1815-17. MONROE FOR PRESIDENT. 459 country's honor. Such a candidate, and no other, was sure of election; and if dispassionate in the earlier dealings with England, all the better. Who, then, so eligible as Monroe, the bosom friend of Jefferson and Madison,-he the political heir and the last of the famous Virginia line, chief and best counsellor of the present administration, and the only one of all Madison's Cabinet who had entered the war with much renown and emerged from it with more? Monroe's frankness, generosity, patient industry, and unsullied honor, grand qualities for a chief magistrate, were universally admitted, and even his faults of character were such as endeared him to the mass. Americans of the present day may smile at the thought that a public experience so extensive as these pages have described, should not have supplied credentials abundant for a President, and that Monroe's executive capacity was still doubted. Not brilliant, but industrious and painstaking on all occasions, the amiable Monroe had passed into ripe manhood so gradually that the companions of his youth might easily underrate still his intellectual strength. But in the crisis of 1814 he had shown rare executive capacity, foresight, and energy in directing the defences of New Orleans; self-abnegation, too, in urging upon Congress the unpopular draft for replenishing our armies. Of the great. Virginia trio Monroe had the least originality, and remains perhaps the least remarkable. This partly, however, because of a boyish petulance, which long clung to him in political life; for, though in earlier years his political judgment was exceedingly fallible, his views on public affairs of late had sometimes proved more accurate than those of Jefferson and Madison combined, and particularly as respected the foreign disposition towards the United States in 1807-1808, and the best means of influencing Europe favorably to our cause. A most conscientious statesman where he differed from others, Monroe had not deferred his convictions to Jefferson himself. Gaining constantly, therefore, as experience corrected his faults of judgment and broadened his whole character, Monroe was, for that new work of public recuperation and peace which belonged to the next. eight years, not only the best of Republicans, but, in reality, the best qualified man in America. Were it not for Monroe's acknowledged prominence, merits, and personal popularity, the State which had already supplied the Presidential chair for twenty-four years out of twentyeight, must have been thrust aside. "My son will never have a chance until the last Virginian is laid in the graveyard," muttered the splenetic John Adams, who nourished family expectations in this direction, impossible to be yet realized. New York's candidate was Governor Tompkins, a man of unblemished character, whose unfaltering support of the war entitled him to recognition. In the Republican caucus Monroe's opponents united upon Crawford. Monroe was Mar. 16, 1816. selected, 65 to 54. Tompkins accepted the caucus nomination to the Vice-Presidency. "Monroe and Tompkins" was a clean national ticket which swept the country easily; these candidates receiving, in fact, the electoral votes of all the States except Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Delaware, where the forlorn hope of Federalism maintained a faltering last stand, and gave Rufus King the compliment of their Presidential ballots, not having thought it worth while to unite upon any person for Vice-President.* Religious as well as secular disputes tended to the final disrupture of the Federalist party at the East; the liberal portion coalescing with Republicans in the State elections.† And thus had New Hampshire, in 1816, reverted to Plumer and his party, who made proscription of the State judges, in their turn, and undertook, moreover, to remodel the charter of Dartmouth College, so as to take the institution out of the hands of its self-perpetuating board of trustees, who were all Federalists and orthodox Congregationalists. A long litigation which grew out of this latter proceeding terminated in a memorable decision of the Supreme Court at Washington, which forbade the State legislature to impair its own contract without consent of the trustees.§ In Massachusetts Dexter was * There were a few vacancies in some of the electoral colleges. See Electoral Vote, Appendix. † See supra, p. 253. See supra, p. 422. ? Dartmouth College v. Woodward, 4 Wheaton's Reports, 518. States being prohibited by the Constitution from impairing the obligations of contracts, this case has become the leading one for securing their char 1815-17. LAST REMAINS OF FEDERALISM. 1816. 1816. 461 brought forward for the governorship by the Republicans and liberals once more in 1816; but upon a close vote he was defeated by John Brooks, the late AdjutantGeneral and a man of Strong's politics, and died soon after. The Connecticut Republicans combined with relig ious sects desiring freedom, upon Wolcott, Hamilton's former assistant and successor in the Treasury, who had for many years been a bank president residing in New York city, and disconnected with politics; they, too, failed to defeat the orthodox Federalists, but made important gains in the legislature.* 1816-17. Monroe's election was hailed at the West, where, like Jefferson, he enjoyed immense popularity without having ever made its tour, and partly because of his agency in procuring for the Union a free Mississippi. Nor were Eastern men displeased; for even Anglo-Federalists remembered Monroe as negotiator of the British treaty. which Jefferson had rejected. "Hartford Convention," and "blue-lights," were already words of reproach hard to bear. Otis and his associates tendered the olive branch, desiring friendship with the incoming administration. An intimate. friend of Monroe visited Boston in 1816, and this set treated him with marked hospitality. They wished Monroe would journey to New England and discover for himself how firm was the loyalty of that section. Otis himself insisted that the basis of the Hartford Convention was union; that he had not heard a single disunion sentiment uttered in that body, but their main object as delegates had been to encourage the people to look up to the Federal party. Otis ad tered immunities to private corporations as against subsequent legislation to their prejudice. * See 6 Hildreth, 595-605. It is difficult to believe this statement, unless Otis stopped his ears whenever disunion was broached. Propositions looking to disunion were doubtless brought to the attention of members by their outside friends. See supra, p. 426. It is more than likely, however, that delegates who imposed such absolute secrecy upon their utterances preferred discussing dangerous propositions informally, and in committee, rather than before the assembled body. mitted, however, that there were two sets of Federalists in the nation; one which believed nothing the administration did could be right, the other, more liberally disposed; and he, for his part, belonged to the latter set. "There should be now no difference of parties," added Quincy, less eagerly and with a spice of sarcasm, " for the Republicans have outfederalized Federalism."* Monroe was not unimpressed by these overtures, but, nevertheless, reserved his decision. He agreed with Andrew Jackson, who had advised him that the chief magistrate of the country ought not to be the head of a party but of the nation. Those, thought the President elect, who left the Federal party during the war, were entitled to the highest confidence; but towards Federalists with principles unfriendly to our system he felt differently. "The administration," he wrote to Jackson, "ought to rest strongly upon the Republican party, indulging towards the other a spirit of moderation and discrimi nation; we must prevent the reorganization and revival of the Federal party."† While Mouroe thus forecast the future, Madison's sun sank calmly to its setting. This administration had been an eventful one, full of strange vicissitudes; but joy came at last, and long tribulation brought a welcome peace, more secure than America had known for seventy years. Madison left public station with applause, therefore; and the genuine esteem with which he was already regarded gradually deepened into affection, if not reverence. He outlived all his contemporaries of 1787, and all political enmities; and in the course of his long and happy retirement earned new claims to public gratitude by contributing much to the historical record of his illustrious times. His homestead, approached through long avenues of noble trees, was Montpelier, a fine wheat farm, not far from the little town of Orange; and here, with his accomplished wife, he lived * Monroe's Correspondence, 1816. † Monroe's Correspondence, 1816. Dolly Paine Madison was, in her sphere, a more remarkable person than her husband in his, being the notable American lady of this period, and one who adorned the most exalted social station as well as the simplest. She was born of Quaker parents at the South, in 1767. When 1815-17. CLOSE OF MADISON'S CAREER. 463 quietly among neighbors of simple manners like himself, Jefferson, his distinguished friend, being within half a day's ride. Faithful in all the relations of life, pure, upright, diligent, discreet, disinterested, benevolent, Madison possessed those traits to which old age always gives lustre. Well-deserving of the nation, he had attained all the honors the nation could bestow, and had done filial service in return. His faults were those of a prudent rather than a zealous or daring executive; responsibility rested uneasily upon his shoulders, for he had been bred a counsellor, and as President he could not stand firmly against opposition.* His administration was weakest where the pressure came upon executive discretion, and strongest where its course was dictated by the popular wishes, of which Madison had always a delicate perception. Conscientious as he was docile and capable, even weakness like this could not ruin the public interests committed to him, for discipline brought correction, and though a President of accommodating opinions, perhaps, his opinions were accommodated, nevertheless, to the times. Madison could never go far wrong, for he never went counter to the sense of those he governed; but in the war of 1812 he seemed less a preceptor and guide than the instrument of those who took up arms so boldly to vindicate American honor; and hence the American people remembered his Presidency in after years less for his achievements than their own. Madison married her, in 1794, she was a young widow. The anecdote is a familiar one of her carrying away the parchment Declaration of Independence, and preserving Stuart's full-length painting of Washington, after the fight of Bladensburg. She died in July, 1850, having survived her husband fourteen years. See Lossing's War of 1812, p. 935. * See Jefferson's Domestic Life for Jefferson's qualified tribute to Madison's character in his last hours. |