The Middle Period 1817-1858 Part 1

The Middle Period 1817-1858.

by John William Burgess.

PREFACE

There is no more serious and delicate task in literature and morals than that of writing the history of the United States from 1816 to 1860. The periods which precede this may be treated without fear of arousing pa.s.sion, prejudice, and resentment, and with little danger of being misunderstood. Even the immaculateness of Was.h.i.+ngton may be attacked without exciting anything worse than a sort of uncomfortable admiration for the reckless courage of the a.s.sailant. But when we pa.s.s the year 1820, and especially when we approach the year 1860, we find ourselves in a different world. We find ourselves in the midst of the ideas, the motives, and the occurrences which, and of the men who, have, in large degree, produced the animosities, the friends.h.i.+ps, and the relations between parties and sections which prevail to-day.

Serious and delicate as the task is, however, the time has arrived when it should be undertaken in a thoroughly impartial spirit. The continued misunderstanding between the North and the South is an ever present menace to the welfare of both sections and of the entire nation. It makes it almost impossible to decide any question of our politics upon its merits. It offers an almost insuperable obstacle to the development of a national opinion upon the fundamental principles of our polity. If we would clear up this confusion in the common consciousness, we must do something to dispel this misunderstanding; and I know of no means of accomplis.h.i.+ng this, save the rewriting of our history from 1816 to 1860, with an open mind and a willing spirit to see and to represent truth and error, and right and wrong, without regard to the men or the sections in whom or where they may appear.

I am by no means certain that I am able to do this. I am old enough to have been a witness of the great struggle of 1861-65, and to have partic.i.p.ated, in a small way, in it. My early years were embittered by the political hatreds which then prevailed. I learned before my majority to regard secession as an abomination, and its chief cause, slavery, as a great evil; and I cannot say that these feelings have been much modified, if any at all, by longer experiences and maturer thought. I have, therefore, undertaken this work with many misgivings.

Keenly conscious of my own prejudices, I have exerted my imagination to the utmost to create a picture in my own mind of the environment of those who held the opposite opinion upon these fundamental subjects, and to appreciate the processes of their reasoning under the influences of their own particular situation. And I have with sedulous care avoided all the histories written immediately after the close of the great contest of arms, and all rehashes of them of later date. In fact I have made it an invariable rule to use no secondary material; that is, no material in which original matter is mingled with somebody's interpretation of its meaning. If, therefore, the facts in my narration are twisted by prejudices and preconceptions, I think I can a.s.sure my readers that they have suffered only one twist. I have also endeavored to approach my subject in a reverent spirit, and to deal with the characters who made our history, in this almost tragic period, as serious and sincere men having a most perplexing and momentous problem to solve, a problem not of their own making, but a fatal inheritance from their predecessors.

I have been especially repelled by the flippant superficiality of the foreign critics of this period of our history, and their evident delight in representing the professions and teachings of the "Free Republic" as canting hypocrisy. It has seemed to me a great misfortune that the present generation and future generations should be taught to regard so lightly the earnest efforts of wise, true, and honorable men to rescue the country from the great catastrophe which, for so long, impended over it. The pa.s.sionate onesidedness of our own writers is hardly more harmful, and is certainly less repulsive.

I recently heard a distinguished professor of history and politics say that he thought the history of the United States, in this period, could be truthfully written only by a Scotch-Irishman. I suppose he meant that the Scotch element in this ideal historian would take the Northern point of view, and the Irish element the Southern; but I could not see how this would produce anything more than another pair of narratives from the old contradictory points of view; and he did not explain how it would.

My opinion is, on the contrary, that this history must be written by an American and a Northerner, and from the Northern point of view--because an American best understands Americans, after all; because the victorious party can be and will be more liberal, generous, and sympathetic than the vanquished; and because the Northern view is, in the main, the correct view. It will not improve matters to concede that the South had right and the North might, or, even, that both were equally right and equally wrong. Such a doctrine can only work injury to both, and more injury to the South than to the North. Chewing the bitter cud of fancied wrong produces both spiritual misery and material adversity, and tempts to foolish and reckless action for righting the imagined injustice. Moreover, any such doctrine is false, and acquiescence in it, however kindly meant, is weak, and can have no other effect than the perpetuation of error and misunderstanding. The time has come when the men of the South should acknowledge that they were in error in their attempt to destroy the Union, and it is unmanly in them not to do so. When they appealed the great question from the decision at the ballot-box to the "trial by battle," their leaders declared, over and over again, in calling their followers to arms, that the "G.o.d of battles" would surely give the victory to the right. In the great movements of the world's history this is certainly a sound philosophy, and they should have held to it after their defeat. Their recourse to the crude notion that they had succ.u.mbed only to might was thus not only a bitter, false, and dangerous consolation, but it was a stultification of themselves when at their best as men and heroes.

While, therefore, great care has been taken, in the following pages, to attribute to the Southern leaders and the Southern people sincerity of purpose in their views and their acts, while their ideas and their reasoning have been, I think, duly appreciated, and patiently explained, while the right has been willingly acknowledged to them and honor accorded them whenever and wherever they have had the right and have merited honor, and while unbounded sympathy for personal suffering and misfortune has been expressed, still not one scintilla of justification for secession and rebellion must be expected. The South must acknowledge its error as well as its defeat in regard to these things, and that, too, not with lip service, but from the brain and the heart and the manly will, before any real concord in thought and feeling, any real national brotherhood, can be established. This is not too much to demand, simply because it is right, and nothing can be settled, as Mr. Lincoln said, until it is settled right. Any interpretation of this period of American history which does not demonstrate to the South its error will be worthless, simply because it will not be true; and unless we are men enough to hear and accept and stand upon the truth, it is useless to endeavor to find a bond of real union between us. In a word, the conviction of the South of its error in secession and rebellion is absolutely indispensable to the establishment of national cordiality; and the history of this period which fails to do this will fail in accomplis.h.i.+ng one of the highest works of history, the reconciliation of men to the plans of Providence for their perfection.

I have not, in the following pages, undertaken to treat _all_ of the events of our experience from 1816 to 1860. The s.p.a.ce allowed me would not admit of that. And even if it had, I still would have selected only those events which, in my opinion, are significant of our progress in civilization, and, as I am writing a political history, only those which are significant of our progress in political civilization. The truthful record, connection, and interpretation of such events is what I call history in the highest sense, as distinguished from chronology, narrative, and romance. Both necessity and philosophy have confined me to these.

I cannot close these prefatory sentences without a word of grateful acknowledgment to my friend and colleague, Dr. Harry A. Cus.h.i.+ng, for the important services which he has rendered me in the preparation of this work.

JOHN W. BURGESS.

323 WEST FIFTY-SEVENTH STREET, NEW YORK CITY.

JANUARY 22, 1897.

CHAPTER I.

THE NATIONALIZATION OF THE OLD REPUBLICAN PARTY

General Character of the Acts of the Fourteenth Congress--Madison's Message of December 5th, 1815--Change in the Principles of the Republican Party--The United States Bank Act of 1816--Report of the Bank Bill by Mr. Calhoun--Mr. Calhoun's Argument in Favor of the Bill--Webster's Objections to the Bank Bill--Mr. Clay's Support of the Bank Bill--Pa.s.sage of the Bank Bill by the House of Representatives--The Pa.s.sage of the Bank Bill by the Senate--The United States Bank of 1816 a Southern Measure--The Tariff Bill Framed by the Committee on Ways and Means--The Tariff Bill Reported--The Character of the Tariff Bill--Mr. Calhoun's Speech upon the Tariff Bill--The Pa.s.sage of the Tariff Bill--The Army and Navy Bills--The Bill for National Improvements--Mr. Calhoun's Advocacy of this Bill--The Opposition to the Internal Improvements Bill--Pa.s.sage of the Bill by Congress--Veto of the Bill by the President--The Failure of Congress to Override the Veto.

It is no part of my task to relate the events of the War of 1812-15.

That has already been sufficiently done in the preceding volume of this series. I take up the threads of the narrative at the beginning of the year 1816, and my problem in this chapter will be to expound the acts and policies of the Fourteenth Congress in the light of the experiences of that War.

{2} [Sidenote: General character of the acts of the Fourteenth Congress.]

Those acts and policies were shaped and adopted under the influence of those experiences, and this influence was so predominant, at the moment, in the minds of the leading men in the Government and throughout the country as to exclude, or at least to overbalance, all other influences. This is especially manifest in the att.i.tude of the statesmen of the slave-holding Commonwealths, and most especially in the att.i.tude of their great leader, Mr. Calhoun, who was the chief champion of some of the most national measures voted by that Congress.

A clear appreciation of his views and his acts at that period of his career will enable us far better than anything else to understand the terrible seriousness of the slavery question, which subsequently drove him into lines of thought and action so widely divergent from those upon which he set out in early life.

[Sidenote: Madison's message of December 5th, 1815.]

It was the President himself, however, one of the chief founders of the "States' rights" party, Mr. Madison, who set the direction toward centralization in the Congressional legislation of 1815-17. In his annual message of December 5th, 1815, he recommended the increase and better organization of the army and the navy, the enlargement of the existing Military Academy and the founding of such academies in the different sections of the country, the creation of a national currency, the protection of manufactures, the construction of roads and ca.n.a.ls, and the establishment of a national university.

This is a very different political creed from that promulgated by President Jefferson when the Republican party first gained possession of the Government at Was.h.i.+ngton. Then, decrease in all the elements of power in the hands of the central Government, and careful maintenance of all the rights and powers of the {3} "States," were recommended and urged upon the attention of the national lawgivers.

[Sidenote: Change in the principles of the Republican party.]

From a "States'-sovereignty" party in 1801, the Republican party had manifestly become a strong national party in 1816; that is, if we are to take the two Presidential messages, to which we have referred, as containing the political principles of that party at these two periods of its existence.

As the Congress of 1801 showed itself, in its legislation, to be in substantial accord with President Jefferson's views and sentiments, so did the Congress of 1815 manifest, in its legislation, the same general harmony with the views and sentiments of President Madison. In order that the latter part of this statement may be set down as an established fact of history, we will review with some particularity the two cardinal acts of this Congress--the United States Bank Act and the Tariff Act.

[Sidenote: The United States Bank Act of 1816.]

So soon as the reading of President Madison's message before the House of Representatives was completed, that body resolved to refer that part of the message which related to the establishment of an uniform national currency to a select committee. The committee chosen was composed of Mr. Calhoun, Mr. Macon, Mr. Pleasants, Mr. Tucker, Mr.

Robertson, Mr. Hopkinson, and Mr. Pickering. The first five of these gentlemen were from Commonwealths south of the Pennsylvania line, and only two, therefore, from what began now to be called the "non-slave-holding States." In other words, it was a Southern committee, and the great South Carolinian was its chairman. It is, therefore, just to regard the bill which this committee brought in, and the arguments with which they supported it, as containing the views and the sentiments of the leading Southern Republicans in the House.

{4} [Sidenote: Report of the Bank Bill by Mr. Calhoun.]

This committee came speedily to the conclusion that the nationalization of the monetary system was the most pressing need of the country, and within a month from the date of the appointment of its members the chairman of the committee reported a bill for the creation of an United States Bank, a mammoth national banking corporation, which should have a capital of thirty-five millions of dollars; in which the central Government should own one-fifth of the stock and be represented by one-fifth of the directors; the president of which should always be selected from among the Government's directors; the demand notes and bills of which should be received in all payments to the United States; and the chartered privileges of which should be made a monopoly for twenty years.

[Sidenote: Mr. Calhoun's argument in favor of the Bill.]

In his great argument in support of the bill, delivered on February 26th, Mr. Calhoun dismissed at the outset any consideration of the const.i.tutionality of the bill. That is, he simply a.s.sumed that Congress had the power to pa.s.s the bill, and declared that the public mind was entirely made up and settled upon that point.

Only five years before this, even the national-minded Clay had p.r.o.nounced the dictum that Congress had no power to grant a national bank charter, and the fact that Congress then declined to grant such a charter is good evidence that the majority of the people of the country held the same view. There can be little question that the Republican party, down to 1812, regarded the establishment of an United States bank by Congress as an usurpation of power not granted by the Const.i.tution.

Five years const.i.tute a short period of time for the accomplishment of so important a change in the public {5} opinion. Five years of ordinary experience would not have produced it. It was, without doubt, the strain brought upon the finances of the country by the necessities of the War that had developed a powerful national opinion upon the subject of the financial system of the country.

Mr. Calhoun also declined to discuss the question whether banks were favorable or unfavorable to "public liberty and prosperity." He a.s.sumed, here again, that public experience had settled that question, and said that such an inquiry was now purely metaphysical. This statement is certainly prime evidence that the practical experiences, made in conducting the Government under the pressure of war, had about knocked the metaphysics of the year 1800 out of the Republican party, and had led the party on to a much more positive stage of political opinion.

Mr. Calhoun furthermore dismissed the question whether a "national bank would be favorable to the administration of the finances of the Government," since there was not enough doubt, he said, in the public mind upon that point to warrant a discussion of it.

He declared, finally, that the only questions which demanded consideration were those relative to the existing disorders of the currency, and the efficiency of a national bank in working their cure.

Upon these two points he was distinct, decided, and thoroughly national. He said that the Const.i.tution had without doubt placed the monetary system of the country entirely within the control of Congress; that the "States" had usurped the power of making money by chartering banks of issue in the face of the const.i.tutional provision forbidding the "States" to emit bills of credit; that the two hundred millions of dollars of irredeemable bank-notes, paper, and credits, issued by these banks, were the cause of the {6} financial disorders of the country; and that the remedy for this condition of things was, in his opinion, to be found in a great specie-paying national bank, sustained by the power of the general Government in the work of bringing such a pressure upon these "State" banks as would force them either to pay specie or go into liquidation. This was clear, generous, and patriotic. No one made a fairer statement of the case, and no one advocated a more national remedy in its treatment.

[Sidenote: Webster's objections to the Bank Bill.]

On the other hand, it was Webster who, at this time, appeared narrow and particularistic. He objected to the large amount of the capital, and to the stock feature of the proposed bank, and expressed alarm at the proposition to place it under such strong governmental control. He thought that the bills and paper of the "State" banks would be good enough, if the general Government would only force them to redeem their currency in specie by refusing to accept for Government dues the bills of banks which did not pay specie on demand.

Whatever may be thought of Webster's att.i.tude from the point of view of political economy, it was certainly, from the point of view of political science, the att.i.tude of a "States'-rights" man rather than that of a nationalist. Webster did not, however, call the const.i.tutionality of the bill in question. That was conceded upon all sides.

The friends of the measure felt more anxiety in regard to Mr. Clay. He had, only five years before, as we have seen, p.r.o.nounced a similar bill unconst.i.tutional in his opinion, and he was now the Speaker of the House, with all the power over the procedure in the House which that position involved. It was generally felt that the fate of the measure would be largely determined by his att.i.tude toward it.

[Sidenote: Mr. Clay's support of the Bank Bill.]