Thirty Years' View (Vol. II of 2)

The storm had been gathering since September: it burst in February. It had been evidently waiting for an occasion: and found it in the first speech of Mr. Calhoun, of that session, in favor of Mr. Van Buren's recommendation for an independent treasury and a federal hard-money currency. This speech was delivered the 15th of February, and was strictly argumentative and parliamentary, and wholly confined to its subject. Four days thereafter Mr. Clay answered it; and although ready at an extemporaneous speech, he had the merit, when time permitted, of considering well both the matter and the words of what he intended to deliver. On this occasion he had had ample time; for the speech of Mr. Calhoun could not be essentially different from the one he delivered on the same subject at the extra session; and the personal act which excited his resentment was of the same date. There had been six months for preparation; and fully had preparation been made. The whole speech bore the impress of careful elaboration and especially the last part; for it consisted of two distinct parts – the first, argumentative, and addressed to the measure before the Senate: and was in fact, as well as in name, a reply. The second part was an attack, under the name of a reply, and was addressed to the personal conduct of Mr. Calhoun, reproaching him with his desertion (as it was called), and taunting him with the company he had got into – taking care to remind him of his own former sad account of that company: and then, launching into a wider field, he threw up to him all the imputed political delinquencies of his life for near twenty years – skipping none from 1816 down to the extra session; – although he himself had been in close political friendship with this alleged delinquent during the greater part of that long time. Mr. Calhoun saw at once the advantage which this general and sweeping assault put into his hands. Had the attack been confined to the mere circumstance of quitting one side and joining the other, it might have been treated as a mere personality; and, either left unnoticed, or the account settled at once with some ready words of retort and justification. But in going beyond the act which gave the offence – beyond the cause of resentment, which was recent, and arraigning a member on the events of almost a quarter of a century of public life, he went beyond the limits of the occasion, and gave Mr. Calhoun the opportunity of explaining, or justifying, or excusing all that had ever been objected to him; and that with the sympathy in the audience with which attack for ever invests the rights of defence. He saw his advantage, and availed himself of it. Though prompt at a reply, he chose to make none in a hurry. A pause ensued Mr. Clay's conclusion, every one deferring to Mr. Calhoun's right of reply. He took the floor, but it was only to say that he would reply at his leisure to the senator from Kentucky.

He did reply, and at his own good time, which was at the end of twenty days; and in a way to show that he had "smelt the lamp," not of Demades, but of Demosthenes, during that time. It was profoundly meditated and elaborately composed: the matter solid and condensed; the style chaste, terse and vigorous; the narrative clear; the logic close; the sarcasm cutting: and every word bearing upon the object in view. It was a masterly oration, and like Mr. Clay's speech, divided into two parts; but the second part only seemed to occupy his feelings, and bring forth words from the heart as well as from the head. And well it might! He was speaking, not for life, but for character! and defending public character, in the conduct which makes it, and on high points of policy, which belonged to history – defending it before posterity and the present age, impersonated in the American Senate, before which he stood, and to whom he appealed as judges while invoking as witnesses. He had a high occasion, and he felt it; a high tribunal to plead before, and he rejoiced in it; a high accuser, and he defied him; a high stake to contend for, his own reputation: and manfully, earnestly, and powerfully did he defend it. He had a high example both in oratory, and in the analogies of the occasion, before him; and well had he looked into that example. I happened to know that in this time he refreshed his reading of the Oration on the Crown; and, as the delivery of his speech showed, not without profit. Besides its general cast, which was a good imitation, there were passages of a vigor and terseness – of a power and simplicity – which would recall the recollection of that masterpiece of the oratory of the world. There were points of analogy in the cases as well as in the speeches, each case being that of one eminent statesman accusing another, and before a national tribunal, and upon the events of a public life. More happy than the Athenian orator, the American statesman had no foul imputations to repel. Different from Æschines and Demosthenes, both himself and Mr. Clay stood above the imputation of corrupt action or motive. If they had faults, and what public man is without them? they were the faults of lofty natures – not of sordid souls; and they looked to the honors of their country – not its plunder – for their fair reward.

When Mr. Calhoun finished, Mr. Clay instantly arose, and rejoined – his rejoinder almost entirely directed to the personal part of the discussion, which from its beginning had been the absorbing part. Much stung by Mr. Calhoun's reply, who used the sword as well as the buckler, and with a keen edge upon it, he was more animated and sarcastic in the rejoinder than in the first attack. Mr. Calhoun also rejoined instantly. A succession of brief and rapid rejoinders took place between them (chiefly omitted in this work), which seemed running to infinity, when Mr. Calhoun, satisfied with what he had done, pleasantly put an end to it by saying, he saw the senator from Kentucky was determined to have the last word; and he would yield it to him. Mr. Clay, in the same spirit, disclaimed that desire; and said no more. And thus the exciting debate terminated with more courtesy than that with which it had been conducted.

In all contests of this kind there is a feeling of violated decorum which makes each party solicitous to appear on the defensive, and for that purpose to throw the blame of commencing on the opposite side. Even the one that palpably throws the first stone is yet anxious to show that it was a defensive throw; or at least provoked by previous wrong. Mr. Clay had this feeling upon him, and knew that the onus of making out a defensive case fell upon him; and he lost no time in endeavoring to establish it. He placed his defence in the forepart of the attack. At the very outset of the personal part of his speech he attended to this essential preliminary, and found the justification, as he believed, in some expressions of Mr. Calhoun in his sub-treasury speech; and in a couple of passages in a letter he had written on a public occasion, after his return from the extra session – commonly called the Edgefield letter. In the speech he believed he found a reproach upon the patriotism of himself and friends in not following his (Mr. Calhoun's) "lead" in support of the administration financial and currency measures; and in the letter, an impeachment of the integrity and patriotism of himself and friends if they got into power; and also an avowal that his change of sides was for selfish considerations. The first reproach, that of lack of patriotism in not following Mr. Calhoun's lead, he found it hard to locate in any definite part of the speech; and had to rest it upon general expressions. The others, those founded upon passages in the letter, were definitely quoted; and were in these terms: "I could not back and sustain those in such opposition in whose wisdom, firmness and patriotism I had no reason to confide." – "It was clear, with our joint forces (whigs and nullifiers) we could utterly overthrow and demolish them; but it was not less clear that the victory would enure, not to us, but exclusively to the benefit of our allies, and their cause." These passages were much commented upon, especially in the rejoinders; and the whole letter produced by Mr. Calhoun, and the meaning claimed for them fully stated by him.

In the speeches for and against the crown we see Demosthenes answering what has not been found in the speech of Eschines: the same anomaly took place in this earnest debate, as reported between Mr. Clay and Mr. Calhoun. The latter answers much which is not found in the published speech to which he is replying. It gave rise to some remark between the speakers during the rejoinders. Mr. Calhoun said he was replying to the speech as spoken. Mr. Clay said it was printed under his supervision – as much as to say he sanctioned the omissions. The fact is, that with a commendable feeling, he had softened some parts, and omitted others; for that which is severe enough in speaking, becomes more so in writing; and its omission or softening is a tacit retraction, and honorable to the cool reflection which condemns what passion, or heat, had prompted. But Mr. Calhoun did not accept the favor: and, neither party desiring quarter, the one answered what had been dropt, and the other re-produced it, with interest. In his rejoinders, Mr. Clay supplied all that had been omitted – and made additions to it.

This contest between two eminent men, on a theatre so elevated, in which the stake to each was so great, and in which each did his best, conscious that the eye of the age and of posterity was upon him, was an event in itself, and in their lives. It abounded with exemplifications of all the different sorts of oratory of which each was master: on one side – declamation, impassioned eloquence, vehement invective, taunting sarcasm: on the other – close reasoning, chaste narrative, clear statement, keen retort. Two accessories of such contests (disruptions of friendships), were missing, and well – the pathetic and the virulent. There was no crying, or blackguarding in it – nothing like the weeping scene between Fox and Burke, when the heart overflowed with tenderness at the recollection of former love, now gone forever; nor like the virulent one when the gall, overflowing with bitterness, warned an ancient friend never to return as a spy to the camp which he had left as a deserter.

There were in the speeches of each some remarkable passages, such only as actors in the scenes could furnish, and which history will claim. Thus: Mr. Clay gave some inside views of the concoction of the famous compromise act of 1833; which, so far as they go, correspond with the secret history of the same concoction as given in one of the chapters on that subject in the first volume of this work. Mr. Clay's speech is also remarkable for the declaration that the protective system, which he so long advocated, was never intended to be permanent: that its only design was to give temporary encouragement to infant manufactures: and that it had fulfilled its mission. Mr. Calhoun's speech was also remarkable for admitting the power, and the expediency of incidental protection, as it was called; and on this ground he justified his support of the tariff of 1816 – so much objected against him. He also gave his history of the compromise of 1833, attributing it to the efficacy of nullification and of the military attitude of South Carolina: which brought upon him the relentless sarcasm of Mr. Clay; and occasioned his explanation of his support of a national bank in 1816. He was chairman of the committee which reported the charter for that bank, and gave it the support which carried it through; with which he was reproached after he became opposed to the bank. He explained the circumstances under which he gave that support – such as I had often heard him state in conversation; and which always appeared to me to be sufficient to exempt him from reproach. At the same time (and what is but little known), he had the merit of opposing, and probably of defeating, a far more dangerous bank – one of fifty millions (equivalent to one hundred and twenty millions now), and founded almost wholly upon United States stocks – imposingly recommended to Congress by the then secretary of the Treasury, Mr. Alexander J. Dallas. The analytical mind of Mr. Calhoun, then one of the youngest members, immediately solved this monster proposition into its constituent elements; and his power of generalization and condensation, enabled him to express its character in two words – lending our credit to the bank for nothing, and borrowing it back at six per cent. interest. As an alternative, and not as a choice, he supported the national bank that was chartered, after twice defeating the monster bank of fifty millions founded on paper; for that monster was twice presented to Congress, and twice repulsed. The last time it came as a currency measure – as a bank to create a national currency; and as such was referred to a select committee on national currency, of which Mr. Calhoun was chairman. He opposed it, and fell into the support of the bank which was chartered. Strange that in this search for a national bank, the currency of the constitution seemed to enter no one's head. The revival of the gold currency was never suggested; and in that oblivion of gold, and still hunting a substitute in paper, the men who put down the first national bank did their work much less effectually that those who put down the second one.

The speech of each of these senators, so far as they constitute the personal part of the debate, will be given in a chapter of its own: the rejoinders being brief, prompt, and responsive each to the other, will be put together in another chapter. The speeches of each, having been carefully prepared and elaborated, may be considered as fair specimens of their speaking powers – the style of each different, but each a first class speaker in the branch of oratory to which he belonged. They may be read with profit by those who would wish to form an idea of the style and power of these eminent orators. Manner, and all that is comprehended under the head of delivery, is a different attribute; and there Mr. Clay had an advantage, which is lost in transferring the speech to paper. Some of Mr. Calhoun's characteristics of manner may be seen in these speeches. He eschewed the studied exordiums and perorations, once so much in vogue, and which the rhetorician's rules teach how to make. A few simple words to announce the beginning, and the same to show the ending of his speech, was about as much as he did in that way; and in that departure from custom he conformed to what was becoming in a business speech, as his generally were; and also to what was suitable to his own intellectual style of speaking. He also eschewed the trite, familiar, and unparliamentary mode (which of late has got into vogue) of referring to a senator as, "my friend," or, "the distinguished," or, "the eloquent," or, "the honorable," &c. He followed the written rule of parliamentary law; which is also the clear rule of propriety, and referred to the member by his sitting-place in the Senate, and the State from which he came. Thus: "the senator from Kentucky who sits farthest from me;" which was a sufficient designation to those present, while for the absent, and for posterity the name (Mr. Clay) would be put in brackets. He also addressed the body by the simple collective phrase, "senators;" and this was, not accident, or fancy, but system, resulting from convictions of propriety; and he would allow no reporter to alter it.

Mr. Calhoun laid great stress upon his speech in this debate, as being the vindication of his public life; and declared, in one of his replies to Mr. Clay, that he rested his public character upon it, and desired it to be read by those who would do him justice. In justice to him, and as being a vindication of several measures of his mentioned in this work, not approvingly, a place is here given to it.

This discussion between two eminent men, growing out of support and opposition to the leading measures of Mr. Van Buren's administration, indissolubly connects itself with the passage of those measures; and gives additional emphasis and distinction to the era of the crowning policy which separated bank and state – made the government the keeper of its own money – repulsed paper money from the federal treasury – filled the treasury to bursting with solid gold; and did more for the prosperity of the country than any set of measures from the foundation of the government.

CHAPTER XXVI.

DEBATE BETWEEN MR. CLAY AND MR. CALHOUN: MR. CLAY'S SPEECH: EXTRACTS

"Who, Mr. President, are the most conspicuous of those who perseveringly pressed this bill upon Congress and the American people? Its drawer is the distinguished gentleman in the white house not far off (Mr. Van Buren); its indorser is the distinguished senator from South Carolina, here present. What the drawer thinks of the indorser, his cautious reserve and stifled enmity prevent us from knowing. But the frankness of the indorser has not left us in the same ignorance with respect to his opinion of the drawer. He has often expressed it upon the floor of the Senate. On an occasion not very distant, denying him any of the noble qualities of the royal beast of the forest, he attributed to him those which belong to the most crafty, most skulking, and the meanest of the quadruped tribe. Mr. President, it is due to myself to say, that I do not altogether share with the senator from South Carolina in this opinion of the President of the United States. I have always found him, in his manners and deportment, civil, courteous, and gentlemanly; and he dispenses, in the noble mansion which he now occupies, one worthy the residence of the chief magistrate of a great people, a generous and liberal hospitality. An acquaintance with him of more than twenty years' duration has inspired me with a respect for the man, although, I regret to be compelled to say, I detest the magistrate.

"The eloquent senator from South Carolina has intimated that the course of my friends and myself, in opposing this bill, was unpatriotic, and that we ought to have followed in his lead; and, in a late letter of his, he has spoken of his alliance with us, and of his motives for quitting it. I cannot admit the justice of his reproach. We united, if, indeed, there were any alliance in the case, to restrain the enormous expansion of executive power; to arrest the progress of corruption; to rebuke usurpation; and to drive the Goths and Vandals from the capital; to expel Brennus and his horde from Rome, who, when he threw his sword into the scale, to augment the ransom demanded from the mistress of the world, showed his preference for gold; that he was a hard-money chieftain. It was by the much more valuable metal of iron that he was driven from her gates. And how often have we witnessed the senator from South Carolina, with woful countenance, and in doleful strains, pouring forth touching and mournful eloquence on the degeneracy of the times, and the downward tendency of the republic? Day after day, in the Senate, have we seen the displays of his lofty and impassioned eloquence. Although I shared largely with the senator in his apprehension for the purity of our institutions, and the permanency of our civil liberty, disposed always to look at the brighter side of human affairs, I was sometimes inclined to hope that the vivid imagination of the senator had depicted the dangers by which we were encompassed in somewhat stronger colors than they justified.

"The arduous contest in which we were so long engaged was about to terminate in a glorious victory. The very object for which the alliance was formed was about to be accomplished. At this critical moment the senator left us; he left us for the very purpose of preventing the success of the common cause. He took up his musket, knapsack, and shot-pouch, and joined the other party. He went, horse, foot, and dragoon; and he himself composed the whole corps. He went, as his present most distinguished ally commenced with his expunging resolution, solitary and alone. The earliest instance recorded in history, within my recollection, of an ally drawing off his forces from the combined army, was that of Achilles at the siege of Troy. He withdrew, with all his troops, and remained in the neighborhood, in sullen and dignified inactivity. But he did not join the Trojan forces; and when, during the progress of the siege, his faithful friend fell in battle, he raised his avenging arm, drove the Trojans back into the gates of Troy, and satiated his vengeance by slaying Priam's noblest and dearest son, the finest hero in the immortal Iliad. But Achilles had been wronged, or imagined himself wronged, in the person of the fair and beautiful Briseis. We did no wrong to the distinguished senator from South Carolina. On the contrary, we respected him, confided in his great and acknowledged ability, his uncommon genius, his extensive experience, his supposed patriotism; above all, we confided in his stern and inflexible fidelity. Nevertheless, he left us, and joined our common opponents, distrusting and distrusted. He left us, as he tells us in the Edgefield letter, because the victory which our common arms were about to achieve, was not to enure to him and his party, but exclusively to the benefit of his allies and their cause. I thought that, actuated by patriotism (that noblest of human virtues), we had been contending together for our common country, for her violated rights, her threatened liberties, her prostrate constitution. Never did I suppose that personal or party considerations entered into our views. Whether, if victory shall ever again be about to perch upon the standard of the spoils party (the denomination which the senator from South Carolina has so often given to his present allies), he will not feel himself constrained, by the principles on which he has acted, to leave them, because it may not enure to the benefit of himself and his party, I leave to be adjusted between themselves.

"The speech of the senator from South Carolina was plausible, ingenious, abstract, metaphysical, and generalizing. It did not appear to me to be adapted to the bosoms and business of human life. It was aerial, and not very high up in the air, Mr. President, either – not quite as high as Mr. Clayton was in his last ascension in his balloon. The senator announced that there was a single alternative, and no escape from one or the other branch of it. He stated that we must take the bill under consideration, or the substitute proposed by the senator from Virginia. I do not concur in that statement of the case. There is another course embraced in neither branch of the senator's alternative; and that course is to do nothing, – always the wisest when you are not certain what you ought to do. Let us suppose that neither branch of the alternative is accepted, and that nothing is done. What, then, would be the consequence? There would be a restoration of the law of 1789, with all its cautious provisions and securities, provided by the wisdom of our ancestors, which has been so trampled upon by the late and present administrations. By that law, establishing the Treasury department, the treasure of the United States is to be received, kept, and disbursed by the treasurer, under a bond with ample security, under a large penalty fixed by law, and not left, as this bill leaves it, to the uncertain discretion of a Secretary of the Treasury. If, therefore, we were to do nothing, that law would be revived; the treasurer would have the custody, as he ought to have, of the public money, and doubtless he would make special deposits of it in all instances with safe and sound State banks; as in some cases the Secretary of the Treasury is now obliged to do. Thus, we should have in operation that very special deposit system, so much desired by some gentlemen, by which the public money would remain separate and unmixed with the money of banks.

"There is yet another course, unembraced by either branch of the alternative presented by the senator from South Carolina; and that is, to establish a bank of the United States, constituted according to the old and approved method of forming such an institution, tested and sanctioned by experience; a bank of the United States which should blend public and private interests, and be subject to public and private control; united together in such manner as to present safe and salutary checks against all abuses. The senator mistakes his own abandonment of that institution as ours. I know that the party in power has barricaded itself against the establishment of such a bank. It adopted, at the last extra session, the extraordinary and unprecedented resolution, that the people of the United States should not have such a bank, although it might be manifest that there was a clear majority of them demanding it. But the day may come, and I trust is not distant, when the will of the people must prevail in the councils of her own government; and when it does arrive, a bank will be established.