The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1909-11-17
CRANE NOT THE
FIRST RECALLED
Monroe Recalled His Mexican
Minister, Catching Him
on the Border.

The experience of Charles R. Crane
with the mission to China recalls the
case of the almost forgotten Ninian
Edwards, who started out as United
States minister TO Mexico. but never
reached the capital of the sister re-
public, says the New York Sun.
Edwards had been United States
senator from Illinois, and Monroe, near
the close of his second term, gave him
the Mexican mission. The country was
then nearing the end of the socalled
era of good feeling, and Edwards had
been contributing his share to the po-
Etical discord OF that curious time by
writing letters signed "a. b. in a
Washington newspaper published in the
interest of Calhoun. These letters ac-
cused William H. Crawford, secretary
of the treasury, of corrupt practices in
office, and they were intended to kill
off Crawford as a candidate for Presi-
dent. Calhoun himself was the sub
ject of similar attacks instigated by
Crawford, but he easily disproved them
Edwards arranged that after he had
started for his post in Mexico the "a
B. letters should be sent to the house
of representatives as the basis of i'm
parchment proceedings against Craw-
ford, and it was then that the author
ship of the letters became known. In
transmitting them to the Speaker of the
house Edwards avowed himself their
author and added to the charges al
ready made public others that were
sufficient as ground of impeachment.
Crawford at the time lay i'll at
home, having been attacked with pa
ralysis about four months earlier, in
September, 1928, and left in such con
dition that he transacted much of his
business as secretary of the treasury
by proxy The attack in the house had
been made by Edwards at such a time
as made it difficult for Crawford to
prepare defense before the political
campaign of 1924 was finished
His friends rallied to his aid and
asked that Edwards he fetched back.
The house accordingly sent the SER
geant alarms after the minister and
he was overtaken near New Orleans.
He came back 1900 miles to Washing
ton in the custody of the sergeant at
arms.
Crawford meanwhile had got to-
gether a mass of evidence on his side
and Edwards completely failed to make
good his charges, so that committee,
of which Daniel Webster and John Ran
dolph were members, unanimously re-
ported in vindication of the accused
secretary.
Although Edwards had had a long,
honorable and successful public career
as judge in Kentucky and as terri
torial governor of Illinois and then as
senator, this affair was his ruin in ma
tional politics. 1t was known that
Crawford had fought two duels and
killed his man in one of them and may
be this fact was taken into account by
the public in estimating the quality of
Edwards s performance in making an
attack upon physically disabled man
and fastening to a distant land just
| when his share in the matter should be-
come known.
At any rate such a storm of contempt
broke upon him that he resigned his APP
| pointment to Mexico and returned to
Illinois. He was then under fifty, but
| he took no further part in national
| politics, though he had a sort of vim
! dic.ttion at home by his election as
| governor of Illinois. He died less than
| ten years after this affair. Crawford,
the invalid, outlived him by about a
year.