sissippi. The negative was, Messrs. Benton, Eaton, Rowan, and Tazewell.-Mr. Calhoun was then Vice-President, and did not vote; but he was in favor of the treaty, and assisted its ratification through his friends. The House of Representatives voted the appropriations to carry it into effect; and thus acquiesced in the repeal of an act of Congress by the President, Senate, and Cherokee Indians; and these appropriations were voted with the general concurrence of the Congress had made in relation to territory; and to was: Messrs. Barton, Berrien, Bouligny, Branch, reverse the disposition which Congress had made Ezekiel Chambers, Cobb, King of Alabama, of a part of its territory. To Congress it be- McKinley, McLane of Delaware, Macon, Ridgelonged to dispose of territory; and to her it be-ly, Smith of Maryland, Smith of South Carolina, longed to repeal her own laws. The treaty John Tyler of Virginia, and Williams of Misavoided the word "repeal," while doing the thing: it used the word "abolish "-which was the same in effect, and more arrogant and offensive-not appropriate to legislation, and evidently used to avoid the use of a word which would challenge objection. If the word "repeal" had been used, every one would have felt that the ordinary legislation of Congress was flagrantly invaded; and the avoidance of that word, and the substitution of another of the same meaning, could have no effect in legal-southern members of the House. And thus izing a transaction which would be condemned under its proper name. And so I held the treaty to be invalid for want of a proper subject to act upon, and because it invaded the legislative department. another slice, and a pretty large one (twelve thousand square miles), was taken off of slave territory in the former province of Louisiana ; which about completed the excision of what had been left for slave State occupation after the Missouri compromise of 1820, and the cession to Texas of contemporaneous date, and previous cessions to Indian tribes. And all this was the work of southern men, who then saw no objection to the Congressional legislation which acted upon slavery in territories-which further curtailed, and even extinguished slave soil in all the vast expanse of the former Louisiana-save and except the comparative little that was left in the State of Missouri, and in the mutilated Territory of Arkansas. The reason of the southern members for promoting this amputation of Arkansas in favor of the Cherokees, was simply to assist in inducing their removal by adding the best part of Arkansas, with its salt springs, to the ample millions of acres west of that territory already granted to them; but it was a gratuitous sacrifice, as the large part of the tribe had already emigrated to the seven millions of acres, and the remainder were waiting for moneyed inducements to follow. And besides, the desire for this removal could have no effect upon the constitutional power of Congress to legislate upon slavery in territories, or upon the policy which curtails the boundaries of a future slave State. The inexpediency of the treaty was in the question of crippling and mutilating Arkansas, reducing her to the class of weak States, and that against all the reasons which had induced Congress, four years before, to add on twelve thousand square miles to her domain; and to almost double the productive and inhabitable capacity of the Territory, and future State, by the character of the country added. I felt this wrong to Arkansas doubly, both as a neighbor to my own State, and because, having a friendship for the delegate, as well as for his territory, I had exerted myself to obtain the addition which had been thus cut off. I argued, as I thought, conclusively; but in vain. The treaty was largely ratified, and by a strong slaveholding vote, notwithstanding it curtailed slave territory, and made soil free which was then slave. Anxious to defeat the treaty for the benefit of Arkansas, I strongly presented this consequence, showing that there was, not only legal, but actually slavery upon the amputated part-that these twelve thousand square miles were inhabited, organized into counties, populous in some parts, and with the due proportion of slaves found in a southern and planting State. Nothing would do. It was a southern measure, negotiated, on the record, by a southern secretary at war, in I have said that the amputated part of Arreality by the clerk McKinney; and voted for kansas was an organized part of the territory, by nineteen approving slaveholding senators divided into counties, settled and cultivated. against four dissenting. The affirmative vote | Now, what became of these inhabitants ?—their property? and possessions? They were bought forts on the part of the British commissioners, out by the federal government! A simultaneous to set up a title to it, its restitution was stipuact was passed, making a donation of three hun-lated under the general clause which provided dred and twenty acres of land (within the re- for the restoration of all places captured by maining part of Arkansas), to each head of a either party. But it was not restored. An family who would retire from the amputated empty ceremony was gone through to satisfy the part; and subjecting all to military removal words of the treaty, and to leave the place in the that did not retire. It was done. They all hands of the British. An American agent, Mr. withdrew. Three hundred and twenty acres of John Baptist Prevost, was sent to Valparaiso, to land in front to attract them, and regular troops go in a British sloop of war (the Blossom) to receive in the rear to push them, presented a motive the place, to sign a receipt for it, and leave it in power adequate to its object; and twelve thou- the hands of the British. This was in the au3 sand square miles of slave territory was evacu-tumn of the year 1818; and coincident with that ated by its inhabitants, with their flocks, and herds, and slaves; and not a word was said about it; and the event has been forgotten. But it is necessary to recall its recollection, as an important act, in itself, in relation to the new State of Arkansas-as being the work of the South-and as being necessary to be known in order to understand subsequent events. nominal restitution was the conclusion of a convention in London between the United States and British government, for the joint occupation of the Columbia for ten years-Mr. Gallatin and Mr. Rush the American negotiators-if those can be called negotiators who are tied down to particular instructions. The joint occupancy was provided for, and in these words: "That any country claimed by either party on the northwest coast of America, together with its harbors, bays, and creeks, and the navigation of all rivers within the same, be free and open, for the term of ten years, to the subjects, citizens, and vessels of the two powers; without prejudice to any claim which either party might have to any part of the country."—I was a practising lawyer at St. Louis, no way engaged in politics, at the time this convention was published; but THE American settlement at the mouth of the I no sooner saw it than I saw its delusive nature Columbia, or Oregon, was made in 1811. It was-it's one-sidedness—and the whole disastrous CHAPTER XXXVII. RENEWAL OF THE OREGON JOINT OCCUPATION an act of private enterprise, done by the eminent merchant, Mr. John Jacob Astor, of New-York; and the young town christened after his own name, Astoria: but it was done with the countenance and stipulated approbation of the government of the United States; and an officer of the United States navy-the brave Lieutenant Thorn, who was with Decatur at Tripoli, and who afterwards blew up his ship in Nootka Sound to avoid her capture by the savages (blowing himself, crew and savages all into the air),—was allowed to command his (Mr. Astor's) leading vessel, in order to impress upon the enterprise the seal of nationality. This town was captured during the war of 1812, by a ship of war detached for that purpose, by Commodore Hillyar, commanding a British squadron in the Pacific Ocean. No attempt was made to recover it during the war; and, at Ghent, after some ef consequences which were to result from it to the United States; and immediately wrote and published articles against it: of which the following is an extract: "This is a specimen of the skill with which the diplomatic art deposits the seeds of a new contestation in the assumed settlement of an existing one, and gives unequal privileges in words ended perhaps by war, where no question at all of equality, and breeds a serious question, to be existed. Every word of the article for this joint occupation is a deception and a blunder-suggesting a belief for which there is no foundation, granting privileges for which there is no equivalent, and presenting ambiguities which require to be solved-peradventure by the sword. It speaks as if there was a mutuality of countries on the northwest coast to which the article was applicable, and a mutuality of benefits to accrue to the citizens of both governments by each occupying the country claimed by the other. Not so the fact. There is but one country in ques “claim” tion, and that is our own ;--and of this the Brit- occupation convention of that year was promulish are to have equal possession with ourselves, gated. I wrote in advance; and long before the and we no possession of theirs. The Columbia ten years were out, it was all far more than is ours; Frazer's River is a British possession to which no American ever went, or ever will go. verified. Our traders were not only driven from The convention gives a joint right of occupying the mouth of the Columbia River, but from all the ports and harbors, and of navigating the its springs and branches;-not only from all the rivers of each other. This would imply that each government possessed in that quarter, ports, and Valley of the Columbia, but from the whole reharbors, and navigable rivers; and were about gion of the Rocky Mountains between 49 and to bring them into hotch-potch for mutual en- 42 degrees;-not only from all this mountain joyment. No such thing. There is but one port, region, but from the upper waters of all our far and that the mouth of the Columbia-but one distant rivers-the Missouri, the Yellow Stone, river, and that the Columbia itself: and both port and river our own. We give the equal use the Big Horn, the North Platte; and all their of these to the British, and receive nothing in re- mountain tributaries. And, by authentic reports turn. The convention says that the "claim" of made to our government, not less than five hunneither party is to be prejudiced by the joint dred of our citizens had been killed, nor less than possession. This admits that Great Britain has a claim-a thing never admitted before by us, five hundred thousand dollars worth of goods nor pretended by her. At Ghent she stated no and furs robbed from them;-the British reclaim, and could state none. Her ministers maining the undisturbed possessors of all the merely asked for the river as a boundary, as be- Valley of the Columbia, acting as its masters, and ing the most convenient; and for the use of the harbor at its mouth, as being necessary to their building forts from the sea to the mountains. ships and trade; but stated no claim. Our com- This was the effect of the first joint occupation missioners reported that they (the British com- treaty, and every body in the West saw its apmissioners) endeavored to lay a nest-egg for proaching termination with pleasure; but the a future pretension; which they failed to do at Ghent in 1815, but succeeded in laying in Lon- false step which the government had made indon in 1818; and before the ten years are out, a duced another. They had admitted a full grown fighting chicken will be hatched of on the part of Great Britain, and given her the that egg. There is no mutuality in any thing. sole, under the name of a joint, possession; and We furnish the whole stake country, river, harbor; and shall not even maintain the joint now to get her out was the difficulty. It could use of our own. We shall be driven out of it, not be done; and the United States agreed to a and the British remain sole possessors. The fur further continued "joint" occupation (as it was trade is the object. It will fare with our traders illusively called in the renewed convention), not on the Columbia under this convention as it fared with them on the Miami of the Lakes (and for ten years more, but "indefinitely, " determinon the lakes themselves), under the British able on one year's notice from either party to treaties of '94 and '96, which admitted British the other. The reason for this indefinite, and traders into our territories. Our traders will be injurious continuance, was set forth in the predriven out; and that by the fair competition of trade, even if there should be no foul play. The amble to the renewed convention (Mr. Gallatin difference between free and dutied goods, would now the sole United States negotiator); and work that result. The British traders pay no recited that the two governments "being desirous duties: ours pay above an average of fifty per to prevent, as far as possible, all hazard of miscentum. No trade can stand against such odds. understanding, and with a view to give further But the competition will not be fair. The savages will be incited to kill and rob our traders, time for maturing measures which shall have for and they will be expelled by violence, without their object a more definite settlement of the waiting the slower, but equally certain process, claims of each party to the said territory;" did of expulsion by underselling. The result then is, that we admit the British into our country, thereupon agree to renew the joint occupation our river, and our harbor; and we get no admit-article of the convention of 1818, &c. Thus, we tance into theirs, for they have none-Frazer's had, by our diplomacy in 1818, and by the perRiver and New Caledonia being out of the ques-mitted non-execution of the Ghent treaty in the tion-that they will become sole possessors of our river, our harbor, and our country; and at the end of the ten years will have an admitted 'claim to our property, and the actual posses sion of it." delivery of the post and country, hatched a question which threatened a "misunderstanding" between the two countries; and for maturing measures for the settlement of which indefinite Thus I wrote in the year 1818, when the joint time was required—and granted—Great Britain remaining, in the mean time, sole occupant of the whole country. This was all that she could ask, and all that we could grant, even if we actually intended to give up the country. I was a member of the Senate when this renewed convention was sent in for ratification, and opposed it with all the zeal and ability of which I was master: but in vain. The weight of the administration, the indifference of many to a remote object, the desire to put off a difficulty, and the delusive argument that we could terminate it at any time-(a consolation so captivating to gentle temperaments)—were too strong for reason and fact; and I was left in a small minority on the question of ratification. But I did not limit myself to opposition to the treaty. I proposed, as well as opposed; and digested my opinions into three resolves; and had them spread on the executive journal, and made part of our parliamentary history for future reference. The resolves were: 1. "That it is not expedient for the United States and Great Britain to treat further in relation to their claims on the northwest coast of America, on the basis of a joint occupation by their respective citizens. 2. That it is expedient that the joint-occupation article in the convention of 1818 be allowed to expire upon its own limitation. 3. That it is expedient for the government of the United States to continue to treat with His Britannic Majesty in relation to said claims, on the basis of a separation of interests, and the establishment of a permanent boundary between their dominions westward of the Rocky Mountains, in the shortest possible time." These resolves were not voted upon; but the negative vote on the ratification of the convention showed what the vote would have been if it had been taken. That negative vote was-Messrs. Benton, Thomas W. Cobb of Georgia, Eaton of Tennessee, Ellis of Mississippi, Johnson of Kentucky, Kane of Illinois, and Rowan of Kentucky-in all 7. Eighteen years afterwards, and when we had got to the cry of "inevitable war, " I had the gratification to see the whole Senate, all Congress, and all the United States, occupy the same ground in relation to this joint occupation on which only seven senators stood at the time the convention for it was ratified. CHAPTER XXXVIII. PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION OF 1828, AND FURTHER ERRORS OF MONS. DE TOCQUEVILLE. GENERAL JACKSON and Mr. Adams were the candidates;—with the latter, Mr. Clay (his Secretary of State), so intimately associated in the public mind, on account of the circumstances of the previous presidential election in the House of Representatives, that their names and interests were inseparable during the canvass. General Jackson was elected, having received 178 electoral votes to 83 received by Mr. Adams. Mr. Richard Rush, of Pennsylvania, was the vicepresidential candidate on the ticket of Mr. Adams, and received an equal vote with that gentleman: Mr. Calhoun was the vice-presidential candidate on the ticket with General Jackson, and received a slightly less vote-the deficiency being in Georgia, where the friends of Mr. Crawford still resented his believed connection with the "A. B. plot." In the previous election, he had been neutral between General Jackson and Mr. Adams; but was now decided on the part of the General, and received the same vote every where, except in Georgia. In this election there was a circumstance to be known and remembered. Mr. Adams and Mr. Rush were both from the nonslaveholding-General Jackson and Mr. Calhoun from the slaveholding States, and both large slave owners themselves-and both received a large vote (73 each) in the free Statesand of which at least forty were indispensable to their election. There was no jealousy, or hostile, or aggressive spirit in the North at that time against the South! The election of General Jackson was a triumph of democratic principle, and an assertion of the people's right to govern themselves. That principle had been violated in the presidential election in the House of Representatives in the sesŝion of 1824-25; and the sanction, or rebuke, of that violation was a leading question in the whole canvass. It was also a triumph over the high protective policy, and the federal internal improvement policy, and the latitudinous construction of the constitution; and of the democracy over the federalists, then called national republicans; and was the re-establishment of parties on principle, according to the landmarks of the early ages of the government. For although and will oppose it, that is, my knowledge, to the Mr. Adams had received confidence and office from Mr. Madison and Mr. Monroe, and had classed with the democratic party during the fusion of parties in the "era of good feeling," yet he had previously been federal; and in the re-establishment of old party lines which began to take place after the election of Mr. Adams in the House of Representatives, his affinities, and policy, became those of his former party: and as a party, with many individual exceptions, they became his supporters and his strength. General Jackson, on the contrary, had always been democratic, so classing when he was a senator in Congress under the administration of the first Mr. Adams, and when party lines were most straightly drawn, and upon principle: and as such now receiving the support of men and States which took their political position at that time, and had maintained it ever since-Mr. Macon and Mr. Randolph, for example, and the States of Virginia and Pennsylvania. And here it becomes my duty to notice an error, or a congeries of errors, of Mons. de Tocqueville, in relation to the causes of General Jackson's election; and which he finds exclusively in the glare of a military fame resulting from "a very ordinary achievement, only to be remembered where battles are rare." He says: "General Jackson, whom the Americans have twice elected to the head of their government, is a man of a violent temper and mediocre talents. No one circumstance in the whole course of his career ever proved that he is qualified to govern a free people; and, indeed, the majority of the enlightened classes of the Union has always been opposed to him. But he was raised to the Presidency, and has been maintained in that lofty station, solely by the recollection of a victory which he gained twenty years ago, under the walls of New Orleans;-a victory which, however, was a very ordinary achievement, and which could only be remembered in a country where battles are rare."-(Chapter 17.) This may pass for American history, in Europe and in a foreign language, and even finds abettors here to make it American history in the United States, with a preface and notes to enforce and commend it: but America will find historians of her own to do justice to the nation al, and to individual character. In the mean time I have some knowledge of General Jackson, and the American people, and the two presidential elections with which they honored the General; flippant and shallow statements of Mons. de Tocqueville. "A man of violent temper." I ought to know something about that-contemporaries will understand the allusion-and I can say that General Jackson had a good temper, kind and hospitable to every body, and a feeling of protection in it for the whole human race, and especially the weaker and humbler part of it. He had few quarrels on his own account; and probably the very ones of which Mons. de Tocqueville had heard were accidental, against his will, and for the succor of friends. "Mediocre talent, and no capacity to govern a free people." In the first place, free people are not governed by any man, but by laws. But to understand the phrase as perhaps intended, that he had no capacity for civil administration, let the condition of the country at the respective periods when he took up, and when he laid down the administration, answer. He found the country in domestic distress-pecuniary distress-and the national and state legislation invoked by leading politicians to relieve it by empirical remedies;-tariffs, to relieve one part of the community by taxing the other;-internal improvement, to distribute public money;—a national bank, to cure the paper money evils of which it was the author;-the public lands the pillage of broken bank paper;depreciated currency and ruined exchanges;— a million and a half of "unavailable funds” in the treasury;—a large public debt;-the public money the prey of banks ;-no gold in the country-only twenty millions of dollars in silver, and that in banks which refused, when they pleased, to pay it down in redemption of their own notes, or even to render back to depositors. Stay laws, stop laws, replevin laws, baseless paper, the resource in half the States to save the debtor from his creditor; and national bankrupt laws from Congress, and local insolvent laws, in the States, the demand of every session. Indian tribes occupying a half, or a quarter of the area of southern States, and unsettled questions of wrong and insult, with half the powers of Europe. Such was the state of the country when General Jackson became President: what was it when he left the Presidency? Protective tariffs, and federal internal improvement discarded; the national bank left to expire upon its own limitation; the public lands redeemed from the pillage of broken bank paper; no more "unavailable |