The Works of Daniel Webster, Volume 1. Daniel Webster
of Congress, who in 1832 had passed a bill to renew the charter, and of the House of Representatives, which had resolved that the deposits were safe in its custody, the affairs of the bank had been conducted with prudence, integrity, and remarkable skill. It was not the least evil consequence of the warfare waged upon the bank, that it was finally drawn into a position (though not till its Congressional charter expired, and it accepted very unwisely a charter as a State institution) in which, in its desperate struggle to sustain itself, it finally forfeited the confidence of its friends and the public, and made a deplorable and shameful shipwreck at once of its interests and honor, involving hundreds, at home and abroad, in its own deserved ruin.
The second administration of General Jackson, which commenced in March, 1833, was principally employed in carrying on this war against the bank, and in the effort to build up the league of the associated banks into an efficient fiscal agent of the government. The dangerous crisis of affairs in South Carolina had, for the time, passed. The passage of the “Force Bill” had vindicated the authority of the Constitution as the supreme law of the land, and had armed the President with the needed powers to maintain it. On the other hand, the Compromise Bill of Mr. Clay, providing for the gradual reduction of all duties to one uniform rate of twenty per cent., was accepted by Mr. Calhoun and his friends as a practical concession, and furnished them the opportunity of making what they deemed a not discreditable retreat from the attitude of military resistance in cxi which they had placed the State. Regarding this bill in the light of a concession to unconstitutional menace, as tending to the eventual prostration of all the interests which had grown up under the system so long pursued by the government, Mr. Webster felt himself compelled to withhold from it his support. He rejoiced, however, in the concurrence of events which had averted the dread appeal to arms that seemed at one time unavoidable.
It would occupy an unreasonable space to dwell upon every public measure before Congress at this session; but there is one which cannot with propriety be passed over, as it drew forth from Mr. Webster an argument not inferior to his speech on the “Force Bill.” A resolution, originally moved by Mr. Clay, expressing disapprobation of the removal of the deposits from the bank, was, after material amendments, adopted by the Senate. This resolution led to a formal protest from the President, communicated to the Senate on the 15th of April, 1834. Looking upon the resolution referred to as one of expediency, it is probable that Mr. Webster did not warmly favor, though, with Mr. Calhoun, he concurred in, its passage. The protest of the President, however, placed the subject on new ground. Mr. Webster considered it as an encroachment on the constitutional rights of the Senate, and as a denial to that body of the freedom of action which the executive claimed so earnestly for itself. He accordingly addressed the Senate on the 7th of May, in a speech of the highest ability, in which the doctrines of the protest were subjected to the severest scrutiny, and the constitutional rights and duties of the Senate asserted with a force and spirit worthy of the important position occupied by that body in the frame of the government. This speech will be ever memorable for that sublime passage on the extent of the power of England, which will be quoted with admiration wherever our language is spoken and while England retains her place in the family of nations.
This speech was received throughout the country with the highest favor; by the most distinguished jurists and statesmen as well as by the mass of the people. Chancellor Kent’s language of praise passes the limits of moderation. “You never,” said he, “equalled this effort. It surpasses every thing in logic, in simplicity and beauty and energy of diction, in clearness, in cxii rebuke, in sarcasm, in patriotic and glowing feeling, in just and profound constitutional views, in critical severity, and matchless strength. It is worth millions to our liberties.” Not less decided was the approbation of a gentleman of great sagacity and experience as a statesman, Governor Tazewell of Virginia. In writing to Mr. Tyler he uses this language: “Tell Webster from me that I have read his speech in the National Intelligencer with more pleasure than any I have lately seen. If the approbation of one who has not been used to coincide with him in opinion can be grateful to him, he has mine in extenso. I agree with him perfectly, and thank him cordially for his many excellent illustrations of what I always thought. If it is published in a pamphlet form, beg him to send me one. I will have it bound in good Russia leather, and leave it as a special legacy to my children.”21
At the same session of Congress, Mr. Webster spoke frequently on the presentation of memorials, which were poured in upon him from every part of the country, in reference to the existing distress. These speeches were of necessity made, in almost every case, with little or no preparation, but many of them contain expositions of the operation of the financial experiment instituted by General Jackson, which will retain a permanent value in our political history. Some of them are marked by bursts of the highest eloquence. The entire subject of the currency was also treated with great ability by Mr. Webster, in a report made at this session of Congress from the committee of the Senate on finance, of which he was chairman. Few documents more skilfully digested or powerfully reasoned have proceeded from his pen.
The same topics substantially occupied the attention of the Senate at the Twenty-fourth as at the Twenty-third Congress. The principal subjects discussed pertained to the currency. The specie circular and the distribution of the surplus revenue were among the prominent measures. A motion made in the Senate to expunge from its records the resolution of March, 1834, by which the Senate expressed its disapprobation of the removal of the deposits, drew forth from Mr. Webster, on behalf of himself and his colleague, a protest against that measure, of cxiii singular earnestness and power. Committed to writing, and read with unusual solemnity, it produced upon the Senate an effect which is still remembered and spoken of. Every word in it is weighed as in a balance.
The administration of General Jackson was drawing to a close; Mr. Van Buren had been chosen to succeed him in November, 1836. In the month of February following, upon an invitation from a large committee of merchants, professional men, and citizens generally of New York, given some months previous, Mr. Webster attended one of those great public meetings which he has been so often called to address. His speech on this occasion, delivered in Niblo’s Saloon on the 15th of March, 1837, is one of the most important in this collection. It embraced a comprehensive review of the entire course of General Jackson’s policy, and closed with a prediction of the impending catastrophe. After the adjournment of Congress, Mr. Webster made a hasty tour to the West, in the course of which he addressed large public meetings at Wheeling in Virginia, at Madison in Indiana, and at other places. The coincidence of passing events with all his anticipations of the certain effects of the administration policy gave peculiar force to these addresses. It is to be regretted that these speeches appear from inadequate reports; of some of the speeches made by him on this tour, no notes were taken.
Such was the financial embarrassment induced by the explosion of the system of the late administration, that President Van Buren’s first official act was a proclamation for an extra session of Congress, to be held in September, 1837. At this session the new government plan of finance, usually called “the Sub-treasury system,” was brought forward. It was the opinion of Mr. Webster, that the rigid enforcement by the government of a system of specie payments in all its public receipts and expenditures was an actual impossibility, in the present state of things in this country and the other commercial countries of the civilized world. The attempt to reject altogether the aid of convertible paper, of bills of exchange, of drafts, and other substitutes for the use and transportation of the precious metals, must fail in practice in a commercial country, where the great mass of the business affairs of the community are transacted with their aid. If the attempt could cxiv be forced through, it would be like an attempt on the part of the government to make use of the ancient modes of travel and conveyance, while every citizen in his private affairs enjoyed the benefit of steam navigation and railways. Mr. Webster accordingly opposed the sub-treasury project from its inception; and it failed to become a law at the extra session of Congress in 1837.
Somewhat to the surprise of the country generally, it received the support of Mr. Calhoun. In common with most of his friends, he had sustained the Bank of the United States, and denounced the financial policy of General Jackson at every stage. But at the extra session of Congress he expressed opinions favorable to the sub-treasury, and followed them up in a remarkable letter to his constituents, published after the adjournment. At the winter session of 1837-38 he defended the government
March’s Reminiscences of Congress, pp. 291, 292.