Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1852-1859, 1856-11-26
REAfI NIscENCEs OF ENERAI.
THE EXPLODED SCANDAL ABorT IFS. EAToS-
BREAKING rP or JAcKsos's oABIsET.

eight was gentleman OF prominence IN Ame-
rican politics iive-and-t twenty yearsago, though,
like most public men who do not keep IN otiice,
he had passed out of the recollection OF the peo
pie, and was but little known TO those who have
been active politicians since General Ja-kson,s
time He was = member of Congress in the
great DAYS Of that body, before il had become
the custom 20 send tlwarfs to'it; and in 625 he
was the colleague of General jackson IN the Se-
nate. When the General became President, his
former colleague was made Secretary Of War,
which Office he held for two years. going out at
the time Of the famous breaking up of the Cabi-
net in 1881. an event which caused a prodigious
sensation at the time, though one now smiles at
the thought of Its being considered very impor-
tant- Had the public been aware ofthe real
causes Of that event, and still more csuld they
have seen what were to he the consequences of
what then happened, there would have been
some reason for the interest that was excited;
but few then knew why the breaking up oc-|
CURED but probably not one man thought that
I it would color orr national politics for long
series OF years, as it IS doing at this very mo-
ment II was the first of many breaches that
were destinedto take place in the new deinocra-
! tic or Jacksonian party, and must long ago have
/ proved fatal 10 it but for the intolcrable and
Unparalleled stupidity OF its opponents who rare
| ~ have hadsense enough TO combine their powers
and who, hayenot known how to accept the fayors
4 which fortune has frequently extended to them.
1 it was the ruin OF his hopes that he acted so
unwisely Had he maintained these relations
with General jackson which existed at the time
4 they were candidates on the same ticket, (both
Southern men, and both Shareholders, and yet
no one was such an ass as 10 accuse them of
being sectionalists,) he would have succeeded
/ him IN the Presidential chair, and, instead Of
becoming nullifier and a pro-slayery agitator
he would have signalled his government by the
Z, intensity of its federalism and the yigor of its
4 development Of the principle OF It's centraliza
4 ton for he was tyrnnnical by nature. deyonred
4 by ambition, ayaricious of power, and ready to
j Crush ont by any means those who disputed
his will. ~ those eminent men whose intiuen-
j ces and labOrs gaye so strong federal turn TO
4 the administrations of Madison and Monroe, Mr.
1 Calhoun WAS the ablest, though second in.pub-
lie estimation to Mr.. Clay, who was his senior
4 IN years. AND the older national statesman of the
4 two. The breach between these two great DEM
ocrats was destined to be as fruitful of trouble
as was the quarrel of Agememnon and Achil-
les, aud rs woman was the cause of the quar-
rel of the two Greeks so was il reported at the
time that woman had something TO do with
the quarrel between the two Americans, the
lof the Secretary of War, General Eaton had
married Mrs. Timherlakc, a very beautiful wild
ow, and highly accomplished. For some reason
or other, Mrs. Calhoun, a lady of exalted char
Iacter, refused TO be ION terms with Mrs Eaton
and the latter was 'scut" both by the wife of the
i Vice President and by the wives of some of the
members of the Cabinet. Scandal MAS busy
with Mrs Eaton's name, and. some people were
so Ignorant or so uncharitable as to couple it
ldisreputably with that of the President II
lis difficult to say to which party this suspi-
cion did the most injustice General Eaton,
who was . man of honor and worth or Mrs
Eaton, who was a yirtuous woman; or Gem
lcral jackson, who was u sirtuous man.
II ever they lived a thoroughly chaste man and
we are afraid it would not trouble Won to count
the number of such men among the greet of the
earth on your fingers that man was Andrew
Jackson. He was continent as Scpic or ssnore
so, for, after all, the Romans self denial did not
amount toimuch. The general is one of the We
j ry few of our public men whose name nowhere
figures in the pages of the American CIfonique
.Sedhdate,tse for private circulation. The lives
Iof most of our principal men could furnish plcn-
ty of materials for new Decameroas and Hepta-
iDierons and incidents might be therein related
lust as pleasant but wicked, - as those which
were told on the banks of the Gave, or are to be
found In "Boccaccio's tales of Florence and the
Arno.n But one would lust as soon think of
finding Washingtons name thore as Jaeksoh's
He was man of the strictest honor In all his
relations with the sex What made the scandal
about him and Mrs. Eaton the more unjust. was
the fact that he was then sincere monrncr for
the death Of his wife, a woman worthy ofhim,
and who had been "done to death BIZ slar,aeto,,s
for the Presidency. For all that had appeared,
Mrs Eaton's sole offences were her youth, beau
", and mental powers, in all which she had the
/ advantage of the ladies who were connected with
I the chiefs of the government; and we should
4 like to know If il could be expected of them, or
of any other collection of female moralists that
| they should forgive crimes SO hcinous 2 Others
might forgive her, but they could not, and it
/ was not reasonable to expect It of petticoated
j Christians situatedas they were. Had she been.
old and ugly, she might have safely been allow
ed the privilege of actual wickedness without
being sent to that penal settlement which Is
known as Coventry; but as she was young and
handsome, the old ladies, as pious and exempla-
ry members of society, felt 1t their solemn duty
4 TO discountenance her, though guilty of nothing
but Of being the victim of their senseless. I'M
founded scandal.
The Eaton affair was the occasion, not the
cause, of the breaking up of the Cabinet Of
lSs9-3i. Gen. Eaton might have remained in
office, If he pleased, but he had accepted the
War Department reluctantly, and had intended
I to leave 1t even if social matters had not taken
so unpleasant turn. There was no interrupt
ton of the friendship that had existed for years
between him and General jackson. he having
been General lackson's biographer, writing al
very respectable octave about the old hero which
viii compare aiyantageously with the biography
OF any Presidential aspirant that has since an
peared. y
When the Cabinet broke up, and Mr. Eaton
voluntarily retired be and Mr.. Berry were classed
with Mr.. Van Buren,, as friends of the President:
while Messrs. Inghani, Branch and Bssrien went
with the Vice President, the latter named very
much against his viii Mr. Barry was Post
master General, and that was the first officer of
that description that ever belonged to the Cabi-
net he was the only member of the first Jack
son Cabinet who did not resign, but was soon
afterwards appointed Minister to Spain. and so
was Amos Kendall, at that time very rnysterf
Gus parsonage, and 50 loved by gentlemen. v no
afterwards were known as Wings, that they
could have eaten him alive. uneooked and with
out salt he recently turned up as a Union
saver, IN company withnot n few of his old de
tractors, and probably felt very nicely in con-
sequence Of this familiarity with men whom he
had accused of seeking to murder the children
General Eaton was appointed Governor of Flori-
da, thena territory, or sucking slave state Mr..