Free
Soil party would be a joke to shake his sides and mine.

Gentlemen, my first acquaintance in public life with Mr. Van Buren was
when he was pressing with great power the election of Mr. Crawford to
the Presidency, against Mr. Adams. Mr. Crawford was not elected, and Mr.
Adams was. Mr. Van Buren was in the Senate nearly the whole of that
administration; and during the remainder of it he was Governor of the
State of New York. It is notorious that he was the soul and centre,
throughout the whole of Mr. Adams's term, of the opposition made to him.
He did more to prevent Mr. Adams's re-election in 1828, and to obtain
General Jackson's election, than any other man,--yes, than any _ten_
other men in the country.

General Jackson was chosen, and Mr. Van Buren was appointed his
Secretary of State. It so happened that in July, 1829, Mr. McLane went
to England to arrange the controverted, difficult, and disputed point on
the subject of the colonial trade. Mr. Adams had held a high tone on
that subject. He had demanded, on the ground of reciprocity and right,
the introduction of our products into all parts of the British
territory, freely, in our own vessels, since Great Britain was allowed
to bring her produce into the United States upon the same terms. Mr.
Adams placed this demand upon the ground of reciprocity and justice.
Great Britain would not yield. Mr. Van Buren, in his instructions to Mr.
McLane, told him to yield that question of right, and to solicit the
free admission of American produce into the British colonies, on the
ground of privilege and favor; intimating that there had been a change
of parties, and that this favor ought not to be refused to General
Jackson's administration because it had been demanded on the ground of
right by Mr. Adams's. This is the sum and substance of the instruction.

Well, Gentlemen, it was one of the most painful duties of my life, on
account of this, to refuse my assent to Mr. Van Buren's nomination. It
was novel in our history, when an administration changes, for the new
administration to seek to obtain privileges from a foreign power on the
assertion that they have abandoned the ground of their predecessors. I
suppose that such a course is held to be altogether undignified by all
public men. When I went into the Department of State under General
Harrison, I found in the conduct of my predecessor many things that I
could have wished had been otherwise. Did I retract a jot or tit