John Randolph of Roanoke, 1773-1833 a biography based largely on new material |
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 | CHAPTER VIII John Randolph of Roanoke, 1773-1833 |  |
CHAPTER VIII
Congressional Career (Continued). Habet
In 1813, Randolph was, for the first and last time, defeated
as a candidate for the House of Representatives;
and his successful opponent was John W. Eppes, who had
taken up his residence in Randolph's district several years
before. The principal cause of Randolph's defeat was his
violent antipathy to the War of 1812; but, as we shall see,
he believed that it was partly compassed by secondary
influences. If so, it is hardly likely, we should say, that
they were of any considerable moment. In 1813, Virginia
still clung with an almost pathetic fidelity to the party,
which, under the leadership of Jefferson and Madison, had,
by adding the havoc of war to the economic paralysis
wrought by commercial restrictions, reduced her to a condition
of the keenest pecuniary distress. Entrenched in
the confidence and affection of the Virginians, as this party
was, patriotic as the spirit of Virginia was, powerful as
were the individual and journalistic agencies, which had
long been consolidating in that state for the purpose of
breaking down Randolph's popularity in his District, the
wonder is not so much that he should have been defeated
as that he should not have been defeated sooner and still
more signally. To the reader of these pages his temporary
exclusion from public service will, we are sure, prove by no
means an unmitigated misfortune. The enforced leisure,
which it produced, did not a little, in some respects, to
diversify and enrich his life. It afforded him time to
actively in the outdoor pastimes in Southside Virginia
which bring into prominence the more amiable side of his
character; it promoted a closer social intercourse between
him and his Southside Virginia and Richmond friends; and,
above all, it made him more dependent than ever before
upon epistolary correspondence with his intimates for
pleasure and relief from ennui. Among his correspondents
between 1813 and 1815, when he was re-elected to Congress,
were Josiah Quincy, the brilliant Federalist member
of the House from Massachusetts, with whom he had
become very friendly in the House, Francis Scott Key, of
Maryland, the distinguished lawyer and the author of our
national anthem, The Star Spangled Banner, and Dr. John
Brockenbrough, a man who seems to have fully deserved
the tribute which Garland pays to him in these words:
"To none did he [Randolph] speak or write more unreservedly
than to Dr. John Brockenbrough, the President of the Bank of
Virginia. No wonder; for his superior is not to be found—a
man of rare talents, varied learning, large experience in the
business of life, refined manners, delicate sensibility, a perfect
gentleman and a faithful friend."[1]
The following letter from Randolph to Key gives us
some insight into the manner in which the former accepted
his defeat:
For so, without ceremony, permit me to
call you. Among the few causes that I find for regret at my
dismissal from public life, there is none in comparison with
the reflection that it has separated me—perhaps forever—from
some who have a strong hold on my esteem and on my affections.
It would indeed have been gratifying to me to see once
more yourself, Mr. Meade [Rev. Wm. Meade, of Virginia],
Ridgely [Andrew Sterrett Ridgely], and some few others; and
any thing of bitterness into what may be termed my disappointment,
if a man can be said to be disappointed when
things happen according to his expectations. On every other
account, I have cause of self-congratulation at being disenthralled
from a servitude at once irksome and degrading.
The grapes are not sour—you know the manner in which you
always combated my wish to retire. Although I have not, like
you, the spirit of a martyr, yet I could not but allow great
force to your representations. To say the truth, a mere sense
of my duty alone might have been insufficient to restrain me
from indulging the very strong inclination which I have felt for
many years to return to private life. It is now gratified in a
way that takes from me every shadow of blame. No man can
reproach me with the desertion of my friends, or the abandonment
of my post in a time of danger and of trial. `I have
fought the good fight, I have kept the faith.' I owe the public
nothing; my friends, indeed, are entitled to everything at my
hands; but I have received my discharge, not indeed honestam
dimissionem, but passable enough, as times go, when delicacy
is not over-fastidious. I am again free, as it respects the
public at least, and have but one more victory to achieve to be
so in the true sense of the word. Like yourself and Mr. Meade,
I cannot be contented with endeavoring to do good for goodness'
sake, or rather for the sake of the Author of all goodness.
In spite of me, I cannot help feeling something very like contempt
for my poor foolish fellow-mortals, and would often
consign them to Bonaparte in this world, and the devil, his
master, in the next; but these are but temporary fits of misanthropy,
which soon give way to better and juster feelings."[2]
Another letter to Key, written shortly after this one,
prolongs the same strain of reflection:
Your letter being addressed to Farmville,
did not reach me until yesterday, when my nephew
brought it up. Charlotte Court House is my post-office. By
office in regard to my books and papers at Crawford's. Pray
give them protection `until the Chesapeake shall be fit for
service.' It is, I think, nearly eight years since I ventured to
play upon those words in a report of the Secretary of the
Navy. I have read your letter again and again, and cannot
express to you how much pleasure the perusal has given me.
"I had taken so strong a disgust against public business,
conducted as it has been for years past, that I doubt my fitness
for the situation from which I have been dismissed. The
House of R. was as odious to me as ever school-room was to a
truant boy. To be under the dominion of such wretches as
(with a few exceptions) composed the majority, was intolerably
irksome to my feelings; and, although my present situation
is far from enviable, I feel the value of the exchange. Today,
for the first time, we have warm weather; and, as I enjoy the
breeze in my cool cabin, where there is scarce a fly to be seen, I
think with loathing of that `compound of villainous smells'
which at all times exhale through the H. of R., but which, in a
summer session, are absolutely pestilential. Many of those,
too, whose society lessened the labors of our vocation, are
gone; Bleecker, Elliott, Quincy, Baker, and (since) Bayard; so
that I should find myself in Congress among enemies or
strangers. Breckenridge, Stanford, and Ridgely, and Lloyd
in the Senate are left; and I am glad that they are not in a
minority, so forlorn as the last. They have my best wishes—
all the aid that I shall ever give to the public cause. The great
master of political philosophy has said that `mankind has no
title to demand that we should serve them in spite of themselves.'
It is not upon this plea, however, that I shall stand
aloof from the bedside of my delirious country. My course is
run. I acquiesce in the decision that has been passed against
me, and seek neither for appeal nor new trial.
"I shall not go northwards until towards the autumn, when I
must visit Philadelphia. My late friend Clay's youngest
son will return with me; and, that journey over, I shall probably
never cross James River again.
"You are mistaken in supposing that `we Virginians like the
war better the nearer it approaches us'; so far from it, there is
district, paradoxical as it may seem, against the war. More
than half of those who voted against me, were persuaded that
I was the cause of the war; that the Government wished for
peace (e.g. the Russian Embassy), but that I thwarted them
in everything, and that, without unanimity amongst ourselves,
peace could not be obtained. If you are acquainted with Daschoff,
tell him that the Russian mediation was (strange as it may
appear) made the instrument of my ejection. It gave a temporary
popularity to the ministry—the people believing that
peace was their object. Its effect on the elections generally
has been very great. Some were made to believe that the
British fleet in the Chesapeake was to aid my election."[3]
A subsequent and briefer letter to Key shows that,
averse as Randolph was to the war, he early withheld his
approval from the extreme position that the New England
Federalists had taken in regard to it:
"Your letter of the 14th was received today—many thanks
for it. By the same mail, Mr. Quincy sent me a copy of his
speech of the 30th of last month. It is a composition of much
ability and depth of thought; but it indicates a spirit and a
temper to the North which is more a subject of regret than of
surprise. The grievances of Lord North's administration
were but as a feather in the scale, when compared with those
inflicted by Jefferson and Madison."[4]
On the same day that this letter was written, Randolph
wrote to Quincy acknowledging the receipt of the copy of
his speech which is mentioned in it:
You lay me under obligations which I know
not how to requite, and yet I cannot help requesting a continuance
of them. I have been highly gratified today by the
I have read them both with deep attention, and with a
melancholy pleasure which I should find it difficult to describe.
You are under some misapprehension respecting my opinions
in regard to certain men and measures—the true sources of our
present calamities. They are not materially, if at all, variant
from your own. It is time indeed to speak out; but, if, as I
fear, the canine race in New York have returned to their
vomit, the voice of truth and of patriotism will be as the voice
of one crying in the wilderness. I feel most sensibly
the difficulties of our situation, but the question is as to the
remedy.
"I had taken the same views (in one respect) of the election
in this district that you have done. But, paradoxical as it
may appear, I am convinced that the war and its authors are
less popular in Virginia than ever, and that the result of the
election here was owing to a fortuitous concurrence of events,
some of them merely local and personal. The Russian mediation,
however, was the great gull-trap. Legion could not
believe that the government which accepted it could have any
other object in view but peace; and the glory of the Russian
victories, which should have called a crimson blush to the
cheeks of the tools of Bonaparte, has thrown a false splendor
around them, and given them a temporary reprieve from the
sentence of public reprobation which impended over them.
The incapacity and imbecility of the British Ministry has also
contributed to give a false popularity to our own Administration.
At the same time, I would not have you expect relief
from the sympathy of the Southern country, the people of
which are prepossessed by the demons of faction and discord
with no very favorable opinion of you. And indeed, if our
own privations and sufferings fail to open our eyes, you cannot
take it unkind that we should continue insensible to the grievances
of others 700 miles off. The history of the government
of this country, if faithfully written, would sound like romance
in the ears of succeeding generations, and be utterly discredited
by them. But for this consideration I have sometimes
thought that I would undertake the task. The oppression of
Lord North's administration was leniency and compassion to
dupes of professions, and imposed upon by names. We fondly
thought that we were about to become an exception to the
general laws of political philosophy, and our disgrace and
punishment is likely to be proportionate to our vanity and
presumption."[5]
A few days later, Randolph wrote to Dr. Brockenbrough:
"I can give Mrs. B. no comfort on the subject of her son.
For my part, it requires an effort to take an interest in anything;
and it seems to me strange that there should be found
inducements strong enough to carry on the business of the
world. I believe you have given the true solution of this problem
by way of corollary from another when you pronounce that
free will and necessity are much the same. I used formerly to
puzzle myself, as abler men have puzzled others, by speculations
on this opprobrium of philosophy. If you have not untied
the Gordian knot, you have cut it, which is the approved
methodus medendi of this disease."[6]
The lassitude that pervades this letter, however, is not
so well maintained in Randolph's next letter to Quincy.
It is as follows:
"One of my New York papers, received today, contains the
answers of the two branches of your Legislature to Governor
Strong's excellent address. In these State papers, I think I
recognize the pen of an old acquaintance, to whom I have been
frequently obliged for the most sound and constitutional
expositions of the principle of our heteroclite government. I
think, too, that, in the same print, I can discern some traces of
the less familiar style of another gentleman to whom I beg to be
mentioned in terms of the most cordial respect. My nature has
become so degenerate and grovelling, during a double apprenticeship
to the art, mystery, or craft of politics, that for the life
of me I cannot envy, whilst I admire and esteem, the services
which you are both rendering to your country. Neither can I,
rhetoric work myself up into any serious regret that I am
no longer under the abject dominion of Mr. H. Clay and Co.
Not that I would be guilty of a contempt, or even insinuate
anything in derogation of Kentuckian suavity or courtesy; but,
for the soul of me, I cannot be bona fidely sorry, as one of their
great orators would say, that I am here at home where, like
the centurion, I say to one—`go' and he goeth; to another `Do
this' and he doeth it, rather than under the discipline and
orders of the Calhouns, Grundys, and Seavers.
"You are likely to find in me at once a troublesome and unprofitable
correspondent. Far removed from our provincial
capital, I can procure nothing, even if it afforded anything
of interest to send you, and, as all eyes are upon you, at this
time, I must request you to furnish me with such publications
as Boston affords; begging you to hold in remembrance that we
have here a little school of intelligent freeholders upon whom
such things are not thrown away."[7]
This letter also expresses the belief that hundreds who,
under the influence of artifice and temporary excitement,
had voted against Randolph in the preceding April, had
come to deplore the fact; and the same idea reappears in
Randolph's next letter to Quincy:
"This day's mail brought me the report of your legislature
on the subject of the defence of Boston. The act of Congress,
of the 23rd of April, 1808, for arming the militia was, as you
know, a bantling of my own nursing. I knew that the brat
was hateful to the sight of the stepmothers of the Constitution,
and foresaw that they would try to overlay it. I asked for an
annual million, and they gave us a beggarly appointment of
$200,000.00, the greater part of which they have contrived to
embezzle, and the proceeds of the remainder they have distributed
amongst their favorites. The terms of the act are
imperative; they admit of no discretion; and, if anything in
the shape of political effrontery could have surprised me, I
should have been astonished at the impudence with which this
but justified on the floor of Congress. Rely upon it that with
all the unpromising appearances of the prospect in this quarter,
there is a revulsion in the public sentiment. I have washed
my hands of politics, but I cannot be insensible of the change
which the matchless folly of our rulers is effecting in Virginia,
and even in Kentucky, where the men of light and leading are
gradually opening their eyes to the sins and fooleries of
administration."[8]
The next letter from Randolph to Quincy is interesting,
if for no other reason because it reveals the ever present
fear of a servile insurrection, which lurked in the heart of a
slave community, and yet so rarely justified its existence.
"We are all here in a state of great alarm and distress. The
Governor has called for more than one-fourth of our effective
men from every county, far and wide. From those nearer the
theatre of war, a yet greater proportion has been demanded.
The distress and alarm occasioned by this requisition do not
arise from fear of the prowess of the enemy, but of the effects of
the climate and water of the lower country, especially at this
season; and the danger from an internal foe, augmented by the
removal of so large a portion of our force. Of the result you
can form no conception. `I have seen more crying,' said
an old neighboring freeholder to me this morning, `since Friday
(the 2nd) than I have seen in all my life before.' If the coldblooded
insect whom God for wise purposes has inflicted upon
us (Pharaoh was plagued with some of the same species),
could have heard the shrieks of agonizing wives that yet ring
in my ears. . . . I am persuaded some compunctious
visitings of his reptile nature would have knocked at his heart.
Perhaps, you do not know that the climate and water of the
lower country are poisonous to our constitutions, and that a
stranger, who would go to Norfolk at this season, would be
reckoned a mad, and certainly a dead, man. To turn men who
have been basking in the shade for two months and never
exposed to the sun—to turn such men at a minute's warning
shoulders and a knapsack and four days provisions at their
backs, beneath this torrid sky, is to sign their death warrant.
Rely upon it that the working of this campaign is against the
faction which has plunged us all unprepared into this disastrous
contest. The express, who brought up our executive
orders, had not as much money as would pay for the hire of a
horse. Twelve shillings, lawful money, would have been
enough; instead of which he was furnished with a power to
impress and actually took the only horse of a very poor man in
this neighborhood. Things are drawing to a head."[9]
Another letter in the series to Key discloses the ruinous
effect that the war was having on the planting interests of
Virginia.
"I heartily wish that I were qualified in any shape to advise
you on the subject of a new calling in life. Were I Premier, I
should certainly translate you to the See of Canterbury; and,
if I were not too conscious of my utter incompetency, I should
like to take a professorship in some college where you were
principal; for, like you, `my occupation (tobacco making) is also
gone.' Some sort of employment is absolutely necessary to
keep me from expiring with ennui. I `see no reviews' nor
anything else of that description. My time passes in uniform
monotony. For weeks together, I never see a new face; and,
to tell you the truth, I am of so much of Captain Gulliver's
way of thinking respecting my fellow-Yahoos (a few excepted
whose souls must have transmigrated from the generous
Houyhnhnhms) that I have as much of their company as is
agreeable to me; and I suspect that they are pretty much of
my opinion: that I am not only ennuyé myself but the cause of
ennui in others. In fact this business of living is, like Mr.
Barlow's reclamations on the French Government, dull work;
and I possess so little of pagan philosophy or of Christian
patience as frequently to be driven to the brink of despair.
`The uses of this world have long seemed to me stale, flat and
unprofitable'; but I have worried along, like a wornout horse
die in the traces, running the same dull stage day after day.
"When you see Ridgely, commend me to him and his amiable
wife. I am really glad to hear that he is quietly at home instead
of scampering along the Bay shore or inditing dispatches.
Our upper country has slid down upon the lower.
Nearly half our people are below the falls. Both my brothers
are gone; but I must refer you to a late letter to Stanford for
the state of affairs hereabouts. Henry Tucker is in Richmond;
Beverley at Norfolk; whence, if he return, he will win his life
with the odds against him. . . .
"Nicholson has luckily shifted his quarters from an exposed
to a very safe position, where he may reflect undisturbed on the
train of measures which have issued in the present unparalleled
state of things. With me, he condemned them at the beginning,
but gradually coincided with the views of the Administration.
He may live to see the time when he will wish that
he had steadily opposed himself to them. I would not give
the reflection that, under every circumstance of discouragement,
I never faltered or wavered in my opposition to them to
be President for life. Nearly eight years ago the real views and
true character of the executive were disclosed to me, and I made
up my mind as to the course which my duty called upon me to
follow. I predicted the result which has ensued. The length
of time and vast efforts which were required to hunt me down
convinced me that the cordial coöperation of a few friends
would have saved the Republic. Sallust, I think, says, speaking
of the exploits of Rome, `Egregiam Virtutem paucorum
civium cuncta patravisse'; and, if those, who ought to have put
their shoulders to the work, had not made a vain parade of
disinterestedness, in returning to private life, all might have
been saved. But the delicacy and timidity of some and the
versatility of others insured the triumph of the court and the
ruin of the country. I know not how I got upon this subject.
It is a most unprofitable one."[10]
A letter of somewhat later date from Randolph to Quincy
still more pointedly brings home to us the hardships that
Virginia:
"A long time has elapsed since a letter passed between us.
Without stopping to inquire who wrote last, I must indulge
myself in congratulating you on the late glorious success of
the Spanish arms in Biscay, and on the probable expulsion of
the French from the Peninsula. This event is pregnant with
the most important consequences. It would be impertinent
in me to dilate on them to a person of your political knowledge
and sagacity, but I cannot forbear naming one which touches
ourselves more immediately. It may dispose our wretched
ministry to a serious endeavor at peace; for it will certainly
shake in some degree their blind faith in the fortunes of Bonaparte.
From such men little good can be expected under any
circumstances; but, should they restore the blessings of peace
to the country, it may be the means of averting incalculable
mischief. . . .
"I suppose you are apprized of the deadly feud between M.
[Monroe] and Armstrong. The partisans of the former keep
no terms in speaking of the latter. There is no measure to
their obloquy, if a great deal of truth mixed with some falsehood
may pass by that name. It is however plain that the
cabinet dare not displace Armstrong. He is now gone on to
`organized victory' in Canada. What an admirable opportunity
for some Villiers to bring another Bayes on the stage.
`Thunder and Lightning by General D. R. W.' [David R.
Williams.]
"The transactions of the last Congress have certainly weakened
in a great degree the confidence of many well meaning
people in the administration. I have observed with great
pleasure the altered tone of the majority. The Hector is
entirely laid aside, and they are forced patiently to submit to
hear many galling sarcasms and yet more galling truths from
the minority who have asserted with a manly spirit their
parliamentary rights. The war is so detested hereabouts that
the under-spurleathers of the ministry are obliged to encourage
their followers with the hope of a speedy peace. Our men in
Norfolk are treated most barbarously. The commissariat and
French and Jews, of whom the trading population is composed,
practice the vilest extortion upon their defenders, who, poor
fellows! are compelled to sell their pay at 40% discount to
obtain necessaries. The whole country, watered by the
rivers, which fall into the Chesapeake, is in a state of paralysis.
We, in this quarter, are sending our wheat to Fayetteville on
Cape Fear River to exchange it for salt, for which we have to
pay at home 15 shillings a bushel, lawful money. In short, the
distress is general and heavy and I do not see how the people
can pay their taxes to both governments. When that operation
commences, the discontent, which has been so long
smothered by a large portion of the people, will break forth to
the consternation of their rulers, whom they will lay upon
the shelf with very little ceremony. It is only by obtaining
entire control over the press, South and West of Virginia, (as
well as in that State) and persuading the country that you and
I and some others were the cause of all their difficulties by
encouraging the British, that they have been able to support
themselves. But this delusion like every other must have an
end. They will however find less difficulty in getting up some
new imposture than in devising ways and means.
"You consider yourself in retirement within an hour's ride of
the metropolis of New England, whilst I am three days' tedious
journey over miserable roads to the only spot in the State
that deserves the name of a town [Richmond], and that
epithet will hardly apply to its present stagnant and deserted
condition. I am indeed hors du monde as well as hors du combat.
It is to be hoped that a very few weeks will restore you
to the society of your friends in Boston, whilst I have before me
a long and dreary winter interrupted only by the sordid cares
of a planter. The variety and vexatious character of these
interruptions can only be conceived by him who has been
subjected to them. They remind me of Cromwell when he
turned farmer at St. Ives; for, without vanity, I may compare
myself to what Oliver was then, and may with truth declare
that my `mind superior to the low occupations to which I am
condemned preys upon itself.' Sometimes I have thought of a
certain mémoire pour servir, etc.; sometimes of a `letter.'
month, and nothing is done. One of the blessings of this war is
that I can procure none but French paper to write upon and
am even glad to get that, wretched as it is."[11]
A letter from Randolph to Key, written about two weeks
after this letter, has its value as illustrating how, to recall
Chatham's famous simile, even the waters of the Rhone
and the Saône will mix at last, however reluctantly, when
they find themselves flowing side by side in the same direction;
or, to alter the comparison, how not unlike two mutually
hostile members of the animal kingdom, brought
together on the same islet of refuge by a rising flood, were
Randolph, the "Baron of Roanoke," as John Adams
called him,[12]
and Quincy, Lloyd, and Otis, his New England
antitheses, when drawn into sympathetic association
with each other by their common detestation of the War of
1812.
"Our postoffice establishment is under shameful mismanagement,"
Randolph said. "Today, I received a letter from
Boston, postmarked Aug. 22nd, and, last week, I got one from
the same place, marked Aug. 23rd. I still keep up an intercourse,
you see, with the headquarters of good principles—for,
although I do not dabble in politics, `I have more regard for
these Eastern people now than I used to have.' Of the policy
of driving the administration into war, I have the same opinion
that you quote from the Quarterly Review. It was a crooked
scheme, and has met its merited fate; but, my dear friend,
great allowance is to be made for men under the régime of
Clay, Grundy, and Co.; and besides a few individuals only are
answerable for the consequences of this tortuous policy. The
great bulk of the Eastern States are guiltless of the sin. When
I consider how much more these people have borne from the
pettifoggers of the West than they would submit to from Lord
North; and reflect that there is no common tie of interest or of
feeling between them and their upstart oppressors, I cannot
I should not like them less if they were so. I am becoming
selfish myself (when too late) and bitterly regret that I did
not practice upon this principle many years ago." (a) . . .
"My will but not poverty consents to my Eastern tour," the
letter continues, "our blessed rulers have nearly ruined me, and
should the war be protracted much longer I must go into some
business, if there be any for which I am fit. My body is
wholly worn out, and the intellectual part much shattered.
Were I to follow the dictates of prudence, I should convert my
estate into money and move northwardly. Whether I shall
have firmness and vigor enough to execute such a scheme
remains to be seen." "Of the print in question," Randolph
further says in this letter, "I think nearly as you do; but it has
done a deal of good with some mischief, and, perhaps, in the
attempt to do more. How was the last administration overthrown
do you suppose? By rejecting proffered service from
any quarter? Had the Aurora no agency think you in the
work? `Homo sum'; man must work with mortal means. Not
choosing to use such, I am idle. When Administration call to
their aid the refuse of New England in the persons of the—,
and opposition reject the aid [of], or stand aloof from, such
high-minded, honorable men as S—, K—, G—, Q—,
L—, O—, L—, P—, what can be expected but defeat?
It is as if, in the Southern states, the assistance of the whites
should be rejected against an adversary that embodied the
negroes on his side. Be assured that nothing can be done
with effect without union among the parts, however heterogeneous,
that compose the opposition. They have time
enough to differ among themselves after they shall have put
down the common foe; and, if they must quarrel, I would advise
them to adjourn the debate to that distant day."[13]
On Sept. 26, 1813, Randolph wrote to Key: "We have
today the account of Perry's success on Lake Erie which
will add another year to the life of the war."[14]
In a later letter to Key, Randolph's general disaffection
member.
"When you see Ridgely, present me most affectionately to
him and his truly excellent wife. I cannot be glad of his
defeat, since it seems that the complexion of your legislature
depended upon success there or in some county on the eastern
shore; but I am convinced that it is best for him and his; and I
am inclined to think no worse for the country. How can a
foolish spendthrift young man be prevented from ruining
himself? How can you appoint a guardian to a people bent
on self-destruction? The state of society is radically vicious.
It is there, if at all, that the remedy should be applied."[15]
Of a similar tenor was the letter written to Quincy on
the day succeeding the date of the one just given.
"The delay in your reply to my last letter is amply compensated
by the interesting views which you have given me of a
subject, in comparison with which all others of a public nature
dwindle into insignificance. As far as I can see, I perceive no
variance in our opinions. I am not a man to put reliance on
paper bulwarks when attacked by cannon and the bayonet.
The parchment in the Rolls office, I presume, has undergone no
erasures nor interpolations (to ante-date or post-date it was
unnecessary); but the Constitution is changed. It can never
get back to what it was. Old age can as soon resume the freshness
and agility of youth. Not, however, that it was ever in
my eyes that model of perfection which so many have pronounced
it to be. . . . I did not then [in his youth] comprehend
why I disliked the new system, but now I know that no
such system can be good. Governments made after that fashion
must have faults of their own, independent of such as
are incidental to the nature of the institution, and, perhaps,
inseparable from it. (Daniel Lambert measured, when
christened, for his wedding suit.) To fit us, they must grow
with our growth, and, whilst they stubbornly protect the
liberty of the subject against every attack, whether from the
one or the many, must possess the capacity to adapt themselves,
the state. I see nothing of this in our system. I perceive
only a bundle of theories (bottomed on an Utopian idea of
human excellence) and, in practice, a corruption the most
sordid and revolting. We are the first people that ever
acquired provinces, either by conquest or purchase (Mr.
Blackstone says they are the same), not for us to govern, but
that they might govern us,—that we might be ruled to our ruin
by people bound to us by no common tie of interest or sentiment.
But such, whatever may be the incredulity of posterity,
is the fact. Match it, if you can, in the savage laws of
Lycurgus, or the brutal castes of Hindostan.
"I will congratulate you on the accession of Austria to the
cause of the Allies, although I confess my hopes are not high.
Yet I look to the plains of Silesia and the Bohemian mountains
for my deliverance from the incubus that has been weighing
down my heart for many a long year. . . .
"I have a brother at Norfolk. In the regiment, to which he
is attached, three hundred and twenty-four are sick. The
hospital holds, by cramming, sixty. The poor creatures are
dying like sheep—ragged and without a blanket."[16]
Randolph's next letter to Quincy was written from
Richmond, where he had sought an escape from the
dreariness of midwinter at Roanoke. It shows that he had
awakened to the stimulus which the war was imparting to
the industrial energies of New England, and which was
the beginning of the radical diversity of economic interests
between the North and South that was to create so much
sectional controversy and animosity.
"Your valued letter," he wrote, "was forwarded to me, a
few days ago, at this place where I have been just a month.
But, the night before it arrived, talking over the state of
affairs with an old friend, we fell into the same train of thinking
with yourself on the consequences of the present war. Without
the same minute knowledge which you possess on the subject
of New England, we both inferred that the war would eventually
enormous bounty, upon your agriculture and manufactures;
and my friend undertook to predict that, by the time we
sickened of the contest, you would support it.
"It is rather more just than generous in you to triumph over
us; for be assured our sufferings are extreme. No State in the
Confederacy has paid so dearly for the war whistle as the
Ancient Dominion. Perhaps, you will say, none deserved to
pay more severely; but remember that our daughter, Kentucky,
has been selling her whiskey and meat and meal and horses,
and enjoying the chase of her favorite red game, whilst our only
source of supply has been a little stale patriotism; and even, in
that staple commodity, we are almost driven out of the
market by her and her sister States. 'Tis true we drive a little
trade in tobacco, which pays for about the hundredth part of
the dry goods which we import land-wise from the North. The
balance is made up in specie; so that our banks, once the
richest in the Union in that important article, are nearly
drained of their last dollar, and, so far from being able to lend
the State the amount of its quota of the direct tax, they are
importuning payment of former advances to the sum of nearly
four hundred thousand dollars, when our treasury has not an
unappropriated cent. Do you wonder at this, when I state it
as a fact that the straw of a crop of wheat, near market, is
worth more than the grain! and that flour, so far from being
reckoned a luxury, as with you, is purchased by some planters
as a cheaper food for their horses and oxen than oats or Indian
corn; these last bearing a good price for the consumption of our
towns. This relief, however, extends only a few miles around
Richmond, Norfolk, and Petersburg.
"It appears to me that, if England can (as she must, if the
war continues) succeed in driving the American navigation off
the ocean, and destroying the nursery of our seamen (the
fishery and coasting-trade), it will not be a bad exchange for
Canada, supposing her to lose it. We have been, from the
breaking out of the war of the French Revolution to the date
of the Embargo (December, 1807), her most formidable commercial
rival. Your ships, which once `vexed every sea,'
under-freighting even the penurious Hollander, are, I believe,
think, are threescore and ten to them. The seamen who
have left their European masters for our service will sail under
the Russian or some other neutral flag. In short, I can see no
motive in an able English Administration for making peace
with us. My only trust is in their folly—for, thank God, their
Castlereaghs and Princes Regent are at least as low in the
scale of intellectual beings as our Monroes and Presidents.
"I concur with you most cordially on the subject of this most
detestable and unnatural war—not to be matched except by
the war of Lord North's government against our liberties;
and even that was waged on motives less base than those
which prompted the present accursed contest. That was a
question concerning which honest men might differ. Not so
this. Mark me, I speak of persons having access to correct
information. On this subject I am glad to find one righteous
man on our side. I mean Frank Key, who says: `The people
of Montreal will enjoy their firesides for this, and I trust for
many a, winter. This I suppose is treason, but, as your Patrick
Henry said, `If it be treason, I glory in the name of traitor.!
I have never thought of those poor creatures without being
reconciled to any disgrace or defeat of our arms!"
"As to the war in Europe, I have sad forebodings, notwithstanding
some of my friends, men of much better information
than myself, and especially on European affairs, are quite
sanguine. Well may the tyrant rely upon his fortune. The
ball that destroyed Moreau did him better service than his
whole train of artillery besides. I consider that a victory
would have been dearly purchased by the Allies at the price
of his loss. I seem already to feel `the wind of that blow which
is to prostrate Europe at the feet of the modern Genghiz.'
"By this time you are quietly fixed in your town residence,
and I have no doubt return to the opes et fumum strepitumque
Romae with as much pleasure as you bade them adieu in the
spring for your paternal shades. You are not now procul
negotiis, but you have every other requisite which the poet
deems indispensable to happiness; and even that is always
within your reach. A ride of eight miles buries you in the
solitudes of Quincy, whilst I have a weary journey of more
when there, I am shut out from all intercourse with the rest
of the world, except through the tedious process of letter-writing."[17]
A letter from Randolph to Key, dated four days later
than this letter, was in reply to one from Key, in which
the latter agreed with Randolph that the general state of
society was radically vicious and that it was there that
the remedy was to be applied, and added these words; so
true to the benevolent and righteous nature which caused
Randolph to speak of Key in his Diary as Benevolus:
"Put down party spirit; stop the corruption of party elections;
legislate not for the next election, but for the next
century; build Lancaster schools in every hundred and repair
our ruined churches; let every country gentleman of worth
become a justice of the peace, and show his neighbors what a
blessing a benevolent religious man is; and let the retired
patriot, who can do nothing else, give his country his prayers,
and often in his meditations `think on her who thinks not
for herself'—`egregia virtus paucorum,' etc., I often think of
your apt quotation."[18]
In his reply, after some requests of Key in regard to his
copy of Stephen's War in Disguise and his favorite fowling-piece,
which he had left behind him at the national Capital,
Randolph said:
"You see what great objects fill my mind when the day `is
big with the fate' of the whole race of man. For my part, my
fears of the power and arts of France almost overpower the
exercise of my judgment. I can see no cause why the world
should not be punished now as in the days of Cæsar or Nebuchadnezzar;
nor why Bonaparte may not be as good an
instrument as either of those tyrants. Endeavoring to turn
away my mind from such contemplations, I try to submit myself
to him whose chastisement is love.
"`Put down Party spirit!' Put a little fresh salt on the
sparrow's tail, and you will infallibly catch him. You will put
down party spirit when you put down whisky-drinking, and
that will be when the Greek calends come. I agree with you
perfectly on the subject of the poor, unoffending Canadians.
To us they are innocent; and, in the eye of Heaven, we must
appear like so many descendants of Cain, seeking to imbrue
our hands in our brothers' blood! Suppose England to lose
Canada, she gets in exchange for it our whole navigation. We
were her great and only commercial rival. We possessed a
tonnage, six years ago, greater than that of Great Britain, at
the accession of the present king. Greater than any other
nation, except our present state, ever owned. Our ships are
short-lived, our seamen must have employment; all the foreign
seamen, and many of the native, will seek the Russian, or some
other neutral, service. We may establish manufactures; but
what of that? Those of England want no vent here. Moreover,
she well knows that, although peace may be restored, it
will be a peace of double duties and restrictions, a `war in disguise.'
In short, I can see no motive in a wise English administration
for putting an end to the war. My only trust is
in their folly. Lord Castlereagh is not much better than
his countryman, with the last syllable of his name, whom you
met in the street.
"Peace or war, the ruin of this country is inevitable; we
cannot have manufactures on a great scale. Already our
specie is drawn off to pay for domestic manufactures from the
middle and eastern States. All the loans, &c. are spent in
New York; and, whilst she and Pennsylvania and New England
are thriving in the most wonderful manner, with us the
straw (near market) of a crop of wheat is worth more than the
grain; and we are feeding our horses and oxen with superfine
flour, although the crop of Indian corn is superabundant; the
flour being the cheaper of the two.
"I heard of our friend, Sterrett Ridgely, by a gentleman who
saw him at the races. I cannot regret that he is not compelled
to mingle in the throng at Annapolis. Sallust, in that quotation
of mine, to which you so frequently refer, speaking of the
exploits of the Roman people (surpassed by the Greeks in
declares it to be his opinion, after long and attentive study and
observation, that `egregiam virtutem paucorum civium cuncta
patravisse.' He goes on to add (I wish I had the book before
me), `Sed postquam luxu atque desidia civitas corrupta est, rursus
Respublica magnitudine sua vitia sustentabat.' In like manner,
we have seen modern France, by the very force of magnitude
and number, support the unutterable vices of her rulers, and
bear down all before her. As we cannot be saved by the
extraordinary virtue of a few, so neither can we rely upon the
height of our power to sustain the incapacity and corruption of
our rulers and of the great mass of our people.
"As to Lancaster schools, I am for the thing, the substance but
not the name. It is stolen by a fellow whom I detest. I hope
you have abolished his cruel and stupid punishments in your
Georgetown Institution. An article in the Quarterly Review
(I think No. XI) satisfied me that Lancaster was an impostor
and a hard-hearted wretch. There is a late review on `National
Education' (in No. XV. I believe) which pleased me very
much."[19]
As the war went on, Randolph's aversion to it became
almost rabid; as witness the following letter which he
wrote to Quincy from Richmond:
"On the subject of the war, I believe there is not a man in
the United States who agrees more entirely with you than
myself. As the mathematicians say, our opinions coincide.
The late news from Leipsic has put the despondent Federalists
here on the house-tops; and, in another week (perhaps), they
will be in the cellar again. For my part, I every day see less
and less cause to hope for a restoration of the blessings we
once enjoyed; and this opinion is founded at least as much
upon the character of the party in opposition as upon that of
those who administer, and their adherents who support or suffer,
the Government. The dictatorship (as by law established)
has not created half the sensation here as did the fall of sugar
from thirty-five to twenty dollars per hundred-weight; or the
London. All heads here are agog for peace, and, if Messrs. M.
and M. give it to us, we shall `ask no questions' on the subject
of the treasure, blood, and honor lost in this unnatural and
hellish contest.
"My dear sir, with all our sins, it must be allowed that we
superabound in the first of Christian and of moral virtues,
charity. We are so full of the ass's milk of human kindness,
that we shall soon learn to speak of Judas Iscariot as an
unfortunate man. Such is the language which our candor
prompts us to apply to Bidwell, Wilkinson, etc., etc.; and
Federalists, ay, good Federalists too, do not hesitate to say of
our precious rulers that Mr. M. is now seriously disposed for
peace with England! Yet, if perforce they are driven to a
cessation of active operations, they will have an armed truce,—
a peace of restrictive measures,—`a peace like a war.'
"The Continental System is to supply the place of arms, as
passion, according to the crown lawyers, sometimes does in
case of treason."[20]
It is amusing to find Randolph in his next letter to
Quincy so far in harmony with his own new Federalist
views as to be able to rejoice that Harrison Gray Otis,
once a stern stickler for national authority, had become a
convert to the dogma of State sovereignty.
"I have seen Mr. Otis' motion, and I assure you that no
occurrence since the war has made so deep an impression upon
me. It has had the like effect upon all seriously-thinking
people with whom I have conversed. What a game of roundabout
has been played since I was initiated into the mysteries
of politics! I recollect the time when with Mr. Otis State-Rights
were as nothing in comparison with the proud
prerogative of the Federal government. Then, Virginia was
building an armory to enable her to resist Federal usurpation.
You will not infer that I attach the least blame to Mr. Otis; far
from it. I rejoice, on the contrary, to see him enlisted on the
side of the liberty of the subject and the rights of the States. Pray
always my opinion that Union was the means of securing the
safety, liberty, and welfare of the confederacy, and not in itself
an end to which these should be sacrificed. But the question
of resistance to any established government is always a question
of expediency; and the resort ought never to be had to this
last appeal, except in cases where there is reasonable prospect
of success, and where the grievance does not admit of palliative
or temporizing remedies. The one is a case to be decided
by argument, the other by feeling. Verily, Mr. M.'s little
finger is thicker than the loins of Lord North."[21]
Randolph's next letter to Quincy is a brief one:
"Certain reports here, to which you cannot be a stranger,
have caused much speculation and some uneasiness here.
Pray give me a little light respecting the serious intentions of
the Opposition in Massachusetts. Rash counsels are not
always, if ever, wise. I trust we shall hold together, and live
to reap the fruits of the late glorious events in Europe, on
which I cordially congratulate you."[22]
The caution is repeated in another letter to Quincy:
"Many thanks to you, my dear sir, for your information.
It is highly interesting. I shall make no comment upon it,
except to express a hope that Opposition with you will furnish
its enemies with no handle against them. They will be delighted
with some tub for the popular whale against the next
election. I am informed that Government has no other hope
of pecuniary supply except from Boston; and that they confidently
rely upon twenty per cent discount countervailing
the patriotism of your moneyed men.
"I have just learned that Carlisle College is broken up by a
conscription of Messrs. Binns, Duane, and Snyder. I believe
this is the triumvirate by which Pennsylvania is governed.
What intelligence for a parent, who fondly believes that his son
is prosecuting his studies under some reverend divine, to hear
machine of murder,' destitute perhaps of the necessaries of life.
Thank Heaven my son is under the protection of Governor
Strong and the Legislature of Old Massachusetts Bay. Why
did you leave out that word Bay in your style and title? I like
it. It was there in 1775. . . .
"Tobacco has sold here as high as $13.10 per hundred-weight.
This gives some relief to the planter; but, on the whole, we are
vexed and oppressed in every shape that the two governments
can devise."[23]
This is, we believe, the last letter that Randolph wrote
to Quincy except two very vivid ones which we shall
recall later in another connection, but which we pass over
now because they have no political interest.
A thrust at Napoleon in a letter from Randolph to Key,
is good enough for repetition:
"We are all in a bustle here with the news from Europe," he
said. "For my part, I hope that Blunderbuss Castlereagh
may succeed in preventing a peace `which shall confirm to the
French Empire an extent of territory France under her kings
never knew.' If they permit him to retain the Low Countries
and Piedmont, they will act like the sapient commissioner
appointed to examine the vaults of the Parliament House, on
the alarm of the Gunpowder-Plot, who reported `that he had
discovered seventy-five barrels of gunpowder concealed under
fagots; that he had caused fifty to be removed, and hoped the
other twenty-five would do no harm.' "[24]
This reminds us of the story told by Randolph on another
occasion of a man who said that he would let his gun off
by degrees.[25]
Some other interesting observations on
Napoleon are contained in a letter from him to Dr. Brockenbrough,
written some five months later.
"As to peace, I have not a doubt that we shall have it forthwith.
Our folks are prepared to say that the pacification of
Europe has swept away the matters in contestation, as M—,
the Secretary of State, has it. All that we see in the Government
prints is to reconcile us the better to the terms which
they must receive from the enemy. From the time of his flight
from Egypt, my opinion of the character of Bonaparte has
never changed, except for the worse. I have considered him
from that date a coward, and ascribed his success to the deity
he worships, Fortune. His insolence and rashness have met
their just reward. Had he found an efficient government in
France, on his abandonment of his brave companions in arms
in Egypt, and returned to Paris, he would have been cashiered
for ruining the best appointed armament that ever left an
European port. But all was confusion and anarchy at Paris,
and, instead of a coup de fusil, he was rewarded with a sceptre.
He succeeded in throwing the blame of Aboukir on poor
Brueys. He could safely talk of `his orders to the Admiral,'
after L'Orient had blown up. His Russian and German
campaign is another such commentary on his character; it is all
of a piece.
"If the allies adhere to their treaty of Chaumont, the peace
of Europe will be preserved; but in France, I think, the seeds
of disorder must abound. Instead of the triple aristocracy of
the Noblesse, the Church, and the Parliaments, I see nothing
but janissaries and a divan of ruffians—Algiers on a great scale.
Moral causes I see none; and I am well persuaded that these
are not created in a day. Matters of inveterate opinion, when
once rooted up, are dead, never to revive; other opinions must
succeed them. But I am prosing—uttering a string of
common-places that every one can write, and no one can deny.
But you brought it on yourself. You expected that I would
say something, and I resolved to try. I can bear witness to
the fact of Mrs. Brockenbrough's prediction respecting Bonaparte's
retirement."[26]
Shortly after this letter was written, the greatest flood
in the Staunton River, that had been known for twenty
Roanoke.
"My whole crop (tobacco and corn)," he said in a letter to
Key, "is destroyed by a fresh, the greatest that has been
known within twenty years. I fear a famine next summer; for
this country, if we had the means of buying, is out of the way of
a supply, except by distant land-carriage, and the harvests of
Rappahannock &c. cannot be brought up to Richmond by
water. The poor slaves, I fear, will suffer dreadfully."[27]
The next day, he wrote to Dr. Brockenbrough:
"I try to forget myself or to obtain some relief from my own
thoughts by pouring them out on one who has heretofore lent
me perhaps too partial an ear. I have lived to feel that there
are `many things worse than poverty or death'; those bugbears
that terrify the great children of the world, and sometimes
drive them to eternal ruin. It requires, however, firmer nerves
than mine to contemplate, without shrinking, even in prospect,
the calamities which await this unhappy district of country—
famine and all its concomitant horrors of disease and misery.
To add to the picture, a late requisition of militia for Norfolk
carries dismay and grief into the bosoms of many families in
this country; and, to have a just conception of the scene, it is
necessary to be on the spot. This is our court day, when the
conscripts are to report themselves, and I purposely abstain
from the sight of wretchedness that I cannot relieve."[28]
The call for the conscripts was due to the rapine and
destruction inflicted in the summer of 1814 upon riparian
towns in Virginia and Maryland, like Hampton and Havre
de Grace, by landing-parties from the fleet of the British
Admiral, Cochrane. Later, a considerable military force
debarked from this fleet on the Patuxent River, pushed
across Southern Maryland towards Washington, and, after
encountering a feeble resistance at Bladensburg, entered
public buildings. The invasion of Virginia and Maryland
was too much even for such an opponent of the war as
Randolph, and, as soon as he heard of the sack of Washington,
he hastened to Richmond, and tendered his services
to the Governor.[29] As he had never had any military experience,
his mind might well, under such novel conditions,
have reverted to the speech which he had made a short
time previously in the House when he had said derisively:
"France with an army of a million of men with Bonaparte,
Massena and other famous generals having failed
in this enterprise [that of conquering the liberty of the sea],
some of our famous Colonels are determined to succeed."[30]
Randolph, however, was given an assignment as a vidette
and duly took to the field. On Sept. 2, 1814, he wrote to
Theodore Dudley from Camp Fairfield, Virginia, as follows:
"My Dear Theodore: You may be surprised at not hearing
from me. But, first, I lost my horses; secondly, I got a violent
bilious complaint, not cholera but cousin-german to it; thirdly,
I heard the news of Washington, and, without delay, proceeded
hither. I am now under orders to proceed to the brick house
forty-two miles on York road just below the confluence of
Pamunkey and Mattapony. Should you come down, report
yourself to the surgeon-general, Dr. Jones, of Nottoway. But
first come to camp and see Watkins Leigh, the governor's aid."[31]
But Randolph was soon released from his military obligations.
Finding that the plan of the enemy was to assail
Baltimore rather than harass Virginia further, he returned
to Richmond, and wrote from that city to Key in these
words:
"I have been here ten days, including four spent in reconnoitering
the lower country between York and James River,
mouth of Chickahominy. You will readily conceive my
anxiety on the subject of my friends at Blenheim, the Woodyard,
and Alexandria. Thank God! Georgetown is safe.
I was in terror for you and yours. Pray, let me hear from
you. Tell me something of Sterrett Ridgely, and remember
me to him and all who care to remember me. I have witnessed
a sad spectacle in my late ride; but I do not wish to depress
your spirits. Dudley is at home with St. George. Poor
Tudor is ill, very ill, at Mr. Morris' near New York."[32]
Mr. Morris was the celebrated Gouverneur Morris, of
New York, the rédacteur of the Federal Constitution, and
former Minister to France and member of the United
States Senate, who, after a long career of gallantry, so
audacious that he even notes in his journal, on one occasion,
that he had observed "good dispositions" in Dolly
Madison, the wife of James Madison,[33]
had first made
Nancy Randolph his house-keeper and then his wife.
After writing to Key on Sept. 8, Randolph remained in
Richmond until Oct. 6, 1814.[34]
On that day, he received
additional intelligence about Tudor's condition, and immediately
set out for Morrisania, where Judith Randolph
had preceded him, by way of Hooe's Ferry on the Potomac,
one of the stage routes of that time.[35]
On Oct. 13,
he wrote to Theodore Dudley from Baltimore, where he
was detained four days by the effects of the fall which he
mentions in his letter:
"I have been detained here since Monday by the consequences
of an accident that befell me at Port Conway (opposite
Port Royal) on Monday morning. At three o'clock, I was
roused to set out in the stage. Mistaking in the dark a very
steep staircase for a passage, at the end of which I expected to
find the descent, walking boldly on, I fell from the top to the
elbow were severely hurt; also the right ankle. My hat saved
my head; which was bruised but not cut. Nevertheless, I
persevered, got to Georgetown, and the next day came to this
place, where I have been compelled to remain in great pain."[36]
On Oct. 23, Randolph wrote to Theodore Dudley from
Morrisania: "After various accidents, one of which had
nearly put an end to my unprosperous life, and confined
me nearly a week on the road, I reached this place yesterday.
Tudor is better; I have hopes of him, if we can get
him to Virginia in his present plight."[37]
On the same day
that this note was written, Randolph left Morrisania for
New York, where he was involved in another grave accident,
which kept him in that City until Nov. 27.[38]
Writing
to Theodore Dudley from New York on Nov. 17th, he
says:
"On returning from Morrisania on Sunday, the 24th of
October, the driver overturned me in Courtlandt Street by
driving over a pile of stones, etc., before a new house,
unfinished, which nuisance extended more than halfway across
a narrow street. I am very seriously injured. The patella is,
in itself, unhurt; but the ligaments are very much wrenched, so
that a tight bandage alone enables me to hobble from one room
to another with the help of a stick. I hope to be able to bear
the motion of a carriage by the last of this week. I shall then
go to Philadelphia, and hope to see you by the first of next
month; assuredly (God willing) before Christmas. I am a
poor, miserable cripple, and you are my only support."[39]
While suffering from his bruises in New York, Randolph
wrote a savagely criminatory letter to Mrs. Morris, which
she met with recrimination equally savage. These two
letters will be laid before the reader in a later chapter.
On Nov. 27th, Randolph left New York[40]
for Philadelphia.
Here he remained until Jan. 18, 1815, in the
enjoyment of social gratifications, to which we shall hereafter
have occasion briefly to revert. On Feb. 15th, he
was again at Roanoke, after leisurely halts on his homeward
journey at various wayside points.[41]
While at Philadelphia, heeding the suggestion that his
counsels might do something to check the disposition of
Federalist extremists in New England to commit New England
to a position of neutrality during the war, or worse,
he addressed a letter to James Lloyd, one of the members
of the United States Senate from Massachusetts, which he
hoped might help to produce that effect. It can still be
read with pleasure; for there is a charm of diction, if
nothing else, that keeps almost everything that Randolph
ever wrote perennially fresh, however marred by his prejudices
or intellectual or temperamental deficiencies.
(See Appendix, p. 1.)
| CHAPTER VIII John Randolph of Roanoke, 1773-1833 | |