Mr. Toombs carried every county in the district and was
returned to Congress by 1681 majority.

When Mr. Toombs returned to Washington he had commanded national
prominence. He had not only carried his State for Zachary Taylor, but
his speech in New York, during a critical period of the canvass, had
turned the tide for the Whig candidate in the country. Toombs and
Stephens naturally stood very near the administration. They soon had
reason to see, however, that the Taylor Cabinet was not attentive to
Southern counsels.

During the fight over the compromise measure in Congress the Northern
papers printed sensational accounts of a rupture between President
Taylor and Messrs. Toombs and Stephens. According to this account the
Georgia congressmen called on the President and expressed strong
disapprobation of his stand upon the bill to organize the Territory of
New Mexico. It was said that they even threatened to side with his
opponents to censure him upon his action in the case of Secretary
Crawford and the Golphin claim. The President, the article recited, was
very much troubled over this interview and remained despondent for
several days. He took his bed and never rallied, dying on the 9th of
July, 1850. Mr. Stephens published a card, promptly denying this
sensation. He said that neither he nor his colleague Mr. Toombs had
visited the President at all during or previous to his last illness, and
that no such scene had occurred.

Toombs and Stephens, in fact, were warm personal friends of George W.
Crawford, who was Secretary of War in Taylor's Cabinet. He had served
with them in the General Assembly of Georgia and had twice been Governor
of their State. The Golphin claim, of which Governor Crawford had been
agent, had been collected from the Secretary of the Treasury while
Governor Crawford was in the Cabinet, but President Taylor had decided
that as Governor Crawford was at the head of an entirely different
department of the government, he had been guilty of no impropriety.
After the death of President Taylor, Governor Crawford returned to
Augusta and was tendered a public dinner by his fellow-citizens,
irrespective of party. He delivered an eloquent and feeling address. He
made an extensive tour abroad, then lived in retirement in Richmond
County, enjoying the respect and confidence of his neighbors.

CHAPTER VI.

THE COMPROMISE OF 1850.

No legislative body ever assembled with more momentous measures before