The landlord's little daughter, aged eleven, prepared the President's bed for him by warming it with a warming-pan. He rewarded her for her efforts by a kiss on the cheek, which she recalled with pride as late as 1860, when she described the incident.

THE WAY TO NEW YORK

From Haverhill it was Washington's purpose to travel, with as few halts as possible, toward Connecticut, by a road that would obviate the necessity of again entering Boston, as further entertainment there would mean delay.

He had been absent from the seat of government at New York since Oct 15, and he planned from now on to proceed "at speed," to get back to it.

He planned to take the so-called Middle Road, which would take him through Lexington, Watertown, Needham, Sherburn, Uxbridge and Douglas, into Connecticut, and thence on to Hartford, where he would rejoin the old Post Road that he had followed on his journey eastward. BOSTON

WINFIELD M. THOMPSON

(To be continued)

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS AND SECESSION, 1842

"He was now enabled to devote his energies to the aid of the abolitionists, who were now beginning to appear conspiciously on the scene. At that time it was impossible for the opponents of slavery to effect much. The only way in which they could get their case before Congress was by presenting petitions for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia. Unwilling to receive such petitions or to allow any discussion on the dreaded question, Congress in 1836 enacted the cowardly "gag-rule" that "all petitions, memorials, resolutions or papers relating in any way or to any extent whatsoever to the subject of slavery or the abolition of slavery, shall without being either printed or referred, be laid upon the table, and that no further action whatever shall be had thereon."* After the yeas and nays had been ordered on this when Mr. Adams' name was called he rose and said: "I hold the resolution to be a direct violation of the Constitution of the United States, the rules of this House and the rights of my constituents." The House sought to drown his words with loud shrieks and yells of "Order! Order!", but he raised his voice to a shout and defiantly finished his sentence. The rule was adopted 117 to 68, but it did more harm than good to the pro-slavery party. They had put themselves in an untenable position, and furnished Mr. Adams with a powerful weapon which he used against them without mercy. As a parliamentary debater he has had few if any superiors; in knowledge and dexterity there was no one in the House who could compare with him; he was always master of himself, even at the white heat of anger to which he often rose; he was terrible in invective, matchless at repartee, and insensible to fear. A singlehanded fight with all the slaveholders in the House was something upon which he was always ready to enter and he usually came off with the last word. Though the superlative vocabulary of the English language seemed inadequate to express the hatred and loathing with which the pro-slavery party regarded him, though he was more than once threatened with assassination, neverthe less his dauntless bearing and boundless resources compelled the respect of his bitterest opponents, and some Southern members with true chivalry, sometimes confessed it. Every session he returned to the assault upon the "gag-rule", until the disgraceful measure was rescinded in 1845. This part of his career consisted of a vast number of small incidents, which make a very instructive and instinctive chapter in American history, but cannot well be epitomized."

I

It is of one of these incidents which Mr. Johnson speaks.—[ED.]

John Fiske.

T is one of the ironies of political life that the most animated and acrimonious controversies sometimes arise over matters which in fact are not at all at issue, or which have no real relation to the actual subject of debate. Perhaps the most familiar example of this is found in the famous and indeed epochal debate in the United States Senate between Webster and Hayne. Its provocation was a harmless and insignificant resolution concerning the survey and sale of Western public lands, but it developed into a battle royal over the purport of the Constitution and the integrity of the Union. Exactly a dozen years later, in one of the most impassioned and dramatic passages in

*Be it remembered—that this infamous resolution was fathered by a Northern man:— Charles G. Atherton, of New Hampshire, and was therefore known as the "Atherton gag."

the history of the House of Representatives, the question of the dissolution of the Union was again exploited at a time when the actual issue before the House was the right of petition.

The supreme protagonist of the scene was John Quincy Adams, probably the most formidable debater ever known in Congress. He had begin his career as a Representative as the champion of the right of the people to have their petitions received by Congress; a right then denied by the Southern and pro-slavery majority. Beginning in 1831, he fought that memorable battle single-handed for sixteen years, winning the victory just before his own death. In the course of that extraordinary campaign, he was more than once or twice called upon to offer to the House petitions of a character repugnant to his own sentiments and principles, and petitions which represented the desires of few if any beside their actual signers. Among these were several petitions for his own expulsion from the House, and one-probably spurious-against the abolition of slavery.

That one which created the greatest sensation, however, and which may be regarded as marking the climax of the whole contest, was a petition from forty-five citizens of Haverhill, Mass., for the immediate dissolution of the Union, because of the incompatibility between the free and the slave States. With this Adams was certainly not in sympathy. Years before he had cordially supported his arch enemy, Jackson, in his resistance to Calhoun's Nullification proposals; and indeed in presenting this petition he made it clear that he was opposed to its purport. That the petition was signed by the forty-five men of Haverhill in good faith, may not be doubted. Secessionist sentiments were not unknown at that time in Massachusetts any more than in South Carolina. Indeed, it was from Massachusetts that they had first been heard upon the floor of Congress; when in 1811 Josiah Quincy then one of the foremost members of the House and afterward a distinguished President of Harvard College, declared that if the bill admitting Louisiana to Statehood were passed, the bonds of the Union would be virtually dissolved, that the States would be free from their moral obligations, and that it would be the right of all and the duty of some to prepare definitely for a separation, amicable or forcible. With prophetic irony, this Massachusetts secessionist was called to order and rebuked by a member from Mississippi!

Nor was the petition which Adams presented the only one of that purport which was addressed to that Congress. Only a few weeks

later Daniel D. Barnard, Representative from the Rochester, N. Y., district received from some of his constituents a similar document, which after several weeks of consideration he presented to the House. By that time the great battle over Adams' presentation of the Haverhill petition was ended, and Barnard's precisely similar offer was met with a simple refusal to receive it, and with no storm and no excitement. The fact is that while there was undoubtedly a good deal of disunion sentiment in the North, as afterward expressed by Lowell in "The Biglow Papers," and by Horace Greeley in the proposal to let the "wayward sisters depart in peace," it was sporadic, unorganized, and not significant; and the tremendous pother that was raised over Adams' presentation of the Haverhill petition was not because of its secessionist purport, but because it gave occasion to raise the question of the abstract right of petition in a peculiarly exacerbated form.

Adams had just presented a petition from citizens of Georgia, asking for his deposition from the Chairmanship of the Foreign Affairs Committee. After an animated debate, it was laid upon the table. Then he immediately arose again, and presented the Haverhill petition, the history of which follows, taken from the public records of the time: JAN. 24, 1842, JOURNAL OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

Mr John Quincy Adams presented a petition of 46 citizens of Haverhill, in the state of Massachusetts, praying Congress immediately to adopt measures peaceably to dissolve the Union of these States, for three reasons, which are set forth in the petition.* Mr Adams moved

*The records of Congress show that Haverhill and Amesbury did more than their share in petitioning, and Whitter's hand is to be seen in the whole movement in that part of Massachusetts. The Southern members were exasperated by the persistency with which these petitions were offered by Adams and Caleb Cushing, and threatened a dissolution of the Union unless even the right of petition was denied upon topics that directly or indirectly affected their "peculiar institution". It was in part to rebuke these hollow threats of dissolution that the Haverhill petition was presented:

"The undersigned, citizens of Haverhill, in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, pray that you will immediately adopt measures, peaceably to dissolve the union of these States: First, because no union can be agreeable or permanent which does not present prospects of reciprocal benefit; Second, because a vast proportion of the resources of one section of the Union is annually drained to sustain the views and course of another section without any adequate return; Third, because (judging from the history of past nations) this union, if persisted in, in the present course of things, will certainly overwhelm the whole nation in utter destruction."

The wildest storm ever witnessed in the House was raised by this petition. Whether it was written by Whitier is not certain, but as it came from his native town at a time when he was actively circulating petitions, it is probable he had something to do with it. Samuel T. Pickard, Life of Whittier, Vol. I, pp. 179.80.

that the said petition be referred to a select committee, with instruction to the committee to report to the House the reasons why the prayer thereof should not be granted. Mr Meriwether raised the question of reception on the said petition, and moved that the question do lie on the table. (which was carried)

Mr Gilmer (Thomas W. later Governor of Georgia) moved a resolution: That in presenting for the consideration of the House a petition for the dissolution of the Union, the member from Massachusetts has justly incurred the censure of this House. On January 25, Thomas F. Marshall, of Kentucky, made a very long and impassioned speech upon the subject, and moved to amend the Gilmer resolution.

We can quote but a small part of the opening of the speech:

Whereas the Federal Constitution is a permanent form of government, and of perpetual obligation until altered or modified in the mode pointed out by that instrument, and the members of the House deriving their political character and power from the same, are sworn to support it; and the dissolution of the Union necessarily implies the destruction of that instrument, the overthrow of the American Republic, and the extinction of our national existence; a proposition therefore to the Representatives of the people to dissolve the organic laws framed by their constituents, and to support which they are commanded by these constituents to be sworn before they can enter upon the execution of the political powers created by it and entrusted to them, is a high breach of privilege, a contempt offered to this House, a direct proposition to the Legislature and each member of it to commit perjury, and involving necessarily in its execution and its consequences the destruction of our country and the crime of high treason.

Resolved, therefore that the Honorable John Quincy Adams, member from Massachusetts, in presenting for the consideration of the House * *, has offered an insult to the people * and for it might well be held to merit expulsion from the National Councils *

*

On February 7, on motion of John Minor Botts, the subject was laid on the table; and so the Gilmer resolution and the Marshall substitute and all other matters connected therewith, were permanently disposed of.

NEW YORK

WILLIS FLETCHER JOHNSON