In the year preceding the delivery of his great speech Mr. Webster had lost his brother Ezekiel by sudden death, and he had married for his second wife Miss Leroy of New York. The former event was a terrible grief to him, and taken in conjunction with the latter seemed to make a complete break with the past, and with its struggles and privations, its joys and successes. The slender girl whom he had married in Salisbury church and the beloved brother were both gone, and with them went those years of youth in which,

“He had sighed deep, laughed free,
Starved, feasted, despaired, been happy.”

One cannot come to this dividing line in Mr. Webster’s life without regret. There was enough of brilliant achievement and substantial success in what had gone before to satisfy any man, and it had been honest, simple, and unaffected. A wider fame and a greater name lay before him, but with them came also ugly scandals, bitter personal attacks, an ambition which warped his nature, and finally a terrible mistake. One feels inclined to say of these later years, with the Roman lover:

“Shut them in
With their triumphs and their glories and the rest,
Love is best.”

The home changed first, and then the public career. The reply which, as John Quincy Adams said, “utterly demolished the fabric of Hayne’s speech and left scarcely a wreck to be seen,” went straight home to the people of the North. It gave eloquent expression to the strong but undefined feeling in the popular mind. It found its way into every house and was read everywhere; it took its place in the school books, to be repeated by shrill boy voices, and became part of the literature and of the intellectual life of the country. In those solemn sentences men read the description of what the United States had come to be under the Constitution, and what American nationality meant in 1830. The leaders of the young war party in 1812 were the first to arouse the national sentiment, but no one struck the chord with such a master hand as Mr. Webster, or drew forth such long and deep vibrations. There is no single utterance in our history which has done so much by mere force of words to strengthen the love of nationality and implant it deeply in the popular heart, as the reply to Hayne.

Before the delivery of that speech Mr. Webster was a distinguished statesman, but the day after he awoke to a national fame which made all his other triumphs pale. Such fame brought with it, of course, as it always does in this country, talk of the presidency. The reply to Hayne made Mr. Webster a presidential candidate, and from that moment he was never free from the gnawing, haunting ambition to win the grand prize of American public life. There was a new force in his career, and in all the years to come the influence of that force must be reckoned and remembered.

Mr. Webster was anxious that the party of opposition to General Jackson, which then passed by the name of National Republicans, should be in some way strengthened, solidified, and placed on a broad platform of distinct principles. He saw with great regret the ruin which was threatened by the anti-masonic schism, and it would seem that he was not indisposed to take advantage of this to stop the nomination of Mr. Clay, who was peculiarly objectionable to the opponents of masonry. He earnestly desired the nomination himself, but even his own friends in the party told him that this was out of the question, and he acquiesced in their decision. Mr. Clay’s personal popularity, moreover, among the National Republicans was, in truth, invincible, and he was unanimously nominated by the convention at Baltimore. The action of the anti-masonic element in the country doomed Clay to defeat, which he was likely enough to encounter in any event; but the consolidation of the party so ardently desired by Mr. Webster was brought about by acts of the administration, which completely overcame any intestine divisions among its opponents.

The session of 1831-1832, when the country was preparing for the coming presidential election, marks the beginning of the fierce struggle with Andrew Jackson which was to give birth to a new and powerful organization known in our history as the Whig party, and destined, after years of conflict, to bring overwhelming defeat to the “Jacksonian democracy.” There is no occasion here to enter into a history of the famous bank controversy. Established in 1816, the bank of the United States, after a period of difficulties, had become a powerful and valuable financial organization. In 1832 it applied for a continuance of its charter, which then had three years still to run. Mr. Webster did not enter into the personal contest which had already begun, but in a speech of great ability advocated a renewal of the charter, showing, as he always did on such themes, a knowledge and a grasp of the principles and intricacies of public finance unequalled in our history except by Hamilton. In a second speech he made a most effective and powerful argument against a proposition to give the States authority to tax the bank, defending the doctrines laid down by Chief Justice Marshall in McCullough vs. Maryland, and denying the power of Congress to give the States the right of such taxation, because by so doing they violated the Constitution. The amendment was defeated, and the bill for the continuance of the charter passed both Houses by large majorities.

Jackson returned the bill with a veto. He had the audacity to rest his veto upon the ground that the bill was unconstitutional, and that it was the duty of the President to decide upon the constitutionality of every measure without feeling in the least bound by the opinion of Congress or of the Supreme Court. His ignorance was so crass that he failed to perceive the distinction between a new bill and one to continue an existing law, while his vanity and his self-assumption were so colossal that he did not hesitate to assert that he had the right and the power to declare an existing law, passed by Congress, approved by Madison, and held to be constitutional by an express decision of the Supreme Court, to be invalid, because he thought fit to say so. To overthrow such doctrines was not difficult, but Mr. Webster refuted them with a completeness and force which were irresistible. At the same time he avoided personal attack in the dignified way which was characteristic of him, despite the extraordinary temptation to indulge in invective and telling sarcasm to which Jackson by his ignorance and presumption had so exposed himself. The bill was lost, the great conflict with the bank was begun, and the Whig party was founded.

Another event of a different character, which had occurred not long before, helped to widen the breach and to embitter the contest between the parties of the administration and of the opposition. When in 1829 Mr. McLane had received his instructions as Minister to England, he had been directed by Mr. Van Buren to reopen negotiations on the subject of the West Indian trade, and in so doing the Secretary of State had reflected on the previous administration, and had said that the party in power would not support the pretensions of its predecessors. Such language was, of course, at variance with all traditions, was wholly improper, and was mean and contemptible in dealing with a foreign nation. In 1831 Mr. Van Buren was nominated as Minister to England, and came up for confirmation in the Senate some time after he had actually departed on his mission. Mr. Webster opposed the confirmation in an eloquent speech full of just pride in his country and of vigorous indignation against the slight which Mr. Van Buren had put upon her by his instructions to Mr. McLane. He pronounced a splendid “rebuke upon the first instance in which an American minister had been sent abroad as the representative of his party and not as the representative of his country.” The opposition was successful, and Mr. Van Buren’s nomination was rejected. It is no doubt true that the rejection was a political mistake, and that, as was commonly said at the time, it created sympathy for Mr. Van Buren and insured his succession to the presidency. Yet no one would now think as well of Mr. Webster if, to avoid awakening popular sympathy and party enthusiasm in behalf of Mr. Van Buren, he had silently voted for that gentleman’s confirmation. To do so was to approve the despicable tone adopted in the instructions to McLane. As a patriotic American, above all as a man of intense national feelings, Mr. Webster could not have done otherwise than resist with all the force of his eloquence the confirmation of a man who had made such an undignified and unworthy exhibition of partisanship. Politically he may have been wrong, but morally he was wholly right, and his rebuke stands in our history as a reproach which Mr. Van Buren’s subsequent success can neither mitigate nor impair.

There was another measure, however, which had a far different effect from those which tended to build up the opposition to Jackson and his followers. A movement was begun by Mr. Clay looking to a revision and reduction of the tariff, which finally resulted in a bill reducing duties on many articles to a revenue standard, and leaving those on cotton and woollen goods and iron unchanged. In the debates which occurred during the passage of this bill Mr. Webster took but little part, but they caused a furious outbreak on the part of the South Carolinians led by Hayne, and ended in the confirmation of the protective policy. When Mr. Webster spoke at the New York dinner in 1831, he gave his hearers to understand very clearly that the nullification agitation was not at an end, and after the passage of the new tariff bill he saw close at hand the danger which he had predicted.

In November, 1832, South Carolina in convention passed her famous ordinance nullifying the revenue laws of the United States, and her Legislature, which assembled soon after, enacted laws to carry out the ordinance, and gave an open defiance to the Federal government. The country was filled with excitement. It was known that Mr. Calhoun, having published a letter in defence of nullification, had resigned the vice-presidency, accepted the senatorship of South Carolina, and was coming to the capital to advocate his favorite doctrine. But the South Carolinians had made one trifling blunder. They had overlooked the President. Jackson was a Southerner and a Democrat, but he was also the head of the nation, and determined to maintain its integrity. On December 10, before Congress assembled, he issued his famous proclamation in which he took up rigorously the position adopted by Mr. Webster in his reply to Hayne, and gave the South Carolinians to understand that he would not endure treason, but would enforce constitutional laws even though he should be compelled to use bayonets to do it. The Legislature of the recalcitrant State replied in an offensive manner which only served to make Jackson angry. He, too, began to say some pretty violent things, and, as he generally meant what he said, the gallant leaders of nullification and other worthy people grew very uneasy. There can be no doubt that the outlook was very threatening, and the nullifiers were extremely likely to be the first to suffer from the effects of the impending storm.

Mr. Webster was in New Jersey, on his way to Washington, when he first received the proclamation, and at Philadelphia he met Mr. Clay, and from a friend of that gentleman received a copy of a bill which was to do away with the tariff by gradual reductions, prevent the imposition of any further duties, and which at the same time declared against protection and in favor of a tariff for revenue only. This headlong plunge into concession and compromise was not at all to Mr. Webster’s taste. He was opposed to the scheme for economical reasons, but still more on the far higher ground that there was open resistance to laws of undoubted constitutionality, and until that resistance was crushed under foot any talk of compromise was a blow at the national dignity and the national existence which ought not to be tolerated for an instant. His own course was plain. He proposed to sustain the administration, and when the national honor should be vindicated and all unconstitutional resistance ended, then would come the time for concessions. Jackson was not slow in giving Mr. Webster something to support. At the opening of the session a message was sent to Congress asking that provision might be made to enable the President to enforce the laws by means of the land and naval forces if necessary. The message was referred to a committee, who at once reported the celebrated “Force Bill,” which embodied the principles of the message and had the entire approval of the President. But Jackson’s party broke, despite the attitude of their chief, for many of them were from the South and could not bring themselves to the point of accepting the “Force Bill.” The moment was critical, and the administration turned to Mr. Webster and took him into their councils. On February 8 Mr. Webster rose, and, after explaining in a fashion which no one was likely to forget, that this was wholly an administration measure, he announced his intention, as an independent senator, of giving it his hearty and inflexible support. The combination thus effected was overwhelming. Mr. Calhoun was now thoroughly alarmed, and we can well imagine that the threats of hanging, in which it was rumored that the President had indulged, began to have a good deal of practical significance to a gentleman who, as Secretary of War, had been familiar with the circumstances attending the deaths of Arbuthnot and Ambrister. At all events, Mr. Calhoun lost no time in having an interview with Mr. Clay, and the result was, that the latter, on February 11, announced that he should, on the following day, introduce a tariff bill, a measure of the same sort having already been started in the House. The bill as introduced did not involve such a complete surrender as that which Mr. Webster had seen in Philadelphia, but it necessitated most extensive modifications and gave all that South Carolina could reasonably demand. Mr. Clay advocated it in a brilliant speech, resting his defence on the ground that this was the only way to preserve the tariff, and that it was founded on the great constitutional doctrine of compromise. Mr. Webster opposed the bill briefly, and then introduced a series of resolutions combating the proposed measure on economical principles and on those of justice, and especially assailing the readiness to abandon the rightful powers of Congress and yield them up to any form of resistance. Before, however, he could speak in support of his resolutions, the “Force Bill” came up, and Mr. Calhoun made his celebrated argument in support of nullification. This Mr. Webster was obliged to answer, and he replied with the great speech known in his works as “The Constitution not a compact between sovereign States.” In a general way the same criticism is applicable to this debate as to that with Hayne, but there were some important differences. Mr. Calhoun’s argument was superior to that of his follower. It was dry and hard, but it was a splendid specimen of close and ingenious reasoning, and, as was to be expected, the originator and master surpassed the imitator and pupil. Mr. Webster’s speech, on the other hand, in respect to eloquence, was decidedly inferior to the masterpiece of 1830. Mr. Curtis says, “Perhaps there is no speech ever made by Mr. Webster that is so close in its reasoning, so compact, and so powerful.” To the first two qualities we can readily assent, but that it was equally powerful may be doubted. So long as Mr. Webster confined himself to defending the Constitution as it actually was and as what it had come to mean in point of fact, he was invincible. Just in proportion as he left this ground and attempted to argue on historical premises that it was a fundamental law, he weakened his position, for the historical facts were against him. In the reply to Hayne he touched but slightly on the historical, legal, and theoretical aspects of the case, and he was overwhelming. In the reply to Calhoun he devoted his strength chiefly to these topics, and, meeting his keen antagonist on the latter’s own chosen ground, he put himself at a disadvantage. In the actual present and in the steady course of development, the facts were wholly with Mr. Webster. Whatever the people of the United States understood the Constitution to mean in 1789, there can be no question that a majority in 1833 regarded it as a fundamental law, and not as a compact an opinion which has now become universal. But it was quite another thing to argue that what the Constitution had come to mean was what it meant when it was adopted. The identity of meaning at these two periods was the proposition which Mr. Webster undertook to maintain, and he upheld it as well and as plausibly as the nature of the case admitted. His reasoning was close and vigorous; but he could not destroy the theory of the Constitution as held by leaders and people in 1789, or reconcile the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions or the Hartford Convention with the fundamental-law doctrines. Nevertheless, it would be an error to suppose that because the facts of history were against Mr. Webster in these particulars, this able, ingenious, and elaborate argument was thrown away. It was a fitting supplement and complement to the reply to Hayne. It reiterated the national principles, and furnished those whom the statement and demonstration of an existing fact could not satisfy, with an immense magazine of lucid reasoning and plausible and effective arguments. The reply to Hayne gave magnificent expression to the popular feeling, while that to Calhoun supplied the arguments which, after years of discussion, converted that feeling into a fixed opinion, and made it strong enough to carry the North through four years of civil war. But in his final speech in this debate Mr. Webster came back to his original ground, and said, in conclusion, “Shall we have a general government? Shall we continue the union of States under a government instead of a league? This vital and all-important question the people will decide.” The vital question went to the great popular jury, and they cast aside all historical premises and deductions, all legal subtleties and refinements, and gave their verdict on the existing facts. The world knows what that verdict was, and will never forget that it was largely due to the splendid eloquence of Daniel Webster when he defended the cause of nationality against the slave-holding separatists of South Carolina.

While this great debate was in progress, and Mr. Webster and the faithful adherents of Jackson were pushing the “Force Bill” to a vote, Mr. Clay was making every effort to carry the compromise tariff. In spite of his exertions, the Force Bill passed on February 20, but close behind came the tariff, which Mr. Webster opposed, on its final passage, in a vigorous speech. There is no need to enter into his economical objections, but he made his strongest stand against the policy of sacrificing great interests to soothe South Carolina. Mr. Clay replied, but did not then press a vote, for, with that dexterous management which he had exhibited in 1820 and was again to display in 1850, he had succeeded in getting his tariff bill carried rapidly through the House, in order to obviate the objection that all money bills must originate in the lower branch. The House bill passed the Senate, Mr. Webster voting against it, and became law. There was no further need of the Force Bill. Clay, Calhoun, even the daring Jackson ultimately, were very glad to accept the easy escape offered by a compromise. South Carolina had in reality prevailed, although Mr. Clay had saved protection in a modified form. Her threats of nullification had brought the United States government to terms, and the doctrines of Calhoun went home to the people of the South with the glory of substantial victory about them, to breed and foster separatism and secession, and prepare the way for armed conflict with the nobler spirit of nationality which Mr. Webster had roused in the North.

Speaking of Mr. Webster at this period, Mr. Benton says:

“He was the colossal figure on the political stage during that eventful time, and his labors, splendid in their day, survive for the benefit of distant posterity."... “It was a splendid era in his life, both for his intellect and his patriotism. No longer the advocate of classes or interests, he appeared as the great defender of the Union, of the Constitution, of the country, and of the administration to which he was opposed. Released from the bonds of party and the narrow confines of class and corporation advocacy, his colossal intellect expanded to its full proportions in the field of patriotism, luminous with the fires of genius, and commanding the homage not of party but of country. His magnificent harangues touched Jackson in his deepest-seated and ruling feeling, love of country, and brought forth the response which always came from him when the country was in peril and a defender presented himself. He threw out the right hand of fellowship, treated Mr. Webster with marked distinction, commended him with public praise, and placed him on the roll of patriots. And the public mind took the belief that they were to act together in future, and that a cabinet appointment or a high mission would be the reward of his patriotic service. It was a crisis in the life of Mr. Webster. He stood in public opposition to Mr. Clay and Mr. Calhoun. With Mr. Clay he had a public outbreak in the Senate. He was cordial with Jackson. The mass of his party stood by him on the proclamation. He was at a point from which a new departure might be taken: one at which he could not stand still; from which there must be either advance or recoil. It was a case in which will more than intellect was to rule. He was above Mr. Clay and Mr. Calhoun in intellect, below them in will: and he was soon seen cooperating with them (Mr. Clay in the lead) in the great measure condemning President Jackson.”

This is of course the view of a Jacksonian leader, but it is none the less full of keen analysis and comprehension of Mr. Webster, and in some respects embodies very well the conditions of the situation. Mr. Benton naturally did not see that an alliance with Jackson was utterly impossible for Mr. Webster, whose proper course was therefore much less simple than it appeared to the Senator from Missouri. There was in reality no common ground possible between Webster and Jackson except defence of the national integrity. Mr. Webster was a great orator, a splendid advocate, a trained statesman and economist, a remarkable constitutional lawyer, and a man of immense dignity, not headstrong in temper and without peculiar force of will. Jackson, on the other hand, was a rude soldier, unlettered, intractable, arbitrary, with a violent temper and a most despotic will. Two men more utterly incompatible it would have been difficult to find, and nothing could have been more wildly fantastic than to suppose an alliance between them, or to imagine that Mr. Webster could ever have done anything but oppose utterly those mad gyrations of personal government which the President called his “policy.”

Yet at the same time it is perfectly true that just after the passage of the tariff bill Mr. Webster was at a great crisis in his life. He could not act with Jackson. That way was shut to him by nature, if by nothing else. But he could have maintained his position as the independent and unbending defender of nationality and as the foe of compromise. He might then have brought Mr. Clay to his side, and remained himself the undisputed head of the Whig party. The coalition between Clay and Calhoun was a hollow, ill-omened thing, certain to go violently to pieces, as, in fact, it did, within a few years, and then Mr. Clay, if he had held out so long, would have been helpless without Mr. Webster. But such a course required a very strong will and great tenacity of purpose, and it was on this side that Mr. Webster was weak, as Mr. Benton points out. Instead of waiting for Mr. Clay to come to him, Mr. Webster went over to Clay and Calhoun, and formed for a time the third in that ill-assorted partnership. There was no reason for his doing so. In fact every good reason was against it. Mr. Clay had come to Mr. Webster with his compromise, and had been met with the reply “that it would be yielding great principles to faction; and that the time had come to test the strength of the Constitution and the government.” This was a brave, manly answer, but Mr. Clay, nationalist as he was, had straightway deserted his friend and ally, and gone over to the separatists for support. Then a sharp contest had occurred between Mr. Webster and Mr. Clay in the debate on the tariff; and when it was all over, the latter wrote with frank vanity and a slight tinge of contempt: “Mr. Webster and I came in conflict, and I have the satisfaction to tell you that he gained nothing. My friends flatter me with my having completely triumphed. There is no permanent breach between us. I think he begins already to repent his course.” Mr. Clay was intensely national, but his theory of preserving the Union was by continual compromise, or, in other words, by constant yielding to the aggressive South. Mr. Webster’s plan was to maintain a firm attitude, enforce absolute submission to all constitutional laws, and prove that agitation against the Union could lead only to defeat. This policy would not have resulted in rebellion, but, if it had, the hanging of Calhoun and a few like him, and the military government of South Carolina, by the hero of New Orleans, would have taught slave-holders such a lesson that we should probably have been spared four years of civil war. Peaceful submission, however, would have been the sure outcome of Mr. Webster’s policy. But a compromise appealed as it always does to the timid, balance-of-power party. Mr. Clay prevailed, and the manufacturers of New England, as well as elsewhere, finding that he had secured for them the benefit of time and of the chapter of accidents, rapidly came over to his support. The pressure was too much for Mr. Webster. Mr. Clay thought that if Mr. Webster “had to go over the work of the last few weeks he would have been for the compromise, which commands the approbation of a great majority.” Whether Mr. Webster repented his opposition to the compromise no one can say, but the change of opinion in New England, the general assent of the Whig party, and the dazzling temptations of presidential candidacy prevailed with him. He fell in behind Mr. Clay, and remained there in a party sense and as a party man for the rest of his life.

The terrible prize of the presidency was indeed again before his eyes. Mr. Clay’s overthrow at the previous election had removed him, for the time being at least, from the list of candidates, and thus freed Mr. Webster from his most dangerous rival. In the summer of 1833 Mr. Webster made a tour through the Western States, and was received everywhere with enthusiasm, and hailed as the great expounder and defender of the Constitution. The following winter he stood forward as the preeminent champion of the Bank against the President. Everything seemed to point to him as the natural candidate of the opposition. The Legislature of Massachusetts nominated him for the presidency, and he himself deeply desired the office, for the fever now burned strongly within him. But the movement came to nothing. The anti-masonic schism still distracted the opposition. The Kentucky leaders were jealous of Mr. Webster, and thought him “no such man” as their idol Henry Clay. They admitted his greatness and his high traits of character, but they thought his ambition mixed with too much self-love. Governor Letcher wrote to Mr. Crittenden in 1836 that Clay was more elevated, disinterested and patriotic than Webster, and that the verdict of the country had had a good effect on the latter. Despite the interest and enthusiasm which Mr. Webster aroused in the West, he had no real hold upon that section or upon the masses of the people and the Western Whigs turned to Harrison. There was no hope in 1836 for Mr. Webster, or, for that matter, for his party either. He received the electoral vote of faithful Massachusetts, and that was all. As it was then, so it had been at the previous election, and so it was to continue to be at the end of every presidential term. There never was a moment when Mr. Webster had any real prospect of attaining to the presidency. Unfortunately he never could realize this. He would have been more than human, perhaps, if he had done so. The tempting bait hung always before his eyes. The prize seemed to be always just coming within his reach, and was really never near it. But the longing had entered his soul. He could not rid himself of the idea of this final culmination to his success; and it warped his feelings and actions, injured his career, and embittered his last years.

This notice of the presidential election of 1836 has somewhat anticipated the course of events. Soon after the tariff compromise had been effected, Mr. Webster renewed his relations with Mr. Clay, and, consequently, with Mr. Calhoun, and their redoutable antagonist in the President’s chair soon gave them enough to do. The most immediate obstacle to Mr. Webster’s alliance with General Jackson was the latter’s attitude in regard to the bank. Mr. Webster had become satisfied that the bank was, on the whole, a useful and even necessary institution. No one was better fitted than he to decide on such a question, and few persons would now be found to differ from his judgment on this point. In a general way he may be said to have adopted the Hamiltonian doctrine in regard to the expediency and constitutionality of a national bank. There were intimations in the spring of 1833 that the President, not content with preventing the re-charter of the bank, was planning to strike it down, and practically deprive it of even the three years of life which still remained to it by law. The scheme was perfected during the summer, and, after changing his Secretary of the Treasury until he got one who would obey, President Jackson dealt his great blow. On September 26 Mr. Taney signed the order removing the deposits of the government from the Bank of the United States. The result was an immediate contraction of loans, commercial distress, and great confusion.

The President had thrown down the gage, and the leaders of the opposition were not slow to take it up. Mr. Clay opened the battle by introducing two resolutions, one condemning the action of the President as unconstitutional, the other attacking the policy of removal, and a long and bitter debate ensued. A month later, Mr. Webster came forward with resolutions from Boston against the course of the President. He presented the resolutions in a powerful and effective speech, depicting the deplorable condition of business, and the injury caused to the country by the removal of the deposits. He rejected the idea of leaving the currency to the control of the President, or of doing away entirely with paper, and advocated the re-charter of the present bank, or the creation of a new one; and, until the time for that should arrive, the return of the deposits, with its consequent relief to business and a restoration of stability and of confidence for the time being at least. He soon found that the administration had determined that no law should be passed, and that the doctrine that Congress had no power to establish a bank should be upheld. He also discovered that the constitutional pundit in the White House, who was so opposed to a single national bank, had created, by his own fiat, a large number of small national banks in the guise of state banks, to which the public deposits were committed, and the collection of the public revenues intrusted. Such an arbitrary policy, at once so ignorant, illogical, and dangerous, aroused Mr. Webster thoroughly, and he entered immediately upon an active campaign against the President. Between the presentation of the Boston resolutions and the close of the session he spoke on the bank, and the subjects necessarily connected with it, no less than sixty-four times. He dealt entirely with financial topics, chiefly those relating to the currency, and with the constitutional questions raised by the extension of the executive authority. This long series of speeches is one of the most remarkable exhibitions of intellectual power ever made by Mr. Webster, or indeed by any public man in our history. In discussing one subject in all its bearings, involving of necessity a certain amount of repetition, he not only displayed an extraordinary grasp of complicated financial problems and a wide knowledge of their scientific meaning and history, but he showed an astonishing fertility in argument, coupled with great variety and clearness of statement and cogency of reasoning. With the exception of Hamilton, Mr. Webster is the only statesman in our history who was capable of such a performance on such a subject, when a thorough knowledge had to be united with all the resources of debate and all the arts of the highest eloquence.

The most important speech of all was that delivered in answer to Jackson’s “Protest,” sent in as a reply to Mr. Clay’s resolutions which had been sustained by Mr. Webster as chairman of the Committee on Finance. The “Protest” asserted, in brief, that the Legislature could not order a subordinate officer to perform certain duties free from the control of the President; that the President had the right to put his own conception of the law into execution; and, if the subordinate officer refused to obey, then to remove such officer; and that the Senate had therefore no right to censure his removal of the Secretary of the Treasury, in order to reach the government deposits. To this doctrine Mr. Webster replied with great elaboration and ability. The question was a very nice one. There could be no doubt of the President’s power of removal, and it was necessary to show that this power did not extend to the point of depriving Congress of the right to confer by law specified and independent powers upon an inferior officer, or of regulating the tenure of office. To establish this proposition, in such a way as to take it out of the thick and heated atmosphere of personal controversy, and put it in a shape to carry conviction to the popular understanding, was a delicate and difficult task, requiring, in the highest degree, lucidity and ingenuity of argument. It is not too high praise to say that Mr. Webster succeeded entirely. The real contest was for the possession of that debatable ground which lies between the defined limits of the executive and legislative departments. The struggle consolidated and gave coherence to the Whig party as representing the opposition to executive encroachments. At the time Jackson, by his imperious will and marvellous personal popularity, prevailed and obtained the acceptance of his doctrines. But the conflict has gone on, and the balance of advantage now rests with the Legislature. This tendency is quite as dangerous as that of which Jackson was the exponent, if not more so. The executive department has been crippled; and the influence and power of Congress, and especially of the Senate, have become far greater than they should be, under the system of proportion and balance embodied in the Constitution. Despite Jackson’s victory there is, to-day, far more danger of undue encroachments on the part of the Senate than on that of the President.

At the next session the principal subject of discussion was the trouble with France. Irritated at the neglect of the French government to provide funds for the payment of their debt to us, Jackson sent in a message severely criticising them, and recommending the passage of a law authorizing reprisals on French property. The President and his immediate followers were eager for war, Calhoun and his faction regarded the whole question as only matter for “an action of assumpsit,” while Mr. Webster and Mr. Clay desired to avoid hostilities, but wished the country to maintain a firm and dignified attitude. Under the lead of Mr. Clay, the recommendation of reprisals was rejected, and under that of Mr. Webster a clause smuggled into the Fortification Bill to give the President three millions to spend as he liked was struck out and the bill was subsequently lost. This affair, which brought us to the verge of war with France, soon blew over, however, and caused only a temporary ripple, although Mr. Webster’s attack on the Fortification Bill left a sting behind.

In this same session Mr. Webster made an exhaustive speech on the question of executive patronage and the President’s power of appointment and removal. He now went much farther than in his answer to the “Protest,” asserting not only the right of Congress to fix the tenure of office, but also that the power of removal, like the power of appointment, was in the President and Senate jointly. The speech contained much that was valuable, but in its main doctrine was radically unsound. The construction of 1789, which decided that the power of removal belonged to the President alone, was clearly right, and Mr. Webster failed to overthrow it. His theory, embodied in a bill which provided that the President should state to the Senate, when he appointed to a vacancy caused by removal, his reasons for such removal, was thoroughly mischievous. It was more dangerous than Jackson’s doctrine, for it tended to take the power of patronage still more from a single and responsible person and vest it in a large and therefore wholly irresponsible body which has always been too much inclined to degenerate into an office-broking oligarchy, and thus degrade its high and important functions. Mr. Webster argued his proposition with his usual force and perspicuity, but the speech is strongly partisan and exhibits the disposition of an advocate to fit the Constitution to his particular case, instead of dealing with it on general and fundamental principles.

The session closed with a resolution offered by Mr. Benton to expunge the resolutions of censure upon the President, which was overwhelmingly defeated, and was then laid upon the table, on the motion of Mr. Webster. He also took the first step to prevent the impending financial disaster growing out of the President’s course toward the bank, by carrying a bill to stop the payment of treasury warrants by the deposit banks in current banknotes, and to compel their payment in gold and silver. The rejection of Benton’s resolutions served to embitter the already intense conflict between the President and his antagonists, and Mr. Webster’s bill, while it showed the wisdom of the opposition, was powerless to remedy the mischief which was afoot.

In this same year (1835) the independence of Texas was achieved, and in the session of 1835-36 the slavery agitation began its march, which was only to terminate on the field of battle and in the midst of contending armies. Mr. Webster’s action at this time in regard to this great question, which was destined to have such an effect upon his career, can be more fitly narrated when we come to consider his whole course in regard to slavery in connection with the “7th of March” speech. The other matters of this session demand but a brief notice. The President animadverted in his message upon the loss of the Fortification Bill, due to the defeat of the three million clause. Mr. Webster defended himself most conclusively and effectively, and before the session closed the difficulties with France were practically settled. He also gave great attention to the ever-pressing financial question, trying to mitigate the evils which the rapid accumulation of the public funds was threatening to produce. He felt that he was powerless, that nothing indeed could be done to avert the approaching disaster; but he struggled to modify its effects and delay its progress.

Complications increased rapidly during the summer. The famous “Specie Circular,” issued by the Secretary of the Treasury without authority of law, weakened all banks which did not hold the government deposits, forced them to contract their loans, and completed the derangement of domestic exchange. This grave condition of affairs confronted Congress when it assembled in December, 1836. A resolution was introduced to rescind the Specie Circular, and Mr. Webster spoke at length in the debate, defining the constitutional duties of the government toward the regulation of the currency, and discussing in a masterly manner the intricate questions of domestic exchanges and the excessive circulation of bank notes. On another occasion he reiterated his belief that a national bank was the true remedy for existing ills, but that only hard experience could convince the country of its necessity.

At this session the resolution to expunge the vote of censure of 1833 was again brought forward by Mr. Benton. The Senate had at last come under the sway of the President, and it was clear that the resolution would pass. This precious scheme belongs to the same category of absurdities as the placing Oliver Cromwell’s skull on Temple Bar, and throwing Robert Blake’s body on a dung-hill by Charles Stuart and his friends. It was not such a mean and cowardly performance as that of the heroes of the Restoration, but it was far more “childish-foolish.” The miserable and ludicrous nature of such a proceeding disgusted Mr. Webster beyond measure. Before the vote was taken he made a brief speech that is a perfect model of dignified and severe protest against a silly outrage upon the Constitution and upon the rights of senators, which he was totally unable to prevent. The original censure is part of history. No “black lines” can take it out. The expunging resolution, which Mr. Curtis justly calls “fantastic and theatrical,” is also part of history, and carries with it the ineffaceable stigma affixed by Mr. Webster’s indignant protest.

Before the close of the session Mr. Webster made up his mind to resign his seat in the Senate. He had private interests which demanded his attention, and he wished to travel both in the United States and in Europe. He may well have thought, also, that he could add nothing to his fame by remaining longer in the Senate. But besides the natural craving for rest, it is quite possible that he believed that a withdrawal from active and official participation in politics was the best preparation for a successful candidacy for the presidency in 1840. This certainly was in his mind in the following year (1838), when the rumor was abroad that he was again contemplating retirement from the Senate; and it is highly probable that the same motive was at bottom the controlling one in 1837. But whatever the cause of his wish to resign, the opposition of his friends everywhere, and of the Legislature of Massachusetts, formally and strongly expressed, led him to forego his purpose. He consented to hold his seat for the present, at least, and in the summer of 1837 made an extended tour through the West, where he was received as before with the greatest admiration and enthusiasm.

The distracted condition of the still inchoate Whig party in 1836, and the extraordinary popularity of Jackson, resulted in the complete victory of Mr. Van Buren. But the General’s chosen successor and political heir found the great office to which he had been called, and which he so eagerly desired, anything but a bed of roses. The ruin which Jackson’s wild policy had prepared was close at hand, and three months after the inauguration the storm burst with full fury. The banks suspended specie payments and universal bankruptcy reigned throughout the country. Our business interests were in the violent throes of the worst financial panic which had ever been known in the United States. The history of Mr. Van Buren’s administration, in its main features, is that of a vain struggle with a hopeless network of difficulties, and with the misfortune and prostration which grew out of this wide-spread disaster. It is not necessary here to enter into the details of these events. Mr. Webster devoted himself in the Senate to making every effort to mitigate the evils which he had prophesied, and to prevent their aggravation by further injudicious legislation. His most important speech was delivered at the special session against the first sub-treasury bill and Mr. Calhoun’s amendment. Mr. Calhoun, who had wept over the defeat of the bank bill in 1815, was now convinced that all banks were mistakes, and wished to prevent the acceptance of the notes of specie paying banks for government dues. Mr. Webster’s speech was the fullest and most elaborate he ever made on the subject of the currency, and the relations of the government to it. His theme was the duty and right of the general government under the Constitution to regulate and control the currency, and his masterly argument was the best that has ever been made, leaving in fact nothing to be desired.

In the spring of 1839 there was talk of sending Mr. Webster to London as commissioner to settle the boundary disputes, but it came to nothing, and in the following summer he went to England in his private capacity accompanied by his family. The visit was in every way successful. It brought rest and change as well as pleasure, and was full of interest. Mr. Webster was very well received, much attention was paid him, and much admiration shown for him. He commanded all this, not only by his appearance, his reputation, and his intellectual force, but still more by the fact that he was thoroughly and genuinely American in thought, feeling, and manner.

He reached New York on his return at the end of December, and was there met by the news of General Harrison’s nomination by the Whigs. In the previous year it had seemed as if, with Clay out of the way by the defeat of 1832, and Harrison by that of 1836, the great prize must fall to Mr. Webster. His name was brought forward by the Whigs of Massachusetts, but it met with no response even in New England. It was the old story; Mr. Clay and his friends were cool, and the masses of the party did not desire Mr. Webster. The convention turned from the Massachusetts statesman and again nominated the old Western soldier.

Mr. Webster did not hesitate as to the course he should pursue upon his return. He had been reelected to the Senate in January, 1839, and after the session closed in July, 1840, he threw himself into the campaign in support of Harrison. The people did not desire Mr. Webster to be their President, but there was no one whom they so much wished to hear. He was besieged from all parts of the country with invitations to speak, and he answered generously to the call thus made upon him.

On his way home from Washington, in March, 1837, more than three years before, he had made a speech at Niblo’s Garden in New York, the greatest purely political speech which he ever delivered. He then reviewed and arraigned with the greatest severity the history of Jackson’s administration, abstaining in his characteristic way from all personal attack, but showing, as no one else could show, what had been done, and the results of the policy, which were developing as he had predicted. He also said that the worst was yet to come. The speech produced a profound impression. People were still reading it when the worst really came, and the great panic broke over the country. Mr. Webster had, in fact, struck the key-note of the coming campaign in the Niblo-Garden speech of 1837. In the summer of 1840 he spoke in Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, and was almost continually upon the platform. The great feat of 1833-34, when he made sixty-four speeches in the Senate on the bank question, was now repeated under much more difficult conditions. In the first instance he was addressing a small and select body of trained listeners, all more or less familiar with the subject. In 1840 he was obliged to present these same topics, with all their infinite detail and inherent dryness, to vast popular audiences, but nevertheless he achieved a marvellous success. The chief points which he brought out were the condition of the currency, the need of government regulation, the responsibility of the Democrats, the miserable condition of the country, and the exact fulfillment of the prophecies he had made. The argument and the conclusion were alike irresistible, but Mr. Webster showed, in handling his subject, not only the variety, richness, and force which he had displayed in the Senate, but the capacity of presenting it in a way thoroughly adapted to the popular mind, and yet, at the same time, of preserving the impressive tone of a dignified statesman, without any degeneration into mere stump oratory. This wonderful series of speeches produced the greatest possible effect. They were heard by thousands and read by tens of thousands. They fell, of course, upon willing ears. The people, smarting under bankruptcy, poverty, and business depression, were wild for a change; but nothing did so much to swell the volume of public resentment against the policy of the ruling party as these speeches of Mr. Webster, which gave character and form to the whole movement. Jackson had sown the wind, and his unlucky successor was engaged in the agreeable task of reaping the proverbial crop. There was a political revolution. The Whigs swept the country by an immense majority, the great Democratic party was crushed to the earth, and the ignorant misgovernment of Andrew Jackson found at last its fit reward. General Harrison, as soon as he was elected, turned to the two great chiefs of his party to invite them to become the pillars of his administration. Mr. Clay declined any cabinet office, but Mr. Webster, after some hesitation, accepted the secretaryship of state. He resigned his seat in the Senate February 22, 1841, and on March 4 following took his place in the cabinet, and entered upon a new field of public service.