Chapter XI: Jackson Vs. Biddle

I

Congress adjourned two days before the second inauguration of Jackson, which lacked the spectacular features of the first. His brief inaugural address revealed absolute confidence in the approval of the people. There was nothing on the surface to warn of his purpose to continue an aggressive war upon the Bank. The transfer of Livingston from the State Department to the Legation in Paris necessitated a reorganization of the Cabinet. Louis McLane, unsympathetic toward the President’s Bank policy, was moved from the Treasury to the State Department. This left the secretaryship of the Treasury vacant, and it was of the highest importance that it be filled by one in complete harmony with the Executive plans.

The choice finally fell on William J. Duane of Philadelphia, variously described as “a distinguished lawyer” and as “the bottom of the Philadelphia bar.” His selection had been recommended by Van Buren[610] and urged by McLane, who was Van Buren’s intimate at the time.[611] He was at least known to Jackson as the son of the fighting editor of the “Aurora,” which had led the fight against the Alien and Sedition Laws.[612] Assuming in the son the militant qualities of the father, and actuated partly, perhaps, by the thought that the appointment would strengthen the Administration in its fight upon the Bank, Duane was pressed to enter the Cabinet, and consented. The personality and character of Duane are dim on the page of history. The Democratic press was apparently hard put to explain the appointment. The “Harrisburg Chronicle” described him as possessing “a well disciplined mind, severe habits of business, which, combined with sound Democratic principles and unbending integrity, are the highest recommendations for office in a free popular government.” Thomas Ritchie, of the “Richmond Enquirer,” who made a more studied effort, feared that the appointment would “scarcely be hailed with the feeling of approbation which it so richly deserves.” But Duane understood “the character of the Bank of the United States--its designs and dangers,” and “on that cardinal subject we have no doubt he will deserve and command the confidence of the friends of the Constitution.” The “Pennsylvanian” informed the National Democracy that “Stephen Gerard saw and appreciated his talents,” and that he was “one of the most sagacious men of the age.”[613] It was only after his break with Jackson that the champions of the Bank discovered his many virtues, and Administration circles his utter insignificance. One of Jackson’s enemies, in berating him, referred to Duane as “that other darling whom you fished up from the desk of a dead miser, and the bottom of the Philadelphia bar.”[614] At first, however, Jackson was much impressed with his discovery, and frequently referred to him as “a chip of the old block, sir.”

Having reorganized his Cabinet, Jackson now concentrated on his plans for the invasion of “the enemy’s country”--his New England tour. His remarkable popularity in that quarter, previously so hostile, grew out of his vigorous defense of the Union and his new relations with Webster. In the spring of 1833 these relations were most cordial, and never were to become personally bitter. At that time he was not on speaking terms with either Clay or Calhoun, and when he met Adams on the street, by chance, he bowed stiffly, without a word. But whenever, in his meanderings about the dingy capital, he encountered Webster, the iron man would pause for a hearty greeting. And while Webster never ceased to consider Jackson temperamentally unfit for the Presidency, he never doubted his integrity or whole-hearted patriotism. “His patriotism,” he was wont to say, “is no more to be questioned than that of Washington.”[615]

It was early in June that Jackson set forth in company with Van Buren, Cass, Woodbury, Donelson, Hill, and the artist, Earle, who lived at the White House. From the moment the party reached Baltimore it was one continuous ovation. Received like a conquering hero in Philadelphia, with an enthusiasm bordering on idolatry in New York City,[616] the ovations he received in Massachusetts eclipsed them all. Harvard conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Laws, Everett delivered an address of welcome at the foot of Bunker Hill, and while the multitude went wild at sight of him in the streets and on the Common, the gentry of Beacon Street refused him the homage of appearing at the windows,[617] and the crabbed Adams, hiding at his Quincy home, a few miles away, poured forth his spleen upon his journal and mourned the degradation of his Alma Mater.[618] Under the load of adulation, the old man’s strength finally failed, and during the last part of his progress he dragged himself from his bed to the parade, and from the physician with his barbarous lancet to the master of ceremonies.[619] Throughout the tour his thoughts were centered on the Bank and his plans for the removal of the deposits, and but few suspected that the courtly old man, whose eyes moistened and beamed at the applause of the crowds, was meditating the step.

When Hamilton called upon him at his hotel in New York, he found him obsessed with the subject. When the son of the father of the first National Bank joined him in the presidential suite to accompany him to the banquet, Jackson placed in his hands papers by several people urging the removal of the deposits, with the request that he examine them carefully and give him an opinion. Promising a careful perusal, Hamilton ventured the suggestion that the proposed step was “a very questionable one” that would “lead to great disturbances in commercial affairs.”[620] Meanwhile, when alone with Van Buren, the President was discussing the project with him to his keen distress.[621] Throughout the tour, sick or well, Jackson found time to work on the Vice-President and favorite, and when, at Concord, he finally won him over to the plan, the frail old man abandoned the tour and hastened back to Washington to begin a new battle.[622] And Adams, learning of the curtailment of the trip, wrote that “President Jackson has been obliged by the feeble state of his health to give up the remainder of his tour.”[623] Just how feeble Jackson was we shall soon see.

II

It is impossible definitely to determine the time Jackson decided on the removal of the deposits. The activity of the Bank in the presidential campaign had not been lost upon him, and he probably had it under consideration at that time. The historian of the Bank is convinced that such was the case.[624] Immediately after the election these rumors multiplied, and Biddle was deluged with warnings, but without disturbing the sublime serenity of his conceit. The autocrat of the Bank was satisfied that the Calhoun following would thereafter be arrayed in favor of the recharter. About this time Dr. Thomas Cooper, then president of the College of South Carolina and one of the intellectual leaders of Nullification, wrote him of his allegiance to the cause.[625] Blair had already charged, in the “Globe,” that there was a coalition between the forces of Clay, Calhoun, and Biddle, and made much of the fact that more Bank stock was owned in South Carolina than in all the other States of the Union south of the Potomac and west of the Alleghany Mountains.[626] The Democratic disaffection, together with the temporary alliance between Jackson and Webster, was quite enough to restore confidence to the ever sanguine Biddle,[627] who took no pains to conceal his satisfaction. This was water on the wheel of Blair, who, Iago-like, and always at Jackson’s elbow, kept impressing him with the idea that the Bank planned and expected an ultimate triumph. In this work he was ably seconded by Amos Kendall and James A. Hamilton, who wrote from New York that “a gentleman whose knowledge of the views of the U.S. Bank is only second to that of its President” had informed him that it expected to get a new charter.[628] It was firmly believed by Amos Kendall that the Bank’s purpose in adding $28,000,000 to its discounts, and multiplying its debtors and dependents, was to serve a political end in the campaign of 1836, and with characteristic persistency he urged the removal of the deposits to prevent their use for political purposes.[629] Jackson himself feared the effect of loans and legal retainers to members of the Congress. In all these suspicions there was ample justification.[630] It did not require much, knowing as he did the character of the banker, to persuade Jackson that his duty was plain, and during the winter and spring of 1833 he was in frequent consultation with Roger Taney, Amos Kendall, and Frank Blair, the three men responsible for the step he took.

During these days of mysterious conferences, the conservative members of the Cabinet, and Van Buren with the traditional timidity of the candidate, were gravely concerned. To none was the prospect more appalling than to Louis McLane, then Secretary of the Treasury, a conservative, a former Federalist, and a prospective candidate for the Presidency. In his anxiety he sent for Kendall, avowed his doubts, and asked for information. In the end he frankly confessed that he was not satisfied as to the wisdom of the step, but that he would execute the plan if called upon to do so by the President. The interview was friendly, and Kendall returned to his office and prepared, for McLane’s edification, an elaborate argument in favor of the removal. It is characteristic of Kendall that, while the paper lightly touched upon the alleged insecurity of the deposits, the greater part of the paper was a discussion of the political effect. The hostility of the Bank to the Administration, he thought, could not be intensified. If the deposits were placed with the State banks, they would become partisans of the Administration. The people of the Southern and Western States would be pleased, and the New York banks, always jealous of the financial preëminence of Philadelphia, would at least secretly rejoice. The New England States were not concerned, one way or the other, and could be safely ignored. And in the end, Kendall insisted that a failure to remove the deposits would make a recharter certain. That this letter, written March 16, 1833, was promptly placed in the hands of Van Buren, who was McLane’s sponsor in the Administration, there can be no doubt.

The aftermath of the letter came a few days later, when Van Buren, meeting Kendall at a White House dinner, warmly protested against the plans of the Kitchen Cabinet. The genius of that famous group rose from the table in his excitement, declared that failure to remove the deposits made a Whig victory certain in 1836, and that he was prepared to lay down his pen. “I can live under a corrupt despotism,” he exclaimed, “as well as any other man by keeping out of its way, which I shall certainly do.”[631] It was the Vice-President and not the auditor of the Treasury who afterwards apologized.

It was under these conditions that Jackson propounded a series of questions to his Cabinet, with a preliminary statement that he favored the removal. The first count of noses in the official household showed Livingston and Cass for the Bank, Barry and Taney against it, with Woodbury hedging. McLane, having greater responsibility as the head of the Treasury, took two months in the preparation of an exhaustive reply opposing the removal, and his argument was afterwards to be used against the Administration.

A month after Congress had adjourned there was a relaxation of tension in Bank circles and among the conservatives of the Administration party, who assumed that nothing would be done during the congressional recess. The hostility of a majority of the Cabinet had not abated, and Biddle thought that the deposits were safe.

But if the official Cabinet was to hear no more, for months, of the proposed removal, the Kitchen Cabinet went into almost continuous session for the consideration of this one subject. The disposal of the deposits, and the time for making the removal, were the principal subjects discussed during those spring days in the White House, and it required but little discussion to determine upon the time. Hugh Lawson White strongly urged the postponement of action until Congress convened, but this was instantly overruled by Taney and Kendall, who urged a recess removal for different reasons. The Attorney-General favored such action “because it is desirable that the members should be among their constituents when the measure is announced, and should bring with them when they come here, the feelings and sentiments of the people.”[632] Kendall suggested another reason, also political. The conservatives had made some impression on Jackson’s mind with the warning that, if he removed the deposits, Congress would order them restored, and he appealed to Kendall for his opinion. “If I were certain,” said Kendall, “that Congress would direct them to be restored, still they ought to be removed, and any order by Congress for their restoration disregarded; for it is the only means by which this embodiment of power which aims to govern Congress and the country can be destroyed.” And, to this militant advice, he added his reasons for favoring the removal during the congressional recess. “Let the removal take place so early as to give us several months to defend the measure in the ‘Globe,’ and we will bring up the people to sustain you with a power which Congress dare not resist.”[633]

Meanwhile Duane had reached Washington and assumed his duties. Soon after his arrival, Kendall was surprised to find him loath to discuss the removal, and when the story of this reticence was carried to Jackson, he explained to his Secretary of the Treasury what was wanted. When Duane demurred, he was told to take his time and report on the President’s return from New England. By this time Amos Kendall had assumed the leadership, and he was instructed to interview the head of the Treasury during Jackson’s absence.

At this time Van Buren, waiting in New York to join his chief on his tour, was blissfully ignorant of the embarrassments that awaited him until he received a letter written on the day Jackson set forth on his journey. “The Bank and change of deposits have engrossed my mind much,” he wrote; “it is a perplexing subject, and I wish your opinion before I finally act.” Three days later, while Jackson was receiving the plaudits of the multitude, Kendall made the situation clear, in a letter to Van Buren, announcing that the removal had been determined upon and outlining the tentative plans. Nothing could have been more painful to the Vice-President, who had strongly urged that, with the veto of the recharter bill, the Bank be permitted quietly to go its way to the termination of its charter.

III

While Jackson between illnesses and ovations was bringing the power of his compelling personality to bear upon his protégé’s timidity, Kendall was following instructions in Washington in attempting to ascertain the intentions of Duane. In this he was wholly unsuccessful. Time and again the subject was broached only to be brushed aside, and Jackson, constantly informed, had some savage moments while smiling urbanely upon the crowds.

Reaching the capital on July 4th, he immediately summoned Duane to a conference. The Secretary, who had been ill, rose from a sick-bed and presented himself at the White House looking pale and feeble. At the sight of his wan adviser, the impulsive Jackson penitently grasped both his hands, reproved him for venturing forth in such a condition, and kindly postponed the interview until he had recovered.[634] After an absence of eight days Duane appeared at the White House again, with a lengthy letter setting forth his reasons for objecting to the removal until after Congress had been informed. Three days later, or on July 15th, another conference between Jackson and his rebellious Secretary was held with Duane stubbornly holding his ground, and Jackson kindness itself. In truth, it appears that, with the aid of McLane, Duane had succeeded in arousing some misgivings in Jackson’s mind as to the possibility of persuading the State banks to accept the deposits.

“Send me to ask them, and I will settle that question,” said Kendall.

“You shall go,” Jackson replied.

Summoning the unhappy Duane, the President announced a postponement of discussions until the attitude of the State banks could be ascertained. Kendall was to be the agent of the Treasury on a tour of investigation, and Duane was to prepare the necessary instructions.

When these instructions were delivered to Kendall, he was amazed. They merely asked the opinions of the banks on the general question, and, in view of their well-established hostility, it was clear enough what the answer would be. Wrathfully hastening to the White House, Kendall bluntly refused to carry instructions so framed, declaring the sole purpose of the investigation should be to learn whether State banks would accept the deposits. He was told to prepare his own instructions, and thus the head of the Kitchen Cabinet sallied forth on his own terms. About the same time, Jackson, in need of a rest and release from the sultry atmosphere of Washington, went to Rip Raps in Hampton Roads, where he was accustomed to relax in the summer, accompanied by Frank Blair. Thus, with one member of the Kitchen Cabinet making a tour of the banks on his own instructions, another was at Jackson’s elbow in the unconventional environment of Rip Raps.[635] All these various moves were promptly reported to Biddle by some member of the Administration, and on the day Kendall was expected in Philadelphia, the financial autocrat was writing to Dr. Cooper, his new ally, in laudation of the firmness of Duane and the viciousness of the Kitchen Cabinet.[636]

Meanwhile, in his visits to the banks of Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, and Boston, Kendall was pulled and hauled and mauled by both the servitors of the Bank and the conservatives of the Administration circle. At Philadelphia it was hinted that a fortune was within his grasp if he would but avail himself of the opportunity.[637] There, too, he fell foul of James Gordon Bennett, then editor of the “Pennsylvanian,” whose mask of cordiality was dropped in the publication of Kendall’s private letters showing hostility to the Bank--as though private letters were necessary to the proof.[638]

But more significant, and politically more important, was Kendall’s interview with Van Buren and McLane in New York City. The three met by chance in the breakfast room of an hotel, and in an interview, then arranged, it was proposed by the hedging politicians that the removal of the deposits be postponed until January when Congress would be in session. This plan originated with McLane, and Kendall, who suspected it was proposed with the hope and expectation that Congress would interpose, replied that he would be satisfied provided McLane, Duane, and the other Bank Democrats would agree to use their personal influence with members of Congress to have the deposits removed.[639] It was agreed that all three should write Jackson at Rip Raps, and, in complying, Kendall said that the proposal was against his judgment, and Jackson instantly rejected it.[640]

Throughout July the Opposition and Bank papers were warning the public of the movement on foot, and the “Intelligencer” was especially alarmed, dwelling at length on the rumor that Kendall was in Philadelphia before he had even left Washington. Blair was moved to mirth. He admitted that Kendall had been seen taking a stage, carrying with him “a large black trunk,” and that, while he “looked charitable, his intent may be wicked.” Worse still, “the Editor of the ‘Globe’ left for the South two days before with baggage enough to last a man a lifetime.” A mysterious, uncanny combination of events, he conceded, that “bodes to owners of U.S. Bank stock, who purchased at 50 per cent, no good.”[641]

This facetiousness enraged and alarmed the Opposition, and its press began to threaten to impeach Duane if he removed the deposits. Kendall was scourged with excoriations, and State banks were warned against taking the deposits on pain of the displeasure of the Biddle institution. Papers under the influence of the Bank, but still posing as Jacksonian, were sure that Jackson “and his able Secretary of the Treasury” would “not be hurried or retarded in his important measure by the violent and indiscreet denunciations and threats of any set of men,” and would “act on the deposits at the proper time and in the proper way.”[642] And Blair, catching the subtle suggestion of Bennett, hastened to assail him as having been “smuggled into the confidence of an unsuspecting Democracy as a friend of the cause” and as a “treacherous instrument of Webb and Biddle,” who had “the impudence to propose by praise to flatter the President and his Cabinet to adopt the views of the Bank.”[643] From his sanctum in the office of the “Albany Journal,” Thurlow Weed, wisest of the Whig journalists, sent forth the threat of panic. “We are impatient for the removal,” he wrote. “Nothing short of a general ruin will cure the people of their delusions, and the sooner it comes, the better.”[644]

IV

Meanwhile Jackson at Rip Raps was in daily conference with Frank Blair on the problems of the removal. All this time Blair was creating the impression in the “Globe” that the President’s sole thought was the recovery of his health. The sea air was “proving advantageous,” his appetite better, his strength returning. Nothing was more remote from the thoughts of Jackson. The situation was delicate and politically mixed. The Cabinet was, for the most part, hostile. Conservative Democrats were terrified at the thought of such radical action, and feared the complete disruption of the party and its defeat in 1836. Kendall does not misstate the conditions when he says that “the ambitious politicians who still surrounded General Jackson, trembled in their knees, and were ready to fly,” and that “almost the only fearless and determined supporters he had around him were Mr. Taney, the editor of the ‘Globe,’ and its few contributors.”[645] The brilliant, but ultra-conservative Ritchie, of the “Richmond Enquirer,” feared that the party would “rue the precipitate step in sackcloth and ashes,” and that it would “present nothing but a splendid ruin.”[646]

Painful as the situation was to all conservatives, it was maddening to Van Buren, who thought he saw the Presidency slipping from his grasp. In his desire to get as far away as possible, he was planning a month’s outing with Washington Irving among the Dutch settlements of Long Island and the North River, when a letter reached him from Jackson calling upon him to take a stand. His reply, under date of August 19th, would have pleased Talleyrand. Having great confidence in Silas Wright, Senator from New York, he wrote that he would confer with him and then formulate his views. A little later he wrote that he and Wright favored the McLane plan. The tone of sharp surprise in Jackson’s response alarmed the hard-pressed heir apparent, and he hastily wrote that he would yield to the wisdom of Jackson. But his troubles were not over. Another letter from Jackson, more alarming still, pursued him to poison his vacation, summoning him to Washington for a consultation. The cunning politician never faced a more painful problem. He could not afford to break with the all-powerful party dictator in the White House--that would be to abandon the Presidency. Nor was he at all certain that he could afford to become intimately identified with the desperate enterprise upon which the chief was determined to embark. The one would deprive him of the nomination of his party; the other might make that nomination worthless. The campaign of 1836 was already in full swing, and the Opposition was insinuating a directing influence between the most unpopular measures of the Administration and Van Buren. Timid and cautious by temperament, his peculiar situation accentuated these traits in the candidate, and the summons to the seat of war sounded to him like the crack of doom.

But he was equal to the crisis. Writing at once of his willingness to respond if Jackson thought best, he feared his presence in Washington at the time of the withdrawal would dim the prestige of the act by giving it the appearance of having been inspired by the moneyed interests of New York.[647] Having painted this thought, he added some lines for the protection of Louis McLane, his friend. He was fearful that, on the resignation of Duane, McLane might feel that he should also tender his, and that would be a pity. Would it not be a good idea, in the event the resignation were offered, to reply that “you confide in him &c., notwithstanding the difference between you on this point, and that if he could consistently remain in the Administration, you would be gratified?” That the suspicious Jackson was deceived is highly improbable, albeit where his affections were involved, as in the case of Van Buren, his vision was apt to be occasionally defective.

But Van Buren and his advice were not needed, for a stronger man, with courage and an iron will equal to his own, was moving to the side of Jackson. Throughout the months of conferences and discussions the one member of his official Cabinet who was in whole-hearted sympathy with the wishes of the Kitchen Cabinet was Roger Taney, the Attorney-General. Before leaving for Rip Raps, Jackson had discussed with him the steps to be taken in the event of a definite refusal from Duane to order the removal, and had intimated that he would transfer Taney to the office of the Secretary of the Treasury. Just about the time Jackson was puzzling over the peculiar hedging of Van Buren, he received a letter from Taney that delighted him. The latter reiterated his conviction that the deposits should be removed, and during the congressional recess. He was sure “the powerful and corrupting monopoly” would “be fatal to the liberties of the people” unless destroyed, and Jackson alone could encompass its destruction. The President had “already done more than any other man has done, or could do, to preserve the simplicity and purity of our institutions, and to guard the country from this dangerous and powerful instrument of corruption.” He had “doubted” whether Jackson’s friends and the country had the right to ask him “to bear the brunt of such a conflict as the removal of the deposits under present conditions is likely to produce.” He had no desire for the secretaryship of the Treasury, but he “would not shrink from the responsibility” if, in the President’s judgment, “the public exigency would require” him to undertake it.[648] Here was a man quite as persuasive in his flattery as Van Buren, and prepared, as Van Buren was not, to stake his future upon an aggressive support of the removal.

For the time being, then, exit Van Buren.

Enter Roger B. Taney.

By this time Jackson’s mind was thoroughly made up. The tour of Kendall had not been a complete success. The banks were timid and fearful of the power of “The Monster.” Catterall credits the report that Kendall himself had concluded the plan unwise, and had admitted to Jackson that “the project of removing the deposits must be given up.”[649] This advice, if given,[650] came too late. The old military leader was in the saddle, war was declared, retreat was defeat. Thus, a few days after receiving Taney’s letter, Jackson wrote him that he had considered the probability that Congress would attempt to overawe him, and had determined that, when Duane withdrew, Taney should step into the place and conduct the affairs of the Treasury until toward the close of the next session of Congress, when the battle would have been won or lost, and the refusal of the Senate to confirm Taney’s nomination would not interfere. He was only awaiting proof of the expenditure of $40,000 of Bank money in the campaign. With this proof, of which he had no doubt, he would feel justified in removing the deposits. The Bank might “rebel against our power, and even refuse to pay to the order of the Government the public money in its vaults, and lay claim to all the money that remains uncalled for on the books of the loan office.” Everywhere he found the “assumed power of this monster.” This pretension must be challenged and tested, and he had no doubt of being “sustained by the people.”[651]

Thus the die was definitely cast at Rip Raps early in September, and Jackson returned to Washington determined to force the fighting.

V

As soon as he reached the capital, he began to press Duane more insistently, with the Secretary stubbornly refusing to budge. Some time before he had voluntarily given the assurance that if the President should determine upon the course outlined, and he should be unable to comply, he would promptly tender his resignation. The President’s intentions were now thoroughly understood, but Duane gave no indication of a disposition to relinquish his post, and the pro-Bank papers were decorating him with laurels. The first covert attack upon him from Administration circles appeared in the “Globe” of September 12th, when Blair, taking cognizance of an article in the “Baltimore Chronicle,” denounced it as a “slanderer of Mr. Duane.” “Would the ‘Chronicle’ convert the Secretary of the Treasury into a Bank officer, and have him communicating to the corporation what belongs only to his relations with the President?” Even Duane could not have mistaken the implication. Five days after this article appeared, the Cabinet was convened, and Jackson took the opinion of his advisers. McLane, Duane, and Cass were against the step, with Taney, Barry, and Woodbury (who had previously hedged), favoring it.

On the following day the Cabinet was again convened to hear the President’s reasons for his determination, set forth in the famous “Paper Read to the Cabinet.” This document, as read, had been revised and rewritten from the notes sent by Jackson from his retreat at Hampton Roads to Taney, and was to become the storm center of congressional controversy, although it did not concern the Congress in the least. Beginning with a confession of a fixed hostility to the Bank on the conviction of its unconstitutionality and danger to the liberties of the people, he elaborately reviewed the charter controversy. The people had passed upon his conduct at the polls and he had been overwhelmingly vindicated. The Nation, therefore, having definitely decided on the abandonment of the Bank as a place of deposit, some method should be devised for the future deposit of the public funds before the expiration of the charter. Under the law, the Secretary of the Treasury could withdraw the deposits whenever he saw fit, provided he informed Congress of his act at the earliest opportunity. To leave the deposits with the Bank until the day of the expiration of the charter with the expectation of making the transfer to some other depository at once would mean “serious inconvenience to the Government and people.” Such work, he thought, “ought not to be the work of months only, but of years,” for otherwise “much suffering and distress would be brought upon the people.” These considerations alone, he thought sufficient to justify the step he proposed.

But in the conduct of the Bank additional and more pressing reasons could be found. Knowing of the Government’s decision to appropriate the greater part of its deposits during 1832 to the payment of the public debt, the Bank, in the sixteen months preceding May, 1832, had extended its loans more than $28,000,000, and the maximum of the extension had been made in May. And two months before that, the Bank had so perfectly understood its inability to pay over the public deposits when called upon, that it had secretly negotiated with foreign holders of the three per cent stock a year’s postponement of a demand for payment after notice should be given by the Government. “This effort to thwart the Government in the payment of the public debt,” he said, “that it might retain the public money to be used for their private interests, palliated by pretenses notoriously unfounded and insincere, would have justified the instant withdrawal of the public deposits.”

Since the congressional report in favor of the Bank, other things had occurred that would surely alter the opinion of the lawmakers. “The fact that the Bank controls, and in some cases substantially owns, and by its money supports, some of the leading presses of the country, is now more clearly established.” Extravagant sums had been loaned to editors on unusual time and nominal security in 1831 and 1832. And the proceedings and management of the Bank had been unusual and indefensible. The terms of the charter had been violated; and when Government directors undertook to restore methods in conformity with the terms of the charter, they had been disregarded. Worse still: the most important transactions involving the credit of the Bank had been turned over to Biddle, and the committees left in utter ignorance of what he was doing. He had been given unlimited authority in the use of the Bank’s money for propaganda purposes. Thousands of dollars had been squandered in the printing of speeches and pamphlets, not only defending the Bank, but attacking the chosen representatives of the people. If, as claimed, the Bank could bring distress and chaos in retaliation, all the more reason for breaking the power of the tyrannical institution. And he closed by fixing October 1st as the day for action.

As the members of the Cabinet sat in the White House that day under conflicting emotions, all appreciating the seriousness of the step, and some contemplating the closing of a career, there could have been none unmindful of the fact that the Paper was intended less for them than for the public. It was characteristic of Jackson in preparing his ground for a fight to speak over the heads of both Cabinet and Congress to the people. That Kendall and Blair were in large part responsible for the original draft which reached Taney for revision, there can be no doubt.

Knowing the real purpose of the Paper, Duane requested a postponement of publication until he could definitely decide. While the Paper was being put in type at the “Globe” office, McLane and Cass threatened to resign rather than accept any responsibility for the act, and Lewis suggested that they be publicly relieved of responsibility. When Blair hastened to Jackson with Lewis’s suggestion, the grim man of iron added the concluding paragraph assuming full personal responsibility--much to the chagrin and disgust of Taney.[652]

The crisis had now been reached, and the action of Duane was awaited by the Kitchen Cabinet with the keenest interest, not unmixed with fear lest Taney decline to take the vacant place and face the bitter fight. Taking counsel of his fears, Kendall rushed to the Attorney-General and was reassured. Confessing his fear that his acceptance would mean the end of his lifelong hopes for a place on the Supreme Bench, Taney declared himself in the fight to the end.[653]

On September 21st, the “Globe” authoritatively announced that “the deposits would be changed to State banks” as soon as the necessary arrangements could be made; and in anticipation of the nature of the war the Bank would wage, Blair stressed the fact that the deposits would not be immediately withdrawn, and that the process would be gradual. “It is believed,” he wrote, “that by this means the change need not produce any inconvenience to the commercial community.”

Four days later the “Paper Read to the Cabinet” appeared in full in the “Globe.”

VI

Two days after this publication, Major Lewis wrote Hamilton that “if Mr. Duane cannot or will not make the order,” he would be superseded by Taney, “who has been decidedly with the President in relation to this matter from the beginning to the end,” and discrediting rumors of other Cabinet resignations.[654] Whatever may have been the feelings of Hamilton, who looked upon the plan as fraught with possibilities of disaster, the effect of the “Globe’s” announcement on Thomas H. Benton, sojourning with relatives in Virginia, was that of a bugle blast to a war charger. He felt “an emotion of the moral sublime at beholding such an instance of civic heroism,” and that “a great blow had been struck, and that a great contest must come on, which could only be crowned with success by acting up to the spirit with which it was commenced.” He “repaired to Washington at the approach of the session with a full determination to stand by the President.”[655]

The day after the reading of the Paper, Jackson called upon Duane for a decision, and the Secretary begged for time to confer with his venerable father, then _en route_ to Washington. The same day Major Donelson, the President’s secretary, informed him of the decision to publish the Paper in the “Globe” on the morrow, and the hard-pressed Minister protested against such precipitancy. This protest was followed with a letter to Donelson reiterating his plea for time, with the assertion that if he were President he would “consult at least reasonably the feelings of a man who has already anxiety enough.”[656] Jackson had, in fact, exercised a most unnatural restraint of his temper, and had been remarkably considerate of his Minister’s feelings. Even before the reading of the Paper, and before Duane had made his choice for martyrdom, Jackson had opened a graceful avenue of escape to the Legation at St. Petersburg, but the offer had been declined.

On the 21st, Duane appeared at the White House and left his written decision with Jackson personally. It is a letter of many words, evidently prepared for publication. After asserting that the Secretary of the Treasury is, by the terms of the charter, the sole custodian of the public funds, he finally reached his reasons for refusing to “carry your directions into effect.” It would be a “breach of public faith,” would appear as “vindictive and arbitrary,” and “if the Bank has abused or perverted its powers, the judiciary are able and willing to punish.” The House of Representatives had declared the funds safe, and, if anything had happened since its report, “the representatives of the people, chosen since your appeal to them in your veto message, will in a few weeks assemble.” Again, “a change to local and irresponsible banks will tend to shake public confidence,” and “it is not sound policy to foster local banks.” And so on with other reasons, including the charge that “persons and presses known to be in the confidence and pay of the Administration” had tried to intimidate him. There could be no misunderstanding of the purpose of the letter. It was written in a spirit bitterly hostile to the Administration, and in the hope of serving the moneyed institution and having the service rewarded.[657] Having thus insulted the President, he withdrew his promise of July to resign if unable to meet his chief’s views, and carefully pointed out that Jackson had the power of dismissal. Here was a martyr zealously seeking the cross.

Jackson immediately wrote a brief, dignified reply to the effect that he could not receive such a communication, nor “enter into further discussion of the question.” Rather sharply, the grim old man reminded his subordinate that the imputation in the latter’s letter had no place in a correspondence between a President and a member of his Cabinet, that the letter of July offering to resign was before him, and brusquely demanding a final answer. Early in the afternoon Duane again took his pen in hand. The result was another tiresome letter concluding with a distinct refusal to issue the order or to resign, and impudently protesting against the interference of the Executive in the affairs of a member of the Cabinet. This second letter could hardly have reached the White House when Duane, seized with a perfect passion for self-expression, wrote a third “to present another view.” The burden of this epistle was that he had been treated unkindly by the “Globe.” Having started this upon its way by messenger, the superheated Secretary grasped his pen for another effort, consisting of painful reiterations. All these letters, thousands of words, and pages of paper, were written on the 21st, but with the exception of the reply to the first, Jackson ignored them. Then, two days later, Jackson wrote a short note, returning the last two letters as containing inaccuracies and being inadmissible, and closing with a curt dismissal. Thus Duane laid down his pen, packed his belongings, and passed out of public life.[658]

The day following Duane’s dismissal, written by Taney, Cass and McLane consulted Jackson as to the desirability of their resignations. This was almost too much for the old warrior’s patience, and he irritably reminded them that they had been released from responsibility, and could remain unless they preferred to join the Opposition. The fire of battle was now in his blood, and he had no intention of parleying with the timid in his official household. Three days later, Taney issued his famous order, McLane and Cass tendered their resignations, and Jackson, in replying, followed Van Buren’s suggestion, and they remained.

On the publication of the Paper in the “Globe,” the Bank summoned a meeting of the directors and a committee was appointed to take action. Writing from Boston to Biddle, Webster made the suggestion, which was adopted, of a memorial to Congress.[659] This memorial, which referred to the President of the United States as “Andrew Jackson,” indicated a disposition to consider the approaching struggle as between “Andrew Jackson” and Nicholas Biddle, between the Bank and the Administration, and the ill-advised arrogance of the paper showed all too clearly that the financiers felt that in such a contest the power and the victory would be on the side of the Bank. And such was the prestige of that powerful corporation that not a few Democrats, including friends and supporters of Jackson, shared in the feeling. When Van Buren was authorized by Jackson to offer the attorney-generalship to Daniel of Virginia, that timid lawyer admitted that his fears of Jackson’s rashness and situation dissuaded him.[660] It was not until early in November that Benjamin F. Butler, yielding to the personal persuasion of Van Buren, accepted the post. And to obtain his consent it was necessary to appeal to personal friendship, private interest, pecuniary benefit, and the allurements of fame.[661]

And almost immediately the storm broke.

VII

“The times will be hard, and the struggle a great one,” wrote Van Buren to Hamilton, “but the patriotism and fortitude of the people will triumph.”[662] And Nicholas Biddle did not propose that the inconvenience should be slight. He was delighted with the order for the removal. He was convinced that out of the distress in business circles would come an irresistible demand, not only for the restoration of the deposits, but for the rechartering of the Bank. This last act of Jackson’s was the golden opportunity. The advantage would be followed. The public, which had sustained Jackson at the polls, was to be punished, or “disciplined,” as Webster mildly described the process. “This discipline,” wrote the orator to Biddle, who was his client as well as his party colleague, “it appears to me, must have very great effects on the general question of the rechartering of the Bank.”

The “disciplining” of the people began with the Bank’s first curtailments on August 13, 1833, and practically ended on July 11, 1834, although it continued to some extent until September. The first move--a proper one--was to issue an order that the amount of money loaned on discounts was not to be increased, and that bills of exchange should be drawn only at short dates and on the Eastern offices. These orders meant inevitable contraction, but of the sort that could be justified. But immediately after Taney had issued his order, the Bank adopted additional measures--the reduction of discounts, the application of the order of restriction on the drawing of bills to all the offices of the Bank, the collection of the balances against the State banks, and the restriction of the receipt of State bank notes. The historian of the Bank truly says that “on the whole, nothing but peril to the Bank could excuse such measures.”[663] But even this second step seemed all too mild to the officers and directors in the marble front building on Chestnut Street, and three weeks later a third step was taken. The branch banks in the West were ordered to persevere in “the course of measures already prescribed,” and instructed that an extraordinary effort should be made to keep down circulation, and to avoid drafts on the northern Atlantic offices.[664] One month later, Philip Hone, the New York banker and business man, was recording in his diary that the “ill-advised and arbitrary step of the President” was “producing an awful scarcity of money, with immediate distress and melancholy forebodings to the merchants and others who require credit to sustain them”; and that “stocks of every description have fallen--Delaware and Hudson from one hundred and twenty-five to one hundred and fourteen, Boston and Providence from one hundred and fifteen to one hundred and three,” and that “money cannot be had on bond and mortgage at 7 per cent, and I am told that good notes will hardly be discounted at 9 per cent.”[665]

Just about the time Hone was recording these conditions, Biddle was offering the notorious Samuel Swartwout, the Jacksonian Collector in New York, whose irregularities in office were to be unmercifully exploited by the Whigs, a directorship in the Bank, and the latter, declining because of the onerous duties of his office, advised that since “the Bank’s power has been shown” in the distress, it might be well now to manifest mercy.[666] Where Niles had found money scarce in September and October without being able to conceive a reason, he wrote in November of “a most severe pressure for money” and the prospect of a “collapse of business.” That month State bank notes began to depreciate and loans were at eighteen per cent per annum. With the convening of Congress and the President’s uncompromising Message in December, Biddle increased the pressure for the purposes of “discipline.” Business men were unable to get credit. Factories were shutting down because of the inability of manufacturers to get loans, and laborers were thrown out into the street. The Christmas season found New York “gloomy” with “times bad,” stocks still falling, and a panic prevailing “which will result in bankruptcies and ruin in many quarters where, a few short weeks ago, the sun of prosperity shone with unusual brightness.”[667] And three days later the Lord Holland of the American Whigs, in his misery and apprehension, was beginning to suspect that politics and the Bank, as well as Jackson’s “ill-advised and arbitrary step,” might be playing a part, and concluding that “between them both the community groans under the distress which these misunderstandings have created.” “A plague on both your houses,” he wrote, his impartial castigation springing, perhaps, from the fact that he had lost $20,000.[668]

In January the crash came. Business houses began to fail in New York, Philadelphia, and Washington, and by the end of the month loans could not be had in New York and Baltimore at less than one and a half per cent discount per month. Wages decreased, along with prices, with laborers out of employment and the real estate values on the slump. And at this time, with the Opposition in Congress working in hearty coöperation with the Bank to create the fear that fed the panic, Jackson sat in the White House one Sunday morning writing to Hamilton: “There is no real distress. It is only with those who live by borrowing, trade on loans, and gamblers in stocks. It would be a godsend to society if all such were put down.... I must stop. The church bells are ringing and I must attend.”[669] This theory that it would be a “godsend” to rid the country of the men who live on borrowing was to be used with considerable effect against Jackson by his congressional enemies.

And at the same time, Biddle was writing to the president of his Boston branch[670] that “the ties of party allegiance can only be broken by the actual conviction of existing distress,” and that “nothing but the evidence of suffering abroad will produce any effect in Congress”; and to Major Jack Downing in New York that “if the bank were to suffer itself to be misled into the measure of making money plentiful, it will only give to its enemies the triumph of having robbed it with impunity.”[671] Thus the evidence is abundant that the Bank exerted its power to the utmost to bring the country to the verge of ruin, and so compel it to consent to a recharter. The fact that the majority of its victims were among its most zealous supporters did not interest Mr. Biddle.[672] Two days after writing the letter to Downing, Biddle determined upon a further contraction in discounts to the amount of $3,320,000, with orders that this should be made within thirty or sixty days, and the largest reductions were to be made in the Western and Southwestern banks. Not content with this, he made another increase in the rates of exchange, and here again discriminated frankly against the West. Thus, in eight months the Bank planned a reduction in discounts to the amount of $13,300,000, which Catterall describes truly as “a preposterously large sum.”[673] When to this is added the further restrictions of as much as $5,000,000 through the breaking up of the exchange dealings of the Bank, the contraction in eight months amounted to at least $18,300,000.

Had the Bank acted honorably, there would have been an inevitable depression for the time because of the removal order, but the panic was the Bank’s panic, deliberately conceived, and cruelly produced, with the frankly avowed purpose of blackmailing the American people into granting another charter. In his letter to the president of the Boston branch, Biddle had bluntly confessed his purpose. “I have no doubt,” he wrote, “that such a course will ultimately lead to a restoration of the currency, and the recharter of the Bank.”[674]

During this time there were certain unscrupulous speculators, the buzzards of the panic, whispering commendation into Biddle’s ear while feathering their own nests through the distress of the people.[675] But Webster, alarmed at the havoc, had urged Biddle, through Horace Binney, “that the Bank ought to reduce as slowly and moderately as they can--and occasionally to ease off--where it is requisite to prevent extreme suffering.”[676] This advice aroused the banker’s ire and resulted in no good. It was Biddle’s idea that the Bank’s senatorial champions, instead of suggesting a policy of moderation, should be using the distress as an argument for a new charter. “The relief,” he wrote Joseph Hopkinson, the distinguished lawyer and jurist, “to be useful or permanent, must come from Congress, and from Congress alone. If that body will do its duty, relief will come--if not, the Bank feels no vocation to redress the wrongs of these miserable people. Rely upon that. This worthy President thinks that because he has scalped Indians and imprisoned Judges, he is to have his way with the Bank. He is mistaken.”[677]

VIII

Meanwhile the Bank was encouraging, inspiring, arranging indignation meetings of the people, where Jackson was arraigned for bringing ruin upon the community, and petitions were drawn asking for the restoration of the deposits. Clay, eager to lash the people into fury, had suggested the plan. “It would be well,” he wrote, “to have a general meeting of the people to memorialize Congress in favor of a restoration of the deposits. Such an example [in Philadelphia] might be followed elsewhere; and it would be more influential as it might be more general.”[678] The artificial nature of many of the petitions was well understood by the Jackson leaders, and the usually elegant John Forsyth had referred to them in the Senate as “these pot-house memorials,” much to the astonishment of Adams.[679] These petitions, according to the plan, were, in many instances, taken to Washington by committees that waited upon the President before presenting them to Congress. Here they were presented in lugubrious speeches calculatingly designed further to fan the fears of the people and keep the panic going. When the New York merchants adopted a memorial and secured the signatures of three thousand people, Tammany Hall ordered meetings in every ward in the city to approve of Jackson’s actions.[680] A few days later, between twelve and fifteen thousand friends of “sound currency by means of a national bank” met at noon in the park. When Hone, selected to preside, reached the park, he found an “immense crowd” composed in large part “of the most respectable mechanics and others of the city--men of character, respectability, and personal worth, with a few miscreants who went, perhaps, of their own accord, but were probably sent there to excite disturbances.” In truth, “the rabble had gotten possession of the chair,” and it required “some hard thumps” from the men of character, respectability, and personal worth to clear the way sufficiently for the presiding genius of the Whig dinner table to reach the platform. When he attempted to speak, the “yells of the mob” rendered all the chairman’s efforts “unavailing”; so he “put the question upon the resolutions which were carried by an immense majority,” and the meeting adjourned. Unhappily the “mob” did not disperse for some time afterwards.[681]

When these committees, composed of bitter enemies of the President, began to pour into the capital and knock at the White House door, they were received, at first, with urbanity and heard with patience. The committeemen, however, carried back “grossly colored” stories of the interviews, and Jackson thereafter decided to hear and dismiss them without discussion.[682] In these stories Jackson is pictured as raving and ranting, spluttering and spouting imprecations and profanity. McMaster, however, accepts as true that he received these committees “with that stately courtesy for which he was so justly distinguished,” and concludes from the evidence that he “soon began to lecture them.”[683] In these lectures Jackson is reported to have told the committees to “go to the Bank” or to “go to Biddle” for relief. No less an authority than Catterall has concluded that he was not far wrong. On one occasion he did use extreme language to a committee which implied the threat of rebellion. “If that be your game,” he exclaimed, “come with your armed Bank mercenaries, and, by the Eternal, I will hang you around the Capitol on gallows higher than Haman.”[684] There is no doubt that he did harangue the committees with bitter denunciations of “The Monster” and properly ascribed a large part of the distress to the deliberate purpose of the Bank to “discipline” the Nation. Some historians have suggested that these outbursts were staged, and it is recorded as a fact by Henry A. Wise, the brilliant Virginia Whig. “When a Bank committee would come ...” he writes, “he would lay down his pipe, rise to the full height of his stature and voice, and seem to foam at the mouth whilst declaiming vehemently against the dangers of money monopoly. The committee would retire in disgust, thinking they were leaving a mad man, and as soon as they were gone, he would resume his pipe, and, chuckling, say, ‘They thought I was mad,’ and coolly comment on the policy of never never compromising a vital issue.”[685] This interpretation of Jackson’s tempests and whirlwinds of passion, coming from a severe critic of his Bank policy, is the most dependable of all the opinions that have been expressed by friend or foe.

IX

And while the committees may have hooted the idea that the Bank was responsible for the severity and continuance of the panic, it very slowly began to dawn upon the New York merchants that possibly the “Emperor Nicholas” might be able to alleviate conditions without in the least compromising the safety of the Bank. Some of his champions were slow to realize or loath to concede this declining popularity. In February the bankers and merchants of New York appointed a committee to wait upon him and urge a suspension of the contraction, and Albert Gallatin, former Secretary of the Treasury, pointedly warned him that the committee was satisfied of his ability to grant relief, and would so report to the New York merchants. Thus cornered and threatened with the desertion of its friends, the Bank finally agreed that up to May 1st there should be no further contraction. This was a fatal concession in that it was a confession that relief had been previously deliberately denied.[686] Even such champions of the Bank as James Watson Webb found real cause for melancholy complaint in heavy losses in Bank stock, and we find him whining that he had lost all except his paper, and that other speculators, including Alexander Hamilton, Jr., had been among the victims.

Thus the drift against the Bank, which began when Governor Wolf of Pennsylvania denounced its actions in his Message to the Legislature, increased alarmingly. The fact that the Governor had been a firm supporter gave tremendous weight to his act. The friends of the institution were stunned, and, as we shall see a little later, the Governor was bitterly denounced and warmly defended in the Senate. Thus the advice of Jackson to “see Biddle,” so mirthfully related by the committees at the time, and so much ridiculed by some historians since, was demonstrating its wisdom. One month after Wolf acted, Governor Marcy of New York imitated his example with the recommendation of a State plan of relief. His proposal to issue $6,000,000 of five per cent State stock to be loaned to State banks was adopted.

The Bank, in its game of “disciplining” the people, had vastly overplayed its hand, and, by its cruel, implacable policy of ruining friends as well as foes, had begun to lose ground in the late winter and early spring. Even among the ultra-conservatives of business, the feeling was germinating that Jackson was not far wrong in the conclusion that a moneyed institution possessing the power to precipitate panics to influence governmental action, was dangerous to the peace, prosperity, and liberty of the people.

X

But the politicians in the Congress were the last to see the drift. Long after the bankers and merchants had lost interest in the fate of Biddle’s Bank, they continued their fight in its behalf throughout the most bitter congressional session the Republic had ever known. The actions of the Bank, the tumult of the market-places, the proceedings of the merchants, are all intimately interwoven with the activities of the Bank’s champions in House and Senate. There the last stand was taken, there the battle was definitely lost. And there the most dramatic feature of the fight was staged. It was at this juncture that three important figures, not hitherto intimately identified with or against the Administration, moved to the firing line. Thomas H. Benton assumed the leadership of the Jacksonian forces, and Clay’s fighters were brilliantly augmented by the advent of two Senators, William Campbell Preston of South Carolina, and Benjamin Watkins Leigh of Virginia.

The complete harmony between Benton’s views and Jackson’s actions in the Bank controversy has given an overshadowing prominence to his leadership. For thirty years he was a constructive force in legislation, associating his name with more important measures written into law than Clay, Webster, and Calhoun combined. In the Senate his faults of mannerism, his arrogance, and stupendous conceit, together with the interminable length of his speeches and his diffusive tendencies, served to overshadow his very substantial contributions to the discussions. The fact that the Chamber emptied and the galleries cleared when he arose did not disturb him in the least. He spoke from the Chamber to the country, and his carefully prepared speeches, especially during the Bank fight, were treatises intended for the education of the people. His personal life was above reproach. His austerity, his imposing dignity, discouraged attempts at intimacy in a day when men loved conviviality and were a trifle lax in their morals. He was one of the colossal figures of American politics and he never loomed larger than in his fight for Jackson.

William C. Preston, fresh from oratorical triumphs in the Nullification contest, entered the Senate at the age of thirty-eight. Few have made a more favorable début in that body. His fame as an orator had preceded him, and Clay’s plans had dedicated the panic session to perfervid oratory. It is impossible to understand, from his speeches in the “Congressional Globe,” the extravagant enthusiasm of so stern a critic as Adams. But we cannot discount the common verdict of his contemporaries who considered him one of the most consummate of orators, and “one of the greatest rhetoricians and declaimers of his generation.”[687] From another we learn that “many thought him the most finished orator the South had produced,” and that he “could arouse his audiences to enthusiasm, and then move them to tears.”[688] Not least among the truimphs of his art was his power to sway a mob in the street as well as move the case-hardened critics of the Senate house. Poet and painter, as he was, it is not surprising that in the heat of advocacy his feelings often predominated over his judgment, and his superheated imagination sometimes led him beyond the realms of reality, but these very weaknesses were to delight the enemies of the Jackson Administration, led to the daily assault by Clay. Thus, in his first year in the Senate, he took his place, far in advance of most of his colleagues, and side by side with Clay, Webster, Calhoun, and Clayton.

In addition to Preston, the Opposition was to be further strengthened by the arrival with the panic session of Leigh. Intellectually, he was one of the strongest men in a State of strong men, and at the bar he was recognized as a great constitutional and civil lawyer. As an orator, he was fluent, fiery, intense, impressive. Wise, who was himself no mean master of English, has described him as “a purist in his Anglo-Saxon,” and as having a style “equal to that of the Elizabethan age of English literature.”[689] Like Prentiss, he was a small man who loomed large when speaking, and, like him, too, he had one short leg and wore a cork on the sole of his shoe. Unlike Prentiss, he capitalized his infirmity oratorically. Wise found that, while his mannerisms were not graceful, they “always excited sympathy for his infirmity.” His voice, which was no small part of his oratorical equipment, has been described as “clear, soft, flute-like, not loud, but like murmuring music.”[690] His manner, his speaking method, his very appearance, fitted in well with Clay’s programme of dramatic, lugubrious oratory, and he at once moved to his place beside the panic orators, and played a conspicuous and theatrical part.

Thus, with the panic at its flood, with Benton moving to the front of the Administration forces, and with Clay’s oratorical battery strengthened, it is time to look in upon the Senate.