CHAP. XVIII.

FINANCIAL MEASURES.

1343

the "Specie Circular," and call an extraordinary session of Congress. Their prayer was rejected, and when that fact became known nearly all the banks in the country suspended specie payment. This movement embarrassed the government, for it was unable to obtain coin wherewith to discharge its own financial obligations. So situated, the public good demanded legislative relief, and the President called an extraordinary session of Congress on the 4th of September. In his message to that body, he proposed the establishment of an independent treasury

for the public funds, totally disconnected with all banking institutions; but during a session of forty-three days, Congress did very little for the general relief, excepting the authorizing of an issue of treasury notes, in amount not exceeding ten million dollars. The independent treasury scheme met with violent opposition, but a bill to that effect became a law in July, 1840, and the "Sub-Treasury System" was put into operation.

MARTIN VAN BUREN.

Peaceful relations between the United States and Great Britain, which had then existed many years, were somewhat disturbed in 1837 and 1838 by events connected with a revolutionary movement that broke out in Canada, the avowed object being to achieve the independence of the provinces of British rule. In this effort our people sympathized, and gave the insurgents all possible aid and comfort. Individuals and organized companies went across the border and joined the insurgents; and refugees from Canada were protected here. The agitation and the outbreak occurred simultaneously in Upper and Lower Canada, but local jealousies prevented a unity of action, and the scheme failed. The active sympathy of the people of the "States," and especially along the northern frontier, irritated the British government. The President issued a proclamation, warning Americans not to violate neutrality and international laws; and he sent General Winfield Scott to the northern frontier to preserve order. It was not permanently effected until at the end of about four years.

Many stirring incidents occurred on the frontier during that outbreak in the Canadas, the most conspicuous of which was on the bosom of the Niagara River. A party of Americans, seven hundred in number, with twenty cannon, took possession of Navy Island, in that stream, two miles above the Great Falls. They had a small steamboat named Caroline, that plied between the Island and Scholosser, on the New York shore. One dark night in December, 1837, a party of royalists crossed the river from Canada, set the Caroline on fire, cut her loose from her moorings, and allowed her to go blazing down the fearful rapids and over the crown of the mighty cataract

into the seething gulf below. It was believed that some persons were on board the Caroline, and perished with her.

Another cause for unpleasant feeling between the governments of the United States and Great Britain was a long-standing dispute concerning the true boundary between the State of Maine and the British province of New Bruns wick. The inhabitants of each frontier had become so exasperated, that at the close of 1838 they were preparing for actual war. General Scott was sent to the scene of strife as a pacificator in the winter of 1839, and the dispute was settled by a treaty negotiated by Daniel Webster and Lord Ashburton, the same year. Provision was made in the same treaty for the co-operation of the two governments in the suppression of the African slave trade; also for the giving up of fugitives from justice, in certain cases. This is known in history as the Ashburton Treaty.

WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON.

Mr. Van Buren was a candidate for the Presidency a second time, and was nominated for that office by the unanimous vote of the Democratic convention assembled at Baltimore in 1840. In December, 1839, a national Whig convention, held at Harrisburg in Pennsylvania, nominated General William Henry Harrison of Ohio for President and John Tyler of Virginia for Vice-President. The canvass was a very exciting one, and the method

CHAP. XVIII.

HARD CIDER CAMPAIGN.

1345

of carrying it on by one party was exceedingly demoralizing. Because Harrison lived in the West and his residence was formerly a log-cabin, such a structure became the symbol of his party; and because of his proverbial hospitality, that quality was symbolized by a barrel of cider. Log-cabins were erected all over the country as places for political gatherings, and seas of cider were drank in them. Young and old partook freely of the beverage, and the meetings were often mere drunken carousals that were injurious to all, and especially to youth. Many a drunk

ard afterward sadly charged his departure from the path of sobriety to the "Hard Cider" campaign of 1840. Demagogues, as usual, had made the people believe that a change in administration would restore prosperity to the country, and they adroitly held the administration of Van Buren responsible for nearly all the woes the country was suffering. The consequence was that Harrison and Tyler were elected by overwhelming majorities; and in the spring of 1841, Mr. Van Buren surrendered the Presidential chair to the popular soldier of the West.

The resources of the coun

Fifty years had now elapsed since the formation of the government under the new constitution. The number of the States had doubled, and the population had reached about seventeen million souls. try had been largely developed, especially its mineral treasures of coal and iron. The railway system was fairly established, and the settlement of the West was in rapid progress. From the beginning of the career of the republic, the State and banking institutions had been closely wedded; the chief event of Mr. Van Buren's administration was their absolute divorce. They were reunited during the late civil war, and their nuptials, under better auspices, have been fruitful of blessings to the country.

General Harrison was an old man-sixty-eight years of age-when he

entered upon the duties of chief magistrate of the nation. He seemed vigorous in mind and body when he delivered his inaugural address from the eastern portico of the Capitol. It was received with favor by all parties, for it was full of wisdom; and confidence was half restored in the commercial world, when it was known that he had chosen Daniel Webster for Secretary of State; Thomas Ewing, Secretary of the Treasury; John Bell, Secretary of War; George E. Badger, Secretary of the Navy; Francis Granger, Postmaster-General, and John J. Crittenden, Attorney-General. This beginning gave omen of the dawn of a day of prosperity for the land, and there were glad hearts everywhere. But the anthems of the inaugural day were speedily changed into solemn dirges. The hopes centred in the new President were extinguished; for precisely one month after he took the oath of office from Chief-Justice Taney, he died. He had performed only one official act of great importance during his brief administration, and that was the issuing of a proclamation on the 17th of March, calling an extraordinary session of Congress in May to consider the subjects of finance and revenue.

John Tyler, the Vice-President, became the constitutional successor of President Harrison, He was called to Washington from Williamsburg in Virginia, by a message sent by Harrison's cabinet-ministers on the 4th of April (the day on which the President died), and he was in the national capital at four o'clock on the morning of the 6th. At noon, the cabinetministers called upon him in a body, and he took the oath of office, administered by Judge Cranch. To the gentlemen present, after alluding to the deceased President, Mr. Tyler said, "You have only exchanged one Whig for another." He had been a Democrat of the school of strict constructionists of the Constitution, but when he was a candidate for the Vice-Presidency, he had avowed himself to be a firm and decided Whig. It seems proper here, in order to better understand the brief record of events that follow, to give an outline sketch of political parties in the United States at that time.

We have seen that the Federal party was cast into a minority on the election of Mr. Jefferson in 1800, and contined in opposition until the close of Madison's administration in 1817, when they soon afterward became extinct as a national party; the administration of Mr. Monroe being so generally satisfactory, that opposition practically ceased. When, in 1824, Adams and Jackson, Crawford and Clay, became rival candidates for the Presidency, separate political organizations of a personal nature were formed, composed of Federalists and Democrats intermingled; but when Jackson was elected to the chief magistracy in 1828, his supporters claimed the name of DemoHis opponents took the name of National Republicans, but when in

crats.

CHAP. XVIII.

THE LOCO FOCO PARTY.

1347 1833 and 1834 they were joined by seceders of the Democratic party, they took the title of Whigs. At the accession of Mr. Van Buren in 1837, the great national parties into which the people were divided were known respectively as Democrats and Whigs. Several minor parties (some of them local in their organization), such as the Anti-Masons in the Eastern States; the State-Rights men in the South, who were opposed to the removal of the deposits from the United States Bank; and the supporters of Jackson in Georgia, Tennessee and other States, who were opposed to Van Buren, generally acted with the Whig party.

Even before the elevation of Mr. Van Buren to the Presidency, the Democratic party had been divided in the Northern and Middle States. There arose in its ranks, in 1835, in the city of New York, a combination opposed to all moneyed institutions and monopolies of every sort. They were the successor of the defunct Workingmen's party, formed in 1829, and called themselves the "Equal Rights Party." They acted with much caution and secrecy in their opposition to the powerful National Democratic party. They never rose above the dignity of a faction, and their first decided demonstration was made in Tammany Hall, one evening at the close of October, 1835, when the " Equal Rights" men objected to some names on the ticket to be put before the people. There was a struggle for the chair, which the "regulars" obtained, declared their ticket and resolutions adopted, and then attempted to adjourn the meeting and put out the lights. The opposition were prepared for this emergency by having "loco-foco" or friction matches in their pockets, with which they immediately restored light to the room, placed their leader in the chair, adopted an "Equal Rights" Democratic ticket, and passed strong resolutions against all monopolies. The faction was ever afterward known as the Loco-Focos, and the name was finally applied by the Whigs to the whole Democratic party. This faction became formidable, and the regulars endeavored to conciliate the irregulars by nominating Richard M. Johnson of Kentucky, their favorite candidate for the Presidency, for Vice-President, with Mr. Van Buren. The advocacy of an extensive specie currency by the latter, and his proposition for a sub-treasury, alienated another portion of the Democratic party, and they formed a powerful faction known as "Conservatives." This fac.. tion finally joined the Whigs, and in 1840 aided in the election of Harrison and Tyler.

The first extraordinary session of the Twenty-seventh Congress began on the 31st of May, 1841, and continued until the 13th of September following. Subjects of grave importance to the nation were presented to that body, chief of which was that of the finances of the country. The Secretary of