IV 
THE WHIG CONVENTION OF 1839 
The defeat of the Anti- Jackson party in 1832 paralyzed 
their political activities for a while, and they were not able to 
get together before the election of 1836. The defeat of 1836 
seemed rather to unite than to scatter their forces, since that 
election was hardly over till movements were on foot looking 
to the next presidential campaign. 
This must not be taken to mean that there was no strife in 
the party itself. The friends of Webster and Clay still held to 
their favorites. They appeared to be more interested in per- 
sonal, factional strife, than in national political organization.^^ 
Webster’s friends said Clay should stand back as he had been 
a candidate in 1824 and 1832.^^ Clay’s friends said that this 
was the first real chance for an election, and as Clay was the 
older, he should have the first chance, and Webster, in turn, 
should have his.^^ 
Clay began to plan his opposition to the new administra- 
tion before it was inaugurated on the ground that none of 
its measures could atone for the original sin of its having 
been chosen by its predecessor.*^^ In the special session of 
1837, he urged the payment of the Fourth Instalment, altho 
he knew the Treasury was empty.®"^ He had plans by which 
the Whigs of the House should embarrass the speaker, and 
he tried to have the control of financial affairs taken away 
from the finance committee of the Senate and given over to 
a new committee controlled by the Whigs.*^® Webster ap- 
proved of these plans, but Adams thought that such prema- 
ture attacks would do the Whigs more harm than good.*^^ 
This policy of opposition to all administrative measures was 
kept up thruout the full four years.*^^ 
Webster’s candidacy was of short duration, altho it was 
Congdon, Reminiscences of a Journalist, 65. 
George T'icknor Curtis, Life of Daniel Webster (New York, 1870), II, 1, 2. 
The Globe, April 26, 1889, from Netv York Evening Star, April 24, 1839. 
Calvin Colton, The Private Correspondence of Henry Clay (New York, 1856), 409; 
Schurz, Life of Henry Clay, II, 130, 131. 
Charles Peck, The Jacksonian Epoch (New York and London, 1899), 363; Schurz, 
Life of Henry Clay, II, 134, 135. 
Albany Argus, January 2, 1838. 
Adams (ed.). Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, IX, 369. 
Albany Argus, February 2, 1838. 
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