The autumnal elections have taken place in most of the States, and
have resulted favourably to the democratic party and the President.
Last April the mayor of New York, who is a Jackson man, was chosen by
the small majority of 181 votes out of 35,147, and the Opposition
prevailed in the Common Council. The majority in favour of General
Jackson is now 2,400; several causes have contributed to produce this
result.
The name of the Bank, whose cause is closely connected with that of the
Opposition, sounds more and more odious to the ears of the multitude;
this is unjust, but it is, nevertheless, true, and some of the late
measures of the Bank have redoubled the animosity of the democratical
party towards it. It refused to show its books to the committee of
inquiry appointed by the House of Representatives, unless in the
presence of the officers of the Bank, and its enemies have persuaded
the multitude, that the _Monster_ dared not reveal the secrets of
its den to the representatives of the people.[AQ] The Bank persists,
conformably to the custom of merchants, in demanding damages on account
of the protest by the French government of the bill of exchange sold to
the Bank by the Administration, and has withheld the dividends due the
United States on their stock. The purpose is merely, say the officers
of the Bank, to bring the question of damages before the proper
tribunal. But the democratic party takes this act as the text for its
tirades against the Bank. "Behold it," they say, "setting itself above
the laws, taking the execution of justice into its own hands, and under
false pretences, laying hold of the public money." In both these cases
it is quite possible that the right was wholly on the side of the Bank,
but appearances are against it, and nothing can be more injurious to
it in a country governed by universal suffrage. Many of its friends,
admitting that the course of the Bank has been strictly legal, would
have preferred that a more prudent policy had been adopted, both for
the interest of the Bank itself and of the Opposition.
The silence of the principal speakers in Congress, who are almost
all in the ranks of the Opposition, has no less contributed to
swell its losses since the close of the session. The friends of the
Administration in Congress, and more especially in the Senate, were
beaten in debate, they felt it themselves, and their whole appearance
was a formal confession of defeat; the whole party was disconcerted by
this hesitation and embarrassment of the leaders. Since the 30th of
June, the party, generals and soldiers, has had time to rally; they
have restored their ranks beyond the reach of the fire of Messrs Clay,
Calhoun, and Webster, and they have gained a victory, which four months
ago they could not have hoped for. The revival of business in the
country has also turned to the disadvantage of the Opposition. During
the April elections in New York, the community was just recovering from
a crisis, all classes had suffered and were still suffering. It was
difficult to deny, that the distress had been caused by the President's
attack on the Bank, in what he himself called an experiment. Commerce
is now active again, the autumn business has been good, and every
thing encourages the expectation of a not less favourable state of
the spring-trade. General Jackson's experiment seems then to have
succeeded; and a great number of persons who belong to the democratic
party as their natural element, and who had quitted it in the spring,
have very naturally fallen back into its ranks.
But it is proper to explain the real extent of this victory of the
Administration; the Opposition has not actually been driven from its
former positions, but the Jackson party has maintained the greater
number of those it before occupied, and has particularly stood firm
in Pennsylvania and New York. In a word, to judge by the elections
that have already taken place, the House of Representatives in the
session that begins at the close of 1835, will be, like the present
House, composed of a majority of Jackson men. The Opposition, however,
has gained rather than lost. It has carried the State of Maryland by
a considerable majority, and has even gained the democratic State of
Ohio, upon which it hardly calculated; ten Representatives out of
nineteen from that State, belong to the Opposition, and although the
Governor is of the Jackson party, the majority of the State legislature
is Anti-Jackson, an important circumstance because the legislatures
elect the Senators in Congress.
The elections in Pennsylvania, where the Opposition has lost two
representatives, have surprised no one, but those in New York have
disappointed all calculations. I know that some well-informed Jackson
men, who had formed correct anticipations in regard to former
elections, did not expect a majority of more than three or four
hundred in the city, and, as I have before observed, they had one of
2,400. The Opposition thought itself able to contest the possession
of the State, and relied upon carrying the city. It is certainly
extraordinary, that the commercial interest should be beaten in the
first commercial city in the New World, and such a result does no
honour to the system which has caused it. The unexpected triumph of the
Opposition in Ohio had redoubled their confidence in New York; they had
celebrated with great display the junction of the young giant of the
West with the Anti-Jackson forces. One of the magnificent steamboats
belonging to the New York and Albany line, and called the Ohio, had
been sent up the river with cannon, and the roar of its guns had been
mingled with the shout of the towns and villages on the Hudson. The
little frigate Constitution, the palladium of the opposition in New
York,[AR] had been publicly paraded before the eyes of the multitude.
A packet-boat had been sent up the canal from Albany, and made the new
and flourishing towns, which at once give to and take from that great
artery of the State, life, activity, and wealth, to resound with salvos
of artillery in honor of Ohio. But now the cannon of the Opposition is
silent, and that of Tammany Hall only is heard. The little frigate,
which during the elections was hung up before the head-quarters of
the Opposition, no longer displays the coloured lights with which her
rigging was then illuminated. The streets of New York, which do not
indeed require it, receive no additional light, except from the Jackson
processions, which parade them nightly by torch-light.
The New York elections are not only important in their results, but
also on account of the order which prevailed while they were going on.
During the last six months, the spirit of anarchy had raised its head
in the United States in such a manner as to inspire serious alarm,
even among those not prone to be timid. You know what happened in
New York during the April elections; several months later, in July,
the city became the theatre of a series of outrages against the poor
blacks, which were repeated several nights. In August the same excesses
ware committed in Philadelphia, under the same pretext, and with no
less audacity and perseverance: then came the brutal assault on the
convent in Charlestown, when the retreat of peaceful nuns devoted to
the education of young girls was attacked, plundered, and burnt down,
without the Selectmen of the town having the power or the courage to
make head against the rioters, and without the well-disposed citizens,
taken by surprise by this act of savage intolerance, venturing to
interfere. (See _Note 17_). Hardly a month since, there was also
an incendiary conflagration at Philadelphia on the evening of the
election; six houses were burnt, and the firemen were driven off
by the rioters, as at Charlestown, by main force. The same evening,
an event of a more grave character occurred; several muskets were
discharged by some of the Opposition whom the mob had assailed with
stones, several persons were wounded, and one or two killed. A week
before, during the preparatory elections, an obscure and peaceable
individual was killed by a stab with a dagger.
A repetition of these scenes of disorder was feared in New York; but
nothing of the sort occurred. Nearly 36,000 voters exercised their
right of suffrage without any disturbance, although both parties were
highly excited. The merit of this wise conduct is wholly due to the
people; the Common Council had, indeed, taken extraordinary measures
for the preservation of the peace, but what is here considered
extraordinary, hardly comes up to the ordinary police in Europe. If
the multitude in the United States abstain from acts of violence, it
is because they choose to do so; if they preserve order, it is because
they love order. Three hundred constables more or less, in a city of
260,000 souls, like New York, could do nothing. Some persons, however,
attribute this moderation of the democracy wholly to its confidence
in success, and insist, that, if there had been any symptoms of the
elections going the other way, the streets would have been thronged, as
in April, by bodies of men armed with clubs.
The fate of the Bank has been decided by these elections. In fifteen
months its charter expires, and the Bank will die, to be revived ere
long under a new form, when a new series of commercial disasters, shall
have proved to the conviction of the most incredulous, that they cannot
get along without it. It is worthy of note, that it falls by the hands
of the two States that owe it the most, New York and Pennsylvania.
The blindness of Pennsylvania in particular is inexplicable. Who
would expect this stupid fury in drying up the sources of its own
prosperity? For without the Philadelphia capital, the interior
districts of the State would yet be a wilderness; its one thousand
miles of canals and railroads, its innumerable bridges, the finest
wooden structures in the world, its numerous roads, its manufactures
and mines which now enrich it, would not exist. Some persons assert,
that Pennsylvania, which begins with perhaps the most enlightened
and refined city in the United States, ends with a rural population
of German origin, the most ignorant and stupid in North America. The
conduct of the Pennsylvanians in regard to the Bank is not calculated
to change the opinion of these severe judges.[AS] As for the New York
electors, it may be supposed, that, if the seat of the Mother Bank
were in their capital, the votes of the town and the State would have
resulted very differently.
The only chance left for the Bank is, that the portion of the South
which is under the influence of Virginia, should condescend to lend
it a helping hand. Such an act of generous compassion on the part of
the South is not probable, but it is not absolutely impossible. I
have often been present at discussions between men of the South and
the North, in which the latter have said to the former: "Without us
you would be at the mercy of your slaves; it is our union with you
which will prevent them from rising and cutting your throats." The
Southerners answered: "We will take it upon ourselves to keep down our
slaves; we shall have no need of your help against any attempts at
insurrection for a long time to come. All we ask of you is, not to stir
them up to revolt. But as for you, why you are yourselves overwhelmed
by a flood of ultra-democracy. Your workmen give you the law. Before
long you will be glad to get the aid of the South to restore the
balance which your universal suffrage has destroyed." The South has now
a fine opportunity to exercise in the North this moderating power of
which it boasts the possession.
Frederic the Great, having gained a victory over the Imperialists just
after the battle of Fontenoy, wrote to Louis XV.: "I have just paid the
draft which your majesty drew on me at Fontenoy." General Jackson has
honoured the bill drawn on him by the New York electors more promptly.
A circular has been directed by the Secretary of the Treasury to the
receivers of the public money, prohibiting the reception of certain
drafts on the branch banks. These drafts were issued, merely because it
was physically impossible for the president and cashier of the Mother
Bank to sign five and ten dollar notes, fast enough to supply the place
of those that were worn out or torn in the course of circulation. They
have the same form with the Bank-notes, and pass like them, although
the charter of the Bank makes no mention of them. This act of the
Administration will, however, do no injury to the Bank; for if it is
obliged to withdraw all these drafts, amounting to seven millions, from
circulation, there is nothing to prevent its issuing bills to the same
amount. The Bank is prepared for every event; the amount of its bills
in circulation comprising the drafts on the branches, does not exceed
17 millions, and its means in specie, or other property that can be
realised at a moment's warning, exceed 20 millions. It will merely be
necessary for the president, Mr Biddle, and the cashier, Mr Jaudon,
who were already crowded with business, to devote three or four hours
a day to signing bills; for the branch drafts were only designed to
relieve them from this duty. The order of the Secretary of the Treasury
amounts, therefore, merely to a task inflicted on those gentlemen.
On both sides of the Atlantic, there is at present a reaction against
the aristocracy of money. Whilst here the eternal chorus of NO
BANK! DOWN WITH THE BANK! NO RAG-MONEY! is forever displayed on the
liberty-poles and the flags of the democracy, amongst us the bankers
are denounced from the national tribune by our most able speakers.
Do those who hope that industry will soon raise itself to political
influence and dignity, deceive themselves then? Or are not rather the
industrial classes themselves, and particularly those who are at their
head, the financial class, yet unconscious of their future destiny,
and too slow to shake off the bad habits which they contracted when
the sword was law, and work was the lot of slaves and serfs? Do not
these Princes of Industry pay too little regard to those lofty and
noble sentiments which are well worth letters of nobility, and without
which no supremacy could ever be sustained? To engage in public affairs
with dignity, the hands must be clean, the public good must be prized
above the money bags; and yet, such is the state of commercial dealings
in our day, that, without inheriting a double share of generosity
and patriotism, it is difficult to escape from them without becoming
contaminated and callous. How many honorable men are there not in the
industrial ranks, who groan over the customs to which they are obliged
to conform, over the examples which they are obliged to imitate? The
Bank of the United States must pay the penalty of the vices, which
even in our day degrade commerce, but which are henceforth to belong
only to history. It is punished for the sins of others, for this great
institution has not itself deserved the reproach of cupidity; the
services it has rendered to the country are immense; those which it has
rendered itself, that is to say, its profits, have been moderate.
I must, however, do America the justice to observe, that, although
the desire to make money is universal, yet in the principal and older
commercial centres, there is more honesty and less illiberality than
amongst us. American selfishness is less contracted than ours; it does
not stoop to petty meannesses; it operates on a more liberal scale.
There are certainly wild speculators, blind and desperate gamblers here
also: but the objects of their schemes are almost always enterprises
of public utility. The spirit of speculation in the United States
has strown this vast country with useful works, canals, railroads,
turnpike-roads, with manufactories, farms, villages, and towns; amongst
us it has been more rash, wild, and foolish, and much less productive
in useful results. It is with us mere stock-jobbing, without any good
influence on the prosperity of the country; it is a game in which the
dice are loaded, in which the credulous lose the earnings of years in
a fever-fit of a moment. Its only results are ruin and despair, and if
it contributes to people any thing, it is the cells of the mad-house.
These are sad truths, but truths which it may be useful to utter.