MR. WEBSTER-HIS UNBENDING PATRIOTISM.

125

order to ascertain what senators would be probably in attendance; and coming to the conclusion that if Mr. Webster, who had been absent from the Senate for several days, could be induced to occupy his seat that morning, the resolution could, in all probability, be carried through by a meagre majority, I immediately dispatched a note to this gentleman's house by a special messenger, apprising him of the expected movement, and of the desire which I felt for his presence and co-operative aid. He came to the Senate accordingly. No sooner did this gentleman reach his seat than he was surrounded by an earnest crowd of his New England friends, some of whom, as I afterward learned from his own lips, came to dissuade him from voting for my pacificatory resolution. He likewise informed me, in an interview which presently occurred between us, that he had received while in his seat, only a few minutes before, two pressing epistolary missives from political friends in the House of Representatives, urging him not farther to risk his popularity and influence by efforts in support of measures of compromise. Under these trying circumstances, this august personage proposed to me that I should agree to unite with him in supporting a motion which he proposed in an hour or two to offer for taking up for separate consideration the California Bill, in consideration of his aiding me in getting my own resolution immediately passed. He stated that, if allowed to make known this arrangement before giving his vote for raising the Committee of Thirteen, he thought it would satisfy certain of his friends whose sensibilities he was unwilling needlessly to wound. To this proposition I could not but ac

cede, considering, as I did, and as I then explained to Mr. Webster himself, that if all the measures of compromise, including the bill for admitting California, should have been once referred to the Committee of Thirteen, there were insuperable parliamentary obstacles to taking up any one of these bills separately, unless a motion for the reconsideration of the resolution of reference should be first carried. Immediately after this conversation, Mr. Webster returned to his seat, when I called up my resolution. When it was put upon its passage, Mr. Webster rose and stated his intention to vote for raising the Committee of Thirteen, but took occasion also to mention in the hearing of the Senate the arrangement which he and I had entered into, as already described. This immediately called forth language of indignant surprise from my own senatorial colleague, Mr. Davis, from Mr. Butler, of South Carolina, and Mr. Clemens, of Alabama, who seemed to object very strongly to the private understanding between Mr. Webster and myself of which they had just been apprised, and one or the other of them insinuated something about the movement being an illicit one, and threatened even to vote against the resolution. I went immediately to the seats of these gentlemen, made such an explanation of what had occurred as the circumstances so easily admitted of, and succeeded in so far pacifying them that they all voted for the resolution, which presently passed.

The committee had now to be formed. According to the terms of the resolution which had been adopted, the Senate would have to designate the members of the committee by ballot. Senatorial comity allowing the mover

COMMITTEE OF THIRTEEN.

127

of the resolution the privilege of naming the persons to be placed on the committee, I caused a list of the members thereof to be laid on the desks of the senators, and the following gentlemen were unanimously voted into the committee: Henry Clay, of Kentucky, chairman; Dickinson, of New York; Phelps, of Vermont; Bell, of Tennessee; Cass, of Michigan; Webster, of Massachusetts; Berrien, of Georgia; Cooper, of Pennsylvania; Downs, of Louisiana; King, of Alabama; Mangum, of North Carolina; Mason, of Virginia; and Bright, of Indiana. Six of these gentlemen were Democrats, six of them were Whigs; six were Southern men, and six were Northern men; with Henry Clay, the Nestor of the Senate (who was now no longer a party man, and who had emphatically announced himself as knowing "no North and no South, no East and no West"), as chairman. A fairer committee was never formed, and no committee was ever better fitted, as the event soon proved, wisely and successfully to execute the important task allotted to it.

In a few days, Mr. Clay, who had retired to the country in order to draw the bills which the committee was expected to report, returned to the Senate, and announced the following programme for the future action of the Senate, accompanying the same with an elaborate and welldrawn report, which it is judged unnecessary to insert here:

"1st. The admission of any new state or states formed out of Texas to be postponed until they shall hereafter present themselves to be received into the Union, when it will be the duty of Congress fairly and faithfully to execute the compact with Texas by admitting such new

state or states.

"2d. The admission forthwith of California into the Union, with the boundaries which she has proposed.

"3d. The establishment of territorial governments, without the Wilmot Proviso, for New Mexico and Utah, embracing all the territory recently acquired from Mexico not contained in the boundaries of California.

"4th. The combination of these two last measures in the same bill.

"5th. The establishment of the western and northern boundaries of Texas, and the exclusion from her jurisdiction of all New Mexico, with the grant to Texas of a pecuniary equivalent; and the section for that purpose to be incorporated in the bill admitting California and establishing territorial governments for Utah and New Mexico.

6th. More effectual enactments of law to secure the prompt delivery of persons bound to service or labor in one state under the laws thereof, who escape into another state; and,

"7th. Abstaining from abolishing slavery, but, under a heavy penalty, prohibiting the slave-trade in the District of Columbia."

MR. CLAY AND MR. WEBSTER.

129

CHAPTER VIII.

Great Compromise Struggle of 1850.—Mr. Clay and Mr. Webster the principal Figures in the Picture.-Mr. Webster's 7th of March Speech, and its prodigious Effect upon the Public Mind.-Striking Extracts therefrom.-Mr. Calhoun's last Speech in the Senate, in which he urges that the Admission of California shall be made a test Question.-Emphatic Protest by the Author to this Portion of the Speech, and painful Altercation with Mr. Calhoun in Reference to the disputed Point.Proceedings of the Nashville Convention.-Wise and patriotic Conduct of Judge Sharkey, the President thereof, which prevents immediate Mischief.-Judge Sharkey arrives in Washington, and is offered the Department of War, which he declines.-Some Account of Judge Sharkey's Life and Character.

THE Contest between the friends of peace and those whose conduct was at this period seriously threatening to disturb the public repose, was now fairly in progress. Of all the champions of the measures of compromise, Mr. Clay and Mr. Webster undoubtedly commanded the largest share of the public respect, and their course in Congress awakened in various quarters much both of commendation and of dispraise. Mr. Clay had delivered at an early period of the session several speeches of marked ability and eloquence, which had called forth gratifying responses in all parts of the republic. It was now evident that old party prejudices were fast giving way to sentiments of a very different character all over the land. Public men of considerable prominence and of no mean influence, who had been the steady and unswerving op