DEATH OF JOHN TAYLOR, OF CAROLINE.
For by that designation was discriminated, in his own State, the
eminent republican statesman of Virginia, who was a Senator in
Congress in the first term of General Washington's administration,
and in the last term of Mr. Monroe--and who, having voluntarily
withdrawn himself from that high station during the intermediate
thirty years, devoted himself to the noble pursuits of agriculture,
literature, the study of political economy, and the service of his
State or county when called by his fellow-citizens. Personally I
knew him but slightly, our meeting in the Senate being our first
acquaintance, and our senatorial association limited to the single
session of which he was a member--1823-24;--at the end of which he
died. But all my observation of him, and his whole appearance and
deportment, went to confirm the reputation of his individuality
of character, and high qualities of the head and the heart. I
can hardly figure to myself the ideal of a republican statesman
more perfect and complete than he was in reality:--plain and
solid, a wise counsellor, a ready and vigorous debater, acute and
comprehensive, ripe in all historical and political knowledge,
innately republican--modest, courteous, benevolent, hospitable--a
skilful, practical farmer, giving his time to his farm and his
books, when not called by an emergency to the public service--and
returning to his books and his farm when the emergency was over.
His whole character was announced in his looks and deportment,
and in his uniform (senatorial) dress--the coat, waistcoat, and
pantaloons of the same "London brown," and in the cut of a former
fashion--beaver hat with ample brim--fine white linen--and a
gold-headed cane, carried not for show, but for use and support
when walking and bending under the heaviness of years. He seemed
to have been cast in the same mould with Mr. Macon, and it was
pleasant to see them together, looking like two Grecian sages, and
showing that regard for each other which every one felt for them
both. He belonged to that constellation of great men which shone
so brightly in Virginia in his day, and the light of which was
not limited to Virginia, or our America, but spread through the
bounds of the civilized world. He was the author of several works,
political and agricultural, of which his _Arator_ in one class, and
his _Construction Construed_ in another, were the principal--one
adorning and exalting the plough with the attributes of science;
the other exploring the confines of the federal and the State
governments, and presenting a mine of constitutional law very
profitably to be examined by the political student who will not be
repulsed from a banquet of rich ideas, by the quaint Sir Edward
Coke style--(the only point of resemblance between the republican
statesman, and the crown officer of Elizabeth and James)--in which
it is dressed. Devotion to State rights was the ruling feature
of his policy; and to keep both governments, State and federal,
within their respective constitutional orbits, was the labor of his
political life.
In the years 1798 and '99, Mr. Taylor was a member of the General
Assembly of his State, called into service by the circumstances
of the times; and was selected on account of the dignity and
gravity of his character, his power and readiness in debate, and
his signal devotion to the rights of the States, to bring forward
those celebrated resolutions which Mr. Jefferson conceived, which
his friends sanctioned, which Mr. Madison drew up, and which "John
Taylor, of Caroline," presented;--which are a perfect exposition
of the principles of our duplicate form of government, and of the
limitations upon the power of the federal government;--and which,
in their declaration of the unconstitutionality of the alien and
sedition laws, and appeal to other States for their co-operation,
had nothing in view but to initiate a State movement by two-thirds
of the States (the number required by the fifth article of the
federal constitution), to amend, or authoritatively expound the
constitution;--the idea of forcible resistance to the execution of
any act of Congress being expressly disclaimed at the time.