members of congress ineligible to office during the term for which they were elected, was abandoned, and a greater number were appointed in his first term, than had been appointed by all his predecessors. Whether these departures from the course he promised to pursue, grew out of a subsequent con viction, that the government 'could not be administered upon such principles, or that these pledges were given merely to influence the popular choice, it is unnecessary to determine. The course of the president was a practical refutation of the promises of the candidate, and it only remained for the people to decide upon the policy adopted after his accession to power.

There were many circumstances, however, co-operating to prevent an unbiassed decision of this question. The policy pursued by the administration, in the management of the foreign relations of the country, indeed, was easily understood and generally approved. The adjustment of the controversy respecting the intercourse between the United States and the British colonies, it is true, presented an unfortunate exception, in which both the dignity and interests of the country were forgotten; but in general, the claims of the American government upon foreign countries, whether for indemnity for old spoliations, or for the protection of existing interests, were urged with ability and success.

The domestic policy was not so clearly developed. Whether it was that the cabinet was defi

cient in a master mind capable of devising and promoting a system of policy calculated to advance the prosperity of the country, or that it was unwilling to assume the responsibility of deciding among conflicting interests; certain it is, that the principles by which it meant to be guided, were promulgated in oracular phrases of equivocal meaning, and easily construed to suit the purposes of all parties.

Not that it was without a policy of its own; but this aimed rather to follow than to lead public sentiment, and to propitiate the people, by deferring, on all occasions, to popular opinion.

Its own views on the great questions which had divided the community, such as the tariff and internal improvement, were consequently cautiously advanced in propositions of ambiguous import, until the public mind was prepared for a full developement of its policy, and its partisans enlisted in its support. Thus the recommendation by the president, of a reduction of the tariff, to a revenue standard, was coupled with an admission of the necessity of protecting all articles required for the defence of the country; and his doubts as to the constitutional right of congress to appropriate moneys to internal improvement, were declared not to extend to any appropriations for the construction of works of a national character. These declarations seemed to be put forth rather to propitiate popular favour, than as the settled convictions of a mind

acquainted with the various and extensive interests committed to its charge, and prepared with a system of policy to advance and sustain them. They were framed to suit the purposes of his partians in different parts of the union, and could be made available to promote his popularity with partiesof the most hostile principles.

To the advocates of a protecting tariff, it might be represented, that the protection of all that was required for the defence of the country, would necessarily embrace more than the country was now ready to manufacture: while its opponents were conciliated by a promise to reduce the duties to a revenue standard.

The enemies of internal improvement were secured by his veto of the Maysville-road bill; while its friends were prevented from deserting by an avowal of his willingness to sanction improvements of a national charac

ter.

On other questions, where no strong interests were arrayed in opposition, a more decisive

course was taken.

Thus in relation to the Cherokee Indians, it was determined to withdraw from them the protection they had until then received from the federal government by virtue of its treaties, and to intrust them to the discretion of Georgia.

This determination, the first unfortunate step in disregarding the obligation of the laws, and substituting in their place individual will and popular feeling, was adopted upon his accession

to power, and served as a deci ded indication of the intention of the cabinet to build up and consolidate the administration party, by rewarding its supporters through the powers of the government.

This, in some measure, changed the character of the parties which existed previous to his election. They had until that event assumed a sectional hue, the south supporting him, and the north opposing him, and each hoping to control the policy of the government.

It was soon found, that by yielding altogether to the views of his southern supporters, too much would be hazarded in the middle and western states, where they could not be brought to sanction the southern policy as to the tariff and internal improve ment.

A temporizing policy was therefore adopted upon those points, and an effort was made to introduce new questions creating broader parties, and consolidating the party strength by dividing the community on subjects, where sectional interests do not come in collision with party obligations.

This was the more necessary, as the alienation of Mr. Calhoun and his friends had taken from the administration a portion of its strength at the south, and rendered it incumbent on them to supply the deficiency from other quarters.

While such a direction, there fore, was given to the patronage and power of the government, as stimulated the prominent and

more active partisans to greater zeal and new exertions in the service of the party; appeals were constantly made to popular prejudices, and efforts were made to excite the jealousies of different classes of the community, and to array them against each other as hostile parties, having conflicting interests.

With this view, the propriety of re-chartering the U. S. bank was brought into discussion long before any movement was made by that institution for a renewal of its charter; and the public mind was agitated, and popular prejudice excited, by charging it with exercising an undue and improper influence over the currency, and with being a monopoly tending to foster the interests of overgrown capitalists at the expense of the labouring classes. The poor were told, that their interests were adverse to those of their more wealthy neighbours, and they were exhorted to array themselves in opposition to their employers.

The power of erecting corporations was stigmatized, as an usurpation tending to create monopolies inconsistent with the nature of a free government, and to increase the power of capitalists to the injury of the labouring classes.

These indications could not be mistaken. It was obvious, that those to whom the administration of the government was intrusted, were seeking to maintain their power by a most dangerous appeal to those very pas

sions which government was established to control.

The conservative principles essential to the orderly existence of society were thus hazarded in a struggle to preserve the emoluments of office; and the singular spectacle was presented, of the party out of power striving to maintain the authority of the government and the supremacy of the laws, in opposition to the systematic efforts of those in power, to bring the principles upon which they depended into disrepute.

It was not probable, that all those who lent themselves to the propagation of these principles, were aware of their dangerous tendency. They only thought that they were popular, and looked no farther than to the manner in which they were received by the multitude for the evidence of their truth.

The legitimate result of these doctrines, however, led to a dissolution of all government, by weakening its powers at the same moment, that the disorderly passions of the idle and the ignorant were roused into action by addresses which stimulated their cupidity, and destroyed their reverence for legal authority.

Thus the determination of the president to acquiesce in the annulling by Georgia of the treaties and laws for regulating the intercourse with the Indians, was sustaining the will and interests of a state government, in opposition to the established law of the union. His continued acqui