Clay

Henry (April 12, 1777-June 29, 1852), an American statesman. He was a native of Virginia. His parents lived in a swampy place, such as in Virginia is called a slash. He studied law and settled in Kentucky and was sent to the state legislature. He was in public office almost continuously for over forty years. During campaigns he was called the "Mill Boy of the Slashes."

Twice he sat in the legislature of Kentucky. He represented his district three times in the United States House of Representatives, and each time he was made its speaker. He was elected to the United States Senate four times. In politics he was a Whig. Three times he was the candidate of that party for the presidency. He was defeated three times at the polls. The first time, by Adams, the second, by Jackson, and the third time, by Polk. During the second of these campaigns Clay's supporters carried ash poles in memory of Ashland. Jackson men carried hickory poles in honor of Old Hickory. The Jackson men sang:

Under Madison, Clay was one of the envoys to negotiate the treaty of peace in 1814; under Adams he was secretary of state. Whether on the floor of the House or the Senate, or whether he acted in some other capacity, he led his party for forty years. His admirers called him the Great Commoner--the appellation of William Pitt. He was recognized as the peer of Daniel Webster and John C. Calhoun.

As to his position on public questions, he forced on the war of 1812; he stood for a protective tariff; he drew up the compromise tariff bill to appease Calhoun and South Carolina; he carried the Missouri Compromise; he stood the staunch friend of the South American republics in their struggles with Spain; he freed his own slaves, and he drew up the famous compromise bill of 1850, known as the Omnibus Bill, because it provided for so many different measures. The chief provisions were,--the admission of California to the Union, organization of the territories of New Mexico and Utah, abolition of the slave trade in the District of Columbia, and the fugitive slave law. He advocated the plan of purchasing all slave children and setting them free. The proposed measure would have cost but a fraction of the $10,000,000,000 actually spent and destroyed by the Civil War.

Toward the end of his career Clay became very much unsettled. He tried to compromise the difficulties between the North and South, but foresaw that the Union was drifting into peril.

Of the three great names associated, Calhoun surpassed in intellect and in the integrity of his convictions; Webster excelled in the extent of his literary acquirements and in oratory; Clay possessed in the higher degree the elements of popular leadership and personal influence.