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Life and Diary of John Floyd - Chapter V

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CHAPTER V. AN APOSTLE OF DISCONTENT

SUFFERING from declining health and despairing of the republic under the administration of Jackson whom he had helped to place in office, Floyd was, during his period as governor of Virginia, an apostle of a local and sectional discontent that, at times, threatened the preservation of the Union. His grievances were not, however, mainly personal and political. He spoke for a poverty stricken and declining section embracing a large part of tidewater and piedmont Virginia and extending far into the same sections of the lower Atlantic seaboard. Thence had gone tobacco growers into Kentucky and Tennessee and cotton planters into the Gulf States leaving desolation and poverty behind. With others Floyd now lamented the decline of the seaboard planters and watched, in dismay, the lowering clouds of obscurity as they gathered over the places made vacant by the flight of population and capital to the westward. Alarm was, indeed, the general aspect of the South's ancient aristocracy, and others than Floyd had come to believe that the days of her wonderful civilization were numbered.

Many patriotic attempts had been made to avert the effects of these calamities. For a decade or more agricultural societies had sought remedial aid in a more scientific cultivation of lands; experiments were then being made with a view to converting the tobacco, corn, and wheat lands of Virginia into cotton plantations; Edmund Ruffin was teaching the scientific use of calcarious manures; plans for connecting

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the eastern and western counties by means of turnpikes and canals were on foot; in defence of a declining power in their legislative assemblies the older sections of the slaveholding states had developed a well defined theory of minority rights; at South Carolina College Doctor Cooper was teaching the sons of the South the Manchester doctrines of laissez faire; near him, at Fort Hill, South Carolina, Calhoun had formulated his famous nullification doctrines; and meanwhile Virginia, in her resolutions on federal relations, had protested, from time to time, against the exactions of the odious tariff.

Regardless of the wishes and interests of the South, the North continued meanwhile to demand protection for her manufacturing industries and congressional appropriations for her projected internal improvements. More alarming still, her power to enforce these demands increased from day to day, as the South's minority in Congress grew smaller. Nor could she always rely upon the loyalty of her own sons removed to other sections to guard her interests. Prosperous in their new homes beyond the mountains, which required only good roads and markets to make them ideal, they had not hesitated to ally themselves with the North in support of the American System of which Clay, himself a native Virginian, was the father.

Under the circumstances there seemed nothing left to the seaboard South but the election of a president who would cast the weight of his office against the demands and power of the North. Thus it was hoped to make any resort to nullification,

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secession, or the Virginia doctrines of 1798 unnecessary. Although Jackson's record was not to their liking, Floyd and others expected his official acts, under the changed conditions, to be shaped largely by the interests and demands of the South. For these and other reasons, already referred to, they had aided in placing him in the presidency.

Speaking of their expectations in this connection Floyd later said:

"At this moment [1828] came the direful struggle between the great parties in Congress founded upon the claim which the majority . . . from the north of the Potomac made to the right to lay any tax upon the importations into the United States which was intended to act as a protection to northern manufacturers by excluding foreign fabrics of the same kind. Hence all the states to the south of the Potomac became dependent upon the Northern States for a supply of whatever thing they might want, and in this way the South was compelled to sell its products low and buy from the North all articles it needed from twenty-five to one hundred and twenty-five per cent higher than from France to England . . . At this juncture the southern party brought out Jackson."

With the popularity which he had shown in 1824 and especially with the aid of Pennsylvania which he had carried at that time, it was thought that "the South could elect Jackson and by his help reduce the odious tariff."(66)

In this connection Floyd's support of the interests and demands of the seaboard South may need some explanation. The interests of his former constituents in the Valley had not' always harmonized with those of eastern Virginia. Besides, it can not be forgotten that Floyd was born and reared in

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Kentucky. He seems, however, to have been true to the interests of his neighbors and was not the tool of the slave-holding aristocracy. Already negro slavery had gained a firm foot-hold in the counties about his home, thus identifying their interests with those of the slaveholding sections. Besides, Floyd was related to and connected with some of the oldest and most conservative families of the old South, notably the Prestons of South Carolina, who were then among Calhoun's most trusted advisers.

Personal and political disappointments played, however, a large part in Floyd's opposition to Jackson and his administration. It seems certain that he left Congress fully expecting to be called to some higher place in the federal service. It is certain that he expected Mr. Calhoun, the vice- president, his close friend, and "the one upon whom we placed the highest confidence," to play the leading role in the new administration; also, that such men as Landon Cheves of South Carolina, Tazewell of Virginia, Hugh L. White of Tennessee, and others of the old guard would be called to the places of highest trust.(67) Instead, of all those who had done most, in Floyd's opinion, to secure Jackson's election only Martin Van Buren received a cabinet portfolio. In some mysterious way Floyd and his friends had qualified as suitable persons for foreign missions and governors of distant territories, and a race of "harpies" represented by Amos Kendall, William B. Lewis, and others of the later famous "kitchen cabinet" had usurped the places which the old line politicians had reserved for themselves.

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Thus Jackson had been tested and found to be like "the apples of the Dead Sea . . fair to the eye but all bitterness and ashes within."(68)

It was under these conditions that Floyd was made governor of Virginia but not as an avowed anti-administration candidate. Those back of his candidacy were too farseeing for any such a blunder. Disappointed in their personal ambitions they still hoped to redress the South's economic grievances and to allay the sectional discord in Virginia which was then threatened with dismemberment. Accordingly many Jackson men in the General Assembly, which then elected the governor, supported Floyd's candidacy.(69) Though the Richmond Enquirer, a Jackson organ ably conducted by Thomas Ritchie, failed to comment upon Floyd's election, there is no reason to conclude that its attitude was in itself a severe stricture.

Already disgusted with the personnel of the new cabinet, Floyd was driven by the events of the year 1830 into active and open opposition to the administration. First there was the Mrs. Eaton affair in which Jackson demanded recognition by his official family for a woman whose reputation was such that Mrs. Calhoun did not recognize her. Then came the famous Webster-Hayne debate in which the bonds uniting the North and the South were drawn to the breaking point with Jackson maintaining the position of a neutral. An effort to ally him with the South, his own section, brought from him that astounding but patriotic declaration: "Our Federal Union, it must be preserved." Soon thereafter followed an open breach between Jackson and Calhoun

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caused by W. H. Crawford's revelation of the long concealed fact that it was Calhoun who, as secretary of war in 1818, had desired to censure Jackson for his conduct in Florida in dealing with the Seminoles and the British agents, Arbuthnot and Ambrister. Explanations from Calhoun had sufficed only to place him among political traitors and in no way appeased Jackson who had probably known of Crawford's intentions for some months. The time had come for a break. Accordingly Duff Green, Calhoun's friend, was deposed from the editorship of the party organ, the Daily Telegraph, to make a place for Jackson's friend, Francis P. Blair, who, in December, 1830, founded a new organ, the Globe. Meanwhile one session of Congress had passed without any change in the tariff schedules.

Thus far the attitude of the administration was equivalent to a declaration of war, if not upon the South certainly upon her politicians of the old guard. In a letter of May 4, 1830, to his "dear friend," Floyd, John Tyler made his position clear. He was certain that the efforts of the president, his satellites, and his mercenaries would not break them (the state rights party) down or cause them to yield to a mere majority. He said:

"We should [thus] derive an immortality of infamy more damnable than that which attended the rascal who fired the Temple of Ephesus. They may pronounce us mad, if they please, but we say with Hamlet that we yet know a "hawk from a hand saw." If I am to sink for this, be it so in the name of all that is holy, I can not die a political death that would be attended with fewer pangs.(70)

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But there is little evidence that Tyler expected political death either for himself or his friends. That was to be the portion of the administration crowd. Failing to recognize Clay's superior rights, Tyler expected Jackson to throw himself at the head of the American System. There, he would favor and encourage large appropriations for roads and canals, a "judicious tariff," a distribution of the surplus revenues, an enlargement of the pension system, removals from office for "opinion's sake" and license for the wildest pretensions of the Federal Supreme Court under the leadership of John Marshall. As in the case of Adams and Clay, this course was expected to result in an avalanche of disapproval. Already discontent was abroad in the land. Tyler had never seen "so much dissatisfaction." His friend Troup, a senator from Georgia, was authority for the statement that the president could not again carry the state of Ohio.

Somewhat later, in a letter of December 27, 1830, Floyd's own impressions and purposes were clearly set forth, to his friend, Colonel John Williams of Nashville, Tennessee, as follows:

As you long ago wrote me, and told me personally, nay predicted, Jackson has thrown me overboard; he is not only unwilling to give me employment, as he promised after I declined a reelection to Congress, but has in every single instance refused office to my friends, and even respectful consideration to my letters of recommendation to others. Nor does he stop here. I am at this moment enduring the whole weight of the opposition to him, his friends, and the power and patronage of his government to break down myself and my friends in Virginia, and to prevent my reelection to the office I now fill. Without having much reputation for political

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matters, I have read those folks at Washington thoroughly . . . I am not of a temper to pocket insult, neglect, or injury.

I have, my dear friend, determined on my course. I can be as silent and patient as any of my aboriginal ancestors, and like them I feel that vengeance would be sweet, but wren the day of retribution shall come, it will be marked by the effects of the tomahawk.

You must know that notwithstanding all efforts to prevent it I calculate on a reelection. Then I will begin to formulate a message in which, as you know, my own principles will be maintained.(71)

Thus all hope of a reconciliation with Jackson had passed, and Floyd began to prepare for a contest. To this end he requested his friend, Colonel Williams, to procure affidavits from certain Methodist ministers of Nashville, Tennessee, who, it was alleged, had been asked by Jackson in the summer of 1830 to be on the lookout for such a man for the vice- presidency as would suit them, in case he should decide to resign the presidency after securing a reelection. He desired, also, to know the particulars about a certain letter reported to have been written by W. H. Crawford in December, 1827, to one Balch of Nashville, in which the vote of Georgia had been promised to Jackson on the condition that he (Jackson) would decline to listen to the views of John C. Calhoun. He desired to know in particular "whether Balch had shown that letter to General Jackson, what the Genl's answer was, and what Balch's answer was to Mr. Crawford." Fortified with this data Floyd was confident of his ability to "produce a state of things which will be ample vengeance for so much ingratitude."

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More interesting still than this declaration of war and active preparation for hostilities, coming, as they did, immediately after a conversation between Floyd and Calhoun, was the willingness of the former, even at this early date, to be on terms of accord with Clay. All that now prevented a reconciliation between them was the absence of common ground "to occupy with the freedom of former friendship." Floyd had no enmity toward Clay, not even "the remotest disposition to check his future hopes in this state, or anywhere else," and he was perfectly willing that his friends "should deal with him as their judgment of the present and belief of the future shall dictate." He also suggested that Clay might be benefited by Calhoun's friends, since all others in the South had for him only curses. For himself, if he could not be Clay's friend, he was resolved not to be his enemy.(72) Considering the character of the combination later effected between the followers of Clay and those of Calhoun for the formation of the Whig party, the above suggestions are, to say the least, interesting.

Notwithstanding these suggestions for the formation of an opposition party, the way to political success was not clear to Floyd. His prospective allies would probably expect too great a share of the spoils and honors. Accordingly he began again to despair of the republic. At that moment Jackson's friends seemed supreme not only at Washington but also in Virginia, and, in disgust, Tazewell was preparing to resign his seat in the federal Senate. Thinking that such a document might serve as a guide and warning to future generations, Floyd now

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began a diary in which he proposed to chronicle the events of our failure at self-government.

Although Floyd continued his diary for some years, his despair soon turned to hope. Encouraged by a unanimous reelection to the governorship of his state, then regarded as pivotal, he was, one month later, taken into the confidence of certain southern leaders who proposed to make Calhoun president in 1832. Accompanied by their favorite they had, following the adjournment of Congress, stopped in Richmond on their way home from Washington to formulate their plans. There they enjoyed a convivial period at the governor's mansion and mingled with members of the General Assembly. They certainly talked about Jackson's candidacy for a reelection and about his rumored choice of Van Buren for the succession. The good of the country plainly demanded their defeat, and Calhoun was thought to be the only man who could accomplish that end.

Before his guests resumed their respective journeys information from Washington made it clear that Jackson knew of the rendezvous in Richmond and that he would give no quarter in the approaching fight. This information came to Floyd in the form of a letter from Duff Green; the recent happenings in political circles at Washington was the pretext. As a matter of self-justification Calhoun had published the correspondence between himself and Jackson relevant to the Seminole affair. It was not wholly favorable to Jackson who became indignant and read Calhoun out of the Democratic party. On the information of Judge W. T. Barry, the postmaster

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master general in Jackson's cabinet, Green was informed that Calhoun must henceforth be regarded as a traitor and a nullifier. Through the same source warning was also given that the attacks upon Van Buren must cease.(73)

The challenge was complete, and Floyd prepared to put Virginia and especially Richmond in a condition for aggressive and defensive warfare. First of all, he desired to weaken the influence of that "profligate," Thomas Ritchie, the editor of the Richmond Enquirer and the head of the Richmond Junto, a body of politicians similar in some respects to the Albany Regency of New York. To this end Thomas W. Gilmer was encouraged to establish a party organ in Richmond, devoted to the Virginia doctrines and to the patriotic duty of keeping Calhoun before the country as a prominent candidate for the presidency. In the following letter of April 16, 1831, to Calhoun, Floyd had already outlined his plans of action:

You will perceive that Messrs. Tyler and Tazewell have declined a public dinner; that however has made no difference with us. Mr. Tazewell is here and has been for several days, has been much among the members, has dined with several messes, and has met a most graceful reception; wherefore we are settling down to a quiet belief that so far as Virginia is concerned, all is safe, or at least so little to doubt that we do not fear the contest.

I have received several letters from Duff Green, which have puzzled me. He writes as though it were his opinion, and perhaps some of our northern friends also, that it would be well to bring you forward by the General Assembly before they adjourn, as the vice-president with Jackson at his reelection, so as to keep the long end of the lever in case of his death.

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Of the wisdom of this scheme I doubt as Jackson in two years may die, and moreover of his reelection I also doubt, because Virginia you may be assured, at least we feel assured, will vote for you as president if necessary at the next election. Then comes the difficulty with Clay and his friends; that with Jackson's own may throw the election into the House. How then would it terminate? Were we now to offer you as a candidate for the vice-presidency, would we be able with good grace to change our front if the presidency should be deemed the proper course next winter? Would it not seem like placing too low a value upon the pretensions of our candidate? Besides, three fourths of our friends look to you as the proper person to be supported as president on the first, fit occasion. Though, if necessary to defeat Clay the vote can be given again to Jackson. If Clay were out of the field, we can carry your election against Jackson to an entire certainty.

Under all these views I really do not know which course to take; whether to announce you a candidate for the presidency and take the hazard of war, or wait the fate of Clay. We would be glad to know your opinion about these things.

I have trough, suggested to our friends that it would be perhaps prudent, to keep firmly in the opposition to Clay, conciliate his former adherents, who are now for you, and observe a quasi war with Jackson through the summer--extend your interests, and still weaken Jackson; let the public eye be still held upon you until the meeting of the Assembly next fall, at which time you will be formally presented, in the meantime our paper will war for our principles, yet holding you forward to be supported at the proper time. As to Van Buren he has been so disposed of that you may consider him in this State a Caput Mortuum, of according to the lawyers civilitur mortuum.

I have talked much with Judge Brook, the confidential friend of Clay. He is at the head of that party, is with us, and is anxious Clay should decline for a time. We have saved these Judges, they are our friends and will give efficient aid by their talents, their characters and Judgment.

This is my course, holding you thus before the public as a candidate for the first office, and as we think, succeeding so well in this state, that we are unwilling to have it supposed

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anything less would be tolerated. You, however, can from your position look through, the whole Union, and can determine whether we are right, and make any suggestion if we are wrong. We think, as I have observed to you, that Clay alone stands in the way. If you can be assured of New England even he, I think, would not prevent your success. As Clay will see if he does not already perceive, the consequence of his continuing in the contest is not to benefit himself, but to aid Jackson, as he never can be president, until another administration has intervened. To ask the people to turn Jackson out and put him in would be to ask them to pronounce a satire upon themselves. To prevail upon them to turn Jackson out, and put you in would be to censure Jackson and so far by that act, to excuse Clay for his former course as to make his future justification more easy. Can he be made to see this course? The Fox and the Stag, when long chased by the hounds, often lose all self-possession and lose their sagacity entirely as to attack their pursuers at a moment when safety would be secured by another effort.

I will not say anything about the proceedings of Pennsylvania. You no doubt are already advised of all. Should they address you, without doubt you will answer fully, fully, very fully. Take from them the charge of nullification and disunion, and you are stronger than any man. I do not urge this as being at all necessary for Virginia. Here you are safe.

The resignation of Jackson's cabinet, which now followed, as a further means of ridding the administration of objectionable influences, made no changes in Floyd's plans. He considered Van Buren's flight a streak of political sagacity in which he could find no personal consolation. Instead he saw in the departure of the "wretched harpies" only evidences of a "concerted political movement, intended by the president and Van Buren to effectuate some great political object." It was possible that they desired to make the latter vice-president and thus "to inflict

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a punishment upon Mr. Calhoun and overthrow his friends."

But so long as Virginia held the destiny of the plotters in her hand Floyd felt secure. By a judicious use of her power and influence he hoped to defeat the political aims of the administration. Accordingly he now proposed united action on the part of the States Rights party of the South in an effort to defeat its plans. Soon he proposed, also, to suggest "to the Confederacy the name of Mr. Calhoun of South Carolina, as a fit and proper person to fill the presidential chair."(74)

That Calhoun knew of and approved, in general, the movements in Virginia there can be no doubt. In a letter of May 10, 1831, to W. C. Preston he said:

I see that Gilmer is about to establish a new paper at Richmond. It does seem to me that nothing could be more propitious to the great cause for which we have been contending than the establishment of such a paper (as I doubt not will be established) at this moment in the Capitol of the Ancient Dominion. I have long believed that the lead of Virginia is all important on all great constitutional struggles touching the interests of the South; and it does seem to me that no time could be more propitious to obtain that lead than the present. Nothing is wanting but an energetick and able press at Richmond, and I do trust that all who feel the importance of the crisis will cooperate in its support. No one state can take a stand on its constitutional rights, however clear her cause, without the cheering voice of her surrounding sister states, but with that nothing can be more easy than to mention her rights. Most men require to be backed by the force of publick opinion. With these views, I do hope that this state will unite with our friends in Virginia in sustaining Mr. Gilmer's move. I know it is hard to get subscribers but still much may be done

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and few can do more than yourself. Let all who have a stake in the South remember that at the next session the battle must be fought, and that it is essential that our cause should be vigorously sustained in the oldest, most populous, and most exposed Southern State. I know that our friends in Virginia are looking anxiously to be sustained in this State and generally in the South.(75)

But all these well laid plans went awry. In the first place the anti- administration organ under the editorship of Gilmer did not materialize, and in the second place Clay refused to listen to any overtures for a political alliance which meant his elimination even for a period of four years. Accordingly Floyd's friends advised a more moderate coarse, and Calhoun himself refused to become an active candidate for the presidency so long as Clay remained in the contest "with just strength enough to defeat him . . . without being able ever to elect himself."(76)

Discouraged and with nightmares of "Peggie" O'Neil and of the towering wrecks of the federal edifice haunting his memory, Floyd betook himself to his home beyond the mountains, there to enjoy a period of quiet and repose. He returned, however, in time to observe the fruitless flirtations which his friends were conducting with the Anti-Masonic party with a view to supporting its candidate, William Wirt, for the presidency in place of Jackson, but Floyd would not listen to their suggestions. He refused absolutely to have anything to do with one of Wirt's "laxity in morals" and "opportune" political thinking; with one who would turn the federal government over to "fanatics, knaves, and religious bigots."

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Again Calhoun appeared on the scene, this time on his return to Washington. Realizing the impossibility of his own political ambitions and that the interests of the South, so far as remedial tariff legislation was concerned, depended upon the approaching session of Congress, that for 1831--1832, he probably advised his friends in Virginia to acquiesce in the reelection of Jackson who, in spite of his faults, was now considered less objectionable than the "persistent" Clay. At any rate Floyd's opposition to Jackson ceased for the time, and he turned his attention to the efforts then being made for a rehabilitation of the sovereign states and for a reduction of the tariff. Considering the fact that nullification was in the air, that Virginia held a strategic position in the crisis, and that Floyd was in the confidence of Calhoun, his annual message of December, 1831, to the General Assembly, was of more than usual interest. That part bearing upon federal relations dealt both with the nature of the federal government and with the tariff.(77)

In clear and forceful language Floyd reasserted the state sovereignty theory of government, as guaranteed by the "Compact or Constitution," holding the Federal Government to be merely the "Agent of the States" entrusted only with such powers as were originally intended to operate "externally" and "upon nations foreign to those composing the Confederacy." He called attention to the disregard with which "an unrestrained majority" had received the memorials and protests of some of the "sovereign states," justifying their acts by precedent and expediency and thus melting away "the

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solder of the Federal chain;" also to the fact that it was then "strongly insinuated" that the states could not "interpose to arrest an unconstitutional measure." Such a course, he was certain, could result only in nullifying the federal constitution and in a complete failure in our experiment in government.

The tariff was considered as a menace to the South's agricultural interests and as a violation of the constitution. Floyd opposed any arrangement whereby money could be drawn from one section, the South, for the enrichment of another section, the North. Under such a system he feared that those who contributed least to the exports which brought wealth to the treasury, would be tempted to urge expedients for increasing their advantages. To his mind the "Compact" with its several compromises had been entered into for the express purpose of averting such a contingency. Otherwise, it had been "misunderstood" and was, therefore, insufficient to accomplish the object for which it was designed, the preservation of our rights and liberties. On the other hand, if the tariff was unconstitutional, then the federal government had usurped the rights of the states and erected a political system "subversive of that to which allegiance is due." No arrangement in justification of the tariff, not even the proposed distribution of the surplus revenue among the several states, was therefore legal and right.

With this statement of his views before the country Floyd was willing to wait the action of Congress and, for a time at least, to eschew politics; but unforeseen events seemed to make the latter desire impossible.

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Accepting as a challenge the refusal of the federal Senate to confirm Jackson's nomination of Van Buren to be Minister to the Court of St. James, his friends now put him forward as the candidate of the Democratic party for the vice-presidency to succeed Calhoun. To Floyd's great amazement, Ritchie and the Richmond Junto fell in with the plan, if indeed, they had not played an importent part in formulating it. As he had not yet given up the idea of a reelection for his favorite and of thus keeping control of the long end of the lever in ease of Jackson's death, these new arrangements for the presidential succession did not appeal to him.

Accordingly his attacks upon Jackson were renewed with increased vigor. Gilmer having failed in his efforts to found a Calhoun organ in Richmond, Richard K. Crallé, Calhoun's friend, was aided in establishing the Jeffersonian and Virginia Times in Petersburg. Meanwhile active steps were taken to prevent the election of Van Buren. To this end, Tazewell having declined to save the day, P. P. Barbour, a Virginian with a long and satisfactory period of public service to his account, was brought forward on a Jackson-Barbour ticket. In this way Floyd expected to throw the choice of the vice-president into the Senate, where, it was thought, Van Buren's election could be prevented.

Meanwhile, in Floyd's dealings with Jackson, a question arose involving the rights and dignity of the "sovereign state" of Virginia. Bearing a letter of studied official character from Floyd, Charles J. Faulkner had appeared at the White House to

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request Jackson's aid in securing information from the British archives regarding the disputed boundary line between Maryland and Virginia. After receiving the "Agent of Virginia" with all due ceremony Jackson promised the desired aid and suggested that it might be necessary to send a special agent to London to make investigations. Whereupon Faulkner advised that, inasmuch as the establishment of state boundary lines was a matter of concern to the federal government, the expenses of such an agent should not fall upon the states. This gave the "Old Hero" an opportunity to remind the "Agent of Virginia" that he too belonged to the strict construction school of politicians, which denied to Congress the power to appropriate money for other than federal purposes. "Sir," said he, "your Senators are constantly watching my appropriations. Tazewell, judging by his past course, would be sure to condemn us, and your Governor, Floyd, would be the first to blast us, if we departed from the strict line of our duties, even if in favor of your own State."(78)

Sarcasm was not considered in good taste in such serious undertakings. Faulkner was therefore asked to prepare an account of his interview in a form suitable for use by Tazewell as the basis of an attack upon Jackson from the floor of the Senate. Of the incident Floyd wrote: "The President has in an official conversation, with the Agent of the State of Virginia, had no hesitation in opposing his own resentment at the political opinions of the governor, and the state, as well as those entertained by the senator, her representative in the Senate of the United

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States." Tazewell was urged to resent it all and was assured of Virginia's approval of his acts. Faulkner's refusal to permit an account of a private interview to be made the basis of a public attack probably saved both Floyd and Tazewell from ridicule.(79)

Other events of the year 1832 were not such as to restore Floyd's confidence in Jackson. Instead they led him to the conclusion that things were going from bad to worse. Notwithstanding the fact that it had received the support of a majority of Virginia's representatives in Congress, the Tariff of 1832 was mockery to the requests and needs of the South; Jackson's attack upon the Bank of the United States was simply a decoy; and the leaders of the South had frequently encountered indifference and ridicule. Then, too, Floyd's friend Barbour had resigned his candidacy for the vice-presidency to accept a place on the federal Supreme Bench, and the "little magician," Van Buren, had been elevated to the vice-presidency with Jackson as president. To cap the climax South Carolina had nullified the tariff act of 1832.

Though counseling prudence and moderation in his annual message of December, 1832, Floyd was then secretly counting the costs and horrors of war. To his mind that "outrage upon our institutions," that "satire upon the revolution," and that "consummation of a long expected executive usurpation," Jackson's Proclamation, in answer to the Nullification Ordinance of South Carolina, made war inevitable. Even before receiving information of his choice by South Carolina for the presidency in

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preference to Jackson, Floyd had, as the governor of Virginia, prepared to sustain her sister state in the fight upon the tariff and had given warning that others should "beware." Already he had recommended a better organization and equipment of the state militia, and he then chafed under the limitations placed on his power by the state constitution.(80)

Whatever one may think of his attitude and statesmanship on this occasion the following letter of December 23, 1832, to his friend Tazewell affords ample proof of Floyd's patriotism:

My Dear Sir: I have received your letter for which I thank you, and hold the expression of your approbation of my message [the regular annual message] and conduct, in this critical and dangerous period, far above the favor of a parasitical confederacy. I, as you will have perceived, have been left to choose my course, for none seem willing to develope any view, or to contribute an effort, to resist this torrent poured upon our liberties by the tyrant usurper, Jackson.

When I know my course has met the approbation of yourself, who have no object in view but the good of the country, and that it is the cheering voice of a personal friend who commends, I feel a pleasing sensation flow over my heart like a smile, which I would not exchange for all the honors and wealth a tyrant could give.

How often I have wished you were now in the Assembly; you could, if a member of that body, still save the republic. As it is I fear the result of the coming conflict will leave us in chains; and unless the tariff party in Congress do now repeal those laws nullified by South Carolina, the blood of our citizens will flow like water. Jackson pants for the sword and will apply it freely in all cases law, politics or religion.

I have, my dear Sir, spent many many sleepless nights since I came to be informed that Jackson had determined to wage war upon a sovereign state, because I knew he was not a patriot, but a tyrant who would as soon fight against his country

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as for it, if he in his own person was to be most distinguished and could rule without a check. I knew that to doubt either his patriotism, his purity, his objects or his wisdom was to stir up opposition, and perhaps hatred in those intended to be protected and to be preserved.

I feel my bosom beginning to overflow, and I am afraid of worrying your patience; for the heart like the eyes finds relief from disburthening itself of long concealed and pent up grief. I will restrain the inclination and say that all my heretofore reading in my school boy days, as well as my own observation in riper years, and we, since the revolution in France down to that in Mexico, had ample fields for observation, confirm me in the full conviction that all who are prominent in authority when those horrid brutalities of civil war begin will surely perish. Virtue and patriotism then often cause the death of the man who possesses them; nor do they receive justice until after ages pronounce Judgment, which is generally correct, there being no successful villain to flatter by an opposite decision.

You will perceive by these reflections that should the tyrant wage a civil war, I have no very strong expectation of living through the struggle; but the crisis has arrived and we ought to meet it like men who have not sought it, but it being inevitable have met it with a corresponding resolution.

I have no desire but to retain the good opinion of my friends, discharge my duty to Virginia like a good and faithful citizen, more anxious to discharge well the duties of office than to possess office.

Should this man bring upon us the scourge of civil war, you will have no cause to lament the vaccillation of your friend or call in doubt the confidence reposed. Killed and conquered we may be, but the honor and the patriotism of the man, and of Virginia shall not be questioned even by malignity itself.

With the sincerest friendship and the highest regard, I am yours.(81) JOHN FLOYD.

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Floyd's family shared with him these sentiments and alarms. On January 1, 1833, his wife wrote:

God bless you my dear Floyd--a happy, happy New Year to you. What will be its close? Will the alarming state of our country break up the enjoyments of our plentiful, peaceful home? Merciful Father! is there not honesty enough in our government "To render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's and unto God the things that are God's? I rejoice to see you hold out for the people. I can not be patient at the possibility of a gallant enlightened community being sacrificed to the passion of a "bloody, bawdy, treacherous, leacherous villian." Oh my husband, how prophetic has your friend Col. John Williams been as to yours and Calhoun's fate. I fear power will crush you both. There is an universal indignation amongst the women of the country at the President's course "for letting the negroes loose upon us." Do you think such a thing is possible? Ritchie I observe has got his cue from the Albany Regency. You are to be sacrificed. Have you no personal or political friend to aid you in these attacks? I advise you at once to discontinue your subscription to Niles Register, upon the principle that I would not pay any man for abusing me. Surely it has come to Ritchie's and Croswell's to meet out the same justice. Croswell has forwarded a statement of your dues to him which I will send by Nathan Hart to you, which please discharge and stop the Albany Argus. If money is to be given let it be to our own side. Duff Green has lately had his arm broken for the cause: strengthen it by giving him that which has pampered Ritchie and Croswell.(82)

Amidst the fears of impending disaster peaceful currents continued meanwhile to flow and to make for national accord. For his own part Floyd had always been willing to "modify" his tone for the common good. Thus when word came to him that South Carolina was willing to submit her grievances to a convention of the states and that Clay would

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agree to a modification of the tariff, Floyd was willing to cooperate with each. The Compromise Tariff of 1833 had his approval, and it was partly out of regard for his desires that the General Assembly of Virginia voted to send Benjamin Watkins Leigh, as a special commissioner, from that state, to South Carolina, bearing requests for moderation and conciliation in the nullification controversy. With these turns the crisis passed leaving all parties in a position to claim victory and the character of the federal government as indefinite as it ever had been.

Under the changed conditions Floyd modified his tone toward Jackson, but he stoutly refused to return to the Democratic fold so long as Van Buren was one of its leaders. With many other state rights men he now became "a sort of Clay man," going so far as to renew his friendship with him and to apologize in the pages of his diary for the abuses which he had made of his confidences.(83) He now probably thought it possible to attach Clay to the Calhoun car, hoping thereby to unite the South and the West upon Calhoun for the presidency.

But it was no time for favorites; principles now amounted to more than men; and the elimination of both Clay and Calhoun from the list of eligibles for the presidency had become temporarily imperative. Accordingly Floyd set himself to the task of working out a fighting alliance between all the factions opposed to the administration. To this end he encouraged discord within the Democratic party, while scrupulously keeping the conflicting ambitions of his own friends in the background. In November, 1833, Judge Brook, Clay's confidential adviser in Virginia,

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made it clear to Floyd that Clay was not then a candidate for the presidency, and about the same time Calhoun's friends ceased to urge his claims to that office. Thus was rendered possible a formidable alliance between the heterogeneous elements opposed to the administration. The product was the Whig party. Thus Floyd retired from office happy in the belief that he had saved his country from a threatened executive usurpation and that the wise and the good would again soon shape the destinies of the republic.

Soon after his retirement from public life Floyd was attacked by a stroke of paralysis from which he never recovered. He died August 16, 1837, and his remains now repose in an unmarked grave at Sweet Springs, Monroe County, West Virginia. His spirit still lives, however, in that bond existing between the Valley of Virginia and her tidewater and piedmont sections. When our claims to Oregon became the leading issue in the presidential election of 1844, his memory and achievements were revived, but they soon sank from sight in the long drawn out period of sectional strife that followed.(84)

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FOOTNOTES

1. Richmond Times-Dispatch, May 2, 1909; Floyd, J. N. Biographical Genealogies of the Virginia-Kentucky Floyd Families.

2. McElroy, R. M., Kentucky in the Nation's History, 2.

3. Morehead, Address on the Settlement of Kentucky (pamphlet).

4. Draper (Manuscripts), 33 S291--335.

5. Morehead's Address.

6. Calendar Virginia State Papers, I, 310.

7. Idem, II, 47; James, George Rogers Clark Pages in Illinois Historical Collection, VIII, 524.

8. Collins, History of Kentucky, I, 238, 311; Marshall, History of Kentucky, I, 115.

9. Johnston, Johnston, Preston, Floyd, and Bowen Families, in manuscript.

10. Journal, House of Delegates, 1814--1815, 13.

11. Idem, pp. 78, 141.

12. Idem, pp. 59, 76.

13. Moore, The Works of James Buchanan, XII, 306.

14. Benton, Abridgement of the Debates of Congress, VI, 158--162.

15. Richmond Enquirer, December 15, 1818; Idem, May 11, 1830.

16. Annals of Congress. 16Cong. 1st sess., II., 1587; Richmond Enquirer, March 7, 1820.

17. Annals of Congress. 16Cong. 2d sess. p. 991.

18. Idem, 16Cong. 2d sess. p. 1154.

19. Idem, p. 1165.

20. Memoirs, V., p. 275.

21. Oregon Historical Society, Quarterly, VI, 261.

22. Idem, 260; Shafer, History of the Pacific Northwest. 129

23. These essays are in the Library of Congress.

24. Benton, Thirty Years' View, I, 13.

25. Annals of Congress, 16Cong. 2d sess., 679; Benton, Abridgment of Debates, VII, 50; Bancroft, H. H. History of Oregon, I, 349--369.

26. Bourne, E. G., Oregon Histo. So. Quarterly, VI, 263.

27. Benton, Thirty Years' View, I, 13.

28. This was undoubtedly a reference to the defalcation of John Preston, one of Floyd's kinsmen. See Richmond Enquirer, January 30, 1820.

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29. Adams, Memoirs, V, 237.

30. Niles Weekly Register, XXI, 270.

31. Idem, XXI, 350.

32. It seems that the name Oregon was first applied by the author of the Travels of Jonathan Carver to a fabled river somewhere in the far west. After Captain Gray's voyage, in 1792, the names "Oregon" and "Columbia" were used interchangeably for the river which he discovered. Later Bryant, in his Thanatopsis popularized the word "Oregon" as the name of a river, but it was John Floyd who first formally applied the name Oregon to the territory along the Columbia River. See Shafer, History of the Pacific Northwest, 47; Oregon Histo. So. Quarterly, VI, 265.

33. Annals of Congress. 17Cong. 1st sess. I, 722, 733; Richmond Enquirer, August 27, 1822.

34. Annals of Congress. 17Cong. I, 1034, 1073.

35. Idem, II, 1617.

36. National Intelligencer, August 30, 1822.

37. Memoirs, VI, 57.

38. Annals of Congress. 17Cong. 2d sess. 397.

39. Francis Baylies was born at Dighton, Massachusetts, in 1783, and was elected to Congress in 1821, where he served three terms. A former Federalist he became a strong supporter of Andrew Jackson for the presidency and voted for Jackson in preference to Adams in 1825. Adams considered him "one of the most talented and worthless men in New England." See Oregon Histo. So. Quarterly, VI, 268.

40. Annals of Congress. 17Cong. 2d sess., 682--683.

41. Idem, 17Cong. 2d sess., 700.

42. Idem, 18Cong. 1st sess., I, 1203; Adams. Memoirs, VI, 239.

43. Annals of Congress. 18Cong. 1st sess., I, 1622; Ibid.. II, 2345.

44. Congressional Debates. I, pt. I, 25; Benton, Abridgments of Debates, VIII, 208.

45. Idem, V, 195.

46. Professor E. G. Bourne, Oregon Histo. So. Quarterly, VI, 275.

47. Benton, Abridgment of Debates, VII, 8.

48. Idem, IX, 358.

49. Idem, VII, 40; Adams, Memoirs, VI, 297, 360, 391.

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50. Adams, Memoirs, VI, 360.