-conservative Ritchie, of the “Richmond Enquirer,” feared that the party would “rue the precipitate step in sackcloth and ashes,” and that it would “present nothing but a splendid ruin.”[646]
Painful as the situation was to all conservatives, it was maddening to Van Buren, who thought he saw the Presidency slipping from his grasp. In his desire to get as far away as possible, he was planning a month’s outing with Washington Irving among the Dutch settlements of Long Island and the North River, when a letter reached him from Jackson calling upon him to take a stand. His reply, under date of August 19th, would have pleased Talleyrand. Having great confidence in Silas Wright, Senator from New York, he wrote that he would confer with him and then formulate his views. A little later he wrote that he and Wright favoredthe McLane plan. The tone of sharp surprise in Jackson’s response alarmed the hard-pressed heir apparent, and he hastily wrote that he would yield to the wisdom of Jackson. But his troubles were not over. Another letter from Jackson, more alarming still, pursued him to poison his vacation, summoning him to Washington for a consultation. The cunning politician never faced a more painful problem. He could not afford to break with the all-powerful party dictator in the White House—that would be to abandon the Presidency. Nor was he at all certain that he could afford to become intimately identified with the desperate enterprise upon which the chief was determined to embark. The one would deprive him of the nomination of his party; the other might make that nomination worthless. The campaign of 1836 was already in full swing, and the Opposition was insinuating a directing influence between the most unpopular measures of the Administration and Van Buren. Timid and cautious by temperament, his peculiar situation accentuated these traits in the candidate, and the summons to the seat of war sounded to him like the crack of doom.
But he was equal to the crisis. Writing at once of his willingness to respond if Jackson thought best, he feared his presence in Washington at the time of the withdrawal would dim the prestige of the act by giving it the appearance of having been inspired by the moneyed interests of New York.[647]Having painted this thought, he added some lines for the protection of Louis McLane, his friend. He was fearful that, on the resignation of Duane, McLane might feel that he should also tender his, and that would be a pity. Would it not be a good idea, in the event the resignation were offered, to reply that “you confide in him &c., notwithstanding the difference between you on this point, and that if he couldconsistently remain in the Administration, you would be gratified?” That the suspicious Jackson was deceived is highly improbable, albeit where his affections were involved, as in the case of Van Buren, his vision was apt to be occasionally defective.
But Van Buren and his advice were not needed, for a stronger man, with courage and an iron will equal to his own, was moving to the side of Jackson. Throughout the months of conferences and discussions the one member of his official Cabinet who was in whole-hearted sympathy with the wishes of the Kitchen Cabinet was Roger Taney, the Attorney-General. Before leaving for Rip Raps, Jackson had discussed with him the steps to be taken in the event of a definite refusal from Duane to order the removal, and had intimated that he would transfer Taney to the office of the Secretary of the Treasury. Just about the time Jackson was puzzling over the peculiar hedging of Van Buren, he received a letter from Taney that delighted him. The latter reiterated his conviction that the deposits should be removed, and during the congressional recess. He was sure “the powerful and corrupting monopoly” would “be fatal to the liberties of the people” unless destroyed, and Jackson alone could encompass its destruction. The President had “already done more than any other man has done, or could do, to preserve the simplicity and purity of our institutions, and to guard the country from this dangerous and powerful instrument of corruption.” He had “doubted” whether Jackson’s friends and the country had the right to ask him “to bear the brunt of such a conflict as the removal of the deposits under present conditions is likely to produce.” He had no desire for the secretaryship of the Treasury, but he “would not shrink from the responsibility” if, in the President’s judgment, “the public exigency would require” him to undertake it.[648]Here was a man quite as persuasive in his flattery as Van Buren,and prepared, as Van Buren was not, to stake his future upon an aggressive support of the removal.
For the time being, then, exit Van Buren.
Enter Roger B. Taney.
By this time Jackson’s mind was thoroughly made up. The tour of Kendall had not been a complete success. The banks were timid and fearful of the power of “The Monster.” Catterall credits the report that Kendall himself had concluded the plan unwise, and had admitted to Jackson that “the project of removing the deposits must be given up.”[649]This advice, if given,[650]came too late. The old military leader was in the saddle, war was declared, retreat was defeat. Thus, a few days after receiving Taney’s letter, Jackson wrote him that he had considered the probability that Congress would attempt to overawe him, and had determined that, when Duane withdrew, Taney should step into the place and conduct the affairs of the Treasury until toward the close of the next session of Congress, when the battle would have been won or lost, and the refusal of the Senate to confirm Taney’s nomination would not interfere. He was only awaiting proof of the expenditure of $40,000 of Bank money in the campaign. With this proof, of which he had no doubt, he would feel justified in removing the deposits. The Bank might “rebel against our power, and even refuse to pay to the order of the Government the public money in its vaults, and lay claim to all the money that remains uncalled for on the books of the loan office.” Everywhere he found the “assumed power of this monster.” This pretension must be challenged and tested, and he had no doubt of being “sustained by the people.”[651]
Thus the die was definitely cast at Rip Raps early in September, and Jackson returned to Washington determined to force the fighting.
Assoon as he reached the capital, he began to press Duane more insistently, with the Secretary stubbornly refusing to budge. Some time before he had voluntarily given the assurance that if the President should determine upon the course outlined, and he should be unable to comply, he would promptly tender his resignation. The President’s intentions were now thoroughly understood, but Duane gave no indication of a disposition to relinquish his post, and the pro-Bank papers were decorating him with laurels. The first covert attack upon him from Administration circles appeared in the “Globe” of September 12th, when Blair, taking cognizance of an article in the “Baltimore Chronicle,” denounced it as a “slanderer of Mr. Duane.” “Would the ‘Chronicle’ convert the Secretary of the Treasury into a Bank officer, and have him communicating to the corporation what belongs only to his relations with the President?” Even Duane could not have mistaken the implication. Five days after this article appeared, the Cabinet was convened, and Jackson took the opinion of his advisers. McLane, Duane, and Cass were against the step, with Taney, Barry, and Woodbury (who had previously hedged), favoring it.
On the following day the Cabinet was again convened to hear the President’s reasons for his determination, set forth in the famous “Paper Read to the Cabinet.” This document, as read, had been revised and rewritten from the notes sent by Jackson from his retreat at Hampton Roads to Taney, and was to become the storm center of congressional controversy, although it did not concern the Congress in the least. Beginning with a confession of a fixed hostility to the Bank on the conviction of its unconstitutionality and danger to the liberties of the people, he elaborately reviewed the charter controversy. The people had passed upon his conduct at the polls and he had been overwhelmingly vindicated.The Nation, therefore, having definitely decided on the abandonment of the Bank as a place of deposit, some method should be devised for the future deposit of the public funds before the expiration of the charter. Under the law, the Secretary of the Treasury could withdraw the deposits whenever he saw fit, provided he informed Congress of his act at the earliest opportunity. To leave the deposits with the Bank until the day of the expiration of the charter with the expectation of making the transfer to some other depository at once would mean “serious inconvenience to the Government and people.” Such work, he thought, “ought not to be the work of months only, but of years,” for otherwise “much suffering and distress would be brought upon the people.” These considerations alone, he thought sufficient to justify the step he proposed.
But in the conduct of the Bank additional and more pressing reasons could be found. Knowing of the Government’s decision to appropriate the greater part of its deposits during 1832 to the payment of the public debt, the Bank, in the sixteen months preceding May, 1832, had extended its loans more than $28,000,000, and the maximum of the extension had been made in May. And two months before that, the Bank had so perfectly understood its inability to pay over the public deposits when called upon, that it had secretly negotiated with foreign holders of the three per cent stock a year’s postponement of a demand for payment after notice should be given by the Government. “This effort to thwart the Government in the payment of the public debt,” he said, “that it might retain the public money to be used for their private interests, palliated by pretenses notoriously unfounded and insincere, would have justified the instant withdrawal of the public deposits.”
Since the congressional report in favor of the Bank, other things had occurred that would surely alter the opinion of the lawmakers. “The fact that the Bank controls, and in somecases substantially owns, and by its money supports, some of the leading presses of the country, is now more clearly established.” Extravagant sums had been loaned to editors on unusual time and nominal security in 1831 and 1832. And the proceedings and management of the Bank had been unusual and indefensible. The terms of the charter had been violated; and when Government directors undertook to restore methods in conformity with the terms of the charter, they had been disregarded. Worse still: the most important transactions involving the credit of the Bank had been turned over to Biddle, and the committees left in utter ignorance of what he was doing. He had been given unlimited authority in the use of the Bank’s money for propaganda purposes. Thousands of dollars had been squandered in the printing of speeches and pamphlets, not only defending the Bank, but attacking the chosen representatives of the people. If, as claimed, the Bank could bring distress and chaos in retaliation, all the more reason for breaking the power of the tyrannical institution. And he closed by fixing October 1st as the day for action.
As the members of the Cabinet sat in the White House that day under conflicting emotions, all appreciating the seriousness of the step, and some contemplating the closing of a career, there could have been none unmindful of the fact that the Paper was intended less for them than for the public. It was characteristic of Jackson in preparing his ground for a fight to speak over the heads of both Cabinet and Congress to the people. That Kendall and Blair were in large part responsible for the original draft which reached Taney for revision, there can be no doubt.
Knowing the real purpose of the Paper, Duane requested a postponement of publication until he could definitely decide. While the Paper was being put in type at the “Globe” office, McLane and Cass threatened to resign rather than accept any responsibility for the act, and Lewis suggested thatthey be publicly relieved of responsibility. When Blair hastened to Jackson with Lewis’s suggestion, the grim man of iron added the concluding paragraph assuming full personal responsibility—much to the chagrin and disgust of Taney.[652]
The crisis had now been reached, and the action of Duane was awaited by the Kitchen Cabinet with the keenest interest, not unmixed with fear lest Taney decline to take the vacant place and face the bitter fight. Taking counsel of his fears, Kendall rushed to the Attorney-General and was reassured. Confessing his fear that his acceptance would mean the end of his lifelong hopes for a place on the Supreme Bench, Taney declared himself in the fight to the end.[653]
On September 21st, the “Globe” authoritatively announced that “the deposits would be changed to State banks” as soon as the necessary arrangements could be made; and in anticipation of the nature of the war the Bank would wage, Blair stressed the fact that the deposits would not be immediately withdrawn, and that the process would be gradual. “It is believed,” he wrote, “that by this means the change need not produce any inconvenience to the commercial community.”
Four days later the “Paper Read to the Cabinet” appeared in full in the “Globe.”
Twodays after this publication, Major Lewis wrote Hamilton that “if Mr. Duane cannot or will not make the order,” he would be superseded by Taney, “who has been decidedly with the President in relation to this matter from the beginning to the end,” and discrediting rumors of other Cabinet resignations.[654]Whatever may have been the feelings of Hamilton, who looked upon the plan as fraught with possibilities of disaster, the effect of the “Globe’s” announcement on Thomas H. Benton, sojourning with relatives in Virginia, was that of a bugle blast to a war charger. He felt “an emotion of the moral sublime at beholding such an instance of civic heroism,” and that “a great blow had been struck, and that a great contest must come on, which could only be crowned with success by acting up to the spirit with which it was commenced.” He “repaired to Washington at the approach of the session with a full determination to stand by the President.”[655]
The day after the reading of the Paper, Jackson called upon Duane for a decision, and the Secretary begged for time to confer with his venerable father, thenen routeto Washington. The same day Major Donelson, the President’s secretary, informed him of the decision to publish the Paper in the “Globe” on the morrow, and the hard-pressed Minister protested against such precipitancy. This protest was followed with a letter to Donelson reiterating his plea for time, with the assertion that if he were President he would “consult at least reasonably the feelings of a man who has already anxiety enough.”[656]Jackson had, in fact, exercised a most unnatural restraint of his temper, and had been remarkably considerate of his Minister’s feelings. Even before the reading of the Paper, and before Duane had made his choice for martyrdom, Jackson had opened a graceful avenue of escape to the Legation at St. Petersburg, but the offer had been declined.
On the 21st, Duane appeared at the White House and left his written decision with Jackson personally. It is a letter of many words, evidently prepared for publication. After asserting that the Secretary of the Treasury is, by the terms of the charter, the sole custodian of the public funds, he finally reached his reasons for refusing to “carry your directions into effect.” It would be a “breach of public faith,” would appear as “vindictive and arbitrary,” and “if the Bank has abused or perverted its powers, the judiciary are able and willing to punish.” The House of Representatives had declared the funds safe, and, if anything had happened since its report, “the representatives of the people, chosen since your appeal to them in your veto message, will in a few weeks assemble.” Again, “a change to local and irresponsible banks will tend to shake public confidence,” and “it is not sound policy to foster local banks.” And so on with other reasons, including the charge that “persons and presses known to be in the confidence and pay of the Administration” had tried to intimidate him. There could be no misunderstanding of the purpose of the letter. It was written in a spirit bitterly hostile to the Administration, and in the hope of serving the moneyed institution and having the service rewarded.[657]Having thus insulted the President, he withdrew his promise of July to resign if unable to meet his chief’s views, and carefully pointed out that Jackson had the power of dismissal. Here was a martyr zealously seeking the cross.
Jackson immediately wrote a brief, dignified reply to the effect that he could not receive such a communication, nor “enter into further discussion of the question.” Rather sharply, the grim old man reminded his subordinate that the imputation in the latter’s letter had no place in a correspondence between a President and a member of his Cabinet, that the letter of July offering to resign was before him, and brusquely demanding a final answer. Early in the afternoon Duane again took his pen in hand. The result was another tiresome letter concluding with a distinct refusal to issue the order or to resign, and impudently protesting against the interference of the Executive in the affairs of a member of the Cabinet. This second letter could hardly have reached theWhite House when Duane, seized with a perfect passion for self-expression, wrote a third “to present another view.” The burden of this epistle was that he had been treated unkindly by the “Globe.” Having started this upon its way by messenger, the superheated Secretary grasped his pen for another effort, consisting of painful reiterations. All these letters, thousands of words, and pages of paper, were written on the 21st, but with the exception of the reply to the first, Jackson ignored them. Then, two days later, Jackson wrote a short note, returning the last two letters as containing inaccuracies and being inadmissible, and closing with a curt dismissal. Thus Duane laid down his pen, packed his belongings, and passed out of public life.[658]