Thirty Years' View (Vol. II of 2)

Thomas Hart Benton

Thirty Years' View (Vol. II of 2) / or, A History of the Working of the American Government / for Thirty Years, from 1820 to 1850

CHAPTER I.

INAUGURATION OF MR. VAN BUREN

March the 4th of this year, Mr. Van Buren was inaugurated President of the United States with the usual formalities, and conformed to the usage of his predecessors in delivering a public address on the occasion: a declaration of general principles, and an indication of the general course of the administration, were the tenor of his discourse: and the doctrines of the democratic school, as understood at the original formation of parties, were those professed. Close observance of the federal constitution as written – no latitudinarian constructions permitted, or doubtful powers assumed – faithful adherence to all its compromises – economy in the administration of the government – peace, friendship and fair dealing with all foreign nations – entangling alliances with none: such was his political chart: and with the expression of his belief that a perseverance in this line of foreign policy, with an increased strength, tried valor of the people, and exhaustless resources of the country, would entitle us to the good will of nations, protect our national respectability, and secure us from designed aggression from foreign powers. His expressions and views on this head deserve to be commemorated, and to be considered by all those into whose hands the management of the public affairs may go; and are, therefore, here given in his own words:

"Our course of foreign policy has been so uniform and intelligible, as to constitute a rule of executive conduct which leaves little to my discretion, unless, indeed, I were willing to run counter to the lights of experience, and the known opinions of my constituents. We sedulously cultivate the friendship of all nations, as the condition most compatible with our welfare, and the principles of our government. We decline alliances, as adverse to our peace. We desire commercial relations on equal terms, being ever willing to give a fair equivalent for advantages received. We endeavor to conduct our intercourse with openness and sincerity; promptly avowing our objects, and seeking to establish that mutual frankness which is as beneficial in the dealings of nations as of men. We have no disposition, and we disclaim all right, to meddle in disputes, whether internal or foreign, that may molest other countries; regarding them, in their actual state, as social communities, and preserving a strict neutrality in all their controversies. Well knowing the tried valor of our people, and our exhaustless resources, we neither anticipate nor fear any designed aggression; and, in the consciousness of our own just conduct, we feel a security that we shall never be called upon to exert our determination, never to permit an invasion of our rights, without punishment or redress."

These are sound and encouraging views, and in adherence to them, promise to the United States a career of peace and prosperity comparatively free from the succession of wars which have loaded so many nations with debt and taxes, filled them with so many pensioners and paupers, created so much necessity for permanent fleets and armies; and placed one half the population in the predicament of living upon the labor of the other. The stand which the United States had acquired among nations by the vindication of her rights against the greatest powers – and the manner in which all unredressed aggressions, and all previous outstanding injuries, even of the oldest date, had been settled up and compensated under the administration of President Jackson – authorized this language from Mr. Van Buren; and the subsequent conduct of nations has justified it. Designed aggression, within many years, has come from no great power: casual disagreements and accidental injuries admit of arrangement: weak neighbors can find no benefit to themselves in wanton aggression, or refusal of redress for accidental wrong: isolation (a continent, as it were, to ourselves) is security against attack; and our railways would accumulate rapid destruction upon any invader. These advantages, and strict adherence to the rule, to ask only what is right, and submit to nothing wrong, will leave us (we have reason to believe) free from hostile collision with foreign powers, free from the necessity of keeping up war establishments of army and navy in time of peace, with our great resources left in the pockets of the people (always the safest and cheapest national treasuries), to come forth when public exigencies require them, and ourselves at liberty to pursue an unexampled career of national and individual prosperity.

One single subject of recently revived occurrence in our domestic concerns, and of portentous apparition, admitted a departure from the generalities of an inaugural address, and exacted from the new President the notice of a special declaration: it was the subject of slavery – an alarming subject of agitation near twenty years before – quieted by the Missouri compromise – resuscitated in 1835, as shown in previous chapters of this View; and apparently taking its place as a permanent and most pestiferous element in our presidential elections and federal legislation. It had largely mixed with the presidential election of the preceding year: it was expected to mix with ensuing federal legislation: and its evil effect upon the harmony and stability of the Union justified the new President in making a special declaration in relation to it, and even in declaring beforehand the cases of slavery legislation in which he would apply the qualified negative with which the constitution invested him over the acts of Congress. Under this sense of duty and propriety the inaugural address presented this passage:

"The last, perhaps the greatest, of the prominent sources of discord and disaster supposed to lurk in our political condition, was the institution of domestic slavery. Our forefathers were deeply impressed with the delicacy of this subject, and they treated it with a forbearance so evidently wise, that, in spite of every sinister foreboding, it never, until the present period disturbed the tranquillity of our common country. Such a result is sufficient evidence of the justice and the patriotism of their course; it is evidence not to be mistaken, that an adherence to it can prevent all embarrassment from this, as well as from every other anticipated cause of difficulty or danger. Have not recent events made it obvious to the slightest reflection, that the least deviation from this spirit of forbearance is injurious to every interest, that of humanity included? Amidst the violence of excited passions, this generous and fraternal feeling has been sometimes disregarded; and, standing as I now do before my countrymen in this high place of honor and of trust, I cannot refrain from anxiously invoking my fellow-citizens never to be deaf to its dictates. Perceiving, before my election, the deep interest this subject was beginning to excite, I believed it a solemn duty fully to make known my sentiments in regard to it; and now, when every motive for misrepresentations have passed away, I trust that they will be candidly weighed and understood. At least, they will be my standard of conduct in the path before me. I then declared that, if the desire of those of my countrymen who were favorable to my election was gratified, 'I must go into the presidential chair the inflexible and uncompromising opponent of every attempt, on the part of Congress, to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia, against the wishes of the slaveholding States; and also with a determination equally decided to resist the slightest interference with it in the States where it exists.' I submitted also to my fellow-citizens, with fulness and frankness, the reasons which led me to this determination. The result authorizes me to believe that they have been approved, and are confided in, by a majority of the people of the United States, including those whom they most immediately affect. It now only remains to add, that no bill conflicting with these views can ever receive my constitutional sanction. These opinions have been adopted in the firm belief that they are in accordance with the spirit that actuated the venerated fathers of the republic, and that succeeding experience has proved them to be humane, patriotic, expedient, honorable and just. If the agitation of this subject was intended to reach the stability of our institutions, enough has occurred to show that it has signally failed; and that in this, as in every other instance, the apprehensions of the timid and the hopes of the wicked for the destruction of our government, are again destined to be disappointed."

The determination here declared to yield the presidential sanction to no bill which proposed to interfere with slavery in the States; or to abolish it in the District of Columbia while it existed in the adjacent States, met the evil as it then presented itself – a fear on the part of some of the Southern States that their rights of property were to be endangered by federal legislation: and against which danger the veto power was now pledged to be opposed. There was no other form at that time in which slavery agitation could manifest itself, or place on which it could find a point to operate – the ordinance of 1787, and the compromise of 1820, having closed up the Territories against it. Danger to slave property in the States, either by direct action, or indirectly through the District of Columbia, were the only points of expressed apprehension; and at these there was not the slightest ground for fear. No one in Congress dreamed of interfering with slavery in the States, and the abortion of all the attempts made to abolish it in the District, showed the groundlessness of that fear. The pledged veto was not a necessity, but a propriety; – not necessary, but prudential; – not called for by anything in congress, but outside of it. In that point of view it was wise and prudent. It took from agitation its point of support – its means of acting on the fears and suspicions of the timid and credulous: and it gave to the country a season of repose and quiet from this disturbing question until a new point of agitation could be discovered and seized.

The cabinet remained nearly as under the previous administration: Mr. Forsyth, Secretary of State; Mr. Woodbury, Secretary of the Treasury; Mr. Poinsett, Secretary at War; Mr. Mahlon Dickerson, Secretary of the Navy; Mr. Amos Kendall, Postmaster General; and Benjamin F. Butler, Esq. Attorney General. Of all these Mr. Poinsett was the only new appointment. On the bench of the Supreme Court, John Catron, Esq. of Tennessee, and John McKinley, Esq. of Alabama, were appointed Justices; William Smith, formerly senator in Congress from South Carolina, having declined the appointment which was filled by Mr. McKinley. Mr. Butler soon resigning his place of Attorney General, Henry D. Gilpin, Esq. of Pennsylvania (after a temporary appointment of Felix Grundy, Esq. of Tennessee), became the Attorney General during the remainder of the administration.

CHAPTER II.

FINANCIAL AND MONETARY CRISIS: GENERAL SUSPENSION OF SPECIE PAYMENTS BY THE BANKS

The nascent administration of the new President was destined to be saluted by a rude shock, and at the point most critical to governments as well as to individuals – that of deranged finances and broken-up treasury; and against the dangers of which I had in vain endeavored to warn our friends. A general suspension of the banks, a depreciated currency, and the insolvency of the federal treasury, were at hand. Visible signs, and some confidential information, portended to me this approaching calamity, and my speeches in the Senate were burthened with its vaticination. Two parties, inimical to the administration, were at work to accomplish it – politicians and banks; and well able to succeed, because the government money was in the hands of the banks, and the federal legislation in the hands of the politicians; and both interested in the overthrow of the party in power; – and the overthrow of the finances the obvious means to the accomplishment of the object. The public moneys had been withdrawn from the custody of the Bank of the United States: the want of an independent, or national treasury, of necessity, placed them in the custody of the local banks: and the specie order of President Jackson having been rescinded by the Act of Congress, the notes of all these banks, and of all others in the country, amounting to nearly a thousand, became receivable in payment of public dues. The deposit banks became filled up with the notes of these multitudinous institutions, constituting that surplus, the distribution of which had become an engrossing care with Congress, and ended with effecting the object under the guise of a deposit with the States. I recalled the recollection of the times of 1818-19, when the treasury reports of one year showed a superfluity of revenue for which there was no want, and of the next a deficit which required to be relieved by a loan; and argued that we must now have the same result from the bloat in the paper system which we then had. I demanded —

"Are we not at this moment, and from the same cause, realizing the first part – the illusive and treacherous part – of this picture? and must not the other, the sad and real sequel, speedily follow? The day of revulsion must come, and its effects must be more or less disastrous; but come it must. The present bloat in the paper system cannot continue: violent contraction must follow enormous expansion: a scene of distress and suffering must ensue – to come of itself out of the present state of things, without being stimulated and helped on by our unwise legislation."

Of the act which rescinded the specie order, and made the notes of the local banks receivable in payment of all federal dues, I said:

"This bill is to be an era in our legislation and in our political history. It is to be a point on which the view of the future age is to be thrown back, and from which future consequences will be traced. I separate myself from it: I wash my hands of it: I oppose it. I am one of those who promised gold – not paper. I promised the currency of the constitution, not the currency of corporations. I did not join in putting down the Bank of the United States to put up a wilderness of local banks. I did not join in putting down the paper currency of a national bank, to put up a national paper currency of a thousand local banks. I did not strike Cæsar to make Antony master of Rome."

The condition of our deposit banks was desperate – wholly inadequate to the slightest pressure on their vaults in the ordinary course of business, much less that of meeting the daily government drafts and the approaching deposit of near forty millions with the States. The necessity of keeping one-third of specie on hand for its immediate liabilities, was enforced from the example and rule of the Bank of England, while many of our deposit banks could show but the one-twentieth, the one-thirtieth, the one-fortieth, and even the one-fiftieth of specie in hand for immediate liabilities in circulation and deposits. The sworn evidence of a late Governor of the Bank of England (Mr. Horsely Palmer), before a parliamentary committee, was read, in which he testified that the average proportion of coin and bullion which the bank deems it prudent to keep on hand, was at the rate of the third of the total amount of all her liabilities – including deposits as well as issues. And this was the proportion which that bank deemed it prudent to keep – that bank which was the largest in the world, situated in the moneyed metropolis of Europe, with its list of debtors within the circuit of London, supported by the richest merchants in the world, and backed by the British government, which stood her security for fourteen millions sterling, and ready with her supply of exchequer bills (the interest to be raised to insure sales), at any moment of emergency. Tested by the rule of the Bank of England, and our deposit banks were in the jaws of destruction; and this so evident to me, that I was amazed that others did not see it – those of our friends who voted with the opponents of the administration in rescinding the specie order, and in making the deposit with the States. The latter had begun to take effect, at the rate of about ten millions to the quarter, on the first day of January preceding Mr. Van Buren's inauguration: a second ten millions were to be called for on the first of April: and like sums on the first days of the two remaining quarters. It was utterly impossible for the banks to stand these drafts; and, having failed in all attempts to wake up our friends, who were then in the majority, to a sense of the danger which was impending, and to arrest their ruinous voting with the opposition members (which most of them did), I determined to address myself to the President elect, under the belief that, although he would not be able to avert the blow, he might do much to soften its force and avert its consequences, when it did come. It was in the month of February, while Mr. Van Buren was still President of the Senate, that I invited him into a committee room for that purpose, and stated to him my opinion that we were on the eve of an explosion of the paper system and of a general suspension of the banks – intending to follow up that expression of opinion with the exposition of my reasons for thinking so: but the interview came to a sudden and unexpected termination. Hardly had I expressed my belief of this impending catastrophe, than he spoke up, and said, "Your friends think you a little exalted in the head on that subject." I said no more. I was miffed. We left the room together, talking on different matters, and I saying to myself, "You will soon feel the thunderbolt." But I have since felt that I was too hasty, and that I ought to have carried out my intention of making a full exposition of the moneyed affairs of the country. His habitual courtesy, from which the expression quoted was a most rare departure, and his real regard for me, both personal and political (for at that time he was pressing me to become a member of his cabinet), would have insured me a full hearing, if I had shown a disposition to go on; and his clear intellect would have seized and appreciated the strong facts and just inferences which would have been presented to him. But I stopped short, as if I had nothing more to say, from that feeling of self-respect which silences a man of some pride when he sees that what he says is not valued. I have regretted my hastiness ever since. It was of the utmost moment that the new President should have his eyes opened to the dangers of the treasury, and my services on the Committee of Finance had given me opportunities of knowledge which he did not possess. Forewarned is forearmed; and never was there a case in which the maxim more impressively applied. He could not have prevented the suspension: the repeal of the specie circular and the deposit with the States (both measures carried by the help of votes from professing friends), had put that measure into the hands of those who would be sure to use it: but he could have provided against it, and prepared for it, and lessened the force of the blow when it did come. He might have quickened the vigilance of the Secretary of the Treasury – might have demanded additional securities from the deposit banks – and might have drawn from them the moneys called for by appropriation acts. There was a sum of about five millions which might have been saved with a stroke of the pen, being the aggregate of sums drawn from the treasury by the numerous disbursing officers, and left in the banks in their own names for daily current payments: an order to these officers would have saved these five millions, and prevented the disgrace and damage of a stoppage in the daily payments, and the spectacle of a government waking up in the morning without a dollar to pay the day-laborer with, while placing on its statute book a law for the distribution of forty millions of surplus. Measures like these, and others which a prudent vigilance would have suggested, might have enabled the government to continue its payments without an extra session of Congress, and without the mortification of capitulating to the broken banks, by accepting and paying out their depreciated notes as the currency of the federal treasury.

CHAPTER III.

PREPARATION FOR THE DISTRESS AND SUSPENSION

In the autumn of the preceding year, shortly before the meeting of Congress, Mr. Biddle, president of the Pennsylvania Bank of the United States (for that was the ridiculous title it assumed after its resurrection under a Pennsylvania charter), issued one of those characteristic letters which were habitually promulgated whenever a new lead was to be given out, and a new scent emitted for the followers of the bank to run upon. A new distress, as the pretext for a new catastrophe, was now the object. A picture of ruin was presented, alarm given out, every thing going to destruction; and the federal government the cause of the whole, and the national recharter of the defunct bank the sovereign remedy. The following is an extract from that letter.

"The Bank of the United States has not ceased to exist more than seven months, and already the whole currency and exchanges are running into inextricable confusion, and the industry of the country is burdened with extravagant charges on all the commercial intercourse of the Union. And now, when these banks have been created by the Executive, and urged into these excesses, instead of gentle and gradual remedies, a fierce crusade is raised against them, the funds are harshly and suddenly taken from them, and they are forced to extraordinary means of defense against the very power which brought them into being. They received, and were expected to receive, in payment for the government, the notes of each other and the notes of other banks, and the facility with which they did so was a ground of special commendation by the government; and now that government has let loose upon them a demand for specie to the whole amount of these notes. I go further. There is an outcry abroad, raised by faction, and echoed by folly, against the banks of the United States. Until it was disturbed by the government, the banking system of the United States was at least as good as that of any other commercial country. What was desired for its perfection was precisely what I have so long striven to accomplish – to widen the metallic basis of the currency by a greater infusion of coin into the smaller channels of circulation. This was in a gradual and judicious train of accomplishment. But this miserable foolery about an exclusively metallic currency, is quite as absurd as to discard the steamboats, and go back to poling up the Mississippi."

The lead thus given out was sedulously followed during the winter, both in Congress and out of it, and at the end of the session had reached an immense demonstration in New York, in the preparations made to receive Mr. Webster, and to hear a speech from him, on his return from Washington. He arrived in New York on the 15th of March, and the papers of the city give this glowing account of his reception:

"In conformity with public announcement, yesterday, at about half past 3 o'clock, the Honorable Daniel Webster arrived in this city in the steamboat Swan from Philadelphia. The intense desire on the part of the citizens to give a grateful reception to this great advocate of the constitution, set the whole city in motion towards the point of debarkation, for nearly an hour before the arrival of the distinguished visitor. At the moment when the steamboat reached the pier, the assemblage had attained that degree of density and anxiety to witness the landing, that it was feared serious consequences would result. At half past 3 o'clock Mr. Webster, accompanied by Philip Hone and David B. Ogden, landed from the boat amidst the deafening cheers and plaudits of the multitude, thrice repeated, and took his seat in an open barouche provided for the occasion. The procession, consisting of several hundred citizens upon horseback, a large train of carriages and citizens, formed upon State street, and after receiving their distinguished guest, proceeded with great order up Broadway to the apartments arranged for his reception at the American Hotel. The scene presented the most gratifying spectacle. Hundreds of citizens who had been opposed to Mr. Webster in politics, now that he appeared as a private individual, came forth to demonstrate their respect for his private worth and to express their approbation of his personal character; and thousands more who appreciated his principles and political integrity, crowded around to convince him of their personal attachment, and give evidence of their approval of his public acts. The wharves, the shipping, the housetops and windows, and the streets through which the procession passed, were thronged with citizens of every occupation and degree, and loud and continued cheers greeted the great statesman at every point. There was not a greater number at the reception of General Jackson in this city, with the exception of the military, nor a greater degree of enthusiasm manifested upon that occasion, than the arrival upon our shores of Daniel Webster. At 6 o'clock in the evening, the anxious multitude began to move towards Niblo's saloon, where Mr. Webster was to be addressed by the committee of citizens delegated for that purpose, and to which it was expected he would reply. A large body of officers were upon the ground to keep the assemblage within bounds, and at a quarter past six the doors were opened, when the saloon, garden, and avenues leading thereto were instantly crowded to overflowing.