But more important to Clay than the attitude of the Nullifiers was that of the Anti-Masons. Strangely enough, he had, at first, looked upon the growing movement, not only with complacency, but with approval. After the failure of the new party in New York in 1830, he had written to a friend: “If they had been successful they would probably have brought out an Anti-Masonic candidate for President. Still, if I had been in New York, I should have given my suffrage to Granger.[488] I will not trouble you with the reasons.”[489] In the same letter, however, he expresses the opinion that such strength as the proscriptive party might muster would ultimately go to the Whigs, in general, and himself in particular, because “it is in conformity with the general nature of minorities,” when they have no candidate of their own, to support the strongest opposition party. Then, too, they were protectionists, had been abused by Van Buren’s organization in New York, “and General Jackson has, as they think, persecuted them.” At any rate, wrote the intriguing politician, “there is no occasion for our friends to attack them.” But a new light broke for Clay when, in the spring of 1831, the Anti-Masons called a national convention, to meet two months before the Whigs’. His close friends became apprehensive. The sounding of the Anti-Masons disclosed no Clay sentiment. Quite the contrary. Much distressed at this revelation, one of the leaders of the movement urged him to exert his well-known powers of conciliation.[490] By the latter part of June he had concluded that the new party might not prove so advantageous after all. Writing to his bosom friend, Francis Brooke, he found that “Anti-Masonry seems to be the only difficulty now in the way of success, both in Pennsylvania and New York.”[491] By the middle of July he was convinced that “it would be politic to leave the Jackson party exclusively to abuse the Antis.”[492] A few days later he had concluded that “the policy of the Antis is to force us to their support,” and that “ours should be to win them to ours.”[493] As the time for the convention approached, the Antis were split on Clay, a small portion wishing the nomination of one who would later withdraw in his favor, but the majority hoping for the nomination of one who would be acceptable to the Whigs in their convention two months later. The problem was finally solved by the nomination of William Wirt. That this brilliant man would have scorned the honor on any other theory than that his nomination would be acceptable to both the Whigs and Clay, with whom he had served in the Cabinet, and for whom he entertained an affection, is shown in his correspondence.[494] But, while resting at Ashland and still ignorant of the convention’s action, Clay was writing to Brooke that “if the alternative is between Andrew Jackson and an Anti-Masonic candidate with his exclusive prescriptive principles, I should be embarrassed in the choice.”[495]