the nomination.

But before the Harrisburg Convention met, and after Mr. Clay had made his Anti-Whig pledges to Judge White, he prepared an elaborate speech, the notes of which he showed to Mr. Wise previous to going to the Taylorsville dinner. Mr. Clay delivered this speech with great force, beauty of style, and with the happiest effect. Mr. Wise was invited with Mr. Clay to attend the Taylorsville festival, but it so happened he could not go, but wrote thus to the committee of invitation: That "the Presidency could not add one cubit to his statue, and I wish all the world could be there to hear him." Mr. Wise wrote thus, and wished thus, because he knew what Mr. Clay would say, as he had just made the foregoing pledges and shown him the prepared notes from which he would speak. The policy which he promised to carry out, should he be made President, was, beyond question, practically Democratic. Moreover, there was a desire to get Mr. Clay back into the ranks from which the "Puritan" had enticed him, and with his powerful arm to strike Nationalism or Whiggery a crushing blow. This intention was certainly laudable, righteous and patriotic. When the Nationals or Whigs met in Convention at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, having largely the majority over the anti Van Buren Democrats, they claimed the privilege of placing on the head of their ticket General Harrison. And as John Tyler had been upon the ticket with Judge White in 1836, the anti Van Buren Democrats, knowing that the Senate of the United States was nearly divided upon many issues of momentous importance, claimed the right to nominate a man who, by his casting vote in the Senate, would guard and protect the principles of the States Right party. Consequenty Mr. Tyler was placed upon the ticket for the Vice-Presidency by the anti Van Buren or States Rights Democrats. They could safely do this because the Nationals or Whigs were pledged by their greatest leader, Henry Clay, against Bank, Tariff, Internal Improvement, Distribution, Abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia and the Territories by the power of Congress, &c. When the Nationals or Whigs assented that Mr. Tyler should be placed on the ticket for the Vice-Presidency, with General Harrison, it was considered a sure guarantee of the pledges made by Mr. Clay. Mr. Tyler received the nomination as a sort of compromise, independently of Mr. Clay's pledges, through the instrumentality of Mr. Wise. Yet this compromise was not effected without some difficulty by the anti Van Buren Democrats who distrusted the Nationals or Whigs from a knowledge of their antecedents, notwithstand

ing their pledges.

This was arranged by Mr. Wise, very adroitly and justly. William C. Rives had expunged Mr. Tyler from the United States Senate, and in turn had become a Conservative late in the day upon the Specie Circular, and appealed to the opposition votes in the Virginia Legislature to send him back to the Senate. The question then arose before that body, "Shall the victim or the instrument of expunging be sent to the Senate?" But what was strange about the affair was, that Mr. Clay and his friends, favored the return of Mr. Rives to the Senate. At that time Mr. Wise had a few friends in the Virginia Legislature, at the head of whom was John M. Gregory now of Richmond. These friends held the balance of power in that body at that time. The day for an election of United States Senator finally came off, when the ballotings comparatively were almost as numerous as they were for Speaker at the meeting of the 34th Congress, when Richardson, Banks and Fuller were candidates-and for some time with the same effect. The Legislature. refusing to elect Mr. Rives, caucuses were held at Washington City and emissaries sent to Richmond; but still no election. could be had. Finally it was found out that Mr. Wise and his friends. checked their operations, and then an effort was made to bully him into subjection and party influence, but to no purpose. The party at Washington then arraigned Mr. Wise in caucus, when he defended. his position by telling them that "he never intended as long as it was in his power to prevent it, that the instrument of expunction should be placed over its victim by Whig or anti expunging votes." At last Mr. Wise suggested a compromise; and it was, that his friends would allow Mr. Rives to be elected, if Mr. Clay and his friends would allow Mr. Tyler to be placed on the ticket with General Harrison, to preside over Mr. Rives, and by his casting vote guard the cherished principles of the States Rights Democracy. This proposition was readily assented to, but unavoidably by the Whig party. And but for Mr. Tyler being placed upon the Whig ticket in 1840, Mr. Wise would have remained neutral in that contest. He never would have voted for Harrison and Granger regardless of the pledges of Mr. Clay. He was from the beginning a Tyler advocate, knowing that Mr. Tyler was an undeviating and unflinching defender of States Rights. It was understood that if Mr. Rives was elected to the Senate, that Mr. Tyler should be the nominee for Vice-President. These facts will certainly show to the world that the election of John Tyler to the Presidency, was the overthrow of the United States Bank and many other odious Federal favorites; and will account for Mr. Wise's being the main stay and

bulwark of the Tyler administration, which will compare in point of ability to any, Jas. K. Polk's not excepted. Mr. Wise was actuated in the course he took in 1840, through the most strictly Southern Rights conception of the Constitution. And through Mr. Wise, as we have before stated, John Tyler saved the country from Van Burenism, which, like Know Nothingism, is but another name for Abolitionism, or the essence and quintessence of all that is rotten, corrupt and loath

some.

On the 4th of July 1840, Mr. Wise was in the city of Philadelphia, and uttered that sentiment which became so general a watchword of influence, "The Union of the Whigs for the sake of the Union." This was a piece of pure philosophy, as well as a watchword of party. It recommended a union of the Whigs, or those who stood upon the pledges that Mr. Clay had given to Judge White through Mr. Wise, with the National Republican Whigs, not for themselves but for the Union. This expression, in fact, was a hint to the Nationals or Whigs, that they were to respect and sustain the principles of the Democratic party. That they were not to use their party for a selfish policy, but to unite with the Democracy to protect the country against the party of Martin Van Buren. The convictions arrived at by Mr. Wise, and that portion of the Democratic party which acted with him, were as true as prophecies, and by his almost superhuman exertions in placing John Tyler upon the Harrisburg ticket, he saved Texas and the Union, and placed the country and the Democratic party in an attitude that insured their success brilliant under the banner of Polk and Dallas in 1844.

In November 1840, Mr. Wise married his second wife, Miss Sarah, third daughter of the Hon. John Sergeant of Philadelphia.

EXTRA SESSION OF CONGRESS, 1841. REJECTION FOR THE MISSION TO FRANCE. RE-ELECTION TO CONGRESS. ELECTED MINISTER TO

RIO JANEIRO. RETURNS HOME IN 1847.

The last session of Congress that met under Van Buren was in 1840 and '41. In the spring of 1841 Mr. Wise met with Mr. Clay and Thomas W. Gilmer soon after the election, and was congratulating himself to Mr. Clay thus: Well, sir, said he, "We have fought a good fight in Virginia, sir, and although we did not exactly win the victory, we came off with the honors of war." Mr. Clay replied: "I congratulate myself, sir, that Virginia has gone for the enemy." Why, said

Mr.

Mr. Wise, "I thought you once said, you would prefer defeat with your mother State for you, to victory with her voice against you." "Sir," said Mr. Clay, "we will no longer be embarrassed by her peculiar opinions." This was the language and sentiment of that great, adroit, astute and disappointed politician Henry Clay. Clay's interpretation of the whole matter was this: as he had not received the nomination for the Presidency over General Harrison at the Harrisburg Convention, he no longer considered himself bound by his pledges to Judge White. The question now arises, would he have abided those pledges had he been made President? What does the philosophic politician say? For ourselves we shall not hazard an opinion of the man of whom John C. Breckenridge said, "His countrymen had wove for him a laurel wreath, and with common hands had placed it upon his venerable brow and sent him crowned to history." The first thing that was done after the Log Cabin triumph in 1840, was to call an extra session of Congress-so anxious were the successful party to commence the war of extermination, and disvow every pledge to which they had sworn eternal fidelity, and promised a sacred allegiance. Very soon after Mr. Wise reached Washington in the spring of 1841, he saw that it. was evidently the intention of the victors, under the leadership of Mr. Clay, to call an extra session. To make all necessary arrangements for this purpose, they assembled in caucus, and gave evident signs by what policy they were dictated and influenced. Mr. Wise not only opposed the extra session, which was gotten up to snatch a bank charter from the arbitrament of enlightened public opinion, which was not be waited for, but to pass harbor and river improvement bills; to distribute a deficiency in the Treasury; to revise and increase the Tariff; to violate the Compromise of 1832; to give new life to Protection; and to agitate a Slavery issue; but he opposed the whole Federal scheme from beginning to end, in a speech delivered in the House of Representatives in the month of January previous to the inauguration of General Harrison, and at a time when the Whig party had just swept nearly every State in the Union.

Immediately after the death of President Harrison, Mr. Wise was the first man that rushed to the side of President Tyler and advised him by all means to veto the United States Bank bill, and use every effort to procure the speedy annexation of Texas. Mr. Tyler was denounced as a traitor by a party themselves false and faithless to the most sacred pledges.

Mr. Tyler's political career, which has been eminently States Right

1

and Conservative, stands now upon the public records of the nation. for the judgment of posterity.

In 1842 Mr. Wise's name was sent to the United States Senate, through the instrumentality of his friend, Bailie Peyton, for the mission to France. A Whig Senate rejected him. In the spring of 1843 he was a candidate for re-election. Mr. Hill Carter of Shirley, was his opponent, who was induced to run by a Whig clique in the city of Richmond; but although the district had just given Harrison and Tyler 1600 majority, they sustained Mr. Wise against a Whig Senate and triumphantly returned him to Congress by his old majority. 400. On Mr. Wise's return to Congress it was discovered that his physical health was giving away rapidly from the constant excitement of about ten years. Consequently his friends sent his name again to the Senate. for the Court of Rio Janeiro. The same influence that had defeated him for the French mission was about to be brought against his name. again, with the additional offence he had committed in denouncing the great leader of the Whig party, Henry Clay, in his then recent canvass with Mr. Hill Carter. But before any decision was made in his case, William S. Archer, Senator from Virginia, sought an interview with Mr. Wise, and asked him, why was it he had been so bitter in his late canvass against the apostle of Whiggery, Henry Clay? Mr. Wise then enquired of him "if the French mission, the Brazilian mission and all the rest of the missions belonged to Mr. Clay? And was subserviency to him a necessary qualification for office? Were personal differences, and not public considerations, to govern in selecting foreign ministers? That it was the office of a Senator to enquire, not whether the nomination is fit, is he faithful to the country, but is he a friend of a political favorite who was not in power? In conclusion, he informed Mr. Archer to go back to his friends and tell them that if they would act like men worthy to be called friends of their idol, they would resent his insults, and would do so in their proper persons, and would not do it by abusing their public offices."

Mr. Archer made no report to the caucus, but demanded that Mr. Wise should be sent to Rio Janeiro, which was done.

On the 8th day of February 1844, he resigned his seat in Congress, and sailed from New York for Rio in the month of May following hist resignation. His course in Brazil met with the entire approbation of Presidents Tyler and Polk, and their Secretaries of State, Calhoun and Buchanan. He returned home in October 1847.