I can get it

In eighteen fifty, the United States faced the threat of a split between northern and southern states. The two sides disagreed strongly over the issue of slavery. At that time, owning slaves was legal in the southern states. But the question remained: should slavery be legal in new territories in the western part of the country?

The issue needed to be settled. There was a danger of civil war between the North and the South. Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky offered a compromise. Conservative southern lawmakers rejected it. Other lawmakers supported it; they believed it was the only way to save the union of states.

One of the nation's top political leaders, Senator Daniel Webster of Massachusetts, supported Henry Clay's compromise. Webster believed that slavery was evil. Yet he believed that national unity was more important. He did not want the nation to divide. He did not want to see the end of the United States of America.

Daniel Webster spoke to other members of the Senate. His speech was an appeal to both sides in the dispute.

"I speak today," he said, "to save the Union. I speak today out of a concerned and troubled heart. I speak for the return of a spirit of unity. I speak for the return of that general feeling of agreement which makes the blessings of this union so special to us all."

Senator Webster spoke of how he hated slavery. He spoke of his fight against the spread of slavery in America. But he disagreed with those who wanted laws making slavery illegal in new territories. It would not be wise to pass such laws, he said. They would only make the South angry. They would only push the South away from the Union.

Then Webster spoke about the things the North and South had done to make each other angry.

One, he said, was the failure of the North to return runaway slaves. He said the South had good reason to protest. It was a matter of law. The law was contained in article four of the national constitution.

"Every member of every northern legislature," Webster said, "has sworn to support the constitution of the United States. And the constitution says that states must return runaway slaves to their owners. This part of the constitution has as much power as any other part. It must be obeyed."

Next, Webster spoke about the Abolition societies. These were organizations that demanded an end to slavery everywhere in the country.

"I do not think that Abolition societies are useful," Webster said. "At the same time, I believe that thousands of their members are honest and good citizens who feel they must do something for liberty. However, their interference with the South has produced trouble."

As an example, Webster spoke about the state of Virginia. Slavery was legal there. Webster noted that public opinion in Virginia had been turning against slavery until Abolitionists angered the people. After that, he said, no one would talk openly against slavery. He said Abolitionists were not ending slavery, but helping it to continue.

Then Webster said the North also had a right to protest about some things the South had done.

He said the South was wrong to try to take slaves into new American territories. He said attempts to do this violated earlier agreements to limit slavery to areas where it already existed.

Webster said the North also had a right to protest statements by southern leaders about working conditions in the North. Southerners often said that slaves in the South lived better lives than free workers in the North.

Webster appealed to both sides to forgive each other. He urged them to come to an agreement. He said the South could never leave the Union without violence.

Webster said the two sides were joined together socially, economically, culturally, and in many other ways. There was no way to divide them. No Congress, he said, could establish a border between the North and South that either side would accept.

In general, Webster's speech to the Senate was moderate. He wanted to appeal to reason, not emotion. Yet it was difficult for him to be unemotional. His voice rose as he finished.

"Secession!" He called out. "Peaceable secession! Your eyes and mine will never see that happen. There can be no such thing as peaceable secession. We live under a great constitution. Is it to be melted away by secession, as the snows of a mountain are melted away under the sun?

"Let us not speak of the possibility of secession. Let us not debate an idea so full of horror. Let us not live with the thought of such darkness. Instead, let us come out into the light of day. Let us enjoy the fresh air of liberty and union."

Northern Abolitionists quickly criticized Daniel Webster's speech. They called him a traitor. Yet most people of the North accepted Webster's appeal for compromise. His speech cooled the debate that threatened a complete break between the North and South.

The dispute about slavery continued in the United States. It would, in time, lead to civil war. But historians say Webster's support for the compromise of eighteen fifty probably helped delay that crisis.

Daniel Webster's speech was not the end of debate on the compromise. Four days later, Senator William Seward of New York rose to speak.

Seward said he opposed any compromise with the South. He said he did not want slavery in the new western territories. And he urged a national policy to start ending slavery everywhere -- peacefully.

Seward criticized Daniel Webster for speaking against the Abolition societies. He said such groups represented a moral movement that could not be stopped. He said the movement would continue until all the slaves in America were free.

Seward then criticized another senator, John C. Calhoun of South Carolina. He denounced Calhoun's demands for a political balance between the North and South. He said this would change the United States from a united, national democracy to an alliance of independent states. In such a system, he said, the minority would be able to veto actions of the majority.

Many lawmakers seemed to support the idea of Clay's compromise. But they could not agree on which parts of it to pass first. Southern supporters were afraid that if a statehood bill for California was passed first, then northerners would refuse to pass the other parts of the compromise. So, southerners wanted to include all parts in one bill.

Hopes for the compromise increased after the death of John C. Calhoun on the last day of March, eighteen-fifty. Calhoun was pro-slavery. He had refused to compromise on the issue. One newspaper in Calhoun's state of South Carolina said: "The senator's death is best for the country and his own honor. The slavery question will now be settled. Calhoun would have blocked a settlement."

A committee of thirteen men was named to write a bill based on Henry Clay's compromise. The committee had six members from slave states and six from free states. Henry Clay was named to lead it.

Three weeks later, the committee offered its bill. It was much like the compromise Clay had first proposed. It made California a free state. It created territorial governments for New Mexico and Utah. It settled the border dispute between Texas and New Mexico. It ended the slave trade in the District of Columbia. And it urged approval of a new law dealing with runaway slaves.

For about a month, the proposed bill seemed to have the support of the administration of President Zachary Taylor. But then, President Taylor made it clear that he would do everything he could to defeat it.

During the first half of the nineteenth century, leaders of the United States could find no answer to the question of slavery. The dispute grew more threatening after the war with Mexico in eighteen forty-nine.

Northern states refused to permit slavery in the new territories of California and New Mexico. Southern states declared that they had a constitutional right to bring slaves into the new lands. The South was ready to secede -- leave and break up the Union of states.

Then, in eighteen fifty, Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky offered a compromise to avoid secession, and a likely war between the North and the South. He said the Union was permanent and created for all future Americans. He attacked the South's claim that it had the right to leave. He warned that the war which would follow southern secession would be long and bloody.

Extremists on both sides opposed Clay's compromise proposals. So did President Taylor. The president had hoped that Webster, Clay, and other Whig Party leaders would support his own limited plan of statehood for California. The president's feelings were hurt when none of the party leaders thought that his idea was important.

The president's chief adviser, Senator Seward of New York, was also against Clay's proposals. Seward strongly opposed slavery and did not believe it was right to compromise on it.

One week after Clay spoke, Senator Jefferson Davis of Mississippi explained his position. He did not say much about Clay's proposed compromise. Davis was sure that no good would result from it, not even from stronger laws on the return of escaped slaves. He said these laws would not be enforced in states where people opposed slavery.

Senator Davis said that what was needed was a change in the North's policy toward the South. He said the North must recognize the rights of southerners, especially the right to take slave property into territories of the United States.

Davis said Congress had no right to destroy or limit this right. He admitted that the old Missouri compromise of eighteen twenty had limited the right to take slaves into the territories. He said the eighteen twenty compromise worked -- not because Congress passed it -- but because the states agreed to it.

Senator Davis said the North was responsible for the growing split, because the North was trying to get complete control of the South. He said if these efforts were not stopped, the North some day would be powerful enough to change the Constitution and end slavery everywhere. Davis warned that the South would never accept this.

Three weeks later, the Senate heard another southern leader, Senator John C. Calhoun. For years, Calhoun was the voice of the South. He now was sixty-eight years old and a sick man. He would die within a month. Calhoun had been too ill to hear Clay's speech. He spent the last week in February writing what he believed to be the true position of the South.

On Sunday, March third, it was announced that Calhoun would speak in the Senate the next day. Most understood that it would be his last speech. The Senate was crowded when Calhoun entered.

One by one, friends came up to speak to him. The old man's long, gray hair fell to his shoulders. His face was thin and white. But his eyes were bright and his jaw firm. Calhoun was too weak to read his speech. He asked Senator Mason to read it for him.

Calhoun said that for a long time he had believed that the dispute over slavery -- if not settled -- would end in disunion. Calhoun said it was clear now to everyone that the Union was breaking apart, that the ties that had held the North and South together were breaking, one by one.

Three churches, once united across the nation, now were split between North and South. The two major political parties, he declared, were divided in the same way. Calhoun said the North was responsible for all this, because it had destroyed the political balance between the two parts of the country.

As the population of the North had grown large, he noted, that part of the country had seized political and economic control. The North had passed tariff bills that the South opposed. It had filled most of the offices in the federal government. It closed the new territories to southern slaveholders. And, said Calhoun, it had viciously attacked the southern institution of slavery.

The situation was so bad, Calhoun said, that the South could not -- with honor and safety -- remain in the Union. "How can the Union be saved?" he asked. "Not by the compromise proposed by the senator from Kentucky. There is but one way. A full and final settlement, with justice, of all the questions disputed by the two sections.

"The South asks for justice, simple justice, and less she ought not to take. She has no compromise to offer but the Constitution, and no concession or surrender to make. She has already surrendered so much that she has little left to surrender."

Then Calhoun listed the things the North must do to satisfy the South. He said it must give the South an equal right in the new territories of the West. It must make people obey the laws on the return of runaway slaves. It must agree to an amendment to the constitution that would return political balance to North and South. And it must stop the attacks against slavery.

If all these things were not done, Calhoun said, then it would be better to separate, to part in peace. But if the North refused a peaceful separation, then the South would be faced with the choice of surrender or fight. "The South will know what to do," said Calhoun.

When Calhoun finished his speech to the Senate, southern lawmakers crowded around the old man, congratulating him. But many of them could not agree with his extreme demands and the violence of his words. His appeal was too late. Most southerners believed that Clay's proposals were a reasonable way to settle the difference and protect the union.

Clay was worried that his compromise might be defeated by northern votes. Many in the North felt slavery was wrong. They opposed the compromise, because it might permit slavery in the New Mexico territory, and because it called for stronger laws on the return of slaves who had escaped to the North.

Eight days before he first proposed the compromise, Clay visited Senator Daniel Webster of Massachusetts. A friend of Webster's described the meeting in these words: "Mister Clay came to Mister Webster's house and had a long talk with him about the best way to settle the difficulties growing out of slavery and the new territories. I heard part of their conversation."

"Mister Clay left after about an hour. Mister Webster called me to his side and spoke to me of Mister Clay in words of great kindness. He said he agreed generally with Mister Clay, that he thought Mister Clay's purpose was great and highly patriotic."

"He said Mister Clay seemed to be very weak and had a very bad cough, that he was sure Mister Clay wanted to do something for the good of his country during the little time he had left on Earth. Mister Webster said further that he thought Mister Clay's plan was one that should be satisfactory to the North and to the reasonable men of the South. He said he believed that he could support all of it and would work for its approval in the Senate."

Webster planned to speak in support of Clay's proposal. But he would wait until the best time for declaring it. He decided to make it on March seventh, just three days after Calhoun's speech was read to the Senate. Webster was sixty-eight years old, as old as Calhoun. His voice was weaker now. But his words rang with the same strength as years earlier.

The United States faced a deep national crisis in eighteen fifty. That crisis threatened to split the nation in two. It began over the issue of slavery in the new territories of California and Mexico. President Zachary Taylor had no clear policy on the issue. He tried to be neutral. He hoped the problem would solve itself. But he did not get his wish.

The split between the North and South only got wider. There was a real danger that the South would declare its independence. Then, Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky stepped forward to save the Union.

After being away from the Senate for almost eight years, Clay was surprised to find how bitter the two sections of the United States -- north and south -- had grown toward each other. Clay urged his friends in the border states between North and South to try to build public support for the Union. He felt this would help prevent the South from seceding.

Clay also began to think about a compromise that might settle the differences between the two sections of the country.

Clay was a firm believer in the idea of compromise. He once said: "I go for honorable compromise whenever it can be made. Life itself is but a compromise between death and life. The struggle continues through our whole existence until the great destroyer finally wins. All legislation, all government, all society is formed upon the principle of mutual concession, politeness, and courtesy. Upon these, everything is based."

Clay was sure that a compromise between North and South was possible. Near the end of January, Clay completed work on his plan. Most parts of it already had been proposed as separate bills. Clay put them together in a way that both sides could accept.

Clay offered his plan in a Senate speech on January twenty-ninth, eighteen fifty. Clay proposed that California join the Union as a free state. He said territorial governments should be formed in the other parts of the western territories, with no immediate decision on whether slavery would be permitted.

Clay proposed that the western border of Texas be changed to give New Mexico most of the land disputed by them. In exchange for this, he said, the national government should agree to pay the public debts that Texas had when it became a state.

He proposed that no more slaves be sold in the District of Columbia for use outside the federal district, but also proposed that slavery should not be ended in the district unless its citizens and those of Maryland approved. Clay said a better law was needed for the return of fugitive slaves to their owners.

He also proposed that Congress declare that it had no power to interfere with the slave trade between states. Senator Clay believed these eight steps would satisfy the interests of both the North and the South.

Senator Jefferson Davis of Mississippi declared that Clay's compromises did not offer anything of value to the South. He said the South would accept nothing less than extending the Missouri compromise line west to the Pacific Ocean. This meant that land south of the line would be open to slavery.

Clay answered that no power on earth could force him to vote to establish slavery where it did not exist. He said Americans had blamed Britain for forcing African slavery on the colonists. He said he would not have the future citizens of California and New Mexico blaming Henry Clay for slavery there.

Clay said he did not want to debate, but wished that the senators would think carefully about his proposals. He said he hoped they would decide on them only after careful study. He asked them to see the proposals as a system of compromise, not as separate bills. Clay expected extremists on both sides to denounce the compromise. But he believed the more reasonable leaders of the North and South would accept it.

One week after Clay first proposed the compromise, he rose in the Senate to speak in its defense. The Senate hall was crowded. People had come from as far away as Boston and New York to hear Clay speak. Some senators said there had not been such a crowd in the capitol building since the day Clay said goodbye to the Senate eight years earlier.

Clay had to rest several times as he climbed the steps of the capitol. He told a friend that he felt very tired and weak. His friend advised Clay to rest and make his speech later. "No," Clay said. "My country is in danger. If I can be the one to save it from that danger, then my health and life are not important."

Clay began his speech by talking of the serious crisis that faced the nation. He said that never before had he spoken to a group as troubled and worried as the one he spoke to now. Clay listed his eight resolutions. Then he said: "No man on earth is more ready than I am to surrender anything which I have proposed and to accept in its place anything that is better. But I ask the honorable senators whether their duty will be done by simply limiting themselves to opposing any one or all of the resolutions I have offered."

"If my plan of peace and unity is not right, give us your plan. Let us see how all the questions that have arisen out of this unhappy subject of slavery can be better settled more fairly and justly than the plan I have offered. Present me with such a plan, and I will praise it with pleasure and accept it without the slightest feeling of regret."

Clay said the major differences separating the country could be settled by facing facts. He said the first great fact was that laws were not necessary to keep slavery out of California and New Mexico. He said the people of California already had approved an anti-slavery state constitution. And he said the nature of land in New Mexico was such that slaves could not be used.

Clay said there was justice in the borders he proposed for Texas, that it would still be a very large state after losing the area it disputed with New Mexico. And he said it was right for the United States to pay the debts of Texas, because that state no longer could collect taxes on trade as an independent country.

Clay said there was equal justice in his resolutions ending the slave trade in the District of Columbia and strengthening laws on the return of runaway slaves. He said the South, perhaps, would be helped more than the North by his proposals. But the North, he said, was richer and had more money and power.

To the North, slavery was a matter of feeling. But to the South, Clay said, it was a hard social and economic fact. He said the North could look on in safety while the actions of some of its people were producing flames of bitterness throughout the southern states.

Then Clay attacked the South's claim that it had the right to leave the Union. He said the Union of states was permanent -- that the men who built the Union did not do so only for themselves, but for all future Americans.

Clay warned that if the South seceded, there would be war within sixty days. He said the slaves of the South would escape by the thousands to freedom in the North. Their owners would follow them and try to return them to slavery by force. This, he said, would lead to war between the slave-holding and free states. He said this would not be a war of only two or three years. History had shown, he said, that such wars lasted many years and often destroyed both sides.

Even if the south could secede without war, he said, it still would not get any of the things it demanded. Secession would not open the territories to slavery. It would not continue the slave trade in the District of Columbia. And it would not lead to the return of slaves who escaped to the North.

So, said Clay, the South would not help itself by leaving the Union. Clay's two-day speech gave new hope to many that the Union could be saved.

Senator Henry Clay's compromise seemed to be a way to settle the dispute. But extremists on both sides opposed it.

In eighteen forty-eight, while James Polk was president, there was a great constitutional debate in the United States. It arose over slavery in the new territories. Southerners argued that they had the right to take slaves into New Mexico and California. Northerners opposed any further spread of slavery. The question was this: did Congress have the power to control or even ban slavery in the new territories?

There seemed to be no answer to the problem. Everyone agreed that governments had to be organized in the territories. But northern and southern leaders could not settle their dispute over slavery.

Senator John Clayton of Delaware proposed to the Senate that it name a special committee on the question of slavery in the new territories. Both parties -- the Whigs and the Democrats -- had the same number of senators on the committee. Senator Clayton was its chairman.

South and North were equally represented. After six days, Clayton's committee agreed on a compromise bill. It proposed that Oregon be organized as free territory. Slavery there would be illegal.

And on California and New Mexico, the bill proposed this: they could be organized as territories. But their territorial legislatures would not have the power to act on the issue of slavery. All questions on slavery in these two territories must be decided by the United States Supreme Court.

Not everyone believed this plan was a good one. Some northern senators believed that Chief Justice Taney would decide for slavery. Southern senators were just as sure that Taney would decide against slavery.

Many Whigs in the House of Representatives opposed the plan, because they feared that the political dispute over slavery would destroy the Supreme Court. The Senate approved the compromise bill. But the House rejected it.

After long debate, Congress finally approved territorial government for Oregon. And it voted that Oregon should be free territory, with slavery illegal.

The vote on the Oregon bill was very close. It passed in the Senate only because two men from slave states voted for it. They were Senator Thomas Benton of Missouri and Senator Sam Houston of Texas.

Senator John C. Calhoun said it was a bad defeat for the South. But what was worse was the fact that it was caused by the votes of two southern senators.

Soon after, at the end of August, Congress ended its session. And the nation's leaders prepared for the national election of eighteen forty-eight.

The country moved quickly into the presidential campaign. President Polk was old, tired and in poor health. He had decided not to try for a second term. Polk felt he had done his duty. During the first days of his administration, he listed the things he planned to do as president.

First, he wanted to reduce the tax on imports. Second, he wished to establish the independent treasury, which the Whigs had voted out. Third, he hoped to settle the Oregon border dispute with Britain. And fourth, he wanted to get California for the United States.

Less than four years later, he had succeeded with each item on his list. The United States and Britain agreed on a compromise in the Oregon dispute. In eighteen forty-six, he was able to establish the independent Treasury again, where the government could keep its own funds. No longer would government funds be kept in private banks.

That same year, Polk was able to get Congress to approve a bill that greatly reduced the taxes on imports. And the peace treaty with Mexico gave the United States not only California, but also New Mexico. So, Polk believed he had served his country well.

Polk, however, had not served his party well. He was not a good politician. He failed to unite the disputing groups of the Democratic Party. What was worse, he let them move even farther apart.

There seemed to be no strong Democratic candidate who could unite the party. At one extreme were the supporters of former President Van Buren -- New York Democrats opposed to slavery. They were called "Barnburners." They got this name from their political opponents, who charged that they were willing to burn down the barn to get rid of pro-slavery rats.

At the party's other extreme were the Democrats of the South, led by John C. Calhoun of South Carolina. In every state, the Democrats were divided between those who supported the administration and those opposed to it.

The Democrats met in Baltimore in May eighteen forty-eight to choose their presidential candidate. Several men were proposed as possibilities: Polk's Treasury Secretary Robert Walker of Mississippi; John Dix of New York; and Senator Lewis Cass of Michigan.

On the fourth vote, the convention chose Cass as the party's presidential candidate. Cass was sixty-six years old. He was a middle-of-the-road Democrat. He was a northerner who did not oppose slavery.

On the question of slavery in the new territories, Cass believed that the people of the territory should make the decision. The Barnburner Democrats of New York refused to accept Cass as their candidate. They walked out of the Baltimore convention.

Senator Henry Clay -- three times the Whig Party choice for president -- expected to be its candidate again. The old members of the party still supported Clay. But young Whigs felt that a new candidate was needed.

Some Whig leaders remembered how William Henry Harrison had won the presidency for the party by campaigning as a military hero. The country had a new military hero now. "Old Zach" -- General Zachary Taylor. General Taylor and his men never lost a battle in the Mexican War. Several times, he defeated Mexican forces much larger than his.

After the general's first victory, New York political leader Thurlow Weed happened to meet Taylor's brother on a Hudson River steamboat. That meeting had a most important effect on future events.

Weed asked Joseph Taylor if his brother was a political man. Joseph answered that "Old Zach" was not. He said his brother belonged to no party, that often he did not even vote. He said Zach supported Henry Clay and did not like Andrew Jackson.

Joseph said his brother felt strongly that American products should be protected against competition from foreign imports. He felt so strongly about it, Joseph said, that he refused to wear any imported clothing. Weed made a quick decision. "Your brother," he said, "will be our next president."

"That is preposterous. My brother knows nothing about government or civil affairs. When I tell you," said Joseph Taylor, "that he is not as fit to be president as I am, you will see how foolish this idea is."

Weed, however, did not think his proposal was foolish. He began to build support for General Taylor among Whig politicians. When Old Zach first heard of efforts to make him president, he agreed with his brother. The idea was foolish.

"I would not accept such high office," he said, "even if it were offered."

This statement he made in June, eighteen forty-six. A month later, he was saying he was not a candidate for president -- and never would be. He said he felt it was wrong to make a military man president. But, a few months later, Taylor changed his mind. He told his son-in-law in December: "I will not say I would not serve if the good people were to be so unwise as to elect me."

By July of eighteen forty-seven, Old Zach had made up his mind. He told a friend: "I am satisfied that if the election were held now, nothing could prevent me from becoming president." Senator Clay did not think Taylor had the ability to be president. But Clay knew well how the voters loved a military hero. Senator Clay was seventy years old. He knew this would be his last chance to become president. He worked very hard to get the support of Whig leaders.

The Whig Party held its convention in Philadelphia in June of eighteen forty-eight. Four names were put before the convention: General Zachary Taylor, Henry Clay, General Winfield Scott and Daniel Webster.

The Whig Party considered four candidates for the presidential election of eighteen forty-eight: Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky, General Zachary Taylor, General Winfield Scott and Senator Daniel Webster of Massachusetts.

Clay was seventy years old. He knew it would be his last chance to get into the White House. He worked hard to get the support of party leaders. But they did not give Clay their support. They wanted to win the election, and they felt they had a better chance for victory with a military hero like General Taylor.

Taylor was sixty-three years old. He had almost no formal education. He had spent almost forty years in the West as an Indian fighter and commander of small army posts.

A number of politicians did not believe he had the ability to be president. General Taylor's supporters put great energy into their campaign for his nomination. They tried to sell the idea that the old general was the only man who could defeat the candidate of the Democratic Party.

On the first vote of the convention, Taylor got the most votes. But no candidate got the necessary majority. On the fourth vote, all of Webster's supporters and many of Clay's supporters gave their votes to Taylor. He finally won the Whig Party's nomination for president.

The Democratic Party's candidate for president was Senator Lewis Cass of Michigan. Many Americans did not like either candidate, because of the candidates' policies on slavery. Lewis Cass saw nothing wrong with slavery if that was what the people wanted. Zachary Taylor was a slave owner.

In Ohio, a group of men decided to form a new political party. They called it the Free Soil Party, because they believed in free land for free settlers. They wanted no further spread of slavery.

The Free Soil leaders proposed a convention of all who supported their ideas. Ten thousand people went to the convention in Buffalo, New York.

For two days, the delegates debated the slavery issue and discussed their choice of a candidate for president. They also worked on a platform -- a statement of their party's purpose.

The platform declared that slavery was an institution of the states, not the nation. It said Congress had no right to help spread slavery by permitting it in the new western territories. The platform declared that the issue should be faced with firmness. No more slave states. No more slave territory. No more compromises with slavery, anywhere.

Convention delegates then voted on candidates. They chose former President Martin Van Buren as candidate for president.

The people of the nation voted on November seventh. It was the first time a presidential election was held on the same day in all parts of the country. Zachary Taylor won both the popular and electoral votes. He became the twelfth president of the United States.

Congress met a few weeks after the election, long before Taylor took office. It faced serious problems. Territorial governments were needed for the areas won in the war against Mexico.

California, especially, needed help. Gold had been discovered in California. Thousands were moving there. A government was needed to protect the lives and property of the new population.

The dispute over slavery had prevented Congress from acting earlier. Southerners wanted the right to take slaves into the new territories. Northerners wanted to keep slavery out.

Then there was the question of laws forcing northern states to return escaped slaves to their owners. The laws were not always obeyed. Southerners wanted a new law that would be easier to enforce.

Congress found it difficult to act on these problems. The House of Representatives was controlled by members of the Free Soil Party, which opposed slavery. The Senate was controlled by southerners, who supported slavery. The two houses found it almost impossible to agree on anything.

Early in January, eighteen forty-nine, a congressman proposed a bill to first limit, and then end, slavery in the District of Columbia. The bill would free all slaves in the district who were born after a certain time. It would permit the federal government to buy slaves and then free them.

Opposition to the bill was strong. It was amended. The new bill would simply close all places in the District of Columbia where slaves were bought and sold.

Southern congressmen disliked the bill, even as amended. They organized a committee representing every one of the southern states. Senator John C. Calhoun of South Carolina said the committee should write a declaration explaining the position of the South. The committee agreed, and Calhoun wrote most of the declaration himself.

The southern declaration accused the North of many aggressions. The South, it said, faced many dangers. Soon there would be enough free states to control both the House and the Senate. And then the Constitution would be changed and all slaves would be freed.

And this, said the southern declaration, would lead to bitter hostility and war between North and South. The declaration called on the people of the South to unite and be firm in their opposition to the North.

With this new firmness, southern lawmakers fought to make slavery legal in the new territories. They effectively blocked proposals for territorial governments in California and New Mexico.

Congress ended its session on March fourth, eighteen forty-nine, without any progress. Zachary Taylor was sworn-in as president that same day.

The new president believed it would be easier to get statehood for California and New Mexico than to create territorial governments for them. Taylor, as we have said, was a slaveholder. But he believed that both California and New Mexico should be free states.

During these years around eighteen fifty, the people of the United States were becoming more and more involved in the dispute over slavery. In the North, more people joined the anti-slavery campaign. Even those who did not wish to end slavery in the South felt that slavery should not spread further.

In the South, many people felt that the constitutional equality of fifteen southern states was being questioned. Sixteen hundred million dollars worth of slave property was threatened by Abolitionists. Southerners felt that if the campaign against slavery was successful, everything they believed in would be destroyed.

People hoped that President Taylor would be able to bring the North and South together again. But his message to Congress showed no signs of such leadership.

Taylor asked Congress to give statehood to California immediately. He reported that California leaders had written a state constitution. The constitution banned slavery. Settlers from both the North and South supported the document.

The president also reported that the people of New Mexico would be asking for statehood soon. He said it would be best to let the people themselves decide if New Mexico would be a slave or free state. Taylor's opponents described these proposals as his "no action plan."

President Taylor really had no policy. He could not support a bill to keep slavery out of the territories. That might start a quick revolt among the southern states. He could not support a bill to let slavery spread into the territories. That would make the North rise in anger.

Taylor tried to be neutral. He hoped the problem of slavery would solve itself. But the problem would not solve itself. The division between North and South grew wider.

In the middle of the eighteen forties, the United States offered to buy California from Mexico. The government of Mexico refused to negotiate. American President James Polk felt that the use of force was the only way to make Mexico negotiate. So, in the spring of eighteen forty-six, he ordered American soldiers to the Rio Grande River. The Rio Grande formed part of the border between the United States and Mexico.

General Zachary Taylor commanded the American force. He sent one of his officers across the river to meet with Mexican officials. The Mexicans protested the movement of the American troops to the Rio Grande. They said the area was Mexican territory. The movement of American troops there, they said, was an act of war.

For almost a month, the Americans and the Mexicans kept their positions. Then, on April twenty-fifth, General Taylor received word that a large Mexican force had crossed the border a few kilometers up the river. A small force of American soldiers went to investigate. They were attacked. All were killed, wounded, or captured. General Taylor quickly sent a message to President Polk in Washington. It said war had begun.

The message arrived at the White House on May ninth. A few days later, President Polk asked Congress to recognize that war had started. He asked Congress to give him everything he needed to win the war and bring peace to the area. A few members of Congress did not want to declare war against Mexico. They believed the United States was responsible for the situation along the Rio Grande. They were out-voted. President Polk signed the war bill. Later, Polk wrote:

"We had not gone to war for conquest. But it was clear that in making peace we would, if possible, get California and other parts of Mexico."

Many Americans opposed what they called "Mr. Polk's war." Whig Party members and Abolitionists in the North believed that slave-owners and southerners in Polk's administration had planned the war. They believed the South wanted to win Mexican territory for the purpose of spreading and strengthening slavery.

President Polk was troubled by this opposition. But he did not think the war would last long. He thought the United States could quickly force Mexico to sell him the territory he wanted. Polk secretly sent a representative to former Mexican dictator Santa Ana. Santa Ana was living in exile in Cuba. Polk's representative said the United States wanted to buy California and some other Mexican territory. Santa Ana said he would agree to the sale, if the United States would help him return to power.

President Polk ordered the United States navy to let Santa Ana return to Mexico. American ships that blocked the port of Vera Cruz permitted the Mexican dictator to land there. Once Santa Ana returned, he failed to honor his promises to Polk. He refused to end the war and sell California. Instead, Santa Ana organized an army to fight the United States.

American General Zachary Taylor moved against the Mexicans. He crossed the Rio Grande River. He marched toward Monterrey, the major trading and transportation center of northeast Mexico. The battle for Monterrey lasted three days. The Mexicans surrendered.

Then General Taylor got orders to send most of his forces back to the coast. They were to join other American forces for the invasion of Vera Cruz. While this was happening, Santa Ana was moving his army north. In four months, he had built an army of twenty thousand men. When General Taylor learned that Santa Ana was preparing to attack, he left Vera Cruz. He moved his forces into a position to fight Santa Ana.

Santa Ana sent a representative to meet with General Taylor. The representative said the American force had one hour to surrender. Taylor's answer was short: "Tell Santa Ana to go to hell."

The battle between the United States and Mexican forces lasted two days. Losses were heavy on both sides. On the second night, Santa Ana's army withdrew from the battlefield. Taylor had won another victory.

Other American forces were victorious, too. General Winfield Scott had captured the port of Vera Cruz and was ready to attack Mexico City. Commodore Robert Stockton had invaded California and had raised the American flag over the territory.

Stephen Kearny had seized Santa Fe, the capital of New Mexico, without firing a shot. Still, the war was not over. President Polk's "short" war already had lasted for more than a year. Polk decided to send a special diplomatic representative to Mexico. He gave the diplomat the power to negotiate a peace treaty whenever Mexico wanted to stop fighting.

A ceasefire was declared. But attempts to negotiate a peace treaty failed. Santa Ana tried to use the ceasefire to prepare for more fighting. So General Scott ended the ceasefire. His men began their attack on Mexico City. The fighting lasted one week. The government of Mexico surrendered. Santa Ana stepped down as president. Manuel de la Pena y Pena -- president of the supreme court -- became acting president.

On February second, eighteen forty-eight, the United States and Mexico signed a peace treaty. Mexico agreed to give up California and New Mexico. It would recognize the Rio Grande River as the southern border of Texas. The United States would pay Mexico fifteen million dollars. It also would pay more than three million dollars in damage claims that Mexico owed American citizens.

The terms of the treaty were those set by President Polk. Yet he was not satisfied with just California and New Mexico. He wanted even more territory. But he realized he probably would have to fight for it. And he did not think Congress would agree to extend the war. So Polk sent the peace treaty to the Senate. It was approved. The Mexican Congress also approved it. The war was officially over.

The United States now faced the problem of what to do with the new lands. President Polk wanted to form territorial governments in California and New Mexico. He asked Congress for immediate permission to do that. But the question of slavery delayed quick congressional action. Should the new territories be opened or closed to slavery. Southerners argued that they had the right to take slaves into the new territories. Northerners disagreed. They opposed any further spread of slavery. The real question was this: did Congress have the power to control or bar slavery in the territories.

Until Texas became a state, almost all national leaders seemed to accept the idea that Congress did have this power. For fifty years, Congress had passed resolutions and laws controlling slavery in United States territories. Northerners believed Congress received the power from the constitution. Southern slave owners disagreed. They believed the power to control slavery remained with the states.

There were some who thought the earlier Missouri Compromise could be used to settle the issue of slavery in California, Oregon, and New Mexico. They proposed that the line of the Missouri Compromise be pushed west, all the way to the Pacific Coast. Territory north of the line would be free of slavery. South of the line, slavery would be permitted.

Everyone agreed that governments had to be organized in the territories. But there seemed to be no way to settle the issue of slavery. Then a senator from Delaware agreed to be chairman of a special committee on the question of slavery in the new territories. The Senate committee included four Whigs and four Democrats. North and South were equally represented. Within six days, the committee had agreed on a compromise bill.

In eighteen thirty-six, Texas declared its independence from Mexico. Nine years later, in eighteen forty-five, the United States Congress passed a resolution inviting the Republic of Texas to join the Union as a state.

President John Tyler signed the resolution on March first. That was just three days before his term ended and James Polk moved into the White House as the nation's eleventh president.

Britain and France tried to prevent Texas from becoming a state. They got Mexico to agree to recognize the independence of Texas, but only if Texas agreed not to join the United States.

Texas had two choices. It could become a state. Or it could remain a republic, with its independence recognized by Mexico. The Texas Congress chose statehood.

James Polk had campaigned for the presidency on two promises. He declared that he would make all of Texas and all of Oregon part of the United States. The people had elected Polk because they shared his belief that the United States should extend from sea to sea -- from the Atlantic to the Pacific Oceans. They felt it was God's will, and their duty, to spread American democracy and freedom across the continent.

In the words of poet Walt Whitman: "It is for the interest of mankind that [America's] power and territory should be extended -- the farther, the better."

Traders from New England were the first Americans to visit Oregon. They stopped on the Oregon coast to trade for animal skins.

Later, American explorers Lewis and Clark crossed the Louisiana territory to reach Oregon. And in eighteen hundred eleven, John Jacob Astor built a fur trading center at the mouth of Oregon's Columbia River.

British explorers had given Britain claims to the same territory. The British Hudson's Bay Company also built a trading center on the Columbia and claimed a large area north of it. The two countries could not agree on how to divide Oregon between them. Since there were few settlers in Oregon, Britain and the United States agreed to occupy the territory jointly.

This system worked well until the eighteen forties. Then, thousands of Americans began moving west to Oregon. The new settlers were not satisfied with the joint occupation agreement. They wanted all of Oregon to belong to the United States.

President Polk said he thought the United States had strong claims to all of the territory. But he said he would compromise. He offered to divide Oregon at the forty-ninth parallel of latitude. All north of this line would belong to Britain. All south of it -- including the Columbia River -- would belong to the United States.

The offer was given to Britain's minister in Washington. He rejected it, refusing even to send it to London. He said Britain would accept nothing but the Columbia River as the southern border of British Oregon. President Polk withdrew the offer. He said America had no choice but to claim all of Oregon. He used strong language and seemed to say that the United States would fight, if necessary, to defend its claim.

Polk really did not want war. But he thought a strong position was necessary in negotiating with Britain. He said softer treatment only led to stronger demands from Britain. Polk asked Congress to give him permission to end the joint occupation agreement. It did so in the spring of eighteen hundred forty-six.

In London, the British government decided that Oregon was not worth a war with the United States. It had demanded the Columbia River border because of the Hudson's Bay trading center on the river. The center had been moved farther north to Vancouver Island. So there was no real reason to continue this demand.

The British foreign minister proposed a treaty that would make the forty-ninth parallel of latitude the border between the United States and British Oregon. The proposal was almost the same that President Polk had made earlier.

Leaders in the western United States demanded that Polk reject the British offer. They wanted all of Oregon. Polk decided to let the Senate vote on the British proposal. The Senate accepted the treaty, and Polk signed it.

The treaty made the forty-ninth parallel the border from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean. The southern border of the Oregon territory was the forty-second parallel. South of this was California. The United States, for some time, had wanted to buy California from Mexico.

Former President Tyler had asked his minister to Mexico to try to buy California. The minister, Waddy Thompson, had been to California. He described it as the richest, the most beautiful, the healthiest country in the world. Thompson said the port of San Francisco was big enough to hold all the navies of the world. He said San Francisco, some day, would control the trade of all of the Pacific Ocean.

There was little chance that Thompson could get California from Mexico. But then something happened that destroyed any chance of getting California peacefully. The commander of a United States navy force in the Pacific, Thomas Jones, received news that led him to believe the United States was at war with Mexico.

He sailed to Monterey, the capital of California. The navy force arrived there in October, eighteen hundred forty-two. Jones and his men seized Monterey and held it for two days. He found he had made a mistake and returned the town to Mexican officials. Jones apologized. But his actions greatly angered Mexican leaders. They refused even to talk about selling California to the United States.

Mexico broke relations with the United States when Congress approved statehood for Texas. Mexican officials had warned that Texas statehood would lead to war. After Polk became president, he sent a representative to Mexico to try to establish diplomatic relations again. A weak government was in power in Mexico, headed by President Jose Joaquin Herrera.

Herrera at first agreed to meet with the American, John Slidell, to discuss four offers from President Polk. Earlier, Mexico had agreed to pay more than two million dollars for damages claimed by Americans. But it did not have the money.

Slidell was to offer to pay these claims if Mexico would accept the Rio Grande River as the border between Texas and Mexico. And America would pay Mexico five million dollars for New Mexico and twenty-five million more for California. If these offers were rejected, Slidell was to try to buy part of California for five million dollars.

Slidell arrived in Mexico City in December, eighteen hundred forty-five. The Mexican government had grown even weaker. And Herrera was afraid he would be forced from power if he met with the American diplomat.

The Herrera government fell anyway. And the new Mexican government refused to talk with the American representative. Slidell returned to the United States, firm in the belief that only force could win the Mexican territories the United States wanted.

President Polk shared Slidell's belief. He learned in January, eighteen hundred forty-six, that Mexico had refused to negotiate with his representative. Polk had wanted a peaceful settlement of the differences with Mexico. This now seemed impossible. Perhaps, he thought, a more forceful policy would make Mexico negotiate.

President Polk had sent several thousand American soldiers to Texas six months before, when Texas accepted statehood. This force, led by General Zachary Taylor, had camped near the town of Corpus Christi at the mouth of the Nueces River. Polk now ordered Taylor's soldiers to the Rio Grande River. He told them to stay on the north side of the river.

Should Mexico attack, Taylor and his men were to strike back as hard as possible. General Taylor was glad to get his orders. For months, his men had been training at Corpus Christi. They were ready for action.

The election of eighteen forty put a new president in the White House: William Henry Harrison. The defeat of President Martin Van Buren had been expected. Still, it was a sharp loss for his Democratic Party.

Harrison was a retired general and a member of the Whig Party. He became the ninth president of the United States. But he got sick and he died after just a month in office. His vice president, John Tyler, became president.

Whig leaders, especially Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky, tried to control the new president. Clay proposed detailed legislative programs for the new administration. Among them: the establishment of a national bank. This was high on Senator Clay's list of proposals.

But Tyler soon showed his independence. He did not approve the plans as proposed by Clay. Tyler vetoed two bills calling for the creation of a national bank. Tyler wanted peace and party unity. But he also wanted to show that he -- not Clay -- was president.

Clay's supporters in the cabinet did their best to get Tyler to sign the bank bills. When the president refused to do so, Whig Party leaders urged the cabinet to resign. This would show that the president, alone, was responsible for the veto of the bills.

All cabinet members, but one -- Daniel Webster -- resigned. Secretary of State Webster was with the president when one of the letters of resignation arrived.

"What am I to do, Mr. President?" asked Webster.

"You must decide that for yourself," Tyler said.

"If you leave it to me, Mr. President, I will stay where I am." President Tyler stood up.

"Give me your hand on that," he said, "and I will say to you that Henry Clay is a doomed man from this hour."

Tyler named a new cabinet. And there was not one Clay supporter in it.

The president's veto of the second bank bill brought strong public protests from those who wanted a national bank. A large group of Whig congressmen met and voted to expel Tyler from the party.

During the struggle over the bank bills, the Whigs did not forget the other parts of Senator Clay's legislative program. Clay especially wanted approval of a bill to give the different states money from the sale of public land. Tyler liked this idea himself. Many of the states owed large amounts of money. The distribution bill, as it was called, would help them get out of debt.

The president was willing to support the bill. But he saw one danger in it. If all the money from land sales was given to the states, the federal government might not have enough money.

Tyler feared that Congress then would raise import taxes to get more money for the federal government. As a southerner, the president opposed taxes on imports. He finally agreed to accept the distribution bill, but on one condition. The distribution of money to the states would be suspended if import taxes rose higher than twenty percent.

Tyler signed the bill, and it became law.

The next year, the government found itself short of money. It was spending more than it had. Congress decided that import taxes should be raised, some even higher than twenty percent. The bill was passed by close votes in the House and Senate.

When it got to the White House, President Tyler vetoed it. He said it was wrong to raise the tax so high and, at the same time, continue to give the states the money from land sales. He said the federal government itself needed the land-sale money. The Whigs were angry.

Still, they did not have enough votes to pass the bill over the president's veto. Then they approved a new bill. This one raised import taxes, but said nothing about distribution of federal money to the states. And President Tyler signed it.

While the Whigs made bitter speeches about the failure of the party's legislative program, Tyler worked to improve relations with Britain. The United States and Britain disputed the border that separated Canada from the northeastern United States. Both Canada and the state of Maine claimed the disputed area. Britain was also angry because Americans had helped Canadian rebels.

Canadian soldiers had crossed the Niagara River and burned a boat that was used to carry supplies to the rebels. Secretary of State Daniel Webster wanted peace with Britain. And there was a new government in Britain. Its foreign minister, Lord Aberdeen, also wanted peace.

Lord Aberdeen sent a special representative, Lord Ashburton, to the United States. Lord Ashburton had an American wife. And he was a friend of Daniel Webster. He arrived in Washington in the spring of eighteen hundred forty-two with the power to settle all disputes with the United States.

Lord Ashburton said Britain regretted that it had not made some explanation or apology for the sinking of an American boat in the Niagara River. The two men discussed the border dispute between Canada and Maine.

Webster proposed a compromise border line. Lord Ashburton accepted the compromise. The agreement gave almost eighteen-thousand square kilometers of the disputed area to Maine. Canada received more than twelve thousand square kilometers.

The Senate approved the Webster-Ashburton agreement. And American-British relations showed improvement. President Tyler then turned to another problem: Texas. Texas asked to become a state during President Van Buren's administration. But nothing was done about the request.

Tyler was interested in Texas and wanted to make it part of the Union. Secretary Webster was cool to the idea of Texas statehood.

As a northerner, he did not want another slave state in the Union. Webster and his supporters were Tyler's only real strength in the Whig Party outside of Virginia. The president, therefore, did not push the issue of Texas.

After Senate approval of his treaty with Lord Ashburton, Webster decided that he could be of no more real use to the administration. He resigned as secretary of state. Tyler named one of his Virginia supporters, Abel Upshur, to the job in the summer of eighteen forty-three.

Upshur was a firm believer in slavery. He felt slaves were necessary in the agricultural economy of the South. Upshur was worried about reports that Britain was interested in ending slavery in Texas. These reports said Britain had promised to defend Texas independence and to give economic aid, if the slaves were freed.

Upshur and other southerners feared what might happen if this were done. Slaves from nearby southern states would try to escape to freedom in Texas. And the abolitionists might use Texas as a base for propaganda against the South.

There was another reason for President Tyler's interest in Texas. He believed it possible to make political use of the question of Texas statehood. It could help him build a new political party, a party that might elect him president for another four years. Four months after becoming secretary of state, Upshur offered a statehood treaty to Texas.

At first, Texas President Sam Houston refused the offer. He finally agreed to negotiate, but said the United States must accept two conditions. It must agree to protect Texas if Mexico attacked it. And it must promise that the United States Senate would approve the treaty.

Upshur told the Texas representative in Washington that Texas would be given military protection just as soon as the treaty was signed. And he said the necessary two-thirds of the senators would approve the statehood treaty. Houston was satisfied. And his representative began secret negotiations with Upshur.

A few weeks later, before the talks could be completed, Upshur joined the president and congressional leaders for a trip down the Potomac River. They sailed on a new American warship that carried two large cannons. The new guns were to be fired for the president.

Upshur was standing near one of the cannons during the firing. He and two other men were killed when the gun exploded. The president was not injured. But nineteen others were hurt.

President Tyler named John C. Calhoun -- a Democrat -- as his new secretary of state. He did so for two reasons: Calhoun believed that Texas should be part of the United States. And Tyler -- a Whig -- hoped that Calhoun might be able to get him nominated as the presidential candidate of the Democratic Party.

In eighteen forty-three, Texas was a major issue in American politics. President John Tyler wanted to make Texas a state in the Union. But his secretary of state, Daniel Webster, was cool toward the idea. Webster was a northerner who opposed having another slave-holding state in the Union.

Tyler did not push the issue. He needed Webster's political support. Then, Webster resigned. The president replaced him with a southerner, Abel Upshur. Four months later, Upshur began negotiations to bring Texas into the Union. But a few weeks before those talks were completed, Upshur died in an accident.

President Tyler was a member of the Whig Party. But he made a Democrat -- John C. Calhoun -- his new secretary of state. Calhoun wanted Texas in the Union. But Tyler also had another reason for wanting his help. Tyler, though a Whig, hoped to get nominated in eighteen forty-four as the presidential candidate of the Democrats.

Calhoun completed the talks that Upshur had begun. And the treaty with Texas was signed April twelfth, eighteen forty-four. A few days later, a letter from Calhoun to the British minister in Washington was made public. The letter was Calhoun's answer to a British note saying that Britain wished to end slavery wherever it existed.

Calhoun defended slavery in the American south. He said that what was called slavery was really a political institution necessary for the peace, safety, and economic strength of those states where it existed. Calhoun said that statehood for Texas was necessary to the peace and security of the United States. He said that ending slavery in Texas would be a danger to the American south and to the Union itself.

Calhoun made it seem that the United States wanted Texas -- not because of some great national interest -- but only to protect slavery in the south. The letter created great opposition to Texas statehood in the north. People called on their senators to vote against the acceptance of Texas. President Tyler sent the treaty with Texas to the Senate on April twenty-second, eighteen forty-four.

This was just nine days before the Whig party opened its national convention in Baltimore. Everybody was sure that the Whigs would choose Senator Henry Clay as their presidential candidate. Clay had been working hard for the nomination for more than two years. The Democrats were to hold their convention a month later. Former President Martin Van Buren was the choice of most Democrats.

Both Clay and Van Buren opposed statehood for Texas. Clay said it would lead to war with Mexico. Van Buren agreed. As expected, Clay was chosen as the Whig Party's candidate for president. But Van Buren was given a surprise. The Democrats adopted a rule that their candidate must receive at least two-thirds of the votes -- one hundred and seventy-seven of the two-hundred and sixty-six delegates to the convention. Van Buren won a majority of the votes -- one hundred and forty-six. But that was not enough.

The convention voted again. But Van Buren still fell short of the necessary two-thirds. The delegates voted again and again without giving Van Buren the number he needed. After a time, Van Buren began to lose votes. None of the names nominated seemed able to win the necessary two-thirds. At last, another name was proposed: James K. Polk. Polk was at one time governor of Tennessee and Speaker of the House of Representatives. He was a supporter of statehood for Texas.

The convention delegates voted for the eighth time. Polk got only forty-four votes. Then they voted again. This time, Polk received all two-hundred sixty-six votes. Senator Silas Wright of New York was chosen as candidate for the vice-presidency. But he refused to accept, because he did not support making Texas a state. The Democrats then chose Senator George Dallas of Pennsylvania.

Two other parties offered candidates in the eighteen forty-four elections. President Tyler formed a party of his supporters and government workers. They met and nominated him for president. A fourth group, the Liberty Party, was organized by northeastern Abolitionists after the Democratic and Whig parties refused to oppose slavery. Representatives from six states met at Albany, New York. They chose James Birney for president.

Texas was the chief issue of the eighteen forty-four campaign. President Tyler had sent the treaty with Texas to the Senate for approval. The Senate received it just one week after the democratic convention. Those senators who had supported Martin Van Buren were still bitter over the party's failure to nominate him as its candidate. They joined with the Whigs to defeat the treaty: thirty-five to sixteen.

Tyler still hoped to get statehood for Texas. James K. Polk, the Democratic candidate, also campaigned on promises to get Texas for the United States. The Whig candidate, Henry Clay, at first opposed statehood for Texas. But this position began to cost him support in the South. Then he said statehood might be possible if most of the people wanted it. This satisfied the slave owners of the South who wanted Texas in the Union as a slave state.

Clay angered many people in the North because he softened his opposition to Texas. Some of these began supporting the Liberty Party candidate, James Birney. The Democrats were able to get President Tyler to withdraw as a candidate. They told him that he would take votes from the Democrats and might make Clay president.

Wild campaign charges were made against both Polk and Clay. Clay was called a gambler, a duelist, a man of dishonest deals. Stories were told about Clay's use of strong language and his love of card games. Whig newspapers reported that a traveler saw a group of slaves being sold in Tennessee. Burned into the skin of each of the slaves, the papers said, were the letters JKP -- the initials of James K. Polk.

The election was very close. Two million seven hundred thousand people voted. Polk received only thirty-eight-thousand votes more than Clay. But Polk got one-hundred-seventy electoral votes. Clay got only one-hundred-five.

The election was really decided in New York state. Clay lost the state's thirty-six electoral votes. But he did so by just fifty-one hundred votes. He might have won the state had not James Birney received more than fifteen thousand votes in New York.

President Tyler believed Polk's victory showed that the American people wanted statehood for Texas. But he knew that he could never get the Senate's approval of a Texas statehood treaty. It would take two-thirds of the Senate vote to do so. So Tyler proposed other action to make Texas a state. When Congress met in December, he proposed that Texas be given statehood through a joint resolution by both the House and Senate. Such a resolution needed only a simple majority for approval.

A resolution calling for the annexation of Texas was passed by the house in January, eighteen forty-five, and by the Senate on February twenty-seventh. Tyler signed the bill on March first -- just three days before he stepped down as president.

The resolution invited Texas to join the Union as a state. It gave Texas the right to split itself into as many as four more states when its population was large enough. Texas could keep its public lands. But it had to pay its own debts. And Texas could enter the Union as a slave state.

The Mexican minister to Washington protested the resolution. He called it an act of aggression against his country. He demanded his passport and returned to Mexico. Britain and France tried to prevent Texas from becoming a state. They got Mexico to agree to recognize Texas independence, but only if Texas would not join the United States.

Texas thus had two choices. It could become a state in the United States. Or it could continue as a republic with its independence recognized by Mexico. The Texas Congress chose statehood. President Polk looked even farther to the west for more new territory.

In November of eighteen forty, the American people elected their ninth president, William Henry Harrison. The election of the retired general was expected. Still, it was a great victory for the Whig Party and a sharply felt loss for the opposing party, the Democrats. They failed to put their man, President Martin Van Buren, in the White House for a second term.

Whig leaders made most of Harrison's campaign decisions. Some of those leaders, especially senators Henry Clay of Kentucky and Daniel Webster of Massachusetts, believed they could control the newly elected president. But Harrison saw what was happening. When he made a trip to Kentucky, he made it clear that he did not want to meet with Clay. He felt that such a meeting might seem to show that Clay was the real power in the new administration.

But Clay made sure that Harrison was publicly invited to visit him. The newly elected president could not say no to such an invitation. He spent several days at Clay's home in Lexington.

Daniel Webster, without even being asked, wrote an inaugural speech for the new president. Harrison thanked him, but said he already had written his speech. Harrison spoke for more than one and a half hours. He gave the speech outside, on the front steps of the Capitol building.

It was the coldest inaugural day in the nation's history. But Harrison did not wear a coat or hat. Harrison caught a cold, probably from standing so long outside in the bitter weather of inaugural day. Rest was his best treatment. But Harrison was so busy, he had little time to rest.

Hundreds of people demanded to see the new president. They wanted jobs with the government. Everywhere he turned, Harrison was met by crowds of job-hungry people. And there was a problem that worried him. Henry Clay and Daniel Webster were fighting each other for power in the new administration.

Harrison had offered Clay any job he wanted in the cabinet. But Clay chose to stay in the Senate. Harrison then gave the job of Secretary of State to Webster. He also gave Webster's supporters the best government jobs in New York City.

Clay did not like this. And he told the president so. Harrison accused Clay of trying to tell him -- the president -- how to do his job. Later, he told Clay that he wanted no further words with him. He said any future communications between them would have to be written.

Harrison's health grew worse. Late in March eighteen forty-one, his cold turned into pneumonia. Doctors did everything they could to cure him. But nothing seemed to help. On April fourth, after exactly one month as president, William Henry Harrison died.

Vice President John Tyler was then at his home in Williamsburg, Virginia. Secretary of State Webster sent his son Fletcher on horseback to tell Tyler of the president's death. The vice President was shocked. He had not even known that Harrison was sick. Two hours after he received the news, Tyler was on his way to Washington. He reached the capital just before sunrise on April sixth, eighteen forty-one.

There was some question about Tyler's position. This was the first time that a president had died in office. No one was really sure if the Constitution meant that the vice president was to become president or only acting president. Webster and the other members of the cabinet decided that Tyler should be president and serve until the next election. Tyler also had decided this.

Tyler was sworn-in as the tenth president on April sixth. He was fifty-one years old. No other man had become president at such an early age. Tyler was born and grew up in the same part of Virginia as William Henry Harrison. His father was a wealthy planter and judge who had been a friend of Thomas Jefferson. John completed studies at the college of William and Mary, and became a lawyer. He entered politics and served in the Virginia legislature. Then he was elected a member of Congress and, later, governor of Virginia. He also served as a United States senator.

Tyler believed strongly in the rights of the states. As a congressman and a senator, he had voted against every attempt to give more power to the federal government. Tyler's political beliefs were strongly opposed to those of the northern and western Whigs. Henry Clay firmly supported the ideas of a national bank, a protective tax on imports, and federal spending to improve transportation in the states. Tyler was just as firmly against these ideas.

There was something else. Clay expected to be the Whig Party's presidential candidate in eighteen forty-four. If he supported Tyler, then the new president might become too strong politically and win a second term in the White House.

Tyler quickly established his independence after becoming president. Webster told him that President Harrison had let the cabinet make the decisions of his administration. He said Harrison had only one vote...the same as any member of the cabinet. Webster asked if Tyler wanted this to continue.

"I do not," said Tyler. "I would like to keep President Harrison's cabinet. But I, alone, will make the decisions. If the cabinet members do not approve of this, let them resign."

Tyler wanted to change the cabinet, but could not do so immediately. All but two members of the cabinet were supporters of Senator Clay. Tyler wanted to put these men out and appoint men who would support him. But if he did this immediately, it would split the party. He would have to wait.

The Whig Party controlled both houses of Congress after the eighteen forty elections. Clay wanted a special session of the new Congress. He was able to get Harrison to call such a session before the president's death. At the session, Clay offered six resolutions as a plan of work for Congress. These proposed putting an end to the independent treasury, the establishment of a new national bank, and a tax increase on imports. They also included a new plan to give the states the money received by the federal government from the sale of public lands.

It was no problem to put an end to the independent treasury. Tyler had opposed it during the campaign and in his message to Congress. Congress soon passed a bill repealing the independent treasury act. And Tyler quickly signed it.

But a dispute arose on the issue of a new national bank. Tyler had his Secretary of the Treasury send Congress the administration's plan for a national bank. It would permit such a bank to be established in Washington. And it would permit the bank to open offices in a state, but only if the state approved.

This was not the kind of bank Clay wanted. He wanted no limits of any kind on the power of a national bank to open offices anywhere in the country. Clay then offered a bill that would create just this kind of bank. There was much debate. And Clay finally agreed to a compromise. Bank offices would be permitted in any state where the state legislature did not immediately refuse permission.

The Congress accepted the compromise. But President Tyler did not. He vetoed the bank bill and sent it back to Congress. This had been a difficult decision for Tyler to make. He wanted peace and unity in the party. But he also wanted to show that he -- and not Henry Clay -- was president. The people knew he opposed Clay's bill. If he accepted it, the people would feel that Clay was the more powerful.

Clay did not have enough votes to pass the bill over the president's veto. Another effort was made to get a bank bill that the president would approve. This time, members of Congress met with Tyler to get his ideas. He explained, again, the kind of bank he would accept. He said the states must have the right to approve or reject bank offices.

The congressmen wrote another bill. They said it was exactly what the president wanted. But the president did not agree. He said this second bill would also be vetoed unless changes were made in it. The changes were not made. And Tyler did as he said he would do. He vetoed it. This second veto caused a crisis in Tyler's cabinet.

As the election of eighteen forty drew closer, the Whig Party felt more and more hopeful that it could put its candidate in the White House. The Whigs believed they could defeat President Martin Van Buren in his attempt to win a second term. Whig leaders turned away from their early choice of Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky as their candidate. There was too much popular opposition to him.

Some people opposed Clay because he owned slaves; others because of his close ties to business interests. They considered him a pro-bank man. Besides, there was a growing feeling among the Whig leaders that they should choose a military hero as their presidential candidate -- a general like Andrew Jackson.

Thurlow Weed, one of the important Whig leaders in the state of New York, remembered how the people had loved Jackson, the hero of the War of Eighteen-Twelve.

Weed thought General William Henry Harrison, one of the candidates in eighteen thirty-six, might be the man the Whigs needed. Harrison had led an attack on Indians in the Indiana territory in eighteen eleven.

Westerners believed the battle -- at a place called Tippecanoe -- was a great victory for Harrison. Weed also thought of General Winfield Scott, who had kept the border with Canada quiet. Scott was a southerner from Virginia. He had not been involved in politics and had no political enemies. Weed finally decided that Scott might be a better candidate than Harrison or Clay.

But other party leaders remembered that Harrison had received many votes in eighteen thirty-six, although not enough to win. When the Whig convention opened, all three men -- Clay, Scott, Harrison -- were possible candidates. The convention delegates finally chose General Harrison.

For vice president, they decided on another southerner, John Tyler. Tyler was a strong believer in states' rights. He had worked hard to win the nomination for Senator Clay. One report said he felt so strongly about it that he cried when Clay was not chosen. Southern Whigs agreed to support Harrison only because Tyler was the vice presidential candidate.

Clay was not at the convention. He stayed in Washington and waited for news from the convention. On the final day, as he waited for word, he drank glass after glass of wine. When the news came that the Whigs had chosen Harrison, Clay said in anger: "I am the most unfortunate man in the history of parties. Always chosen as a candidate when sure to be defeated. And now, tricked out of the nomination when I, or anyone, would surely be elected."

The Democrats were happy that Clay was not the Whig presidential candidate. They were glad the Whigs chose the sixty-seven year old Harrison. Democrats spoke of Harrison as an "old lady." They called him "Granny Harrison." One democratic newspaper said the old man did not really want to be president. It said Harrison would be happier with a two thousand dollar a year pension, a barrel of hard cider to drink, and a log cabin to live in.

Working men drank hard apple cider. And a great many farmers still lived in houses, or cabins, made of rough logs. The Whigs put the democratic statement to their own use. They saw a way to represent their party of bankers and businessmen as the party of the working man and the small farmer. "The statement is right!" they cried. "The Whig Party is the party of hard cider and log cabins."

They made Harrison -- a Virginia aristocrat -- a simple man of the people. His big home in Ohio became a log cabin. He exchanged his silk hat for the kind worn by farmers. Whig leaders would not let their candidate make many speeches. They would not let him write anything. All his letters were written by his political advisers. When Harrison did speak in public, it usually was about nothing important. No one really knew what the old man thought about any of the important issues.

The Democrats opened their nominating convention in Baltimore in May eighteen forty. Van Buren was chosen to be the party's candidate again. The president received the votes of all the party representatives at the convention. But the representatives were not able to agree on a vice presidential candidate. They finally decided to let the states nominate candidates for the job.

The election campaign was one of the wildest in the nation's history. Both parties did everything possible to show that they were the friend of the common man. The Whigs put up log cabins everywhere and offered free hard cider to everyone. They organized huge outdoor meetings for thousands, with food and drink for all. They held parades and marched with flags, bands, and pictures of William Henry Harrison. Many campaign songs were written. These songs told of Harrison's bravery against the Indians. They told how Harrison loved the hard and simple life of the common man.

At the same time, the Whig campaign songs said Van Buren lived like a king in the White House. A Whig congressman from Pennsylvania made a wild speech against the president. Copies of it were spread throughout the country. The congressman charged that the White House had become a palace. He said Van Buren slept in the same kind of bed as the one used by the French King, Louis the Fifteenth. He said the president ate French food from gold and silver dishes. The carpets in the White House, he said, were so thick that a man could bury his feet in them. The congressman charged that President Van Buren wore silk clothing, and even put French perfume on his body to make him smell sweet as a flower.

Van Buren and other Democrats called the charges foolish. But no one seemed to hear. The Democrats made charges just as foolish. They claimed that Harrison could not read or write. They said he would not pay people the money he owed them. And they charged that Harrison even sold white men into slavery. Henry Clay said the campaign was a struggle between log cabins and palaces, between hard cider and champagne.

The state of Maine held elections in September of eighteen forty. Voters in Maine elected Whig Edward Kent as governor. They gave the state's electoral votes to Harrison, the hero of Tippecanoe. The election results produced a new song for the Whigs. "And have you heard the news from Maine, and what old Maine can do. She went hell-bent for Governor Kent, and Tippecanoe and Tyler, too. And Tippecanoe and Tyler, too. "

One by one, the other states voted. It was clear early in the election that General Harrison would win. The election was close in total votes. But Harrison received two hundred thirty-four electoral votes, and Van Buren only sixty. And so, Harrison became the ninth president of the United States.

Whig leaders had made most of Harrison's campaign decisions. Some of them -- especially Henry Clay and Daniel Webster -- believed they could continue to control him, even after Harrison moved into the White House. But Harrison saw what was happening. He made a trip to Kentucky, Clay's home state, late in eighteen forty. Harrison made it clear that he did not want to meet with Clay. He was afraid such a meeting would seem to show that Clay was the real power in the new administration.

In eighteen forty, as the administration of Martin Van Buren came closer to an end, there was a widespread feeling that he had not been a strong president. He seemed unable to make the people understand his policies. The opposition Whig Party was happy over Van Buren's failures.

The Whig leader in the Senate was Henry Clay of Kentucky. Clay told a friend he was sure he would be called on to serve as the Whig candidate for president. Other Whig leaders were not so sure. They did not question Clay's ability to be president. But he had been a candidate both in eighteen twenty-four and eighteen thirty-two. And he had lost both times.

Then there was a growing political force in the United States that would not be helpful to Clay's candidacy. That was the abolitionist movement, which opposed slavery. Abolitionists did not like Clay, because he owned slaves.

The dispute over slavery seemed to have been laid to rest for a time. But during the eighteen thirties, it rose to the surface again. A major reason why the dispute came alive again was cotton. Cotton plants spread across the states of the south.

Cotton production had grown so heavily that it gave the south a one-crop economy. Cotton depended on the labor of slaves. By the eighteen thirties, cotton planters believed that without slavery, the whole economic system of the south would lie in ruins. To them, slavery was no longer just a question of right or wrong. It was a necessity for survival.

Cotton made the agricultural south economically dependent on the industrial north. Northern ships carried southern cotton to the markets of Europe. Manufactured goods needed in the South came from the North. The South put so much time and energy into growing cotton, that it failed to give much thought to developing industries of its own.

The situation deeply troubled the political leaders of the South. What made things worse was the fact that most of the federal government's financial aid for public works went to the North.

Then there was the old dispute over import taxes. Taxes on foreign goods mostly helped the manufacturers of the North. The taxes were to be lowered in eighteen forty-two. But that was some time in the future. No one could be sure what would happen then. Such was the general political and economic picture in the United States when the abolitionist movement began to make itself felt.

In the beginning, the abolitionist movement was organized by religious groups. The members of these groups believed there could be no compromise with evil. They felt that slavery was evil. So slavery must go.

The eighteen thirties saw the birth of anti-slavery societies in New York and New England. The societies published newspapers and pamphlets. They began to flood the country with pamphlets and anti-slavery petitions. The South tried to stop the flow of this anti-slavery literature across the borders of southern states. The Abolitionists, in turn, declared that such actions violated freedom of the press and the constitutional right of petition. This was the beginning of a long, bitter struggle. It lasted for twenty years. It finally split the Union.

The abolitionists had not as yet received major support from the people of the North. Many northerners were hostile to them. But in eighteen thirty-six, the House of Representatives declared that it would not listen to any anti-slavery petitions. This became known as the "gag rule."

The Senate did not pass such a rule. But the Senate still made it almost impossible for anti-slavery petitions to come before it. Former President John Quincy Adams, who was then a congressman, rose up in protest. He was not an abolitionist. But he led a campaign against the gag rule. Adams said the rule was a violation of the constitutional right to petition Congress. The gag rule made great numbers of people in the North very angry. Because of it, these people began to support the abolitionist movement.

The increasing bitterness over the issue of slavery put Whig leader Henry Clay in a difficult position. Clay was under pressure to make a decision on slavery, on the abolitionists, and on the southern extremists.

Where did he stand? Senator Clay had always hated slavery, although he owned some slaves himself. In a Senate speech in eighteen thirty-three, he called slavery "this great evil ... the darkest spot in the map of our country."

Clay feared that the dispute over slavery might destroy him as a political leader. And, what was worse, he was afraid that it might destroy the nation. Clay was an extremely strong believer in the Union.

Clay opposed violent action. He thought the slow growth of public opinion was better than violence in bringing about a solution to slavery. Clay hated the abolitionists and the great noise they were beginning to make over slavery. He said they were interfering with a southern institution and were forcing slavery into politics. Slavery, he declared, did not belong in politics.

Still, Clay was a national leader. He knew it would be bad to stand too strongly opposed to the growing abolitionist movement. Clay also opposed the southern senators who tried to prevent discussion of slavery. He said their position was emotional and extreme. It was as bad as that of the abolitionists.

The Senate did, in fact, discuss slavery, in a general way. It was concerned about the legal position of the federal government in relation to slavery. Senator John C. Calhoun of South Carolina offered a resolution for consideration. This is what he said:

The Union was created by an agreement among the states. Each state had the constitutional right to complete control over its own institutions. It was the job -- the duty -- of the government in Washington to protect that right. That meant protection against any interference in the institution of slavery.

Calhoun was most forceful when it came to slavery in the District of Columbia and in the territories. He declared that any federal, state, or private interference with slavery in those places was a direct and dangerous attack on the interests of slave states. Calhoun said the South must not surrender an inch to the abolitionist movement. "If we do," he said, "we are gone."

Senator Clay did not like such extreme talk about states' rights. He became especially angry when states talked about separating from the Union, instead of trying to solve problems together.

"Separation," Clay said, "is a terrible word. One's ears should not accept it. I desire to see -- in continued safety and prosperity -- this Union, and no other Union. I am opposed to all separate confederacies and to all sectional conventions. This Union, this government, will do nothing to attack the rights and security of the slave-holding states."

Clay then offered his own resolution for Senate consideration. This is what he said:

Congress had no legal power over slavery within the states. Therefore, petitions for the abolition of slavery must be rejected, because Congress had no constitutional right to act on them. The Senate approved Clay's resolution. It rejected the one offered by Calhoun.

Clay had acted as he did because he wanted to settle the dispute, and because he loved the Union. He did so for personal political reasons, too. Clay had defended the constitutional right of petition. That pleased the North. But he also had used a legal move to block the Abolitionist Movement from bringing anti-slavery petitions before Congress. That pleased the South.

Clay believed he had protected his national position. He told a friend: "I have acted in such a way that I lost nothing, either in the South or the North."

As the national election of eighteen forty got closer, the Whig Party felt more hopeful. They began to believe they could defeat President Van Buren in his attempt to win a second term. But they also began to turn away from Henry Clay as a presidential candidate.

Martin Van Buren was sworn-in as the eighth president of the United States in eighteen thirty-seven. Not long after he took office, the United States suffered an economic depression.

Many state banks had printed more money than they could guarantee with gold or silver. As more paper money came into use, the value fell. Prices rose sharply. Some people could not buy food or other necessities. In a short time, the demand on banks to exchange paper money for gold and silver grew too heavy. The banks halted such exchanges. They said the situation was only temporary. But the crisis continued.

Many of the weaker state banks closed after gold and silver payments were suspended. Those that stayed open had almost no money to lend. Businessmen could not pay back money they owed the banks. And they could not get loans to keep their businesses open. Many factories closed. Great numbers of people were out of work.

The federal government itself lost nine million dollars because of bank failures. Businessmen said the government was to blame for the economic depression. They said the biggest reason was an order made by former president Andrew Jackson. Jackson had said the government would not accept paper money as payment for the purchase of government land. It would accept only gold or silver.

Opponents of the order said it had caused fear and mistrust. Even some of Jackson's strongest supporters said the order should be lifted. They said it had done its job of ending land speculation. Now, they said, it was hurting the economy.

Two of President Van Buren's closest advisers urged him to continue the order. Lifting it, they argued, would flood the federal government with paper money of questionable value.

Van Buren was troubled about the government's money. He wanted to make sure the government had enough money. And he wanted this money safe until needed.

At the same time, Van Buren did not believe the federal government had the responsibility for ending the depression. And he did not believe the government had the right to interfere in any way with private business. So Van Buren decided to continue the order. No government land could be bought with paper money.

The economy got worse. The president called a special meeting of Congress. In his message to Congress, Van Buren said "over-banking and over-trading" had caused the depression. He proposed several steps to protect the government.

Van Buren asked Congress to postpone payment of surplus federal government money to the states. He said the money would be needed to operate the federal government in the coming year. He also asked Congress to pass a law permitting the government to keep its own money in the Treasury, instead of putting it in private banks. This was the so-called "independent Treasury" bill.

The opposition Whig Party denounced the president's proposals. It criticized Van Buren for thinking only of protecting the federal government -- and not helping businessmen, farmers and the states.

Whig opposition was not strong enough to defeat all the president's proposals. Congress approved a bill to postpone payment of surplus federal government money to the states. But the Whigs -- together with conservative Democrats -- rejected the proposal for an independent Treasury.

America's Treasury Department received money when it collected import taxes and sold land. It used this money to pay what the government owed. The Treasury did not, however, hold the money from the time it was collected to the time it was paid out.

The Treasury put the money in private banks. President Van Buren wanted to end this situation. He wanted a law to permit the Treasury to keep government money in its own secure places.

The Whigs argued that such a law would give presidents too much power over the economy. Some Democrats who believed strongly in states' rights also opposed it. Between them, they had enough votes in Congress to defeat the proposal.

President Van Buren tried again the following year to get approval for an independent Treasury. Again, the proposal was defeated.

Finally, in June, eighteen-forty, Congress passed a law permitting the Treasury Department to hold government money itself. Van Buren signed the bill. The economic depression of eighteen thirty-seven lasted for six years. It was the major problem -- but not the only problem -- during Van Buren's one term as president.

In foreign affairs, one of the chief problems Van Buren faced was a dispute with Britain about Canada. Canadian rebels had tried two times to end British rule of Canada. They failed both times. Rebel leaders were forced to flee to safety in the United States. There they found it easy to get men and supplies to help them continue their struggle.

The rebels built a base on a Canadian island in the Niagara River which formed part of the border between the two countries. They used an American boat to carry supplies from the American side to their base. In December eighteen thirty-seven, Canadian soldiers crossed the Niagara River and seized the boat. One American was killed in the fight.

For a while, Canadian forces and Canadian rebels exchanged attacks on river boats. A number of American citizens fought with the rebels. President Van Buren was troubled. He declared that the wish to help others become independent was a natural feeling among Americans. But, he said no American had a right to invade a friendly country. He warned that citizens who fought against the Canadian government, and were captured, could expect no help from the United States.

Another problem between the United States and Canada at that time concerned the border along the state of Maine. That part of the border had been in dispute ever since seventeen eighty-three when Britain recognized the independence of the American states.

Years later, the king of the Netherlands agreed to decide the dispute. The king said it was impossible to decide the border from words of the peace treaty between Britain and the United States. So he offered what he believed was a fair settlement instead: The United States would get about two times as much of the disputed area as Canada.

Britain accepted the proposal by the king of the Netherlands. The United States did not. The United States refused, because the state of Maine would not accept it.

In eighteen thirty-eight, Britain withdrew its acceptance of the proposal. And Canadians entered the disputed area. The governor of Maine sent state forces to the area. The soldiers drove out the Canadians and built forts. Canada, too, began to prepare for war.

President Van Buren sent General Winfield Scott to Maine. Scott was able to get the governor to withdraw his forces from the disputed area. He also received guarantees that Canadian forces would not enter the area. The danger of war passed.

Americans in the border area, however, were angry with President Van Buren. They believed Van Buren was weak, because he did not want war. Not only in the Northeast was the president losing support. People all over the country were suffering because of the economic depression.

Most people believed Van Buren was responsible for their troubles, because he did not end the depression. The economy had fallen apart because of the hard money policies of former President Andrew Jackson, and the opposition to those policies by businessmen and bankers. And Van Buren did nothing to change those policies.

Van Buren had been a good political adviser to President Jackson. But he had not been a strong president. He was unable to make the people understand his policies. The opposition Whig Party was happy over these developments. It saw an excellent chance to win the next presidential election.

Van Buren had been very close to the outgoing president, Andrew Jackson. Van Buren had been successful in forming a strong political alliance that helped put Jackson in the White House in the election of eighteen twenty-eight. Jackson was grateful for Van Buren's help, and asked him to come to Washington to serve as secretary of state.

Van Buren had just been elected governor of the state of New York, but decided to accept Jackson's offer.

Van Buren quickly became the most powerful man in Jackson's cabinet. He was able to help Jackson in negotiations with Britain and France. But his greatest help was in building a strong political party for Jackson. It was this party that gave Jackson wide support for his policies.

Van Buren built up the national Democratic Party with the same methods he used to build his political organization in New York state. He removed from government jobs people who had not supported Jackson. These jobs were then given to those who had supported the president.

Van Buren served as secretary of state for two years. He resigned because he saw his resignation as the only way of solving a serious problem Jackson faced.

The problem was Vice President John C. Calhoun. Calhoun had presidential hopes. He did not think Jackson would serve more than one term. And he planned to be a candidate in the next election.

Three of the five men in Jackson's cabinet supported Calhoun. Jackson could not trust them.

And he wanted to get them out of the cabinet ... but without a political fight.

Then, later, he named Van Buren minister to Britain. But Calhoun's supporters in the Senate defeated Van Buren's nomination.

By this time, Jackson had decided that Van Buren would be the best man to follow him as president. He offered to resign after the eighteen thirty-two elections and give Van Buren the job of president.

Van Buren rejected the offer. He said he wanted to be elected by the people. But he did agree to be Jackson's vice president in eighteen thirty-two.

Four years later, at Jackson's request, the Democrats chose Van Buren to be their presidential candidate. He was opposed by several candidates of the newly formed Whig Party. The opposition was divided. And Van Buren won the election with little difficulty.

Andrew Jackson stood beside Martin Van Buren as the new president was sworn-in. Physically, the two men were very different.

Jackson was tall, with long white hair that flowed back over his head. Jackson's health had been poor during the last few months he spent in the White House. He seemed tired. There was almost no color in his face.

Van Buren was much shorter and had much less hair. His eyes were brighter than those of the old man next to him.

In his inaugural speech, Van Buren noted that he was the first American born after the revolution to become president. He said he felt he belonged to a later age. He called for more unity among Democrats of the North and South. He said better times were ahead for the country.

Van Buren had a strange way with words. He could talk with excitement about something, but say very little about his own feelings on the subject.

Once, he spoke in New York about the tax on imports. Two men who heard the speech discussed it later. "It was a very able speech," said one man, a wool buyer. "Yes, very able," answered his friend. There was silence for a moment. Then the first man spoke again. "Was Mister Van Buren for or against the import tax?"

The new president was a warm and friendly man. He tried to keep his political life and his social life separate. It was not unusual to see him exchange handshakes, smiles and jokes with men who were his political enemies.

Van Buren had a poor education as a boy. He went to school only for a few years. His father was a farmer and hotel keeper at a little town in New York state. Van Buren had a quick mind and was a good judge of men. But he always felt he could have done more had he received a college education.

Van Buren had been president for just a few days when an economic crisis and a political storm struck the country. The storm had been building for many months. It really began with the death of the Bank of the United States more than a year before.

Andrew Jackson had opposed the powerful bank in which the government's money was kept. He vetoed a bill that would have continued it.

The bank was so strong that it was able to control the economy throughout most of the country. It did so through its loans to businessmen. By making many loans, the bank could increase economic activity. By reducing the number of loans, the economy could be tightened.

The Bank of the United States also helped to control the smaller state banks. It refused to accept the notes, or paper money, of these banks, unless the state banks were ready to exchange the paper for gold or silver money.

After the end of the Bank of the United States, there was little control of any kind over the state banks. Many new state banks opened. All of them produced large amounts of paper money -- many times the amount they could exchange for gold or silver. Much of this paper money was used by business speculators to buy land from the government.

These men bought the land, held it for a while, then sold it for more than they paid. The government soon found itself with millions of dollars of paper money.

To stop this, President Jackson ordered gold or silver payments only for government land. This made it necessary for speculators to exchange their paper notes for gold. Many banks could not do this. They did not have enough gold.

There was another problem. Congress passed a law on what was to be done with federal money not needed by the national government. This extra money, or surplus, was to be given to the states.

Since the closing of the Bank of the United States, the government had kept its money in a number of state banks. Now these banks had to surrender the government surplus to the state governments. This left even less gold and silver to exchange for the huge amounts of paper money the banks had issued.

There was still another demand for what gold the banks had.

Eighteen thirty-five and eighteen thirty-seven were bad years for American agriculture. Many crops failed. Instead of the United States exporting farm products to Europe, the opposite happened. American traders had to import these things from Europe. And they had to pay for them in gold or silver.

As more and more paper money was put into use, the value of the money fell. Prices rose higher and higher. Poor people found it almost impossible to buy food and other necessities.

In eighteen thirty-five, a barrel of flour cost six dollars. Two years later, the price had jumped to more than twelve dollars. The same was true with meat and other foods. Even coal, the fuel people used to heat their homes, cost twice as much.

Poor people protested. But businessmen were satisfied. They wished to continue the flood of paper money. Violence finally broke out at a protest meeting in New York City.

A crowd of angry people heard speakers criticize the use of paper money. Some in the crowd began demanding action against the rich traders. A crowd of about one-thousand marched to a nearby store, broke into it, and destroyed large amounts of flour and grain.

In the spring of eighteen thirty-seven, the demand on banks for gold and silver grew too heavy. The banks stopped honoring their promises to exchange their paper money for gold. They said this was just temporary. That it was necessary to stop -- for a while -- all payments in gold or silver. The crisis got worse.

During this period, Christmas was a very different kind of holiday than it is today. There was no set way of celebrating the day, which was not yet an official holiday. Communities around the country honored the day in different ways. Some observed Christmas as an important Christian religious day honoring the birth of Jesus. Others celebrated the day with parties, music, drinking and eating. And, some communities did not celebrate the day at all.

But, it was during this period that Americans began to reinvent the holiday by combining ancient Christmas traditions from different cultures with modern American influences. You can think about the historical people we have been talking about, Andrew Jackson, Martin van Buren and others, and the ways they too might have celebrated Christmas.

In eighteen nineteen, the popular American writer Washington Irving wrote a series of five essays published in a book called "The Sketchbook of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent."

The essays describe a wealthy British landowner who invites his farm workers into his home to celebrate Christmas. The landowner recreates a traditional Christmas as it would have been celebrated in the distant past. Irving praised this looking back to ancient traditions. He liked the idea of different levels of society coming together to enjoy a festive and peaceful holiday. Washington Irving seemed to express concern about the lack of such unifying Christmas traditions in modern America.

Penne Restad wrote a book "Christmas in America: A History." It shows how Americans began to slowly shape Christmas into a unifying national holiday during the first half of the nineteenth century. She describes how Christmas had different meanings for Americans who came from different cultural and religious backgrounds. Many immigrants brought Christmas traditions from their own countries.

Religion played a big role in how an American might celebrate the holiday. Calvinist Christians banned the celebration of Christmas. But groups such as Episcopalians and Moravians honored the day with religious services and seasonal decorations.

By mid-century, Christian groups began to ignore their religious differences over the meaning of Christmas and honored the day in special ways.

Christmas became an important time for families to celebrate at home. More and more Christian Americans also began to follow the European traditions of Christmas trees and giving gifts. Christians believed that the tree represented Jesus and was also a sign of new beginnings. German immigrants brought their tradition of putting lights, sweets and toys on the branches of evergreen trees placed in their homes.

This tradition of setting up a Christmas tree soon spread to many American homes. So did the practice of giving people presents. As these traditions increased in popularity, the modern trade and business linked to Christmas also grew.

As Christmas became more popular, some states declared the day a state holiday. Louisiana was the first state to make the move in eighteen thirty-seven. By eighteen sixty, fourteen other states had followed. It was not until eighteen seventy that President Ulysses Grant made Christmas a federal holiday.

Americans already knew old Christmas songs that came from England and other areas of Europe. But many new American Christmas songs started to become popular. For example, in eighteen forty-nine, a religious leader from Massachusetts wrote the words to "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear." The song "Jingle Bells" appeared seven years later. And, a year later, a religious leader in Williamsport, Pennsylvania wrote the song "We Three Kings of Orient Are."

And of course, no discussion of Christmas would be complete without talking about of one of the holiday's most famous representations, Santa Claus.

This character is based on the story of Saint Nicholas, a Christian holy person believed to have lived in the third century. Saint Nicholas became known as a protector of children. In his role as a Christmas hero, different cultures have given him different names. These include Sinterklaas, Kris Kringle and Father Christmas. But for most Americans his most popular name would become Santa Claus.

In the nineteenth century, many Dutch immigrants living in the United States celebrated the feast of Saint Nicholas on December sixth. Saint Nicholas was especially important to New Yorkers because of their history as a Dutch colony. In eighteen-oh-nine, Washington Irving published his "History of New York." It lists Saint Nicholas as the patron saint of New Yorkers. He describes the saint wearing a low hat, large pants, and smoking a pipe. Does this description sound familiar?

In eighteen twenty-two, an American professor named Clement Clarke Moore wrote a poem that redefined the image of Saint Nicholas. It was called "Account of a Visit from Saint Nicholas." He did not expect it to be published. He wrote it as a Christmas present for his young children. In recent years, experts have questioned whether Moore actually wrote the poem.

Some believe it was written by Henry Livingston, a map maker in New York who wrote and published funny poems in his spare time.

But whoever wrote this classic poem, it has since become a favorite around the world. This poem combines the traditions of Santa Claus, seasonal decorations and gift-giving that have come to define Christmas in America. We leave you with Clement Clarke Moore's poem, popularly known as "'Twas the Night Before Christmas."

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that Saint Nicholas soon would be there.

The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads.
And mamma in her ‘kerchief, and I in my cap,
Had just settled our brains for a long winter’s nap.

When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.

The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow
Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below.
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer.

With a little old driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be Saint Nick.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name!

"Now Dasher! Now, Dancer! Now, Prancer and Vixen!
On, Comet! On, Cupid! On Donner and Blitzen!
To the top of the porch! To the top of the wall!
Now dash away! Dash away! Dash away all!"

As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky.
So up to the house-top the coursers they flew,
With the sleigh full of toys, and Saint Nicholas, too.

And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof.
As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
Down the chimney Saint Nicholas came with a bound.

He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot.
A bundle of toys he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a peddler, just opening his pack.

His eyes -- how they twinkled! His dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow.

The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath.
He had a broad face and a little round belly,
That shook when he laughed, like a bowlful of jelly!

He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself!
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread.

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all the stockings, then turned with a jerk.
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose!

He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim, ‘ere he drove out of sight,
"Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good-night!"

Texas won its independence from Mexico during the administration of President Andrew Jackson. Leaders of the territory then wanted to become part of the United States.

Jackson wanted to make Texas a state in the Union. But more important to him was the Union itself. Jackson felt that to give statehood to Texas would deepen the split between the northern and southern states. Texas would be a state where slavery was permitted. For this reason, the anti-slavery leaders in the North strongly opposed Texas statehood.

Jackson told Texas minister William Wharton that there was a way that statehood for Texas would bring the North and South together, instead of splitting them apart.

Jackson said Texas should claim California. The fishing interests of the North and East, said Jackson, wanted a port on the Pacific coast. Offer it to them, the president said, and they will soon forget the spreading of slavery through Texas.

Jackson and Wharton held this discussion just three weeks before the end of the president's term. Wharton spent much time at the White House.

He also worked with congressmen, urging the lawmakers to recognize Texas. He was able to get Congress to include in a bill a statement permitting the United States to send a minister to Texas. Such a minister was to be sent whenever the president received satisfactory evidence that Texas was an independent power. This bill was approved four days before the end of Jackson's term.

Wharton went back to the White House. Again and again he gave Jackson arguments for recognizing Texas.

On the afternoon of March third, eighteen thirty-seven, Jackson agreed to recognize the new republic led by his old friend, Sam Houston. He sent to Congress his nomination for minister to Texas.

One of the last acts of that Congress was to approve the nomination. The United States recognized Texas as an independent republic. But nine years would pass before Texas became a state.

The fourth of March, eighteen thirty-seven, was a bright, beautiful day. The sun warmed the thousands who watched the power of government pass from one man to another.

Andrew Jackson left the White House with the man who would take his place, Martin Van Buren. They sat next to each other as the presidential carriage moved down Pennsylvania Avenue toward the Capitol building.

Cheers stopped in the throats of the thousands who stood along the street. In silence, they removed their hats to show how much they loved this old man who was stepping down.

"For once," wrote Senator Thomas Hart Benton, "the rising sun was eclipsed by the setting sun."

The big crowd on the east side of the Capitol grew quiet when Jackson and Van Buren walked out onto the front steps of the building. After Chief Justice Taney swore in President Van Buren, the new president gave his inaugural speech.

Then Andrew Jackson started slowly down the steps. A mighty cheer burst from the crowd.

"It was a cry," wrote Senator Benton, "such as power never commanded, nor man in power received. It was love, gratitude and admiration. I felt a feeling that had never passed through me before."

Why was this, men have asked? Why did the people love Jackson so?

Senator Daniel Webster gave this reason: "General Jackson is an honest and upright man. He does what he thinks is right. And he does it with all his might."

Another senator put it this way: "He called himself 'the people's friend.' And he gave proofs of his sincerity. General Jackson understood the people of the United States better, perhaps, than any president before him."

Jackson was always willing to let the people judge his actions. He was ready to risk his political life for what he believed in. Jackson's opposition could not understand why the people did not destroy him. They said he was lucky. "Jackson's luck" the opposition called it.

Jackson seemed always to win whatever struggle he began. And the men he fought against were not weak opponents. They were political giants: Henry Clay, John C. Calhoun, Nicholas Biddle. The old general fought these men separately and, at times, all together.

The day after Van Buren became president, Jackson met with a few of his friends. Frank Blair, the editor of Jackson's newspaper, was one of them. Senator Benton was another. It was a warm, friendly meeting. They thought back over Jackson's years in the White House and talked about what had been done.

Jackson said he thought his best piece of work was getting rid of the Bank of the United States. He said he had saved the people from a monopoly of a few rich men.

Someone asked about Texas. Jackson said he was not worried about Texas. That problem would solve itself, he said.

Did the general have any regrets about anything? "Only two," said Jackson. "I regret I was unable to shoot Henry Clay or to hang John C. Calhoun."

The next morning, March sixth, Jackson left Washington to return to his home in Tennessee. President Van Buren protested that Jackson was not well enough to travel.

The old man had been sick for the last few months of his presidency. He suffered from tuberculosis, and at times lost great amounts of blood from his lungs.

When Jackson refused to listen to Van Buren's protests, the president sent the army's top doctor, Surgeon General Thomas Lawson, to travel with Jackson.

General Jackson was to leave the capital by train. Thousands of people lined the streets to the train station, waiting for a last look at their president. Jackson stood in the open air on the rear platform of the train. His hat was off, and the wind blew through his long white hair.

Not a sound came from the people who crowded around the back of the train. A bell rang. There was a hiss of steam. And the train began to move. General Jackson bowed. The crowd stood still.

The train moved around a curve and could no longer be seen. The crowd began to break up. One man who was there said it was as if a bright star had gone out of the sky.

Jackson lived for eight more years. He died as he had lived, with dignity and honor.

A few hours after his death, a tall man and a small child arrived at the Jackson home. They had traveled a long way -- all the way from Texas. The big man was Sam Houston, the president of Texas. He had heard that his friend was dying.

Houston was too late to say goodbye. He stood before Jackson's body, tears in his eyes. Then Houston dropped to his knees and buried his face on the chest of his friend and chief. He pulled the small boy close to him.

"My son," he said, "try to remember that you have looked on the face of Andrew Jackson."

Andrew Jackson stepped down from the presidency in March, eighteen thirty-seven. His presidential powers were passed to his most trusted political assistant, Martin Van Buren of New York.

Van Buren was elected president after campaign promises to continue the policies of Jackson. He was opposed by several candidates, all of the new Whig Party. Van Buren won easily with the help of Andrew Jackson.

Years before, Van Buren had done much himself to elect Jackson to the White House. After the election of eighteen twenty-four had divided the opponents of John Quincy Adams, Van Buren began to put together a political alliance for the future.

In the early eighteen thirties, the territory of Texas belonged to Mexico. But many Americans had moved to Texas because they could buy a lot of land with little money. The government of Mexico expected the settlers to speak Spanish, to become Roman Catholic and to accept Mexican traditions. The settlers did not want to.

For the most part, there was little that President Andrew Jackson could do. The United States had a treaty of friendship with Mexico. The government in Washington had a duty to remain neutral, even as the situation in Texas became increasingly tense.

Americans in Texas held a convention in April eighteen thirty-three. They prepared a list of appeals to the leader of Mexico, General Santa Ana.

The Texas settlers asked Santa Ana to end a tax on goods imported into the territory. They asked him to lift a ban on new settlers from the United States. And they asked that Texas be organized as a separate state of Mexico.

One of the Americans, Stephen Austin, carried the appeals to Mexico City. He spent six months negotiating with the Mexican government. General Santa Ana promised to honor all the requests except one. He would not make Texas a separate state, although he said that might be possible someday. Stephen Austin was satisfied. He left the Mexican capital to return to Texas.

On his way home, to his surprise, Austin was arrested. He was arrested because of a letter he wrote earlier, when his negotiations with Mexican officials seemed to be failing. He had said it might be best if the people declared Texas a separate state. Austin was put in prison in Mexico City for a year and a half.

Austin urged the people of Texas to remain loyal to Mexico. But talk of rebellion already had begun. The settlers already were calling themselves "Texans."

Minor hostilities broke out between Texans and local Mexican officials. The Mexican army threatened action. When Austin returned from prison, he was chosen to negotiate with the commander of Mexican forces. The commander refused to negotiate. It appeared that war would come. The Texans began to organize their own army.

In November eighteen thirty-five, representatives from all parts of Texas held a convention to discuss the situation. They had no plans to take Texas out of the Mexican Republic. In fact, a proposal to do that was defeated by a large vote.

However, the Texans took action to protect themselves against Santa Ana, who had declared himself dictator. They organized a temporary state government. They organized a state army. And they made plans for another convention to begin on March first.

Before the Texans could meet again, Santa Ana led an army of seven thousand men across the Rio Grande River into Texas. The first soldiers reached San Antonio on February twenty-third. The Texas forces withdrew to an old Spanish mission church called the Alamo.

On March first, the second Texas convention opened. This time, the representatives voted to declare Texas a free, independent and sovereign republic. They wrote a constitution based on the constitution of the United States. They created a government. David Burnet was named president. And Sam Houston was to continue as commander of Texas forces.

On the second day of the convention, a letter came from the Alamo in San Antonio. The letter was addressed to the people of Texas and all Americans. The commander of Texas forces at the Alamo wrote:

"I have been under an artillery attack for twenty-four hours and have not lost a man. The enemy has demanded our surrender. Otherwise, he said, he will kill every one of us. I have answered his demand with a cannon shot. Our flag still waves proudly from the walls. I shall never surrender or retreat.

"I call on you -- in the name of liberty, of patriotism, and everything dear to the American character -- to come to our aid with all speed. If my appeal is not answered, I will fight as long as possible, and die like a soldier who never forgets what he owes his own honor and that of his country."

The letter from the Alamo closed with the words: "Victory or Death."

Representatives at the convention wanted to leave immediately to go to the aid of the Texans in San Antonio. But Sam Houston told them it was their duty to remain and create a government for Texas. Houston would go there himself with a small force.

The help came too late for the one hundred eighty-eight men at the Alamo. Santa Ana's forces captured the Spanish mission on March sixth. When the battle ended, not a Texan was left alive.

Sam Houston ordered all Texas forces to withdraw northeast -- away from the Mexican army.

One group of Texans did not move fast enough. Santa Ana trapped them. He said the Texans would not be harmed if they surrendered. They did. One week later, they were marched to a field and shot. Only a few escaped to tell the story.

Santa Ana then moved against Sam Houston. He was sure his large army could defeat the remaining Texas force.

President Andrew Jackson and Sam Houston were close friends. When told of Houston's retreat, the president pointed to a map of Texas. He said: "If Sam Houston is worth anything, he will make his stand here.

Jackson pointed to the mouth of the San Jacinto River.

The battle of San Jacinto began at four o'clock in the afternoon. There were about eight-hundred Texans. There were two times that many Mexicans. The Mexicans did not expect the retreating Texans to turn and fight. But they did.

Shouting "Remember the Alamo!" the Texans ran at the Mexican soldiers. Eighteen minutes later, the battle was over. Santa Ana's army was destroyed.

About half of the Mexicans were killed or wounded. The other half were captured. Only two Texans were killed. Twenty-three, including Sam Houston, were wounded.

The Texans found Santa Ana the next day, wearing the clothes of a simple Mexican soldier. Santa Ana begged for mercy. Houston told him: "You might have shown some at the Alamo."

Many of the Texans wanted to shoot the Mexican general. But Houston said he was worth more alive than dead.

On May fourteenth, eighteen thirty-six, Texas President Burnet and General Santa Ana signed a treaty. The treaty made Texas independent.

Eighteen thirty-six was a presidential election year in the United States. Andrew Jackson had served for eight years. He did not want another term. He supported his vice president, Martin Van Buren.

Jackson's opposition to the demands for more states' rights, and his attack on the Bank of the United States, had created problems for his Democratic Party. Texas also was a problem.

Slavery was legal in the new Republic of Texas. Most northerners in the United States opposed slavery anywhere. Jackson felt that if he recognized Texas, the Democrats would lose votes in the presidential election. So Jackson decided not to act on Texas until after the election.

Opposition to the Democrats came from a coalition political party. Members of the party called themselves Whigs. Three Whigs ran for president in eighteen thirty-six against Martin Van Buren.

The Whigs did not expect any of their candidates to win. But they hoped to get enough votes to prevent Van Buren from gaining a majority. Then the House of Representatives would have to decide the election. And a Whig might have a better chance. The plan failed. Van Buren won.

Andrew Jackson had only a few months left as president. It seemed that much of his time was occupied with one question. That was the request by the Republic of Texas to become a state of the union.

Jackson wanted to make Texas a state. But more important was the union itself. The issue of slavery in Texas was critical. Jackson said:

"To give statehood to Texas now, or to recognize its independence, would increase the bitterness between the north and south. Nothing is worth this price."

Then Jackson thought of a way in which statehood for Texas could bring the nation together, instead of splitting it apart.

The national election of eighteen thirty-two put Andrew Jackson in the White House for a second term as president. One of the major events of his second term was the fight against the Bank of the United States. Jackson believed that the bank had grown too powerful. He urged Congress not to renew the bank's charter to do business. He also stopped putting federal money into the Bank of the United States. Instead, he put the money into state banks.

The head of the Bank of the United States was Nicholas Biddle. Biddle fought with all his power to keep the bank open. He created a financial panic and blamed it on President Jackson. Biddle did this by demanding immediate repayment of loans. Businesses struggled without the bank's financial assistance. Workers lost their jobs. President Jackson was warned that a mob could march on Washington. But nothing happened. Most of the battle against the Bank of the United States was fought in Congress.

Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky led the support for the bank. Clay was head of the opposition political party, the National Republicans. Clay argued his case on the floor of the Senate for three days. He strongly urged the Senate to re-new the bank's charter. He said:

"The country is in the middle of a revolution ... not yet a bloody revolution. But things are happening that point to a total change of the pure republican character of our government. Power is being centered in the hands of one man." He meant President Jackson.

Clay added: "If Congress does not act, the government will fail. And we will all die as slaves." Clay then asked the Senate to condemn Jackson for violating the constitution and the nation's laws. The Senate approved the resolution.

Things went better for Jackson in the House of Representatives. James Polk defended Jackson's opposition to the bank. Polk said: "The bank set itself up as a great, irresponsible, competing power of the government. If the bank wins this fight, no man afterwards can expect to be elected to high office in this country without first surrendering to the bank. The question is," Polk said, "if we shall have the republic without the bank or the bank without the republic."

As time passed, businessmen began to see that the Bank of the United States was being much tighter in its money policy than was necessary. They began to feel that it was Biddle -- not Jackson -- who was responsible for the serious economic situation in the country. Biddle took no responsibility for the financial crisis. He said:

"The relief must come from Congress, and Congress alone. The bank feels no need to right the wrongs caused by these miserable people. This president thinks he is to have his way with the bank. He is mistaken."

Biddle then made a serious mistake. He asked the governor of Pennsylvania to make a speech to the state legislature--a speech supporting the bank.

At the same time, Biddle refused to lend the state of Pennsylvania three hundred-thousand dollars. The governor was furious. Instead of making a speech supporting the bank, he made one that sharply criticized it. The upper house of the Pennsylvania legislature agreed with the governor. Although Nicholas Biddle threatened all sorts of action, the upper house passed a resolution that Congress should not give the bank a new charter.

Two days later, the governor of New York proposed that the state sell four or five million dollars of stock for loans to help state banks. The New York legislature approved selling even more.

This action would strengthen the state banks and help to break the power of the Bank of the United States. Nicholas Biddle began to see that the battle was lost. He started making more loans to businesses. The economic panic he had started slowly ended.

Jackson's victory over the Bank of the United States was clear. Biddle started to lose the support of many members of Congress. In the House of Representatives, James Polk proposed four resolutions on the bank. One said the bank should not get a new charter.

The second resolution said government money should not be deposited in the bank. The third said the government should continue to put its money in state banks. And the fourth proposed an investigation of the bank and the reasons for the economic panic in the country. All four of these anti-bank resolutions were approved.

One of Biddle's assistants described the feelings of bank officials.

"This day," he said, "should be ripped from the history of our republic. The president of the United States has seized the public treasury in violation of the law of the land. And the representatives of the people have approved his action."

Jackson's words were shorter: "I have won a glorious triumph."

The other major event of Andrew Jackson's second term as president was the situation in Texas. In an agreement with Spain in eighteen nineteen, the United States had given up its claim to Texas. In exchange, Spain gave the United States all of Florida.

After Mexico won its independence from Spain in eighteen twenty-one, the United States tried to buy Texas. Mexico did not want to sell. When Andrew Jackson became president he, too, tried to buy Texas. Mexico still refused to sell.

Texas was a rich land. But it was empty. Mexico decided to permit Americans to build colonies in Texas. Stephen Austin formed the first colony in eighteen twenty-two. Each farming family in his colony could have about eighty hectares of land.

Each family that wished to raise cattle could have about two thousand hectares. The settlers in Texas were able to buy the land for almost nothing. But they had to promise to join the Roman Catholic Church. They also had to promise to obey the laws of Mexico.

Most of the settlers came from the states of Tennessee, Mississippi and Louisiana. Many owned slaves and brought the slaves with them to Texas. During the eighteen twenties, Americans poured into Texas for the low-priced land.

The leader of one American colony got into trouble with the Mexican government. He was ordered to leave, but refused. With the help of a few supporters, he seized the town of Nacogdoches. He declared Texas to be an independent republic. He called it Fredonia.

This man expected the other American colonists to join him against Mexico. He was wrong. Most of the colonists did not support him. In fact, some even joined the Mexican force that put down his rebellion. The man fled back across the border into the United States.

The rebellion failed. But it made Mexican leaders see the danger of continuing to permit Americans to settle in Texas. The Mexican government sent an official to inspect conditions along the border with the United States. The official reported that as he traveled north through Texas, he saw less and less that was Mexican and more and more that was American.

He said there were very few Mexicans in some towns. And these Mexicans, he said, were extremely poor. He said the American settlers were not becoming true Mexicans. They were not speaking Spanish. They were not becoming Roman Catholics. And they were not accepting Mexican traditions. The official said the situation in Texas could throw the whole Mexican nation into revolution. He urged Mexico to send troops to occupy Texas.

Andrew Jackson was elected president in eighteen twenty-eight. He was popular with voters. But he was not sure he wanted to run for re-election in eighteen thirty-two. He was getting old. He suffered from health problems. Yet he wanted to give voters a chance to show their approval of his programs.

So Jackson made a decision. He would run again. If he won, however, he would resign after the first or second year. He would leave the job to his vice president.

President Jackson spoke of this plan to the man he wanted as his vice president, Martin Van Buren. He made the offer in eighteen thirty, when Van Buren was still his secretary of state. Van Buren thanked Jackson for the offer. However, he rejected it. Van Buren said it would be politically dangerous. He did not want anyone to say that he had been brought into the presidency in secret.

Jackson did not give up his idea. For more than a year, he continued to urge Van Buren to accept the offer. Van Buren continued to say no. He agreed to be Jackson's vice presidential candidate in eighteen thirty-two. But he said he did not want to become president without being elected by the people.

As the election got closer, Jackson's health began to improve. He began to think about serving a second full term.

One thing that helped was an operation to remove a bullet from his arm. He had received the wound during a gun fight with another man about twenty years earlier. It troubled him so badly that sometimes he could not use the arm. Doctors were afraid to remove the bullet. They thought it might cause a terrible shock to his heart.

Early in the election year, a doctor said he believed the bullet could be removed easily. He told the president that it was poisoning his whole body. Jackson asked the doctor to cut out the bullet at once. The operation was over in a few minutes. Jackson's health quickly became much better.

A funny little story was told about that bullet. Someone reportedly said Jackson should give it to the family of the man who shot him. One family member rejected the offer. He said Jackson had possessed the bullet for twenty years. So, he said, under the law, Jackson had clear ownership to it. "Only nineteen years," someone noted. "Oh," the man said, "that is all right. Since Jackson took good care of it, I will forget the extra year."

The presidential election campaign of eighteen thirty-two was bitter. President Jackson was, once again, the candidate of the Democratic Party. Henry Clay was the candidate of the National Republican Party.

Clay had the support of Nicholas Biddle, who was head of the Bank of the United States. He also had the support of about two-thirds of the nation's newspapers. This was because most of them owed money to the bank. Most wealthy people supported Clay, too.

Farmers and laborers supported Jackson. They showed their support by marching in parades and holding big, noisy public meetings.

On election day, the people showed that Jackson was still their president. There was a much bigger difference in popular votes between Jackson and Clay than between Jackson and John Quincy Adams four years earlier. As the votes were counted, one of Clay's supporters said: "The news blows over us like a great cold storm."

Jackson received about six hundred eighty-eight thousand popular votes. Clay received about four hundred seventy-three thousand votes. In the electoral college, Jackson got more than four times the number of votes than Clay got. Jackson's vice president would be Martin Van Buren.

Andrew Jackson saw his re-election as proof that the American people approved of his policies. This included his policy to close the Bank of the United States when its charter ended in eighteen thirty-six.

During his second term, Jackson decided on a plan to reduce the bank's economic power. He would stop putting federal money into the bank. Instead, he would put it into state banks. This would greatly reduce the amount of money the Bank of the United States could use.

The plan was not as easy as it seemed. The charter for the bank said federal money had to be kept there unless the secretary of the treasury ordered it put someplace else. President Jackson's treasury secretary was friendly to the bank. He would not give the order.

Jackson would have to dismiss the man and appoint someone who supported his plan. But the treasury secretary was a powerful politician. Jackson could not push him out of the job. He had to find another way. So he decided to reorganize his whole cabinet.

Jackson named his secretary of state to be minister to France. He named his treasury secretary to be secretary of state. Then he brought in someone new as secretary of the treasury. That turned out to be a mistake.

The new treasury secretary refused to put federal money anywhere but in the Bank of the United States. He also refused to resign when Jackson asked him to resign. So Jackson dismissed him and named yet another new treasury secretary.

This man immediately ordered that after October first, eighteen thirty-three, all federal money was to be put into twenty-three state banks. He did not withdraw the government money already in the Bank of the United States. He said this money could be used to make payments until it was all gone.

Nicholas Biddle, the head of the bank, fought back. He ordered the immediate repayment of all bank loans. He also withdrew from public use large numbers of bank notes. People had been using the notes as money.

These actions caused serious economic difficulties throughout the country. Many businesses failed. They could not pay back their loans or borrow the money they needed. As businesses failed, workers lost their jobs.

Nicholas Biddle said the Jackson administration was responsible for all the trouble. He said the bank was forced to take firm measures, because it was losing government money. He told people to protest to the administration. Critics of President Jackson's bank policy called him "King Andrew the First."

Groups of businessmen called on the president at the White House. They urged him to put government money back into the bank. Jackson told one group: "I will never restore the money. I will never renew the charter of the Bank of the United States. If you want help, go to Nicholas Biddle. "

The president's actions worried even some of his supporters. There could be serious long-term effects of closing the Bank of the United States. Some of his supporters in Congress went to see him. They warned him of reports that a mob was forming to march on Washington. They told him that the mob planned to seize the Capitol building until Congress returned government money to the bank.

"Gentlemen," Jackson said, "I will be glad to see this mob on Capitol Hill. I will hang its leaders high. That should stop forever all attempts to control Congress by force."

The question of continuing the Bank of the United States became a serious political issue in the national election of eighteen thirty-two. The head of the bank, Nicholas Biddle, had become very powerful. Biddle refused to recognize that the government had the right to interfere in any way with the bank's business. The bank was privately operated but could make loans with taxpayers' money.

President Andrew Jackson understood the power of the Bank of the United States. He opposed giving the bank a new charter.

Jackson said the Bank of the United States was dangerous to the liberty of Americans. The bank, he said, could build up or pull down political parties through loans to politicians. The bank, he said, would always support those who supported the bank. He proposed to form a new national bank, as part of the Treasury Department.

In the election year of eighteen thirty-two, the bank still had four years left to continue. Its charter would not end until eighteen thirty-six. Jackson had been urging Congress to act early, so that the bank could -- if its charter were rejected -- close its business slowly over several years. This would prevent serious economic problems for the country.

Many of Jackson's advisers believed he should say nothing about the bank until after the election. They feared he might lose the votes of some supporters of the bank. Biddle felt that this might be the best time to get a charter.

Henry Clay, the presidential candidate of the National Republicans, helped Biddle to make this decision. Senator Clay, however, was not thinking of the bank when he gave his advice. Clay needed an issue to campaign on. Most of the people of the country approved of Jackson's programs. Clay could not get votes by opposing successful programs. But, he was sure that the issue of the bank could get him some votes.

The campaign for a new charter was led by the most powerful men in each house of Congress. In the Senate, the bank's supporters included Senator Clay and Daniel Webster. Former President John Quincy Adams -- now a congressman -- led the bank's struggle in the house.

The chief opponent to the bank was Senator Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri. "I object to the renewal of the charter," he told the Senate, "because the bank is too great and powerful to be permitted in a government of free and equal laws. I also object because the bank makes the rich richer, and the poor poorer."

In the House, Representative Augustin Clayton of Georgia proposed an investigation of the bank. In a speech written by Senator Benton, Clayton charged that the bank had violated its charter a number of times.

The bank's supporters were afraid to vote down the proposed investigation. It would be almost the same thing as saying that the charges were true. The investigation was approved. And a special committee was given six weeks to study the charges against the bank.
Four members of the seven-man committee were opponents of the bank. Three, including John Quincy Adams, were friendly. As expected, opponents of the bank found the charges to be true. And the bank's supporters found them all to be false.

The majority report told of easy loans made to congressmen and newspapermen. It said a New York newspaper that had opposed the bank began supporting it after receiving a secret fifteen-thousand-dollar loan.

The investigation did not really change the votes of any of the congressmen. Many votes had been bought by the bank.

Attorney General Roger Taney told of one example of this. Taney opposed the bank. And he rode to work one morning with a congressman who also opposed it. The congressman asked Taney for help on a speech he planned to make against the bank.

Taney was surprised later to find that this same congressman had voted to give the bank its new charter. The congressman told Taney that the bank had made him a loan of twenty-thousand dollars.

The Senate finally voted on the bank's new charter. The vote was twenty-eight for and twenty against. The House voted three weeks later. It approved the charter, one hundred seven to eighty-five.

The bill was sent to the White House. President Jackson called a cabinet meeting. Two cabinet members, McLane and Livingston, agreed that the bill should be vetoed. But they urged Jackson to reject the bank charter in such a way that a compromise might be worked out later.

Attorney General Taney, however, believed that the veto should be in the strongest possible language. He opposed any compromise that would continue the bank beyond eighteen thirty-six. Jackson agreed with Taney. He asked the attorney general and two White House advisers to help him write the veto message. They worked on the message for three days.

On July tenth, the veto was announced. And the message explaining it was sent to Congress. Jackson said he did not believe the bank's charter was constitutional. He said it was true that the Supreme Court had ruled that Congress had the right to charter a national bank. But he said he did not agree with the high court.

And Jackson said the president -- in taking his oath of office -- swears to support the Constitution as he understands it, not as it is understood by others. He said the president and the Congress had the same duty as the court to decide if a bill was constitutional.

Jackson also spoke of the way the bank moved money from West to East. He said the bank was owned by a small group of rich men, mostly in the East. Some of the owners, he said, were foreigners. Much of the bank's business was done in the West. The money paid by westerners for loans went into the pockets of the eastern bankers. Jackson said this was wrong. Then the president spoke of his firm belief in the rights of the common man.

"It is to be regretted," he said, "that the rich and powerful bend the acts of the government to their own purposes. Differences among men will always exist under every just government.
"Equality of ability, or education, or of wealth cannot be produced by human institutions. Every man has the equal right of protection under the laws. But when these laws are used to make the rich richer, and the powerful more powerful, then the more humble members of our society have a right to complain of injustice."

Jackson said he could not understand how the present owners of the bank could have any claim of special treatment from the government. He said the government should shower its favors -- as heaven does its rain -- on the high and low alike, on the rich and the poor equally.

Henry Clay had made the bank bill the chief issue of the eighteen thirty-two presidential election campaign. Andrew Jackson chose the words of his veto message for the same purpose -- to win votes in the coming election. His veto of the bank bill cost him the votes of men of money. But it brought him the votes of the common man: the farmer, the laborer, and industrial worker.

After his first two years as president, Andrew Jackson was not sure he wished to serve a second term. Jackson was not sure his health would permit him to complete a full eight years in the White House. But he wished to be a candidate again in eighteen thirty-two to give the people a chance to show they approved of his programs.

Jackson decided that he would campaign again for president. But if he won, he would resign after the first or second year, and leave the job to his vice president.

Andrew Jackson served as president of the United States from eighteen twenty-nine to eighteen thirty-seven. His first term seemed to be mostly a political battle with Vice President John C. Calhoun.

Calhoun wanted to be the next president. Jackson believed his secretary of state, Martin Van Buren, would be a better president. And Van Buren wanted the job. He won the president's support partly because of his help in settling a serious political dispute.

President Jackson's cabinet was in great disorder. Vice President Calhoun was trying to force out Secretary of War John Eaton. Eaton would not resign, and the president would not dismiss him.

Van Buren designed a plan to gain Eaton's resignation. One morning, as Jackson discussed his cabinet problems, Van Buren said: "There is only one thing, general, that will bring you peace -- my resignation."

"Never," said Jackson.

Van Buren explained how his resignation would solve a number of Jackson's political problems. Jackson did not want to let Van Buren go. But the next day, he told Van Buren that he would never stop any man who wished to leave.

The president wanted to discuss the resignation with his other advisers. Van Buren agreed. He also said it might be best if Secretary of War Eaton were at the meeting.

The advisers accepted Van Buren's resignation. Then they went to Van Buren's house for dinner. On the way, Eaton said: "Gentlemen, this is all wrong. I am the one who should resign!" Van Buren said Eaton must be sure of such a move. Eaton was sure.

President Jackson accepted Eaton's decision as he had accepted Van Buren's. But he was unwilling to give up completely the services of his two friends. He named Van Buren to be minister to Britain. And he told Eaton that he would help him get elected again to the Senate.

Jackson then dismissed the remaining members of his cabinet. He was free to organize a new cabinet that would be loyal to him and not to Vice President Calhoun.

Even with a new cabinet, Jackson still faced the problem of nullification. South Carolina politicians, led by Calhoun, continued to claim that states had the right to reject -- nullify -- a federal law which they believed was bad.

Jackson asked a congressman from South Carolina to give a message to the nullifiers in his state. "Tell them," Jackson said, "that they can talk and write resolutions and print threats to their hearts' content. But if one drop of blood is shed there in opposition to the laws of the United States, I will hang the first man I can get my hands on to the first tree I can find."

Someone questioned if Jackson would go so far as to hang someone. A man answered: "When Jackson begins to talk about hanging, they can begin to look for the ropes."

The nullifiers held a majority of seats in South Carolina's legislature at that time. They called a special convention. Within five days, convention delegates approved a declaration of nullification.

They declared that the federal import tax laws of eighteen twenty-eight and eighteen thirty-two were unconstitutional, and therefore, cancelled. They said citizens of South Carolina need not pay the tax.

The nullifiers also declared that if the federal government tried to use force against South Carolina, then the state would withdraw from the union and form its own independent government.

President Jackson answered with a declaration of his own. Jackson said America's constitution formed a government, not just an association of sovereign states. South Carolina had no right to cancel a federal law or to withdraw from the union. Disunion by force was treason. Jackson said: "The laws of the United States must be enforced. This is my duty under the Constitution. I have no other choice."

Jackson did more. He asked Congress to give him the power to use the Army and Navy to enforce the laws of the land. Congress did so. Jackson sent eight warships to the port of Charleston, South Carolina, and soldiers to federal military bases in the state.

While preparing to use force, Jackson offered hope for a peaceful settlement. In his yearly message to Congress, he spoke of reducing the federal import tax which hurt the sale of southern cotton overseas. He said the import tax could be reduced, because the national debt would soon be paid.

Congress passed a compromise bill to end the import tax by eighteen forty-two. South Carolina's congressmen accepted the compromise. And the state's legislature called another convention. This time, the delegates voted to end the nullification act they had approved earlier.

They did not, however, give up their belief in the idea of nullification. The idea continued to be a threat to the American union until the issue was settled in the Civil War which began in eighteen sixty-one.

While President Jackson battled the nullifiers, another struggle began. This time, it was Jackson against the Bank of the United States. Congress provided money to establish the Bank of the United States in eighteen sixteen. It gave the bank a charter to do business for twenty years. The bank was permitted to use the government's money to make loans. For this, the bank paid the government one and one-half million dollars a year. The bank was run by private citizens.

The Bank of the United States was strong, because of the great amount of government money invested in it. The bank's paper notes were almost as good as gold. They came close to being a national money system.

The bank opened offices in many parts of the country. As it grew, it became more powerful. By making it easy or difficult for businesses to borrow money, the bank could control the economy of almost any part of the United States.

During Jackson's presidency, the Bank of the United States was headed by Nicholas Biddle. Biddle was an extremely intelligent man. He had completed studies at the University of Pennsylvania when he was only thirteen years old. When he was eighteen, he was sent to Paris as secretary to the American minister.

Biddle worked on financial details of the purchase of the Louisiana territory from France. After America's war against Britain in eighteen twelve, Biddle helped establish the Bank of the United States. He became its president when he was only thirty-seven years old.

Biddle clearly understood his power as president of the Bank of the United States. In his mind, the government had no right to interfere in any way with the bank's business. President Jackson did not agree. Nor was he very friendly toward the bank. Not many westerners were. They did not trust the bank's paper money. They wanted to deal in gold and silver.

Jackson criticized the bank in each of his yearly messages to Congress. He said the Bank of the United States was dangerous to the liberty of the people. He said the bank could build up or pull down political parties through loans to politicians. Jackson opposed giving the bank a new charter. He proposed that a new bank be formed as part of the Treasury Department.

The president urged Congress to consider the future of the bank long before the bank's charter was to end. Then, if the charter was rejected, the bank could close its business slowly over several years. This would prevent serious economic problems for the country.

Many of President Jackson's advisers believed he should say nothing about the bank until after the presidential election of eighteen thirty-two. They feared he might lose the votes of those who supported the bank. Jackson accepted their advice. He agreed not to act on the issue, if bank president Biddle would not request renewal of the charter before the election.

Biddle agreed. Then he changed his mind. He asked Congress for a new charter in January eighteen thirty-two. The request became a hot political issue in the presidential campaign.

In our last few programs, we described the presidential election campaign of eighteen-twenty-eight. It split the old Republican Party of Thomas Jefferson into two hostile groups: the National Republicans of John Quincy Adams and the Democrats of Andrew Jackson. The election of Jackson deepened the split. It became more serious as a new dispute arose over import taxes.

Congress passed a bill in eighteen twenty-eight that put high taxes on a number of imported products. The purpose of the import tax was to protect American industries from foreign competition. The South opposed the tax, because it had no industry to protect. Its chief product was cotton, which was exported to Europe.

The American import taxes forced European nations to put taxes on American cotton. This meant a drop in the sale of cotton and less money for the planters of the South. It also meant higher prices in the American market for manufactured goods.

South Carolina refused to pay the import tax. It said the tax was not constitutional, that the constitution did not give the federal government the power to order a protective tax.

At one time, the vice president of the United States -- John C. Calhoun of South Carolina -- had believed in a strong central government. But he had become a strong supporter of states' rights.

Calhoun wrote a long statement against the import tax for the South Carolina legislature. In it, he developed the idea of nullification -- cancelling federal powers. He said the states had created the federal government and, therefore, the states had the greater power. He argued that the states could reject, or nullify, any act of the central government which was not constitutional. And, Calhoun said, the states should be the judge of whether an act was constitutional or not.

Calhoun's idea was debated in the Senate by Robert Hayne of South Carolina and Daniel Webster of Massachusetts. Hayne supported nullification, and Webster opposed it. Webster said Hayne was wrong in using the words "liberty first, and union afterwards." He said they could not be separated. Said Webster: "Liberty and union, now and forever, one and inseparable."

No one really knew how President Andrew Jackson felt about nullification. He made no public statement during the debate. Leaders in South Carolina developed a plan to get the president's support. They decided to hold a big dinner honoring the memory of Thomas Jefferson. Jackson agreed to be at the dinner.

The speeches were carefully planned. They began by praising the democratic ideas of Jefferson. Then speakers discussed Virginia's opposition to the alien and sedition laws passed by the federal government in seventeen-ninety-eight.

Next they discussed South Carolina's opposition to the import tax. Finally, the speeches were finished. It was time for toasts. President Jackson made the first one. He stood up, raised his glass, and looked straight at John C. Calhoun. He waited for the cheering to stop. "Our union," he said, "it must be preserved."

Calhoun rose with the others to drink the toast. He had not expected Jackson's opposition to nullification. His hand shook, and he spilled some of the wine from his glass.

Calhoun was called on to make the next toast. The vice president rose slowly. "The union," he said, "next to our liberty, most dear." He waited a moment, then, continued. "May we all remember that it can only be preserved by respecting the rights of the states and by giving equally the benefits and burdens of the union."

President Jackson left a few minutes later. Most of those at dinner left with him.

The nation now knew how the president felt. And the people were with him -- opposed to nullification. But the idea was not dead among the extremists of South Carolina. They were to start more trouble two years later.

Calhoun's nullification doctrine was not the only thing that divided Jackson and the vice president. Calhoun had led a campaign against the wife of Jackson's friend and secretary of war, John Eaton.

Three members of Jackson's cabinet supported Calhoun. Mister Calhoun and the three cabinet wives would have nothing to do with Mister Eaton. Jackson saw this as a political trick to try to force Eaton from the cabinet, and make Jackson look foolish at the same time.

The hostility between Jackson and his vice president was sharpened by a letter that was written by a member of President Monroe's cabinet. It told how Calhoun wanted Jackson arrested in eighteen-eighteen.

The letter writer, William Crawford, was in the cabinet with Calhoun. Jackson had led a military campaign into Spanish Florida and had hanged two British citizens. Calhoun proposed during a cabinet meeting that Jackson be punished. Jackson did not learn of this until eighteen-twenty-nine. Jackson wanted no further communications with Calhoun.

Several attempts were made to soften relations between Calhoun and Jackson. One of them seemed to succeed. Jackson told Secretary of State Martin van Buren that the dispute had been settled. He said the unfriendly letters that he and Calhoun sent each other would be destroyed. And he said he would invite the vice president to have dinner with him at the White House.

With the dispute ended, Calhoun thought he saw a way to destroy his rival for the presidency -- Secretary of State Martin van Buren. He decided not to destroy the letters he and Jackson sent to each other. Instead, he had a pamphlet written, using the letters. The pamphlet also contained the statement of several persons denying the Crawford charges. And, it accused Mister van Buren of using Crawford to try to split Jackson and Calhoun.

One of Calhoun's men took a copy of the pamphlet to Secretary Eaton and asked him to show it to President Jackson. He told Eaton that the pamphlet would not be published without Jackson's approval. Eaton did not show the pamphlet to Jackson and said nothing to Calhoun's men. Calhoun understood this silence to mean that Jackson did not object to the pamphlet. So he had it published and given to the public.

Jackson exploded when he read it. Not only had Calhoun failed to destroy the letters, he had published them. Jackson's newspaper, the Washington Globe, accused Calhoun of throwing a firebomb into the party.

Jackson declared that Calhoun and his supporters had cut their own throats. Only later did Calhoun discover what had gone wrong. Eaton had not shown the pamphlet to Jackson. He had not even spoken to the president about it. This was Eaton's way of punishing those who treated his wife so badly.

Jackson continued to defend Margaret Eaton's honor. He even held a cabinet meeting on the subject. All the secretaries but John Eaton were there.

Jackson told them that he did not want to interfere in their private lives. But, he said it seemed that their families were trying to get others to have nothing to do with Mister Eaton. "I will not part with John Eaton," Jackson said. "And those of my cabinet who cannot harmonize with him had better withdraw. I must and I will have harmony." Jackson said any insult to Eaton would be an insult to himself. Either work with Eaton or resign. There were no resignations.

But the problem got no better. Many people just would not accept Margaret Eaton as their social equal. Mister van Buren saw that the problem was hurting Jackson deeply. But he knew better than to propose to Jackson that he ask for Secretary Eaton's resignation. He already had heard Jackson say that he would resign as president before he would desert his friend Eaton.

Andrew Jackson became president of the United States in March of eighteen twenty-nine. Thousands of his supporters came to Washington to see him sworn-in. Many were there, however, only to get a government job. They expected President Jackson to dismiss all the government workers who did not support him in the election. Jackson supporters wanted those jobs for themselves.

Most of the jobs were in the Post Office Department, headed by Postmaster General John McLean. McLean told Jackson that if he had to remove postmasters who took part in the election, he would remove those who worked for Jackson as well as those who worked for the re-election of President John Quincy Adams.

Jackson removed McLean as postmaster general. William Barry of Kentucky was named to the position. Barry was willing to give jobs to Jackson's supporters. But he, too, refused to take jobs from people who had done nothing wrong.

Many government workers had held their jobs for a long time. Some of them did very little work. Some were just too old. A few were drunk most of the time. And some were even found to have stolen money from the government. These were the people President Jackson wanted to remove. And he learned it was difficult for him to take a job away from someone who really needed it.

One old man came to Jackson from Albany, New York. He told Jackson he was postmaster in that city. He said the politicians wanted to take his job. The old man said he had no other way to make a living.

When the president did not answer, the old man began to take off his coat. "I am going to show you my wounds," he said. "I got them fighting the British with General George Washington during the war for independence."

The next day, a New York congressman took President Jackson a list of names of government workers who were to be removed. The name of the old man from Albany was on the list. He had not voted for Jackson. "By the eternal!" shouted Jackson. "I will not remove that old man. Do you know he carries a pound of British lead in his body?"

The job of another old soldier was threatened. The man had a large family and no other job. He had lost a leg on the battlefield during the war for independence. He had not voted for Jackson, either. But that did not seem to matter to the president. "If he lost a leg fighting for his country," Jackson said, "that is vote enough for me. He will keep his job." Jackson's supporters who failed to get the jobs they expected had to return home.

Next, the president had to deal with a split that developed between himself and Vice President John C. Calhoun. The trouble grew out of a problem in the cabinet. Three of the cabinet members were supporters and friends of Calhoun. These were Treasury Secretary Samuel Ingham, Attorney General John Berrien, and Navy Secretary John Branch.

A fourth member of the cabinet, Secretary of State Martin van Buren, opposed Calhoun. The fifth member of the cabinet was Jackson's close friend, John Eaton.

Eaton had been married a few months before Jackson became president. Stories said he and the young woman had lived together before they were married. Vice President Calhoun tried to use the issue to force Eaton from the cabinet. He started a personal campaign against Missus Eaton.

Calhoun's wife, and the wives of his three men in the cabinet, refused to have anything to do with her. This made President Jackson angry, because he liked the young woman.

The split between Jackson and Calhoun deepened over another issue. Jackson learned that Calhoun -- as a member of former president James Monroe's cabinet -- had called for Jackson's arrest. Calhoun wanted to punish Jackson for his military campaign into Spanish Florida in eighteen eighteen.

Another thing that pushed the two men apart was Calhoun's belief that the rights of the states were stronger than the rights of the federal government. His feelings became well known during a debate on a congressional bill.

In eighteen twenty-eight, Congress had passed a bill that -- among other things -- put taxes on imports. The purpose of the tax was to protect American industries.

The South opposed the bill mainly because it had almost no industry. It was an agricultural area. Import taxes would only raise the price of products the South imported. The South claimed that the import tax was not constitutional. It said the constitution did not give the federal government the right to make a protective tax.

The state of South Carolina -- Calhoun's state -- refused to pay the import tax. Calhoun wrote a long statement defending South Carolina's action. In the statement, he developed what was called the Doctrine of Nullification. This idea declared that the power of the federal government was not supreme.

Calhoun noted that the federal government was formed by an agreement among the independent states. That agreement, he said, was the Constitution. In it, he said, the powers of the states and the powers of the federal government were divided. But, he said, supreme power -- sovereignty -- was not divided.

Calhoun argued that supreme power belonged to the states. He said they did not surrender this power when they ratified the Constitution. In any dispute between the states and the federal government, he said, the states should decide what is right. If the federal government passed a law that was not constitutional, then that law was null and void. It had no meaning or power.

Then Calhoun brought up the question of the method to decide if a law was constitutional. He said the power to make such a decision was held by the states. He said the Supreme Court did not have the power, because it was part of the federal government.

Calhoun argued that if the federal government passed a law that any state thought was not constitutional, or against its interests, that state could temporarily suspend the law.

The other states of the union, Calhoun said, would then be asked to decide the question of the law's constitutionality. If two-thirds of the states approved the law, the complaining state would have to accept it, or leave the union. If less than two-thirds of the states approved it, then the law would be rejected. None of the states would have to obey it. It would be nullified -- cancelled.

The idea of nullification was debated in the Senate by Daniel Webster of Massachusetts and Robert Hayne of South Carolina. Hayne spoke first. He stated that there was no greater evil than giving more power to the federal government. The major point of his speech could be put into a few words: liberty first, union afterwards.

Webster spoke next. He declared that the Constitution was not the creature of the state governments. It was more than an agreement among states. It was the law of the land. Supreme power was divided, Webster said, between the states and the union. The federal government had received from the people the same right to govern as the states.

Webster declared that the states had no right to reject an act of the federal government and no legal right to leave the union. If a dispute should develop between a state and the federal government, he said, the dispute should be settled by the Supreme Court of the United States.

Webster said Hayne had spoken foolishly when he used the words: liberty first, union afterwards. They could not be separated, Webster said. It was liberty and union, now and forever, one and inseparable.

No one really knew how President Jackson felt about the question of nullification. He had said nothing during the debate. Did he support Calhoun's idea. Or did he agree with Webster.

Andrew Jackson defeated President John Quincy Adams, after a campaign in which both sides made bitter and vicious charges. One of those charges was about Jackson's wife, Rachel.

His opponents accused him of taking her from another man. They said Andrew and Rachel were married before she was legally divorced from her first husband. This was true. But it was because her first husband said he had divorced her, when really he had not. Andrew and Rachel remarried -- legally this time -- after they learned of the situation.

Rachel Jackson was a kind and simple woman. The campaign charges hurt her deeply. She was proud that Andrew was elected president. But she was not happy about the life she would have to lead as first lady. At first, it was thought that she might remain in Tennessee. But Rachel Jackson knew that her place was with her husband. She would go with him to Washington.

Preparations had to be made for the move to Washington. And for weeks, the Jackson home was busy. There was little time for Misses Jackson to rest. Her health seemed to suffer. Then on December seventeenth, just a few days before the Jacksons were to leave for Washington, two doctors were rushed to the Jackson home outside Nashville. They found Rachel in great pain. She seemed to be suffering a heart attack. The doctors treated her, and for a time, she seemed to get better.

After a day or so, Rachel was able to sit up and talk with friends. She seemed cheerful. Jackson was at her side much of the time. On Sunday, Rachel sat up too long and began feeling worse. But the doctors said it was not serious, and they urged General Jackson to get some rest. He was to go to Nashville the next day.

After her husband went to sleep in the next room, Rachel had her servant help her to sit up again. Rachel's mind was troubled about the years ahead in Washington. "I had rather be a door-keeper in the house of God," she said, "than live in that palace in Washington."

A few minutes after ten that night, Rachel cried out and fell from her chair. The servants' screams awakened everyone. Jackson was the first to get to Rachel. He lifted her to the bed. He watched as the doctors bent over her. Jackson read in their eyes that life had left Rachel. Jackson could not believe it. He sat next to her, his head in his hands, his fingers through his gray hair.

To his friend, John Coffee, Jackson said: "John, can you realize she is dead. I certainly cannot."

Rachel was buried two days later. Ten-thousand persons went to the Jackson home for the funeral. The Reverend William Hume spoke simply of Rachel Jackson's life. He talked of her kindness and humility. And he told how she had been hurt by the terrible charges made during the election campaign.

Jackson fought to hold back his tears. When the churchman finished speaking, those near Jackson heard him say: "In the presence of this dear saint, I can and do forgive all my enemies. But those vile wretches who have lied about her, must look to God for mercy."

Jackson felt that Rachel's death was caused by the vicious charges made during the election campaign. He told a friend a few days later: "May God almighty forgive her murderers as I know she would forgive them. I never can." Jackson left his home January eighteenth to begin the long trip to Washington. "My Heart is nearly broken," he said. "I try to lift my spirits, but cannot."

In Washington, no one knew what to expect. Senator Daniel Webster wrote a friend at Boston: "General Jackson will be here about the fifteenth of February. Nobody knows what he will do when he does come. My opinion is that when he comes, he will bring a breeze with him. Which way it will blow, I cannot tell. My fear is stronger than my hope."

Crowds of Jackson's supporters began arriving in the capital. Some wanted to see their man sworn-in as president. Many wanted -- and expected -- a government job. General Jackson arrived in Alexandria, Virginia, across the Potomac River from Washington, on February twelfth.

Jackson was sixty-one years old. He was a tall, thin man. His face was wrinkled. And his white hair was pushed back from his high forehead. His eyes -- usually sharp and commanding -- were filled with grief. Jackson's health had never been really good. He carried in his body two bullets from duels fought years before. But he was a tough man with a spirit strong enough to keep moving, even when seriously sick. For three weeks, the general met with his advisers and friends. He decided on the men who would form his cabinet.

For the job of Secretary of State, Jackson chose Martin Van Buren of New York, a man of great political ability. He named a Pennsylvania businessman, Samuel Ingham, to be secretary of the treasury. John Berrien of Georgia was chosen to be attorney general. His Navy Secretary would be John Branch, a former senator and governor of North Carolina. For war secretary, Jackson chose an old friend, Senator John Eaton of Tennessee.

Three members of this cabinet -- Berrien, Branch, and Ingham -- were friends of John C. Calhoun, Jackson's vice president. Calhoun expected to be president himself when Jackson stepped down in four or eight years. Martin Van Buren also wanted the presidency. He would do all he could to block Calhoun's ambition.

Andrew Jackson was sworn-in as president on March fourth, eighteen-twenty-nine. President John Quincy Adams did not go to the ceremony at the Capitol building. Jackson had said publicly he would not go near Adams. And he did not make the traditional visit to the White House while Adams was there. Jackson was still filled with bitterness over the charges made against his wife in the election campaign. He felt Adams was at least partly responsible for the charges.

The sky over Washington was cloudy on the fourth of March. But the clouds parted, and the sun shone through, as Jackson began the ride to the Capitol building. His cheering supporters saw this as a good sign. So many people crowded around the Capitol that Jackson had to climb a wall and enter from the back. He walked through the building and into the open area at the front where the ceremony would be held.

The ceremony itself was simple. Jackson made a speech that few in the crowd were able to hear. Then Chief Justice John Marshall swore-in the new president. In the crowd was a newspaperman from Kentucky, Amos Kendall. "It is a proud day for the people," wrote Kendall. "General Jackson is their own president."

From the Capitol, Jackson rode down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House. Behind him followed all those who had watched him become the nation's seventh president. The crowds followed him all the way into the White House, where food and drink had been put out for a party.

Everyone tried to get in at once. Clothing was torn. Glasses and dishes were broken. Chairs and tables were damaged. Never had there been a party like this at the White House. Jackson stayed for a while. But the crush of people tired him, and he was able to leave. He spent the rest of the day in his hotel room in Alexandria.

The guests at the White House finally left after drinks were put on the table outside the building. Many of the people left through windows, because the doors were so crowded.

Jackson was now the president of the people. And it seemed that everybody was in Washington looking for a government job. Everywhere Jackson turned, he met people who asked him for a job. They urged him to throw out those government workers who supported Adams in the election. They demanded that these jobs be given to Jackson supporters.

The presidential campaign of eighteen twenty-eight was bitter and vicious, full of angry words and accusations. The old Republican Party of Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and James Monroe had split into two opposing groups. One group was led by President John Quincy Adams and Secretary of State Henry Clay. It called itself the National Republican Party. The other group was led by General Andrew Jackson. It called itself the Democratic Party.

Each party had its own newspapers. In Washington, the Daily National Journal supported President Adams. The United States Telegraph supported General Jackson. The Telegraph published charges against the administration made by congressional Democrats.

The Journal, in turn, published a pamphlet that had been used against Jackson earlier. Among other things, the pamphlet charged that Jackson had fought a man, chased him away like a dog, and then took his wife. The charge was not true. This is the story. It is important, because it had a great effect on Andrew Jackson for the rest of his life.

Jackson met the young woman, Rachel, at her mother's home near Nashville, Tennessee. At the time, Rachel and her husband, Lewis Robards, were living there. They were having marriage problems. Robards argued with his wife about Jackson. He said she and Jackson seemed too close. Jackson was advised to leave, and he agreed to go.

Before he left, he met with Robards. Robards reportedly wanted to fight Jackson with his fists. Jackson refused to fist-fight. But, he said he would face Robards in a duel, if Robards wished to fight like a gentleman. Robards rejected the invitation, and nothing more happened between the two men. Jackson left.

Robards and Rachel settled their differences. She went back to their home in Kentucky, but did not stay long. They had another dispute, and she left. Court records say she left with a man -- Andrew Jackson.

Rachel's family had heard how unhappy she was with Robards, and had asked Jackson to bring her back to Tennessee. Robards followed them. Rachel told him she wanted a divorce. Robards threatened her. He said he would carry her away by force if she did not go back to Kentucky. Rachel decided to flee. She would go with some traders to Natchez, in the Mississippi territory. It would be a dangerous trip down the Cumberland, Ohio, and Mississippi rivers.

Jackson was troubled. He felt badly, because he had been the cause of Rachel's unhappiness. By now, Rachel meant much to Jackson. He had fallen in love with her. When the traders asked him to go to Natchez, he agreed. The group left early in seventeen ninety-one.

A few weeks earlier, Lewis Robards had begun preparations for a divorce. He did not complete the necessary action, however. Yet he led Rachel's family to believe that he had. That the two of them were no longer married.

Jackson returned to Nashville after several months. He asked for permission to marry Rachel, now that she was free of Robards. Rachel's mother gave her permission.

Andrew Jackson and Rachel were married in August seventeen-ninety-one. Both were twenty-four years old. They remained in Tennessee. The next two years were busy ones for Jackson. As a young lawyer, he worked hard and traveled far.

In December, seventeen ninety-three, he discovered court papers showing that Lewis Robards had only recently divorced Rachel. This meant that at the time Jackson and Rachel were married, she was still legally married to Robards. Jackson was shocked. As soon as possible, he and Rachel were married again -- legally this time.

Almost ten years passed. Jackson was a judge and took part in Tennessee politics. One day, Jackson met the state's governor outside the court house in Knoxville. The governor was telling a large crowd about his great services to the state.

Jackson felt it necessary to say that he, too, had done some public services. "Services," shouted the governor. "I know of no great service you have done the country except taking a trip to Natchez with another man's wife!"

Jackson's eyes grew as cold as ice. The governor pulled his sword. "Great God!" cried Jackson. "Do you speak her sacred name." He jumped at the governor with a stick. The two men were separated. A few years later, Jackson killed a man in a duel, after the other man made a joke -- while drunk -- about Jackson's marriage.

As a candidate for president, Jackson could not take to the dueling field to defend his wife's honor. He wanted to. But he knew it would prevent him from being elected.

Jackson asked a special committee of citizens to investigate his marriage and make a public report. The committee found that Jackson and Rachel got married only after they believed her first husband had divorced her.

As soon as the mistake was discovered, they were married again, legally. The report said they were not at fault.

The pro-Jackson newspaper in Washington published the committee's report. But anti-Jackson newspapers did not. They insulted him and his wife.

General Jackson struggled to control his anger. "How hard it is," he said, "to keep myself away from these villains. I have made many sacrifices for my country. But being unable to punish those who lie about my wife is a sacrifice too great to bear."

Anti-Jackson newspapers continued to print vicious lies about him. And the pro-Jackson newspapers began to print vicious lies about President Adams and his wife.

All during the bitter campaign, neither candidate said anything about one very important issue: slavery. Adams did not want to lose what little support he had in the South and West by denouncing slavery. Jackson did not want to lose the support of some Republicans in the North by openly defending it.

Adams's silence did not mean that he approved of slavery. Southerners were sure that he opposed it. And Jackson did not have to tell the South what he thought about slavery. He was a slave owner, and had bought and sold slaves all his life.

There was another important difference between the two men and their political parties. President Adams and the Republicans represented the interests of those who owned property.

Many of the president's supporters felt that wealthy, property-owning citizens should control the government. They feared popular rule, or government elected by all the people.

Jackson and the Democrats represented the interests of common men. They did not feel that the rich had more right to govern than the poor. They believed in the democratic right of all men to share equally in the government.

The election was held in different states on different days between October thirty-first and November fifth, eighteen-twenty-eight. In two states -- South Carolina and Delaware -- the legislature chose the presidential electors.

In all the other states, the electors were chosen by the voters. When the electoral votes were counted, Jackson received one hundred seventy-eight. Adams received only eighty-three. It was a great victory for Jackson.

His wife, however, was troubled. She was a simple, kind woman who loved her husband. "For Mr. Jackson's sake," she wrote, "I am glad. For my own part, I never wished it." She knew, of course, of the charges made during the campaign about their marriage. Her courage supported her. But when the excitement of the election had ended, she lost her energy. And her health became worse.

Someone proposed that Rachel Jackson stay in Tennessee until her health became better. Then she could join her husband at the White House in Washington. Rachel did not want to go to Washington. But she felt that her place was with her husband.

John Quincy Adams was sworn in as president of the United States on March fourth, eighteen twenty-five. A big crowd came to the Capitol building for the ceremony. All the leaders of government were there: senators, congressmen, Supreme Court justices and James Monroe, whose term as president was ending.

John Quincy Adams spoke to the crowd. The main idea in his speech was unity. Adams said the Constitution and the representative democracy of the United States had proved a success. The nation was free and strong. And it stretched from the Atlantic Ocean across the continent of North America to the Pacific Ocean.

During the past ten years, he noted, political party differences had eased. So now, he said, it was time for the people to settle their differences to make a truly national government. Adams closed his speech by recognizing that he was a minority president. He said he needed the help of everyone in the years to come. Then he took the oath that made him the sixth president of the United States.

John Quincy Adams had been raised to serve his country. His father was John Adams, the second president of the United States. His mother, Abigail, made sure he received an excellent education. There were three major periods in John Quincy Adams's public life. The period as president was the shortest.

For about twenty-five years, Adams held mostly appointed jobs. He was the United States ambassador to the Netherlands, Germany, Russia, and Britain. He helped lead the negotiations that ended the War of Eighteen Twelve between Britain and the United States. And he served eight years as secretary of state. He was president for four years after that. Then he served about seventeen years in the House of Representatives. He died in eighteen forty-eight.

As secretary of state, Adams had two major successes. He was mostly responsible for the policy called the Monroe Doctrine. In that policy, President James Monroe declared that no European power should try to establish a colony anywhere in the Americas. Any attempt to do so would be considered a threat to the peace and safety of the United States.

Adams's other success was the Transcontinental Treaty with Spain. In that treaty, Spain recognized American control over Florida. Spain also agreed on the line marking the western American frontier. The line went from the Gulf of Mexico to the Rocky Mountains. From there, it went to the Pacific Ocean, along what is now the border between the states of Oregon and California.

John Quincy Adams did not care for political battles. Instead, he tried to bring his political opponents and the different parts of the country together in his cabinet. His opponents, however, refused to serve. And, although his cabinet included southerners, he did not really have the support of the South.

Others in his administration tried to use the political power that he refused to use. One was Vice President John C. Calhoun of South Carolina. Calhoun hoped to be president himself one day. He tried to influence Adams's choices for cabinet positions. Adams rejected Calhoun's ideas and made his own choices.

Senator James Barbour, a former governor of Virginia, became secretary of war. Richard Rush of Pennsylvania became secretary of the treasury. And William Wirt of Maryland continued as attorney general. Adams thought he had chosen men who would represent the different interests of the different parts of the country.

In his first message to Congress, President Adams described his ideas about the national government. The chief purpose of the government, he said, was to improve the lives of the people it governed. To do this, he offered a national program of building roads and canals. He also proposed a national university and a national scientific center.

Adams said Congress should not be limited only to making laws to improve the nation's economic life. He said it should make laws to improve the arts and sciences, too.

Many people of the West and South did not believe that the Constitution gave the national government the power to do all these things. They believed that these powers belonged to the states. Their representatives in Congress rejected Adams's proposals.

The political picture in the United States began to change during the administration of John Quincy Adams. His opponents won control of both houses of Congress in the elections of eighteen-twenty-six.

These men called themselves Democrats. They supported General Andrew Jackson for president in the next presidential election in eighteen twenty-eight.

A major piece of legislation during President Adams's term involved import taxes. A number of western states wanted taxes on industrial goods imported from other countries. The purpose was to protect their own industries.

Southern states opposed import taxes. They produced no industrial goods that needed protection. And they said the Constitution did not give the national government the right to approve such taxes.

Democrats needed the support of both the West and South to get Andrew Jackson elected president. So they proposed a bill that appeared to help the West, but was sure to be defeated. They thought the West would be happy that Democrats had tried to help. And the South would be happy that there would be no import taxes.

To the Democrats' surprise, many congressmen from the Northeast joined with congressmen from the West to vote for the bill. They did so even though the bill would harm industries in the Northeast. Their goal was to keep alive the idea of protective trade taxes.

The bill passed in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. This left President Adams with a difficult decision. Should he sign it into law? Or should he veto it?

If he signed the bill, it would show he believed that the Constitution permitted protective trade taxes. That would create even more opposition to him in the South. If he vetoed it, then he would lose support in the West and Northeast. Adams signed the bill. But he made clear that Congress was fully responsible for it.

There were other attempts by Democrats in Congress to weaken support for President Adams. For example, they claimed that Adams was misusing government money. They tried to show that he, and his father before him, had become rich from government service.

Others accused him of giving government jobs to his supporters. This charge was false. Top administration officials had urged Adams to give government jobs only to men who were loyal to him. Adams refused. He felt that as long as a government worker had done nothing wrong, he should continue in his job.

During his four years as president, he removed only twelve people from government jobs. In each case, the person had failed to do his work or had done something criminal. Adams often gave jobs to people who did not support him politically. He believed it was completely wrong to give a person a job for political reasons. Many of Adams's supporters, who had worked hard to get him elected, could not understand this. Their support for him cooled.

The political battle between Adams's Republican Party and Jackson's Democratic Party was bitter. Perhaps the worst fighting took place in the press. Each side had its own newspaper. The Daily National Journal supported the administration. The United States Telegraph supported Andrew Jackson.

At first, the administration's newspaper called for national unity and an end to personal politics. Then it changed its policy. The paper had to defend charges of political wrongdoing within the Republican Party. It needed to turn readers away from these problems. So it printed a pamphlet that had been used against Andrew Jackson during an election campaign.

The pamphlet accused Jackson of many bad things. The most damaging part said he had taken another man's wife.

Four of the first five presidents of the United States came from Virginia. They were George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and James Monroe.

The second president, John Adams, was a New Englander. In the election of eighteen twenty-four, his son, John Quincy Adams, was one of four leading candidates for president. At the same time, the West began to make its presence felt in national politics.

This week in our series, Maurice Joyce and Stewart Spencer discuss the election of eighteen twenty-four.

General Andrew Jackson of Tennessee got the most electoral votes: ninety-nine. But he needed one hundred thirty-one to win a majority.

The secretary of state, John Quincy Adams, was second with eighty-four votes. Treasury Secretary William Crawford received forty-one. And Henry Clay of Kentucky got thirty-seven.

None of the candidates got a majority of the votes. And the decision went to the House of Representatives. The House voted on only the three top candidates for president.

The most powerful man in Congress -- Henry Clay -- was not, therefore, a candidate. But Clay's support would be the greatest help any of the candidates could receive. All three wanted his support.

Treasury Secretary Crawford had suffered a serious illness before the election, and his health was bad. Clay felt he could not support him for that reason.

This left Adams and Jackson. Clay did not agree with all of Adams's policies. But he did believe Adams had the education and ability to be president.

Clay did not like Jackson, the hero of New Orleans during the War of Eighteen Twelve. He knew Jackson was poorly educated and easy to anger. Clay did not think Jackson would be a good president.

So Clay decided to support Adams for president. He said nothing about this for a time. Several of Clay's friends visited Adams. They told him that Clay's supporters in the West would be pleased if Adams, as president, named Clay as secretary of state.

Adams told them that if the votes of the West elected him president, he would put a westerner in his cabinet. But he would not promise that the westerner would be Clay, or that the cabinet job would be that of secretary of state.

Clay still had not said publicly which candidate he supported. But it became known that his choice was Adams. Late in January, the Philadelphia newspaper Columbian Observer published an unsigned letter. The letter charged that Clay and Adams had made a secret agreement.

Clay, the letter said, would give his support to Adams. In exchange, Adams would name Clay his secretary of state.

Clay was furious. He not only denied the charge, but offered to fight a duel with the letter-writer, should his name be known. Much was made of the charge that Clay had sold his vote to Adams. But no proof was ever given.

Clay demanded an investigation. But the man who accused him in the newspaper letter refused to say anything. Clay was sure Jackson's supporters were responsible.

Snow was falling in Washington on the morning of February ninth, the day that Congress would elect the president. At noon, members of the Senate walked into the House of Representatives.

The electoral votes were counted, and it was announced officially that no candidate had won. The senators left, and the House began voting.

Each state had one vote for president. Adams was sure he would get the votes of twelve states. Crawford had the votes of four and Jackson, seven. New York was the question. Seventeen of the New York congressmen were for Adams, and seventeen were opposed to him. Adams needed just one of these opposition votes to get the vote of New York and become president.

One of those New Yorkers opposed to Adams was a rich old man who represented the Albany area, Stephen Van Rensselaer. Although Van Rensselaer had supported Crawford or Jackson, he really was not sure now whom to support. Henry Clay had taken the old man into his office that morning and talked to him. Daniel Webster also was there.

They both told the New York congressman that the safety of the nation depended on the election of Adams as president. Clay and Webster told the old man that his was the most important vote in the whole Congress. That Stephen Van Rensselaer would decide who would be president.

The old man's head was not too clear after listening to Clay and Webster. He still did not know what to do.

When the New York congressmen voted, Van Rensselaer still was not sure of his choice. And he put his head down on his desk and asked God to help him make the right choice.

After this short prayer, he opened his eyes and saw on the floor at his feet a piece of paper with Adams's name on it. Van Rensselaer picked it up and put it in the ballot box as his vote.

This gave Adams the vote of the state of New York and made him president of the United States. A committee of congressmen was sent to Mister Adams's home to tell him of the vote.

One member of the committee described the secretary of state: "Sweat rolled down his face. He shook from head to foot and was so nervous he could hardly stand to speak."

Later in the evening, Adams had control of himself. President Monroe gave a big party at the White House. Adams was there. So was Jackson, and Clay.

During the party, Adams and Jackson met face to face. Jackson had his arm around a young lady.

"How do you do, Mister Adams," said Jackson. "I give you my left hand, for the right -- as you see -- is devoted to the fair. I hope you are well, sir."

"Very well, sir," answered Adams, coolly. "I hope General Jackson is well."

Two days later, Adams told President Monroe that he had decided to offer the job of secretary of state to Clay. He said he was doing so because of the western support he had received.

Clay thought deeply for a week about the offer. He asked a number of friends for advice. Most of them urged him to take the job. They told him that a man of the West was needed in the cabinet. And they said being secretary of state would greatly help his own chances of becoming president some day.

Clay accepted the offer. He said he would serve as Adams's secretary of state. Until now, General Jackson had refused to believe the charges that Clay had sold his vote to Adams for the top cabinet job. Now he was sure of it. He wrote to a friend: "Was there ever before such bare faced corruption. What is this trade of vote for office, if not bribery?"

Many of Jackson's supporters did not believe John Quincy Adams had the ability to be political leader of the party. They believed that Clay would seize the party leadership and use this power to help himself become elected the next president.

Jackson, himself a senator, showed his feelings when the Senate was asked to approve Clay as secretary of state. He voted no. And thirteen other senators joined him against the nomination. But they were too few to prevent Clay from getting the job.

The next presidential election was four years away. General Andrew Jackson promised himself this would be one election he would not lose. Before he left Washington to return to Tennessee, Jackson wrote a letter that soon became public.

"I became a soldier for the good of my country," Jackson wrote. "Difficulties met me at every step. I thank God that it was my duty to overcome them. I am in no way responsible to Henry Clay. There is a purer court to which I will put my case -- to the intelligent judgment of our patriotic and honest voters."

General Jackson returned to Nashville to rest and plan. He was still a senator, and he questioned if it might not be best for him to resign from the Senate. He would be free of Washington politics and able to build his political strength for the election in eighteen twenty-eight. He decided to resign.

In the spring of eighteen twenty, President James Monroe was coming to the end of his first four years as president. He wanted to be elected again. But he faced a difficult decision.

Congress, after much debate between the North and the South, had approved a bill giving statehood to Missouri. Missouri was part of the Louisiana territory. Southern lawmakers wanted Missouri to permit slavery. Northerners wanted no slaves in Missouri. A compromise was reached. Missouri could have slaves. But nowhere else in the northern part of the Louisiana territory would slavery be permitted.

Many southerners were not satisfied. The compromise closed the door against slavery entering large new areas of land. Southerners -- like all other Americans -- had a right to settle in the new territory. President Monroe was a slave-owner. He understood the feelings of the South. His friends urged him to veto the compromise bill, because it limited slavery in the territory.

Monroe believed the compromise was wrong -- but not because it kept slaves out of the territory. The president did not believe the Constitution gave Congress the right to make such conditions.

Monroe even wrote a veto message explaining why he could not approve the compromise. But he did not use the veto. He also understood the strong feelings of those opposed to slavery.

He believed there might be civil war if he rejected the compromise. So Monroe signed the bill. Missouri had permission to enter the union as a slave state.

The crisis seemed ended. But a few months later, a new problem developed. Missouri wrote a state constitution that it sent to Congress for approval. One part of this constitution did not permit free black men to enter the state. The constitution was immediately opposed by a number of congressmen. They charged that it violated the United States constitution.

The United States Constitution said citizens of each state had the rights of citizens of each of the other states. And since free black men were citizens of some states, they should have the right to be citizens of Missouri. The debate over this lasted several months.

Former House speaker Henry Clay finally proposed a compromise that both sides accepted. Missouri could become a state if its legislature would make this promise: it would never pass any law that would violate the rights of any citizen of another state. This second compromise ended the dispute over slavery in Missouri and the Louisiana territory.

The compromise of eighteen twenty settled the crisis of slavery for more than twenty years. But everyone knew that the settlement was only temporary.

[Former President] Thomas Jefferson used these words to explain his feelings about the compromise: "This question -- like a fire bell in the night -- awakened and filled me with terror. I understood it at once as the threat of death to the union. It is hushed, indeed, for the moment.

"But," said Jefferson, "this is a reprieve only. Not a final settlement."

Monroe's decision to approve the compromise did not hurt his election chances in eighteen twenty. There was at this time really only one party -- the Republican -- and he was its leader. The opposition Federalist Party was dead. It was no longer an election threat.

Monroe was the only presidential candidate in the election of eighteen twenty. He received the vote of every elector, but one. William Plumer of New Hampshire voted for John Quincy Adams. He explained later that George Washington had been the only president to get all the electoral votes. Plumer said he did not want anyone to share this honor given to Washington.

Monroe's first four years as president had been successful. He had increased the size of the United States. Florida now was part of the country. And the problem of slavery had been temporarily settled. There had been economic problems -- some of the worst in the nation's history. But the situation was getting better.

The nation was growing. As it grew, new problems developed between its different sections. There were really three separate areas with very different interests. The northeastern states had become the industrial center of the nation. The southern states were agricultural with large farms that produced cotton, rice and tobacco. Much of the work on these farms was done by slave labor.

The western states were areas of small farms where grain was produced with free labor. It was a place where a man could make a new start. Could build a new life. The land did not cost much. And the fruits of a man's labor were his own.

This division of the nation into different sections with opposing interests ended the one-party system of Monroe's administration. The industrial Northeast wanted high taxes on imported products to protect its industry from foreign competition. This part of the country also believed the national government should pay for roads and waterways to get their products to markets.

The South did not agree to high import taxes. These taxes raised the prices on all goods. And import taxes on foreign goods might cause foreign nations to raise import taxes on southern cotton and tobacco. The South also opposed spending federal money for roads and canals. The mountains through the southern Atlantic states would make road-building difficult and canals impossible.

The western states supported government aid in the building of roads and canals. The Ohio and Mississippi rivers were the only inexpensive transportation systems for moving their products to markets. The westerners also supported high taxes on imports, because they believed such taxes would raise the prices of their agricultural products.

The separate interests of these different sections produced an exciting presidential election campaign in eighteen twenty-four. Each section had at least one candidate. Several had more than one. The campaign began almost as soon as Monroe was elected for the second time.

At one time, as many as sixteen men thought of themselves as presidential possibilities. By eighteen twenty-two, the number had been reduced to six men. Three of them were members of Monroe's cabinet: Secretary of State John Quincy Adams, Treasury Secretary William Crawford, and Secretary of War John C. Calhoun.

Adams was the only northern candidate. He was an extremely able man. There were few jobs in government he could not do, and do well. But he was not the kind of man that people liked. He was cold, questioning, and had a sharp tongue. His father was John Adams, the second president of the United States.

Treasury Secretary Crawford was a southerner -- born in Virginia -- and a large landowner in Georgia. Crawford had received some votes when the Republicans chose Monroe as their presidential candidate in eighteen sixteen. He was a good politician and supported by most southern Republicans.

War Secretary Calhoun also was a southern candidate. But he had much less support than Crawford. His home state -- South Carolina -- first named another man as its candidate. When that man died, they named Calhoun.

The West had two candidates in the election of eighteen twenty-four. One was Henry Clay of Kentucky -- "Harry of the West" -- a great lawyer, congressman, speaker of the House and senator. The other was Andrew Jackson -- "Old Hickory" -- the hero of New Orleans [the Battle of New Orleans during the war of 1812]. Jackson was poorly educated, knew little about government, and had a terrible temper. He was a fighter, a man of the people.

The sixth candidate was Dewitt Clinton of New York. He was governor of that state and leader of the commission that built the Erie Canal. But New York presidential electors were chosen by the legislature, which was controlled by Clinton's enemies. So Clinton's chances were poor.

Treasury Secretary Crawford was clearly the leading candidate two years before the election. But he had a serious illness in the autumn of eighteen twenty-three. He could not meet with the cabinet for months. He could not sign official papers.

Crawford did go back to work. But he was only a shadow of the man he had been. "He walks slowly, like a blind man," wrote one reporter. So that took secretary Crawford out as a possible candidate for the coming election.

Spain asked other European countries to help it put down rebellion among Spanish colonies in Latin America. Some of these colonies had overthrown their Spanish rulers and declared themselves independent.

Britain wanted no part of the Spanish proposal. It was trading heavily with these new Latin American countries. Spanish or even French control of this area would destroy or limit this trade.

So Britain proposed a joint statement with the United States to say that neither country wanted any of Spain's territory in the New World. Britain also wanted the United States to join in opposing the transfer of any of Spain's American territories to any other power in Europe.

Most of President James Monroe's advisers urged him to accept the British offer. Secretary of State John Quincy Adams opposed it. He did not believe the United States should tie itself to any European power, even Britain.

Monroe accepted the advice of his secretary of state. He included Adams' ideas in his message to Congress in December eighteen twenty-three. This part of the message became known as the Monroe Doctrine.

The president said no European power should, in the future, try to establish a colony anywhere in the Americas. He said the political system of the European powers was very different from that of the Americas. Monroe said any attempt to extend this European system to any of the Americas would threaten the peace and safety of the United States.

The president also said the United States had not interfered with the colonies of any European power in South America and would not do so in the future.

But, said Monroe, a number of these former colonies had become independent countries. And the United States had recognized their independence. We would see it as an unfriendly act, he said, for any European power to try to oppress or control these new American countries in any way.

At the same time, Monroe said, the United States never had -- and never would -- take part in any war among the European powers. This statement of Monroe's was only part of a presidential message to Congress. But it clearly stated one of the most important of America's foreign policies.

The nation had continued to grow during Monroe's term as president. A number of new states were added to the union. Indiana, Mississippi, Illinois, and Alabama all became states before eighteen twenty. Louisiana had become the first state to be formed from part of the Louisiana territory that the United States bought from France.

The rest of this great area was given the name of the Missouri Territory. By eighteen nineteen, there were enough people in part of the Missouri Territory for that part to become astate. It would be known as the state of Missouri. But Missouri could not become a state without the approval of Congress. And this approval was almost impossible to get.

The problem was slavery. Slaves were not new in America. Spain had brought them to the West Indies hundreds of years before. In sixteen nineteen, a ship brought twenty African slaves to Jamestown, Virginia. These black men were sold to farmers. Over the years, the use of slaves spread to all the American colonies.

There were many more slaves in the agricultural South than in the North. The farms in the North were smaller and needed less man-power. But in the South, farms were much larger, and needed many men. Slaves were the least expensive form of labor.

Most of the northern states had passed laws before eighteen hundred freeing slaves. Even the southern states made it illegal to import more slaves from Africa. But those southerners who already owned slaves believed they were necessary, and they refused to free them.

Slavery had been legal when France and Spain controlled the Louisiana territory. The United States did nothing to change this when it purchased the area. So slavery was permitted in the Missouri Territory at the time it asked for statehood.

A New York congressman, James Tallmadge, offered an amendment to Missouri's request to become a state. Tallmadge proposed that no more slaves be brought into Missouri, and that the children of slaves already there be freed at the age of twenty-five. His proposal started a debate that lasted a year.

Supporters of Tallmadge argued that his proposed amendment was Constitutional. The Constitution, they said, gave Congress the right to admit new states into the union. This also meant, they said, that Congress could refuse to admit new states unless these states met conditions demanded by Congress.

Supporters of the amendment also said small farmers of the North and East could not compete with the southern farmers and the free labor of slaves. They argued that these northern and eastern farmers had as much right to the land of Missouri as anyone else. The Louisiana territory had been paid for by the taxes of all Americans.

Those opposed to slavery also argued that slave-holding states would be given too great a voice in the government if Missouri joined them.

Under the Constitution, three of every five slaves were included in the population count to decide membership in the House of Representatives. In the past, each time a slave state was admitted to the union, a free state also had been admitted. This kept a balance in Congress.

Southerners had an answer for each argument of those supporting the Tallmadge amendment. They agreed that Congress had the Constitutional right to admit or reject a state. But they said Congress did not have the right to make conditions for a territory to become a state.

William Pinkney of Maryland argued that states already in the union had joined without any conditions. If Congress, he declared, had the right to set conditions for new states, then these new states would not be equal to the old ones. The United States no longer would be a union of equal states.

The debate was violent on both sides. Representative Howell Cobb of Georgia told Tallmadge: "You have started a fire. All the waters of the oceans cannot put it out. Only seas of blood can do so."

The House of Representatives passed the Missouri bill with the Tallmadge amendment. It was rejected by the Senate. The people of Missouri would try again for statehood when the new Congress met in eighteen twenty.

By this time, another free state was ready to enter the union. Maine -- with the permission of Massachusetts -- asked to become a separate state. Once again, a New York congressman tried to put a condition on statehood for Missouri. He offered an amendment that Missouri should agree never to permit any kind of slavery inside its borders.

House Speaker Henry Clay said that as long as any kind of condition was put on Missouri, he could never permit Maine to become a state. Clay was not strong enough to prevent the House from approving statehood for Maine. This bill was sent to the Senate for its approval. The Senate, however, joined the Maine bill with the one for unlimited statehood for Missouri. Senators refused to separate the two.

Finally, Senator Thomas of Illinois offered a compromise. He said Missouri should be admitted as a state permitting slavery. But he said no other state permitting slavery could be formed from the northern part of the Louisiana territory.

The compromise was accepted. And Congress approved statehood both for Missouri and Maine. But they would not become states until President Monroe signed the bills. President Monroe had to make a difficult decision. He was a slave-holder. Many of his friends urged him to veto the bills, which would limit slavery in the Louisiana territory. And electors would soon be chosen for the next presidential election. Still, a decision had to be made.

President James Madison retired after two four-year terms. His Republican Party chose another Virginian, James Monroe, as its next presidential candidate.

The opposition Federalist Party had almost disappeared by the time of the election in eighteen sixteen. The party did not even meet to choose a presidential candidate. But three states -- Connecticut, Delaware and Massachusetts -- promised to vote for a Federalist, Rufus King.

James Monroe easily won the election. He would serve two terms. Monroe was sworn-in as president in February eighteen-seventeen.

A few months later, he began a long trip to thirteen states. Everywhere he stopped, the people welcomed him warmly. Even in New England the crowds were large.

The president returned to Washington after three and a half months. He was tired. But he was pleased with the way the people of the United States had accepted him.

Not everyone was happy that Monroe had been elected. After all, he was the fourth American president from Virginia. The situation caused hard feelings among political leaders in other states, especially the states of New England.

Monroe tried to improve this situation. He wanted to give the top four jobs in his cabinet to men from each of the nation's four major areas: the Northeast, the South, the West and the Middle Atlantic coast. This would help improve unity. And it would help the president get expert knowledge about each of those parts of the country.

Monroe was not able to do what he wanted. He got cabinet ministers from only three of the four areas. The West was not represented.

The top cabinet job -- secretary of state -- went to John Quincy Adams of Massachusetts. Adams was the son of former president John Adams. John Quincy Adams had been a Federalist, like his father. But he became a Republican during the presidency of Thomas Jefferson.

Adams had served his country in many ways. He had served as minister to Russia. And he had been the chief negotiator at the peace talks with Britain following the War of Eighteen Twelve. President Monroe asked Henry Clay of Kentucky to be secretary of war. But Clay refused.

The president could find no other westerner who would take the job as chief of the War Department. So he gave it to John C. Calhoun, a congressman from South Carolina. William Crawford of Georgia, another Southerner, continued as treasury secretary. And William Wirt of Virginia became head of the Justice Department.

One of the first problems facing President Monroe was east Florida. It was the territory which is now the state of Florida in the southeastern United States. At that time, the territory belonged to Spain. But Spain controlled only a few towns in the area. The rest was controlled by criminals, escaped slaves and former British soldiers.

There also were native American Indians of the Seminole and Creek tribes. Sometimes, people from east Florida would cross the border and attack American citizens. One serious fight involved Seminole Indians and people just across the border in the state of Georgia.

General Andrew Jackson was ordered to march against the Indians. He was a hero of the war of eighteen twelve against Britain. Jackson sent a message to President Monroe. He said:

"Let me know in any way that the United States wants possession of the Florida territory. And in sixty days, it will be done."

Jackson received no answer to his letter. He believed the silence meant that he was free to seize Florida. He quickly gathered a force of soldiers and marched toward Florida.

General Jackson failed to capture any Indians. But he seized two Spanish towns: Saint Marks and Pensacola.

He also arrested two British subjects. The two men were tried by a military court. They were found guilty of spying and giving guns to the Indians. Both were executed.

Jackson left soldiers at several places in Florida. Then he returned to his home in Tennessee.

President Monroe called a cabinet meeting as soon as he learned of Jackson's actions. All the ministers, except Secretary of State Adams, believed that Jackson had gone too far. But they decided not to denounce him in public.

Secretary Adams prepared messages to Britain and Spain about the incidents. His message to Britain carefully stated the activities of the two British subjects in Florida and explained why they were executed. Britain agreed not to take any action.

Adams's message to Spain explained the situation this way: Spain had failed to keep the peace along the border as it had promised to do in a treaty. The United States had sent soldiers into Florida only to defend its citizens on the American side.

The United States recognized that Florida belonged to Spain. But if Americans were forced to enter Florida again -- in self-defense -- the United States might not return the territory to Spain. Spain had a choice. It could send enough soldiers to keep order in Florida. Or it could give Florida to the United States.

Spain really had no choice. At that time, Spain's colonies in South America were rebelling. All had declared their independence. Jose de San Martin led the struggle in Argentina. Bernardo O'Higgens was in Chile. And Simon Bolivar created the Republic of Great Columbia in the north.

Spain's forces could not be sent to Florida. They were needed in South America. So the king of Spain agreed to give Florida to the United States. In exchange, the United States agreed to pay five million dollars to American citizens who had damage claims against Spain.

The Florida treaty was signed in February eighteen nineteen. The American Senate quickly approved the treaty. But the king of Spain delayed his approval for almost two years.

He had hoped the United States would agree to one more demand. He did not want the United States to recognize the independence of the rebel Spanish colonies in South America.

The United States rejected the king's demand. It said Spain must approve the Florida treaty, or it would take Florida on its own. The threat succeeded. Spain approved the treaty.

Many Americans believed that the United States should recognize the independent republics in South America. The speaker of the House of Representatives, Henry Clay, agreed.

He said recognition would help protect the rights and liberties of the new republics. He said it would lead to economic ties with the United States. And he said it would make the new republics follow the lead of the United States in diplomacy and foreign policy. As a result of all this, Clay said, the United States would become the leading nation in the Americas.

Secretary of State Adams disagreed. He did not believe that the new republics could develop free and liberal forms of government. He also feared that United States' recognition of the South American republics would lead to trouble with European nations.

At the end of the Napoleonic wars, some of the nations of Europe joined in an agreement to keep the peace. They agreed to help each other put down rebellions. Such rebellions were defeated in Spain and Italy.

Britain refused to be part of the agreement. And it did not want the alliance to interfere in South America. Britain had a good trade with the new republics. Britain proposed a joint statement with the United States. The statement would say that neither country would seize Spanish colonies in the new world. And both would oppose any effort by Spain to give its American territory to another European nation.

At first, President Monroe thought he would accept the British proposal. He asked former presidents Jefferson and Madison for their advice. Both urged him to accept it. Secretary of State Adams, however, disagreed sharply. He said the United States should act alone in protesting European interference in South America.

President Monroe finally accepted the advice of his secretary of state. He included Adams's ideas in his message to Congress in eighteen twenty-three. They became known as the Monroe Doctrine.

The United States and Britain agreed late in December of eighteen fourteen to end the war between them. The peace treaty was signed the day before Christmas at Ghent, Belgium. It took several weeks for word of the agreement to reach Washington. This resulted in two events that would not have happened had communications across the Atlantic been faster.

One of the events was the battle of New Orleans. British forces had begun the attack about the time the peace treaty was being signed in Ghent. The American commander, General Andrew Jackson, had prepared his defenses well. He won a great victory against the British in a battle that was unnecessary, because the war was already over.

The other event was a convention of New England Federalists at Hartford, Connecticut. The meeting began in the middle of December and lasted through the first few days of January. Most of the representatives were from Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut. There were a few from New Hampshire and Vermont.

The Federalists called the meeting to protest the war with Britain. Many of them had opposed the war from the beginning. Federalist state governments refused to put their soldiers under control of the central government. And Federalist banks refused to lend to the government in Washington.

During the early part of the war, many businessmen in the New England states traded with the enemy. All these things had caused people in other parts of the country to turn against the Federalists. This, in turn, caused some Federalist extremists to talk of taking the New England states out of the union.

There was some fear that representatives to the Hartford convention would propose a separate and independent government for New England. Such a proposal -- while the nation was at war with Britain -- would seriously threaten America's future. Not only were the representatives at Hartford to protest the war, they also were there to plan a convention to change the United States Constitution. They wanted changes that would protect the interests of the New England states. These states felt threatened because new states were being created from the western territories.

These new states would weaken the power of New England. Some of the more extreme Federalists, led by Timothy Pickering, believed Britain would capture New Orleans. By doing so, Britain could control the Mississippi River, which the western states needed to move their products to market. "If the British succeed against New Orleans," wrote Pickering, "and I see no reason to question that they will be successful, then I shall consider the Union as cut in two. I do not expect to see a single representative in the next Congress from the western states. "

Not all the representatives at the convention were as extreme as Pickering. The majority of them were more moderate. They did not want to split the union. They only wanted to protect the interests of the New England states. These more moderate federalists controlled the secret meetings and prevented any extreme proposals. They were able to do so because of the Republican strength in New England. True, the federalists controlled the governments of these states, but only by small majorities. There would surely have been violence had the federalists tried to take these states out of the union.

Not all the representatives at the convention were as extreme as Pickering. The majority of them were more moderate. They did not want to split the union. They only wanted to protect the interests of the New England states. These more moderate federalists controlled the secret meetings and prevented any extreme proposals. They were able to do so because of the Republican strength in New England. True, the federalists controlled the governments of these states, but only by small majorities. There would surely have been violence had the federalists tried to take these states out of the union.

The federalist leaders made a public statement at Hartford, January fifth. They sharply criticized the war and President Madison. But they said there was no real reason to withdraw from the central government. New England's problems, they said, resulted from the war and from the Republican government in Washington.

Then the Federalists listed the changes they wanted in the Constitution. They wanted to reduce the congressional representation of the southern states, where slavery was permitted. They wanted new states added to the Union only if two-thirds of Congress approved. They wished to reduce the power of the central government to interfere with trade.

The Federalists wished to limit to four years the time that a man could serve as president. And they wanted only men born in the United States to serve in the government. Three of the Federalists were chosen to take this list of proposals to Washington and give it to President Madison. By the time they arrived, Washington had received the news of the peace treaty signed at Ghent. The war was over.

The three Federalists met with Madison. They made only small talk and said nothing about the demands of the Hartford convention.

The Federalist Party found itself greatly embarrassed by the peace. Its leaders had long denounced the war and said Britain could not be defeated. Many of them had traded with the enemy. Some had even worked with the British against their own country. They had even threatened to break up the Union. While there was some question about how the war would end, the Federalist Party had supporters. But once the war was over, its supporters vanished. And the party itself soon disappeared, even in New England.

The Senate acted quickly to approve the treaty with Britain. On February seventeenth, eighteen fifteen, President Madison declared the war officially ended. It had lasted two years and eight months. The United States had suffered thirty thousand casualties -- killed, wounded, or captured. But the war had united the American people. Albert Gallatin, Madison's treasury secretary and one of the negotiators at Ghent, explained it this way:

"The war has renewed and reinstated the national feelings and character which the revolution had given and which were becoming weaker. The people now have more general objects of attachment with which their pride and political opinions are joined. They are more American. They feel and act more like a nation."

On the following Fourth of July, the nation celebrated its thirty-ninth anniversary of independence. In Washington, the man who wrote the "Star-Spangled Banner," Francis Scott Key, spoke at the celebrations.

"My countrymen," he said, "we hold something rich in trust for ourselves and all the rest of mankind. It is the fire of liberty. If it is ever put out, our darkened land will cast a sad shadow over the nations. If it lives, its blaze will enlighten and gladden the whole earth. "

President Madison had been elected to his second term in eighteen twelve, the year the war started. The next presidential election was in eighteen sixteen. Madison continued the tradition, begun by Washington and followed by Jefferson, of only serving eight years as president. Republican members of the House and Senate met March fifteenth to choose their presidential and vice presidential candidates.

Three Republicans wanted to be president: Secretary of State James Monroe, former Senator and Secretary of War William Crawford, and New York Governor Daniel Tompkins. Monroe received sixty-five votes. Fifty-four of the lawmakers voted for Crawford. With Monroe chosen as the presidential candidate, the Republicans then chose Governor Tompkins as their vice presidential candidate. The Federalists did not meet to choose a presidential candidate. But electors from three of the New England states promised to vote for a New York Federalist, Rufus King. Nineteen states voted in the elections of eighteen sixteen.

In the summer of eighteen fourteen, the two countries opened peace talks at Ghent, in Belgium. But Britain was in no hurry to agree on a peace treaty.

British forces were planning several campaigns in the United States later in the year. Successful military campaigns could force the United States to accept the kind of treaty Britain wanted.

British representatives to the talks demanded that the United States give control of its Northwest Territory to the Indians. They also asked that the United States give part of the state of Maine to Canada, and make other changes in the border.

United States representatives were led by John Quincy Adams, son of former president John Adams. They made equally tough demands. The United States wanted payment for damages suffered during the war. It also demanded that Britain stop seizing American seamen for the British navy. And the United States wanted all of Canada.

The British representatives said they could not even discuss the question of impressing Americans into the British navy.

John Quincy Adams had little hope the talks would succeed. The Americans would surrender none of their territory. Old John Adams, the former president, told President James Madison: "I would continue this war forever before surrendering an acre of America."

His son, John Quincy, did not believe the British would reduce any of their demands. But another of the Americans at Ghent, House Speaker Henry Clay, felt differently. Clay was right. After Britain received word that its military campaigns had failed at Baltimore and Plattsburgh, its representatives became easier to negotiate with. They dropped the demand that the United States give the Northwest Territory to the Indians.

Britain still hoped for military successes in America. The British government asked the Duke of Wellington to lead British forces in Canada. The duke had won important victories in the war against Napoleon. Perhaps he could do the same in America. The duke was offered the power to continue the war or to make peace.

Wellington told the government he would go to America if requested. But he refused to promise any success. He said it was not a new general that Britain needed in America, but naval control of the Great Lakes that separated the United States from Canada.

"The question is," Wellington said, "can we get this naval control? If we cannot, then I will do you no good in America. I think," said Wellington, "that you might as well sign a peace treaty with the United States now. I think you have no right to demand any territory from the United States. The failure of the British military campaigns in America gives you no right to make such demands."
The British government accepted this advice from its top military expert. It ordered the British representatives at Ghent to drop the demands for American territory. The Americans then dropped their demands for Canadian territory.

The things that led to the war no longer existed. Britain's war with France had caused the British and French to interfere with neutral American trade. And Britain had needed men for its navy. Now, the war with France was over. No longer was there any reason to interfere with the trade of any nation. And no longer was there any need to seize Americans for service in the British navy.

On the day before Christmas, eighteen fourteen, the United States and Britain signed a simple treaty. In it, each side agreed to stop fighting. They agreed to settle all their differences at future negotiations.

The war had ended. But one more battle was to be fought before news of the peace treaty reached the United States.

During the autumn of eighteen fourteen, British soldiers at Jamaica began preparing for an attack against New Orleans, at the mouth of the Mississippi River. Late in November, this force of about seven thousand five hundred men sailed from Jamaica to New Orleans.

The British soldiers were commanded by General Sir Edward Pakenham. The general did not take his men directly to the mouth of the Mississippi River. Instead, they sailed across a lake east of the city.

Early during the afternoon of December twenty-third, General Andrew Jackson, the commander of American forces at New Orleans, learned the British force was near.

General Jackson was a good soldier and a great leader of men. He fought in the Revolutionary War, then studied law. He moved west to Nashville, Tennessee. The general also served in both houses of the United States Congress.

When war broke out in eighteen twelve, he was elected general of a group of volunteer soldiers from Tennessee. Jackson was a rough man. His soldiers feared and respected him. They called him "Old Hickory,” because he seemed as tough as hickory wood.

Jackson was given responsibility for defending the Gulf coast. Earlier in the year, he had attacked Pensacola, in east Florida, and forced out several hundred British marines. Jackson believed the British would attack Mobile before attacking New Orleans. He left part of his forces at Mobile and took the others to the mouth of the Mississippi.

Jackson was a sick man when he got to New Orleans. And what he found made him feel no better. Little had been done to prepare for the expected British attack. Jackson declared martial law and began building the city's defenses.

Most of the work on the defenses had been completed when Jackson got word that the British were only a few kilometers from New Orleans. "Gentlemen," Jackson told his officers, "the British are below. We must fight them tonight."

The British soldiers rested. They believed it would be easy to capture the city the next day. But Jackson rushed up guns and men, and attacked the British by surprise just after dark. Then, the Americans retreated to a place about eight kilometers south of the city.

Jackson had chosen this place carefully. On the right was the Mississippi River. On the left was a swamp -- mud and water that could not be crossed. In front of the American soldiers was an open field.

For two weeks, the British soldiers waited. They tested the American defenses at several places, but found no weaknesses. Every day, Jackson had his men improve their positions. At night, small groups of Jackson's soldiers would slip across the field and silently attack British soldiers guarding the other side.

Finally, on January eighth, the British attacked. They expected the Americans to flee in the face of their strong attack. But the Americans stood firm.

Jackson's artillery fired into the enemy. When the British got as close as one hundred fifty meters, the Americans began to fire their long rifles. The rain of bullets and shells was deadly. General Pakenham was wounded twice and then killed by a shell that exploded near him. Only one British soldier reached the top of the American defenses.

The British finally retreated. They left behind more than two thousand dead and wounded. Five hundred other British soldiers had been captured. Thirteen Americans were killed. It was a great victory for the United States, but one that was not necessary. The war had ended, by treaty, two weeks earlier.

British forces attacked Washington in the summer of eighteen fourteen. They burned the Capitol building, the White House and other public buildings before withdrawing to their ships in the Chesapeake Bay.

British General Robert Ross and Admiral Sir George Cockburn led the attack on Washington. They planned next to attack Baltimore. But the people of Baltimore expected the attack, and began to prepare for it. Fifty thousand of them built defenses around the city.

The port of Baltimore was protected by Fort McHenry. The guns and cannon of the fort could prevent British ships from reaching the city.

The British began with a land attack against Baltimore. General Ross, Admiral Cockburn, and about four thousand British soldiers landed at North Point, a finger of land reaching into the Chesapeake Bay.

From North Point, it was a march of about twenty-two kilometers to Baltimore. The march began about seven in the morning. General Ross and Admiral Cockburn stopped their men after an hour. The two commanders and several of their officers rode to a nearby farmhouse and forced the family living there to give them breakfast.

When the British officers had finished eating, the farmer asked General Ross where the British were going. "To Baltimore," answered Ross. The farmer told Ross that he might have some difficulty getting there, because of the city's strong defenses. "I will eat supper in Baltimore...or in hell," answered the British general.

Ross and Cockburn moved far in front of the British forces. A group of several hundred Americans opened fire on the British officers. Ross was hit and died soon afterwards.

The Americans retreated, but slowed the progress of the British soldiers. It was late the next day before the British force arrived to face the army of Americans near Baltimore. The Americans were on high ground and had about one hundred cannon to fire down on the British. The British commander ordered his men to rest for the night. He sent a message to the British warships to attack the city with guns and mortars. Such an attack, he felt, might cause the Americans to fall back. But the British ships already had been firing since early morning at Fort McHenry. The British guns were more powerful than those of the fort. This let the ships fire from so far away that the American guns could not hit them.

Shells and bombs from British mortars fell like rain over Fort McHenry. But few Americans in the fort were hurt or killed. Most of the rockets and shells exploded in the air or missed. Many of them failed to explode.

On a tall staff from the center of the fort flew a large American flag. The flag could be seen by the soldiers defending the city and by the British warships. The flag also was seen by a young American. His name was Francis Scott Key.

Key was a lawyer who once had thought of giving his life to religious work. He was a poet and writer. Key opposed war. But he loved his country and joined the army in Washington to help defend it.

When the British withdrew from Washington, they took with them an American doctor, Wiliam Beanes. Key knew Beanes. And he asked President Madison to request the British commander to release the doctor. President Madison wrote such a request, and Key agreed to carry it to Admiral Cockburn. Key also carried letters from wounded British soldiers in American hospitals. In one of the letters, a British soldier told of the excellent medical care he was being given.

Cockburn agreed to free the doctor after he read the reports of good medical care given his wounded men. But Cockburn would not permit Key, the doctor, or a man who came with Key to return to land until after the attack.

Francis Scott Key watched as the shells and rockets began to fall on Fort McHenry.

"I saw the flag of my country," Key said later, "waving over a city -- the strength and pride of my native state. I watched the enemy prepare for his assault. I heard the sound of battle. The noise of the conflict fell upon my listening ear. It told me that the `brave and the free' had met the invaders."

All through the rainy day, the attack continued. Doctor Beanes, watching with Key, had difficulty seeing the flag. He kept asking Key if the "stars and stripes" still flew above the fort. Until dark, Key could still see it. After then, he could only hope.
Britain tried to land another force of men near the fort. But the Americans heard the boats and fired at them. The landing failed. Shells and rockets continued to rain down on Fort McHenry. At times, the fort's cannon answered. And Key knew the Americans had not surrendered.

The British land force east of Baltimore spent most of the night trying to keep dry. Commanders could not decide if they should attack or retreat. Finally, orders came from the admiral: "Withdraw to your ships." A land attack against Baltimore's defenses would not be attempted.

At first light of morning, British shells were still bursting in the air over the fort. The flag had holes in it from the British shells. But it still flew. The British shelling stopped at seven o'clock. Key took an old letter from his pocket and wrote a poem about what he had seen.

Oh, say can you see by the dawn's early light

What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?

Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight

O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?

And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,

Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.

Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave

O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

For more than one hundred years, Americans sang this song and remembered the attack at Fort McHenry. In nineteen thirty-one, Congress made the "Star-Spangled Banner" the national anthem of the United States.

The unsuccessful British attack on Baltimore was followed by news that Britain also had suffered a defeat to the north.

British General Sir George Prevost led eleven thousand soldiers south from Montreal to New York. At Plattsburgh, on the western shore of Lake Champlain, his army was opposed by less than four thousand Americans. General Prevost believed he should get control of the lake before moving against the American defenders.

He requested the support of four British ships and about ten gunboats. A group of American ships of about the same size also entered the lake. In a fierce battle, the American naval force sank the British ships. The large land army of Prevost decided not to attack without naval support. The eleven- thousand British soldiers turned around and marched back to Montreal.

By the time these battles of eighteen f ourteen had been fought, the two sides already had agreed to discuss peace. The peace talks began in the summer at Ghent, in Belgium.

The British at first were in no hurry to sign a peace treaty. They believed that their forces would be able to capture parts of the United States.

Britain demanded as a condition for peace that the United States give large areas of its northwest to the Indians. It also said America must give Canada other areas along the border. And Britain would not promise to stop seizing American seamen and putting them in the British navy.

The United States declared war on Britain in eighteen twelve. It did so because Britain refused to stop seizing American ships that traded with France -- Britain's enemy in Europe.

Britain finally suspended its orders against neutral trade, after a change in government. But the British acted too late. The United States had declared war.

The United States navy was not ready for war. It had only a few real warships and a small number of gunboats. It could not hope to defeat the British navy, the most powerful in the world. What the United States planned to do was seize Canada, the British territory to the north. Twenty-five hundred British soldiers guarded the border. And American generals believed they could win an easy victory. They were wrong.

An American general named William Hull led two thousand men across the Canadian border. British soldiers were prepared, and they forced the Americans back. The British fought so well that General Hull surrendered all his men and the city of Detroit.

The next American attack was made from Fort Niagara, a military center in New York on the shore of Lake Ontario. A small group of American soldiers crossed the Niagara River and attacked the British. Other Americans -- state soldiers of New York -- refused to cross the border to help against the British. They calmly watched as British soldiers shot down the attacking Americans.

The third campaign was made by General Henry Dearborn. He led an army of state soldiers from Plattsburgh, New York, to the Canadian border. He was to cross the border and attack Montreal. But the state soldiers again refused to cross the border. Dearborn could do nothing but march them back to Plattsburgh.

British forces at this time were winning victories. They captured an American fort in northern Michigan. And Indians -- fighting for the British -- captured a fort at the place now known as Chicago.

Instead of marching through Canada without difficulty, the Americans found themselves trying hard to keep the British out of the state of Ohio.

For a while, the weak little American navy was doing better than the army.

Just two months after the war started, the United States warship Constitution forced a British ship to surrender. Several months later another American ship, the Wasp, captured the British ship Frolic. Then the frigate the United States defeated one of Britain's most famous fighting ships, the Macedonian. The British ship was captured and brought to the United States.

There were other victories at sea. At the end of six months, the United States navy had captured six British ships and lost only one of its own vessels.

Private American trade ships had been armed with guns when the war started. They, too, were successful against the British. They captured more than three hundred British trade ships.

The American successes forced Britain to bring more of its fighting ships into the war with the United States. By the middle of eighteen thirteen, a year after the war started, British ships controlled the United States coast. Not an American ship could enter or leave any port south of New England.

The military situation was improving in the West. William Henry Harrison, governor of the Indiana territory, formed a large force to try to capture Detroit from the British. At the same time, Captain Oliver Perry built five warships on Lake Erie. With these and four he already had, Perry met and completely defeated an English naval force.

Perry reported his victory to Harrison: "We have met the enemy, and they are ours."

Perry's victory and Harrison's large force caused the British to withdraw from Detroit, and from a British fort at Malden, in Canada. Harrison's men continued to chase the enemy. They caught them and defeated them in the battle of the Thames. Killed in this battle was the great Indian chief Tecumseh who had been fighting for the British.

United States forces made new attempts to win control of Lake Ontario and invade Canada across the Niagara River. But none of these succeeded. Late in eighteen thirteen, British soldiers crossed the river and captured Fort Niagara. They also burned the town of Buffalo.

By April eighteen fourteen, Napoleon was forced from power in Europe. And the war between France and Britain was over. This permitted Britain to send many of its soldiers in Europe to fight against the United States.

Fourteen thousand troops were sent to Canada. A smaller force was put on ships that sailed along the American coast. Another group of British soldiers was sent to Jamaica to prepare for an attack on New Orleans.

The British planned to send an army of eleven thousand men down from Canada into New York. But before this, the soldiers aboard ships along the American coast were to attack the Chesapeake Bay area and threaten Washington and Baltimore.

About four thousand British soldiers landed on the Chesapeake coast, southeast of Washington. They marched quickly toward the capital. An American general, William Winder, commanded a force two times the size of the British group. Winder was not a good general, and his troops did not defend well.

The two sides met at Bladensburg, a town ten kilometers from Washington. The British attacked and at first the American defenders held their ground. But then, British soldiers broke through the American lines, and the Americans began to run away.

General Winder ordered his men back to Washington. A group of sailors refused to retreat with their artillery. Commanded by Joshua Barney, the four hundred sailors chose to stand and fight. The struggle did not last long against the four thousand British soldiers.

Barney held his position for a half hour before enemy soldiers got behind his men and silenced the guns. Barney was wounded seriously. The British thought so much of his courage that they carried him to a hospital for their own soldiers at Bladensburg. Barney himself said the British officers treated him as a brother.

Once the British force had smashed through Barney's navy men, nothing stood between it and Washington.

The enemy spent the night about half a kilometer from the Capitol building. The commanders of the British force, General Robert Ross and Admiral Sir George Cockburn, took a group of men to the Capitol and set fire to it. Then the two commanders went to the White House to burn it.

Before setting fire to the president's home, Cockburn took one of President Madison's hats and the seat from one of Dolley Madison's chairs. The admiral found the president's table ready for dinner. As a joke, he took a glass of wine and toasted the health of "President Jemmy."

President Madison had fled the White House earlier. He crossed the Potomac River and started toward his home in Virginia. He joined his wife on the road the second day. And they decided to wait with others about twenty-five kilometers from Washington. The president returned to the capital three days after he left it. The British, after burning most public buildings, had withdrawn.

The British coastal force next attacked the city of Baltimore. But this time, the defenses were strong, and the attack failed.

Baltimore port was guarded by Fort McHenry. British warships sailed close to the fort and tried to destroy it with their guns. But the attack did little real damage to the fort.

A young American civilian, Francis Scott Key, was aboard one of the British warships during the twenty-five-hour shelling of Fort McHenry. He and a group of others had gone to the ship with a message from President Madison. The message asked the British to release an American doctor they were holding.

All through the night, the young man watched the shells bursting and the rockets exploding over the fort. In the first light of morning, he saw that the American flag still flew. On the back of an old letter from his pocket, Francis Scott Key wrote the words of "The Star-Spangled Banner," the national anthem of the United States.

In the spring of eighteen twelve, the United States and Britain were moving closer to war. Congress had approved a ninety-day embargo to stop American ships from leaving home. And American ships in foreign ports and at sea were ordered to return to the United States. President James Madison requested the embargo to prevent the capture of these ships once a war started.

The president was sure there would be war. He had seen the instructions from London to British minister Augustus Foster. The British foreign minister warned Foster to say nothing about any compromise. He wanted the United States to see how firmly Britain would continue its orders against neutral trade with the enemies of Britain.
President Madison had hoped for some sign of compromise. But there was none. Congress continued to prepare the nation for war. Lawmakers voted to increase the size of the army and to borrow money to pay for things the larger army would need.

But not all members of Congress wanted war with Britain. Many Federalists, especially, opposed it. Some of them tried to end the embargo only a month after it began.

Congressman Hermanus Bleecker showed the House a list of hundreds of names from his area of New York. He said all these people opposed the embargo and the idea of war with Britain. "It is impossible," he said, "that we can go to war when the embargo ends, sixty days from now. Where are our armies? Our navy? Have we the money to fight a war? Why, it would be treason to go to war this soon, so poorly prepared."

Treasury Secretary Albert Gallatin was having a difficult time finding money to borrow. He could get almost no money at all from Federalist New England banks. Congress had approved borrowing eleven million dollars. But Gallatin found the banks would lend only six million to the United States government.

The Federalists charged that Gallatin's difficulties showed the people did not want war, especially the people of New England. If the people of the West and the South wanted to fight, then let them pay for the war.

Republican John Randolph also spoke against the war. "How could the administration speak of war when it did not even have the courage to order taxes to raise money? Are we to go to war without money, without men, without a navy? The people will not believe it."

John C. Calhoun answered Randolph. "So far from being unprepared, sir, I believe that four weeks from the time war is declared, we will have captured much of British Canada.”

Sure that Britain would not change its hostile policies, President Madison sent a secret message to Congress on June first, proposing that war be declared. Madison listed the reasons for war:

British warships had violated the American flag at sea. The British navy had seized and carried off persons protected by this flag. British warships also violated United States waters, interfering with American ships as they entered and left port. Another reason, he said, was Britain's orders against trade with France or allies of France. International law, he said, gave Britain no right to make such orders.

Madison also spoke of the hostile Indians of the northwest territory, and seemed to charge British Canada with helping the Indians.

The president's message was sent to the Foreign Affairs Committee of the House for discussion. The committee's report was made two days later by chairman John C. Calhoun. He proposed that the House declare war.

The House, meeting in secret, heard the report. Federalist Josiah Quincy proposed that the debate should be made public. This proposal was defeated. The final vote on declaring war was seventy-nine for and forty-nine against. In the Senate, the vote was even closer: nineteen for and thirteen against.

President Madison signed the bill on June eighteenth. The War of 1812 had begun.

The leaders in Washington did not know it, but Britain -- two days earlier -- had ended its orders against neutral American trade. The orders might have been withdrawn earlier, except for a number of events.

British Prime Minister Spencer Perceval, under great political pressure, had decided to end the British orders on neutral trade. Businessmen and traders were loudly protesting that the orders were destroying England's economy. On May eleventh, before Perceval could act, he was shot to death. Not until June eighth was agreement reached on a new prime minister, Lord Liverpool.

Eight days later, his government announced that the orders were ended immediately. This was only two days before war was to be declared in Washington. And, with ships the only method of communication, the British action was not learned of in time.

If the United States had had a minister in London during the spring of eighteen twelve, he would have been able to report progress toward ending the orders. But the American minister, William Pinkney, had returned home a year earlier.

On the day that war was declared, the United States was far from ready to fight. There were only about eight thousand American soldiers. And most of them were serving in the West. The United States had only a few warships and gunboats with which to face the British navy -- the most powerful naval force in the world.

Worst of all was the division among the people of the United States about the war. It was strongly opposed in the Northeast. Church bells were rung and flags lowered in New England when the declaration of war was announced. Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut refused to let their state soldiers follow the orders of the national government.

The United States could not have lasted long against the military power of Britain had it not been for the war in Europe. Most of Britain's forces were battling the soldiers of Napoleon Bonaparte. Britain could send only small forces to fight the Americans.

The United States tried to increase the size of its army. But the United States had not fought a war, or needed an army, for a long time.

The officers who led troops in the Revolutionary War were old men, and tired. The young men had never fought and knew little about the ways of war. Two top generals were named by President Madison: sixty-two-year-old Henry Dearborn, and Thomas Pinckney, sixty-three. Most of the other generals were almost as old.

There also was the problem of getting enough men to serve as soldiers. Congress had approved an increase of twenty-five thousand men. Only five thousand agreed to serve. Members of Congress from the western states had spoken proudly of how their people would rush to fight the British. This did not happen. The first request to Kentucky for soldiers produced only four hundred men.

The United States decided the first attacks should be made against Canada. There were only about twenty-five hundred British soldiers guarding the border between the United States and Canada. Four campaigns were planned. The first of these was led by an old Revolutionary War soldier, General William Hull.

General Hull and his two thousand men were ordered to march from southern Ohio to the city of Detroit, in the Michigan territory. They had completed the three hundred kilometer march before war was declared. Hull was given immediate orders to invade Canada.

The old general crossed the border and attacked the British at Malden. But the British general there was prepared, and the attack failed. Hull retreated back to Detroit. He was chased by a smaller force of British soldiers and Indians.

Although Hull had the stronger force and plenty of supplies, he surrendered Detroit to the British. After the war, Hull was tried by a military court on charges of cowardice. The court found him guilty and ordered him shot. The president, because of Hull's service during the Revolutionary War, permitted the old soldier to live.

James Madison of Virginia was elected president of the United States in eighteen hundred and eight. He followed Thomas Jefferson and served two terms.

Madison's first four years were not easy. He had to deal with a foreign policy problem that Jefferson was not able to solve: increasingly tense relations with Britain. His second four years were worse. There was war.

James Madison was inaugurated in Washington on March fourth, eighteen-oh-nine. The people of the city were happy with the new president. But the nation was not yet sure what kind of leader he would be.

The French minister to the United States did not think much of him. He said: "Mister Madison is an intelligent man, but weak. He will always see what should be done, but will not do it."

Like the first three American presidents, Madison had a small cabinet. There would be a secretary of state and a secretary of the treasury.

Madison decided to keep Albert Gallatin in the position of treasury secretary. Gallatin probably knew more about the nation's finances than anyone else. The choice for secretary of state was political. Madison named Robert Smith, the brother of a senator. The new president was not too concerned about Mister Smith's abilities, because he planned to make foreign policy himself.

Jefferson's biggest foreign policy problem arose from a war between Britain and France. The two nations refused to honor America's neutrality. Each tried to prevent the United States from trading with the other. Both interfered with American shipping. And the British navy sometimes seized American sailors.

President Jefferson ordered a ban on trade with Europe. But it failed to end the hostile acts against the United States.

Britain and France were still at war when Madison was elected president. In place of the trade ban, Congress had approved a new law. It was called the Non-Intercourse Act. The law prevented trade with Britain and France. But it gave President Madison the power to re-open trade if either nation stopped interfering with American ships.

Madison hoped the law would force Britain and France to honor American neutrality. He did not want war. But neither did he want to surrender America's rights as an independent nation.

A month after Madison took office, the British minister in Washington, David Erskine, received new orders from his government. He said he had been given the power to settle all differences between the United States and Britain.

Erskine said Britain would stop seizing American ships if the United States would end the Non-Intercourse Law. He did not make clear that the British government demanded several conditions before an agreement could be reached.

One condition was that the United States continue the law against trade with France. Another was that Britain be permitted to capture American ships that violated the law. Erskine called the conditions, "proposals." He did not force the United States to accept them.

On April nineteenth, President Madison announced that an agreement had been reached. He said the United States would re-open trade with Britain. The American people welcomed the agreement. It appeared that -- after less than two months as president -- Madison had been able to remove the threat of war.

The United States began trading again with Britain on June tenth, as agreed. Hundreds of ships left American ports. Relations with Britain seemed to have returned to normal.

President Madison decided to spend the summer of eighteen-oh-nine at his home in the hills of Virginia. Soon after he arrived, he received surprising news. The British government had rejected the agreement he had reached with Erskine.

A British newspaper said the agreement was not what Britain wanted. It said Erskine had violated his orders and was being called back to London. A new minister, Francis James Jackson, would take his place.

Madison returned to Washington in the autumn, about a month after the new British minister arrived. He learned that Secretary of State Smith had made no progress in talks with him. So the president decided to deal with him directly. He wanted to know exactly why Britain had rejected the agreement. Madison ordered that all communications between the two sides be written. There would be no more talks.

Letters were exchanged. But the British minister failed to explain satisfactorily what had happened. And his letters seemed to charge that the United States had not negotiated honestly. Madison finally broke off all communications, and the British minister left Washington.

America's policy of trade with Britain and France continued to be a serious issue. In the early days of eighteen ten, Congress began to consider a new law to control such trade. After several weeks of debate, the two houses of Congress approved a compromise bill.

The bill ended the Non-Intercourse Act against Britain and France. It permitted trade with any nation. But it gave the president the power to declare non-intercourse again with either Britain or France separately. President Madison signed the bill into law.

Relations between the United States and Britain did not improve during the year. And President Madison once again declared non-intercourse against Britain. Trade between the two countries was stopped at the beginning of March, eighteen-eleven.

Trade was not the only problem, however. A growing number of Americans believed that the British were helping some Native American Indians to fight the United States.

As the people of the United States began to move to the northern and western territories, the government made treaties with the different Indian tribes. The treaties explained which land belonged to the Indians...and which land could be settled by the white men. The settlers did not always honor the treaties.

A leader of the Shawnee Indian tribe, Tecumseh, decided to take action. He started a campaign to unite all Indians and to help them defend against the white men.

Throughout the west, many Americans believed that the British in Canada were responsible for Tecumseh's efforts to unite the Indians. They demanded war with Britain to destroy the power of the tribes.

In Washington, a new Congress was meeting. Some of the new members were very different from the men who had controlled Congress before. They were less willing to compromise -- and more willing to go to war to defend America's interests. They soon got the name "War Hawks."

The new Congress quickly approved several measures to prepare the United States for war. One bill increased the size of the army by twenty-five thousand regular soldiers and fifty thousand volunteers.

At the same time, America had a new secretary of state. President Madison had not been pleased with the work of Robert Smith. Nor did he trust Smith. The president could not be sure of Smith's support for administration proposals.

Madison wanted his close friend, James Monroe, to be secretary of state. Monroe was then governor of Virginia. He agreed to take the new job.

What the United States did not have at that troubled time was a representative in Britain. When Madison broke off communications with British minister Jackson in Washington, Jackson returned to London. And the American minister in London, William Pinkney, sailed home.

There was no official in either capital to report what was happening. And the two countries were moving closer to war.

Thomas Jefferson left the White House in March of eighteen hundred and nine. His secretary of state, James Madison, had been elected president. Jefferson believed the nation was in good hands. He returned to Monticello, his country home in Virginia, and never went back to Washington again. But Jefferson and the new president exchanged letters often. Jefferson offered advice on a number of problems that Madison faced as the nation's fourth president.

There were many visitors to Monticello. But Jefferson was happiest when he could discuss books, government, science and education.

Jefferson believed firmly in the value of education. His whole idea of government depended on the ability of citizens to make intelligent decisions. He spent the final years of his life building a better educational system for Virginia.

Jefferson had been interested in education for most of his life. He had developed many ideas about the best way to educate the people. He believed that every citizen had the right to an education. But, he understood that all people do not have the same ability to learn.

Jefferson divided the people into two groups: those who labor and those who use their minds. He thought both should start with the same simple education -- learning to read and write and count. After these things were learned, he believed the two groups should be taught separately.

Those in the labor group, he thought, should learn how to be better farmers or how to make things with their hands. The other group should study science, or medicine or law.

Jefferson did not wait long to begin working to improve education in Virginia. A group of men decided to build a college at Charlottesville, near Jefferson's home. Jefferson immediately offered to take a leading part in starting the school. He said he would plan the buildings and also plan what the students would study. He wrote to many of his friends -- experts in education. He asked for their advice.

One of the experts told Jefferson he should not include religion among the studies. Jefferson agreed. But he understood that leaving out religious studies would cause problems. He explained it this way:

"We cannot always do what is absolutely best. Those with whom we act have different ideas. They have the right and power to act on their ideas. We make progress only one step at a time. To do our fellow men the most good, we must lead where we can, follow where we cannot. But we must still go with them, watching always for the moment we can help them move forward another step."

Jefferson began by planning a program of studies for the Charlottesville College. But he did not stop there. Before he finished, he had completed plans for a complete education system for Virginia. He proposed a school system of three steps.

The first step would be elementary schools, where all children could learn reading, writing, arithmetic and geography. These schools would be built in all areas of the state and would be paid for by the people living in each area.

The second step would be colleges -- equal to the high schools of today. He proposed that nine of these schools be built in the state. Students would begin the study of science, or would study agriculture, or how to use their hands to make things. These schools would be paid for by the state.

The third step would be a state university, where students of great ability could go to get the best of educations. The university would produce the lawyers, doctors, professors, scientists and government leaders. Young men whose families had money would pay for their own educations. The state would pay the costs of a small number of bright students from poor families.

Jefferson also proposed that the University of Virginia be built at Charlottesville. He already had begun work on the college there and offered to give it to the university.

His education program was offered to the Virginia legislature. Many lawmakers thought it was excellent. But many others opposed it. They did not want to raise taxes for the large amount of money such a system would cost.

The legislature, however, agreed to part of the plan. It approved a bill to help pay the cost of educating poor children. And it agreed to spend fifteen thousand dollars each year for a university. There was much debate about where the university should be built. Several other towns wanted the school. Finally, Charlottesville was chosen.

By this time, Jefferson had completed plans for the university buildings. He borrowed many of his ideas from the beautiful buildings of ancient Greece and Rome. The buildings were so well planned that one hundred years later, when the university was to put up a new building, the builder could find no reason to change the plans drawn by Jefferson.

Work began on the university immediately. But it was six years before the school was open to students.

Jefferson was there almost every day, watching the workmen. He was quick to criticize any mistake or work that was not done well. When he was sick and not able to go down to the university, he would watch the work through a telescope from a window of his home.

The cost of the university kept growing. And Jefferson had to struggle to get the legislature to pay for it. He also worked hard to get the best possible professors to teach at the university. He sent men throughout the United States to find good teachers. He even sent a man to Europe for this purpose. Finally, in March, eighteen hundred twenty-five, the University of Virginia opened.

Jefferson's health had suffered during his years of work for the university. He was eighty-two years old and feeling his age. He suffered from rheumatism and diabetes, and was so weak he could walk only short distances. Jefferson also found his memory was failing.

He knew he did not have much longer to live. He told a friend one day: "When I look back over the ranks of those with whom I have lived and loved, it is like looking over a field of battle. All fallen."

As his health grew worse, Jefferson turned his thoughts to death. He wrote how he wished to be buried. He wanted a simple grave on the mountainside below his house. He drew a picture of the kind of memorial he wanted put at his grave.

On this stone he wanted the statement: "Here was buried Thomas Jefferson -- author of the Declaration of American Independence, of the Virginia Law for Religious Freedom, and Father of the University of Virginia."

He did not choose his work as governor of Virginia, secretary of state, or president. There was not a word about his purchase of the Louisiana Territory from France, which added so greatly to the United States. Jefferson did not explain why he chose the Declaration of Independence, the law for religious freedom, and the university as his greatest works.

Writer Nathan Schachner, in his book on Jefferson, offers this explanation:

"He chose those points in his life when he performed some service in the unending struggle to free the human mind. Freedom from political tyranny, freedom from religious tyranny, and finally, freedom through education -- from all the tyrannies that have ever clouded and held back the human spirit."

On the Fourth of July, eighteen twenty-six, the nation began its celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Then, from Boston, came news that former president John Adams had died. His last words were: "Thomas Jefferson still lives."

But Adams was wrong. At ten minutes before ten in the morning, on that same Fourth of July, his friend, Thomas Jefferson, had died.

As the news of the deaths of the two great men spread across the country, the celebrations turned to mourning and sorrow. Jefferson was buried the next day, as he had ordered, in a simple grave on the quiet mountainside.

In the closing days of eighteen-oh-seven, President Thomas Jefferson signed a bill banning all trade with Europe. No ships could enter the United States, and no ships could leave. The purpose of the trade ban was to keep America out of the war between Britain and France.

Jefferson acted to protect American traders, ship owners and sailors. Yet those were the people who protested loudest against the ban. They were willing to take the chance of having Britain or France seize their ship and goods. They could make no money without trade.

The situation quickly turned into a political battle between Jefferson's party, the Republicans, and the opposition Federalists.

Federalist newspapers attacked Jefferson. They charged that he supported the trade ban to help Napoleon Bonaparte. They called him a tool of France.

One Federalist senator wrote a pamphlet against the trade ban. He urged northeastern states to refuse to enforce it. Then he went even further. He met secretly with the British official sent to Washington to discuss the situation. He told the British official that President Jefferson would be forced out of office because of the trade ban.

The Federalists tried hard to get Congress to end the ban. But they were not successful.

President Jefferson did not believe that trade bans -- embargoes -- were the best way to settle America's problems with other nations. But at the time, he thought an embargo was the only way to deal with Britain and France, short of war. And he did not want war.

Jefferson's economic policies had brought much progress during his two terms as president. He had been able to pay much of the national debt, and still reduce taxes. He also had begun several projects to improve communication and transportation throughout the country. He was afraid that a war would destroy everything he had done.

Jefferson simply wished to give the trade embargo a fair chance. "For a time," he wrote, "I think the embargo is less evil than war. But after a time, this will not be so. If the war should continue in Europe, and if Britain and France continue to act against us, then it will be for Congress to say if war would not be better than the embargo."

Jefferson hoped that the loss of American trade would force Britain and France to change their policies toward the United States. And he hoped the change would come quickly, for he knew the American people would not accept a long ban on trade.

A British traveler visiting New York City described what the embargo had done. He wrote: "The port is full of ships. But all of them are closed. Only a few sailors can be seen. Many of the counting houses are closed. The coffee houses are almost empty. The streets near the water are almost deserted. Grass has begun to grow upon the docks."

America's northern industrial states felt the loss of trade most strongly. But the agricultural South also was affected. Rich southern farmers and planters suddenly found themselves poor.

Tobacco was one of their major crops. And Britain bought more American tobacco than any other country. Its price fell so low because of the embargo that it had almost no value. The price of wheat fell from two dollars a bushel to seven cents a bushel. Good farmland dropped in value until it was worth almost nothing. Opposition to the embargo was growing.

Opposition was strongest in the Northeast. Ship owners and traders there believed that the embargo was wrong. They continued to export goods secretly.

Some traders began sending goods over land to Canada. From there, the goods were sent on to Britain. Congress passed a law against this kind of trade. But the shipments did not stop. Too many people were willing to violate the law for the large amounts of money they could make by trading secretly with Britain.

By August, eighteen-oh-eight, Treasury Secretary Albert Gallatin had lost all hope that the embargo would be successful. Gallatin told President Jefferson: "The embargo is now defeated by open violations, by ships sailing without permission of any kind."

Another of Jefferson's supporters gave the president this advice: "If the trade ban could be enforced, and if the people would accept it, then I am sure it would be the wisest course. But if it cannot be enforced completely, and if the people will not accept it, then it will not answer its purpose. And it should not be continued."

Jefferson, however, was not ready to give up his plan. In his last State of the Union message to Congress, he painted a bright picture of the nation.

He reported that American industry was making progress. Many goods which had been imported before the embargo were now being made at home. He said almost all of the national debt had been paid. And he said more than one hundred gunboats had been built -- enough, he declared, to defend the country.

Jefferson said nothing about opposition to the embargo. Nor did he talk of the serious economic problems caused by it. He said only that Britain and France still refused to honor American neutrality, and so the embargo must continue.

The rest of the nation was not so sure. Congress began debating a number of proposals to either lift or amend the embargo. And the opposition Federalist Party used the issue to increase its strength in northeastern states. Eighteen-oh-eight was, after all, a presidential election year.

Thomas Jefferson had served two four-year terms as president. No law prevented him from running again. But Jefferson had decided years before that a man should be limited to two terms as president.

Without such a limit, Jefferson believed, a powerful man might be able to keep the position for as long as he wished. George Washington had served two terms, and then retired. Jefferson would do the same.

Three members of Jefferson's Republican Party wanted to be president. One was James Madison, the secretary of state. The second was James Monroe, who had served as a special assistant to the president. The third was George Clinton, who was vice president during Jefferson's second term.

The Republican Party chose Madison as its candidate for president. It chose Clinton as its candidate for vice president. The Federalist Party named the same candidates it had chosen four years earlier: Charles Cotesworth Pinckney for president, and Rufus King for vice president.

The Federalists were sure of victory in the election. They thought that Jefferson's embargo on trade had angered the people and turned them away from the Republican Party. Even some Republicans felt the election could go very badly for their party.

But Jefferson remained calm. He believed that most Americans understood what he was trying to do with the embargo. And he believed they would vote for his party's candidate. Jefferson was right. Madison was elected.

As we said earlier, Congress was trying to resolve the issue of the embargo before Jefferson left office.

In the first months of eighteen-oh-nine, it finally approved a bill. The bill lifted the ban on trade with all European countries except Britain and France.

Jefferson had hoped to continue the embargo a little longer and with more powers to enforce it. He was not satisfied with the final bill. But he signed it anyway on March first. Three days later, the fifteen-month-old embargo was dead. And the United States had a new president.

In the early eighteen hundreds, Britain and France were at war with each other. The United States remained neutral. President Jefferson did not want to become involved in a war. He believed it would destroy all the progress he had made.

His economic policies had helped to pay much of the national debt. And he was able to reduce taxes. Staying neutral was not easy, however. The United States was having trouble with Britain.

For many years, Britain had been taking men by force to serve in its navy. The custom was called 'impressment.' Britain claimed the right to impress -- or seize -- any British citizen, anywhere.

Conditions in the British navy were not good at that time, and many sailors deserted. Some went to work on American ships. The American ships were stopped and searched in British waters.

Anyone born in Britain was seized. Several thousand sailors were taken off American ships during the early eighteen hundreds. Sometimes, American citizens were taken by mistake.

Impressment was one of two major problems the United States was having with Britain in the early eighteen hundreds. The other problem was trade.

Britain wanted to stop the United States from trading with France and its colonies. British warships blocked the port of New York all through the year eighteen-oh-five. No American ship could leave without being searched. When goods for France were discovered, the ship was taken to Halifax on the coast of Canada.

There, a British court had the power to seize the goods and force the ship's owners to pay a large amount of money.

President Jefferson protested this interference in American trade. He sent James Monroe to London to negotiate a treaty. Jefferson wanted Britain to stop taking sailors from American ships, and to stop interfering in the trade of neutral nations. Monroe tried many times to discuss such an agreement. But the British foreign minister was always too busy to see him.

In Washington, Congress decided to act and not wait for a treaty. The House of Representatives debated two proposals.

One proposal would stop all goods from being imported into the United States from Britain and its colonies. Imports would be permitted only after Britain had answered America's protests.

The representative who offered the proposal said: "We do not wish to destroy the ties that ought to join nations of the same interests. To prevent this, we want an agreement that will satisfy both the United States and Britain. But if Britain continues its hostile acts, then we must loosen these ties of friendship."

Some members of Congress felt that this measure was too extreme. They believed it might lead to war with Britain. The second proposal was more moderate. It would ban only those British goods which could be gotten from other places.

The House of Representatives debated the two proposals. After four months, it finally approved a ban on the import of some British goods.

President Jefferson did not want the trade ban to last long. He pressed for an agreement with Britain. He sent William Pinkney to assist James Monroe in London.

The two diplomats were told to make clear to Britain what it must do to end the limited ban on British imports. Britain was to stop taking sailors from American ships. It was to stop interfering with trade between the United States and the colonies of France. And it was to pay for all property seized from American ships.

Monroe and Pinkney knew they could never reach an agreement if they obeyed their orders. So they decided to negotiate on their own as best they could.

They dropped the demand for payment for seized property. And they accepted a note -- separate from the agreement – about impressment. The note promised that Britain would be careful not to seize any more American sailors.

At the end of December, eighteen-oh-six, Monroe and Pinkney sent word to Washington that the treaty was ready. But from the way their note was written, it seemed the treaty might not be satisfactory.

Secretary of State James Madison wrote back. He said if the two diplomats could get no clear agreement on the question of impressment, then the talks should end without a treaty.

But it was too late. Monroe and Pinkney had signed the agreement.

President Jefferson was angry. His negotiators had disobeyed his orders. He refused to send the treaty to the Senate for approval. And he said he would tell Monroe and Pinkney to re-open negotiations.

Before that could happen, an incident added more fuel to the diplomatic fire. A British navy ship attacked the American Navy ship Chesapeake while looking for deserters.

Britain believed that some of the deserters were on the American ship. The United States said the men were American citizens who had been forced to serve in the British navy. It refused to return them.

When the Chesapeake sailed out of American waters, the British ship tried to stop it and search it. The American captain did not stop. The British ship first fired two shots in front of the Chesapeake. Then it fired all its guns directly at the American ship. The Chesapeake was able to answer with only one gun. The American captain surrendered.

News of the British attack spread quickly. President Jefferson ordered all British navy ships in American waters to leave at once. He told citizens not to aid them. And he said any person -- American or British -- who disobeyed his orders would be arrested.

In London, James Monroe protested the attack on the Chesapeake. But the British foreign minister did not want to talk about the incident. Monroe saw little purpose in remaining. So he sailed for home.

A few days after he left London, the British government announced a new rule. It said any American ship sailing to Europe must stop first in Britain to get permission. Ships violating the rule would be seized. Relations between the two countries had reached the breaking point.

When President Jefferson learned of the new rule, he called a cabinet meeting to discuss the crisis. He said the United States had three choices: Go to war with Britain. Stop all trade with Europe. Do nothing. Jefferson supported the second choice -- a total embargo -- no trade with Europe.

The president sent a special message to Congress. He proposed that no ships be permitted to enter the United States, and no ships be permitted to leave. Both houses of Congress approved Jefferson's proposal. He signed the measure in the closing days of eighteen-oh-seven.

Jefferson later explained why he thought the embargo was the best choice of action.

He said if American ships had sailed out of American waters, they would have been seized by Britain or France. That would have forced the United States into war. Jefferson said: "It was far better to stop all communications with these nations until they returned to some sense of justice."

Jefferson's decision, and continuing tense relations with Britain, caused problems through his final days as president. The situation did not improve for America's next president, James Madison.

Aaron Burr was vice president of the United States. His term came to an end in eighteen hundred and five. He was heavily in debt and his political future did not look promising.

Burr was not without plans, however. For some time, he had been considering an idea. He wanted to seize Mexico from Spain. Burr made secret deals with a number of people. He told them different things to get their help or their money for his plan.

What was Aaron Burr's real goal? Was it to seize Mexico? Or was it to create a country of his own out of some of America's western lands? The facts are not clear.

Burr traveled west in the spring of eighteen-oh-five. His trip would take him down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers to the port city of New Orleans. In that city, he talked with a number of rich, powerful men. He explained his plan. And he found support among those who wished to end Spanish control of Mexico.

Burr was then ready to return east and put his plan into action.

On the way back, Burr stopped in Saint Louis to see General James Wilkinson, governor of the Louisiana Territory. Wilkinson was plotting with Burr.

At the same time, however, Wilkinson was spying for Spain. He did not want to lose the money Spain paid him for information. So he began to think about how he could pull out of Burr's plan.

He advised Burr that it might be best to forget Mexico, that perhaps the time was not right. He offered to help Burr get back into politics as a congressman from Indiana.

Burr rejected Wilkinson's offer. He was not yet ready to give up his dream about Mexico.

Burr had hoped to begin his move against Mexico in the spring of eighteen-oh-six. Without money, however, he could do nothing.

He tried to get money from people who might be interested in sharing the riches of Mexico. But he was not successful. Nor did he get the money and ships he had asked earlier from Britain.

War between the United States and Spain was an important part of Burr's plan. Should there be such a war, Burr was sure the men of the western lands would join him against the Spanish in Mexico. Without war, the campaign might fail.

Burr received bad news after he returned to Washington.

He met with President Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson made clear that there would be no war with Spain.

After his meeting with Jefferson, Burr began to make new plans. He would forget the idea of invading Mexico -- at least temporarily. Instead, he said he would build a settlement in Louisiana and wait for a better time.

While Aaron Burr had been traveling in the west, stories began to spread about his activities. Newspaper reports came close to accusing him of plotting to split the Union. People seemed willing to believe the reports. This was the situation General Wilkinson would use to pull out of Burr's plan.

Wilkinson wrote a letter to President Jefferson. He claimed that a force of ten thousand men was moving toward New Orleans. He said it was part of a campaign against Mexico. He gave details of the campaign, but claimed he did not know who was leading it. He warned the president that the force might try to seize Louisiana as well as Mexico.

It was not the first letter Jefferson received about Burr's Mexican campaign. Nor was it the first to say that Burr was, in fact, planning to split some western states from the Union. But, unlike the other letters, Jefferson accepted Wilkinson's as firm evidence against Burr.

The president called a cabinet meeting to discuss what should be done. The result of the meeting was this: all American military commanders were ordered to stop Burr.

President Jefferson then made a public declaration. He said a private military campaign was about to begin against the Spanish, and that anyone involved should leave it immediately. The declaration did not speak of Aaron Burr by name.

Jefferson also spoke of the private military campaign in his yearly State of the Union message to Congress. Congress asked for more information. In a special message, the president said Burr had several plans. One was to split the western states from the Union. Another was to seize Mexico. He said Burr wanted to make people believe he was building a settlement in Louisiana. But, he said, that was just a trick.

The president said Burr had discovered that the people of the western states would not support any attempt to take them out of the Union. So, the president said, Burr had decided to capture New Orleans. Jefferson said there was no question that Burr was guilty.

Burr's guilt had not been proved in court. But to many Americans, Jefferson's statement was taken as truth. Some demanded that Burr be put to death for treason.

The crime of treason, as explained in America's Constitution, is the act of a citizen making war against the United States.

Burr was arrested in February, eighteen-oh-seven, and taken to Richmond, Virginia. A federal grand jury hearing would be held to decide if there was enough evidence to bring him to trial. In June, the grand jury officially charged him with treason. Burr would stand trial before John Marshall, chief justice of the United States.

At one point in court, Burr spoke for himself. "Treason," he said, "is not possible without action. Yet I am being attacked -- not for acts -- but because of false reports about what I might do. The whole country has been turned against me. Is this justice? Wilkinson frightened the president with his reports about me. Then, the president frightened the people."

It was true that President Jefferson wanted to prove Burr guilty. He ordered government officials in all parts of the country to find witnesses who could give evidence against Burr.

Some of Jefferson's opponents said he did this to turn the trial into a political battle. They believed he wanted to use the trial record to attack Chief Justice Marshall, who was a member of the opposition Federalist Party. Jefferson objected to the way Marshall controlled the Supreme Court. He felt Marshall used his position to threaten the powers of the presidency and Congress.

Chief Justice Marshall knew of Jefferson's part in the accusations against Burr. He was extremely careful and fair in giving his opinions and decisions.

At the end of August, Chief Justice Marshall stopped taking evidence. He told the court that -- under the Constitution -- a charge of treason must be proved by two witnesses. He said the government's claim had not been proved by even one witness. He ordered the jury to decide the case.

On September first, the jury announced its decision. It said: "We of the jury declare that Aaron Burr is not proved guilty by any evidence offered to us. Therefore, we find him not guilty." Burr and his lawyers angrily protested the way the decision had been written. They said it was wrong for the jury to say more than "guilty" or "not guilty." Marshall agreed. He ordered the decision to be changed to read, simply, "not guilty." The trial was over.

Aaron Burr lived another twenty-nine years. He spent some time in Europe, and then New York City. A few hours before he died, a friend asked if he had ever plotted -- as part of his plan to seize Mexico -- to split the Union of American states. Burr answered: "No! I would as soon have thought of seizing the moon and informing my friends that I would divide it among them."