In appearance he was not prepossessing. Below the medium height, he was spare as well as crippled. In his high forehead and the expression of his eyes his intellect was indicated, and he carried himself with that haughty air of superiority which men, forced to fight for their existence, are apt to assume. This was described by his enemies as “demoniacal.” He always dressed plainly as a workingman. Without imagination or dreams, severely practical and to the point, conscious of his limitations, and passionately devoted to both his convictions and prejudices, there was nothing about him to appeal to the fashionable or the intellectually elect. In no sense dazzling in his gifts, hesitating instead of eloquent, shocking the Senate of his time by reading his speeches, and proud of his profession, he was not pointed out to travelers who wrote books, nor lionized in the drawing-rooms, nor dignified by the complimentary notices of the women letter-writers or diarists of his day. He has come down largely as his enemies have painted him, and their very hate of him discloses his effectiveness as a politician. He was one of the Republic’s first uncompromising partisans--“My party, right or wrong.” IV An Administration and party paper had been considered important in the political circles of the Republic from the beginning, but it was left to the editors of the Kitchen Cabinet to develop it to the highest degree of efficiency. The “National Journal,” Court paper of the Adams Administration, had awakened the Opposition to an appreciation of the practical value of a powerful party paper. Duff Green and the “Telegraph,” in a sense, met the requirements, but even then there were Democrats of influence and aspirations who found something lacking. To Van Buren, the editor, devoted to Calhoun, was unsatisfactory. It is inconceivable that he felt the need for a more aggressive pen for the Opposition. Nevertheless, in the summer of 1826, while planning a more vigorous attack on the Adams Administration, he had an “animated conversation” concerning the need of a strictly party paper with Calhoun, at the latter’s house in Georgetown. The Carolinian urged the adoption of the “Telegraph” as the party organ, with Van Buren pressing the advantage of prevailing upon Thomas Ritchie of the “Richmond Enquirer” to accept the editorship of a new party paper at the capital.[358] Failing to persuade Calhoun, the Red Fox cleverly approached Senator Tazewell of Virginia, an ardent friend of the Carolinian, and persuaded him to join in an invitation to the Richmond journalist.[359] Ritchie declined, however, on the ground of his attachment to Virginia and his reluctance to leave old friends and associates.[360] Thus, at the beginning of the Administration, it seemed that Duff Green and the “Telegraph” were destined to become the pen and organ of the Jacksonian Democracy.