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of Andrew Jackson. Party considerations in the main actuated him. Socially, intellectually and morally, his sympathies were with Mr. Adams. He did not comprehend Mr. Adams on account of the narrowness of his studies, and the meagreness of his knowledge of nations, their laws, histories and developments. In knowledge he was nearer the level of Jackson than Adams. Yet in the main, party moved him in this choice.

After Mr. Adams became president Mr. Van Buren opposed his administration and began at once to shape the next campaign for Jackson. In this work he was skillful. He was schooled in it. In the Senate of New York he had planned and secured the manipulation of the party in that state, and held it for fifteen years. Now in the Senate of the United States he was doing the same work for the party of the country. He became chief manipulator. He was not too scholarly, nor too moral, nor too great-minded to enjoy this work; nor was he so broad a lover of his country as to feel the degradation of this intense partisanship. The way was making for a great change in the partisanship of national politics, and Mr. Van Buren was perhaps as influential in that direction as any other man. The change to come was expressed in the phrase: "To the victors belong the spoils." One meaning of it was, "the minority have no rights which the majority are bound to respect."

In February, 1827, Mr. Van Buren was re-elected to the Senate of the United States. In 1828 Governor Clinton died and Mr. Van Buren was chosen to fill his place, as Governor of New York. In this position he sought to improve the finances of the state by recommending and urging to adoption, the famous funding system. But it was a scheme of his fertile brain, and proved a failure. He had not studied finance, or political economy-was not a scholar in any of the great matters of political science, and of course could not recommend anything out of any large knowledge of the subject. His meagre mental furnishing was constantly showing itself.

SECRETARY OF STATE.

He

March 4, 1829, Andrew Jackson became president. appointed Martin Van Buren to the first place in his cabinetsecretary of state. Jackson began at once the great partisan measure which had been foreshadowed, "to the victors belong the spoils." Federalists and opponents of all kinds were removed from office without cause only that they had voted against Jackson. He made his adminstration partisan from center to circumference, and Jacksonian in its destructive vigor. Mr. Van Buren was one with his chief, and it may, perhaps, have been as much due to him as to Jackson, that these strong partisan measures were put into force. When Mr. Monroe was president and selected Mr. Adams for secretary of state, and retained the most of the officers of his predecessor, and appointed many moderate federalists, Andrew Jackson commended him. for it. But now he was in a different mood. How much Van Buren's partisanship did to produce this different mood, of course is not known; but that Van Buren approved of Jackson's slaughter of his opponents in office, seems now clear. Two men of absolutely different mould had now met and worked in fraternal partisanship to defeat their partisan adversaries and reward their friends. Mr. Van Buren was a state rights advocate, and was professedly jealous of national power. When elected Senator, in his letter of acceptance, he said: "It shall be my constant and zealous endeavor to protect the remaining rights reserved to the states by the federal constitution, to restore those of which they have been divested by construction, and to promote the interest and honor of our common country." His main thought seemed to be to guard the rights of the states.

The national bank, which Jackson fought and destroyed, and by doing so brought financial ruin to the whole country, was opposed chiefly because it was a national and not a state institution, and was in danger of becoming an overshadowing monopoly; it was also a federalist institution, established by them, who believed in a strong and stable central government. It must, therefore, be destroyed and the funds of the govern

ment be deposited in state banks. The state banks were Jackson's pets and must handle the funds of the national government; that was democracy, he fancied. He and Mr. Van Buren were one in opposition to the national bank and in favor of the state banks, and doubtless were agreed in the veto of the renewal of the charter of the national bank and the removal of the deposits to the state banks, and were together the cause of the immense mischief that followed, when every state bank failed or suspended, business stopped, a wreck, and the government had to go into the markets of Europe a bankrupt, to borrow money to keep its machinery moving. What was national was suspicious to minds like theirs, fevered with the partisanship doctrines of states rights.

While Mr. Van Buren was secretary of state there occurred one of those strange episodes in high life that once in a while shake a nation. There was a tavern-keeper in Washington by the name of O'Neal. When Jackson was United States senator he boarded at this tavern. Peggy O'Neal was a lively daughter who made herself so social with her father's guests as to throw suspicions upon the propriety of her conduct. Miss O'Neal at length married a Mr. Timberlake, a purser in the United States navy. Major John H. Eaton, of Tennessee, Jackson's secretary of war, boarded at O'Neal's and was much captivated with the society of Mrs. Timberlake. The tongue of scandal was not still. Timberlake committed suicide in the Mediterranean sea; Eaton married his widow. Now Peggy O'Neal was the wife of a cabinet officer. The wives of the other members of the cabinet were shocked, and would not receive her into their society. Jackson impetuously defended Mrs. Eaton as an abused and innocent woman. Van Buren, without wife or daughter, was one of the most pliant and polite of men, and as politic as he was courteous. He called upon Mrs. Eaton; treated her with marked attention, and made parties for her and her husband; all of which was very grateful to his chief and in keeping with Mr. Van Buren's politic character. But the Eaton controversy raged for two years. The wives of foreign ministers were drawn into it. Washington society was shocked and shaken by it.

The president and his cabinet and vice-president were eight; four were for Mrs. Eaton, four against her. At length the president determined to secure harmony in his cabinet by the Jacksonian method of dismissing them all and appointing a new cabinet. This was accomplished by having those in sympathy with him resign and he would appoint them to other places. Van Buren was immediately appointed to the court of St. James. The others took the hint and resigned. All this redounded to the popularity of Van Buren. He was now regarded as a sort of political magician whose will moved cabinets and senates.

But this was not all. This Eaton embroglio, intensified likes and dislikes that before existed. Van Buren had secured Jackson's friendship in his work for his election. He had pleased him in everything as a cabinet officer; now this kindness for the traduced and charming Mrs. Eaton had won his heart. Henceforth he loved Van Buren; and Jackson's love was a great volcanic fire that ceased not to flow from its deep sources. On the other hand, Calhoun had labored for Crawford in the campaign; had not given him great pleasure in the cabinet; and had taken bitter ground against Mrs. Eaton, and greatly embittered the president against him. This bitterness followed Calhoun as much as the president's love followed and rewarded Van Buren. Jackson's opposition to Calhoun for his nullification of the tariff laws, in his next term, had in it not a little of the spite of the Eaton controversy. He probably never ceased to regret that he did not get the chance to "hang Calhoun high as Haman."

Mr. Van Buren met a triumphant reception in New York, and sailed very soon for England. He was cordially received in England. His courtly manners, great personal beauty, and distinguished position in his own country, were at once recognized, and he was received with honor.

But when Congress met in the winter, it refused to approve his appointment. Calhoun, Clay and Webster opposed him bitterly, "accusing him of such a spirit of narrow partisanship as to unfit him to be the representative of the whole country." He was acused of being "the originator of the system of remov

ing from office every incumbent, however able and faithful, who did not advocate the principles of the party in power."

Mr. Van Buren's rejection by the Senate, it was supposed by some, would operate against his popularity. Mr. Calhoun, who most bitterly hated him, said triumphantly: "It will kill him, sir, kill him dead. He will never kick, sir,-never kick." But Jackson's mighty energy was roused in his behalf, and he determined to do everything in his power to elevate him.

VICE-PRESIDENT VAN BUREN.

March 4, 1833, Jackson was re-elected president and Martin Van Buren vice-president. This made him president of the Senate. It was a stormy administration, with a strong and determined opposition from the Senate.

The president's destruction of the United States bank, and removal of the funds of the government to the state banks, so paralyzed the monetary affairs of the country as to alarm business, awaken distrust, and put a stop to all development of

resources.

This made the opposition fiercer and the party contests more bitter. This was the condition of the country when Jackson retired to the Hermitage, and Van Buren came to be inaugurated in his place.

PRESIDENT VAN BUREN.

On the fourth of March, 1837, Mr. Van Buren was inaugurated President of the United States. This was a result greatly desired by his great predecessor. Jackson had set his heart on this; partly because he loved him, partly because Calhoun hated him, whom he would like to have hanged for his nullification.

"Leaving New York out of the canvass," says Mr. Parton, "the election of Mr. Van Buren to the presidency was as much the act of General Jackson as though the constitution had conferred upon him the power to appoint a successor."

Mr. Van Buren selected John Forsyth, of Georgia, secretary of state; Levi Woodbury, of New Hampshire, secretary of the treasury; Joel R. Poinsett, of South Carolina, secretary of war;

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