WHIG PARTY. 



767 



posed to aim at reducing all duties above 20 per cent, 

 ad valorem, to that figure as a uniform rate, but to 

 provide that only one-tenth of the excess shoul J be de- 

 ducted annually thus making the last reduction take 

 effect in 1842. Although this measure passed both 

 Houses, yet it was not favored, either by Jackson or 

 Webster. 



The steadily increasing pressure of the slavery 

 question tended to divide and demoralize the Whig 

 party. When the House of Representatives in 

 1838 passed the Twenty-first rule, which declared that 

 every petition, etc., relating to slavery or the abolition 

 thereof should be laid upon the table without being 

 debated, printed, or referred, the Northern Whigs 

 voted against this rule, which became known as the 

 "Atherton Gag;" but the Southern Whigs joined 

 with Northern and Southern Democrats to sustain it. 

 The Whigs were apparently in favor of allowing the 

 Abolitionists the right of petition, yet they were ready 

 to fight them if they used it. They were jealous of 

 the increasing power of the Abolitionists, nearly every 

 vote of whose strength they saw would be taken from 

 their own party. The Whigs were again defeated at 

 the Presidential election of 183l> wlirn William H. 

 Harrison was their candidate. Van Buren had 170 

 electoral votes, and 1 14 were distributed among four 

 Whig candidates Harrison having 73. While the 

 victory of Van Buren was pronounced, he was consid- 

 ered the political legatee of Jackson, and, therefore, 

 all the bitter conflicts of the preceding administration 

 were continued in that of Van Buren. The com- 

 mercial crisis of KIT. which was undoubtedly due to 

 Jackson's policy, gave an opportunity to the Whigs 

 which was improved to the utmost. The nomination 

 for the Presidency in 1840 should have IK-I-II given by 

 the Whigs to either ])anicl Webster or Henry Clay, 

 had it been decided by the real value of their services, 

 but the working politicians considered that Gen. Wil- 

 liam H. Harrison was more "available," and he was 

 nominated. The ensuing campaign was probably tin- 

 most stirring and personal that has ever been waned in 

 the United States. Harrison received 2.J4 electoral 

 votes ; and Van Buren. who had been renominatod 

 unanimously in his party's convention, had but 60. 

 Tyler, succeeding to the Presidency after Harrison's 

 death, soon proved himself not to be in sympathy with 

 the Whigs, and those of them who had been chosen by 

 Harrison to form his cabinet resigned shortly after- 

 ward. Daniel Webster, however, remained secretary 

 of state for some months, in order to complete the 

 negotiations with Great Britain about the boundary 

 line between Maine and Canada. 



Meantime the Whigs, under the leadership of Clay 

 in the Senate, succeeded, before a really open rupture 

 with the President came, in repealing the Sub-treasury 

 Act ; in enacting a national bankrupt law ; distributing 

 prospectively among the States the proceeds of the 

 public lands; and also in enacting the tariff of 

 1842. The movement to annex the republic of Texas 

 was favored throughout the South, but was opposed" 

 by the Whigs in the Northern Suites. Clay favored 

 the annexation of Texas as soon as that republic 

 ceased its war with Mexico ; but the more aggressive 

 policy of the Democrats for such annexation and for 

 the occupation of the Territory of Oregon to the limit 

 of 51 4o' N. gave them a stronger hold upon the 

 popular vote. Clay, in accepting the nomination for 

 President in 1844, expected Van Buren to be his 

 rival, and that the issues would be simply those of 

 internal improvements, the national bank, and a pro- 

 tective tariff. Had the campaign Ix'cn fought upon 

 these issues it is likely that he would have been 

 elected. As it was, he received only |0:> votes as 

 against 170 for Polk, another "available" candidate. 

 To L'.iin support in the South, Clay had written a let- 

 ter on the annexation of Texas, declaring that he 

 would bo. plad to sen it annexed ''without dissension, 

 without war, with the common consent of the nation, 



and upon just and fair terms." The effect of this 

 letter was greater in the North than in the South ; it 

 carried many Northern Whigs over to the Free Soil 

 party. This defection, more than any other cause, 

 gave the^State of New York to Polk by only 5106 

 votes. The Democrats, being thus thoroughly in- 

 trenched in power, repealed the tariff of 1842 and 

 enacted in 1840 a tariff for revenue only. The election 

 of Polk was also interpreted to mean the national ap- 

 proval of the annexation of Texas, and that step in- 

 volved a war with Mexico. The Northern \\ higs 

 then began to recruit the ranks of the Free Soil party. 

 The Whigs of the South, along with Clay, regarded 

 slavery as a legitimate institution not to be hastily in- 

 j terfered with. Both of the parties in the North were 

 also divided upon the question ; each had its faction 

 j in favor of slavery and another against it. Thus the 

 Mexican war opened with the two political parlies 

 divided almost upon Mason and Dixon's line, for the 

 annexation of Texas was an extension of the domain 

 of slavery, and the Mexican war opened up a long 

 vista of such extensions. Then followed a curious 

 phase of political history. Although the war com- 

 menced by a Democratic administration was successful 

 from the outset, yet the House of Representatives 

 elected in 1846 had a large Whig majority. The de- 

 feat of the Democrats was owing to the tariff of J84t>, 

 the failure of the administration to sustain the ad- 

 vanced boundary of Oregon, and, more than all, be- 

 cause the war had been undertaken for the sake of 

 extending the area of the slave States. The Whigs, 

 having control of the popular branch of Congress, 

 attempted to pass the famous. Wilmot proviso that 

 slavery should not exist in any territory acquired from 

 Mexico. The administration was strong enough to 

 defeat the proviso ; but it was not strong enough to 

 boar down the returning tide of Whig power. The 

 glory which was acquired by Gen. Taylor led to his 

 nomination for President by the Whigs in 1848. 

 Once more Clay and Webster were rejected as the 

 standard-bearers of their party. The managers of the 

 Whigs planned and executed a .campaign which 

 avoided the issue upon the slavery question. Their 

 non-committal course alienated some of their party in 

 New England who refused to support Taylor and be- 

 came known as " conscience \\higs." William H. 

 Seward prevented a similar defection among the Whigs 

 of the State of New York, and Pros. Polk had alien- 

 ated many Democrats in that State by failing to recog- 

 nize Van Buren and Silas Wright, whom he distrusted 

 as rivals. The vote of New York went to Taylor and 

 elected him President His electoral votes were 103, 

 as against 127 for Cass, the Democratic candidate, and 

 none for Van Buren, now the Free Soil candidate. 

 The latter days of that campaign will be ever memo- 

 rable in the annals of American political history for 

 the combined efforts of William H. Seward, Thurlow 

 Weed, and Horace Greeley to carry the State of New 

 York. Pres. Taylor formed his cabinet in accordance 

 with the non-committal lines upon which the cam- 

 paign had been fought. The members were drawn in 

 about equal numbers from the North and the South, 

 but the more influential of them were from the North. 

 The re-^ntry of Calhoun into the Senate and the pro- 

 digious efforts of Clay and Webster in that body 

 showed that slavery was still the burning question. 

 It was now 43 years since Clay had first appeared in 

 the Senate, and he was still in full vigor. His resolu- 

 tions, which were afterward put in the shape of a 

 general measure known as the "Omnibus bill," were 

 to the effect that Congress should not restrict slavery 

 in the Territories; that California should be admitted 

 without restrictions ; that Congress had no power to 

 obstruct the slave-trade between the slave States; and 

 that a more effective fugitive slave law should be en- 

 acted. The Omnibus bill, though griinting largely 

 the demands of the South, was opposed by Pres. Tay- 

 lor. Had he lived to finish his term it is probable 



