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before, and the system of revenue and finance established under his predecessors; the merit claimed for General Jackson, with regard to the payment of the public debt, is not justly his due; that the credit of this provident plan of gradually reducing the debt, was principally due to Mr. Lowndes, a distinguished member of Congress from South Carolina; and President Adams and the Congress acting with him, had faithfully pursued this wise and prudent course, having reduced the national debt, by the appropriation of about ten millions annually. The credit of managing our foreign relations with ability is not denied to General Jackson by his political opponents. With regard to his course in other matters, it is thus summed up by Mr. Bradford, in his history of the federal government :"The promises of President Jackson's friends and supporters were not realized. They, indeed, were rewarded; but not without a gross disregard to economy, and whoever would not flatter the president, nor applaud his measures, however honest, were removed from office; and his professed friends exclusively intrusted with commissions which should be given only to the upright and patriotic.

"But his arbitrary conduct in the management of the public moneys was most highly objectionable and most alarming to the friends of constitutional law, who considered the funds of the government entirely under the control of the representatives of the people; except that the executive should be allowed discretion as to the time and manner of expending the money appropriated by law. His conduct, therefore, in seizing on the public funds, and withdrawing them from the bank of the United States, where Congress had ordered them to be deposited and kept, was very generally condemned, as an act of a most arbitrary nature, and of very dangerous precedent. And it was not so much this single act, arbitrary and unauthorized as it was, as the principle assumed by the president, in this measure, of a right in the executive to go beyond law, and contrary to law even; and to make his own opinion, rather than the laws of Congress, the rule of his conduct.

"The conduct of President Jackson was not, in all respects, so favorable to the hopes of those who had been sanguine in their belief of the perpetuity of the republic, as that of his two immediate predecessors. Of the others, it is not necessary here to speak. They made the constitution a guide in their practice as well as in their professions; and assumed little or no powers not clearly vested in the chief magistrate of the Union. In monarchies, the reigning prince has high discretionary powers. The exercise of the royal prerogative is often carried to a great extent; and thus the rights of the subjects are liable to be violated by the mere will of the king. In a republic, it is at least theoretically otherwise. Where the discretion of the magistrate is the rule and measure of his official acts, however patriotic are his purposes, equal and impartial justice can not be expected. He is not infallible, and may err in his judgment. He is

subject to like passions and prejudices, as other men, and will probably act from partial and improper feelings. From this source, there is always great danger to a republican government. The people must check all usurpation, and all arbitrary assumption of power in their rulers, or their liberties will be temporary and evanescent. If several successive chief magistrates of the Union are arbitrary in administering the government, and repeatedly transcend or disregard the provisions of the constitution, many generations will not have passed, before their civil freedom will be lost beyond recovery, and the people subject to as despotic rule as that of Cæsar, or Napoleon, or the autocrat of Russia. Unless the constitution be the guide, the government of the United States, once highly blest, will be that of misrule and despotism."

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

OF

MARTIN VAN BUREN.

THE seven presidents of the United States whose lives and administrations we have noticed in the preceding pages, it will have been observed, were all descended from emigrants from the British isles; their official terms occupy a space of forty-eight years, or nearly half a century from the adoption of the constitution; and each of them had witnessed the period when the nation acquired her independence. We now enter upon a new era, and, leaving those whose early lives carry our memories back to the men and the times of our revolutionary struggle, we proceed to sketch the career of our eighth president, who, to use his own words, "unlike all who have preceded him, was born after the revolution was achieved;" belonging, also, to another race by descent, as well as to a later age.

The ancestors of Mr. Van Buren, both paternal and maternal, were among the early emigrants from Holland to the colony of New Netherlands, now the state of New York. The family have always resided in the ancient town of Kinderhook, Columbia county, on the east bank of the Hudson river. The father of the president, Abraham Van Buren, was a farmer of moderate circumstances, who is represented to have been an upright and intelligent man, of strong common sense, and pacific disposition. The maiden name of the mother of the president was Hoes, also of Dutch descent. The name was originally Goes, and was one of some distinction in the history of the Netherlands. She was twice married; first to Mr. Van Alen, by whom she had two sons and a daughter, all of whom have been many years deceased. James I. Van Alen was a respectable lawyer of Columbia county, who was honored with several important offices, and with whom his younger half-brother was connected in business at his entrance to the bar.

The mother of Mr. Van Buren was distantly connected with the family of his father before their marriage. She was distinguished for her amia

ble disposition, sagacity, and exemplary piety. She survived until 1818, four years after the death of her second husband.

Martin Van Buren is the eldest son of these parents. He was born at Kinderhook, December, 5, 1782. At an early age he exhibited indications of a superior understanding. His opportunities of instruction were limited, probably on account of the moderate property of his father, who had two other sons, and two daughters.*

After acquiring the rudiments of an English education, he became a student in the academy, in his native village. He there made considerable progress in the various branches of English literature, and gained some knowledge of Latin. It may be inferred, however, that all these acquisitions were not great in amount, as he left the academy, when but fourteen years of age, to begin the study of his profession.

At that early period he evinced a strong passion for extempore speaking and literary composition. Even at that early age, too, he is represented, by those who knew him, to have had a spirit of observation, with regard to public events, and the personal dispositions and characters of those around him, which gave an earnest of his future proficiency in the science of politics and of the human heart.

In the year 1796, at the age of fourteen, Mr. Van Buren commenced the study of the law, in the office of Francis Sylvester, Esq., a respectable lawyer of Kinderhook. The courts of law in the state of New York have adhered more closely to the English forms of practice than has been done in most of the other states. The period of study preparatory to admission to the bar, was seven years, for candidates who, like the subject of this memoir, had not the benefit of a collegiate education.

The management of cases in courts held by justices of the peace, not unfrequently devolved upon students at law. The early indications of ability as a speaker and reasoner, which were exhibited by Mr. Van Buren, occasioned his almost incessant employment in trials in these courts, from the earliest period of commencing the study of his profession. His father was a firm whig in the revolution, and a democrat in the days of John Adams; and the son was educated in the same principles, and of course formed his most intimate connexion with persons of the same political faith. The democratic party was then a small minority in the town and county of his nativity. His political opinions, as well as his talents, led to his employment by the members of his own party, in their controversies with regard to personal rights, and rights of property. It often happened that, in the management of cases, he encountered men of age, talent, and high standing in the profession.

At this early period Mr. Van Buren was an ardent and active politician. It was his constant habit to attend all meetings of the democratic party, to study with attention the political intelligence of the day, and to yield his For part of this memoir we are indebted to Professor Holland's Life of Van Buren.

As early as 1800,

most zealous aid to the principles he held to be true. when only in his eighteenth year, and still a student at law, he was deputed by the republicans in his native town, to attend a convention of delegates to nominate a candidate for the legislature. He had similar marks of the confidence of his political friends, on other occasions during his minority.

The last year of Mr. Van Buren's preparatory studies was passed in the city of New York, in the office of Mr. William P. Van Ness, and under his direction. This gentleman was a native of Columbia county, but at that time a distinguished member of the bar in the city of New York, and a very conspicuous leader of the democratic party. In this situation Mr. Van Buren had every possible advantage for improvement; and his thirst for knowledge, together with his aptitude in acquiring it, enabled him to make great advances.

Mr. Van Ness was a devoted and intimate friend of Colonel Aaron Burr, at that time vice-president of the United States; and in the feud which sprung up after the presidential election, between the respective friends. of the president and vice-president, Mr. Van Ness advocated the cause of Colonel Burr, through the public press, with signal ability. Through the medium of this gentleman, Mr. Van Buren was introduced to the notice of the vice-president, who was led, by his knowledge of the young lawyer's activity and influence in his native county, as well as by a quick-sighted observation of the future eminence promised by his early display of talent, to treat him with marked attention, and to make every reasonable effort to secure his favorable regard. The tact and ability displayed by Colonel Burr in the great political contest which resulted in elevating Mr. Jefferson and himself to the highest offices in the gift of the people, and the reputation he had acquired as a leader of the party, caused him to be looked upon as an oracle of political wisdom, particularly by young and ardent democrats, who were desirous of availing themselves of instruction from so experienced and influential a source. Among the maxims of Colonel Burr for the guidance of politicians, one of the most prominent was, that the people at elections were to be managed by the same rules of discipline as the soldiers of an army; that a few leaders were to think for the masses; and that the latter were to obey implicitly their leaders, and to move only at the word of command. He had, therefore, great confidence in the machinery of party, and that system of regular nominations in American politics of which he may perhaps be considered one of the founders. Educated as a military man, and imbibing his early views with regard to governing others, in the camp, it is not surprising that Colonel Burr should have applied the rules of military life to politics, and always inculcated the importance of discipline in the ranks of a party, to insure its ultimate success. In no part of the United States have these party rules been more constantly and rigidly enforced, than among the demo

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