much
criticism. How the Governor got it does not appear, but it gives a
glimpse of Van Buren's political methods that is interesting. "Unless
we can alarm them (the Clintonians) by two or three prompt removals,"
he says, "there is no limiting the injurious consequences that may
result from it."

Soon after, two of the postmasters were removed. If the charge was
true, that postmasters were preventing the circulation of Bucktail
newspapers, Van Buren's course was very charitable. Evidently he did
not want places for his friends so much as a proper delivery of the
mails; for otherwise he would have insisted upon the removal of all
offenders. The gentle suggestion that the removal of two or three
would be a warning to others, explains how this devout lover of men
lived through a long life on most intimate terms with his neighbours.
If such conditions existed under the modern management of the
Post-Office Department, every wrong-doer would be summarily dismissed,
regardless of party or creed. Van Buren's methods had no such drastic
discipline; yet his letter became the subject of much animadversion by
the Clintonians, not so much because they disapproved the suggestion
as because Van Buren wrote it. "It is very important to destroy this
prince of villains," Clinton declared, in a letter to Post of December
2, 1820.[213]

[Footnote 213: DeWitt Clinton's Letters to Henry Post, in _Harper's
Magazine_, Vol. 50, p. 415.

Clearly discerning Van Buren as his most formidable competitor for
political leadership, Clinton's letters to Post from 1817 to 1824
abound in vituperative allusions, as, for example: "Whom shall we
appoint to defeat the arch scoundrel Van Buren?" November 30, 1820.
"Of his cowardice there can be no doubt. He is lowering daily in
public opinion, and is emphatically a corrupt scoundrel," August 30,
1820. "Van Buren is now excessively hated out of the State as well as
in it. There is no doubt of a corrupt sale of the vote of the State,
although it cannot be proved in a court of justice," August 6, 1824.
"We can place no reliance upon the goodwill of Van Buren. In his
politics he is a confirmed knave." And again: "With respect to Van
Buren, there is no developing the man. He is a scoundrel of the first
magnitude, ... without any fixture of principle or really of virtue."
"Van Buren must be conquered through his fears. He has no heart, no
sincerity."]

Like many other brilliant political leaders, Van Buren was