THE MASSACHUSETTS CONVENTION AND THE PLYMOUTH ORATION.
The conduct of the Dartmouth College case, and its result, at once raised
Mr. Webster to a position at the bar second only to that held by Mr.
Pinkney. He was now constantly occupied by most important and lucrative
engagements, but in 1820 he was called upon to take a leading part in a
great public work which demanded the exertion of all his talents as
statesman, lawyer, and debater. The lapse of time and the setting off of
the Maine district as a State had made a convention necessary, in order to
revise the Constitution of Massachusetts. This involved the direct resort
to the people, the source of all power, which is only required to effect a
change in the fundamental law of the State. On these rare occasions it has
been the honored custom in Massachusetts to lay aside all the
qualifications attaching to ordinary legislatures and to choose the best
men, without regard to party, public office, or domicile, for the
performance of this important work. No better or abler body could have been
assembled for this purpose than that which met in convention at Boston in
November, 1820. Among these distinguished men were John Adams, then in his
eighty-fifth year, and one of the framers of the original Constitution of
1780, Chief Justice Parker, of the Supreme Bench, the Federal judges, and
many of the leaders at the bar and in business. The two most conspicuous
men in the convention, however, were Joseph Story and Daniel Webster, who
bore the burden in every discussion; and there were three subjects, upon
which Mr. Webster spoke at length, that deserve more than a passing
allusion.
Questions of party have, as a rule, found but little place in the
constitutional assemblies of Massachusetts. This was peculiarly the case in
1820, when the old political divisions were dying out, and new ones had not
yet been formed. At the same time widely opposite views found expression in
the convention. The movement toward thorough and complete democracy was
gathering headway, and directing its force against many of the old colonial
traditions and habits of government embodied in the existing Constitution.
That portion of the delegates which favored certain radical changes was
confronted and stoutly opposed by those who, on the whole, inclined to make
as few alterations as possible, and desired to keep things about as they
were. Mr. Webster, as was natural, was the leader of the conservative
party, and his course in this convention is an excellent illustration of
this marked trait in his disposition and character.
One of the important questions concerned the abolition of the profession of
Christian faith as a qualification for holding office. On this point the
line of argument pursued by Mr. Webster is extremely characteristic.
Although an unvarying conservative throughout his life, he was incapable of
bigotry, or of narrow and illiberal views. At the same time the process by
which he reached his opinion in favor of removing the religious test shows
more clearly than even ultra-conservatism could, how free he was from any
touch of the reforming or innovating spirit. He did not urge that, on
general principles, religious tests were wrong, that they were relics of
the past and in hopeless conflict with the fundamental doctrines of
American liberty and democracy. On the contrary, he implied that a
religious test was far from being of necessity an evil. He laid down the
sound doctrine that qualifications for office were purely matters of
expediency, and then argued that it was wise to remove the religious test
because, while its principle would be practically enforced by a Christian
community, it was offensive to some persons to have it engrafted on the
Constitution. The speech in which he set forth these views was an able and
convincing one, entirely worthy of its author, and the removal of the test
was carried by a large majority. It is an interesting example of the
combination of steady conservatism and breadth of view which Mr. Webster
always displayed. But it also brings into strong relief his aversion to
radical general principles as grounds of action, and his inborn hostility
to far-reaching change.
His two other important speeches in this convention have been preserved in
his works, and are purely and wholly conservative in tone and spirit. The
first related to the basis of representation in the Senate, whose members
were then apportioned according to the amount of taxable property in the
districts. This system, Mr. Webster thought, should be retained, and his
speech was a most masterly discussion of the whole system of government by
two Houses. He urged the necessity of a basis of representation for the
upper House different from that of the lower, in order to make the former
fully serve its purpose of a check and balance to the popular branch. This
important point he handled in the most skilful manner, and there is no
escape from his conclusion that a difference of origin in the two
legislative branches of the government is essential to the full and perfect
operation of the system. This difference of origin, he argued, could be
obtained only by the introduction of property as a factor in the basis of
representation. The weight of his speech was directed to defending the
principle of a suitable representation of property, which was a subject
requiring very adroit treatment. The doctrine is one which probably would
not be tolerated now in any part of this country, and even in 1820, in
Massachusetts, it was a delicate matter to advocate it, for it was hostile
to the general sentiment of the people. Having established his position
that it was all important to make the upper branch a strong and effective
check, he said that the point in issue was not whether property offered the
best method of distinguishing between the two Houses, but whether it was
not better than no distinction at all. This being answered affirmatively,
the next question to be considered was whether property, not in the sense
of personal possessions and personal power, but in a general sense, ought
not to have its due influence in matters of government. He maintained the
justice of this proposition by showing that our constitutions rest largely
on the general equality of property, which, in turn, is due to our laws of
distribution. This led him into a discussion of the principles of the
distribution of property. He pointed out the dangers arising in England
from the growth of a few large estates, while on the other hand he
predicted that the rapid and minute subdivision of property in France would
change the character of the government, and, far from strengthening the
crown, as was then generally prophesied, would have a directly opposite
effect, by creating a large and united body of small proprietors, who would
sooner or later control the country. He illustrated, in this way, the value
and importance of a general equality of property, and of steadiness in
legislation affecting it. These were the reasons, he contended, for making
property the basis of the check and balance furnished to our system of
government by an upper House. Moreover, all property being subject to
taxation for the purpose of educating the children of both rich and poor,
it deserved some representation for this valuable aid to government. It is
impossible, in a few lines,[1] to do justice to Mr. Webster's argument. It
exhibited a great deal of tact and ingenuity, especially in the distinction
so finely drawn between property as an element of personal power and
property in a general sense, and so distributed as to be a bulwark of
liberty. The speech is, on this account, an interesting one, for Mr.
Webster was rarely ingenious, and hardly ever got over difficulties by
fine-spun distinctions. In this instance adroitness was very necessary, and
he did not hesitate to employ it. By his skilful treatment, by his
illustrations drawn from England and France, which show the accuracy and
range of his mental vision in matters of politics and public economy, both
at home and abroad, and with the powerful support of Judge Story, Mr.
Webster carried his point. The element of property representation in the
Senate was retained, but so wholly by the ability of its advocate, that it
was not long afterwards removed.
[Footnote 1: My brief statement is merely a further condensation of the
excellent abstract of this speech made by Mr Curtis.]
Mr. Webster's other important speech related to the judiciary. The
Constitution provided that the judges, who held office during good
behavior, should be removable by the Governor on an address from the
Legislature. This was considered to meet cases of incompetency or of
personal misconduct, which could not be reached by impeachment. Mr. Webster
desired to amend the clause so as to require a two thirds vote for the
passage of the address, and that reasons should be assigned, and a hearing
assured to the judge who was the subject of the proceedings. These changes
were all directed to the further protection of the bench, and it was in
this connection that Mr. Webster made a most admirable and effective speech
on the well-worn but noble theme of judicial independence. He failed to
carry conviction, however, and his amendments were all lost. The perils
which he anticipated have never arisen, and the good sense of the people of
Massachusetts has prevented the slightest abuse of what Mr. Webster rightly
esteemed a dangerous power.
Mr. Webster's continual and active exertion throughout the session of this
convention brought him great applause and admiration, and showed his powers
in a new light. Judge Story, with generous enthusiasm, wrote to Mr. Mason,
after the convention adjourned:--
"Our friend Webster has gained a noble reputation. He was before
known as a lawyer; but he has now secured the title of an eminent
and enlightened statesman. It was a glorious field for him, and he
has had an ample harvest. The whole force of his great mind was
brought out, and, in several speeches, he commanded universal
admiration. He always led the van, and was most skilful and
instantaneous in attack and retreat. He fought, as I have told him,
in the 'imminent deadly breach;' and all I could do was to
skirmish, in aid of him, upon some of the enemy's outposts. On the
whole, I never was more proud of any display than his in my life,
and I am much deceived if the well-earned popularity, so justly and
so boldly acquired by him on this occasion, does not carry him, if
he lives, to the presidency."
While this convention, so memorable in the career of Mr. Webster and so
filled with the most absorbing labors, was in session, he achieved a still
wider renown in a very different field. On the 22d of December, 1820, he
delivered at Plymouth the oration which commemorated the two hundredth
anniversary of the landing of the Pilgrims. The theme was a splendid one,
both in the intrinsic interest of the event itself, in the character of the
Pilgrims, in the vast results which had grown from their humble beginnings,
and in the principles of free government, which had spread from the cabins
of the exiles over the face of a continent, and had become the common
heritage of a great people. We are fortunate in having a description of the
orator, written at the time by a careful observer and devoted friend, Mr.
Ticknor, who says:--
"_Friday Evening._--I have run away from a great levee there is
down-stairs, thronging in admiration round Mr. Webster, to tell you
a little word about his oration. Yet I do not dare to trust myself
about it, and I warn you beforehand that I have not the least
confidence in my own opinion. His manner carried me away
completely; not, I think, that I could have been so carried away if
it had been a poor oration, for of that, I apprehend, there can be
no fear. It _must_ have been a great, a very great performance, but
whether it was so absolutely unrivalled as I imagined when I was
under the immediate influence of his presence, of his tones, of his
looks, I cannot be sure till I have read it, for it seems to me
incredible.
"I was never so excited by public speaking before in my life. Three
or four times I thought my temples would burst with the gush of
blood; for, after all, you must know that I am aware it is no
connected and compacted whole, but a collection of wonderful
fragments of burning eloquence, to which his whole manner gave
tenfold force. When I came out I was almost afraid to come near to
him. It seemed to me as if he was like the mount that might not be
touched and that burned with fire. I was beside myself, and am so
still."
"_Saturday._--Mr. Webster was in admirable spirits. On Thursday
evening he was considerably agitated and oppressed, and yesterday
morning he had not his natural look at all; but since his entire
success he has been as gay and playful as a kitten. The party came
in one after another, and the spirits of all were kindled brighter
and brighter, and we fairly sat up till after two o'clock. I think,
therefore, we may now safely boast the Plymouth expedition has gone
off admirably."
Mr. Ticknor was a man of learning and scholarship, just returned from a
prolonged sojourn in Europe, where he had met and conversed with all the
most distinguished men of the day, both in England and on the Continent. He
was not, therefore, disposed by training or recent habits to indulge a
facile enthusiasm, and such deep emotion as he experienced must have been
due to no ordinary cause. He was, in fact, profoundly moved because he had
been listening to one of the great masters of eloquence exhibiting, for the
first time, his full powers in a branch of the art much more cultivated in
America by distinguished men of all professions than is the custom
elsewhere. The Plymouth oration belongs to what, for lack of a better name,
we must call occasional oratory. This form of address, taking an
anniversary, a great historical event or character, a celebration, or
occasion of any sort as a starting point, permits either a close adherence
to the original text or the widest latitude of treatment. The field is a
broad and inviting one. That it promises an easy success is shown by the
innumerable productions of this kind which, for many years, have been
showered upon the country. That the promise is fallacious is proved by the
very small number among the countless host of such addresses which survive
the moment of their utterance. The facility of saying something is
counterbalanced by the difficulty of saying anything worth hearing. The
temptation to stray and to mistake platitude for originality is almost
always fatal.
Mr. Webster was better fitted than any man who has ever lived in this
country for the perilous task of occasional oratory. The freedom of
movement which renders most speeches of this class diluted and commonplace
was exactly what he needed. He required abundant intellectual room for a
proper display of his powers, and he had the rare quality of being able to
range over vast spaces of time and thought without becoming attenuated in
what he said. Soaring easily, with a powerful sweep he returned again to
earth without jar or shock. He had dignity and grandeur of thought,
expression, and manner, and a great subject never became small by his
treatment of it. He had, too, a fine historical imagination, and could
breathe life and passion into the dead events of the past.
Mr. Ticknor speaks of the Plymouth oration as impressing him as a series of
eloquent fragments. The impression was perfectly correct. Mr. Webster
touched on the historical event, on the character of the Pilgrims, on the
growth and future of the country, on liberty and constitutional principles,
on education, and on human slavery. This was entirely proper to such an
address. The difficulty lay in doing it well, and Mr. Webster did it as
perfectly as it ever has been done. The thoughts were fine, and were
expressed in simple and beautiful words. The delivery was grand and
impressive, and the presentation of each successive theme glowed with
subdued fire. There was no straining after mere rhetorical effect, but an
artistic treatment of a succession of great subjects in a general and yet
vivid and picturesque fashion. The emotion produced by the Plymouth oration
was akin to that of listening to the strains of music issuing from a
full-toned organ. Those who heard it did not seek to gratify their reason
or look for conviction to be brought to their understanding. It did not
appeal to the logical faculties or to the passions, which are roused by the
keen contests of parliamentary debate. It was the divine gift of speech,
the greatest instrument given to man, used with surpassing talent, and the
joy and pleasure which it brought were those which come from listening to
the song of a great singer, or looking upon the picture of a great artist.
The Plymouth oration, which was at once printed and published, was received
with a universal burst of applause. It had more literary success than
anything which had at that time appeared, except from the pen of Washington
Irving. The public, without stopping to analyze their own feelings, or the
oration itself, recognized at once that a new genius had come before them,
a man endowed with the noble gift of eloquence, and capable by the exercise
of his talents of moving and inspiring great masses of his fellow-men. Mr.
Webster was then of an age to feel fully the glow of a great success, both
at the moment and when the cooler and more critical approbation came. He
was fresh and young, a strong man rejoicing to run the race. Mr. Ticknor
says, in speaking of the oration:--
"The passage at the end, where, spreading his arms as if to embrace
them, he welcomed future generations to the great inheritance which
we have enjoyed, was spoken with the most attractive sweetness and
that peculiar smile which in him was always so charming. The effect
of the whole was very great. As soon as he got home to our
lodgings, all the principal people then in Plymouth crowded about
him. He was full of animation, and radiant with happiness. But
there was something about him very grand and imposing at the same
time. I never saw him at any time when he seemed to me to be more
conscious of his own powers, or to have a more true and natural
enjoyment from their possession."
Amid all the applause and glory, there was one letter of congratulation and
acknowledgment which must have given Mr. Webster more pleasure than
anything else, It came from John Adams, who never did anything by halves.
Whether he praised or condemned, he did it heartily and ardently, and such
an oration on New England went straight to the heart of the eager,
warm-blooded old patriot. His commendation, too, was worth having, for he
spoke as one having authority. John Adams had been one of the eloquent men
and the most forcible debater of the first Congress. He had listened to the
great orators of other lands. He had heard Pitt and Fox, Burke and
Sheridan, and had been present at the trial of Warren Hastings. His
unstinted praise meant and still means a great deal, and it concludes with
one of the finest and most graceful of compliments. The oration, he says,
"is the effort of a great mind, richly stored with every species of
information. If there be an American who can read it without tears,
I am not that American. It enters more perfectly into the genuine
spirit of New England than any production I ever read. The
observations on the Greeks and Romans; on colonization in general;
on the West India islands; on the past, present, and future of
America, and on the slave-trade, are sagacious, profound, and
affecting in a high degree."
"Mr. Burke is no longer entitled to the praise--the most consummate
orator of modern times."
"What can I say of what regards myself? To my humble name,
_Exegisti monumentum aere perennius_."
Many persons consider the Plymouth oration to be the finest of all Mr.
Webster's efforts in this field. It is certainly one of the very best of
his productions, but he showed on the next great occasion a distinct
improvement, which he long maintained. Five years after the oration at
Plymouth, he delivered the address on the laying of the corner-stone of
Bunker Hill monument. The superiority to the first oration was not in
essentials, but in details, the fruit of a ripening and expanding mind. At
Bunker Hill, as at Plymouth, he displayed the massiveness of thought, the
dignity and grandeur of expression, and the range of vision which are all
so characteristic of his intellect and which were so much enhanced by his
wonderful physical attributes. But in the later oration there is a greater
finish and smoothness. We appreciate the fact that the Plymouth oration is
a succession of eloquent fragments; the same is true of the Bunker Hill
address, but we no longer realize it. The continuity is, in appearance,
unbroken, and the whole work is rounded and polished. The style, too, is
now perfected. It is at once plain, direct, massive, and vivid. The
sentences are generally short and always clear, but never monotonous. The
preference for Anglo-Saxon words and the exclusion of Latin derivatives are
extremely marked, and we find here in rare perfection that highest
attribute of style, the union of simplicity, picturesqueness, and force.
In the first Bunker Hill oration Mr. Webster touched his highest point in
the difficult task of commemorative oratory. In that field he not only
stands unrivalled, but no one has approached him. The innumerable
productions of this class by other men, many of a high degree of
excellence, are forgotten, while those of Webster form part of the
education of every American school-boy, are widely read, and have entered
into the literature and thought of the country. The orations of Plymouth
and Bunker Hill are grouped in Webster's works with a number of other
speeches professedly of the same kind. But only a very few of these are
strictly occasional; the great majority are chiefly, if not wholly,
political speeches, containing merely passages here and there in the same
vein as his great commemorative addresses. Before finally leaving the
subject, however, it will be well to glance for a moment at the few
orations which properly belong to the same class as the first two which we
have been considering.
The Bunker Hill oration, after the lapse of only a year, was followed by
the celebrated eulogy upon Adams and Jefferson. This usually and with
justice is ranked in merit with its two immediate predecessors. As a whole
it is not, perhaps, quite so much admired, but it contains the famous
imaginary speech of John Adams, which is the best known and most hackneyed
passage in any of these orations. The opening lines, "Sink or swim, live or
die, survive or perish, I give my hand and my heart to this vote," since
Mr. Webster first pronounced them in Faneuil Hall, have risen even to the
dignity of a familiar quotation. The passage, indeed, is perhaps the best
example we have of the power of Mr. Webster's historical imagination. He
had some fragmentary sentences, the character of the man, the nature of the
debate, and the circumstances of the time to build upon, and from these
materials he constructed a speech which was absolutely startling in its
lifelike force. The revolutionary Congress, on the verge of the tremendous
step which was to separate them from England, rises before us as we read
the burning words which the imagination of the speaker put into the mouth
of John Adams. They are not only instinct with life, but with the life of
impending revolution, and they glow with the warmth and strength of feeling
so characteristic of their supposed author. It is well known that the
general belief at the time was that the passage was an extract from a
speech actually delivered by John Adams. Mr. Webster, as well as Mr.
Adams's son and grandson, received numerous letters of inquiry on this
point, and it is possible that many people still persist in this belief as
to the origin of the passage. Such an effect was not produced by mere
clever imitation, for there was nothing to imitate, but by the force of a
powerful historic imagination and a strong artistic sense in its
management.
In 1828 Mr. Webster delivered an address before the Mechanics' Institute in
Boston, on "Science in connection with the Mechanic Arts," a subject which
was outside of his usual lines of thought, and offered no especial
attractions to him. This oration is graceful and strong, and possesses
sufficient and appropriate eloquence. It is chiefly interesting, however,
from the reserve and self-control, dictated by a nice sense of fitness,
which it exhibited. Omniscience was not Mr. Webster's foible. He never was
guilty of Lord Brougham's weakness of seeking to prove himself master of
universal knowledge. In delivering an address on science and invention,
there was a strong temptation to an orator like Mr. Webster to substitute
glittering rhetoric for real knowledge; but the address at the Mechanics'
Institute is simply the speech of a very eloquent and a liberally educated
man upon a subject with which he had only the most general acquaintance.
The other orations of this class were those on "The Character of
Washington," the second Bunker Hill address, "The Landing at Plymouth,"
delivered in New York at the dinner of the Pilgrim Society, the remarks on
the death of Judge Story and of Mr. Mason, and finally the speech on laying
the corner-stone for the addition to the Capitol, in 1851. These were all
comparatively brief speeches, with the exception of that at Bunker Hill,
which, although very fine, was perceptibly inferior to his first effort
when the corner-stone of the monument was laid. The address on the
character of Washington, to an American the most dangerous of great and
well-worn topics, is of a high order of eloquence. The theme appealed to
Mr. Webster strongly and brought out his best powers, which were peculiarly
fitted to do justice to the noble, massive, and dignified character of the
subject. The last of these addresses, that on the addition to the Capitol,
was in a prophetic vein, and, while it shows but little diminution of
strength, has a sadness even in its splendid anticipations of the future,
which makes it one of the most impressive of its class. All those which
have been mentioned, however, show the hand of the master and are worthy to
be preserved in the volumes which contain the noble series that began in
the early flush of genius with the brilliant oration in the Plymouth
church, and closed with the words uttered at Washington, under the shadow
of the Capitol, when the light of life was fading and the end of all things
was at hand.