John Randolph of Roanoke, 1773-1833 a biography based largely on new material |
| I. |
| II. |
| III. |
| IV. | CHAPTER IV |
| V. |
| VI. |
| VII. |
| VIII. |
| IX. |
| X. |
 |
 | CHAPTER IV John Randolph of Roanoke, 1773-1833 |  |
CHAPTER IV
Randolph as a Parliamentary Orator
In his John Randolph, Henry Adams says of Randolph:
"Neither his oratory nor his wit would have been tolerated
in a Northern State."[1]
This conception had its origin
simply in the womb of prejudice. Indeed, we doubt
whether any real assent accompanied it in the mind of
Henry Adams, superficial as his knowledge of Randolph
was at the time at which it was expressed. There was too
much general education and literary culture in the Northern
States, especially the New England States, for such
gifts as those of Randolph not to be highly appreciated
by their inhabitants. In point of fact, some of the most
impressive testimony to his intellectual powers that has
come down to us is that of Northern men. Speaking in
his journal, under date of May 16, 1826, of a stage journey
from Richmond to the Potomac which he had just taken
in company with Randolph, Jared Sparks, of Massachusetts,
certainly no mean authority, says:
"That strange, eccentric being, John Randolph was in company.
He talked all day; his memory is prodigious, he
touched upon all subjects—literature, politics, theology,
history with quotations innumerable from the Latin and
English classics. His mind is a storehouse filled to overflowing.
He was in good humor and high spirits nearly all day,
and, as there was but one gentleman besides myself in the
stage, his conversation was carried on almost entirely with me.
and, indeed, if his conversation were printed, it would be quite
as entertaining, profound, and versatile as his speeches during
the present session in the Senate."[2]
S. G. Goodrich, of Connecticut, better known under his
nom de plume of Peter Parley, pronounces Randolph in his
widely read Memoirs to have been undoubtedly a man of
genius.[3]
He also says that Randolph "sometimes seemed
almost inspired."[4]
The unfailingly readable James Parton,
of Massachusetts, also pronounces Randolph to have
been a man of genius.[5]
And so does George Ticknor
Curtis, of Massachusetts, the biographer of Daniel
Webster. (a)[6]
"I had two opportunities of listening to Mr. Randolph in
the Senate," Josiah Quincy the younger, of Massachusetts,
informs us in his delightful Figures of the Past, "and was completely
fascinated by his extraordinary gifts as a talker; for it
was not oratory (though at times he would produce great
oratorical effects) so much as elevated conversation that he
poured forth."[7]
On Jan. 8, 1820, Edward Dowse, a member of Congress
from Masachusetts, wrote to his wife: "I wish you could
be present sometimes and hear John Randolph's wit. It
is the most delicate and at the same time keenest."[8]
And,
if it is not too much like seething a kid in its mother's or
its great-grandmother's milk, we might also record what
Henry Adams' great-grandfather, John Adams, we need
not add "of Massachusetts," had to say about Randolph's
wit and eloquence in his review of a pamphlet published
States Senate from Connecticut:
"Mr. John Randolph inherited his name, family connections,
his fine plantations and thousand negroes, which have given
him more power in this country than the Duke of Bedford has
in England, and more than he would have, if he possessed all
the brilliant wit, fine imagination and flowing eloquence of that
celebrated Virginian."[9]
Among Randolph's warmest admirers, was no less an
arbiter of wit and eloquence than our American Addison,
Washington Irving, of New York. A copy, which he had
taken of the portrait of Randolph, painted by J. W. Jarvis,
hangs upon the walls of the New York Historical Society
today. Another admirer of Randolph was Harmanus
Bleecker, of Albany, who served in Congress with him; and
to his generosity the State of Virginia is indebted
for a portrait of Randolph which is now in its
Library at Richmond. Whoever saw a school reader
or an anthology of American eloquence, compiled
by a Northern hand, and published by a Northern publishing
house that did not contain selections from Randolph's
most famous speeches, along with selections from
the most renowned orations of Webster or Edward
Everett? (a) And who was it but the "good gray poet"
of New England, John Greenleaf Whittier, who wrote the
stirring lines on Randolph so full of tender reverence for
his genius, including his mirth, "sparkling like a diamond
shower," which Dr. Charles W. Eliot, one of the living
exemplars of all that is best in the New England intellect
and character, has inserted in the Harvard Classics? The
truth of the case is well summarized by Thos. H. Benton,[10]
"Wit and genius all allowed him." But why waste ink in
refutation of malice so alien to the truth that it might be
one of the heirlooms of the Adams family, as well as other
much nobler things. If we except some intervals during
his term of service in the United States Senate, when his
mind was unquestionably unhinged, it may well be
doubted whether any American orator ever commanded
the undivided attention of his listeners more completely
than Randolph; and, when we assert this, we do not forget
that once, when describing the transport excited by the
eloquence of Henry, he, himself, said that, when Henry
was speaking, one felt like whispering to his neighbor,
"Hush! don't stir, don't speak, don't breathe";[11] nor do we
forget Webster "whose look," if we may follow in the footsteps
of Milton and Rufus Choate,
Or summer's noon-tide air."
Mixed with the intentness with which Randolph was
heard was of course the curiosity which was concerned
rather with his plantation background and the singularities
of his physical appearance, dress, and manner than
with his rhetorical talents; but curiosity of this sort, after
all, can account for but a few minutes of arrested attention;
not for the hours during which Randolph's auditors not
infrequently surrendered themselves completely to the
enchanting flow of his fresh and sparkling elocution. "He
was listened to with undivided attention," we are told by
Sawyer, who was one of his Congressional associates for
many years.[12]
"It is unquestionably his praise," declares Hugh Blair
Grigsby, who sat with him in the Virginia Constitutional
Convention of 1829-30, "that above all his contemporaries, he
was successful in fixing the attention of his audience of every
class and degree throughout his longest speeches."[13]
"There is no speaker in either House that excites such
universal attention as Jack Randolph," Washington Irving
wrote to William Irving on one occasion.[14]
"He drew an
attentive audience together in Congress more certainly
than any other speaker," was the statement of the National
Portrait Gallery.[15]
"His genius and oratorical powers, language, voice and
gesture cause him to be listened to as perhaps no other
man was ever listened to in Congress," is the testimony of
George R. Gilmer, a member of Congress, in a letter to his
wife written in 1822.[16]
"He attracted a crowded gallery,"
says James Buchanan, who was in the House for a time with
him, "when it was known he would address the House, and
always commanded the undivided attention of his whole
audience."[17]
"When he began to speak," wrote Phœbe Morris from
Washington to her father, Anthony Morris, of Philadelphia,
in 1812, "what a silence reigned throughout the House!
Everyone appeared to wait in anxious, almost breathless,
expectation as if to catch the first sound of his voice, and what
a voice! Clear, melodious, and penetrating, it fascinates."[18]
Most striking of all perhaps is what Horace Binney, the
celebrated advocate, had to say on the subject at the
memorial meeting in honor of Randolph held in Philadelphia
immediately after his death:
"He has probably spoken to more listeners than any other
man of his day; having been unrivalled in the power of riveting
the attention by the force and pungency of his language, the
facility and beauty of his enunciation, and the point and
emphasis of his most striking manner."[19]
(a)
Some of these statements are blended with a certain
amount of disparagement of Randolph in one respect or
another. But, whatever may be the justice of this disparagement,
they certainly substantiate what we have
said about the extent to which he held the ear of his
auditors, whether Northern, or Southern, in bondage.
The physical characteristics of no American orator of
Randolph's day are better known to us than his. At
least five different original portraits of him are in existence.
One by Gilbert Stuart, now in the possession of the Corcoran
Art Gallery at Washington, was taken in March,
1804, when Randolph was in his 31st year.[20]
It is the
portrait of a boy, rather than of a man, but in this respect
it is true to the original at that age, and the poetic, sculptured
face which stands out from it is as handsome and as
unmistakably indicative of genius as the face of Byron
or Burns. After scanning it, we can readily believe the
statement of Littleton Waller Tazewell that, when Randolph
was his schoolmate at Williamsburg, he was the
most beautiful boy he had ever beheld.[21]
Another portrait
of Randolph was taken by J. W. Jarvis in 1811, and, in a
letter to Henry Brevoort, written from Philadelphia,
Washington Irving says that Randolph had consented
that he should have a copy of it.[22]
About two weeks later,
Irving wrote from Washington to Brevoort a letter in
which he made these lively comments on Jarvis:
"I have seen nobody on my route but the elegant Jarvis,
whom I found sleeping on a sopha-bed in his painting room like
a sleeping Venus, and his beautiful dog couched at his feet. I
aroused the varlet, and bid him on pain of death to have the
likeness of Randolph done on my return; he breakfasted with
us and entertained us with several jokes which had passed the
ordeal of Baltimore dinner tables."[23]
Jarvis' portrait, or a copy of Jarvis' portrait, of Randolph
has descended to Mrs. Admiral Edward Simpson,
of Washington, from Randolph's friend, Charles Sterett
Ridgely, her ancestor, and a portrait is owned by Harold
Randolph, of Baltimore, a son of the poet Innes Randolph,
which closely resembles that portrait, or copy. Another
portrait of Randolph was taken by J. Wood in 1816, and
was given by Randolph to Francis Scott Key. In a letter
to Key, written from Semmes' hotel at Georgetown,
whither he had gone partly for the purpose of seeing Key,
and partly for the purpose of giving Wood his last sitting,
Randolph said:
"I wished to give Wood an opportunity to finish the picture.
I called last evening, but he was gone to Mt. Vernon. I shall
drive by his apartment and give him the last sitting this
morning. It is a soothing reflection to me that your children,
long after I am dead and gone, may look upon their sometime
father's friend, of whose features they will have perhaps
retained some faint recollection. Let me remind you that,
although I am childless, I cannot forego my claim to the
return picture on which I set a very high value."[24]
Randolph did receive the return picture; for, some two
years later, he wrote to Key, "Wood has again failed but
not so entirely as at first. It is you in some of your
humors, but neither your serious nor more cheerful face.
It shall hang, however, near my bed and I hope will prove
a benefit as well as a pleasure to me."[25]
That is, he hoped,
that the image of such a heavenly-minded man as Key by
his bedside would help him in the struggle which once
caused him, in familiar converse with a friend, to strike his
own breast and to exclaim: "This rebel is in constant
revolt."[26]
The Wood portrait of Randolph, it is said, is
of Philadelphia, but we have been unable to trace it to its
owner. Another portrait of Randolph is the one donated
by Harmanus Bleecker to the State of Virginia. By
whom this portrait was executed does not seem to be
known. It was apparently from it that the charming
likeness of Randolph which appears in Powhatan Bouldin's
Home Reminiscences was engraved. There is still another
portrait of Randolph by Chester Harding—which now
hangs in the Corcoran Art Gallery at Washington. "He
sat to me for three different pictures," Harding says in
his My Egotistigraphy.[27] In one of his letters to the Rev.
John Hall, the Rev. James Waddell Alexander states that
"the lithograph of Childs from a painting by Harding is
said to give the best idea of Randolph."[28] A portrait of
Randolph owned by the late Judge William Leigh, of
Danville, Va., closely resembles the Harding portrait in
the Corcoran Art Gallery. Numerous other pictorial
representations of Randolph are extant, including several
highly artistic silhouettes; and quite an assortment of
crude caricatures. A curious engraving of what would
appear to have been another portrait of Randolph taken
when he was quite young is in the possession of Mr. John
Stewart Bryan, of Richmond. A letter from Randolph to
Theodore Dudley discloses the fact that he had at the date
of the letter some sort of a picture of himself taken for his
friend, Joseph Clay, of Philadelphia.[29] There is, also, a fine,
full length silhouette inscribed: "Original by Brown from
Life, John Randolph of Roanoke on his embarkation for
Russia on board ship Concord." This silhouette also
belongs to Mr. Bryan. Still another fine, full length silhouette
projects Randolph's tall, lank figure appropriately
enough on a background consisting of a worm-fence pasture
brochure entitled, Wax Models and Silhouettes, published
by the Society of the Colonial Dames of Massachusetts.
Harpers Magazine states that the sketch of Randolph
with cap and cape, which was reproduced in the second
volume of Garland's Life of Randolph, was copied from a
portrait taken during Randolph's last visit to England and
was said to present a by no means overdrawn representation
of his appearance when on the street.[30] This we
can readily believe after reading what F. W. Thomas
has to say about Randolph in his John Randolph of
Roanoke and Other Sketches of Character.[31]
"One day as I was standing in Market (now Baltimore)
Street, I remarked a tall, thin, unique-looking being hurrying
towards me with a quick, impatient step, evidently much
annoyed by a crowd of boys who were following close at his
heels. Not in the obstreperous mirth with which they would
have followed a crazy or drunken man or an organ-grinder
and his monkey, but in the silent, curious wonder with which
they would have haunted a Chinese bedecked in full costume.
I instantly knew the individual to be Randolph from the
descriptions. I, therefore, advanced towards him that I might
take a full observation of his person without violating the rules
of courtesy in stopping to gaze at him. As he approached,
he occasionally turned towards the boys with an angry glance
but without saying anything, and then hurried on as if to
outstrip them; but it would not do. They followed close
behind the orator, each one observing him so intently that he
said nothing to his companions."
The different caricatures of Randolph, which have been
brought to our attention, are too rudimentary in point of
conception and execution to merit attention in detail.
The American cartoonists of Randolph's day knew little
more about drawing than the ruder cavemen. In a letter
himself taken by Wood in 1809.[32] Perhaps, this was the
miniature which Theodore Dudley, when a medical student
in Philadelphia in 1812, lent, at the request of Dr.
Chapman of that City, to the Portfolio, in order that it
might be engraved for the pages of that publication. The
engraving was to be followed in a succeeding number by a
biographical sketch of Randolph, but this expectation was
defeated by Randolph's disinclination to supply the
requisite materials. And even as to the miniature he
wrote to Dudley: "I really regret that you lent the miniature
for the purpose of having it so wretchedly engraved."[33]
A miniature of Randolph is owned by Harold
Randolph, of Baltimore; whether it is the Wood miniature
or not we cannot say; nor do we know what has become of
the model of Randolph's face which was taken the day
after his decease by Gerelot.[34]
The celebrity of Randolph may be roughly measured by
the extraordinary degree to which he has been pictured in
one form or another. In the A. L. A. Portrait Index of the
Library of Congress will be found a long list of references
to portraits and engravings of him.[35]
And what the brush
of the limner has omitted the pen of the contemporary
writer has abundantly supplied; for Randolph's
countenance and figure have been described in the minutest
detail—and in some instances most graphically—
by many persons who had eagerly scrutinized them. One
of these descriptions was composed only a year or so after
Jefferson had written to his daughter, Mrs. Eppes, that John
Randolph had in the debate, in which he stigmatized our
regular soldiery as "rag-a-muffins," "entered into debate
was penned in 1803, it was not published until
after Randolph's death in 1833. It first appeared in the
New York Courier, by which it is stated to have been written
by a gentleman who had been in habits of intimacy with
Randolph ever since it had been written, and it was
afterwards copied into the National Intelligencer.[37]
"Mr. Randolph," says this writer, "is beyond comparison
the most singular and striking person that I ever met with.
As an orator, he is unquestionably the first in the country,
and yet there are few men who labor under so many physical
disadvantages. He seeems made up of contradictions.
Though his person is exceedingly tall, thin and disproportionate,
he is the most graceful man in the world; and, with an
almost feminine voice, he is more distinctly heard in the house
than either Mr. D. or Roger—; though the former is more noisy
than a field preacher, and the latter more vociferous than a
crier of oysters. When seated on the opposite side of the Halls
of Congress, Mr. Randolph looks like a youth of 16, but, when
he rises to speak, there is an almost sublimity in the effect,
proceeding from the contrast in his height when seated or
standing. In the former, his shoulders are raised, his head
depressed, his body bent; in the latter, he is seen with his
figure dilated in the attitude of inspiration, his head raised,
his long, thin finger pointing, and his dark, clear chestnut eye
flashing lightning at the object of his overwhelming sarcasm."
"Mr. Randolph," the paper continues, "looks, acts and speaks
like no other man I have ever seen. He is original, unique in
everything. His style of oratory is emphatically his own.
Often diffusive and discursive in his subjects, his language is
simple, brief and direct, and, however he may seem to wander
from the point occasionally, he never fails to return to it
with a bound, illuminating it with flashes of wit, or the happiest
illustrations, drawn from a retentive memory and a rich
imagination. Though eccentric in his conduct in the ordinary
affairs of life and his intercourse with the world, there will be
than in those of any other man in Congress. His illustrations
are almost always drawn from familiar scenes, and no man is so
happy in allusions to fables, proverbs and the ordinary incidents
of human life, of which he has been a keen observer.
His is not that fungus species of eloquence which expands itself
into empty declamation, sacrificing strength, clearness and
perspicuity to the more popular charm of redundant metaphors
and periods rounded with all the precision of the compass.
Mr. Randolph is a man of wit, and wit deals in
comparisons; yet his language is perfectly simple and less
figurative than that of any of our distinguished speakers. . . .
Though continually worried by the little terriers of the House
who seem to be sent there for no other purpose than to bark at
him, Mr. Randolph never becomes loud or boisterous, but
utters the most biting sarcasm with a manner the most irritatingly
courteous and a voice that resembles the music of
the spheres. Such indeed is the wonderful clearness of his
voice and the perfection of his enunciation that his lowest
tones circulate like echoes through the hall of Congress, and
are more distinctly understood than the roarings of M. L.
[Matthew Lyon], the bellowings of R. N., or the bleatings of
the rosy and stentorian Robert Ross. In all the requisites of a
great orator, he has no superior, and, in the greatest of all,
that of attracting, charming, riveting the attention of his
hearers, no equal in this country, or perhaps in the world.
. . . It is with regret, I add, that this brilliant man, who has
already attracted the attention not only of his countrymen but
of the world, will in all probability survive but a few years.
His health appears irretrievably lost, and his constitution
irreparably injured. A premature decay seems gradually
creeping upon all his vital powers, and an inevitable, unseen
influence appears to be dragging him to the grave. At the age
of 30, with all the world in his grasp, wealth in his possession,
and glory and power in perspective, he is in constitution an
infirm old man, with light, glossy hair parted over his forehead,
and tied loosely behind with a black ribbon; teeth white as
ivory; an eye sparkling with intellect and a countenance
seamed with a thousand small wrinkles. At a distance of a
of premature growth; approach him and, at every step, his
appearance changes, and he becomes gradually metamorphosed
into an old man. You will then see a face such as you
never saw before, never will see again; if he likes you, a smile,
such as you never beheld on the face of any other man, and,
when that smile passes away, a countenance bearing an
expression of long continued anxiety and suffering that will
make your heart ache."[38]
This well-written paper ends with these glowing words:
"When he [Randolph] departs this scene, in which he has
suffered the martyrdom of sickness and detraction combined,
if living, I will bear this testimony that he will not leave
behind any man that can claim superiority over him as a
glorious orator, a sagacious, high-minded, independent patriot
and inflexibly honest man."[39]
Lemuel Sawyer became a member of the House in 1807,
and his long association with Randolph in that body gives
what he has to say about Randolph's appearance and oratorical
characteristics a peculiar value.
"His color," Sawyer says, "was somewhat tawny; he was
straight, and he walked like the Indian with one foot placed
on a straight line before the other. When he was seated at his
desk, he appeared rather below the middle size, but, when he
arose, he seemed to unjoint or unfold himself, and stood erect,
near six feet high; his lower limbs being disproportionately long
for his body. His head was small, his hair light, and worn
long, and tied behind; his eyes were black and piercing, his
mouth handsome but with the arrangement of his teeth gave
him a puerile look; his chin rather pointed and smooth or
beardless; his hands small, and his fingers long and tapering.
His dress was that of the old Virginia gentleman. He wore
white top boots with drab or buckskin shortclothes, and
sometimes gaiters, and, though neat, he was generally plain
prevalent fashion."[40]
It would seem that the color of Randolph's eyes was
hazel as the writer in the New York Courier states, and not
black as Sawyer states, but, as we go on, it will be seen
that the testimony on this point is conflicting. As to
Sawyer's statement that Randolph, when erect, stood
near six feet high, it is enough to say that his exact height
was six feet and two inches and his width across the shoulders
thirteen inches.[41]
The observations of Sawyer on Randolph's
eloquence are equally interesting:
"In his latter years, he could not confine himself to the
point, but touched upon things in general as if in a tone of
conversational improvisation. He spoke so slow and deliberately
that I have thought in listening to him that he had not
considered the subject before he arose; but, as he proceeded,
his mind was put into motion, or rather commotion, and he
threw off the new coinage of his active brain as fast as it was
struck. He was greatly assisted and encouraged, and generally
arrayed his countenance in a bland smile, if he could
discover among his audience anyone paying particular attention
to his address. He would rivet his eye upon him, and
seem to address him alone; and I have seen members in that
case nod assent to his assertions as he proceeded, which he
appeared to take as a marked favor. During his speech on the
Judiciary bill, I believe in April, 1826, I happened to be a
listener and standing near the President of the Senate when
Mr. Randolph was denouncing the Executive for buying up the
leading prints in the different States. Among others, he
enumerated the Petersburg Intelligencer, and added one or
two others, and, looking steadily at me, asked was there not
the whole three that had given in their adhesion? I was ignorant
of the circumstance, and did not return the nod of assent,
which seemed to confuse Mr. Randolph, and, remarking that
he knew who he was talking to, dropped that part of his
to the question before the House as other members, and,
when roused by opposition, seldom left it till it was completely
exhausted. He was then animated, clear and distinct;
his delivery was forcible and his language pure, his words
select and strictly grammatical, and his order and arrangement
lucid and harmonious. His voice was clear, loud and
sonorous, and almost as fine as a female's, and, in his extemporaneous
efforts, in which he excelled, his action was perfectly
suited to his expression. If he was treated with courtesy
and deference by his antagonists, he always returned it with
interest; but, if they provoked him by the use of any personality
or unfairness in stating his arguments, he retaliated with
terrible retribution."[42]
In a later chapter of his book, Sawyer returns to the same
subject in these terms:
"He was possessed of a fine taste for literature, a general
reader, a `ripe scholar,' particularly in the Department of Belles
Lettres; by which acquirements he was well supplied with apt
illustrations to embellish and enrich his oratory. He levied
his contributions from the wide dominions of ancient and
modern literature with the undisputed authority of a conqueror,
which he stored away in his capacious memory as an
inexhaustible magazine to distribute with judicious discrimination
upon every subject that arose in debate. Although in
the course of his long political career of more than 30 years, he
spoke volumes, and some of his speeches, towards the close of
it, were rather verbose and irrelevant, yet he never failed,
during some part of them, to arouse and astonish his audience
by some classical allusions, happy similes, `some thoughts that
breathed and words that burned,' some beautiful and striking
metaphors and most mellifluous and harmonious periods.
Even now in reading those speeches (although so much is lost
in their delivery), while we may have to penetrate through a
heap of chaff (if anything of his may be so abused in terms) in
reaching the kernel or grain, we are abundantly rewarded in
Although the mind might not be chained and carried captive
in the triumphant march of a gigantic intellect by the depth of
research and the force of reasoning, yet was it fascinated, won
and unresistingly carried along, as by a spell, by the ease, the
grace, the fluency and the pleasing, emphatic delivery of the
speaker. His sallies of wit, his biting sarcasm, his happy
retorts and home thrusts; his satiric turn, or his playful humor
rendered him a more agreeable and popular speaker than
others who were more severe and elaborate. If Ridicule be
the test of Truth, he had a most effective way of drawing her
into the light of all the orators of his day; he possessed the
rare art of trying the measures and the opinions of the prominent
men, to whom it was his destiny to be regularly opposed,
by that touchstone; and by it to hold them up to the derision
or censure of the People. With this powerful lever, he could
shake, if not move from its foundations, any administration.
That it contributed in no small degree to subvert that of the
second Adams, no man can doubt who witnessed his repeated
and dexterous attacks, and observed the effects of his peculiar
mode of warfare."[43]
Sawyer also tells us that Randolph never entered into a
contest to catch the eye of the Speaker: "If he saw an
eagerness in members to give their views," he says, "he
generally waited till the last one had concluded and the
question was ordered to be put."[44]
In another place, the
same writer expresses the opinion that, as an orator, Randolph
was more splendid than solid[45]
; yet there could be no
better proof of the admiration excited by Randolph's
eloquence in the House than the language which Sawyer,
who was a thick and thin administration Democrat, and far
from partial to Randolph personally, sometimes employs in
regard to him. Randolph, he thought, was still a powerful
extemporaneous speaker as late as the debates over the
admission of Missouri into the Union in 1821.[46]
There
says, to mark "the bright track of his resplendent car."[47]
In using such a figure of speech, Sawyer was but doing
what almost all commentators on Randolph as an orator
do, when endeavoring to describe the general effect of his
speeches on their minds. Corruscation, brilliancy, high
candle-power is the dominant idea that the hearer seems
to have brought away from them. For instance, when
Thomas H. Benton comes to speak of Randolph, he finds
his illustration in the same field of imagery as Sawyer.
"For more than thirty years," he says, "he [Randolph] was
the political meteor of Congress, blazing with undiminished
splendor, during the whole time, and often appearing as the
`planetary plague' which shed not war and pestilence on
nations but agony and fear on members."[48]
In 1808, the year succeeding that in which Sawyer took
his seat in the House, Francis Walker Gilmer heard Randolph
in the House for the first time, and, later, recorded
the impression left on him in his Sketches, which it is
impossible for any Virginian to read without remembering
that they were written by a brilliant young man who was
prematurely cut off like a blossoming spray from a fruit
tree when he had hardly passed that "delightful season of
life" which Randolph, in the Virginia Convention of 182930,
feelingly reminded its presiding officer, the aged James
Monroe, that neither of them could ever recall[49]
; but not
until Jefferson had pronounced him "the best educated
subject we have raised since the Revolution,"[50]
and Randolph
had conferred upon him the full measure of his
admiring and affectionate friendship.
"The first time that I ever felt the spell of eloquence,"
declares Gilmer, "was when a boy standing in the gallery of
House I saw rise a gentleman who in every quality of his person,
his voice, his mind, his character, is a phenomenon
amongst men. His figure is tall, spare and somewhat emaciated;
his limbs long, delicate, slow and graceful in all their
motions; his countenance with the lineaments of boyhood, but
the wrinkles, the faded complexion, the occasional sadness of
old age, and even of decrepitude; possessing however vast
compass and force of expression. His voice is small but of the
clearest tone and most flexible modulation I ever heard. In
his speech, not a breath of air is lost; it is all compressed into
round, smooth liquid sound; and its inflections are so sweet, its
emphasis so appropriate and varied, that there is a positive
pleasure in hearing him speak any words whatever. His
manner of thinking is as peculiar as his person and voice.
He has so long spoken parables that he now thinks in them.
Antitheses, jests, beautiful conceits, with a striking turn and
point of expression, flow from his lips with the same natural
ease, and often with singular felicity of application, as regular
series of arguments follow each other in the deductions of
logical thinkers. His invective, which is always piquant, is
frequently adorned with the beautiful metaphors of Burke
and animated by bursts of passion worthy of Chatham.
Popular opinion has ordained Mr. Randolph the most eloquent
speaker now in America."[51]
But Gilmer's appreciation is not without its limitations,
though they are somewhat inconsistent with the rest of his
text. The epithets applicable to Randolph's style of speaking
were "striking" and "brilliant," he further says. Randolph
adapted his phrases to the sense, with poetic felicity,
and his voice to the sound, with musical exactness; but the
nature of his eloquence was not favorable to the excitement
of any deep or permanent passion. His deliberate,
graceful, and commanding delivery could not be too much
praised; but his total want of method could not be too
much condemned. There was no breach in the train of
John Marshall's thoughts; there was little connection between
but each was far from being a finished orator. (a) Samuel
C. Jewett, of Maine, an ardent administration Republican,
writing to General H. A. S. Dearborn, of Massachusetts,
on Feb. 5, 1817, has this glowing praise to bestow on
Randolph as an orator, though of the opinion that he was
a very useless member of Congress:
"I was highly amused on Monday in hearing John Randolph
abuse the District of Columbia in consequence of a
petition of one of the incorporated banks to be corporated.
He talked about every subject, and made an elegant speech
about matters and things in general. He is truly a man of
astonishing powers of mind. His manner of speaking is the
most forcible I ever witnessed, and his language elegant
beyond description."[52]
W. H. Sparks, in his Memories of Fifty Years, thus
depicts for us Randolph's appearance about 1821:
"His figure was outre; his voice fine as the treble of a violin;
his face wan, wrinkled and without beard; his limbs long
and unsightly, especially his arms and fingers. The skin
seemed to grow to the attenuated bone, and the large, ill-formed
joints were extremely ugly."[53]
To this auditor, too, the strongest impression conveyed
by the eloquence of Randolph was that of lustre; of a
radiant figure appareled in exceeding brightness; and, in
his effort to communicate his impression to the reader,
he uses a tawdry simile unworthy of his general literary
merits. Referring to the debates over the admission of
Missouri into the Union, he says:
"Mr. Randolph was the leader in the debates of the House,
and occupied the floor frequently in the delivery of lengthy
and almost always very interesting speeches. These touched
its powers. They were brilliant and beautiful; full of classical
learning and allusion, and sparkling as a casket of diamonds
thrown upon and rolling along a Wilton carpet."[54]
This is almost as bad as the naïve allegation in The
South in the Building of the Nation that Randolph "was
a tall, lean, lank man with long fingers which he used to
great advantage in debate."[55]
—an artless announcement
which, by the way, reminds us of the foreword in the
ferocious attack which Richard Rush made upon Randolph
in 1828, under the name of Julius: "The fiend is
long and lean and lank."
Julius Melbourn informs us that Randolph "stood and
walked exactly perpendicular." "No marble pillar could
be formed more so," he says. Melbourn also says: "He
had a fine eye but there was no more expression or variation
in the color of his face than in a block of granite."[56]
"His peculiar voice, sweet as a flute and an octave higher
than other men's voices, his long, wand-like fingers, spare
form, pallid face—the skin upon it not wrinkled but corrugated
into compartments like a bed-quilt—his dark, large clear eye,
his stately but quiet carriage, made him beyond expression the
most striking person I have ever met."[57]
These words are extracted from the Reminiscences of
David Holmes Conrad, who first heard Randolph speak
in the House in 1812. In his very important recollections
of John Randolph, Jacob Harvey, who first became acquainted
with him about 1823, says:
"More than 20 years have elapsed since I first became
acquainted with the late eccentric John Randolph. But time
has not obliterated the deep impressions which his great and
while life remains, the delight with which I listened to his most
captivating eloquence."[58]
In a letter to Caroline Webster, his future wife, undated,
but written from Washington in 1816, Lewis H. Machen,
an accomplished scholar, who held a position in the office
of the Secretary of the United States Senate for nearly
fifty years, institutes this comparison between Randolph
and Pinkney as orators:
"Mr. Randolph and Mr. Pinkney possess great oratorical
powers but differ in their peculiar excellence. Randolph, cool
and collected, is seldom agitated, or even warmed by his
subject. Desultory, and perhaps superficial, incapable of the
higher species of eloquence, seldom attempting alone logical
deduction, and never with success, he yet seizes the attention
by the fascination of his manner, communicates his ideas with
great clearness, and gives to the subject every grace which an
intimate acquaintance with classic literature seldom fails to
impart. Those who desire profound investigation would
return from Mr. Randolph disappointed; but for cool, yet
cutting sarcasm, severity of retort, quickness of reply, the play
of fancy, and corruscations of wit, he has scarcely a superior."[59]
The vigor and brilliancy of Randolph's mind remained
unimpaired down to the time when he became a member
of the United States Senate, and, even during his Senatorial
term, and afterwards, he spoke occasionally with his
former inspiration; but from the date of his election to the
Senate began the extreme irrelevancy and extravagance
of speech which would compel us to believe that at times,
during his Senatorial term, his intellect was gravely disordered,
even if positive testimony to that effect had not
been rendered in the litigation which arose over his wills
after his death. The melodious bells of his eloquence
jangled—out of tune. Niles, the proprietor of Niles'
Register, was very hostile to him. Newspapers generally
were; for his candid, fearless tongue impugned their accuracy
and fairness too often for their editors to cherish any
friendly feeling for him; and besides he was as morbidly
sensitive to the tyranny of the press as to other forms
of tyranny; but the following observations on Randolph,
which appeared in Niles' Register in 1826, when
Randolph was a Senator, doubtless have at least the
semblance of truth which belongs even to the grossest
caricature:
"Those who never have heard this far-famed, highly gifted
and extraordinary man deliver one of his free speeches, or rather
`long talks,' cannot entertain anything like a tolerably correct
idea either of his manner or his matter. The first cannot be
placed upon paper, and no other than a master in the histrionic
art, some one like Matthews, can fairly represent it; and the
second, if put down exactly as delivered, word for word, with all
the pauses, nods and motions, would seem no other than a
broad caricature of what he did say to at least ninety-nine such
persons out of a hundred. Many of his speeches are written
out and placed into his hands for revision (Note:—The editors
of the National Intelligencer are pretty freely charged with
suppressing his late speeches. It is well known in Washington
that they are not censurable for the suppression or delay of
them); and, when not so, no regular reporter would risk his own
reputation for fidelity by giving the thousand expletives and
sharply-pointed and rough words, with which these speeches, or
talks, abound. The subjects touched by him are, no doubt,
correctly set forth; but the whole that he says never is published,
and for the reason above stated—not that Mr. R.
would shrink from any responsibility on account of words used,
but because of the repetition and redundancy of his words,
with his innumerable `Yes, Sirs,' and `No, Sirs.' Now and
then, however, he delivers a sentence, as perhaps no other
man can, direct to his purpose, beautiful in its construction,
interests even in its rudeness, or wanton attack upon private
or defenceless individuals; and, in general, it is in severe
invective or desultory conversation that he excels; and in these,
indeed, he wonderfully excells. He rarely attempts what
would be called a regular argument, and to dwell for one hour
upon any subject is not expected of him. Nine-tenths of his
long speeches just as well apply to a discussion about the
constitutional powers of congress to make a road as to the case
of John Smith or the long disputed claim about Amy Darden's
stud-horse; and hence it is that, on one occasion, last week,
the Senate was left without a quorum to adjourn, and on
another that there were hardly a dozen senators in their seats,
at least one of whom appeared to be pretty soundly asleep, and
for nearly an hour, towards the close of the sitting.
"Though frequent opportunities have occurred, it is several
years since I listened to Mr. Randolph even for half an hour
at a time: but, on the 2nd inst., I spent thirty-five minutes in
the Senate while he was speaking. What he said during that
period, if fully reported, would fill from two to three pages of
this work—I mean, if all the words that he used were printed.
I had been told that the Bankrupt Bill was before the Senate,
but, during the time stated, he never, to the best of my
recollection, mentioned, or even remotely alluded to, it, or any
of its parts, in any manner whatsoever. The following is a
faithful account of the chief subjects that he talked about. I
do not pretend to give his words, unless here and there; but as
to the substance of what he did say I am not mistaken, if substance
there was in his remarks.
"When I entered the chamber, he was giving out a plan to
make a bank by persons resolved to become `rag-earls.' Well
—Sir, we agree to make a bank. You subscribe 10,000 dollars,
you 10,000, and you 10 or 20,000, and so on; looking
toward different members. Then we borrow some rags, or
make up the capital out of our own promissory notes. Next
we buy an iron chest, for safety against fire and against thieves,
but the latter is wholly unnecessary; who would steal our
paper, Sir? All being ready, we issue bills; I wish I had one of
them (hunting his pockets as though he expected to find one),
red; I think, Sir, they begin with `I promise to Pay'; yes,
promise to pay, Sir—promise to pay. He dwelt upon this
making of a bank for about five minutes, and then said
something concerning Unitarians in religion and politics;
making a dash at the President and the administration;
mentioning also Sir Robert Walpole in a way that I do
not recollect. Then he spoke of the Bible, and expressed
his disgust at what are called `family Bibles'; though he
thought no family safe or would flourish without a Bible;
but not of an American edition! These published by the
Stationers Company of London ought only, or chiefly, to
have authority, except those from the presses of the Universities
of Oxford and Cambridge. He described these corporations
briefly. They would be fined 10,000 £ sterling, if they
should leave the word not out of the Seventh Commandment,
however convenient it might be to some, or agreeable to others,
(looking directly at certain members, and half-turning himself
round to the ladies). He never bought an American edition
of any book. He had no faith in their accuracy. He wished
all his books to have Cadell's imprint—Cadell, of the Strand,
London. But people were liable to be cheated. He had
bought a copy of Aristotle's Ethics to present to a lady, to a
lady, Sir, who could understand them, yes, Sir—and he found
it full of errors, though it had Cadell's imprint; which he gave
us to understand was a forgery. From the Bible he passed
to Shakespeare, or rather mingled the holy writings with the
productions of the poet, preferring each nearly equally, and
drubbing some one that he named most soundly for having had
the impudence to publish a `family Shakespeare,' and he made
a quotation from his favorite author. He next jumped on the
American `Protestant Episcopal church,' and vehemently disavowed
all connection with it; declaring that he belonged to
the Church of Old England. He told us that he was baptized
by a man regularly authorized by the Bishop of London who
had laid his hands upon him, (laying his own hands on the
head of the gentleman next to him), and he spoke warmly of
the character of the Bishop and of the priest who had baptised
him; wishing that the latter might have lived to perform the
church he gave something as a quotation from a part of the
service, beginning with `them that'—as reprobating its grammar,
and implying that no good man could belong to a church
which used such language! Suddenly, he spoke about wine.
It was often mentioned in the Bible, and he approved of the
drinking of it, if in a gentlemanly way, at the table; not in the
closet; not in the closet; but, as to whiskey, he demanded that
any one should shew him the word in the Bible; it was not
there. No, Sir, you can't find it in the whole book. Next,
or shortly after this, he spoke of his land, saying that he held
it by a royal grant, with which he seemed greatly pleased; but,
in a minute or two, was speaking of the `men of Kent,' in
England, saying that Kent had never been conquered by
William the Conqueror, but had made terms with him, and, in
consequence, when the militia of England are called to the
field, the men of Kent are entitled to the front rank. He spoke
of a song which had been made on the `men of Kent,' which, I
think, he said he would give a thousand pounds to have been
the author of. He was apparently about to rehearse or sing it,
when, being close to Mr. Randolph, and within three or four
steps of the door, I hastily retreated, and left the chamber,
wondering what the `men of Kent' and William the Conqueror
had to do with the royal grant by which Mr. Randolph held his
land, or what relation that tenure had to the bill before the
senate to establish an uniform system of bankruptcy; and
thinking that to eat my dinner was an affair as interesting, at
half past 3 o'clock, as to hear a song about the `men of Kent.'
"I could have made the preceding sketch more ample than
it is, but would avoid the suspicion of misrepresenting the
`Senator from Virginia.' He talks with so much ease that,
unless for want of `meat, drink or sleep,' one would suppose
that he might speak twelve months without stopping; though
he freely stops to rest himself, and keeps the senate waiting,
when he pleases. A greater part of the time that I heard him,
he was leaning, or lolling, against the railing which is fixed
behind the outer row of chairs, to protect the senators from
the pressure of persons passing around the chamber; and the
careless ease, with which he delivered himself, brought to mind
They, however, have a regular design, which his speeches have
not. Mr. Randolph says any thing which happens to cross his
mind, and cares not a tittle whether it belongs to any subject
that ever was discussed, or ever shall be discussed, or not; and
it is this perfect indifference to everything like method, with
the versatility of his talents, his sometimes beautiful sentences,
keen wit and unsparing invective that causes `the million' to
press in crowds to hear him, and makes the chamber of the
Senate of the United States a place of deposit for empty Senatorial
seats. It has rarely, if ever, happened, before Mr. Randolph's
long speeches were heard in the Senate, that that body
adjourned without a quorum, or that a quorum was not present
to listen to what a member had to say. The courtesy of
the gentlemen composing it, one towards another, has forbidden
occurrences of this sort; but to expect that persons shall
quietly keep their places, and listen five or six hours to discourses
not at all interesting to them, and when, perhaps, they may not
have touched food for nine or ten hours, is out of all reason,
and far beyond aught that courtesy should require. The
Vice President, however, always retains his seat, `like patience
on a monument,' and, indeed, very seldom even changes his
position. Such is a faint, but faithful, outline of proceedings
had in the Senate of the United States. Who is chiefly to
blame for such transactions, the Senate, as a body, the Vice-President,
or Mr. Randolph alone, is not for me to say; but it
is generally felt, and pretty freely acknowledged, by many of
the Senators themselves, that their body has lost a large portion
of their own respect for it, and of the respect of the people,
through Mr. Randolph's incessant talking. If every other
gentleman spoke as long as he does, and every one might speak
as long and as much to the purpose as he commonly does, a
three years' perpetual session would not do the business of a
week; for it must further be observed that, except in the simple
act of giving his vote, Mr. R. attends not to public business,
unless speaking is to be regarded as doing the business of the
nation. This may be agreeable to the established notion of the
Attick `School of Virginia,' as set forth by Mr. Ritchie in the
Enquirer, but will not suit the `Boeotians' of Pennsylvania, &c.,
have been called. Persons of the `Schools' of Mr. Giles, or of
Mr. Randolph, would spend more time in discussing the powers
and duties of a legislature to make a road or build a bridge
than Pennsylvania would require to pass the law and effect all
the purposes of it. Which is best, may be seen in the progress
of population and wealth in the two States. Why is it that
the statesmen of Virginia do not attend to these things? Every
feeling of my heart is that Virginia should be a strong state.
It is for the `general welfare' that she should so be. But her
politicians, by talking and speaking, have made her a comparatively
weak one. They would, however, be amply punished
by being compelled to sit six hours every day, and preserve the
appearance of listening to Mr. Randolph. They would
heartily wish that gentleman at home, `planting corn' in his
own fields, with his own hands; or in England, or anywhere
else, so that they could not hear him: and yet his speeches are
read with great avidity, as matters of amusement, when seated
at our leisure, and at liberty to read or let it alone."[60]
Commenting on this article, the editor of the Franklin
Gazette justly said:
"It is an easy matter to turn into ridicule a man of eccentric
manners. We publish a specimen of this kind of wit today
from Niles' Register, and though the report of facts may be
correct, as far as it goes, had the whole speech been candidly
reported, and not for the purpose of producing a ludicrous
effect; had not the characteristic peculiarities been presented in
a glaring light, and the subject matter been studiously kept
out of view, we are, indeed, much mistaken if the reader would
agree with Mr. Niles when he asserts that the speech had no
bearing upon the bill before the House."[61]
To these comments Niles rejoined with considerable
heat, and published in the same issue from the columns of
the National Intelligencer an unrevised report of a speech
the number of Circuit Judges, which he contended was a
fair standard by which to test the justice of his article.
In the Senate, Randolph, doubtless, often spoke much
that was very little germane to the subject of the debate,
but, as this report did not pretend to be anything but an
unfinished sketch, it may well be accepted with grave
doubts. After reading every reported speech delivered
by Randolph in Congress, we can at least say that no such
rambling and incoherent speech as the one outlined in
this sketch was ever reported in the record of the House
debates. Moreover, we should remember that it was,
perhaps, of this speech that Randolph wrote from The
Hague to Dr. Brockenbrough in these terms on Aug. 8,
1826:
"I hope, however, that no report of my speeches will be
taken as evidence of what I have uttered; for I have never seen
anything further from a just representation than the report of
one that G. and S. say I in part revised. And so I did, and, if
they had printed it by their own proof-sheet, now in London, I
should have been better satisfied with that part; the first, that
I did not revise, is mangled, and hardly intelligible even to
me."[62]
More important than the satire of Niles is a letter from
Daniel Webster, who, however, had a sore spot in his
memory too, to Mr. Denison:
"Mr. Randolph," Webster said, "was elected last fall a
Senator from Virginia. It was unexpected, but his great
devotion to certain political opinions cherished in that State
gave him the election. He is a violent opposer of the present
government, and has conducted his part of the discussions
in the Senate in a way hitherto altogether unknown. The
Vice President has found out that he has no authority to call
him to order or restrain his wanderings; so he talks on for two,
occurs to him on all subjects. This course and its indulgence
by the Presiding Officer of the Senate (Calhoun) has produced
a very strong sensation throughout the country."[63]
But there was an individual and a highly intellectual
and discriminating one, too, who took a much more favorable
view of Randolph's loquacity and excursiveness when
a Senator; and that was Josiah Quincy, Jr. In his Figures
of the Past, he speaks in one place of the "admiration"
with which he had listened to the "wonderful improvisation
in the Senate" of Randolph.[64]
And, in the same volume,
after mentioning that he had twice heard him in the
Senate, he says:
"His speeches were charming or provoking, according to the
point of view of the listener. To a Senator anxious to expedite
the public business or to hurry through the bill he had in
charge, Randolph's harangues upon all sorts of irrelevant
subjects must have been very annoying; but to one who was
not troubled by such responsibility they were a delightful
entertainment. There was no effort about the speeches; they
were given with absolute ease; the speaker constantly changing
his position, turning from side to side, and at times leaning
against the rail which enclosed the Senatorial chairs. His
dress was a blue riding coat with buckskin breeches; for he
always rode to the Senate, followed by his black servant; both
master and man being finely mounted. His voice was silvery
in its tones; becoming unpleasantly shrill only when conveying
direct invective. Four-fifths of what he said had the slenderest
possible connection with the subject which had called him
up; but, so far as the chance visitor was concerned, this variety
only added a charm to the entertainment"[65]
A few pages later, when describing Randolph's second
speech in relation to the Panama mission, Quincy observes:
"But Mr. Randolph's great effort (if I may so call a performance
which to him was evidently no effort at all) was
reserved for the next day. He announced that he should ask
for the consideration of his resolution immediately upon the
meeting of the Senate, and that meant that another speech
would be forthcoming. I was early upon the spot, and for two
hours (he) held my attention fixed by his various and fluent
improvisations, his cutting irony, his terribly sincere, although
absolutely undeserved, denunciations. His memory and
imagination seemed inexhaustible. He would take a subject
(almost any which happened to get in his way), turn and twist
it about, display it in some fantastic light, and then with scorn
push it aside."[66]
James Buchanan was in the House with Randolph at
one time, and he also has something to say about Randolph
as an orator:
"He had a shrill and penetrating voice, and could be heard
distinctly in every portion of the House. He spoke with great
deliberation, and often paused for an instant as if to select
the most appropriate word. His manner was confident, proud
and imposing; and pointing, as he always did, his long finger at
the object of attack, he gave peculiar emphasis to the severity
of his language."[67]
Because of the enmity excited by his aggressive peculiarities,
Randolph's influence in the House, Buchanan
thought, "bore no proportion to the brilliancy of his
talents."[68]
Randolph, as he was during the debates of the Virginia
Constitutional Convention of 1829-30, has also been depicted
in a highly life-like manner by more than one hand.
"We have often heard persons attempt to imitate his
[Randolph's] voice; but we have never known anyone to
succeed; for it was in fact inimitable," says Hugh R. Pleasants.
doubt whether any of them ever heard anything like it. It
was higher than that of men generally, yet it did not in the
least partake of that harsh quality which is generally found
associated with a higher voice in persons of the sterner sex.
On the contrary, it was as soft, as rich and as delicious as the
most mellifluous tones of Jenny Lind, when she pours her
whole soul into one of her breathing melodies. Of course, we
speak of him only, as we saw him in the Convention; for we
never saw him in any other deliberative body, and we are
disposed to think that he was more himself, while here, than
he had been elsewhere for years. It has been said that in his
unhappy moments in Congress, while laboring under fits of
violent exasperation, his voice became dry and harsh in the
extreme. . . . He usually spoke with the greatest deliberation;
his left hand resting on his cane, and his right employed
in giving emphasis to his words. Each sentence, nay each
word, seemed to be thoroughly weighed before he gave utterance
to it; and it was pronounced so distinctly that it was
impossible to mistake it. We once saw a beautiful handwriting,
so distinct that it could be read as easily as print, which
possessed the remarkable peculiarity of having a full stop after
every word. We have often thought there was some analogy
between it and Mr. Randolph's style of speaking, as it presented
itself to our observation in the Convention. . . . Mr.
Randolph's eyes exceeded in brightness and penetration any
we have ever seen in a human head. They absolutely blazed
when kindled by the excitement of debate. It was his custom
to employ very little gesticulation, his forefinger being used
almost entirely for purposes of that sort."[69]
Another spectator of the proceedings of the Convention
was Jeremiah Bell Jeter, one of the most celebrated Baptist
divines of his day.
"The most notable man in the body," he said, "or at least
the member who made the deepest impression on my mind,
Randolph of Roanoke. He was unquestionably the most
perfect orator to whom in the course of half a century it has
been my privilege to listen. I have heard many of the most
eminent speakers of the present day in this country, and some
in Europe, in legislative halls, and in pulpits, and I have not
seen one who seemed so thoroughly to understand the art of
public speaking as he did. I have probably heard speakers
more profound in thought, more convincing in argument and
more moving in appeal; but none so faultless in speaking as was
the orator of Roanoke. His voice was sharp and quite peculiar,
but not unpleasing to the ear. His gestures were few, but all
graceful and expressive. In the art of pausing, he was unrivalled.
He would throw together the clauses of a sentence, exciting
expectation, and, before he would bring out its meaning
with his hand gracefully elevated, he would pause as if some
thought too large for utterance were struggling to find expression.
There was no doubt but that the sentence would be
gracefully and forcibly finished. The delay intensified the
desire to hear the conclusion. Every head was pressed forward,
and every eye was strained to mark the effect of the
coming bolt; nor was there any disappointment when it came.
It went to the mark with unerring precision, and with resistless
force. His style was natural, clear and strong, adapted simply
to convey and press his thoughts."[70]
Another description of Randolph in the Convention is
from the pen of George Wythe Munford, who was for a
time its secretary. He tells us
"that Randolph's head, in proportion to his frame, was small;
that his hair grew low upon his brow, and that he parted it in
the middle; that his features were rather delicate and feminine;
that his eyes were black and full of lustre; that his voice was
peculiarly feminine and shrill, yet clear as the tones of a silver
bell, and of a compass to convey its lowest whisper to a distance;
that his neck was very short, and deeply seated between
his shoulders, which were somewhat elevated, and that his
and his fingers attenuated."[71]
As to Randolph's methods of speech when addressing
the Convention, Munford, who had heard him in the
United States Senate, tells us that they were wholly different
from his eccentric and discursive mode of speaking in
that body.
"It [Randolph's first speech] was calm, collected, dignified
and commanding," he says, "and his gesticulation was that of
a master actor. He would begin to express a thought in language,
and then, leaving the sentence incomplete, would by a
wave of the hand or a change of the muscles of the face, give the
idea as perfect to the mind as if conveyed by the most speaking
words. No reporter can catch these peculiarities, and it is
difficult to convey a just conception of the effect."[72]
Dwelling further on the dramatic element of Randolph's
oratory, Munford, after quoting some of Randolph's
previous utterances in his first speech, adds:
"And then he said `the gentleman from Augusta,' and he
seized his cravat with both hands, and twisted and pulled at it,
as if feeling a sense of extreme suffocation, and the contortions
of face, united with the efforts of the hands to relax the throttle
he felt—the whole gesture—expressing the idea so forcibly that
you saw it palpable that he intended to say that Virginia was
suffering strangulation from the ruffians who were assailing
her."[73]
Equally speaking are the words of Hugh Blair Grigsby,
who was himself a member of the Convention; having
succeeded to the vacancy created by the resignation of
Robert Barraud Taylor:
"Of all the members of the Convention, Mr. Randolph
excited the greatest curiosity. Not a word that fell from
eye. When he rose to speak, the empty galleries began to fill,
and, when he ended and the spell was dissolved, the throng
passed away. It was on the 14th of November he made his
first speech. Mr. Stanard had just concluded his speech, and
the question on the amendment of Judge Green to the resolution
of the Legislative Committee, basing the representation
in the House of Delegates on white population exclusively, was
about to be taken when he arose to address the chair. The
word passed through the City in an instant that Randolph
was speaking, and soon the House, the Lobby and the Gallery
were crowded almost to suffocation. He was evidently ill at
ease when he began his speech, but soon recovered himself
when he saw the telling effect of every sentence that he uttered.
He spoke nearly two hours, and, throughout that time, every
eye was fixed upon him, and, among the most attentive of his
hearers, were Mr. Madison and Mr. Monroe, who had not
heard him before since his rupture with the administration
of their predecessor in the Presidency. From that day, he
addressed the body with perfect self-possession, and, although
he did not at any subsequent time speak at length, he frequently
mingled with marked ability in debate; and it was
easy to tell from the first sentence that fell from his lips when
he was in fine tune and temper, and, on such occasions, the
thrilling music of his speech fell upon the ear of that excited
assembly like the voice of a bird singing in the pause of the
storm. It is difficult to explain the influence which he exerted
in that body. He inspired terror to a degree that, even at this
distance of time, seems inexplicable. He was feared alike by
East and West, by friend and foe. The arrows from his
quiver, if not dipped in poison, were pointed and barbed,
rarely missed the mark, and as seldom failed to make a rankling
wound. He seemed to paralyze alike the mind and body
of his victim. What made his attack more vexatious, every
sarcasm took effect amid the plaudits of his audience. He
called himself, on one occasion, a tomahawker and a scalper,
and true to the race, from which he sprung, he never explained
away or took back anything; and, as he knew the private as
well as the public history of every prominent member, it was
and on whom his attacks would fall. He also had political
accounts of long standing to settle with sundry individuals,
and none could tell when the day of reckoning would arrive.
And, when it did come, it was a stern and fearful one. What
unnerved his opponents, was a conviction of his invulnerability,
apparent or real; for, unconnected as he was by any social
relation, and ready to fall back on a colossal fortune, he was
not on equal terms with men who were struggling to acquire a
competency, and whose hearts were bound by all the endearing
ties of domestic love. Moreover, it was impossible to answer
a sneer or a sarcasm with an argument. To attempt anything
of the kind was to raise a laugh at one's expense. Hence the
strong and the weak in a contest with him were upon the same
level. In early youth, the face of Mr. Randolph was beautiful,
and its lineaments are in some degree preserved in his portrait
by Stuart; but, as he advanced in life, it lost its freshness, and
began to assume that aspect which the poet Moore described
in his diary as a young-old face, and which is so faithfully
portrayed by Harding. His voice, which was one of the great
sources of his power, ranged from tenor to treble; it had no bass
notes; its volume was full at times, but, though heard distinctly
in the hall and the galleries, it had, doubtless, lost much of the
sweetness and roundness of its earlier years. Its sarcastic
tones were on a high key. He was, too, though he had the art
to conceal his art from common observers, a consummate actor.
In the philosophy of voice and gesture, and in the use of the
pause, he was as perfect an adept as ever trod the boards of
Covent Garden or Drury Lane. When he described Chapman
Johnson as stretching his arm to intercept and clutch the
sceptre, as it was passing over Rock Fish Gap, or, when he
rallied him for speaking not, `fifteen minutes as he promised,
but two hours, not by Shrewsbury Clock, but by as good a
watch as can be made in the City of London,' and, opening the
case of his hunting watch, held it up to the view of the Chairman;
or, when seeking to deride the length of Johnson's speech,
he said, `The Gentleman said yesterday, or the day before, or
the day before that,' Garrick or Kean would have crowned his
acting with applause. No weight of character, no grade of
the committee, to which was referred, near its close, all the
resolutions of the Convention, with a view of having them
drawn in the form of a Constitution, was the most venerable
in years, in genius, in all the accomplishments of the human
mind, and in length and value of public service, that ever
sat on this side of the Atlantic. Madison, Marshall, Tazewell,
Doddridge, Watkins Leigh, Johnson and Cooke were the
seven members who composed it. Yet Mr. Randolph, almost
without an effort, raised a laugh at their expense. It appears,
if I am not mistaken, that some qualification of the right of
suffrage, which was embraced in the resolutions, was not to be
found in the reported draft, and to this omission Mr. Randolph
called the attention of the House. Mr. Leigh observed
that, if Mr. Randolph's views were carried out, it would
virtually leave the entire regulation of the right of suffrage to
the General Assembly. Randolph replied, with all his peculiar
emphasis and gesture, `Sir, I would as soon trust the House
of Burgesses of the Commonwealth of Virginia as the Committee
of Seven.' I followed his finger, and, amid the roar of
laughter, which burst forth, I saw Mr. Madison and Mr. Leigh
suddenly and unconsciously bow their heads. He idolized
Shakespeare, and cherished a taste for the drama; and, in this
department of literature, as well as in that of the older English
classics from Elizabeth to Anne, and, indeed, in all that was
embraced by the curiosity and taste of a scholar, his library
was rich. He spoke and wrote the English language in all its
purity and elegance, and his opponents had at least the gratification
of knowing that they were abused in good English;
indeed, Madison could not vie with him in a full and ready
control over the vocabulary or the harmony of the English
tongue. His later speeches exemplify this remark in a more
striking manner than his earlier ones. In his speech on
Retrenchment, delivered in the House of Representatives in
1828, one meets with sentences of great beauty, and it may be
observed that, towards the close of that speech, is one of the few
pathetic touches to be found in his productions. Yet it may
well be doubted whether his speeches will hold a high place
in aftertimes. His sayings will be quoted in the South; and
will hardly emerge beyond Mason and Dixon's line, and never
reach, even within that limit, the dignity of models. What Sir
James McIntosh observed to an American respecting one of his
speeches, will probably convey, when oral tradition grows
faint, the impression which they make on impartial minds—
that there was a striving after effect—a disposition to say
smart or hard things beyond the ability. On the score of
argument, they were beneath criticism. It is but just, however,
to say that Mr. Randolph protested against the authenticity
of most of the speeches attributed to him. Those in
the published debates of the Convention are undoubtedly
authentic, and must have received his revisal."[74]
In another place, in the same discourse, Grigsby speaks
of "the rich soprano" of Randolph.[75]
Dr. Francis West, Jr.'s, Reminiscences, dated May 24, 1833, copied by
D. Grinnan, Sept. 27, 1887, from original in possession of Dr. Philip Slaughter,
of Culpeper Co., Va.
To all this might be added the declaration of Tristam Burges, of Rhode
Island, in the House: "Genius he certainly has; for he is original and unlike
all other men. If you please, he is eloquent, but, if so, the eloquence is
like himself—sui generis." Reg. of Deb., 1830-31, v. 7 494.
"No collection of American speeches, however, has been deemed complete
without some of them [Randolph's speeches]; though pronounced, as
us the impress of genius is upon them all." National Portrait Gallery, v. 4,
Title, Randolph, p. 3.
In a letter to David K. Este, a distinguished lawyer and citizen of
Cincinnati, dated Washington, Feb. 15, 1916, John McLean, after dwelling
with some pungency upon the length and discursiveness of Randolph's
speeches in the House at that time, nevertheless concludes: "And yet,
this extraordinary man generally commands attention. He speaks with
great fluency, and his elocution is never perhaps surpassed. In invective he
stands certainly unrivalled." Louise E. Bruce MSS.
Evidence of the fact that Randolph lacked the egotism to be intolerant
of criticism conceived in a proper spirit is also to be found in the patient
manner with which he accepted the harsher part of Gilmer's sketch of
himself as an orator, in which Gilmer even stated that someone who had
lately heard Randolph in the House had compared him to an exhausted
crater. The letter from Randolph to Gilmer which touched upon this
subject is one of the best that he ever wrote. Century Mag., v. 29, 714.
| CHAPTER IV John Randolph of Roanoke, 1773-1833 | |