Page:Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography volume 2.djvu/244

 PROMINENT PERSONS

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tion of the good faith "implied in the cession of the District," accompanying it with re- marks in which he was understood to de- plore the attacks on slavery no less, if not more, than the existence of slavery itself.

During the canvass of 1840, Clay declared all the old questions of Bank, tariff and internal improvement "obsolete questions,'* but on the accession of Harrison as Presi- dent, Clay rallied the Whigs in favor of these measures, and brought about a breach in the Whig party by running counter to the known views of President Tyler. On March 31, 1842, Clay left the senate, as he said, "forever/' On May i, 1844, he was a third time nominated for President by the Whig national convention without any bal- lot. Polk became president, the annexation of Texas followed, as well as the war with Mexico. Clay protested against the Mex- ican war, referring to the declaration of congress that "war existed by the act of Mexico," and said that no earthly considera- tion could ever have tempted or provoked him to vote for a bill with such a palpable falsehood stamped upon its face. Later on he contemplated selling "Ashland," to sat- isfy pressing pecuniary obligations, but the president of the bank at Lexington, to whom he was offering a payment, informed him that sums of money had arrived from various parts of the country to pay his debts, and every note and mortgage of his was canceled. Clay was deeply moved, but to his inquiries the answer given was that the names of the donors were unknown. Mr. Clay took no part in the canvass that elected President Taylor, but in December, 1848, he was unanimously reelected to the senate, and took his seat December, 1849. He took an active part in framing the bill for the vot-u

admission of California, for territorial gov- ernment in New Mexico and Utah, the set- tlement of the western boundary of Texas, the provision of new laws for the return of fugitive slaves to their masters, the aboli- tion of slavery in the District of Columbia, and in the decision that congress had no power to prohibit or obstruct the trade in slaves between slaveholding states. This was the famous compromise of 1850, the last plan of the kind to which he gave his mind and energies. When congress adjourned Clay went to Cuba for his health, and re- turned to Ashland. In December, 185 1. he was again in Washington, but appeared only once in the senate. He lived to see the substance of his celebrated compromise measure on the subject of slavery pass into the political platforms of the Whig and Democratic parties at the national conven- tion of June, 1852. After appropriate funeral services in the senate chamber his remains were removed to Kentucky, the people as- sembling by thousands in the cities through which the funeral train passed, to do honor to his memory. He died June 29, 1852, and on July 10, he was buried at Lexington, Kentucky, where an imposing monument has been erected. Nine months before his death his friends in New York caused to be made a gold medal in commemoration of his public services. Mr. Qay said: "If any- one desires to know the leading and para- mount object of my public life, the preser- vation of the Union will furnish him with the key." Mr. Clay died June 29, 1852.

Gnindy, Felix, born in Berkeley county, Virginia, September 11, 1777. His father, an Englishman, removed to Pennsylvania, and then to Kentucky. His first instruction

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