Perth Amboy evening news., 1920-03-27
Five Minutes A Day
With Our Presidents
A FUGITTyE FRoM wIIrrE uorSr
BY JAMES MORGAN.

MI
over whose dreary the weary
plosrapher would wander sthirst for
human a~necdote. Her bubbling spirits
renewed the austerity of J~effersonian
simplicity and won her a popularity
that has been equaled. 81 at ali.
among the mistresses of the White
House only by Mrs. Cleveland.
Ihe regal Dolly signalized the
opening of her reign by holding the
nrst inaugural ball, where she radi-
ated In q gown of buff velvet. with n
Parisian turban and bird of Paradise
Piunes which had run the British
on its Journey to her from
Paris. Washington Irving. who was
whirled from New York to another
or her functions in only hfty-two
hours, as he said in amazement, has
left us a picture of her as a fine,
portIy, buxom dame" with "a smile
and a pleasant word for everybody"
But "as to Jenny Madison-ah, poor
Jenny! He is a withered little
apple-John."
Unless Grant must be excepted,
Madison is the only President who
round the presidency an anticlimax
to his career. One Of the really great
Withou executive force, that is to
say, without a knack for choosing
other men and getting them to do his
work.
With a weak cabinet. this gentle,
sweet tempered, peace loving scholar
found himself adrift on the turbid
sea of the great Napoieonic wars.
Perhaps it was no longer possible to
Keep us out of war when at last the
United States was the only neutral
left in the civilized world. But GER
tainly 1t was no time for a fair
weather sailor.
After twenty years of kicking and
al n ~ ~ Fn@.l ~ Z - r.
pean conflict, bullied by England and
lied to by Napoleon. the country was
sore all over when the "warhawks''
of congress, under the youthful
Henry Clay, seized the tiller of the
ship of state from Madison's irreso-
Lutte hand and recklessly pointed the
vessel straight into the teeth of the
storm. The seaboard East was more
for peace md at that time the mill
tant section was the new West, where
the Tennesseans and k~entuckians,
Indianans and Ohioans were Justify
shouting "on to CANADA" O%verborne
by their rash %counsels, Madison con-
sented, as he said, to throw forward
the flag of the country. sure that the
people would press onward N de-
fend it,"
Without competent civilian mill
tary leaders, without financial credit,
without war equipment, the people
could not press onward, as any his
tory of the dismal War OF 1912 will
tell you. Even the capital was left
undefended, and Madison, lin q little
round hat with q big cockade" ran
about in helpless b"ewilderment rs
the British marched upon Washing
ton.
With the invaders entering at one
side of the ~defenseless town, the
President fled at the other. AS he
turned and saw the flames shooting
up behind him, he few the faster and
the farther. While the British com
mander was blowing QUE candles on
his dinner table that he might feast
in the light OF he burning White
House, its fugitive master was hiding
in a forest but twenty-five miles
away.
After an absence of three Days. "a
heaNy-hearted, shattered, houseless
President returned to view the
charred walls of his official residence
and of the capitol. At every turn he
was greeted by ugly mutterings Of
the general disposition TO make him
the scapcgoat for all the national
shortcomings i'll q war that had been
thrust upon him. But with victory
at New Orleans and the return to
peace. the voice of the faulthndor
was drowned in the hum of sudden
prosperity. And in The closing days
of his administration Madison was
cheeTed by many assurances thai his
countrylnen were not forgetful Of
the forty years that lie had served
them in pure devotion.
Like John Adams, he emerged
from his retirement to sit in the con-
stitutional convention of his state.
where the aged statesman closed his
active public life, as he had opened
il. with a sentiment OF humanity for
the slaves. His long scrvise still was
to be crowned by him in his eighty
fourth year, when South Carolina
; and her policy of nullitication aroused
the venerable father OF the Consti-
tuition and drew from him q ringing
challenge to the spirit of d%isunion,
After his death there was found
among his papers 4 solemn warning
for his country TO look upon the sec
ret enemy of the Union as the ser
pent c~reering with his deadly wilcs
into paradise"
AS with the other Virginia farmer
Presidents, Madison was land poor,
and he threat of poverty hung over
his last years. After he was gone.
Montpelier was swept away in the
dissipatio0s of his Stepson, Mrs. Mad
ison's only child. who betrayed his
mother ana left her without a root
OF her own.
Returning to Washington, the
widow passed her remaining years III
Il house belonging to . relative, and
there, until congress game to her re
lief by purchasing her husbands
papers. she may sometimes have suf-
fered want in sight of the White
House. Although so poor as gladly
TO welcome an occasional marked
basket from her thoughtful neigh
Dor, Daniel Webster, II to accep
aid wen from 2 former slave, she
never lost the favor She won in hel
prosperity but continued to the end
like a d0wagor queen, TO draw abou'
her Il court of her own
Copyright. 1920, by James Morgan
published by special arrangement
with The Mcclure Newspaper Syn
dicate).
3