INTRODUCTION

HE world has passed into a new era since the events chronicled in this volume moulded into definite shape the government of a great country founded in the struggles of our Revolutionary progenitors, and established upon fundamental principles that their wisdom inspired and developed. Among the Builders, who erected upon the foundations laid by the Fathers of the Republic the edifice of a great Nation, were many men who are no less worthy than they of the grateful remembrance of their descendants. These Builders of the superstructure did their work with patriotism, with ability, with far-sightedness and with devotion; and to their labors in settling vexed questions, in developing natural resources, in broadening knowledge, and in stabilizing for every citizen the opportunities of liberty and of the pursuit of happiness, is due no small part of the greatness and power of a country that has become the greatest and most powerful of the countries of the earth.

These men of the period succeeding that of the patriots, who laid the foundations in Declarations of Independence and written Constitutions and Bills of Rights, were confronted with difficulties and dangers in their construction and interpretation no less grave than those which were encountered by the men who had formulated and cemented them in the suffering and blood of the Revolution. They met these difficulties and dangers with the patriotic spirit, the courage, and the ability of their fathers; and they deserved well of the Republic.

High on the roll of these Builders stands the name of Alexander Hugh Holmes Stuart.

The period of Mr. Stuart's public life was one of mighty differences of opinion, of wide divergences of view as to the process of economic development, and of great sectional antagonisms. To the righteous solution of these vital questions he brought a broad-minded and unselfish patriotism, a singular devotion, an unceasing patience and a distinguished ability that mark him as an outstanding and noble figure in an epoch of crises and of perils. He gave his life to the peaceable adjustment of difficulties that grew inevitably out of the compromises which had been wrought into the Constitution of the Union, and to the preservation and perpetuation of the Constitution itself; and when the experiment of a free government, theretofore untried in the world, seemed threatened with destruction through a disruption that he had spent himself in seeking to avert, he devoted himself, with equal patriotism, patience and ability to the preservation and perpetuation of the principles on which the Union had been founded, and to the healing of the wounds that followed its attempted dissolution.

No one can read this biography without the conviction that love of country was the corner-stone of his character, and that to its vindication he devoted all of his great intel lectual powers.

Mr. Stuart came of the race known in American history as "the Scotch-Irish,"-men who were descendants of Scots, who for the sake of civil and religious liberty, had gone from Scotland into Ulster, the northern province of Ireland, and emigrating thence to the Western Hemisphere, have since given to the country of their last adoption statesmen, soldiers, scholars and divines, the bede-roll of whose names includes, in addition to his own, those of many men illustrious in the story of the Union-Houston, and Preston, and McDowell, and Breckinridge, and Alexander, and Benton, and Crittenden, and Jackson, and Hampton, and Calhoun. It was a race that was characterized by an innate love of freedom; and its traditions and creeds were inheritances of his blood. Of his immediate progenitors, begin

ning with the immigrant, Alexander Stuart, his great-grandfather, his biographer has given brief accounts in this book, which demonstrate that they were all imbued with a libertyloving and patriotic spirit, and were prominent in the affairs. of their successive generations.

Mr. Stuart's earlier political experience as a legislator of his native state, and as one of its representatives in the Federal Congress, was followed by his incumbency of the office of Secretary of the Interior in the Cabinet of President Fillmore. In his legislative services he evinced great powers of study and investigation and an unusual constructive ability. His utterances on political questions and measures were marked by an accuracy of knowledge, a power of logic, and a singular eloquence that made him a conspicuous and influential figure from the beginning to the end of his political life. To the administrative office of Cabinet Secretary he brought a remarkable knowledge of the workings of the Federal government, a wide acquaintance with the public men of his time, a trained and acute intellect, a systematic attention to details and much patience and industry in their management; and thus equipped, and inspired as he was with the conscientious purpose of serving his people, he discharged the duties of the office with notable ability and distinction.

But it was as a proponent and expositor of governmental and economic principles, and as a leader and actor in national affairs that he was most able and effective. He was a fine type on the hustings and in the halls of legislation of that breed of highly educated and thoroughly informed statesmen who adorned the annals of the country in the period preceding the War of the 'Sixties, and who have since in a large measure passed away; and as a polemic writer on all subjects connected with the public events and questions of his time, he had few equals and no superiors.

The clearness of his literary style, the moderation of his expression, the logic of his argument and the earnestness and profundity of his conviction, are all vividly illustrated

in his writings that are included in this volume. His exposition in "the Madison Letters" of the principles and policies of the American party, the great fundamental doctrine of which was the proper control of foreign immigration into the United States, reveals a marked power of investigation, a wealth of knowledge, a force of logic, and a vigor of statement that make these papers notable examples of controversial political argument; and they remain today the ablest presentation of the principles and policies of that short-lived organization that has ever been written.

In the pronouncement of his facts and deductions in these notable "Letters" are visible the clearness, the logical ability and the moderation of language, which are characteristics of his writings. Between the lines of all his controversial papers, as in his public speeches, are perceptible the urbanity, the courtesy, the earnestness, the forbearance which were throughout his life among his distinguishing personal and intellectual attributes.

He wielded the keen-edged scimitar of Saladin in behalf of the American party; and when that party went down in Virginia in 1855 before the blows of the Crusader's battleaxe in the hands of Henry A. Wise, it had had no unworthy support in Mr. Stuart's powerful presentation of its doctrines and purposes.

Wise, after his defeat of the "Know-Nothings," as they were called by their adversaries on account of the secret methods of their organization, made the picturesque boast: "I have met the Black Knight with his visor down, and vanquished him." But Mr. Stuart, himself, was no "Black Knight" with closed visor. The mysterious mummeries and rituals of the American party, which conduced to its defeat, were expressly repudiated by him in the "Madison Letters," in which he exposed with keen logic and prophetic vision the threatening dangers of an unrestricted and uncontrolled foreign immigration, that has since inundated the United States with masses of "undesirable citizens," and has sown