A Biography of Henry Clay, the Senator from Kentucky: Containing Also, a Complete Report of All His Speeches; Selections From His Private Correspondence; Eulogies in the Senate and House; and a Poem, by George D. Prentice, Esq.
History
A Biography of Henry Clay, the Senator from Kentucky: Containing Also, a Complete Report of All His Speeches; Selections From His Private Correspondence; Eulogies in the Senate and House; and a Poem, by George D. Prentice, Esq.
Clay, Henry, 1777-1852; Speeches, addresses, etc., American
During Mr. Clay’s absence from congress, which, as has been before
stated, was occasioned to furnish him an opportunity to repair
pecuniary losses, he was appointed, in connection with Mr. Bibb, to
attend the Virginia legislature, for the purpose of adjusting certain
Kentuckian land claims. The land laws of Kentucky were a source of
great perplexity and litigation, subjecting those who had settled there
prior to her separation from Virginia, to great inconvenience and loss.
In his appeal to the general assembly of Virginia, Mr. Clay manifested
unusual anxiety to protect the interests of the occupants of the soil,
in the state from which he was a delegate, and succeeded in awakening
a corresponding feeling of sympathy in the hearts of those whom he
addressed. He drew a vivid picture of the privations and hardships
which the settler had to encounter, placed him before them in the
attitude of bidding adieu to the ‘tombs and temples of his fathers,’
then followed him to the wilderness, and traced his toilsome progress,
step by step, until he brought him to the period when he began to reap
the reward of his labors. He exhibited him sitting at twilight in the
door of his comfortable tenement, looking out upon his broad enclosures,
the happy partner of his cares by his side, and his dear little ones
enjoying their innocent pastimes around him, and almost made them see
the heavings of his grateful heart, and the moistening of his eye, as
he surveyed the abundance of domestic bliss, and peace, and plenty,
which his industrious hand had gathered about him. This, said Mr. Clay,
is the bright side of the picture; now let us look at the dark; and
then, in his solemn, impressive, and inimitably graphic manner, with
a quivering lip, and a hand tremulous with emotion, he pointed to
the same group, yet he painted no happy look, he caused no shout
of sportive joy to ascend, but he rendered audible the deep sigh,
the suffocating sob, and piercing groan; he made almost visible the
furrowed brow of toil-worn manhood wet with the dew of despair, a
broken-hearted wife drowned in grief, surrounded by sorrowing childhood,
all fixing a last look upon a home dear to them as their lives, as they
were about to depart to rear a new abode in the uninviting wilderness.
This is no picture of a heated imagination, said Mr. Clay, it is
suggested by scenes of almost every day occurrence, and it is to
_prevent_ their occurrence that prompts us to attempt the adjustment
of these conflicting ‘land claims.’ Equity, humanity, and benevolence,
all urge this; they all mingle their voices of mercy, and beseech that
when the settler has by his honest and industrious efforts acquired
the comforts and blessings of social and domestic life, he shall be
permitted to enjoy them, and not be in danger of being dispossessed by
a prior claim to his domain, and of which he was ignorant. In one of
his most pathetic strains, he attempted to quote the affecting lines
of sir Walter Scott:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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