The details of Mr. Van Buren's defeat are presented because of its large influence on the subsequent development of anti-slavery strength in the North. He was sacrificed because he was opposed to the immediate annexation of Texas. Had he taken ground in favor of annexation, he would in all probability have been nominated with a fair prospect of election; though the general judgment at that time was that Mr. Clay would have defeated him. The overthrow of Mr. Van Buren was a crisis in the history of the Democratic party, and implanted dissensions which rapidly ripened into disaster. The one leading feature, the forerunner of important political changes, was the division of delegates on the geographical line of North and South. Though receiving a clear majority of the entire convention on the first ballot, Mr. Van Buren had but nine votes from the slave States; and these votes, singularly enough, came from the northern side of the line of the Missouri Compromise. This division in a Democratic National Convention was, in many of its relations and aspects, more significant than a similar division in the two Houses of Congress. Though cruelly wronged by the convention, as many of his supporters thought, Mr. Van Buren did not himself show resentment, but effectively sustained his successful competitor. His confidential friend, Silas Wright, had refused to go on the ticket with Mr. Polk, and George M. Dallas was substituted by the quick and competent management of Mr. Robert J. Walker. The refusal of Mr. Wright led the Whigs to hope for distraction in the ranks of the New-York Democracy; but that delusion was soon dispelled by Wright's acceptance of the nomination for governor, and his entrance into the canvass with unusual energy and spirit. It was widely believed that Jackson's great influence with Van Buren was actively exerted in aid of Polk's election. It would have cruelly embittered the few remaining days of the venerable ex-president to witness Clay's triumph, and Van Buren owed so much to Jackson that he could not be indifferent to Polk's success without showing ingratitude to the great benefactor who had made him his successor in the Executive chair. Motives of this kind evidently influenced Mr. Van Buren; for his course in after years showed how keenly he felt his defeat, and how unreconciled he was to the men chiefly engaged in compassing it. The cooler temperament which he inherited from his Dutch ancestry enabled him to bide his time more patiently than men of Scotch-Irish blood, like Calhoun; but subsequent events plainly showed that he was capable of nursing his anger, and of inflicting a revenge as significant and as fatal as that of which he had been made the victim,--a revenge which would have been perfect in its gratification had it included Mr. Calhoun personally, as it did politically, with General Cass.