DEATH OF SILAS WRIGHT, EX-SENATOR AND EX-GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK.
He died suddenly, at the early age of fifty-two, and without the
sufferings and premonitions which usually accompany the mortal
transit from time to eternity. A letter that he was reading, was
seen to fall from his hand: a physician was called: in two hours
he was dead--apoplexy the cause. Though dying at the age deemed
young in a statesman, he had attained all that long life could
give--high office, national fame, fixed character, and universal
esteem. He had run the career of honors in the State of New
York--been representative and senator in Congress--and had refused
more offices, and higher, than he ever accepted. He refused cabinet
appointments under his fast friend, Mr. Van Buren, and under Mr.
Polk, whom he may be said to have elected: he refused a seat on
the bench of the federal Supreme Court; he rejected instantly the
nomination of 1844 for Vice-President of the United States, when
that nomination was the election. He refused to be put in nomination
for the presidency. He refused to accept foreign missions. He spent
that time in declining office which others did in winning it; and of
those he did accept, it might well be said they were "_thrust_" upon
him. Office, not greatness, was thrust upon him. He was born great,
and above office, and unwillingly descended to it; and only took it
for its burthens, and to satisfy an importunate public demand. Mind,
manners, morals, temper, habits, united in him to form the character
that was perfect, both in public and private life, and to give the
example of a patriot citizen--of a farmer statesman--of which we
have read in Cincinnatus and Cato, and seen in Mr. Macon, and some
others of their stamp--created by nature--formed in no school: and
of which the instances are so rare and long between.
His mind was clear and strong, his judgment solid, his elocution
smooth and equable, his speaking always addressed to the
understanding, and always enchaining the attention of those who had
minds to understand. Grave reasoning was his forte. Argumentation
was always the line of his speech. He spoke to the head, not to
the passions; and would have been disconcerted to have seen any
body laugh, or cry, at any thing he said. His thoughts evolved
spontaneously, in natural and proper order, clothed in language of
force and clearness; all so naturally and easily conceived that an
extemporaneous speech, or the first draught of an intricate report,
had all the correctness of a finished composition. His manuscript
had no blots--a proof that his mind had none; and he wrote a neat,
compact hand, suitable to a clear and solid mind. He came into
the Senate, in the beginning of General Jackson's administration,
and remained during that of Mr. Van Buren; and took a ready and
active part in all the great debates of those eventful times.
The ablest speakers of the opposition always had to answer him;
and when he answered them, they showed by their anxious concern,
that the adversary was upon them whose force they dreaded most.
Though taking his full part upon all subjects, yet finance was his
particular department, always chairman of that committee, when his
party was in power, and by the lucidity of his statements making
plain the most intricate moneyed details. He had a just conception
of the difference between the functions of the finance committee of
the Senate, and the committee of ways and means of the House--so
little understood in these latter times: those of the latter founded
in the prerogative of the House to originate all revenue bills;
those of the former to act upon the propositions from the House,
without originating measures which might affect the revenue, so as
to coerce either its increase or prevent its reduction. In 1844 he
left the Senate, to stand for the governorship of New York; and
never did his self-sacrificing temper undergo a stronger trial, or
submit to a greater sacrifice. He liked the Senate: he disliked the
governorship, even to absolute repugnance. But it was said to him
(and truly, as then believed, and afterwards proved) that the State
would be lost to Mr. Polk, unless Mr. Wright was associated with
him in the canvass: and to this argument he yielded. He stood the
canvass for the governorship--carried it--and Mr. Polk with him; and
saved the presidential election of that year.
Judgment was the character of Mr. Wright's mind: purity the quality
of the heart. Though valuable in the field of debate, he was still
more valued at the council table, where sense and honesty are most
demanded. General Jackson and Mr. Van Buren relied upon him as
one of their safest counsellors. A candor which knew no guile--an
integrity which knew no deviation--which worked right on, like a
machine governed by a law of which it was unconscious--were the
inexorable conditions of his nature, ruling his conduct in every
act, public and private. No foul legislation ever emanated from
him. The jobber, the speculator, the dealer in false claims, the
plunderer, whose scheme required an act of Congress; all these
found in his vigilance and perspicacity a detective police, which
discovered their designs, and in his integrity a scorn of corruption
which kept them at a distance from the purity of his atmosphere.
His temper was gentle--his manners simple--his intercourse
kindly--his habits laborious--and rich upon a freehold of thirty
acres, in much part cultivated by his own hand. In the intervals
of senatorial duties this man, who refused cabinet appointments
and presidential honors, and a seat upon the Supreme Bench--who
measured strength with Clay, Webster, and Calhoun, and on whose
accents admiring Senates hung: this man, his neat suit of broadcloth
and fine linen exchanged for the laborer's dress, might be seen
in the harvest field, or meadow, carrying the foremost row, and
doing the cleanest work: and this not as recreation or pastime, or
encouragement to others, but as work, which was to count in the
annual cultivation, and labor to be felt in the production of the
needed crop. His principles were democratic, and innate, founded
in a feeling, still more than a conviction, that the masses were
generally right in their sentiments, though sometimes wrong in their
action; and that there was less injury to the country from the
honest mistakes of the people, than from the interested schemes of
corrupt and intriguing politicians. He was born in Massachusetts,
came to man's estate in New York, received from that State the only
honors he would accept; and in choosing his place of residence in it
gave proof of his modest, retiring, unpretending nature. Instead of
following his profession in the commercial or political capital of
his State, where there would be demand and reward for his talent, he
constituted himself a village lawyer where there was neither, and
pertinaciously refused to change his locality. In an outside county,
on the extreme border of the State, taking its name of St. Lawrence
from the river which washed its northern side, and divided the
United States from British America--and in one of the smallest towns
of that county, and in one of the least ambitious houses of that
modest town, lived and died this patriot statesman--a good husband
(he had no children)--a good neighbor--a kind relative--a fast
friend--exact and punctual in every duty, and the exemplification of
every social and civic virtue.