VAN BUREN DEFEATED AT BALTIMORE
1844
The ca.n.a.l contest and Horatio Seymour"s success preceded many surprises and disappointments which were to be disclosed in the campaign of 1844. Never were the motions of the political pendulum more agitated or more irregular. For three years, public sentiment had designated Henry Clay and Martin Van Buren as the accepted candidates of their respective parties for President; and, until the spring of 1844, the confidence of the friends of the Kentucky statesman did not exceed the a.s.surance of the followers of the ex-President. Indeed, the Democratic party was known throughout the country as the "Van Buren party," and, although James Buchanan, John C. Calhoun, and Lewis Ca.s.s had each been named as suitable persons for Chief Executive, the sage of Lindenwald was the party"s recognised leader and prospective candidate. His sub-treasury scheme, accepted as wise and salutary, was still the cornerstone of the party, b.u.t.tressed by a tariff for revenue and opposition to a national bank.
In national affairs, the Democratic party in New York was still a unit. The Legislature of 1843 had re-elected Silas Wright to the United States Senate, without a dissenting Democratic vote; and a state convention, held at Syracuse in September of the same year, and made up of Radicals and Conservatives, had instructed its delegation to support New York"s favourite son. But a troublesome problem suddenly confronted Van Buren. President Tyler had secretly negotiated a treaty of annexation with Texas, ostensibly because of the contiguity and great value of its territory, in reality, because, as Calhoun, then secretary of state, showed in his correspondence with Great Britain, Texas seemed indispensable to the preservation and perpetuation of slavery. Texas had paved the way for such a treaty by providing, in its const.i.tution, for the establishment of slavery, and by prohibiting the importation of slaves from any country other than the United States. But for three months friends of the treaty in the United States Senate had vainly endeavoured to find a two-thirds majority in favour of its ratification. Then, the exponents of slavery, having secretly brought to their support the enormous prestige of Andrew Jackson, prepared to nominate a successor to President Tyler who would favour the treaty.
Van Buren had never failed the South while in the United States Senate. He had voted against sending abolition literature through the mails into States that prohibited its circulation; he had approved the rules of the Senate for tabling abolition pet.i.tions without reading them; he had publicly deprecated the work of abolition leaders; and, by his silence, had approved the mob spirit when his friends were breaking up abolition meetings. But, in those days, American slavery was simply seeking its const.i.tutional right to exist unmolested where it was; and, although the anti-slavery crusade from 1830 to 1840, had profoundly stirred the American conscience, slavery had not yet, to any extended degree, entered into partisan politics. The annexation of Texas, however, was an aggressive measure, the first of the great movements for the extension of slavery since the Missouri Compromise; and it was important to the South to know in advance where the ex-President stood. His administration had been adverse to annexation, and rumour credited him with unabated hostility. To force him into the open, therefore, William H. Hammit, a member of Congress from Mississippi, addressed him a letter on the 27th of March, 1844. "I am an unpledged delegate to the Baltimore convention," wrote Hammit, "and it is believed that a full and frank declaration of your opinion as to the const.i.tutionality and expediency of immediately annexing Texas will be of great service to the cause, at a moment so critical of its destiny."[327] Van Buren held this letter until the 20th of April, thirty-seven days before the meeting of the convention. When he did reply he recalled the fact that in 1837, after an exhaustive consideration of the question, his administration had decided against annexation, and that nothing had since occurred to change the situation; but that if, after the subject had been fully discussed, a Congress chosen with reference to the question showed that the popular will favoured it, he would yield. It was a letter of great length, elaborately discussing every point directly or indirectly relating to the subject.
[Footnote 327: Jabez D. Hammond, _Political History of New York_, Vol.
3, p. 441.]
Van Buren deeply desired the nomination, and if the South supported him he was practically certain of it. It was in view of the necessity of such support that Van Buren"s letter has been p.r.o.nounced by a recent biographer "one of the finest and bravest pieces of political courage, and deserves from Americans a long admiration."[328] Such eulogy is worthily bestowed if Van Buren, at the time of the Hammit letter, fully appreciated the gravity of the situation; but there is no evidence that he understood the secret and hostile purpose which led up to the Hammit inquiry, and the letter itself is evidence that he sought to conciliate the Southern wing of his party. Charles Jared Ingersoll of Pennsylvania, in his diary of May 6, 1844, declares that nearly all of Van Buren"s admirers and most of the Democratic press were even then committed to annexation. Nevertheless, Van Buren and his trusted advisers could not have known of the secret plotting of Buchanan"s and Ca.s.s"s followers, or of the deception shrewdly practised by Cave Johnson of Tennessee, ostensibly a confidential friend, but really a leader in the plot to defeat Van Buren.[329]
Besides, the sentiment of the country unmistakably recognised that powerful and weighty as the inducements for annexation appeared, they were light when opposed in the scale of reason to the treaty of amity and commerce with Mexico, which must be scrupulously observed so long as that country performed its duties and respected treaty rights. Even after the nomination of a President only sixteen senators out of fifty-one voted for annexation, proving that the belief still obtained, in the minds of a very large and influential portion of the party, that annexation was decidedly objectionable, since it must lead, as Benton put it in his great speech delivered in May, 1844, to an unjust, unconst.i.tutional war with Mexico upon a weak and groundless pretext. Thus, Van Buren had behind him, the weight of the argument, a large majority of the Senate, including Silas Wright, his n.o.ble friend, and a party sentiment that had not yet yielded to the crack of the southern whip; and he was ignorant of the plan, already secretly matured, to defeat him with the help of the followers of Buchanan and Ca.s.s by insisting upon the two-thirds rule in the convention. Under these circ.u.mstances, it did not require great courage to reaffirm his previous views so forcibly and ably expressed. Cognisant, however, of the growing desire in the South for annexation, he took good care to remove the impression that he was a hard-sh.e.l.l, by promising to yield his opinion to the judgment of a new Congress. This was a long step in the direction of consent. It virtually said, "If you elect a Congress that will ratify the treaty and pay the price, I will not stand in your way." In the presence of such complacency, the thought naturally occurs that he might have gone a step farther and consented to yield his opinions at once had he known or even suspected the secret plans of his southern opponents, the bitterness of Calhoun and Robert J. Walker, and their understanding with the friends of Buchanan and Ca.s.s. Jackson"s letter favourable to annexation, skilfully procured for publication just before the convention, "to blow Van out of water," as his enemies expressed it, was, indeed, known to Van Buren, but the latter believed its influence discounted by the great confidence Jackson subsequently expressed in his wisdom.[330]
[Footnote 328: Edward M. Shepard, _Life of Martin Van Buren_, p. 407.]
[Footnote 329: "Judge Fine, Mr. Butler, and other members of the New York delegation, reposed great confidence in the opinions and statements of Mr. Cave Johnson, of Tennessee. He frequently met with the delegation, and expressed himself in the strongest terms of personal and political friendship towards Mr. Van Buren and Mr.
Wright. He said he regretted that the Democratic convention in Tennessee had not named Mr. Van Buren as the candidate. So strong was the confidence in Mr. Johnson as a friend of Mr. Van Buren, that he was apprised of all our plans in regard to the organisation of the convention, and was requested to nominate Gov. Hubbard of New Hampshire, as temporary chairman. But when the convention a.s.sembled Gen. Saunders of North Carolina called the convention to order and nominated Hendrick B. Wright, of Pennsylvania, a friend of Mr.
Buchanan, as temporary president. Messrs. Walker, Saunders, and Cave Johnson were the princ.i.p.al managers for the delegates from the southern section of the Union."--Jabez D. Hammond, _Political History of New York_, Vol. 3, p. 447.]
[Footnote 330: "The danger of Van Buren"s difference with Jackson it was sought to avert. Butler visited Jackson at the Hermitage, and doubtless showed him for what sinister end he had been used. Jackson did not withdraw his approval of annexation; but publicly declared his regard for Van Buren to be so great, his confidence in Van Buren"s love of country to be so strengthened by long intimacy, that no difference about Texas could change his opinion. But the work of Calhoun and Robert J. Walker had been too well done."--Edward M.
Shepard, _Life of Martin Van Buren_, p. 407.]
Three days before the date of Van Buren"s letter, Henry Clay, writing upon the same subject, expressed the opinion that annexation at this time, without the a.s.sent of Mexico, would be a measure "compromising the national character, involving us certainly in war with Mexico, probably with other foreign powers, dangerous to the integrity of the Union, inexpedient to the present financial condition of the country, and not called for by any general expression of public opinion." Van Buren had visited Clay at Ashland in 1842, and, after the publication of their letters, it was suggested that a bargain had then been made to remove the question of annexation from politics. However this may be, the friends of the ex-President, after the publication of his letter, understood, quickly and fully, the gravity of the situation.
Subterranean activity was at its height all through the month of May.
Men wavered and changed, and changed again. So great was the alarm that leading men of Ohio addressed their delegation in Congress, insisting upon Van Buren"s support. It was a moment of great peril.
The agitators themselves became frightened. A p.r.o.nounced reaction in favour of Van Buren threatened to defeat their plans, and the better to conceal intrigue and tergiversation they deemed it wise to create the belief that opposition had been wholly and finally abandoned. In this they proved eminently successful. "Many of the strongest advocates of annexation," wrote a member of the New York delegation in Congress, on May 18, nine days before the convention, "have come to regard the grounds taken by Van Buren as the only policy consistent not only with the honour, but the true interests of the country. Such is fast becoming and will soon be the opinion of the whole South."[331]
But the cloud, at last, burst. No sooner had the Baltimore convention convened than Benjamin F. Butler, the ardent friend and able spokesman of Van Buren, discovered that the backers of Ca.s.s and Buchanan were acting with the Southerners in the interest of a rule that required two-thirds of all the delegates in the convention to nominate.
Instantly the air was thick with suggestion, devices, expedients. All the arts of party emergency went on at an unprecedented rate. The eloquent New Yorker, his clear, tenor voice trembling with emotion, fought the battle on the highest moral grounds.
[Footnote 331: Jabez D. Hammond, _Political History of New York_, Vol.
3, p. 444.]
With inexhaustible tenacity, force, and resource, he laboured to hold up to men"s imagination and to burn into their understanding the shame and dishonour of adopting a rule, not only unsound and false in principle, but which, if adhered to, would coerce a majority to yield to a minority. "I submit," declared Butler, in closing, "that to adopt a rule which requires what we know cannot be done, unless the majority yield to the minority, is to subject ourselves to the rule, not of reason, but of despotism, and to defeat the true purposes and objects of this convention--the accomplishment of the people"s will for the promotion of the people"s good."[332]
[Footnote 332: Jabez D. Hammond, _Political History of New York_, Vol.
3, p. 450.
"The real contest took place over the adoption of the rule requiring a two-thirds vote for the nomination. For it was through this rule that enough Southern members, chosen before Van Buren"s letter, were to escape obedience to their instructions to vote for him. Robert J.
Walker, then a senator from Mississippi, a man of interesting history and large ability, led the Southerners. He quoted the precedent of 1832 when Van Buren had been nominated for the Vice Presidency under the two-thirds rule, and that of 1835, when he had been nominated for the Presidency. These nominations had led to victory. In 1840 the rule had not been adopted. Without this rule, he said amid angry excitement, the party would yield to those whose motto seemed to be "rule or ruin." Butler, Daniel S. d.i.c.kinson, and Marcus Morton led the Northern ranks.... Morton said that under the majority rule Jefferson had been nominated; that rule had governed state, county, and township conventions. Butler admitted that under the rule Van Buren would not be nominated, although a majority of the convention was known to be for him. In 1832 and 1835 the two-thirds rule had prevailed because it was certainly known who would be nominated; and the rule operated to aid not to defeat the majority. If the rule were adopted, it would be by the votes of States which were not Democratic, and would bring "dismemberment and final breaking up of the party." Walker laughed at Butler"s "tall vaulting" from the floor; and, refusing to shrink from the Van Buren issue, he protested against New York dictation, and warningly said that, if Van Buren were nominated, Clay would be elected."--Edward M. Shepard, _Life of Martin Van Buren_, p. 408.]
The adoption of the rule, by a vote of 148 to 118, showed that the Democratic party did not have a pa.s.sionate devotion for Martin Van Buren. Buchanan opposed his nomination; leading men in other States did not desire him. The New England States, with Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, had instructed for him; yet sixty-three of these instructed delegates voted for the two-thirds rule, knowing that its adoption would defeat him. The rule received thirty majority, and Van Buren, on the first ballot, received only thirteen. On the second ballot he dropped to less than a majority; on the seventh he had only ninety-nine votes.
The excitement reached a climax when a motion to declare him the nominee by a majority vote, was ruled out of order. In the pandemonium, the New Yorkers, for the first time, seemed to unloose themselves, letting fly bitter denunciations of the treachery of the sixty-three delegates who were pledged to Van Buren"s support. When order was restored, a Virginian suddenly put forward the name of James K. Polk as that of "a pure, whole-hogged Democrat." Then the convention adjourned until the next day.
Harmony usually follows a bitter convention quarrel. Men become furiously and sincerely indignant; but the defeated ones must accept the results, or, Samson-like, destroy themselves in the destruction of their party. The next morning, Daniel S. d.i.c.kinson, the most violently indignant the day before, declared that "he loved this convention because it had acted so like the ma.s.ses." In a high state of nervous excitement, Samuel Young had denounced "the abominable Texas question"
as the firebrand thrown among them, but his manner now showed that he, also, had buried the hatchet. Even the serene, philosophic Butler, who, in "an ecstacy of painful excitement," had "leaped from the floor and stamped," to use the language of an eye-witness, now resumed his wonted calmness, and on the ninth ballot, in the midst of tremendous cheering, used the discretion vested in him to withdraw Van Buren"s name. In doing so, he took occasion to indicate his preference for James K. Polk, his personal friend. Following this announcement, d.i.c.kinson cast New York"s thirty-five votes for the Tennesseean, who immediately received the necessary two-thirds vote. The situation had given Polk peculiar advantages. The partisans of Ca.s.s and Buchanan, having willingly defeated Van Buren, made the friends of the New Yorker thirsty to put their knives into these betrayers. This situation, opening the door for a compromise, brought a "dark horse"
into the race for the first time in the history of national conventions. Such conditions are common enough nowadays, but it may well be doubted if modern political tactics ever brought to the surface a more inferior candidate. "Polk! Great G.o.d, what a nomination!" wrote Governor Letcher of Kentucky to Buchanan.
To make the compromise complete, the convention, by acclamation, nominated Silas Wright for Vice President. But the man who had recently declined a nomination to the Supreme Court of the United States, and who, after the defeat of Van Buren, had refused the use of his name for President, did not choose, he said, "to ride behind the black pony." A third ballot resulted in the selection of George M.
Dallas of Pennsylvania. Among the resolutions adopted, it was declared that "our t.i.tle to the whole of Oregon is clear and unquestionable; that no portion of the same ought to be ceded to England or any other power; and the reoccupation of Oregon and the reannexation of Texas at the earliest practicable period, are great American measures, which the convention recommends to the cordial support of the Democracy of the Union."
Van Buren"s defeat practically closed his career. His failure of re-election in 1840 had left his leadership unimpaired, but with the loss of the nomination in 1844 went prestige and power which he was never to regain. Seldom has it been the misfortune of a candidate for President to experience so overwhelming an overthrow. Clay"s failure in 1839 and Seward"s in 1860 were as complete; but they lacked the humiliating features of the Baltimore rout. Harrison was an equal favourite with Clay in 1839; and at Chicago, in 1860, Lincoln shared with Seward the prominence of a leading candidate; but at Baltimore, in 1844, no other name than Van Buren"s appeared conspicuously above the surface, until, with the help of delegates who had been instructed for him, the two-thirds rule was adopted. It seemed to Van Buren the result of political treachery; and it opened a chasm between him and his former southern friends that was destined to survive during the remaining eighteen years of his life. The proscription of his New York friends undoubtedly aided this division, and the death of Jackson, in 1845, and rapidly acc.u.mulating political events which came to a climax in 1848, completed the separation.
There are evidences that Van Buren"s defeat did not break the heart of his party in New York. Contemporary writers intimate that after his election as President the warm, familiar manners changed to the stiffer and more formal ways of polite etiquette, and that his visit to New York, during his occupancy of the White House, left behind it many wounds, the result of real or fancied slights and neglect. Van Buren"s rule had been long. His good pleasure sent men to Congress; his good pleasure made them postmasters, legislators, and cabinet officers. In all departments of the government, both state and national, his influence had been enormous. For years his friends, sharing the glory and profits of his continued triumphs, had been filling other ambitious men with envy and jealousy, until his overthrow seemed necessary to their success. Even Edwin Croswell shared this feeling, and, although he did not boldly play a double part, the astute editor was always seeking a position which promised the highest advantage and the greatest security to himself and his faction. This condition of mind made him quick to favour Polk and the annexation of Texas, and to leave Van Buren to his now limited coterie of followers.
Van Buren had much liking for the career of a public man. Very probably he found his greatest happiness in the triumphs of such a life; but we must believe he also found great contentment in his retirement at Lindenwald. He did not possess the tastes and pleasures of a man of letters, nor did he affect the "cla.s.sic retirement" that seemed to appeal so powerfully to men of the eighteenth century; but, like John Jay, he loved the country, happy in his health, in his rustic tastes, in his freedom from public cares, and in his tranquil occupation. Skilled in horticulture, he took pleasure in planting trees, and in cultivating, with his own hand, the fruits and flowers of his table. There can be no doubt of his entire sincerity when he a.s.sured an enthusiastic Pennsylvania admirer, who had p.r.o.nounced for him as a candidate in 1848, that whatever aspirations he may have had in the past, he now had no desire to be President.
CHAPTER VII
SILAS WRIGHT AND MILLARD FILLMORE
1844
The New York delegation, returning from the Baltimore convention, found the Democratic party rent in twain over the gubernatorial situation. So long as Van Buren seemed likely to be the candidate for President, opposition to Governor Bouck"s renomination was smothered by the desire of the Radicals to unite with the Conservatives, and thus make sure of the State"s electoral vote. This was the Van Buren plan. After the latter"s defeat, however, the Radicals demanded the nomination of Silas Wright of Canton. Van Buren and Wright had taken no part in the ca.n.a.l controversy; but they belonged to the Radicals, and, with Wright, and with no one else, could the latter hope to defeat the "Agricultural Governor." Their importunity greatly distressed the Canton statesman, who desired to remain in the United States Senate, to which he had been recently re-elected for a third term, and to whom, from every point of view, the governorship was distasteful.[333] Besides taking him from the Senate, it meant contention with two bitterly jealous and hostile factions, one of which would be displeased with impartiality, the other ready to plunge the party into a fierce feud on the slightest show of partiality.
Therefore, he firmly declined to be a candidate.
[Footnote 333: "Next to the Presidency no place was so much desired, in the times we are now reviewing, as that of senator of the United States. The body was ill.u.s.trious through the fame of its members, who generally exhibited the very flower and highest outcome of American political life; dignified, powerful, respected, it was the pride of the nation, and one of its main bulwarks. The height of ordinary ambition was satisfied by attainment to that place; and men once securely seated there would have been content to hold it on and on, asking no more. One cannot doubt the sincerity of the expressions in which Mr. Wright announced his distress at being thrown from that delightful eminence into the whirlpools and quicksands at Albany."--Morgan Dix, _Memoirs of John Dix_, Vol. 1, pp. 194, 195.]
But the Albany _Atlas_, representing the Radicals, insisted upon Wright"s making the sacrifice; and, to give Bouck an easy avenue of escape, Edwin Croswell, representing the Conservatives, advised that the Governor would withdraw if he should consent to stand. But he again refused. Still the _Atlas_ continued to insist. By the middle of July things looked very black. In Albany, the atmosphere became thick with political pa.s.sion. Finally, Van Buren interfered. He was profoundly affected with the idea that political treachery had compa.s.sed his defeat, and he knew the nomination of Polk was personally offensive to Silas Wright; but, faithful to his promise to support the action of the Baltimore convention, he requested his friend to lead the state ticket, since the result in New York would probably decide, as it did decide, the fate of the Democratic party in the nation. Still the Senator refused. His decision, more critical than he seemed to be aware, compelled his Radical friends to invent new compromises, until the refusal was modified into a conditional consent. In other words, he would accept the nomination provided he was not placed in the position of opposing "any Republican who is, or who may become a candidate."
This action of the Radicals kept the Conservatives busy bailing a sinking boat. They believed the candidacy of Bouck would shut out Wright under the terms of his letter, and, although the Governor"s supporters were daily detached by the action of county conventions, and the Governor himself wished to withdraw to avoid the humiliation of a defeat by ballot, the Conservatives continued their opposition.
For once it could be truthfully said of a candidate that he was "in the hands of his friends." Even the "judicious" delegate, whom the Governor directed to withdraw his name, declined executing the commission until a ballot had nominated Wright, giving him ninety-five votes to thirty for Bouck. "Wright"s nomination is the fatality," wrote Seward. "Election or defeat exhausts him."[334] Seward had the gift of prophecy.
[Footnote 334: F.W. Seward, _Life of W.H. Seward_, Vol. 1, p. 723.
"Wright was a strong man the day before his nomination for governor.
He fell far, and if left alone will be not, what he might have been, George I. to William of Orange, lineal heir to Jackson, through Van Buren. The wiseacres in New York speak of him with compliment, "this distinguished statesman;" yet they bring all their small artillery to bear upon him, and give notice that he is demolished. The praise they bestow is very ill concealed, but less injurious to us than their warfare, conducted in their mode."--Letter of W.H. Seward to Thurlow Weed, _Ibid._, Vol. 1, p. 725.]
The bitterness of the contest was further revealed in the refusal of Daniel S. d.i.c.kinson, a doughty Conservative, to accept a renomination for lieutenant-governor, notwithstanding Silas Wright had especially asked it. There were many surmises, everybody was excited, and the door to harmony seemed closed forever; but it opened again when the name of Addison Gardiner of Rochester came up. Gardiner had been guided by high ideals. He was kind and tolerant; the voice of personal anger was never heard from his lips; and Conservative and Radical held him in high respect. At Manlius, in 1821, Gardiner had become the closest friend of Thurlow Weed, an intimacy that was severed only by death. He was a young lawyer then, anxious to seek his fortune in the West, and on his way to Indianapolis happened to stop at Rochester.
The place proved too attractive to give up, and, through his influence, Weed also made it his residence. "How curious it seems," he once wrote his distinguished journalistic friend, "that circ.u.mstances which we regard at the time as scarcely worthy of notice often change the entire current of our lives." A few years later, through Weed"s influence, Gardiner became a judge of the Supreme Court, laying the foundation for a public life of honourable and almost unceasing activity.
Though the Whigs needed their ablest and most popular men to meet Wright and Gardiner, preceding events guided the action of their state convention, which met at Syracuse, on the 11th of September, 1844.
Horace Greeley had picked out Millard Fillmore for the Vice Presidency on the ticket with Henry Clay, and his New York friends, proud of his work in Congress, as chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means, presented his name with the hope that other States, profiting by the tariff which he had framed, might join them in recognising his valuable public service. But the convention had not taken kindly to him, probably for the same reason that Greeley desired his promotion; for, upon the slavery question, Fillmore had been more p.r.o.nounced and aggressive than Seward, sympathising and acting in Congress with Giddings of Ohio and John P. Hale of New Hampshire, a part very difficult to perform in those days without losing caste as a Whig.
Fillmore"s defeat on May 1, however, made him the candidate for governor on September 11. Weed p.r.o.nounced for him very early, and the party leaders fell into line with a unanimity that must have been as balm to Fillmore"s sores. "I wish to say to you," wrote George W.
Patterson to Weed, "that you are right, as usual, on the question of governor. After Frelinghuysen was named for Vice President, it struck me that Fillmore above all others was the man. You may rest a.s.sured that he will help Mr. Clay to a large number of good men"s votes. Mr.
Clay"s slaves and his old duel would have hurt him with some men who will now vote the ticket. Fillmore is a favourite everywhere; and among the Methodists where "old Father Fillmore" is almost worshipped, they will go him with a rush."[335] Yet the Buffalo statesman, not a little disgruntled over his treatment at Baltimore, disclaimed any desire for the nomination. To add to his chagrin, he was told that Weed and Seward urged his selection for his destruction, and whether he believed the tale or not, it increased his fear and apprehension.
But people did not take his a.s.sumed indifference seriously, and he was unanimously nominated for governor, with Samuel J. Wilkin, of Orange, for lieutenant-governor. Wilkin had been a leader of the Adams party in the a.s.sembly of 1824 and 1825. He was then a young lawyer of much promise, able and clear-headed, and, although never a showy debater, he possessed useful business talent, and an integrity that gave him high place among the men who guided his party. "I like Wilkin for lieutenant-governor," wrote Seward, although he had been partial to the selection of John A. King.
[Footnote 335: Thurlow Weed Barnes, _Life of Thurlow Weed_, Vol. 2, p.
121.]
Without doubt, each party had put forward, for governor, its most available man. Fillmore was well known and at the height of his popularity. During the protracted and exciting tariff struggle of 1842, he had sustained himself as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee with marked ability. It added to his popularity, too, that he had seemed indifferent to the nomination. In some respects Fillmore and Silas Wright were not unlike. They were distinguished for their suavity of manners. Both were impressive and interesting characters, wise in council, and able in debate, with a large knowledge of their State and country; and, although belonging to opposite parties and in different wings of the capitol at Washington, their service in Congress had brought to the debates a genius which compelled attention, and a purity of life that raised in the public estimation the whole level of congressional proceedings. Neither was an orator; they were clear, forcible, and logical; but their speeches were not quoted as models of eloquence. In spite of an unpleasant voice and a slow, measured utterance, there was a charm about Wright"s speaking; for, like Fillmore, he had earnestness and warmth. With all their power, however, they lacked the enthusiasm and the boldness that captivate the crowd and inspire majorities. Yet they had led majorities. In no sphere of Wright"s activities, was he more strenuous than in the contest for the independent treasury plan which he recommended to Van Buren, and which, largely through his efforts as chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, was finally forced into law on the 4th of July, 1840. Fillmore, in putting some of the hated taxes of 1828 into the tariff act of 1842, was no less strenuous, grappling facts with infinite labour, until, at last, he overcame a current of public opinion that seemed far too powerful for resistance.