Thirty Years' View (Vol. I of 2)

Other witnesses testified to his denials, while the nomination was depending, of all authorship of these publications: among them, the editors of the National Intelligencer, – friends to Mr. Crawford. Mr. Edwards called at their office at that time (the first time he had been there within a year), to exculpate himself from the imputed authorship; and did it so earnestly that the editors believed him, and published a contradiction of the report against him in their paper, stating that they had a "good reason" to know that he was not the author of these publications. That "good reason," they testified, was his own voluntary denial in this unexpected visit to their office, and his declarations in what he called a "frank and free" conversation with them on the subject. Such testimony, and the absence of all proof on the other side, was fatal to the accusations, and to the accuser. The committee reported honorably and unanimously in favor of Mr. Crawford; the Congress and the country accepted it; Mr. Edwards resigned his commission, and disappeared from the federal political theatre: and that was the end of the A. B. plot, which had filled some newspapers for a year with publications against Mr. Crawford, and which might have passed into oblivion, as the current productions and usual concomitants of a Presidential canvass, had it not been for their formal communication to Congress as ground of impeachment against a high officer. That communication carried the "six charges," and their ten chapters of specifications, into our parliamentary history, where their fate becomes one of the instructive lessons which it is the province of history to teach. The newspaper in which the A. B. papers were published, was edited by a war-office clerk, in the interest of the war Secretary (Mr. Calhoun), to the serious injury of that gentleman, who received no vote in any State voting for Mr. Crawford.

CHAPTER XV.

AMENDMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION IN RELATION TO THE ELECTION OF PRESIDENT AND VICE-PRESIDENT

European writers on American affairs are full of mistakes on the working of our government; and these mistakes are generally to the prejudice of the democratic element. Of these mistakes, and in their ignorance of the difference between the theory and the working of our system in the election of the two first officers, two eminent French writers are striking instances: Messrs. de Tocqueville and Thiers. Taking the working and the theory of our government in this particular to be the same, they laud the institution of electors, to whom they believe the whole power of election belongs (as it was intended); – and hence attribute to the superior sagacity of these electors the merit of choosing all the eminent Presidents who have adorned the presidential chair. This mistake between theory and practice is known to every body in America, and should be known to enlightened men in Europe, who wish to do justice to popular government. The electors have no practical power over the election, and have had none since their institution. From the beginning they have stood pledged to vote for the candidates indicated (in the early elections) by the public will; afterwards, by Congress caucuses, as long as those caucuses followed the public will; and since, by assemblages called conventions, whether they follow the public will or not. In every case the elector has been an instrument, bound to obey a particular impulsion; and disobedience to which would be attended with infamy, and with every penalty which public indignation could inflict. From the beginning these electors have been useless, and an inconvenient intervention between the people and the object of their choice; and, in time, may become dangerous: and being useless, inconvenient, and subject to abuse and danger; having wholly failed to answer the purpose for which they were instituted (and for which purpose no one would now contend); it becomes a just conclusion that the institution should be abolished, and the election committed to the direct vote of the people. And, to obviate all excuse for previous nominations by intermediate bodies, a second election to be held forthwith between the two highest or leading candidates, if no one had had a majority of the whole number on the first trial. These are not new ideas, born of a spirit of change and innovation; but old doctrine, advocated in the convention which framed the Constitution, by wise and good men; by Dr. Franklin and others, of Pennsylvania; by John Dickinson and others, of Delaware. But the opinion prevailed in the convention, that the mass of the people would not be sufficiently informed, discreet, and temperate to exercise with advantage so great a privilege as that of choosing the chief magistrate of a great republic; and hence the institution of an intermediate body, called the electoral college – its members to be chosen by the people – and when assembled in conclave (I use the word in the Latin sense of con and clavis, under key), to select whomsoever they should think proper for President and Vice-President. All this scheme having failed, and the people having taken hold of the election, it became just and regular to attempt to legalize their acquisition by securing to them constitutionally the full enjoyment of the rights which they imperfectly exercised. The feeling to this effect became strong as the election of 1824 approached, when there were many candidates in the field, and Congress caucuses fallen into disrepute; and several attempts were made to obtain a constitutional amendment to accomplish the purpose. Mr. McDuffie, in the House of Representatives, and myself in the Senate, both proposed such amendments; the mode of taking the direct votes to be in districts, and the persons receiving the greatest number of votes for President or Vice-President in any district, to count one vote for such office respectively; which is nothing but substituting the candidates themselves for their electoral representatives, while simplifying the election, insuring its integrity, and securing the rights of the people. In support of my proposition in the Senate, I delivered some arguments in the form of a speech, from which I here add some extracts, in the hope of keeping the question alive, and obtaining for it a better success at some future day.

"The evil of a want of uniformity in the choice of presidential electors, is not limited to its disfiguring effect upon the face of our government, but goes to endanger the rights of the people, by permitting sudden alterations on the eve of an election, and to annihilate the right of the small States, by enabling the large ones to combine, and to throw all their votes into the scale of a particular candidate. These obvious evils make it certain that any uniform rule would be preferable to the present state of things. But, in fixing on one, it is the duty of statesmen to select that which is calculated to give to every portion of the Union its due share in the choice of the Chief Magistrate, and to every individual citizen, a fair opportunity of voting according to his will. This would be effected by adopting the District System. It would divide every State into districts, equal to the whole number of votes to be given, and the people of each district would be governed by its own majority, and not by a majority existing in some remote part of the State. This would be agreeable to the rights of individuals: for, in entering into society, and submitting to be bound by the decision of the majority, each individual retained the right of voting for himself wherever it was practicable, and of being governed by a majority of the vicinage, and not by majorities brought from remote sections to overwhelm him with their accumulated numbers. It would be agreeable to the interests of all parts of the States; for each State may have different interests in different parts; one part may be agricultural, another manufacturing, another commercial; and it would be unjust that the strongest should govern, or that two should combine and sacrifice the third. The district system would be agreeable to the intention of our present constitution, which, in giving to each elector a separate vote, instead of giving to each State a consolidated vote, composed of all its electoral suffrages, clearly intended that each mass of persons entitled to one elector, should have the right of giving one vote, according to their own sense of their own interest.

"The general ticket system now existing in ten States, was the offspring of policy, and not of any disposition to give fair play to the will of the people. It was adopted by the leading men of those States, to enable them to consolidate the vote of the State. It would be easy to prove this by referring to facts of historical notoriety. It contributes to give power and consequence to the leaders who manage the elections, but it is a departure from the intention of the constitution; violates the rights of the minorities, and is attended with many other evils. The intention of the constitution is violated, because it was the intention of that instrument to give to each mass of persons, entitled to one elector, the power of giving an electoral vote to any candidate they preferred. The rights of minorities are violated, because a majority of one will carry the vote of the whole State. This principle is the same, whether the elector is chosen by general ticket or by legislative ballot; a majority of one, in either case, carries the vote of the whole State. In New-York, thirty-six electors are chosen; nineteen is a majority, and the candidate receiving this majority is fairly entitled to count nineteen votes; but he counts in reality, thirty-six: because the minority of seventeen are added to the majority. Those seventeen votes belong to seventeen masses of people, of 40,000 souls each, in all 680,000 people, whose votes are seized upon, taken away, and presented to whom the majority pleases. Extend the calculation to the seventeen States now choosing electors by general ticket or legislative ballot, and it will show that three millions of souls, a population equal to that which carried us through the Revolution, may have their votes taken from them in the same way. To lose their votes, is the fate of all minorities, and it is their duty to submit; but this is not a case of votes lost, but of votes taken away, added to those of the majority, and given to a person to whom the minority was opposed.

"He said, this objection (to the direct vote of the people) had a weight in the year 1787, to which it is not entitled in the year 1824. Our government was then young, schools and colleges were scarce, political science was then confined to few, and the means of diffusing intelligence were both inadequate and uncertain. The experiment of a popular government was just beginning; the people had been just released from subjection to an hereditary king, and were not yet practised in the art of choosing a temporary chief for themselves. But thirty-six years have reversed this picture. Thirty-six years, which have produced so many wonderful changes in America, have accomplished the work of many centuries upon the intelligence of its inhabitants. Within that period, school, colleges, and universities have multiplied to an amazing extent. The means of diffusing intelligence have been wonderfully augmented by the establishment of six hundred newspapers, and upwards of five thousand post-offices. The whole course of an American's life, civil, social, and religious, has become one continued scene of intellectual and of moral improvement. Once in every week, more than eleven thousand men, eminent for learning and for piety, perform the double duty of amending the hearts, and enlightening the understandings, of more than eleven thousand congregations of people. Under the benign influence of a free government, both our public institutions and private pursuits, our juries, elections, courts of justice, the liberal professions and the mechanic arts, have each become a school of political science and of mental improvement. The federal legislature, in the annual message of the President, in reports from heads of departments, and committees of Congress, and speeches of members, pours forth a flood of intelligence which carries its waves to the remotest confines of the republic. In the different States, twenty-four State executives and State legislatures are annually repeating the same process within a more limited sphere. The habit of universal travelling, and the practice of universal interchange of thought, are continually circulating the intelligence of the country, and augmenting its mass. The face of our country itself, its vast extent, its grand and varied features, contribute to expand the human intellect, and to magnify its power. Less than half a century of the enjoyment of liberty has given practical evidence of the great moral truth, that, under a free government, the power of the intellect is the only power which rules the affairs of men; and virtue and intelligence the only durable passports to honor and preferment. The conviction of this great truth has created an universal taste for learning and for reading, and has convinced every parent that the endowments of the mind, and the virtues of the heart, are the only imperishable, the only inestimable riches which he can leave to his posterity.

"This objection (the danger of tumults and violence at the elections) is taken from the history of the ancient republics; from the tumultuary elections of Rome and Greece. But the justness of the example is denied. There is nothing in the laws of physiology which admits a parallel between the sanguinary Roman, the volatile Greek, and the phlegmatic American. There is nothing in the state of the respective countries, or in their manner of voting, which makes one an example for the other. The Romans voted in a mass, at a single voting place, even when the qualified voters amounted to millions of persons. They came to the polls armed, and divided into classes, and voted, not by heads, but by centuries. In the Grecian Republics all the voters were brought together in one great city, and decided the contest in one great struggle. In such assemblages, both the inducement to violence, and the means of committing it, were prepared by the government itself. In the United States all this is different. The voters are assembled in small bodies, at innumerable voting places, distributed over a vast extent of country. They come to the polls without arms, without odious distinctions, without any temptation to violence, and with every inducement to harmony. If heated during the day of election, they cool off upon returning to their homes, and resuming their ordinary occupations.

"But let us admit the truth of the objection. Let us admit that the American people would be as tumultuary at their presidential elections, as were the citizens of the ancient republics at the election of their chief magistrates. What then? Are we thence to infer the inferiority of the officers thus elected, and the consequent degradation of the countries over which they presided? I answer no. So far from it, that I assert the superiority of these officers over all others ever obtained for the same countries, either by hereditary succession, or the most select mode of election. I affirm those periods of history to be the most glorious in arms, the most renowned in arts, the most celebrated in letters, the most useful in practice, and the most happy in the condition of the people, in which the whole body of the citizens voted direct for the chief officer of their country. Take the history of that commonwealth which yet shines as the leading star in the firmament of nations. Of the twenty-five centuries that the Roman state has existed, to what period do we look for the generals and statesmen, the poets and orators, the philosophers and historians, the sculptors, painters, and architects, whose immortal works have fixed upon their country the admiring eyes of all succeeding ages? Is it to the reigns of the seven first kings? – to the reigns of the emperors, proclaimed by the prætorian bands? – to the reigns of the Sovereign Pontiffs, chosen by a select body of electors in a conclave of most holy cardinals? No – We look to none of these, but to that short interval of four centuries and a half which lies between the expulsion of the Tarquins, and the re-establishment of monarchy in the person of Octavius Cæsar. It is to this short period, during which the consuls, tribunes, and prætors, were annually elected by a direct vote of the people, to which we look ourselves, and to which we direct the infant minds of our children, for all the works and monuments of Roman greatness; for roads, bridges, and aqueducts, constructed; for victories gained, nations vanquished, commerce extended, treasure imported, libraries founded, learning encouraged, the arts flourishing, the city embellished, and the kings of the earth humbly suing to be admitted into the friendship, and taken under the protection, of the Roman people. It was of this magnificent period that Cicero spoke, when he proclaimed the people of Rome to be the masters of kings, and the conquerors and commanders of all the nations of the earth. And, what is wonderful, during this whole period, in a succession of four hundred and fifty annual elections, the people never once preferred a citizen to the consulship who did not carry the prosperity and the glory of the Republic to a point beyond that at which he had found it.

"It is the same with the Grecian Republics. Thirty centuries have elapsed since they were founded; yet it is to an ephemeral period of one hundred and fifty years only, the period of popular elections which intervened between the dispersion of a cloud of petty tyrants, and the coming of a great one in the person of Philip, king of Macedon, that we are to look for that galaxy of names which shed so much lustre upon their country, and in which we are to find the first cause of that intense sympathy which now burns in our bosoms at the name of Greece.

"These short and brilliant periods exhibit the great triumph of popular elections; often tumultuary, often stained with blood, but always ending gloriously for the country. Then the right of suffrage was enjoyed; the sovereignty of the people was no fiction. Then a sublime spectacle was seen, when the Roman citizen advanced to the polls and proclaimed: 'I vote for Cato to be Consul;' the Athenian, 'I vote for Aristides to be Archon;' the Theban, 'I vote for Pelopidas to be Bæotrach;' the Lacedemonian, 'I vote for Leonidas to be first of the Ephori.' And why may not an American citizen do the same? Why may not he go up to the poll and proclaim, 'I vote for Thomas Jefferson to be President of the United States?' Why is he compelled to put his vote in the hands of another, and to incur all the hazards of an irresponsible agency, when he himself could immediately give his own vote for his own chosen candidate, without the slightest assistance from agents or managers?

"But, said Mr. Benton, I have other objections to these intermediate electors. They are the peculiar and favorite institution of aristocratic republics, and elective monarchies. I refer the Senate to the late republics of Venice and Genoa; of France, and her litter; to the kingdom of Poland; the empire of Germany, and the Pontificate of Rome. On the contrary, a direct vote by the people is the peculiar and favorite institution of democratic republics; as we have just seen in the governments of Rome, Athens, Thebes, and Sparta; to which may be added the principal cities of the Amphyctionic and Achaian leagues, and the renowned republic of Carthage when the rival of Rome.

"I have now answered the objections which were brought forward in the year '87. I ask for no judgment upon their validity at that day, but I affirm them to be without force or reason in the year 1824. Time and experience have so decided. Yes, time and experience, the only infallible tests of good or bad institutions, have now shown that the continuance of the electoral system will be both useless and dangerous to the liberties of the people; and that 'the only effectual mode of preserving our government from the corruptions which have undermined the liberty of so many nations, is, to confide the election of our chief magistrate to those who are farthest removed from the influence of his patronage;'1 that is to say, to the whole body of American citizens!

"The electors are not independent; they have no superior intelligence; they are not left to their own judgment in the choice of President; they are not above the control of the people; on the contrary, every elector is pledged, before he is chosen, to give his vote according to the will of those who choose him. He is nothing but an agent, tied down to the execution of a precise trust. Every reason which induced the convention to institute electors has failed. They are no longer of any use, and may be dangerous to the liberties of the people. They are not useful, because they have no power over their own vote, and because the people can vote for a President as easily as they can vote for an elector. They are dangerous to the liberties of the people, because, in the first place, they introduce extraneous considerations into the election of President; and, in the second place, they may sell the vote which is intrusted to their keeping. They introduce extraneous considerations, by bringing their own character and their own exertions into the presidential canvass. Every one sees this. Candidates for electors are now selected, not for the reasons mentioned in the Federalist, but for their devotion to a particular party, for their manners, and their talent at electioneering. The elector may betray the liberties of the people, by selling his vote. The operation is easy, because he votes by ballot; detection is impossible, because he does not sign his vote; the restraint is nothing but his own conscience, for there is no legal punishment for his breach of trust. If a swindler defrauds you out of a few dollars in property or money, he is whipped and pilloried, and rendered infamous in the eye of the law; but, if an elector should defraud 40,000 people of their vote, there is no remedy but to abuse him in the newspapers, where the best men in the country may be abused, as much as Benedict Arnold, or Judas Iscariot. Every reason for instituting electors has failed, and every consideration of prudence requires them to be discontinued. They are nothing but agents, in a case which requires no agent; and no prudent man would, or ought, to employ an agent to take care of his money, his property, or his liberty, when he is equally capable to take care of them himself.

"But, if the plan of the constitution had not failed – if we were now deriving from electors all the advantages expected from their institution – I, for one, said Mr. B., would still be in favor of getting rid of them. I should esteem the incorruptibility of the people, their disinterested desire to get the best man for President, to be more than a counterpoise to all the advantages which might be derived from the superior intelligence of a more enlightened, but smaller, and therefore, more corruptible body. I should be opposed to the intervention of electors, because the double process of electing a man to elect a man, would paralyze the spirit of the people, and destroy the life of the election itself. Doubtless this machinery was introduced into our constitution for the purpose of softening the action of the democratic element; but it also softens the interest of the people in the result of the election itself. It places them at too great a distance from their first servant. It interposes a body of men between the people and the object of their choice, and gives a false direction to the gratitude of the President elected. He feels himself indebted to the electors who collected the votes of the people, and not to the people, who gave their votes to the electors. It enables a few men to govern many, and, in time, it will transfer the whole power of the election into the hands of a few, leaving to the people the humble occupation of confirming what has been done by superior authority.

"Mr Benton referred to historical examples to prove the correctness of his opinion.

"He mentioned the constitution of the French Republic, of the year III. of French liberty. The people to choose electors; these to choose the Councils of Five Hundred, and of Ancients; and these, by a further process of filtration, to choose the Five Directors. The effect was, that the people had no concern in the election of their Chief Magistrates, and felt no interest in their fate. They saw them enter and expel each other from the political theatre, with the same indifference with which they would see the entrance and the exit of so many players on the stage. It was the same thing in all the subaltern Republics of which the French armies were delivered, while overturning the thrones of Europe. The constitutions of the Ligurian, Cisalpine, and Parthenopian Republics, were all duplicates of the mother institution, at Paris; and all shared the same fate. The French consular constitution of the year VIII. (the last year of French liberty) preserved all the vices of the electoral system; and from this fact, alone, that profound observer, Neckar, from the bosom of his retreat, in the midst of the Alps, predicted and proclaimed the death of Liberty in France. He wrote a book to prove that 'Liberty would be ruined by providing any kind of substitute for popular elections:' and the result verified his prediction in four years."