national work, dismiss an experienced, faithful, and zealous president, afterward testify to his ability by a voluntary resolution, and reward his extraordinary services by a large gratuity, and appoint in his place an executive favorite, totally inexperienced and incompetent, to propitiate the president. We behold the usual incidents of approaching tyranny. The land is filled with spies and informers, and detraction and denunciation are the orders of the day. People, especially official incumbents in this place, no longer dare speak in the fearless tones of manly freedom, but in the cautious whispers of trembling slaves. The premonitory symptoms of despotism are upon us; and if Congress do not apply an instantaneous and effective remedy, the fatal collapse will soon come on, and we shall die-ignobly die! base, mean, and abject slaves-the scorn and contempt of mankind-unpitied, unwept, unmourned!"

The resolutions offered by Mr. Clay on the 26th of December, 1833, were debated, from time to time, in the senate, till the 28th of March, 1834, when the substance of them was passed, by a vote of 26 to 20, in the following form:

Resolved, That the president, in the late executive proceedings, in relation to the public revenue, has assumed upon himself authority and power not conferred by the constitution and laws, but in derogation of both."

It will be interesting, as well as instructive, in this connexion, to observe the EFFECTS of the removal of the deposites upon the interests of the country, which are incidentally, and in that way, most impressively, brought to view, in the action of Congress on sundry petitions and memorials, which were preferred to that body in the early part of 1834, before the adjournment of that session when Mr. Clay's resolutions were debated in the senate. The following remarks of Mr. Clay, on the 7th of March, 1834, made upon a memorial from Philadelphia, are in point, and involve more history than could be given in equally few words. The appeal to the vice-president (Mr. Van Buren, ex-officio president of the senate), will be regarded with much interest:

"I have been requested [said Mr. Clay] by the committee from Philadelphia, charged with presenting the memorial to Congress, to say a few words on the subject; and although, after the ample and very satisfactory exposition which it has received from the senator from Massachusetts, further observations are entirely unnecessary, I can not deny myself the gratification of complying with a request, proceeding from a source so highly worthy of respectful consideration.

"And what is the remedy to be provided for this most unhappy state of the country? I have conversed freely with the members. of the Philadelphia committee. They are real, practical, working men-intelligent, well-acquainted with the general condition, and with the sufferings of their particular community. No one, who has not a heart of steel, can listen to them, without feeling the deepest sympathy for the privations and sufferings unnecessarily brought upon the laboring classes. the laboring classes. Both the committee and the memorial declare that their reliance is, exclusively, on the legislative branch of the government. Mr. President, it is with subdued feelings of the profoundest humility and mortification that I am compelled to say, that, constituted as Congress now is, no relief will be afforded by it, unless its members shall be enlightened and instructed by the people themselves. A large portion of the body, whatever may be their private judgment upon the course of the president, believe it to be their duty, at all events safest for themselves, to sustain him, without regard to the consequences of his measures upon the public interests. And nothing but clear, decided, and unequivocal demonstrations of the popular disapprobation of what has been done, will divert them from their present purpose.

"But there is another quarter which possesses sufficient power and influence to relieve the public distresses. In twenty-four hours the executive branch could adopt a measure which would afford an efficacious and substantial remedy, and re-establish confidence. And those who, in this chamber, support the administration, could not render a better service than to repair to the executive mansion, and, placing before the chief magistrate the naked and undisguised truth, prevail upon him to retrace his steps and abandon his fatal experiment. No one, sir, can perform that duty with more propriety than yourself. You can, if you will, induce him to change his course. To you, then, sir, in no unfriendly spirit, but with feelings softened and subdued by the deep distress which pervades every class of our countrymen, I make the appeal. By your official and personal relations with the president, you maintain with him an intercourse which I neither enjoy nor covet. Go to him and tell him, without exaggeration, but in the language of truth and sincerity, the actual condition of his bleeding country. Tell him it is nearly ruined and undone, by the measures which he has been induced to put in operation. Tell him that his experiment is operating on the nation like the philosopher's experiment upon a convulsed animal, in an exhausted receiver, and that it must expire in agony, if he does not pause, give it free and sound circulation, and suffer the energies of the people to be revived and restored. Tell him that, in a single city, more than sixty bankruptcies, involving a loss of upward of fifteen millions of dollars, have occurred. Tell him of the alarming decline in the value of all prop

erty, of the depreciation of all the products of industry, of the stagnation in every branch of business, and of the close of numerous manufacturing establishments, which, a few short months ago, were in active and flourishing operation. Depict to him, if you. can find language to portray, the heart-rending wretchedness of thousands of the working-classes cast out of employment. Tell him of the tears of helpless widows, no longer able to earn their bread; and of unclad and unfed orphans, who have been driven, by his policy, out of the busy pursuits in which but yesterday they were gaining an honest livelihood."

On the 14th of the same month (March), Mr. Clay rose to address the senate on other petitions and memorials and said :

We

"Mr. President, it is a question of the highest importance, what is to be the issue, what the remedy, of the existing evils. should deal with the people openly, frankly, sincerely. The senate stands ready to do whatever is incumbent upon it; but unless the majority in the house will relent, unless it will take heed of and profit by recent events, there is no hope for the nation from the joint action of the two houses of Congress at this session. Still, I would say to my countrymen, do not despair. You are a young, brave, intelligent, and, as yet, a free people. A complete remedy for all that you suffer, and all that you dread, is in your own hands. And the events, to which I have just alluded, demonstrate that those of us have not been deceived, who have always relied upon the virtue, the capacity, and the intelligence of the people.

"The senate stands in the breach, ready to defend the constitution, and to relieve the distresses of the people. But, without the concurrence of another branch of Congress, which ought to be the first to yield it, the senate alone can send forth no act of legislation. Unaided, it can do no positive good; but it has vast preventive power. It may avert and arrest evil, if it can not rebuke usurpation. Senators, let us remain steadily by the constitution and the country, in this most portentous crisis. Let us oppose, to all encroachments, and to all corruption, a manly, resolute, and uncompromising resistance.

"Senators! we hold a highly responsible and arduous position; but the people are with us, and the path of duty lies clearly marked before us. Let us be firm, persevering, and unmoved. Let us perform our duty in a manner worthy of our ancestors, worthy of American senators, worthy of the dignity of the sovereign states that we represent-above all, worthy of the name of American freemen! Let us pledge our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor,' to rescue our beloved country from all impending dangers. And, amid the general gloom and darkness which prevail, let us continue to present one unextinguished light, steadily burning, in the cause of the people, of the constitution, and of civil liberty."

In one of the debates, about the 20th of May, Mr. Clay took occasion again to call the attention of the senate to the extraordinary fact, that, although the senate had been nearly six months in session, no nomination had been made for a secretary of the treasury; and Mr. Webster, at the same time, to show the feeling of General Washington on this subject, and his conscientious respect for the co-ordinate power of the senate in the matter of appointments, read the following document :

66

Message from the President of the United States to the Senate of the United States.

"UNITED STATES, February 9, 1790.

"Gentlemen of the Senate:

66

Among the persons appointed, during the last session, to offices under the national government, there were some who declined serving. Their names and offices are specified in the first column of the foregoing list. I supplied these vacancies, agreeably to the constitution, by temporary appointments, which you will find mentioned in the second column of the list. These appointments will expire with your present session, and indeed OUGHT NOT TO EN

DURE LONGER THAN UNTIL OTHERS CAN BE REGULARLY MADE.

For that purpose, I now nominate to you the persons named in the third column of the list, as being in my opinion qualified to fill the offices opposite to their names in the first.

"G. WASHINGTON."

On Monday, June 23, Mr. Taney's nomination was at last sent in, and on Tuesday, the 24th-the next day—he was rejected by a vote of 28 to 18. So, it appears, these important, momentous transactions were all done by an unauthorized agent, or by taking advantage of a mere formal license of the law. It could not be said, that the forms of law had been violated, though the intention of it evidently was.

In reward for this fidelity, Mr. Taney was subsequently made Chief Justice of the United States!!

CHAPTER V.

THE EXPUNGING RESOLUTION.

The Secret of General Jackson's Power.-Its Culminating Point.-Armed Interpretation of Law.-Silencing Remonstrance.-A Case of Political Casuistry.General Jackson's Protest against the Resolution of the Senate.-Mr. Calhoun's Views of It.-Revival of the Names of Whig and Tory.-Why both were not kept up.-The Yeas and Nays on the Expunging Resolution.-Remarks of Mr. Clay. Protest of the Massachusetts Senators.-The Resolution.-Act of Expunging. A Scene in the Senate.

THE secret of General Jackson's influence, which raised him to power so triumphantly, and sustained him throughout his administration of eight years, with unexampled popularity, at the same time that he was destroying the greatest and best interests of the country, on the largest scale, it is believed, is not generally understood. It has, for the most part, been ascribed to the eclat of military fame. That there was capital in this, can not be denied. It has also been partly attributed to the force of his character. There is reason also in this. But, neither his military fame, nor the force of his character, could account for his political career. Though the country was grateful for his distinguished services in fighting her battles, it will be observed, that nearly ten years had rolled round after the great victory over the British army, on the 8th of January, 1815, before he obtained any decided position as a candidate for political eminence. As the effect of military fame, he should have gained ground much faster than this, though that, undoubtedly, aided him very essentially. It was felt not inconsiderably in the presidential campaign of 1824; but, nevertheless, there was manifested on that occasion, but a small part of the popular enthusiasm which burst forth in his favor in the campaign of 1828, and which had not died away in that of 1832. To understand how . he obtained such a strong hold on the people, as to be able for many years, as president, to do as he pleased, and make the people believe he was seeking their good, when he was doing them the greatest possible injury-as to make them satisfied with measures and acts, which, but for their idolatrous regard, would have shocked