Jackson, or rather his manager, William B. Lewis, a most astute politician, had written a letter to a Dr. Coleman, of Warrenton, Va., upon the subject of the tariff. The letter was ostensibly a reply to one from Dr. Coleman, inquiring of Jackson his views upon this question. Very probably, however, Dr. Coleman's letter was also dictated by Mr. Lewis. Jackson's reply contained nothing definite in regard to the subject. It was a first-class political document, that is, it was a document which could be interpreted to mean anything which might be made necessary or desirable by time, place, and circumstances. In a word, Lewis had made for Jackson a sort of _tabula rasa_ record on the subject of the tariff. In such a state of things it is certainly reasonable to ascribe South Carolina's preference for Jackson to the facts that he claimed to be her son by birth, and that Calhoun, rightly discerning Jackson to be the coming man, withdrew from the race for the presidency, and was regarded as running for the vice-presidency on the Jackson ticket. [Sidenote: Pennsylvania in the Election of 1824.] It is somewhat more difficult to account for the attitude of Pennsylvania. We are now so accustomed to consider Pennsylvania the "tariff State" _par excellence_, that it is difficult to conceive of a time when she was not such. She was indeed, in 1824, for the tariff, but her interests had not then become so completely linked together with it as after 1840. In 1824 her vast beds of anthracite had not been applied to the preparation of her iron ores, in fact {139} had hardly been discovered. Pennsylvania west of the Alleghanies was then an agricultural country, and was filled with a population intensely democratic and almost lawless. So far as they had any political science it was based upon the most radical postulates of the French philosophy. The principal "plank" of the platform of the Harrisburg convention of March 4th, 1824, which nominated Jackson, read as follows: "This artificial system of cabinet succession to the presidency is little less dangerous and anti-republican than the hereditary monarchies of Europe. If a link in this chain of successive secretary dynasties be not broken now, then may we be fettered by it forever. Andrew Jackson comes pure, untrammelled, and unpledged from the people." Adams, Crawford, and Calhoun were then members of President Monroe's cabinet, and Clay was Speaker of the House of Representatives. Jackson alone of all the candidates seemed to possess the qualifications required by the Harrisburg doctrine. While this may explain the attachment of the Pennsylvania Republicans to Jackson, we must not forget that the remnant of the Pennsylvania Federalists were also for him. In 1816 Jackson had written some letters to President Monroe advising him not to ignore the Federalists in his appointments to office, but to unite the country by showing himself superior to the distinctions of party in his Administration.