Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 13.pdf/412

 Thomas H. Benton. ers of the opposition to him as "fire eaters," led on by Calhoun, whom he regarded as the arch-traitor of the country. He had no sense of fear, and with a boldness and fearlessness that was characteristic of the man, figur atively speaking, took the hide off the leaders of the opposition. He usually picked out a local leader—and he knew the history of each man—and in scathing terms held him up to public scorn. It was verily the fight of his life, and he seemed to feel it. Kot one effort did he make at conciliation. The re sult of this canvass was, that he stirred up the people as they had never been stirred be fore; but he was defeated by the next Legis lature for re-election. Once after Benton had spoken, a friend suggested to him that evidently he had made an impression on the audience, to which he quickly replied: "Always the case; always the case, sir; no body opposes Benton but a few blackjack prairie lawyers; they are the only opponents of Benton; Benton and the people. Benton and the Democracy are one and the same; synonymous terms—synonymous terms, sir." It was usually a dangerous experiment for one to interrupt Benton with a question while speaking. One day a former political friend, Colonel A. W. Lamb (who had been a mem ber of Congress), interrupted him by asking a question. Benton stopped and looked at him, and then, as if he did not know him, asked, "Who are you sir?'' The reply came, "My name is Lamb, sir." "Oh," replied Benton, "you are the lamb that slipped into Con gress by hanging on to my coat-tail." Criticising on another occasion one who had deserted him, he said: "His ingrati tude is more base than traitors' arms; mean did I say: yes, most damnably mean; yes, the meanest man God ever made." Speak ing again of his enemies, he described them as "flatterers, who do not season with anysalt the praises they give; whose flatteries have a nauseous sweetness which sickens the heart that listens to them : those sordid cour tiers of favor, those perfidious adorers of for tune, who burn incense before you in pros

375

perity and crush you in misfortune. They may do it, but, if Benton goes down, he will go down with his flag at topmast, and with his pathway strewn with the bones of his enemies." One day after Benton had de livered his celebrated speech against the Omnibus Bill, which, by way of derision, he compared to Dr. Townsend's sarsaparilla, and in which he kept the Senate in a roar of laughter at the expense of Mr. Clay, who had opposed the bills separately, but supported them when consolidated, he met Judge Bay on the street, as he was going home, and asked him if he heard his speech. Bay, having answered in the affirmative, Benton said: "Didn't I give Clay hell; didn't I give Clay hell?" Judge Henry, formerly of the Supreme Court of Missouri, who often heard Benton speak, in a recent paper says of him: "I have met many men whose personality impressed me, but never one who so commanded my admiration. I knew that he was an egotist, a dogmatist, bitter and intolerant, but his transcendent genius obscured these faults as the sun's brilliant light hides from our view the stars which are so bright, when the sun has set in the west. Benton was not a lovable man. He had nothing to attract men to him except his gigantic intellect. He did not adopt the means to which 'small fry' politicians resort to win popular favor. He was honest, and the people knew it; he was able, and the people recognized it.'' Judge Henry was politically opposed to Mr. Benton in his lifetime. In 1852 Mr. Benton was elected to Congress from St. Louis. While serving in the House he made his last great speech in opposition to the Kansas and Nebraska bill, which had been so stronglv urged by Douglass. So intense were his sentiments against the bill advocated by Douglass, that in speaking once before a Missouri audience, to emphasize his feeling against Douglass, he spoke of him as "Stephen A. Douglass—not Fred." The mat ter of the aspirations of Douglass for the Presidency being once mentioned in his près