settled. Mr. Webster came to me, I well remember, in his most solemn and formal manner, and declared, in more zealous and pointed language than he was at all accustomed to use on ordinary occasions, his disgust and indignation at what he understood Mr. Benton was attempting to effect, and assured me that there was no Whig member of the Senate who would not vote with the Democratic members of that body in defense of our territorial interests under the treaty. Not knowing whether yet the injunction of secrecy in relation to the proceedings then pending has been removed, I shall only say now that, whatever may have been the nature of the proposition then pending in the Senate, there were only two speeches made in that body-one in favor of and one in opposition to this proposition, and that the Senate then voted it down at once, with only one dissentient vote. Whose vote that was I leave to be conjectured.

It will surprise no one now, I presume, to learn that I considered myself justified by such facts as I have mentioned, and which various of the senators then upon the stage of action, and who yet survive, are prepared to attest, in doing what I could legitimately and fairly do to weaken Mr. Benton's influence in the country, and to circumscribe his capacity for public mischief. Hence my assailment of him in the newspapers in the summer of 1849, as already stated, and my anxiety to prevent his obtaining the lead on the California question of admis sion. But my opposition to Mr. Benton did by no means stop here. I determined to deal him an additional blow, which, if the Democratic members of the Senate should prove as mindful of the honor of the country, as well as

OFFICIAL DISGRACE OF COLONEL BENTON. 111

of their own individual dignity, as I hoped, could not but be fatal to him. On the first day of the approaching session of Congress I determined to enter the Democratic senatorial caucus, which was uniformly convoked on that day, and move that Mr. Benton, upon charges which I was prepared to array against him, should be discontinued as chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, well knowing that if this movement should be successful in caucus, the Democratic party having a decided majority in the Senate, Mr. Benton would be of necessity ousted from his position as the head of that important committee. In point of fact, I afterward pursued this very course. I moved in caucus that William R. King, of Alabama, should be chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs instead of Thomas H. Benton, which motion, after two mornings spent in earnest controversy, was carried by a majority of a single vote; soon after which Mr. Benton resigned his place as a member of said committec. Whether these proceedings had any influence in Missouri afterward in securing Mr. Benton's defeat for senatorial re-election from that state, which occurred during the subsequent winter, I have never specially inquired, and it is not at all important now that this question should be settled. It is a respected maxim that the dead should not be spoken of but with commendation. I am not at all disposed to violate this maxim upon the present occasion; but, as Mr. Benton was accustomed to observe when living, "The truth of history must be vindicated."

I shall decline saying any thing as to the motives by which he was actuated in this strange affair of the protocol, nor shall I now descant upon the moral qualities,

whether good or bad, which entered into his character, either as a public man or as a private citizen. He was certainly a man of much natural strength of intellect, and of a most capacious and retentive memory. He possessed much knowledge of various kinds, and as a writer of pure and nervous English he had few equals. He was exceedingly deficient in extemporaneous oratorical power, had a bad voice, a forbidding, dogmatical, and unconciliatory manner, showed but little respect for the feelings of others whom he met in debate, and, as a politician, was not over-scrupulous as to the means which he employed for the attainment of his ends. He never spoke in the Senate except upon the most deliberate preparation, and then always from copious notes, and his principal speeches were generally written out in full before their delivery. While General Jackson was in the presidential office, and Mr. Blair was editing the Globe, he was eminently successful as a party leader in the Senate. When another Pharaoh arose "who did not know Joseph," and when the Globe was fated to give way to the Union, under the direction of the venerable Thomas Ritchie, the renowned champion of the celebrated expunging resolution seemed to have forever lost his political equipoise, and his conduct as a senator was thenceforth such as not only to grieve his remaining friends most sorely, but seriously to impair his legislative usefulness, as well as to enfeeble his claims to influence the opinions and conduct of such as had looked up to him at one time with sentiments of profound esteem and admiration. In view of these sad and painful scenes, we may well exclaim with Mr. Burke, "What shadows we are, and what shadows we pursue!"

GENERAL TAYLOR'S NON-ACTION POLICY. 113

CHAPTER VII.

Review of General Taylor's non-action Policy.-Painful and exciting Rumors in regard to the Instrumentalities employed by him to carry that Policy into Operation.-Intense Alarm awakened among Patriots as to the Fate of the Country. — Mr. Clay leaves his own Home, and comes to Washington upon a Mission of Pacification.-He is met upon his arrival there with general Cordiality and Respect.-Mr. Benton attempts to inveigle him into a false Position in regard to the Measure of admitting California, and is for a time successful.-Mr. Clay's Programme of Adjustment, and the "five bleeding Wounds."—This Gentleman severs his Alliance with Mr. Benton, and becomes the Champion of the famous Omnibus Scheme.-His magnanimous waver of certain abstract Opinions with a View to general Conciliation.-First meeting of the Nashville Convention.-Great Excitement consequent upon its Proceedings.-Anti-slavery Movements about the same Period, and Mr. Seward's anti-compromise Speech.-Resolution introduced by the Author, several weeks before, for the raising of the famous Committee of Thirteen, finally pushed to a Vote at the Instance of Mr. Cass.-Eminently patriotic Conduct of Mr. Webster on this Occasion.—Resolution finally carried.-Mr. Clay appointed Chairman thereof, who speedily brings in his Report, upon which an animated Discussion occurs.

THE scheme of policy which, in the summer of 1849, it was generally known that the administration of General Taylor had deliberately adopted, by which it was expected that by an adroit and subtle process, for which there had been then no example, slavery would be at once and forever shut out from the territories recently acquired (it being "understood," as is now frankly confessed, "that being thus organized, in the absence of both slaveholders and slaves, they would almost necessarily be

come free states"), leaves no ground for surprise that, in the condition of the popular mind at that period existing throughout the South, intense excitement and alarm should have every where prevailed. It was discovered that, within a month or two, in some mysterious manner, one of the great parties to the "irrepressible conflict," which had been so oracularly announced, had already put on the armor of war and regularly taken the field; that all the appliances which government could muster were ready to be used, yea, were being at that moment used to render that party ultimately triumphant; and that the boasted equiponderance of power upon which the South had so long confidently relied was about to disappear forever. Popular meetings were immediately called in every Southern state, and indeed almost in every neighborhood of each state, for the purpose of remonstrating respectfully but earnestly against the menaced infraction of slaveholding rights. Inflammatory resolutions were adopted at all these meetings, and from some of them strong and eloquent addresses went forth, calculated to produce alarm, distrust, and alienation in bosoms where quiet, and confidence, and fraternal affection had been formerly wont to dwell. Grave and thoughtful statesmen were grieved and astonished at the prospect of coming evils; and fierce sectional demagogues, the pest of all extended republics, were every where engaged in fanning the embers of dissatisfaction; ambitiously hoping, doubtless, that in the whirlwind which seemed to be now coming on, even such miscreants as themselves might perchance be tossed into positions of airy and lofty elevation. The whole republic was convulsed as by a moral