Studies in American History 
151 
A still more questionable trick is said to have been worked 
on the Virginia delegation. It was halting between Scott 
and Harrison when Thaddeus Stevens visited the Virginia 
headquarters and inadvertently dropped a letter which Scott 
had written to Francis Granger showing his sympathy for 
antislavery. This at once turned her vote to Harrison.^®^^ 
After six ballots, Harrison secured a majority of all the 
votes cast. Clay still held all the southern states and Rhode 
Island; Scott had the vote of New Jersey and Connecticut, 
and Harrison held all the West and central states, besides 
Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont in the East. 
The final vote was Harrison 148, Clay 90, and Scott 16.^^® 
This vote was then submitted to the convention as a whole 
and was accepted by it. A letter v/hich Clay had written to 
a friend urging “the selection of that citizen, although it 
should not be me, who may appear to be most likely . . . 
to bring about a salutary change in the administration of the 
General Government”^'^^ helped to restore good feeling. 
The vice-presidential candidate was chosen in the same way. 
Henry Wise said that a deal was made between Clay, Tyler, 
and Rives whereby Tyler was to get the vice-presidency and 
Rives the senatorship from Virginia. As several other men 
were offered the position before Tyler, it is extremely unlikely 
that such a deal was made. No platform was adopted. 
The fight was not one between Clay and Harrison, but 
rather a struggle to keep Clay out. It may be said that he 
lost because of the composite character of the party he had 
formed. By any fair means Clay would have been nominated. 
The leaders of the party thought that Clay could not hold 
the Anti-Van Buren vote together, so chose a man who could. 
There is little ground for believing that Clay’s friends de- 
serted him from any other motive than that it was for the 
party’s interest that he be sacrificed. The chief elements that 
prevented the nomination of Clay were the Abolitionists, 
the Anti-Masons, the personal friends of Webster, and those 
politicians who were more interested in the spoils of office 
A. K. McClure, Our Presidents and Hoiv We Make Them, 68 (cited in footnote 
of J. A. Woodburn’s Life of Thaddeus Stevens, 65, 66). 
The Globe, December 12, 1839. 
157 Proceedings of the Democratic Whig national convention on December 4, 1839, at 
Harrisburg, Pa. (1839), 21-23. 
158 Wise, Seven Decades of the Union, 158-161. 
Tuckerman (ed.). The Diary of Philip Hone, I, 393, 394. 
