Hence, in condemning
General Jackson, Mr. Clay was again in opposition to the
administration; and the General of course concluded, that the Speaker
designed, in ruining him, merely to further his own political schemes.
How he boiled with fury against Mr. Clay, his published letters
amusingly attest. "The hypocrisy and baseness of Clay," wrote the
General, "in pretending friendship to me, and endeavoring to crush the
Executive through me, makes me despise the villain."
Jackson, as we all know, was triumphantly sustained by the House. In
fact, Mr. Clay's speech was totally unworthy of the occasion. Instead
of argument and fact, he gave the House and the galleries beautiful
declamation. The evidence was before him; he had it in his hands; but,
instead of getting up his case with patient assiduity, and exhibiting
the damning proofs of Jackson's misconduct, he merely glanced over the
mass of papers, fell into some enormous blunders, passed over some
most material points, and then endeavored to supply all deficiencies
by an imposing eloquence. He even acknowledges that he had not
examined the testimony.
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