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now undertake to pronounce. The banks have lost all shame, and exemplify a beautiful and very just observation of one of the finest writers, that men banded together in a common cause, will collectively do that at which every individual of the combination would spurn. This observation has been applied to the enormities committed and connived at by the British East India Company; and will equally appply to the modern system of banking, and still more to the spirit. of party.

As to establishing this bank to prevent a variation in the rate of exchange of bank paper, you might as well expect it to prevent the variations of the wind; you might as well pass an act of Congress (for which, if it would be of any good, I should certainly vote) to prevent the northwest wind from blowing in our teeth as we go from the House to our lodgings.

"But, sir, I will conclude by pledging myself to agree to any adequate means to cure the great evil, that are consistent with the administration of the government, in such a manner as to conduce to the happiness of the people and the reformation of the public morals."

Mr. Randolph combated the bill in all its stages, moved amendments with a view of abridging and restraining the powers of the corporation, and, finally, on the 5th of April, 1816, when the bill was sent back from the Senate with sundry amendments for the concurrence of the House, he moved, for the purpose of destroying the bill, that the whole subject be indefinitely postponed; and supported his motion by adverting to the small number of members present, and the impropriety of passing, by a screwed up, strained, and costive majority, so important a measure, at the end of a session, when the members were worn down and exhausted by a daily and long attention to business; a measure which, in time of war, and of great public emergency, could not be forced through the House; a measure so deeply involving the future welfare, and which was to give a color and character to the future destiny of this country; a measure which, if it and another (the tariff) should pass into laws, the present session would be looked back to as the most disastrous since the commencement of the republic; and which, much as he deprecated war, he would prefer war itself to either of them. Mr. Randolph then proceeded to argue against the bill as unconstitutional, inexpedient, and dangerous. His constitutional objections, he said, were borne out by the decision of Congress in refusing to renew the charter of the old bank, which decision was grounded on the want of constitu

tional power. He adverted, also, in support of his opinion, to the instructions from the legislatures of Virginia and Kentucky to their senators to vote against the old bank; which instructions were given on the ground of that institution being unconstitutional. "I declare to you, sir," said Mr. Randolph, "that I am the holder of no stock whatever, except live stock, and had determined never to own any -but, if this bill passes, I will not only be a stockholder to the utmost of my power, but will advise every man, over whom I have any influence, to do the same, because it is the creation of a great privileged order of the most hateful kind to my feelings, and because I would rather be the master than the slave. If I must have a master, let him be one with epaulettes-something that I can fear and respect, something that I can look up to—but not a master with a quill behind his ear."

After finally passing through both Houses, the bank bill was presented to Mr. Madison; he signed it, and it became a law. Mr. Madison, it is well known, was hitherto opposed to the incorporation of a National Bank on constitutional grounds. His Report in 1799– 1800, to the Virginia legislature on the general powers of the Federal Government, is conclusive and unanswerable on that subject. But on the present occasion he waived the question of the constitutional authority of the legislature to establish an incorporated bank, as being precluded, in his judgment, by repeated recognitions, under varied circumstances, of the validity of such an institution in acts of the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of the government, accompanied by indications, in different modes, of a concurrence of the general will of the nation.

Mr. Clay and his compeers surrendered the Constitution on the plea of necessity-the force of circumstances-Mr. Madison on the score of precedent-repeated recognitions of the validity of such an institution! Well might the patriot weep over this last, fatal act of a great and a good man! Well might he bemoan the imbecility of human nature, when he beheld the same hand that constructed the immortal argument by which the Constitution is made to rest on its true and lasting basis, in old age destroy the glorious work of its meridian power.

Randolph did not scruple to charge this act to the weakness of

old age. Some years after this event, and when the bank was in full career, fulfilling all his predictions, hear what he says:

"I am sorry to say, because I should be the last man in the world to disturb the repose of a venerable man, to whom I wish a quiet end of his honorable life, that all the difficulties under which we have labored, and now labor, on this subject (Tariff and Internal Improvement by the General Government), have grown out of a fatal admission, by one of the late Presidents of the United States, an admission which runs counter to the tenor of his whole political life, and is expressly contradicted by one of the most luminous and able state pa pers that ever was written, the offspring of his pen-an admission which gave a sanction to the principle, that this government had the power to charter the present colossal Bank of the United States. Sir," said Mr. Randolph, "that act, and one other, which I will not name, bring forcibly home to my mind a train of melancholy reflections on the miserable state of our mortal being.

'In life's last scenes, what prodigies arise!

Fears of the brave and follies of the wise.

From Marlborough's eyes the streams of dotage flow;
And Swift expires a driv❜ler and a show.'

"Such is the state of the case, sir. It is miserable to think of it -and we have nothing left to us but to weep over it."

And again, on the same occasion, in 1824

"But the gentleman from New-York, and some others who have spoken on this occasion, say, What! shall we be startled by a shadow? Shall we recoil from taking a power clearly within (what?) our reach? Shall we not clutch the sceptre-the air-drawn sceptre that invites our hand, because of the fears and alarms of the gentleman from Virginia?

For

"Sir, if I cannot give reason to the committee, they shall at least have authority. Thomas Jefferson, then in the vigor of his intellect, was one of the persons who denied the existence of such powersJames Madison was another. He, in that masterly and unrivalled report in the legislature of Virginia, which is worthy to be the textbook of every American statesman, has settled this question. me to attempt to add any thing to the arguments of that paper, would be to attempt to gild refined gold-to paint the lily-to throw a perfume on the violet-to smooth the ice-or add another hue unto the rainbow-in every aspect of it, wasteful and ridiculous excess. Neither will I hold up my farthing rush-light to the blaze of that meridian sun. But, sir, I cannot but deplore-my heart aches when I think of it-that the hand which erected that monument of political wisdom, should have signed the act to incorporate the present Bank of the United States."

CHAPTER VII.

HOME SOLITUDE.

MR. RANDOLPH was not less strenuous in his opposition to the "revenue bill," or tariff measure, of this eventful session; but we pass that, for the present, until it comes up again in a more aggravated form. Death, it seems, had made his friends the chosen mark for his fatal weapons. Mrs. Judith Randolph died in March, at the house of her friend-a great and a good man-Dr. John H. Rice, of Richmond. She doubtless died of a broken heart. Bereft of every comfort, life had no charms for her, and she sought death as a blessing. Her friends and Mr. Randolph's friends followed her mortal remains in sad procession to Tuckahoe--the family seat of her ancestors-some miles above Richmond, on James River, where they rest in peace beneath the shadow of those venerable oaks that witnessed the sweet gambols of her joyous and innocent childhood.

No sooner was this sad bereavement communicated to Mr. Randolph, than he was called to the bedside of a dying friend--an old and tried friend-a companion who had stood by him through evil as well as good report, as he fought like a bold champion for the Constitution and the rights of the people. "Yesterday (April 11th) we buried poor Stanford. I staid by his bedside the night before he died. Jupiter was worn down by nursing him, and is still feeling the effects of it. He returned home on Sunday morning, and has been sick ever since. My own health is not much better, and my spirits worse. Poor Stanford! he is not the least regretted of those who have been taken from me within the past year."

In addition to his present family--Dr. Dudley and young ClayMr. Randolph took upon himself the charge and the responsibility of two other orphan boys. "I have just returned from Baltimore, where I went to meet the sons of my deceased friend Bryan, consigned to my care. They are fine boys, but have been much neglected. I propose to place them at Prince Edward College, under the care of Dr. Hogue, after they shall have undergone some preparatory tuition at Mr. Lacy's school."

These acts speak for themselves. By these, and such as these, that crowd his whole life, let him be judged. Here is one the world have agreed to condemn as a misanthrope-a hater of his fellow-man. It is certain he did not seek to be known of men. Few could understand ("My mother-she understood me!"), few could appreciate him.

While apparently absorbed in the business of legislation, the great question was still uppermost in his thoughts. Before leaving Washington for his solitary home, he sought an interview with his trusty friend, "Frank Key," and rode over to Georgetown (May 7th, 1816,) for that purpose. But failing to meet with him, he went into Semmes's Hotel, and wrote him the following letter:

"Hearing, at Davis's, yesterday, that you were seen in Georgetown the evening before, I came here in the expectation of the pleasure of seeing you; but my intelligence proved to be like the greater part that happens under that name in this poor, foolish world of ours. I had also another motive. 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.

I

"Your absence from home is a sore disappointment to me. wanted to have talked with you, unreservedly, on subjects of the highest interest. I wanted your advice as a friend, on the course of my future life. Hitherto it has been almost without plan or systemthe sport of what we call chance.

"About a year ago, I got a scheme into my head, which I have more than once hinted to you; but I fear my capacity to carry it into execution.

"There is, however, another cause of uneasiness, about which I could have wished to confer freely with you. It has cost me many a pang, within a few months past especially. In the most important of human concerns I have made no advancement; on the contrary (as is always the case when we do not advance), I have fallen back. My mind is filled with misgivings and doubts and perplexities that leave me no repose. Of the necessity for forgiveness I have the strongest conviction; but I cannot receive any assurance that it has been accorded to me. In short, I am in the worst conceivable situ

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