33 HARRISON, TYLER 



acter of the bank and the binding force of instruc- 

 tions, were formally asserted. 



Mr. Tyler was reflected to the legislature annually, 

 until in November, 1816, he was chosen to fill a va- 

 cancy in the United States House of Representatives. 

 In the regular election to the next Congress, out of 

 two hundred votes given in his native county, he re- 

 ceived all but one. As a member of Congress he soon 

 made himself conspicuous as the most rigid of strict 

 constructionists. When Mr. Calhoun introduced his 

 bill in favour of internal improvements, Mr. Tyler voted 

 against it. He also voted against the proposal for a 

 national bankrupt act. He condemned, as arbitrary 

 and insubordinate, the course of General Jackson in 

 Florida, and contributed an able speech to the long 

 debate over the question as to censuring that gallant 

 commander. He was a member of a committee for 

 inquiring into the affairs of the national bank, and his 

 most elaborate speech was in favour of Mr. Trimble's 

 motion to issue a scire facias against that institution. 

 On all these points Mr. Tyler's course seems to have 

 pleased his constituents ; in the spring election of 1819 

 he did not consider it necessary to issue the usual cir- 

 cular address, or in any way to engage in a personal 

 canvass. He simply distributed copies of his speech 

 against the bank, and was reelected to Congress 

 unanimously. 



The most important question that came before 

 the sixteenth Congress related to the* admission of 

 Missouri to the Union. In the debates over this 

 question, Mr. Tyler took extreme ground against the 

 imposition of any restrictions upon the extension of 

 slavery. At the same time he declared himself on 



