To bring the General squarely before the public as the Bank's destroyer, Statesman Clay anticipates the years and offers a measure renewing the charter of that money temple. Statesman Calhoun, with every Senate foe of the General, is for it. The measure gallops through both Senate and House. It is sent whirling to the White House. “Will he sign it?” wonders Statesman Clay, in consultation with his own thoughts. For an anxious moment Statesman Clay fears the coming of that signature; he cannot conceive of courage greater than his own. His anxiety is misplaced. The General will not sign. When the Clay-constructed measure renewing the charter of the Bank is laid before him, with about what ado might attend the killing of a garter snake he breaks its back with his veto. Statesman Clay rubs his satisfied hands. “Now,” says he to Banker Biddle, who is becoming a bit weak, “we have him helpless! That veto is his death warrant! The campaign is at hand; I shall be the candidate of my party, he of his. That veto shall be the issue! Money, you know, is all powerful. Being so, who shall doubt the result when now the public is driven to choose between the Bank and the White House--Prosperity and Andrew Jackson?” CHAPTER XII--THE DOWNFALL OF MACHIAVELLI CLAY MACHIAVELLI CLAY is one who looks seldom from the window and often in the glass. No man carries himself more upon the back of his own regard than does Machiavelli Clay. He believes in the wisdom of the classes, the ignorance of the masses, and thinks that government should be of people, by statesmen, for statesmen. Also he has a profound respect for Money, and little for perishing flesh and blood. As to each of these thought-conditions he lives in head-on collision with the General, who in all things is his precise contradiction. As a guide by which the popular view may direct itself, Machiavelli Clay asks the Senate to pass a vote of censure upon the General. With the help of Statesman Calhoun, he puts it through. The Clay-invoked “censure” strikes these sparks from the General: “Major,” he cries, thinking on his saw-handles as he and Wizard Lewis sit with their evening pipes, “if I live to get these robes of office off, I may yet bring that rascal to a dear account.” Banker Biddle, now when his precious Bank for its life or death will be made the campaign issue, is not without those pale misgivings which ever shake the livid heart of Money on the eve of war. Observing this knee-knocking trepidation, Machiavelli Clay attempts to give him courage. This is no difficult task for Machiavelli Clay to undertake; since, in his native ignorance of the popular, he harbors no doubt of the General's downfall. Also he extends cheering word the more readily to the quaking Banker Biddle, because the latter and his jeopardized Bank are to furnish those golden sinews of war, which will be required for the Whig campaign.