“Before, however, I commence my reply to that gentleman, I beg leave to make a few observations on the last Presidential election. I shall purposely pass over every charge which has been made, that it was accomplished by bargain and sale or by actual corruption. If that were the case, I have no knowledge of the fact, and shall therefore say nothing about it. I shall argue this question as though no such charges had ever been made. So far as it regards the conduct which the people of the United States ought to pursue, at the approaching election, I agree entirely with the eloquent gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Randolph] (I cannot with propriety call him my friend), that it can make no difference whether a bargain existed or not. Nay, in some aspects in which the subject may be viewed, the danger to the people would be the greater, if no corruption had existed. It is true, that this circumstance ought greatly to influence our individual opinions of the men who now wield the destinies of the Republic; but yet the precedent would be at least equally dangerous in the one case as in the other. If flagrant and gross corruption had existed, every honest man would start from it with instinctive horror, and the people would indignantly hurl those men from the seats of power, who had thus betrayed their dearest interests. If the election were pure, there is, therefore, the greater danger in the precedent. I believe, in my soul, that the precedent which was established at the last Presidential election, ought to be reversed by the people, and this is one of my principal reasons for opposing the re-election of the present Chief Magistrate. “Let us examine this subject more closely. General Jackson was returned by the people of this country to the House of Representatives, with a plurality of electoral votes. The distinguished individual who is now the Secretary of State, was then the Speaker of this House. It is perfectly well known, that, without his vote and influence, Mr. Adams could not have been elected President. After the election, we beheld that distinguished individual, and no man in the United States witnessed the spectacle with more regret than I did, descending—yes, Sir, I say descending—from the elevated station which you now occupy, into the cabinet of the President whom he had elected. “‘Quantum mutatus ab illo.’