RESIGNATION OF SENATOR HUGH LAWSON WHITE OF TENNESSEE: HIS
DEATH: SOME NOTICE OF HIS LIFE AND CHARACTER.
This resignation took place under circumstances, not frequent, but
sometimes occurring in the Senate--that of receiving instructions
from the General Assembly of his State, which either operate as a
censure upon a senator, or require him to do something which either
his conscience, or his honor forbids. Mr. White at this time--the
session of 1839-'40--received instructions from the General Assembly
of his State which affected him in both ways--condemning past
conduct, and prescribing a future course which he could not follow.
He had been democratic from his youth--came into the Senate--had
grown aged--as such: but of late years had voted generally with
the whigs on their leading measures, and classed politically with
them in opposition to Mr. Van Buren. In these circumstances he
received instructions to reverse his course of voting on these
leading measures--naming them; and requiring him to support the
administration of Mr. Van Buren. He consulted his self-respect, as
well as obeyed a democratic principle; and sent in his resignation.
It was the conclusion of a public life which disappointed its whole
previous course. From his youth he had been a popular man, and that
as the fair reward of conduct, without practising an art to obtain
it, or even seeming to know that he was winning it. Bred a lawyer,
and coming early to the bar, he was noted for a probity, modesty and
gravity--with a learning, ability, assiduity and patience--which
marked him for the judicial bench: and he was soon placed upon
it--that of the Superior Court. Afterwards, when the judiciary of
the State was remodelled, he was placed on the bench of the Supreme
Court. It was considered a favor to the public to get him to take
the place. That is well known to the writer of this View, then a
member of the General Assembly of Tennessee, and the author of the
new modelled judiciary. He applied to Judge White, who had at that
time returned to the bar to know if he would take the place; and
considered the new system accredited with the public on receiving
his answer that he would. That was all that he had to do with
getting the appointment: he was elected unanimously by the General
Assembly, with whom the appointment rested. That is about the way
in which he received all his appointments, either from his State,
or from the federal government--merely agreeing to take the office
if it was offered to him; but not always agreeing to accept: often
refusing--as in the case of a cabinet appointment offered him by
President Jackson, his political and personal friend of forty years'
standing. It was long before he would enter a political career, but
finally consented to become senator in the Congress of the United
States: always discharging the duties of an office, when accepted,
with the assiduity of a man who felt himself to be a machine in the
hands of his duty; and with an integrity of purpose which left his
name without spot or stain. It is beautiful to contemplate such
a career; sad to see it set under a cloud in his advanced years.
He became alienated from his old friends, both personally and
politically--even from General Jackson; and eventually fell under
the censure of his State, as above related--that State which, for
more than forty years, had considered it a favor to itself that
he should accept the highest offices in her gift. He resigned in
January, and died in May--his death accelerated by the chagrin of
his spirit; for he was a man of strong feelings, though of such
measured and quiet deportment. His death was announced in the
Senate by the senator who was his colleague at the time of his
resignation--Mr. Alexander Anderson; and the motion for the usual
honors to his memory was seconded by Senator Preston, who pronounced
on the occasion a eulogium on the deceased as just as it was
beautiful.
"I do not know, Mr. President, whether I am entitled to the
honor I am about to assume in seconding the resolutions which
have just been offered by the senator from Tennessee, in
honor of his late distinguished colleague; and yet, sir, I
am not aware that any one present is more entitled to this
melancholy honor, if it belongs to long acquaintance, to sincere
admiration, and to intimate intercourse. If these circumstances
do not entitle me to speak, I am sure every senator will feel,
in the emotions which swell his own bosom, an apology for my
desire to relieve my own, by bearing testimony to the virtues
and talents, the long services and great usefulness, of Judge
White.
"My infancy and youth were spent in a region contiguous to
the sphere of his earlier fame and usefulness. As long as I
can remember any thing, I remember the deep confidence he had
inspired as a wise and upright judge, in which station no man
ever enjoyed a purer reputation, or established a more implicit
reliance in his abilities and honesty. There was an antique
sternness and justness in his character. By a general consent
he was called Cato. Subsequently, at a period of our public
affairs very analogous to the present, he occupied a position
which placed him at the head of the financial institutions of
East Tennessee. He sustained them by his individual character.
The name of Hugh L. White was a guarantee that never failed to
attract confidence. Institutions were sustained by the credit
of an individual, and the only wealth of that individual was
his character. From this more limited sphere of usefulness and
reputation, he was first brought to this more conspicuous stage
as a member of an important commission on the Spanish treaty,
in which he was associated with Mr. Tazewell and Mr. King. His
learning, his ability, his firmness, and industry, immediately
extended the sphere of his reputation to the boundaries of
the country. Upon the completion of that duty, he came into
this Senate. Of his career here, I need not speak. His grave
and venerable form is even now before us--that air of patient
attention, of grave deliberation, of unrelaxed firmness. Here
his position was of the highest--beloved, respected, honored;
always in his place--always prepared for the business in
hand--always bringing to it the treasured reflections of a
sedate and vigorous understanding. Over one department of our
deliberations he exercised a very peculiar control. In the
management of our complex and difficult relations with the
Indians we all deferred to him, and to this he addressed himself
with unsparing labor, and with a wisdom, a patient benevolence,
that justified and vindicated the confidence of the Senate.
"In private life he was amiable and ardent. The current of his
feelings was warm and strong. His long familiarity with public
affairs had not damped the natural ardor of his temperament.
We all remember the deep feeling with which he so recently
took leave of this body, and how profoundly that feeling was
reciprocated. The good will, the love, the respect which we
bestowed upon him then, now give depth and energy to the
mournful feelings with which we offer a solemn tribute to his
memory."
And here this notice would stop if it was the design of this work
merely to write on the outside of history--merely to chronicle
events; but that is not the design. Inside views are the main
design: and this notice of Senator White's life and character would
be very imperfect, and vitally deficient, if it did not tell how
it happened that a man so favored by his State during a long life
should have lost that favor in his last days--received censure from
those who had always given praise--and gone to his grave under a
cloud after having lived in sunshine. The reason is briefly told.
In his advanced age he did the act which, with all old men, is an
experiment; and, with most of them, an unlucky one. He married
again: and this new wife having made an immense stride from the
head of a boarding-house table to the head of a senator's table,
could see no reason why she should not take one step more, and that
comparatively short, and arrive at the head of the presidential
table. This was before the presidential election of 1836. Mr. Van
Buren was the generally accepted democratic candidate: he was
foremost of all the candidates: and the man who is ahead of all the
rest, on such occasions, is pretty sure to have a combination of all
the rest against him. Mr. Van Buren was no exception to this rule.
The whole whig party wished to defeat him: that was a fair wish.
Mr. Calhoun's party wished to defeat him: that was invidious: for
they could not elect Mr. Calhoun by it. Many professing democrats
wished to defeat him, though for the benefit of a whig: and that
was a movement towards the whig camp--where most of them eventually
arrived. All these parties combined, and worked in concert; and
their line of operations was through the vanity of the victim's
wife. They excited her vain hopes. And this modest, unambitious man,
who had spent all his life in resisting office pressed upon him by
his real friends, lost his power of resistance in his old age, and
became a victim to the combination against him--which all saw, and
deplored, except himself. As soon as he was committed, and beyond
extrication, one of the co-operators against him, a whig member of
Congress from Kentucky--a witty, sagacious man of good tact--in
the exultation of his feelings wrote the news to a friend in his
district, who, in a still higher state of exultation, sent it to the
newspapers--thus: "_Judge White is on the track, running gayly, and
won't come off; and if he would, his wife won't let him._" This was
the whole story, briefly and cheerily told--and truly. He ran the
race! without prejudice to Mr. Van Buren--without benefit to the
whig candidates--without support from some who had incited him to
the trial: and with great political and social damage to himself.
Long an inhabitant of the same State with Judge White--indebted to
him for my law license--moving in the same social and political
circle--accustomed to respect and admire him--sincerely friendly
to him, and anxious for his peace and honor, I saw with pain the
progress of the movement against him, and witnessed with profound
grief its calamitous consummation.