Date: 1982-12-03
Speaker: ROBERT C. BYRD (democrat)
Chamber: S

Mr. Presldent. it is hard to imagine that there could have been. issues before the Senate during the TwentyThird and TwentyFourth Congresses as monumental as the censure of President Jackson at the beginning of his second term and the equally dramatic expunging of the censure that I discussed in my last statement on the United States Senate. But a host of other matters engaged the Senate. demanding close attention. Major crises arose during Andrew Jacksons second term. and the four years that followed. under his political heir. Martin Van Buren. They involved troubles with France and Texas. a serious financial panic that sent businessmen and farmers reeling in all sections of the country. and problems with the Treasury. set in motion by the Bank issue. These and the slavery issue would require long and intense Senate sessions. Giants like Henry Clay of Kentucky. John C. Calhoun of South Carolina. and Daniel Webster of Massachusetts still strode these halls during this period. I have spoken often of these men. and their genius. and their quarrels will infuse todays statement as well. It always helps to make historical figures come alive if we can turn to some of the Senates fine art work. because. without our even realizing it. these men stare down upon us every day. We have only to step out into the adjacent reception room to feel the presence of all three of these Senate giants. peering at us from their "portholes." Each time we enter this chamber through the main corridor. we also must pass muster before the keen eyes of this triumverate. Next time. before opening the swinging doors. glance to the right. in fact. toward the Democratic Leaders office. and you will find that Calhoun. looking every bit the "Iron Man." with his mane of steely hair. Clay. "Harry of the West." looking deceptively benign. and the "Magnificent Daniel" are watching from their frames high on the east wall. Webster. in fact. also stands guard in all his sartorial splendor over the staircase right outside the presidents Footnotes at end of article. room off this chamber. Calhoun keeps an even closer eye upon us. There he is up there (Calhoun is the last statue on the west wall. right where it joins the north wall). scowling above us. filling his niche by virtue of being a vice president. a most unhappy vice president. under Andrew Jackson. These are just some of the likenesses of the men of this era with which we live every day. Keep in mind their stern gaze as you pass before them. They are our senatorial forefathers and surely they are watching us. In 1833. these men sparred with one another in the Old Senate Chamber down the hall. In the Senate. the first session of the TwentyThird Congress was totally absorbed with the bitter effort to censure the president for removing federal deposits from the bank. The House. however. had its own moment of drama. which I mention only because it involved a notable former senator whom we have met before in one or more of my earlier statements. Eccentric John Randolph of Roanoke. once the scourge of the Senate. though wracked by illness. had been elected to the House for the TwentyThird Congress. He died. however. on May 24. 1833. before the Congress convened. Shortly after the House next met. Randolphs successor. Thomas Bouldin. fiftytwo. arose to announce Randolphs death. He had uttered only a few words when. as the Congressional Globe reports. Representative Bouldin "swooned. fell. and in a few minutes expired" on the floor of the House. It was almost as if Nature herself was thrown into perturbation by the final disappearance of so great and untrammeled a natural force as John Randolph once had been. After the drama of the censure debates. the final days of the TwentyThird Congress were relatively colorless. No Senate session. however. with Thomas Hart Benton still smarting over the censure of his friend. the president. could be entirely lackluster. Earlier in the year. Bentons nemesis. Henry Clay. had demanded from Secretary of the Treasury. Roger Taney (pronounced tawnee). a full report of the nations finances. At the time. Clay and his proBank cohorts were deluging their Senate colleagues with doleful descriptions of the wrack and ruin brought on by the presidents actions. and Clay was certain that the report would back them up. Unfortunately for him. the facts set forth were a startling contrast to the grim picture he and his followers had painted. Even more unfortunately for Clay. the administration decided that this report to the Senate deserved the greatest possible publicity. Taney and Benton conferred at the Treasury and worked on a speech for Benton to deliver when the report was introduced. As could be expected. the reading of the Secretarys report had not proceeded far when an embarrassed Daniel Webster. the Banks staunchest friend. arose to move that further reading be dispensed with and the report quietly sent to the Finance Committee. Benton. of course. objected. The report was read. Then the Missourian. at his flamboyant best. arose to give his speech. "Well. the answer comes." he exclaimed. "It is a report to make the patriot heart rejoice. replete with rich information. pregnant with evidences of national prosperity. How is it receivedhow received by those who called for it: With downcast looks and wordless tongues. A motion is made to stop the reading." He went on" . . . a pit was dug for Mr. Taney. the diggers of the pit have fallen into it: the fault is not his. and the sooner they clamber out. the better for themselves." Regardless of any embarrassment to the conspirators. Benton declared his determination to let the country know that "never since America had a place among nations was the prosperity of the country equal to what it is this day."2 At the end of the first session of the TwentyThird Congress. President Jackson. with his customary confidence in the people. set off for the Hermitage and a much needed rest. His friends. however. were not so complacent and had given orders to take nothing in the fall elections for granted. Their purpose was twofoldto at least hold the line in the Senate. and to defeat. wherever possible. any senatorial enemies who were candidates for reelection. These elections in the fall of 1834 were the first in which the Opposition to the Jacksonian Democrats would fight under its new party name of Whig. In an earlier statement. I discussed the birth of this new party. essentially an uneasy alliance of old National Republicans. Southern states righters. bank supporters like Webster. and disgruntled Westerners. held together by their hatred of "King" Andrew. It was John Forsyth. the caustic senator from Georgia whose services as the administations floor leader had been of immense value. who said. when he learned of the new partys title. "It is a glorious name. and I have no doubt they will disgrace it." 3 Let us look at a few of these Senate elections. where the Bank issue still burned. because this was the era of what historian Claude Bowers calls "political hydrophobia." when elections were vicious affairs. The elections in New Jersey and Pennsylvania were held in October. a month before most others. and they brought the Whigs their first shocks. They had rightly expected little success in Pennsylvania but much was expected from New Jersey where Senator Theodore Frelinghuysen was up for reelection. Frelinghuysen had consistently voted on the side of the Bank. When the New Jersey legisl.ture adopted resolutions commending the presidents actions and urging its senators to support him. too. Frelinghuysen and his colleague. Samuel Southard. chose to ignore them. Frelinghuysen even boasted that he and Southard had "dared to meet the frowns of their constituents." and would not "bow the knee to these instructions." Now he was before these constituents for reelection. Their verdict was unmistakable. New Jersey swept into the Jackson column with a substantial majority. Frelinghuysen was retired in favor of good Democrat Garrett Wall.4 Two of the most bitter Senate fights that fall were waged in Virginia and Mississippi. Virginia was antiBank but also antiJackson. The Democrats strategy was to make the most of the unpopularity of Benjamin Leigh. the Whig candidate. Leigh had been widely disliked since his bitter fight in the Constitutional Convention against the extension of the suffrage. He was also as strongly for the Bank as the voters were against it. Every poll and canvass revealed a majority of the people were against him. But the Whigs pulled off his election in the state legislature reflecting a flagrant disregard of the will of the people. Newspapers were flooded with resolutions and letters protesting Leighs victory. The battle. from the Democrats point of view. however. was only half lost. for they were supplied with ammunition proving the Whigs callous disdain for the masses that they would use to drive both of Virginias antiJackson senators. Leigh and John Tyler. from office in little more than a year.5 In Mississippi. the Jacksonians were determined to prevent the reelection of Senator George Poindexter. once the idol of the Mississippi Democracy. Poindexter had turned on Jackson with a virulence scarcely equaled in any oldline Federalist. and cast his lot with Clay. With the adjournment of Congress. Poindexter hastened home where the Whigs had planned a series of banquets at which he was to denounce the president. The Democrats. delighted with a slashing and brilliant assault on Poindexter by young lawyer Robert J. Walker. put him up as their candidate. Within a week. Walker was engaged in one of the most spectacular canvasses Mississippi had ever known. stirring up enormous meetings of frenzied Jacksonians wherever he stopped. The outcome was the election of Walkera victory sweet to Jackson. and all the more so since Poindexter had not only supported Clay on the Bank. but Calhoun on Nullification.6 Thus. the elections of 1834 were more than pleasing to the Democrats and the president. Two of Jacksons strongest senatorial foes. Frelinghuysen and Poindexter. had been swept away because of their opposition. and Leigh. who had been saved by an action in clear defiance of the popular will. would not remain in the Senate for long. The administrations forces were clearly strengthened in the Senate. In the House. the Democratic majority was reduced by eight votes. but still held a majority of 46 in. that 242member body. Webster accepted the verdict of the election as the final statement on the Bank issue and. much to the distress and indignation of Bank president Nicholas Biddle. announced that he was through with it. Clay. whose own political interests had forced Biddle into making early recharter an issue in the first place. was also glad to dump the Bank from his shoulders. Most of their colleagues were ready to join them in abandoning the Bank as dead. but one last unfortunate incident at the very end of the TwentyThird Congress proved that the issue was still very much alive. The event was the attempt on the life of President Jackson at the Capitol on January 30. 1885. No other incident so well illustrates the venomous hatreds engendered by the struggles of the preceding years. Senators. editors. and the president himself were sullied in the aftermath. Jackson had visited the House chamber to attend funeral services for the late Representative Warren R. Davis of South Carolina. The chaplains sermon spoke to the fact that life is uncertain. particularly for the aged. "There sat the grayhaired president." wrote English visitor Harriet Martineau. "looking scarcely able to go through this ceremonial." 7 The discourse finished. Jackson filed past the casked and descended to the rotunda of the Capitol. As Jackson entered the Rotunda. a young stranger. his face covered with a thick black beard. stood six feet away. No one noticed him draw a small. bright pistol. or aim it at the president. until they heard the shot ring through the stone chamber. Calmly. the man produced another pistol and fired again. Jackson raised his cane and started for his assailant but an army officer reached him first. The president was unharmed. By some miracle. only the caps of the pistols had exploded. the charges failing to go off. The assailant was Richard Lawrence. an unemployed house painter. who claimed to be the rightful heir to the British throne and .blamed Jacksons opposition to the Bank for his difficulty in finding work. When Lawrence was quickly dispatched to a lunatic asylum. partisans on both sides objected to the undramatic disposition of the case. Frank Blair. the rabidly Jacksonian editor of the Washington Globe hinted strongly that Lawrence was the tool of Jacksons enemies. part of a conspiracy. In opposition to that view. Senator John Tyler saw things in an even more sinister light and suggestd that the assassination attempt may have been staged for "political effect" by Jacksons own supporters. in an effort to create popular sympathy for the president.9 Both. sfdes deeply resented any suggestion of complicity or motive in the near tragedy. None could escape the fact that this was the first time an attempt had been made upon the life of a president. and it was a president who had been intemperately denounced as a tyrant. despot. and wrecker of American institutions and liberties. Soon the capital was further shocked by the linking of the name of Senator Poindexter. about to leave the Senate in defeat. with that of the assailant. On the slimmest of evidence. the idea grew in Jacksons mind that his Mississippi enemy had instigated the assassination attempt. and he spoke of his suspicions to many visitors to the White House. Hearing of Jacksons charges. Poindexter wrote him that he would discredit the reports unless confirmed by the president. but that a failure to reply would be accepted as a confirmation. Jackson made no response. To understand the bitterness behind this feud. let us look a bit more closely at this departing senator. George Poindexter was a genius and. before his break with Jackson. the idol of all of Mississippi. the leader of the states Democrats. and its former governor and representative. One who knew him in his early days noted. "his mind was logical and strong. his conception was quick and acute. his powers of combination and application were astonishing. his wit was pointed and caustic. and his sarcasm overwhelming." 9 All of these qualities made him a awesome stump speaker. He had further endeared himself to Mississippians during the War of 1812 with his patriotic appeals for preparation. and. after he had aroused the people to fever heat. his volunteering as an aide to General Jackson. Along the way. it was inevitable that such a charismatic man should make enemies. So unscrupulous were his speeches. and so bitter his denunciations of his political enemies that at one time a conspiracy was formed to force him into a duel and kill him. Nowhere in the presidential campaign of 1828 did Jackson receive more ardent support than in Mississippi where his old comradeatarms directed his forces. A year after Jacksons inauguration. Poindexter was in the Senate where he was expected to be a loyal supporter. Unfortunately. the feud between the erstwhile friends began almost immediately. Jackson wanted to appoint a Tennessean. a neighbor of the Hermitage. to the land office of Mississippi. Poindexter protested that this patronage belonged to him. Jackson refused to yield. Poindexter prevented . the confirmation. Jackson made a recess appointment and from then on the old comrades were at swords points. Poindexter abandoned not only the president but all the principles he had previously embraced. He stood with the Bank. favored the censure. sided with Clay. and espoused Nullification. Had his personal life been irreproachable. Poindexter might have been immune from the barbs of his new enemies. but his domestic relations had become the scandal of Mississippi. He had divorced his wife. denied the paternity .of his children. and plunged into a life a reckless dissipation. His indecent remarks upon the purity of his former wife drove her family. which was rich and powerful. into the hands of his enemies as well. At the time of Lawrences attack on the president. Poindexter was preparing to leave not only the Senate. but. with his second wife. to leave Mississippi as well. Despite Poindexters sullied reputation. no one except Jackson striously suspected him of conspiring to assassinate the president. In February. only a few days before the expiration of his term and that of the Congress. he asked the Senate to investigate the charges being made in the White House against him. Three days later. a committee exonerated him from suspicion. Webster asked for the yeas and nays on accepting the committees verdict. every senator voted yea. No matter what his personal reputation. Poindexter left the Senate with this blot on his record corrected.0 At the end of the TwentyThird Congress. in March 1835. a longsimmering dispute with France came to a head and its peaceful resolution marked a major victory for Henry Clay over President Jackson. On July 4. 1831.. a treaty had been signed in Paris by which France had agreed to pay 25 million francs for outrages committed upon American commerce during the Napoleonic wars. The payments were supposed to have begun in 1832. and King Louis Philippe was most anxious to carry out the agreement. Unfortunately. the French Chambers were less than anxlous to make the necessary appropriations. President Jackson waited almost two years. his anger mounting all the while. and then he ordered his Secretary of State. John Forsyth. the former senator from Georgia. to call the French minister to the State Department. The minister nervously asked if Forsyth. expected a- "collision." a diplomatic euphemism for war. over the issue. Forsyth said he wouldnt doubt it. Jackson ordered the Navy to prepare for sea duty and wrote a strong message to Congress on the subject. Congress received Jacksons message on December 2. 1834. It began calmly enough. restating the history of the case. but then it turned belligerent. The United States. he claimed. should insist upon "prompt execution" of the treaty. and. in case it be refused or longer delayed. "take redress into our own hands." He recommended that provisions be passed authorizing the seizure of French property to the amount of the debt. in case the next session of the Chambers refused once again to pass the appropriation.2 Couriers spurred their horses. perspiring firemen piled wood beneath the boilers of locomotives and steamboats to speed the message abroad in the nation. A flurry swept the commercial world. Marine insurance companies refused to assume risks resulting from a rupture with France. France recalled its minister. Jacksons message was sent to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee of which Clay was the chairman. Clay had not been averse to reprisals against France when he was Secretary of State. but now he viewed the situation with alarm. While political considerations probably influenced him (they were never far from Clays mind). he seems also to have been sincerely alarmed over the possibility of war. He wrote his son. Henry Jr.: The most engrossing subject of the Ses. sion is likely to be the Presidents Message relative to our French affairs. His rashness. in advising a warlike measure. without waiting for the decision of the French chambers . . . seems to be generally condemned . . . Irritation begets irritation. and I should not be surprised if. in the sequel. two gallant nations. hitherto entertaining for each other the greatest respect. shall be found unexpectedly engaged in War. The Senate has placed me at the head of the Committee of Foreign Affairsthe most responsible situation of the Senate. I shall endeavor to discharge my duty. but I confess I have less heart than ever to exert myself in public business." Despite this weary disavowal. Clay appears to have been delighted to have a hand in such an important issue. On January 6. 1835. Clay reported the Committees resolution stating "That it is inexpedient at this time to pass any law vesting in the President authority for making reprisals upon French property . . .." and accompanied it with a report devoid of partisan animus. Clay was gratified that his mild report was accepted without a dissenting vote.14 The House was in a far more beligerent mood. however. and went so far as to appropriate three million dollars for the presidents use in defending the country. When this came to the Senate. a storm predictably broke out. Webster and Calhoun wanted the Senate to disagree. Leigh averred that to pass such a bill would be the equivalent of saying "that the President should be made Counsul for life. or Emperor of the American people." Wright and James Buchanan of Pennsylvania. on the other hand. painted the horror of a French attack upon our defenseless shores. Calhoun retorted that there was about as much danger of the Capitol being swallowed by an earthquake before Congress met again! Clay counciled against the measure. and it went down to defeat.5 In April 1835. the French Chambers finally passed the necessary appropriation. but with a proviso that it not be paid unless some satisfactory explanation could be given for Jacksons harsh language. This only angered Jackson more. He recalled our minister to France. and drew up another bellicose message to Congress. Forsyth and Van Buren succeeded in softening his language a bit and worked in a denial of any Intention to menace or insult France. At this juncture. England offered mediation to smooth the path. the French professed themselves satisfied. and the long awaited payments began. with interest. in the spring of The crisis was over. And Henry Clay. according to his biographer. Glyndon Van Deusen. felt proud of his unselfish role in averting a costly war. His committee report had been spread abroad in France. where it was taken as evidence that the United States was not bent on a fight. and thus it helped keep open the pathway of negotiation.16 From the adjournment of the TwentyThird Congress in March 1835. until the TwentyFourth Congress convened in December. its members were preoccupied with presidential politics. The struggle for position was desperate and unscrupulous. Within the Democratic party. it eventually pitted President Jackson against another former friend. Hugh Lawson White of Tennessee. who had succeeded Jackson to the Senate when he resigned in 1825. Though obscure today. White was familiarly known to his own generation as "the Cato of the Senate." Though he lacked sparkle and magnetism. the purity of his character and his fidelity to duty commanded great respect. His senatorial speeches were noteworthy for their temperate tonerare in his generation. Always heard with attention. he was attentive to others. and he was frequently the one listener to other senators routine speeches. No member of the Senate more impressively looked the part. Tall. slender. and wellproportioned. with a broad forehead and deepset. serious. penetrating blue eyes. he was the embodiment of senatorial dignity. With long gray hair. brushed back from his forehead. and curling at some length on his shoulders. he appeared every inch the patriarch. This was the man who was to give Jackson. in the election of his successor. his only uneasy hours.7 From the beginning of Jacksons first administration. when the president. fearing an early death. had expressed a preference for Van Buren as his successor. the latter had been looked upon as the crown prince. By 1834. it was clear to the White House that the most serious challenge to these plans would come from Hugh Lawson White. considered a renegade from the Jackson camp. The once close attachment of the president and his Senate successor had cooled perceptibly in the year following the 1829 inauguration. White had becom estranged by his old friends growing intimacy with the new school of practical politics. First White had drifted into a position as independent supporter of the administration. but. by 1834. his position was one of 6pen hostility. By the spring of 1834. White had announced his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination. throwing down the gauntlet to Jackson and Van Buren in Tennessee. which became the battleground. Though James K. Polk marshalled the support of his Tennessee newspapers behind Jackson. White did succeed in embarrassing the president by convincing the state legislature to nominate him for the presidency. But this would be the last of his successes. The Van Buren steamroller would prove too powerful for the renegade White. or any other upstart Democrat for that matter. When the TwentyFourth Congress convened in December 1835. the slavery issue reemerged with renewed vehemence. The establishment. in 1831. of William Lloyd Garrisons Liberator in Boston had revived the abolition movement. which got another boost in 1833 ."n Great Britain emancipated her West Indian slaves. At the opening of the new Congress. its members were apprehensive because of the antislavery and antiabolition riots of the year before. Adding to the turmoil was the American AntiSlavery Society. which began to deluge the South with abolitionist circulars calculated to arouse the slaves to Insurrection. It was specifically those abolitionist tracts that precipitated the renewed fight in the Senate over slavery in the winter of 1835. In July. the citizens of Charleston. South Carolina raided the post office. stole and burned a sack of the pamphlets. and informed the postmaster in New York not to forward any more to them or they would suffer the same fate. The New York postmaster laid the matter before Amos Kendall. PostmasterGeneral and Jacksons close friend. Kendall expressed his belief that the federal mails could not carry any matter prohibited by state laws. thus opening the door to the wholesale destruction of the Incendiary documents. Though Kendall acted without legal authority. he did act with the presidents blessing. In his message to Congress that December. Jackson denounced abolitionists as plotters of a civil war with all its horrors and asked that Kendalls fait accompli be legalized by the passage of a law prohibiting the circulation of publications intended to incite slaves to insurrection. The howls from Northern liberals against this proposal were loud and immediate. But the proposal was even too drastic for Southerners like Calhoun. whose veneration for the Constitution guaranteed his fiery opposition. To those who accused Calhoun of opposing the measure simply because his enemy. Jackson. supported it. he bitterely replied. "I have too little regard for the opinion of General Jackson. and if he were not President of the United States. I would say for his character. to place myself in such a position." Is Whatever his reasons. Calhoun led the debate that dragged on for months. In the end. the measure went down to defeat. with even Clay and Benton for once voting on the same side. But the issue of the mails proved to be only the opening trumpet of the slavery issue before this Congress. It was followed by a chorus of dissent on the issue of abolitionist petitions. The question was not new. The usual practice had been to receive the petitions and to table them instantly. But in January 1836. Calhoun decided that he had had enough. When. on January 7. an abolition petition was presented by some Ohio citizens. Calhoun moved that it not be received and supported his motion with such an intemperate speech that even proslavery senators were alarmed. "We must meet the enemy on the frontieron the question of receiving." he thundered. "We must secure that important passit is our Thermopylae." "o By 1836. Calhoun was far more than merely the aspiring politician who had feuded with Jackson in 1830. Personal ambition was now increasingly submerged in a cold monomania for South Carolina and for slavery. Friends like Harriet Martineau found they could no longer communicate with him. He felt. says historian Arthur Schlesinger. so deeply that he rarely heard argument. so passionately that he never forgot his responsibility. "There is no relaxation with him." cried his devoted friend Representative and later Senator Dixon Lewis of Alabama. He appeared to many to exist in an unimaginable Intellectual solitude. his mind committed to his interminable obligation. focusing forever on a single shining point. He was. said Miss Martineau. "the castiron man who looks as if he had never been born. and never could be extinquished." 2o Colleagues and obstrvers testified that Calhoun was still a startling figure when he rose to speak in the Senate. with eyes burning like live coals in his pale face. hair. bristling and erect. skin loose nver his prominent bones. words pouring out in a closely reasoned flow. His voice was metallic and harsh. his gestures monotonous. yet his commanding eye. grim earnestness. and utter integrity. held the galleries in anxious attention. When standing in the narrow aisle of the Senate. bracing himself against the desks. he averaged perhaps one hundered eighty words a minute of terse and unconquerable argument. Calhoun was still the supreme intelligence among the statesmen of his day. Clay relied on richness and audacity of feeling. Webster on mellifluous rhetoric. Benton on the sheer weight of facts. and all indulged in shameless orgies of verbiage. But Calhouns speeches were stripped bare. arguing the facts alone with an iron logic. Nourished on Aristotle. Machiavelli. and Burke. he displayed the uncanny ability to cut quickly through to the substance of the issues before the Senate.2 This was the man whose proposal for rejecting aboliti n petitions still hung fire when. four days later. James Buchanan presented a petition even more odious to him. Buchanan stepped forward to offer a memorial. from a group of Quakers in Pennsylvania praying for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbiaan extremely delicate matter because it lay entirely within the power of the Congress to act in this case. Buchanan made it quite clear that "I entirely dissent from the opinion which they express." but urged that the memorial from his constituents deserved to be received. Calhoun. however. plunged the Senate into a heated twomonth debate on whether it should be received at all.22 Calhoun ultimately lost again (though the request contained in the petition was rejected). but the intensity of the debate stirred new fears on both sides and widened the gap between supporters and opponents of slavery. Abolition entreaties had flooded the House as well. but there efforts like Calhouns met with more success. The result was the infamous "gag rule" banning all such petitions and the beginning of the courageous crusade for free speech by sixtynineyearold John Quincy Adams. who. two years after his term as president had ended. returned to Washington to represent Massachusetts in the House for the next seventeen years. I have mentioned James Buchanan several times thus far and I would like to take a closer look at the freshman senator from Pennsylvania. Buchanan arrived in the Senate after serving ten years in the House and two years as Minister to Russia. During his first four terms in the House. Buchanan had been a Federalist. and many of the Jacksonians. whom he joined in 1828. doubted the sincerity of his conversion to the Democratic faith. During the TwentyThird and TwentyFourth Congresses. however. Buchanan proved himself a loyal Democrat by joining Senators Wright of New York. William King of Alabama. and Benton as defenders of the president in the Senate. A fortytwo. Buchanan was a heavyset bachelor. the only bachelor. in fact. to become president. The story goes that in 1819. while still a struggling young lawyer. Buchanan had become engaged to a belle whose father was one of this countrys first millionaires. A combination of the fathers objections. gossip that Buchanan was interested chiefly in her fortune. and the young swains apparent neglect of his fiancee in favor of clients led to a broken engagement. followed by the young ladys sudden death. Buchanan resolved to honor her memory by remaining a bachelor for the rest of his days. Buchanan had a large head and pudgy features: He usually wore a highcollared coat to conceal a neck scar. And an eye defect caused him to tilt his head slightly forward and to one side so that he always seemed to be listening intently and with great concern. His oddly cocked head sometimes got him into trouble. As one of his biographers noted. his "mere appearance conveyed so definite an impression of assent and approbation that many people. on early acquaintance. sincerely believed that they had completely captivated James Buchanan and reciprocated by attentions to him which he attributed to traits more complimentary to him than a wry neck." 2:1 Still another dimension was added to the increasingly volatile slavery issue in the final days of the TwentyFourth Congress. Though the question of Texas would chiefly preoccupy future Congresses. Calhoun used an early reference to the turmoil in the Southwest to further alienate North and South (Texas. under Sam Houston. friend of both Jackson and Benton. had declared its independence from Mexico after the Battle of San Jacinto on April 21.) Calhoun enraged abolitionists and frightened many lukewarm Northerners fly calling for the immediate annexation of Texas in order to extend the reach of slavery. Though immediately pounced upon by Benton. and though Calhouns motion lost. a new and troubling dimension had been added to the festering slavery question. In the midst of this turmoil. the presidential elections had taken place in the fall of 1836. between the first and second session of the TwentyFourth Congress. After all the preelection jockeying. the actual campaign was hardly as exciting as that of 1832. The Whigs were still only a loose coalition and could not choose a single candidate. Instead. various elements put up a number of individuals. such as Senators White and Webster. with strong followings. hoping to throw the election into the House. None of these candidates had a chance. The Democrats met in Baltimore and unanimously chose Jacksons handpicked successor. Martin Van Buren. As the results began to come in that fall. it was clear that the "Sly Fox." would accede to the White House. Van Buren was content with his victory margin of fortysix electoral votes. And Andrew Jackson. whose long reign was now nearly over. was content as well. He finally had the satisfaction of seeing Senator Bentons annual resolution to expunge the 1834 censure vote of the president succeed at last. Clay. Calhoun. and Webster fought against it to the end. as I noted in my last statement. but the tide of Jacksons popularity had finally engulfed even the Senate. Andrew Jackson left his prot6g6. Martin Van Buren. and his other followers with a warning: "Of all things. never once take your eyes off Texas. and never let go of fiftyfourforty." 24 Both the South and the Southwest would indeed prove troublesome in the years to come. but Jackson badly misjudged the real and nearest threat to national stability. The nation was then poised on the brink of financial disaster. Unfortunately. Jackson would have to own up to the fact that his real legacies to his friend Van Buren were the mak.ings of the worst depression in.the nations sixtyyear history and a hopeless mire of monetary problems. The financial bubble that burst during the TwentyFifth Congress had been building for at least two years. On June 23. 1836. after Nicholas Biddles Bank of the United States had finally become merely a state bank. the Senate and House had passed the Deposit Act. requiring the Secretary of the Treasury to select one or more banks in each state and territory to receive federal deposits and perform the services previously provided by the Bank of the United States. The stability of the countrys economy. however. had been gravely shaken by the disappearance of the old National Bank and. with government money pouring into a wide variety of local banks. an uncontrolled inflation began. These banks began to issue huge amounts of paper money against the new funds in their vaults. and prices began to skyrocket. Hoping to curb the spiral. Jackson had issued the "Specie Circular." drafted for him by Senator Benton. whose hardmoney views were soon to win him the name "Old Bullion Benton." The Specie Circular announced that. from that point on. to curb the "ruinous extension" of paper money. the government would accept only speciegold or silverin payment for public lands. The circular did burst the inflationary bubble but started. in its place. a financial panic. State banks did not have enough specie to cover the paper money. loans could not be covered. land prices plummeted. All this had happened while Congress was out of session. When it returned in December 1836. the Senate Whigs put forth a resolution demanding repeal of the circular. By March 1. 1837. that measure had passed both houses. but Jackson. with only three days left in office. used a pocketveto to kill it. Jackson. by the way. was the first president to veto bills of Congress for other than "Constitutional" reasons. Thus. the stage was set for financial disaster. Eight weeks after Van Buren entered the White House. the Panic of 1837 exploded with full fury. On the morning of May 10. 1837. a card was pinned to the door of a New York bank. reading simply. "Closed Until Further Notice." By afternoon. New York Whig Philip Hone. watching the gathering mob. heard the screams of trampled women and curses against. Jackson and Van Buren. The Panic of 1937 was not a slump of a years duration. It was the depression of an era. It was not national. it was world wide. Depression in England drastically lowered the price paid for American cotton. for example. It climaxed the dizziest. fastest. richest boom era the young Republic had ever known. Slowly the great. evil flood moved over America. It took almost a year for this tide of woe to spread across the Southern backcountry. but when it did. the ruin was complete. It engulfed the Mississippi delta country. leaving behind a trail of empty plantation houses and barns. and crudely lettered signs flapping from trees. "Gone to Texas." It ravaged the country from New Orleans to Cincinnati. where hungry mobs smashed down doors. tore apart furniture. and looted the strongboxes of banks and brokerage offices. Bankruptcies multiplied. unemployment rose. and interest rates mounted. Eight hundred fifty banks were closed. three hundred fortythree never to reopen again.25 The cries of the ruined were not long in reaching Washington. Van Buren reluctantly called Congress into session three months early. Henry Clay. like the other Whigs. was convinced that the distress was the result of the Democrats policies. and thus. that it was up to the Democrats. not the Whigs. to furnish a program of relief. They expectantly awaited the new presidents economic proposals. When the "Sly Fox" sent his message up to the. Hill. it attributed the hard times primarily to undue business expansion. distribution of the surplus. and the drain of gold abroad. Van Buren flatly refused to consider reestablishing a National Bank. The main feature of the message was the proposal that the Treasury keep its own money in its own handsthe socalled "SubTreasury" or "Independent Treasury" plan. Other than this. Van Buren urged the lawmakers to allow the depression to run its course. Clay and the Senate Whigs pronounced the program barren. Daniel Webster accused the president of "leaving the people to shift for themselves." While many of Van Burens measures were essential to staunch the flow of money. the Whigs. in a purely partisan move. refused to support them. They took their main stand against the SubTreasury bill and were joined by conservative Democrats such as Nathaniel Tallmadge of Van Burens own state of New York and William Rives (pronounced reeves) of Virginia. But. since the regular Democrats still controlled the Senate. they were able. under the leadership of party stalwart Silas Wright. New Yorks other senator. to beat back the forces of Clay and Webster. The House. however. due to a combination of Whigs and conservative Democrats. voted down the bill and a long struggle began." Van Buren recommended the SubTreasury plan again in his December message to Congress. and on January 16. 1838. Silas Wright reported it out of the Finance Committee. Few positions had been altered in the interval. Clay pounced on it immediately. blustering "that all the calamities of war with the most potent power on earth would be a blessing compared with the consequences of this measure." By an amazing feat of mental legerdemain. he even claimed that it was both dangerous because it centralized power. and that it promoted disunion.27 On February 19. Clay spoke for four and a half hours against the bill. This speech included a bitter attack on Calhoun. who. to the surprise of friends and foes alike. had come out in favor of the SubTreasury bill. The South Carolinians Whiggery. it seemed. had been based as much upon his hatred of Jackson and his hope of dominating the Whig party as it was on principle. Dominating Jackson had proved impossible and now Calhoun could see that to remain in an uneasy coalition with Clay and Webster would probably mean his own political annihilation. Calhouns support for the bill signaled his return to the Democratic fold. and the clash between Calhoun and Clay. which followed hard upon Clays speech. marked the resumption of warfare between the two men.28 Despite the vigorous opposition of Clay and Webster. the SubTreasury bill again passed the Senate in March 1838. by a vote of 27 to 25. But in the House. it again went down to defeat. Silas Wright was very depressed. Even in January. the bills chief defender had complained of "an unusual visitation of hypocondria" that he was unable to shake off. and in August. after the session had ended. he wrote. "I have experienced a sort of mental apathy . . . I have been compelled to devote myself so entirely to the questions now at issue before the country for more than a year that they have become sickening almost to disgust and I find it difficult to rouse myself up to the point of attempting to think upon them." Other administration defenders were as tired as Wright. As James Buchanan said during the spring session. the endless debate had worn the subject "threadbare." and most of the senators left the chamber whenever the SubTreasury bill was being discuseed."9 Reintroduced and fought over each year. the Independent Treasury Act finally became law on July 4. 1840. only to be repealed the next year by a legislature dominated by Whigs. and then reinstated by the Democrats in 1846. The scheme established regional subtreasuries with their own vaults. collecting all federal receipts. disbursing all payments in silver and gold. and serving the financial needs of the different sections of the country. It was retained. essentially unchanged. as the organizational basis of the nations fiscal system until the passage of the Federal Reserve Act in 1913.a0 Before moving on to the raucous election of 1840 that brought to a close this period in the Senates history. I would like to pause. as I have occasionally in previous statements. to look at some of the less monumental. but perhaps no less important. events in the Senates own internal development during this period. For. while major issues were debated and catastrophes like the Panic of 1837 were dissected. bills and resolutions were introduced and rules were adopted and changed that shaped and directed the daytoday life of the Senate and affected the lives of our predecessors. Physically. the Senate was growing. Two new states joined the Union during this period. raising the number of senators from 48 to 52. To prpserve the delicate balance established in the wake of the Missouri Compromise. Arkansas. a slave state. had been admitted in 1836. followed by Michigan. a free state. in 1837. All four of the new senators turned out to be faithful Democrats. much to the joy of the administration. The Senate chamber was filling up not only with senators but with reporters. the predecessors of our observers up in the gallery above. There was a great flurry of activity among the "scribblers" that made its way into the Senate rules. In earlier statements. I have discussed the opening of the Senate chamber to observers and the first admittance of designated reporters into its midst to record the Senates activities in 1802. During the next few years. these reporters and those who had come to join their ranks were seated in the eastern gallery. above the presiding officer. and this was the arrangement in 1835. On February 27. 1835. Senator Alexander Porter of Louisiana introduced a motion that a committee of three be appointed to look into "the expediency of so arranging the seats in the Senate chamber as will promote the convenience of members. and facilitate the dispatch of public business." Among the eventual recommendations of that committee was the following. "That the reporters be removed from the eastern gallery. and placed on the floor of the Senate. under the direction of the Secretary." The proposal was approved during the TwentyFourth Congress. and thus. for the first time specific provision was made for the press in the Senates Standing Rules." This was the situation when the Senate eyed the press in 1838 as it was considering changes in Rule 47. which listed the persons who might be admitted to the Senate floor. Buried in the changes was the following provision permitting ". .. two reporters for each of the daily papers. and one reporter for each triweekly paper published in the City of Washington . . ." to be seated in the chamber.32 The press. both in Washington and the rest of the country. apparently overlooked this change. which was adopted on the last night of the session in the usual closeofsession rush. But not for long. It slowly dawned on them that all but the Washington press were to be excluded from the chamber where. before. many had sat. Rumor had it that the measure had been slipped through by Senator John Niles of Connecticut. who loathed the press. The outoftown reporters had mobilized by the second session of the TwentyFifth Congress and they convinced new Senator John Norvell of Michigan to present their memorial. protesting that: By the rule of the Senate they are deprived of the opportunity and privilege of obtaining information of Congressional proceedings for their respective papers. that the provision of the Senate exclusively furnishing the facilities they ask to city reporters. does not furnish the people of the country with full reports of what takes place until several days after the date of such transactions . . . : and praying that the Senate may assign them such seats on the floor or in the galleries. as may enable them to discharge their duties to those whose agents they are." In January 1939. the committee to which the memorial was referred proposed that the front seats of the eastern gallery be set apart for the outoftown reporters as well as the local ones. The report generated a debate that runs for almost four pages of the Congressional Globe and elicited some rather violent remarks from Senator Niles: He was somewhat surprised at a proposition that the body should sanction. and in some manner endorse. the vile slanders that issue daily from these letter writers by assigning them seats within the chamber. Who were these persons who styled themselves reporters. Why miserable slanderers. hirelings hanging on to the skirts of literature. earning a miserable subsistence from their vile and dirty misrepresentations of the proceedings here. and many of them writing for both sides ... Perhaps no member of that body had been more misrepresented and caricatured than himself by those vqnal and profligate scribblers. who were sent here to earn a disreputable living by catering to the depraved appetite of the papers they work for ... .a4 Apparently. many Senators agreed with Senator Niles. His motion to table the memorial finally passed 20 to The reporters were not about to take such Insults lying down. Niles and the other supporters of their exclusion were excoriated in editorial after editorial. Here is just a sample of their invective: The bitter hostility of such men as Niles to a Free Press is easily accounted for as it tears the Lions Skin from the Jackass. and distinguishes the braying of that stupid beast from the roar of the Noble Monarch of the Wood. . . . then for Doctor Niles of Connecticut. Nature made him an ostler (stableboy). Chance. and his own roguery made him a United States Senator . .. Never was fellow meaner than this same Niles who with the fancies of a dolt makes pretensions to the intellect of the most talented man in the country. His manners are bad. and his breeding worse . .. On Saturday last the poor reporters who had petitioned for a separate seat in the eastern gallery of the Senate. were rowed up Salt River by the locofoco (radical Democrats) members. who seemed to be in a terrible fury with the letter writers for not allowing them to have more talent and decency than they possess."s Despite their outrage. here the matter stood at the end of the TwentyFifth Congress. For the next 3 years. outoftown reporters. aided by local journalists. used all sorts of subterfuges to get around this exclusionary rule. but the rule stuck. It was not until 1841. when the Whigs became a majority in the Senate. that the rule would be changed and the doors were once again opened to the reporters. As the 1840 elections approached. the Senate once again became infused with presidential fever. Both Clay and Webster hoped to receive their partys nomination at the Whig convention in Harrisburg. Webster was fiftysevenyearsold in 1839. and had begun to take on the appearance of a venerable statesman. The Webster paunch had become as noticeable as the famous dome and the fierce brows. His steps was heavier. his manner even more deliberate. In his customary dressthe - black. longtailed coat with gold buttons and buffcolored vest and pantaloons. he moved through the streets of Washington and Boston like a revolutionary frigate under full sail. Unlike his rival. Clay. whose feelings were always close to the surface and who was addicted to profane tantrums in times of stress and disappointment. Webster was sanguine. almost glacial. in his ability to accept temporary defeat. As one of his biographers. Irving Bartlett. points out. even before Van Burens 1837 inauguration. Webster had begun to plan for 1840. In a candid letter to a supporter. he outlined his plans for the next four years. He would leave the Senate for two years. (He did notagreeing to stay after much imploring by New England businessmen.) During this period he would travel. keep himself before the public. and at the same time get his personal financial difficulties under control so that. upon his return to political life he would not have to divide his efforts between the Senate and his very lucrative law practice. Meanwhile. he reasoned. Van Buren would have revealed enough of the vulnerability of administrative policies to be effectively attacked.31 Clay. however. was also busy laying his plans. From the beginning of Van Burens administration. he too had pictured himself as the "Little Magiclans" opponent in 1840. Yearning for the nomination manifested itself in his letters. and as the summer of 1837 wore on. he discovered prospects of being "again forced into the Presidential arena." It didnt take much forcing. Clays satisfaction over evidences of support was unconcealed.38 As the Van Buren administration wore on. the Senate Whigs saw abundant reason to believe that 1840 would be their year. There was certainly no better time to be in the opposition. they believed. than in periods of financial depression. A Wbig victory seemed almost inevitable. But it was not clear what role the two sparring Whig senators would take. Their colleagues looked on with interest as they courteously greeted each other day after day. To their tremendous disappointment. Clay and Webster were bypassed at the Whig convention in Harrisburg. Wanting desperately to win. and fearing that both men were too controversial. the Whigs decided to follow the Democrats example of selecting a miliatry hero. They nominated Ohios General William Henry Harrison of the Battle of Tippecanoe and War of 1812 fame. who had served in the Senate from 1825 to 1828. "I am the most unfortunate man in the history of parties." mourned Clay. "Always run . . . when sure to be defeated. and now betrayed for a nomination when I. or any one. would be sure of an election.""" Both Webster and Clay. their own ambitious thwarted. might have had excuse for sulking in their separate tents. but neither did so. both had dreams of leading a Whigdominated Senate and. like gallant troupers. toured with the grand Whig bandwagon. The campaign of 1840 was the most ludicrous of any in American history up to that time. The Whigs presented no platform and carefully hid any views Harrison might have had on the issues. Instead. they whipped up an emotional circus. promoting the myth that Harrison. a man of means whose wealthy father had been a signer of the Declaration of Independence from Virginia. had been born in a frontier log cabin and raised on hard cider. They portrayed him as more a man of the people than the effete little man in the White House. As his partisans sang songs like "Tippecanoe and Tyler Too." (John Tyler. recent senator from Virginia. was Harrisons running mate). Harrison overwhelmed Van Buren and the Democrats. The election of 1840 brought not only the nations first Whig president. but also Whig majorities in the Senate and House. It inaugurated a decade of national expansion and of increased sectional tensions. This was to be a decade of political warfare. between the Whigs and the Democrats. between the president and the Congress. and finally between the North and the South. The principal battleground was to be the floor of the United States Senate. as we shall see in my next statement. Mr. President. I ask unanimous consent that various footnotes be printed in the RECORD.