Marionette madison is withdrawn from the White House boards at
the close of his second term. Jefferson, working the machinery from
Monticello, replaces him with Marionette Monroe. It is now Aaron begins
his war on the system of Congressional nomination--a system which has
obtained since the days of Washington. He writes to Alston:
“_Our Virginia junta, beginning with Washington, owning Adams, and
controlled by Jefferson, having had possession of the Government for
twenty-four years, consider the nation their property, and by bawling,
‘Support the administration!’ have so far succeeded in duping the
public. The moment is auspicious for a movement which in the end must
break down this degrading system. The best citizens all over the country
are impatient of the Virginia rule, and the wrongs wrought under it.
Its administrations have been weak; offices have been bestowed merely
to preserve power, and without a smallest regard for fitness. If, then,
there be in the country a man of firmness and decision and standing, it
is your duty to hold him up to public view. There is such a man--Andrew
Jackson. He is the hero of the late war, and in the first flush of
a boundless popularity. Give him a respectable nomination, by a
respectable convention drawn from the party at large, and in the teeth
of the caucus system--so beloved of scheming Virginians--his final
victory is assured. If it does not come to-day, it will come to-morrow;
for ‘caucus,’ which is wrong, must go down; and ‘convention,’ which is
right, must prevail. Have your legislature pass resolutions condemning
the caucus system; in that way you can educate the sentiment of South
Carolina, and the country, too. Later, we will take up the business of
the convention, and Jackson’s open nomination._”
Aaron writes in similar strain to Major Lewis, Jackson’s neighbor and
man of politics in Tennessee. He winds up his letter with this:
“_Jackson ought to be admonished to be passive; for the moment he is
announced as a candidate, he will be assailed by the Virginia junta
with menaces, and those failing, with insidious promises of boons and
favors._”
On the back of this anti-caucus, pro-convention letter-writing, that
his candidate Jackson may have a proper début, Aaron pulls a Swartwout
string, pushes a Van Ness button. At once the obedient Bucktails proffer
a dinner in Jackson’s honor. The hero accepts, and comes to town. The
town is rent with joy; Bucktail enthusiasm, even in the cider days and
nights of Martling, never mounted more wildly high.
Aaron, from his back parlor in the old Jay house, directs the
excitement. It is there Jackson finds him.
“I shall not be at the dinner, general,” says Aaron; “but with Van Buren
and Davis and Van Ness and Ogden and Rutgers and Swart-wout and the
rest, you will find friends and good company about you.”
“But you?”
“There will be less said by the Clintons and the Livingstons of traitors
and murderers if I remain away. I owe it to my past to subdue lies and
slanders to a smallest limit. No; I must work my works behind bars and
bolts, and in darkened rooms. It is as well--better! After a man sees
sixty, the fewer dinners he eats, the better for him. I intend to live
to see you President; not on your account, but mine, and for the grief
it will bring my enemies. And yet it may take years. Wherefore, I must
save myself from wine and late hours--I must keep myself with care.”
Aaron and the general talk for an hour.
“And if I should become President some day,” says Jackson, as they
separate, “you may see that Southwestern enterprise of ours revived.”
“It will be too late for me,” responds Aaron. “I am old, and shall be
older. All my hopes, and the reasons of them are dead--are in the grave.
Still”--and here the black eyes sparkle in the old way--“I shall be glad
to have younger men take up the work. It should serve somewhat to wipe
‘treason’ from my fame.”
“Treason!” snorts the fiery Jackson. “Sir, no one, not fool or liar,
ever spoke of treason and Colonel Burr in one breath!”
There is a mighty dinner outpouring of Buck-tails, and Jackson--the
“hero,” the “conqueror,” the “nation’s hope and pride,” according to
orators then and there present and eloquent--is toasted to the skies. At
the close of the festival a Clintonite, one Colden, thinks to test the
Jackson feeling for Aaron. He will offer the name of Aaron’s arch enemy.
The wily Colden gets upon his feet. Lifting high his glass he loudly
gives:
“De Witt Clinton!”
The move is a surprise. It is like a sword thrust, and Van Buren,
Swartwout, Rutgers, and other Bucktail leaders know not how to parry it.
Jackson, the guest of honor, is not, however, to be put in the attitude
of offering even tacit insult to the absent Aaron. He cannot reply in
words, but he manages a retort, obvious and emphatic. As though the word
“Clinton” were a signal, he arises from his place and leaves the room.
The thing is as unmistakable in its meaning, as it is magnificent in its
friendly loyalty to Aaron, and shows that Jackson has not changed since
that street-corner Richmond oratory so disturbing to Wirt and Hay. Also,
it removes whatever of doubt exists as to what will be Aaron’s place in
event of Jackson’s occupation of the White House. The maladroit Colden,
intending outrage, brings out compliment; and, as the gaunt Jackson goes
stalking from the hall, there descends a storm of Bucktail cheers,
and shouts of “Burr! Burr!” with a chorus of hisses for Clinton as the
galling background. Throughout the full two terms of Marionette Monroe,
Aaron urges his crusade against Jefferson, the Virginia junta, and King
Caucus. His war against his old enemies never flags. His demand is for
convention nominations; his candidate is Jackson.
In all Aaron asks or works for, the loyal Bucktails are at once his
voice and his arm. In requital he shows them how to perpetuate
their control of the town. He tells them to break down a property
qualification, and extend the voting franchise to every man, whether he
be landholder or no.
“Let’s make Jack as good as his master,” says Aaron. “It will please
Jack, and hurt his master’s pride--both good things in their way.”
It is a rare strategy, one not only calculated to strengthen Tammany,
but drive the knife to the aristocratic hearts of the Clintons, the
Livingstons and the Schuylers.
“Better be ruled by a man without an estate, than by an estate without a
man!” cries Aaron, and his Bucktails take up the shout.
The proposal becomes a law. With that one stroke of policy, Aaron
destroys caste, humbles the pride of his enemies, and gives State and
town, bound hand and foot, into the secure fingers of his faithful
Bucktails.
Time flows on, and Aaron is triumphant. King Caucus is stricken down;
Jefferson, with his Virginians are beaten, and Jackson is named by a
convention.
In the four-cornered war that ensues, Jackson runs before the other
three, but fails of the constitutional majority in the electoral
college. In the House, a deal between Adams and Clay defeats Jackson,
and Adams goes to the White House.
Aaron is unmoved.
“I am threescore years and ten,” says he--“the allotted space of man.
Now I know that I am to live surely four years more; for I shall yet see
Jackson President.”
Adams fears Aaron, as long ago his father feared him. He strives to win
his Bucktails from him with a shower of appointments.
“Take them,” says Aaron to his Bucktails. “They are yours, not
his--those offices. He but gives you your own.”
Aaron, throughout those four years of Adams, tends the Jackson fires
like a devotee. Van Ness is astonished at his enthusiasm.
“I should think you’d rest,” says he.
“Rest? I cannot rest. It is all I live for now.”
“But I don’t understand! You get nothing.”
The black eyes shoot forth the old ophidian sparks. “Sir, I get
vengeance--and forget feelings!”
[Illustration: 0377]
Adams comes to his White House end, and Jackson is elected in his
place. Jackson comes to New York, and he and Aaron meet in the latter’s
rooms--pleasant rooms, overlooking the Bowling Green. They light their
long pipes, and sit opposite one another, smoking like dragons.
Jackson is the one who speaks. Taking the pipe from his lips, he says:
“Colonel Burr, my gratitude is not wholly declamatory.”
“General,” returns Aaron, “the best favor you can show me is show favor
to my friends.”
“That I shall do, be sure! Van Ness is to become a judge, Swartwout
collector, while Van Buren goes into my Cabinet as Secretary of State.
Also I shall say to your enemies--the Clintons and those other proud
ones--that he from New York who seeks Andrew Jackson’s appointment, must
come with the approval of Colonel Burr.”
Jackson is inaugurated.
“I am through,” says Aaron--“through at four and seventy. Now I shall
work a little, play a little, rest a deal; but no more politics--no more
politics! My friends are triumphant. As for my foes, I leave them to
Providence and Andrew Jackson.”