 | John Randolph |  |
THE OLD MAN AND THE YOUNG MAN ELOQUENT.
During the later years of his life Daniel Webster was often
referred to as the "Old Man Eloquent," but that was after
Patrick Henry had long been in his grave. The last burning
words which fell from the lips of the old Revolutionary hero
and orator, uttered shortly before his death, were an impassioned
appeal to Virginia to beware how by pronouncing
upon the validity of Federal laws she should invite the horrors
of civil war and final subjugation by foreign powers.
He painted to their imaginations Washington at the head of
a numerous and well-appointed army inflicting upon them
military execution.
"And where," he asked, "are our resources to meet such a
conflict? Where is the citizen of America who will dare to
lift his hand against the father of his country?"
A drunken man in the audience threw up his arm and exclaimed
that he dared to do it.
"No," answered Patrick Henry, enfeebled with the last ills
to which his flesh was to be heir, but still rising aloft in
majesty and earnestness; "no," he thundered, "you dare not
do it; in such a parricidal attempt, the steel would drop from
your nerveless arm."
The scene of these words was a rough stand erected near
a tavern, which the grand jury of Charlotte County had just
deserted to hear the noted orator; the time, March, 1799, and
the occasion, a pro-and-con discussion of the Alien and Sedition
laws, especially the right of Virginia to judge of their
unconstitutionality. The whole country roundabout had
turned out to honor the old-school patriot, who all but wept
at the threatened disruption of the country which his mature
manhood did so much to found.
Learned divines and professors were there from Prince
Edward College, as well as state and county politicians, the
two candidates for Congress, college students, planters,
tradesmen and a thousand and one men of all characters and
grades of intelligence; and curiosity, affection and admiration
struggled in the breast of the meanest as the old man
put all his failing strength into this appeal for harmony, albeit
it called for the placing in the background some of the
historic and aristocratic pride of the Old Dominion.
One of the candidates for Congress, Powhatan Bolling,
was dressed in a red coat—a tall, large, proud Virginian; just
the kind of a man to voice a loud defi for his state and answer
Patrick Henry, old man though he was, for thus advising her
to submit to oppression by the general government even in
the interest of the Union. But Mr. Bolling was there to be
seen and not heard. There were orators of not a little fame,
besides, but they made no move to reply to Mr. Henry when
he had concluded in this strain: "If I am asked what is to
be done when a people feel themselves intolerably oppressed,
my answer is ready—overturn the government. But do not,
I beseech you, carry matters to this length without provocation.
your rights and which cannot otherwise be redressed; for if
ever you recur to another change, you may bid farewell forever
to representative government. You can never exchange
the present government but for a monarchy. If the administration
have done wrong, let us all go wrong together
rather than split into factions which must destroy that Union
upon which our existence hangs. Let us preserve our
strength for the French, the English, the Germans, or whoever
else shall dare to invade our territory, and not exhaust
it in civil commotions and intestine wars."
As the orator concluded many strong men of Virginia
wept, responsive both to the pathetic words and manner of
their beloved father, and Patrick Henry was almost literally
clasped in the arms of the crowd.
The argument has been advanced pro; now from whom is
the con to come? Not surely from that tall, slender, smooth-faced,
light-haired effeminate-looking youth with the bright
hazel eyes, dressed in buff and blue with fair-top boots. If
you have frequented the roads between Roanoke and Bizarre,
you can bear witness that he sits a horse as well as anybody
in that part of the country, and that he has slaves and dogs
at his beck. You know he is at the head of two large estates
and is nervous and eccentric. Your neighbor at the Patrick
Henry gathering tells you that this aristocratic Virginia boy
is a candidate for Congress and has been put forth by those
who have more than a surface knowledge of him to reply to
the foremost orator of the day. He is actually upon his feet
and tears also are in his hazel eyes and a quiver still upon his
of Roanoke, about to make his maiden speech.
Unlike Byron, the young Virginian was not obliged to wait
the morrow's sun to find himself famous. The evident emotion
playing over his mobile features disarmed the natural
criticism of presumption on his part, and his first modest
words expressing a regret that he was obliged to oppose the
venerable and revered gentleman who had just concluded,
went to hearts already softened. He then examined the position
of his famous opponent calmly and logically, making
such a suggestive personal reference as this: "But the gentleman
has taught me a very different lesson from that he is
now disposed to enjoin on us. I fear that time has wrought
its influence on him, as on all other men; and that age makes
him willing to endure what in former years he would have
spurned with indignation. I have learned my first lessons in
his school. He is the high-priest from whom I received the
little wisdom my poor abilities were able to carry away from
the droppings of the political sanctuary. He was the inspired
statesman that taught me to be jealous of power, to watch its
encroachments and to sound the alarm on the first movement
of usurpation.
"Inspired by his eloquent appeals—encouraged by his example—alarmed
by the rapid strides of Federal usurpation,
of which he had warned them—the legislature of Virginia
has nobly stepped forth in defense of the rights of the states
and interposed to arrest that encroachment and usurpation of
power that threaten the destruction of the Republic."
After speaking of the Alien laws as repugnant to the entire
spirit of the constitution, which in its very essence was the
to this effect: "And what is that other law which so fully
meets the approbation of my venerable friend? It is a law
that makes it an act of sedition, punishable by fine and imprisonment,
to utter or write a sentiment that any prejudiced
judge or juror may think proper to construe into disrespect
to the President of the United States. Do you understand
me? I dare proclaim to the people of Charlotte my opinion
to be that John Adams, so-called President, is a weak-minded
man, vain, jealous and vindictive; that influenced by evil
passions and prejudices, and goaded on by wicked counsel,
he has been striving to force the country into a war with our
best friend and ally. I say that I dare repeat this before the
people of Charlotte and avow it as my opinion. But let me
write it down and print it as a warning to my countrymen.
What then? I subject myself to an indictment for sedition.
I make myself liable to be dragged away from my home and
friends and to be put on trial in some distant Federal court,
before a judge who receives his appointment from the man
that seeks my condemnation, and to be tried by a prejudiced
jury, who have been gathered from remote parts of the country,
strangers to me and anything but my peers—and have
been packed by the minions of power for my destruction!"
It is but justice to the fame of Mr. Randolph, secured at
a bound, to say that no verbatim report of his maiden speech,
his noted reply to Patrick Henry, has ever come down to us.
One of his neighbors, however, who has enjoyed the advantage,
moreover, of comparing notes with several who heard
the oration, has undoubtedly brought down the substance of
it, if not the words. The speech lasted three hours, and the
outburst of brilliant thoughts clad in words of light.
When Randolph concluded, an old planter, turning to his
neighbor, exclaimed, "He's no bug-eater, I tell you."
Mr. Henry said to a by-stander: "I haven't seen the little
dog before, since he was at school; he was a great atheist
then." He made no reply to the speech, but, approaching
Mr. Randolph, took him by the hand and said: "Young
man, you call me father; then, my son, I have something to
say unto you (holding both his hands). Keep justice, keep
truth, and you will live to think differently."
They dined together, and Randolph revered his venerable
friend more than ever and his memory, which was all that
remained in a few weeks from that eventful day, was one of
the sacred things of his after life.
| John Randolph | |