Daniel D. Tompkins, preferring
governor to Vice President, was willing to be called; and Peter B.
Porter, Erastus Root, and Nathan Sanford, figured among those whose
names were canvassed. The contest, however, soon settled down between
Yates and Young, with the chances decidedly in favour of the former.
People admired Young and were proud of him--they thoroughly liked
Yates and trusted him. If Young had possessed the kindly, sympathetic
disposition of Yates, with a tithe of his discretion, he would have
rivalled Martin Van Buren in influence and popularity, and become a
successful candidate for any office in the gift of the voters; but,
with all his splendid genius for debate and eloquent speaking, he was
neither a patient leader nor a popular one. When the Republican
members of the Legislature got into caucus, therefore, Joseph C. Yates
had a pronounced majority, as had Erastus Root for lieutenant-governor.

Young's defeat for the nomination left bitter enmity. A reconciliation
did, indeed, take place between him and Yates, but it was as formal
and superficial as that of the two demons described in Le Sage's
story. "They brought us together," says Asmodeus; "they reconciled us.
We shook hands and became mortal enemies." Young and Yates were
reconciled; but from the moment of Yates' nomination, until, chagrined
and disappointed, he was forced into retirement after two years of
humiliating obedience to the Regency, Samuel Young spared no effort to
render his late opponent unpopular.

Although Clinton's canal policy, upon the success of which he had
staked his all, was signally vindicating itself in rapidity of
construction, and the very moderate estimate of cost, his friends did
not hesitate to advise him that his re-election to the governorship
was impossible. It was a cold proposition for a man to face who had
inaugurated a system of improvement which would confer prosperity and
wealth upon the people, and enrich and elevate the State. For a time,
like a caged tiger, he bit at the bars that seemed to limit his
ambition. But his friends were right. Through his management, or want
of management, the Clintonians had ceased to exist as an organisation,
and his supporting Federalists, as evidenced by the election of
delegates to the constitutional convention in 1821, had passed into a
hopeless minority. "Governor Clinton, though governor," said Thurlow
Weed, "was much in the condition of a pastor without a congregation."