ELECTED TO CONGRESS.
Entering public life about the same time, living a short distance apart,
professing the same political principles, practicing in the same courts
of law, were Alexander H. Stephens of Taliaferro and Robert Toombs of
Wilkes. Entirely unlike in physical organism and mental make-up,
differing entirely in origin and views of life, these two men were close
personal friends, and throughout an eventful period of more than half a
century, preserved an affectionate regard for each other.
Mr. Stephens was delicate, sensitive, conservative, and sagacious, while
Toombs was impetuous, overpowering, defiant, and masterful. Stephens was
small, swarthy, fragile, while Toombs was leonine, full-blooded, and
majestic. And yet in peace and war these two men walked hand in hand,
and the last public appearance of Robert Toombs was when, bent and
weeping, he bowed his gray head at the coffin and pronounced the funeral
oration over Alexander Stephens.
In the General Assembly of 1843, Robert Toombs was a member of the
house, but his ability and power had marked him as a candidate for
Congress, and Mr. Stephens had already been promoted from the State
Senate to a seat in the national legislature at Washington. The law
requiring the State to choose congressmen on the district plan had been
passed, and the General Assembly was then engaged in laying off the
counties into congressional districts. The bill, as first reported,
included the counties of Wilkes and Taliaferro in the second district of
Georgia. Here was a problem. Toombs and Stephens had been named as Whig
candidates for the Clay campaign of 1844. To have them clash would have
been to deprive the State of their talents in the national councils. It
would be interesting to speculate as to what would have been the result
had these two men been opposed. Stephens was naturally a Union man, and
was no very ardent advocate of slavery. Toombs inherited the traditions
of the Virginia landowners. It is not improbable that the firmness of
the one would have been a foil for the fire of the other. History might
have been written differently had not the conference committee in the
Georgia Legislature in 1843 altered the schedule of districts, placing
Taliaferro in the seventh and Wilkes in the eighth Congressional
district. Both were safely Whig, and the future Vice-President and
premier of the Southern Confederacy now prepared for the canvass which
was to plunge them into their duties as members of the national
Congress.
Robert Toombs had already made his appearance in national politics in
1840. Although still a member of the Georgia Legislature, he took a deep
interest in the success of the Whig ticket for President. His power as a
stump speaker was felt in eastern Georgia, where the people gathered at
the "log cabin and hard cider" campaigns. The most daring feat of young
Toombs, just thirty years old, was in crossing the Savannah River and
meeting George McDuffie, the great Democrat of South Carolina, then in
the zenith of his fame. An eye-witness of this contest between the
champions of Van Buren and Harrison declared that McDuffie was
"harnessed lightning" himself. He was a nervous, impassioned speaker.
When the rash young Georgian crossed over to Willington, S. C., to meet
the lion in his den, Toombs rode horseback, and it was noticed that his
shirt front was stained with tobacco juice, and yet Toombs was a
remarkably handsome man. "Genius sat upon his brow, and his eyes were as
black as death and bigger than an ox's." His presence captivated even
the idolators of McDuffie. His argument and invective, his overpowering
eloquence, linger in the memory of old men now. McDuffie said of him: "I
have heard John Randolph of Roanoke, and met Burgess of Rhode Island,
but this wild Georgian is a Mirabeau."
In 1844 Robert Toombs was a delegate to the Baltimore convention which
nominated Henry Clay, and during this visit he made a speech in New York
which attracted wide attention. It threatened to raise a storm about his
head in Georgia. In his speech he arraigned Mr. Calhoun for writing his
"sugar letter" to Louisiana, and for saying that he would protect sugar
because it was the production of slave labor. Mr. Toombs declared: "If
any discrimination is made between free and slave labor it ought to be
in favor of free labor." "But," said he, "the Whigs of Georgia want no
such partial protection as Mr. Calhoun offers; they want protection for
all classes of labor and home industry. The Whigs protest against these
efforts to prejudice the South against the North, or the North against
the South. They have a common interest as well as a common history. The
blood that was mingled at Yorktown and at Eutaw cannot be kept at enmity
forever. The Whigs of Bunker Hill are the same as the Whigs of Georgia."
Mr. Toombs was actually charged in this campaign with being an
Abolitionist. He was accused of saying in a speech at Mallorysville,
Ga., during the Harrison campaign, that slavery was "a moral and
political evil." This was now brought up against him. Mr. Toombs
admitted saying that slavery was a political evil. He wrote a ringing
letter to his constituents, in which he declared that "the affected fear
and pretended suspicion of a part of the Democratic press in relation to
my views are well understood by the people. I have no language to
express my scorn and contempt for the whole crew. I have no other reply
to make to these common sewers of filth and falsehood. If I had as many
arms as Briareus they would be too few to correct the misrepresentations
of speeches I have made in the past six months."
It was on the 3d of October, 1844, that Robert Toombs spoke at a
memorable political meeting in Augusta, Ga. Augusta was in the heart of
the district which he was contesting for Congress, and the Democrats, to
strengthen their cause, brought over McDuffie from South Carolina. Large
crowds were present in the shady yard surrounding the City Hall; seats
had been constructed there, while back in the distance long trenches
were dug, and savory meats were undergoing the famous process of
barbecue. Speaking commenced at ten o'clock in the morning, and, with a
short rest for dinner, there were seven hours of oratory. People seldom
tired in those days of forensic meetings. Toombs was on his mettle. He
denounced the Democrats for dragging the slavery question before the
people to operate upon their fears. It was a bugbear everlastingly used
to cover up the true question at issue. It was kept up to operate on
the fears of the timid and the passions and prejudices of the
unsuspecting.
The young Whig then launched into a glowing defense of the National
Bank. The Democrats had asked where was the authority to charter a bank?
He would reply, "Where was the authority, in so many words, to build
lighthouses? Democrats were very strict constructionists when it was
necessary to accomplish their political purposes, but always found a way
to get around these doubts when occasion required." He taunted McDuffie
with having admitted that Congress had power to charter a bank.
Mr. Toombs contended that a tariff, with the features of protection to
American industry, had existed since the foundation of the government.
This great system of "plunder" had been supported by Jefferson.
Eloquently warming up under the Democratic charge that the tariff was a
system of robbery, Mr. Toombs appealed to every Whig and Democrat as an
American who boasted of this government as "a model to all nations of
the earth; as the consummation of political wisdom; who asks the
oppressed of all nations to come and place himself under its protection,
because it upholds the weak against the strong and protects the poor
against the rich, whether it has been going on in a system of plunder
ever since it sprang into power." "It is not true," he said, "it is not
true!"
Turning with prophetic ken to his Augusta friends, he asked what would
be the effect were the Savannah River turned through the beautiful
plains of Augusta, and manufactures built up where the industrious could
find employment. Hundreds of persons, he said, would be brought together
to spin the raw cotton grown in the State, to consume the provisions
which the farmers raised, thus diversifying their employment and
increasing their profits. "Would any man tell me," shouted the orator,
his eyes blazing, and his arms uplifted, "that this would impoverish the
country--would make paupers of the people? To increase the places where
the laborer may sell his labor would never make him a pauper. Be
controlled," said he, "in the administration of government and in all
other things, by the improvement of the age. Do not tie the living to
the dead. Others may despise the lights of science or experience; they
have a right, if they choose, to be governed by the dreams of economists
who have rejected practical evidence. But no such consistency is mine. I
will have none of it."
McDuffie in his speech declared that all the plundering which England
had been subjected to from the days of Hengist and Horsa could not equal
the plundering which the people of the exporting States had sustained.
Toombs answered that if a man must pay tax to sustain the government it
was better he should pay it in such a way as to benefit his own
countrymen than for the benefit of foreign manufacturers and foreign
capitalists.
Mr. Toombs alluded to a letter of James K. Polk to a Pennsylvania
manufacturer, as leaning toward protection.
McDuffie said that Polk's letter was "composed for that meridian."
"Henry Clay does not need an interpreter," cried Toombs. "He is the same
in the North as in the South. He would rather be right than President."
"Dallas, the Democratic nominee for vice president, is a high-tariff
man," said Toombs. "He voted for the tariff of 1832 and against the
compromise measures. Although the sword was drawn to drink the blood of
McDuffie's friends in Carolina, Dallas would still adhere to his pound
of flesh."
Toombs concluded his great reply to McDuffie: "We have lived under the
present order of things for fifty years, and can continue to live under
it for one thousand years to come, if the people of the South are but
content to stand upon their rights as guaranteed in the Constitution,
and not work confusion by listening to ambitious politicians: by taking
as much pains to preserve a good understanding with our Northern
brethren, the vast majority of whom are inclined to respect the
limitations of the Constitution."
This was perhaps the greatest political meeting Georgia ever held.
Politics were at white heat. Toombs and McDuffie each spoke two hours.
The campaign cry was for the Whigs: "Clay, Frelinghuysen, Toombs, and
our glorious Union," and by the Democrats: "Polk, Dallas, Texas, and
Oregon." It was Whig _vs._ Loco-foco. The Whig leaders of the South were
Pettigru, Thompson, and Yeadon of South Carolina, Merriweather, Toombs,
and Stephens, of Georgia, while the Democratic lights were McDuffie,
Rhett, and Pickens of South Carolina, and Charlton, Cobb, Colquitt, and
Herschel V. Johnson of Georgia.
The campaign of 1844 was bitter in Georgia. The Whigs carried the burden
of a protective tariff, while the memories of nullification and the
Force bill were awakened by a ringing letter from George M. Troup,
condemning the tariff in his vigorous style. This forced Mr. Toombs, in
his letter accepting the congressional nomination, to review the subject
in its relation to the States' Rights party in Georgia. "The tariff of
1824," said he, "which was voted for by Andrew Jackson, carried the
principle of protection further than any preceding one. Jackson was the
avowed friend of the protective policy, yet he received the vote of
Georgia, regardless of party. In 1828 the Harrisburg convention demanded
additional protection, and this measure was carried through Congress by
the leading men of the Democratic party. It created discontent in the
South, and the Act of 1832 professed to modify the tariff--but this
measure not proving satisfactory was 'nullified' by South Carolina.
General Jackson then issued his proclamation which pronounced principles
and issues utterly at war with the rights of the States, and subversive
of the character of the government. The opponents of consolidating
principles went into opposition. Delegates met in Milledgeville in 1833,
adopted the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions, denounced the sentiments
of Jackson's proclamation, and affirmed the doctrine of States' Rights."
"The Democratic party was then," said Toombs, "cheek by jowl with the
whole tariff party in the United States, sustaining General Jackson, and
stoutly maintaining that the leaders of that spirited little band in our
sister State, whose talent shed a glory over their opposition, deserved
a halter. They sustained John C. Forsythe in voting against the
Compromise bill--that peace offering of the illustrious Henry Clay."
Mr. Toombs declared in this campaign that the effect of a tariff on the
productive industries of a country has been a disputed question among
the wisest statesmen for centuries, and that these influences are
subject to so many disturbing causes, both foreign and domestic, that
they are incapable of being reduced to fixed principles. Mr. Toombs did
not hesitate, however, to condemn "the theories of the South Carolina
school of politics."
Mr. Toombs opposed the acquisition of Texas. He did not believe the
North would consent. "It matters not," he said, "that Mexico is weak,
that the acquisition is easy. The question is just the same: Is it
right, is it just, is it the policy of this country to enlarge its
territory by conquest? The principle is condemned by the spirit of the
age, by reason, and by revelation. A people who love justice and hate
wrong and oppression cannot approve it. War in a just cause is a great
calamity to any people, and can only be justified by the highest
necessity. A people who go to war without just and sufficient cause,
with no other motive than pride and love of glory, are enemies to the
human race and deserve the execration of all mankind. What, then, must
be the judgment of a war for plunder?" He denounced the whole thing as a
land job, and declared that he would rather have "the Union without
Texas than Texas without the Union."
The Democratic opponent of Mr. Toombs in this canvass was Hon. Edward J.
Black of Screven, who had been in Congress since 1838. The new district
was safely Whig, but the young candidate had to fight the prestige of
McDuffie and Troup and opposition from numberless sources. It was
charged that he always voted in the Georgia Legislature to raise taxes.
He retorted, "It is right to resort to taxation to pay the honest debt
of a State. I did vote to raise taxes, and I glory in it. It was a duty
I owed the State, and I would go to the last dollar to preserve her good
name and honor."
While Mr. Toombs was making a speech in this canvass a man in the
audience charged him with having voted for the free banking law and
against the poor-school fund. "The gentleman," said Mr. Toombs, "seems
to find pleasure in reveling in my cast-off errors. I shall not disturb
him."
"How is this, Mr. Toombs," shouted a Democrat at another time, "here is
a vote of yours in the house journal I do not like."
"Well, my friend, there are several there that I do not like: now what
are you going to do about it?"
Especially was opposition bitter to Henry Clay. Cartoons were published
from Northern papers, of Clay whipping a negro slave, with this
inscription: "The Mill Boy of the _Slashes_." Pictures appeared in the
Democratic papers of a human figure surmounted by a pistol, a bottle,
and a deck of cards. To this a _resume_ of Clay's misdeeds was appended:
"In 1805 quarreled with Colonel Davis of Kentucky, which led to his
first duel. In 1808 challenged Humphrey Marshall, and fired three times
at his breast. In 1825 challenged the great John Randolph, and fired
once at his breast. In 1838 he planned the Cilley duel, by which a
murder was committed and a wife made a mourner. In 1841, when sixty-five
years old, and gray-headed, is under a five thousand dollar bond to keep
the peace. At twenty-nine he perjured himself to secure a seat in the
United States Senate. In 1824, made the infamous bargain with Adams by
which he sold out for a six thousand dollar office. He is well known as
a gambler and Sabbath-breaker."
But the eloquent Harry of the West had a large and devoted following. He
visited Georgia in March of this year, and charmed the people by his
eloquence and magnetism. Robert Toombs had met him at the social board
and had been won by his superb mentality and fine manners. Women paid
him the tribute of their presence wherever he spoke, and little children
scattered flowers along his path. But the November election in Georgia,
as elsewhere, was adverse to the party of Henry Clay. Toombs and
Stephens were sent to Congress, but the electoral vote of Georgia was
cast for Polk and Dallas, and the Whigs, who loved Clay as a father,
regarded his defeat as a personal affliction as well as a public
calamity.