I beg permission to offer my hearty thanks, and to make my respectful
acknowledgments, for the affectionate reception which has been given
me during my present visit to my old congressional district, and for
this hospitable and honorable testimony of your esteem and confidence.
And I thank you especially for the friendly sentiments and feelings
expressed in the toast which you have just done me the honor to drink.
I always had the happiness of knowing that I enjoyed, in a high degree,
the attachment of that portion of my fellow-citizens whom I formerly
represented; but I should never have been sensible of the strength
and ardor of their affection, except for the extraordinary character
of the times. For near two years and a half I have been assailed with
a rancor and bitterness which have few examples. I have found myself
the particular object of concerted and concentrated abuse; and others,
thrusting themselves between you and me, have dared to arraign me for
treachery to your interests. But my former constituents, unaffected
by the calumnies which have been so perseveringly circulated to my
prejudice, have stood by me with a generous confidence and a noble
magnanimity. The measure of their regard and confidence has risen
with, and even surpassed, that of the malevolence, great as it is,
of my personal and political foes. I thank you, gentlemen, who are a
large portion of my late constituents. I thank you, and every one of
them, with all my heart, for the manly support which I have uniformly
received. It has cheered and consoled me, amidst all my severe trials;
and may I not add, that it is honorable to the generous hearts and
enlightened heads who have resolved to protect the character of an old
friend and faithful servant.
The numerous manifestations of your confidence and attachment will
be among the latest and most treasured recollections of my life. They
impose upon me obligations which can never be weakened or cancelled.
One of these obligations is, that I should embrace every fair
opportunity to vindicate that character which you have so generously
sustained, and to evince to you and to the world, that you have not
yielded to the impulses of a blind and enthusiastic sentiment. I feel
that I am, on all fit occasions, especially bound to vindicate myself
to my former constituents. It was as _their_ representative, it was
in fulfilment of a high trust which _they_ confided to me, that I have
been accused of violating the most sacred of duties――of treating their
wishes with contempt, and their interests with treachery. Nor is this
obligation, in my conception of its import, at all weakened by the
dissolution of the relations which heretofore existed between us. I
would instantly resign the place I hold in the councils of the nation,
and directly appeal to the suffrages of my late constituents, as a
candidate for reëlection, if I did not know that my foes are of that
class whom one rising from the dead cannot convince, whom nothing can
silence, and who wage a war of extermination. On the issue of such
an appeal they would redouble their abuse of you and of me, for their
hatred is common to us both.
They have compelled me so often to be the theme of my addresses to
the people, that I should have willingly abstained, on this festive
occasion, from any allusion to this subject, but for a new and imposing
form which the calumny against me has recently assumed. I am again put
on my defence, not of any new charge, nor by any new adversary; but
of the old charges, clad in a new dress, and exhibited by an open and
undisguised enemy. The fictitious names have been stricken from the
foot of the indictment, and that of a known and substantial prosecutor
has been voluntarily offered. Undaunted by the formidable name of that
prosecutor, I will avail myself, with your indulgence, of this fit
opportunity of free and unreserved intercourse with you, as a large
number of my late constituents, to make some observations on the past
and present state of the question. When evidence shall be produced, as
I have now a clear right to demand, in support of the accusation, it
will be the proper time for me to take such notice of it as its nature
shall require.
In February, 1825, it was my duty, as the representative of this
district, to vote for some one of the three candidates for the
presidency, who were returned to the house of representatives. It has
been established, and can be further proved, that, before I left this
state the preceding fall, I communicated to several gentlemen of the
highest respectability, my fixed determination not to vote for general
Jackson. The friends of Mr. Crawford asserted to the last, that the
condition of his health was such as to enable him to administer the
duties of the office. I thought otherwise, after I reached Washington
city, and visited him to satisfy myself; and thought that physical
impediment, if there were no other objections, ought to prevent his
election. Although the delegations from four states voted for him,
and his pretensions were zealously pressed to the very last moment,
it has been of late asserted, and I believe by some of the very persons
who then warmly espoused his cause, that his incompetency was so
palpable as clearly to limit the choice to two of the three returned
candidates. In my view of my duty, there was no alternative but that
which I embraced. That I had some objections to Mr. Adams, I am ready
freely to admit; but these did not weigh a feather in comparison
with the greater and insurmountable objections, long and deliberately
entertained against his competitor. I take this occasion, with great
satisfaction, to state, that my objections to Mr. Adams arose chiefly
from apprehensions which have not been realized. I have found him at
the head of the government able, enlightened, patient of investigation,
and ever ready to receive with respect, and, when approved by his
judgment, to act upon, the counsels of his official advisers. I add,
with unmixed pleasure, that, from the commencement of the government,
with the exception of Mr. Jefferson’s administration, no chief
magistrate has found the members of his cabinet so united on all public
measures, and so cordial and friendly in all their intercourse, private
and official, as these are of the present president.
Had I voted for general Jackson, in opposition to the well-known
opinions which I entertained of him, one tenth part of the ingenuity
and zeal which have been employed to excite prejudices against me,
would have held me up to universal contempt; and what would have been
worse, _I_ should have _felt_ that I really deserved it.
Before the election, an attempt was made by an abusive letter,
published in the Columbian Observer, at Philadelphia, a paper which,
as has since transpired, was sustained by Mr. senator Eaton, the
colleague, the friend, and the biographer of general Jackson, to
assail my motives, and to deter me in the exercise of my duty. This
letter being avowed by Mr. George Kremer, I instantly demanded from the
house of representatives an investigation. A committee was accordingly,
on the fifth day of February, 1825, appointed in the rare mode of
balloting by the house, instead of by selection of the speaker. It was
composed of some of the leading members of that body, not one of whom
was my political friend in the preceding presidential canvass. Although
Mr. Kremer, in addressing the house, had declared his willingness to
bring forward his proofs, and his readiness to abide the issue of the
inquiry, his fears, or other counsels than his own, prevailed upon him
to take refuge in a miserable subterfuge. Of all possible periods, that
was the most fitting to substantiate the charge, if it were true. Every
circumstance was then fresh; the witnesses all living and present; the
election not yet complete; and therefore the imputed corrupt bargain
not fulfilled. All these powerful considerations had no weight with
the conspirators and their accessories, and they meanly shrunk from
even an attempt to prove their charge, for the best of all possible
reasons――because, being false and fabricated, they could adduce no
proof which was not false and fabricated.
During two years and a half, which have now intervened, a portion of
the press devoted to the cause of general Jackson has been teeming with
the vilest calumnies against me, and the charge, under every chameleon
form, has been a thousand times repeated. Up to this time, I have in
vain invited investigation, and demanded evidence. None, not a particle,
has been adduced.
The extraordinary ground has been taken, that the accusers were not
bound to establish by proof the guilt of their designated victim. In
a civilized, christian, and free community, the monstrous principle
has been assumed, that accusation and conviction are synonymous; and
that the persons who deliberately bring forward an atrocious charge are
exempted from all obligations to substantiate it! And the pretext is,
that the crime, being of a political nature, is shrouded in darkness,
and incapable of being substantiated. But is there any real difference,
in this respect, between political and other offences? Do not all the
perpetrators of crime endeavor to conceal their guilt and to elude
detection? If the accuser of a political offence is absolved from
the duty of supporting his accusation, every other accuser of offence
stands equally absolved. Such a principle, practically carried into
society, would subvert all harmony, peace, and tranquillity. None――no
age, nor sex, nor profession, nor calling――would be safe against its
baleful and overwhelming influence. It would amount to a universal
license to universal calumny!
No one has ever contended that the proof should be exclusively that
of eye-witnesses, testifying from their senses positively and directly
to the fact. Political, like other offences, may be established by
circumstantial as well as positive evidence. But I do contend, that
_some_ evidence, be it what it may, ought to be exhibited. If there be
none, how do the accusers know that an offence has been perpetrated?
If they do know it, let us have the _fact_ on which their conviction
is based. I will not even assert, that, in public affairs, a citizen
has not a right freely to express his _opinions_ of public men, and
to speculate upon the motives of their conduct. But if he chooses to
promulgate opinions, let them be given as _opinions_. The public will
correctly judge of their value and their grounds. No one has a right
to put forth a positive assertion, that a political offence has been
committed, unless he stands prepared to sustain, by satisfactory proof
of some kind, its actual existence.
If he who exhibits a charge of political crime is, from its very nature,
disabled to establish it, how much more difficult is the condition of
the accused? How can he exhibit negative proof of his innocence, if no
affirmative proof of his guilt is or can be adduced?
It must have been a conviction that the justice of the public required
a definite charge, by a responsible accuser, that has at last extorted
from general Jackson his letter of the sixth of June, lately published.
I approach that letter with great reluctance, not on my own account,
for on that I do most heartily and sincerely rejoice that it has
made its appearance. But it is reluctance, excited by the feelings of
respect which I would anxiously have cultivated towards its author. He
has, however, by that letter, created such relations between us, that,
in any language which I may employ, in examining its contents, I feel
myself bound by no other obligations than those which belong to truth,
to public decorum, and to myself.
The first consideration which must, on the perusal of the letter, force
itself upon every reflecting mind, is that which arises out of the
delicate posture in which general Jackson stands before the American
public. He is a candidate for the presidency, avowed and proclaimed. He
has no competitor at present, and there is no probability of his having
any, but one. The charges which he has allowed himself to be the organ
of communicating to the very public who is to decide the question of
the presidency, though directly aimed at me, necessarily implicate
his only competitor. Mr. Adams and myself are both guilty, or we are
both innocent of the imputed arrangement between us. _His_ innocence
is absolutely irreconcilable with _my_ guilt. If general Jackson,
therefore, can establish my guilt, and, by inference or by insinuation,
that of his sole rival, he will have removed a great obstacle to the
consummation of the object of his ambition. And if he can, at the same
time, make out his own purity of conduct, and impress the American
people with the belief, that his purity and integrity alone prevented
his success before the house of representatives, his claims will become
absolutely irresistible. Were there ever more powerful motives to
propagate, was there ever greater interest, at all hazards, to prove
the truth of charges?
I state the case, I hope, fairly; I mean to state it fairly and
fearlessly. If the position be one which exposes general Jackson
to unfavorable suspicions, it must be borne in mind that he has
voluntarily taken it, and he must abide the consequences. I am acting
on the defensive, and it is he who assails me, and who has called forth,
by the eternal laws of self-protection, the right to use all legitimate
means of self-defence.
General Jackson has shown in his letter, that he is not exempt
from the influence of that bias towards one’s own interest, which
is unfortunately the too common lot of human nature. It is _his_
interest to make out that he is a person of spotless innocence, and of
unsullied integrity; and to establish by direct charge, or by necessary
inference, the want of those qualities in his rival. Accordingly, we
find, throughout the letter, a labored attempt to set forth his own
immaculate purity in striking contrast with the corruption which is
attributed to others. We would imagine from his letter, that he very
seldom touches a newspaper. The Telegraph is mailed regularly for him
at Washington, but it arrives at the Hermitage very irregularly. He
would have the public to infer, that the postmaster at Nashville, whose
appointment happened not to be upon his recommendation, obstructed his
reception of it. In consequence of his not receiving the Telegraph,
he had not on the sixth of June, 1827, seen Carter Beverley’s famous
Fayetteville letter, dated the eighth of the preceding March, published
in numerous gazettes, and published, I have very little doubt, although
I have not the means of ascertaining the fact, in the gazettes of
Nashville. I will not say, contrary to general Jackson’s assertion,
that he had never read that letter, when he wrote that of the sixth
of June, but I must think that it is very strange that he should
not have seen it; and I doubt whether there is another man of any
political eminence in the United States who has not read it. There is a
remarkable coincidence between general Jackson and certain editors who
espouse his interest, in relation to Mr. Beverley’s letter. They very
early took the ground, in respect to it, that I ought, under my _own
signature_, to come out and deny the statements. And general Jackson
now says, in his letter of the sixth of June, that he ‘always intended,
should Mr. Clay come out over his own signature, and deny having any
knowledge of the communication made by his friends to my friends and to
me, that I would give him the name of the gentleman through whom that
communication came.’
The distinguished member of congress who bore the alleged overture,
according to general Jackson, presented himself with diplomatic
circumspection, lest he should wound the very great sensibility of
the general. He avers that the communication was intended with the
most friendly motives, ‘that he came as a friend,’ and that he hoped,
however it might be received, there would be no alteration in the
friendly feelings between them. The general graciously condescends to
receive the communication, and, in consideration of the high standing
of the distinguished member, and of his having always been a professed
friend, he is promised impunity, and assured that there shall be no
change of amicable ties. After all these necessary preliminaries are
arranged between the high negotiating powers, the envoy proceeds: ‘he
had been informed by the friends of Mr. Clay, that the friends of Mr.
Adams had made overtures to them, saying if Mr. Clay and his friends
would unite in aid of the election of Mr. Adams, Mr. Clay should be
secretary of state; that the friends of Mr. Adams were urging, as a
reason to induce the friends of Mr. Clay to accede to their proposition,
that if I was elected president, Mr. Adams would be continued secretary
of state, (inuendo, there would be no room for Kentucky.)’ [Is this
general Jackson’s inuendo, or that of the distinguished member of
congress?] ‘That the friends of Mr. Clay stated the west does not
want to separate from the west, and if I would say, or permit any of
my confidential friends to say that, in case I was elected president,
Mr. Adams should not be continued secretary of state, by a complete
union of Mr. Clay and his friends, they would put an end to the
presidential contest in one hour; and he was of opinion it was right
to fight such intriguers with their own weapons.’ To which the general
states himself to have replied in substance, ‘that in politics, as in
every thing else, my guide was principle, and contrary to the expressed
and unbiased will of the people or their constituted agents, I never
would step into the presidential chair; and requested him to say to Mr.
Clay and his friends, (for I did _suppose_ he had come from Mr. Clay,
_although he used the terms Mr. Clay’s friends_,) that before I would
reach the presidential chair by such means of bargain and corruption, I
would see the earth open and swallow both Mr. Clay and his friends and
myself with them.’ Now all these professions are very fine, and display
admirable purity. But its sublimity would be somewhat more impressive,
if some person other than general Jackson had proclaimed it. He would
go into the presidential chair, but never, no! never, contrary to ‘the
expressed and unbiased will of the people, or their constituted agents:’
two modes of arriving at it the more reasonable, as there happens to
be no other constituted way. He would see ‘the earth open and swallow
both Mr. Clay and his friends and myself,’ before he would reach the
presidential chair by ‘such means of bargain and corruption.’ I hope
general Jackson did not intend that the whole human race should be
also swallowed up, on the contingency he has stated, or that they were
to guaranty that he has an absolute repugnance to the employment of
any exceptionable means to secure his elevation to the presidency.
If he had rendered the distinguished member of congress a little more
distinguished, by instantly ordering him from his presence, and by
forthwith denouncing him and the infamous propositions which he bore,
to the American public, we should be a little better prepared to admit
the claims to untarnished integrity, which the general so modestly puts
forward. But, according to his own account, a corrupt and scandalous
proposal is made to him; the person who conveyed it, advises him to
accept it, and yet that person still retains the friendship of general
Jackson, who is so tender of his character that his name is carefully
concealed and reserved to be hereafter brought forward as a witness! A
man, who, if he be a member of the house of representatives, is doubly
infamous――infamous for the advice which he gave, and infamous for his
willingness to connive at the corruption of the body of which he is a
sworn member――is the credible witness by whom general Jackson stands
ready to establish the corruption of men, whose characters are never
questioned!
Of all the properties which belong to honorable men, not one is
so highly prized as that of character. General Jackson cannot be
insensible to its value, for he appears to be the most anxious to set
forth the loftiness and purity of his own. How has he treated mine?
During the dispensation of the hospitalities of the hermitage, in the
midst of a mixed company of individuals from various states, he permits
himself to make certain statements respecting my friends and me, which,
if true, would forever dishonor and degrade us. The words are hardly
passed from his mouth, before they are committed to paper, by one
of his guests, and transmitted in the form of a letter to another
state, when they are published in a newspaper, and thence circulated
throughout the union. And now he pretends that these statements were
made ‘without any calculation that they were to be thrown into the
public journals.’ Does he reprove the indiscretion of this guest who
had violated the sanctity of a conversation at the hospitable board?
Far from it. The public is incredulous. It cannot be, general Jackson
would be so wanting in delicacy and decorum. The guest appeals to
him for the confirmation of the published statements; and the general
promptly addresses a letter to him, in which ‘he unequivocally confirms
(says Mr. Carter Beverley,) all I have said regarding the overture made
to him pending the last presidential election before congress; and he
_asserts a great deal more than he ever told me_.’ I should be glad to
know if all the versions of the tale have now made their appearance,
and whether general Jackson will allege, that he did not ‘calculate’
upon the publication of his letter of the sixth of June.
The general states that the unknown envoy used the terms, ‘Mr. Clay’s
friends,’ to the exclusion, therefore, of myself, but he nevertheless
inferred that he had come from me. Now, why did he draw this inference
contrary to the import of the statement which he received? Does not
this disposition to deduce conclusions unfavorable to me, manifest
the spirit which actuates him? And does not general Jackson exhibit
throughout his letter a desire to give a coloring to the statements
of his friend, the distinguished member of congress, higher than
they would justify? No one should ever resort to implication but
from necessity. Why did he not ascertain from the envoy if he had
come from me? Was any thing more natural than that general Jackson
should ascertain the persons who had deputed the envoy? If his slacked
sensibility and indignant virtue and patriotism would not allow him
to inquire into particulars, ought he to have hazarded the assertion,
that I was privy to the proposal, without assuring himself of the fact;
could he not, after rejecting the proposal, continuing, as he did, on
friendly terms with the organ of it, have satisfied himself if I were
conusant of it? If he had not time then, might he not have ascertained
the fact from his friend or from me, during the intervening two and a
half years? The compunctions of his own conscience appear for a moment
to have visited him towards the conclusion of his letter, for he there
does say, ‘that in the supposition stated, _I may_ have done injustice
to Mr. Clay; if so, the gentleman informing me can explain.’ No good
or honorable man will do another voluntarily any injustice. It was not
necessary that general Jackson should have done me any. And he cannot
acquit himself of the rashness and iniquity of his conduct towards me,
by referring at this late day to a person whose name is withheld from
the public. This compendious mode of administering justice, by first
hanging and then trying a man, however justifiable it may be, according
to the precepts of the Jackson code, is sanctioned by no respectable
system of jurisprudence.
It is stated in the letter of the sixth of June, that the overture was
made early in January; and that the second day after the communication,
it ‘was announced in the newspapers, that Mr. Clay had come out openly
and avowedly in favor of Mr. Adams.’ The object of this statement is
obvious. It is to insinuate that the proposal which was rejected with
disdain by general Jackson, was accepted with promptitude by Mr. Adams.
This renders the fact as to the time of the alleged annunciation very
important. It is to be regretted that general Jackson had not been a
little more precise. It was _early_ in January that the overture was
made, and the _second_ day after, the annunciation of my intention
took place. Now, I will not assert that there may not have been some
speculations in the newspapers about that time, (although I do not
believe there were any _speculations_ so early,) as to the probable
vote which I should give; but I should be glad to see any newspaper
which the second day after early in January, asserted in its columns,
that I had come out ‘openly and avowedly in favor of Mr. Adams.’
I challenge the production of such a paper. I do not believe my
intention so to vote for Mr. Adams was announced in the newspapers
openly and avowedly during the whole month of January, or at any
rate until late in that month. The only _avowal_ of my intention to
vote for him, which was publicly made in the newspapers, prior to the
election, is contained in my letter to Judge Brooke, which is dated
the twenty-eighth of January. It was first published in the Enquirer
at Richmond, some time in the ensuing month. I go further; I do not
believe any newspaper at Washington can be produced, announcing, before
the latter part of January, the fact, whether upon my avowal or not,
of my intention to vote for Mr. Adams. General Jackson’s memory must
deceive him. He must have confounded events and circumstances. His
friend, Mr. George Kremer, in his letter to the Columbian Observer
bearing date the twenty-fifth of January, has, according to my
recollection of the public prints, a claim to the merit of being the
first, or among the first, to announce to the public my intended vote.
That letter was first published at Philadelphia, and returned in the
Columbian Observer to Washington city, on the thirty-first of January.
How long before its date that letter was written to Mr. Kremer, does
not appear. Whether there be any connection made by the distinguished
member of congress, and that letter, perhaps general Jackson can
explain.
At the end of more than two years after a corrupt overture has
been made to general Jackson, he now, for the first time, openly
proclaims it. It is true, as I have ascertained since the publication
of Mr. Beverley’s Fayetteville letter, the general has been for a long
time secretly circulating the charge. Immediately on the appearance
at Washington of that letter in the public prints, the editor of the
Telegraph asserted, in his paper, that general Jackson had communicated
the overture to him about the period of the election, not as he now
states, but according to Mr. Beverley’s version of the tale. Since
I left Washington on the tenth of last month, I have understood that
general Jackson has made a similar communication to several other
persons at different and distant points. Why has the overture been
thus clandestinely circulated? Was it that through the medium of the
Telegraph, the leading paper supporting the interest of general Jackson,
and through his other depositories, the belief of the charge should be
duly and gradually infused into the public mind, and thus contribute
to the support of his cause? The zeal and industry with which it has
been propagated, the daily columns of certain newspapers can testify.
Finding the public still unconvinced, has the general found it to
be necessary to come out in proper person, through the thin veil of
Mr. Carter Beverley’s agency?
When the alleged overture was made, the election remained undecided.
Why did not general Jackson then hold up to universal scorn and
indignation the infamous bearer of the proposal, and those who dared
to insult his honor, and tamper with his integrity? If he had at that
time denounced all the infamous parties concerned, demanded an inquiry
in the house of representatives, and established by satisfactory proof
the truth of his accusation, there might and probably would have been a
different result to the election. Why, when at my instance, a committee
was on the fifth day of February, 1825, (only four days before the
election,) appointed to investigate the charges of Mr. Kremer, did not
general Jackson present himself and establish their truth? Why, on the
seventh of that month, two days before the election, when the committee
reported that Mr. Kremer declined to come forward, and that ‘if _they
knew_ of any reason for such investigation, they would have asked to
be clothed with the proper power, but not having themselves any such
knowledge, they have felt it to be their duty only to lay before the
house the communication which they have received;’ why did not general
Jackson authorize a motion to recommit the report, and manfully come
forward with all his information? The congress of the nation is in
session. An important election has devolved on it. All eyes are turned
towards Washington. The result is awaited with intense anxiety and
breathless expectation. A corrupt proposition, affecting the election,
is made to one of the candidates. He receives it, is advised to
accept it, deliberates, decides upon it. A committee is in session to
investigate the very charge. The candidate, notwithstanding, remains
profoundly silent, and, after the lapse of more than two years, when
the period of another election is rapidly approaching, in which he is
the only competitor for the office, for the first time, announces it
to the American republic! They must have more than an ordinary share
of credulity who do not believe that general Jackson labors under some
extraordinary delusion.
It is possible that he may urge by way of excuse, for what must be
deemed his culpable concealment of meditated corruption, that he did
not like to volunteer as a witness before the committee, or to transmit
to it the name of his friend, the distinguished member of the house
of representatives, although it is not very easy to discern any just
reason for his volunteering now, which would not have applied with
more force at that time. But what apology can be made for his failure
to discharge his sacred duty as an American senator? More than two
months after the alleged overture, my nomination to the office which
I now hold, was made to the senate of the United States, of which
general Jackson was then a sworn member. On that nomination he had to
deliberate and to act in the most solemn manner. If I were privy to
a corrupt proposal to general Jackson, touching the recent election;
if I had entered into a corrupt bargain with Mr. Adams to secure his
elevation, I was unworthy of the office to which I was nominated;
and it was the duty of general Jackson, if he really possessed the
information which he now puts forward, to have moved the senate to
appoint a committee of inquiry, and by establishing my guilt, to have
preserved the national councils from an abominable contamination.
As the conspiracy of George Kremer & Co. had a short time before
meanly shrunk from appearing before the committee of the house of
representatives, to make good their charges, I requested a senator
of the United States, when my nomination should be taken up, to ask
of the senate the appointment of a committee of inquiry, unless it
should appear to him to be altogether unnecessary. One of our senators
was compelled, by the urgency of his private business, to leave
Washington before my nomination was disposed of; and as I had but
little confidence in the fidelity and professed friendship of the
other, I was constrained to present my application to a senator from
another state. I was afterwards informed that when it was acted upon,
general Jackson, and every other senator present, was silent as to the
imputation now made; no one presuming to question my honor or integrity.
How can general Jackson justify to his conscience or to his country,
this palpable breach of his public duty? It is in vain to say that
he gave a silent negative vote. _He_ was in possession of information
which, if true, must have occasioned the rejection of my nomination. It
does not appear that any other senator possessed the same information.
Investigation was alike due to the purity of the national councils,
to me, and, as an act of strict justice, to all the other parties
implicated. It is impossible for him to escape from the dilemma that
he has been faithless as a senator of the United States, or has lent
himself to the circulation of an atrocious calumny.
After the election, general Jackson was among the first who eagerly
pressed his congratulations upon his successful rival. If Mr. Adams had
been guilty of the employment of impure means to effect his election,
general Jackson ought to have disdained to sully his own hands by
touching those of his corrupt competitor.
On the tenth of February, 1825, the very next day after the election,
general Jackson was invited to a public dinner at Washington, by some
of his friends. He expressed to them his wish that he might be excused
from accepting the invitation, because, alluding to the recent election,
he said, ‘any evidence of kindness and regard, such as you propose,
might, by many, be viewed as conveying with it EXCEPTION, murmurings,
and feelings of complaint, which I sincerely hope belong to none of my
friends.’ More than one month after the corrupt proposal is pretended
to have been received, and after, according to the insinuation of
general Jackson, a corrupt arrangement had been made between Mr. Adams
and me: after the actual termination of an election, the issue of which
was brought about, according to general Jackson, by the basest means,
he was unwilling to accept the honors of a public dinner, lest it
should imply even an _exception_ against the result of the election.
General Jackson professes in his letter of the sixth of June――I
quote again his words――‘to have always intended, should Mr. Clay
come out over his own signature, and deny having any knowledge of
the communication made by his friends to my friends, and to me,
that I would give him the name of the gentleman through whom that
communication came.’ He pretends never to have seen the Fayetteville
letter; and yet the pretext of a denial under _my signature_ is
precisely that which had been urged by the principal editors who
sustain his cause. If this be an unconcerted, it is nevertheless a
most wonderful coincidence. The general never communicated to me his
professed intention, but left me in entire ignorance of his generous
purpose; like the overture itself, it was profoundly concealed from
me. There was an authorized denial from me, which went to the circle
of the public prints, immediately after the arrival at Washington of
the Fayetteville letter. In that denial my words are given. They were
contained in a letter dated at Washington city on the eighteenth day of
April last, and are correctly stated to have been ‘that the statement
that his (my) friends had made such a proposition as the latter
describes to the friends of general Jackson was, as far as he knew
or believed, utterly destitute of foundation; that he was unwilling
to believe that general Jackson had made any such statement; but
that no matter with whom it had originated, he was fully persuaded
it was a gross fabrication of the same calumnious character with the
Kremer story, put forth for the double purpose of injuring his public
character, and propping the cause of general Jackson; and then for
himself and for his friends he _defied_ the substantiation of the
charge before any fair tribunal whatever.’ Such were my own words,
transmitted in the form of a letter from a friend to a _known_ person.
Whereas the charge which they repelled was contained in a letter
written by a person then unknown to some person also unknown. Did I not
deny the charge under my own signature, in my card of the thirty-first
of January, 1825, published in the National Intelligencer? Was not
there a substantial denial of it in my letter to Judge Brooke, dated
the twenty-eighth of the same month? In my circular to my constituents?
In my Lewisburg speech? And may I not add, in the whole tenor of my
public life and conduct? If general Jackson had offered to furnish
me the name of a member of congress, who was capable of advising his
acceptance of a base and corrupt proposition, ought I to have resorted
to his infamous and discredited witness?
It has been a thousand times asserted and repeated, that I violated
instructions which I ought to have obeyed. I deny the charge; and I
am happy to have this opportunity of denying it in the presence of my
assembled constituents. The general assembly requested the Kentucky
delegation to vote in a particular way. A majority of that delegation,
including myself, voted in opposition to that request. The legislature
did not intend to give an _imperative_ instruction. The distinction
between a request and an instruction was familiar to the legislature,
and their rolls attest that the former is always addressed to the
members of the house of representatives, and the latter only to the
senators of the United States.
But I do not rely exclusively on this recognised distinction. I dispute
at once the right of the legislature to issue a mandatory instruction
to the representatives of the people. Such a right has no foundation
in the constitution, in the reason or nature of things, nor in usage of
the Kentucky legislature. Its exercise would be a manifest usurpation.
The general assembly has the incontrovertible right to express its
opinions and to proclaim its wishes on any political subject whatever;
and to such an expression great deference and respect are due; but
it is not obligatory. The people, when, in August, 1824, they elected
members to the general assembly, did not invest them with any power
to regulate or control the exercise of the discretion of the Kentucky
delegation in the congress of the United States. I put it to the candor
of every elector present, if he intended to part with his own right, or
anticipated the exertion of any such power, by the legislature, when he
gave his vote in August, 1824?
The only instruction which I received from a legitimate source,
emanated from a respectable portion of my immediate constituents; and
that directed me to exercise my own discretion, regardless of the will
of the legislature. You subsequently ratified my vote by unequivocal
demonstrations, repeatedly given, of your affectionate attachment
and your unshaken confidence. You ratified it two years ago, by the
election of my personal and political friend, (judge Clarke) to succeed
me in the house of representatives, who had himself subscribed the only
legitimate instruction which I received. You ratify it by the presence
and the approbation, of this vast and respectable assemblage.
I rejoice again and again, that the contest has at last assumed
its present practical form. Heretofore, malignant whispers and dark
surmises have been clandestinely circulated, or openly or unblushingly
uttered by irresponsible agents. They were borne upon the winds, and
like them were invisible and intangible. No responsible man stood
forward to sustain them, with his acknowledged authority. They have
at last a local habitation and a name. General Jackson has now thrown
off the mask and comes confessedly forth from behind his concealed
batteries, publicly to accuse and convict me. We stand confronted
before the American people. Pronouncing the charges, as I again
do, destitute of all foundation, and gross aspersions, whether
clandestinely or openly issued from the halls of the capitol, the
saloons of the hermitage, or by press, by pen, or by tongue, and safely
resting on my conscious integrity, I demanded the witness, and await
the event with fearless confidence.
The issue is fairly joined. The imputed offence does not comprehend
a single friend, but the collective body of my friends in congress;
and it accuses them of offering, and me with sanctioning, corrupt
_propositions_, derogating from honor, and in violation of the most
sacred of duties. The charge has been made after two years deliberation.
General Jackson has voluntarily taken his position, and without
provocation. In voting against him as president of the United States,
I gave him no just cause of offence. I exercised no more than my
indisputable privilege, as, on a subsequent occasion, of which I have
never complained, he exercised his in voting against me as secretary
of state. Had I voted for him, I must have gone counter to every
fixed principle of my public life. I believed him incompetent, and his
election fraught with danger. At this early period of the republic,
keeping steadily in view the dangers which had overturned every other
free state, I believed it to be essential to the lasting preservation
of our liberties, that a man, devoid of civil talents, and offering
no recommendation but one founded on military service, should not
be selected to administer the government. I believe so yet; and I
shall consider the days of the commonwealth numbered, when an opposite
principle is established. I believed, and still believe, that now,
when our institutions are in comparative infancy, is the time to
establish the great principle, that military qualification alone is
not a sufficient title to the presidency. If we start right, we may run
a long race of liberty, happiness, and glory. If we stumble in setting
out, we shall fall as others have fallen before us, and fall without
even a claim to the regrets or sympathies of mankind.
I have never done general Jackson, knowingly, any injustice. I have
taken pleasure, on every proper occasion, to bestow on him merited
praise, for the glorious issue of the battle of New Orleans. No
American citizen enjoyed higher satisfaction than I did with the event.
I heard it for the first time on the boulevards of Paris; and I eagerly
perused the details of the actions, with the anxious hope that I should
find that the gallant militia of my own state had avenged, on the banks
of the Mississippi, the blood which they had so freely spilt on the
disastrous field of Raisin. That hope was not then gratified; and
although I had the mortification to read in the official statement,
that they ingloriously fled, I was nevertheless thankful for the
success of the arms of my country, and felt grateful to him who had
most contributed to the ever memorable victory. This concession is not
now made for the purpose of conciliating the favor or mitigating the
wrath of general Jackson. He has erected an impassable barrier between
us, and I would scorn to accept any favor at his hands. I thank my God
that He has endowed me with a soul incapable of apprehensions from the
anger of any being but himself.