resolution, had been elected President by a large majority. The popular will so manifested, Benton affirmed, was, “upon the principle of representative government, binding and obligatory” on the Senate, — one of those doctrines which Jacksonian orators were peculiarly fond of dwelling upon. After a fulsome panegyric on Jackson's public career, Benton wound up with a display of that frank and ingenuous egotism which distinguished him, saying: “Solitary and alone, and amidst the jeers and taunts of my opponents, I put this ball in motion. The people have taken it up and rolled it forward. I am no longer anything but a unit in the vast mass which now propels it. In the name of that mass I speak. I demand the execution of the edict of the people.”
A great oratorical tournament followed, in which all the distinguished men of the Senate took part. Against the expunging resolution were Calhoun, Crittenden, Bayard, Clayton, Southard, Preston, White, Ewing of Ohio, Kent, Clay, and Webster; and for it spoke Benton, Buchanan, and Rives. The debate ranged once more over all the constitutional and legal questions bearing upon the removal of the deposits. The opposition proved to the satisfaction of all unbiased men that to expunge any recorded proceeding of the Senate would be a clear violation of the Constitution, which provided that “each house shall keep a record of its proceedings:” if the record was to be “kept,” it could not be expunged. The evident
