LESTER BURRELL SHIPPEE
44
United States, and are willing we should advance a claim to 54 40'; such a course on our part will make it easier for 28 ." them to agree to stop at 49 But this smooth sailing could not continue. The particular form which the 54 40' agitation took did not, contrary to .
.
Everett's belief, urge the British government to further concessions. The congressional bills and resolutions and debates,
party discussions and intrigues, especially that portion relating to the annexation of Texas, all served to cool the con-
the
ardor of Aberdeen and the British ministry. And then, just four days before the Foreign Secretary sent to Pakenham his new instructions, came the death of Upshur, ciliatory
leaving the State Department in the hands of the Assistant Secretary Nelson until a successor could be chosen.
Had Aberdeen
been able to foresee the selection of John Calhoun as Secretary of State he might, in view of the past record of that gentleman, have felt that British interests were in no danger. To Calhoun the Texas and Oregon quesC.
tions
were the
sole
reasons
weighty enough to cause his
resignation as Senator and acceptance of a Cabinet position under Tyler; 24 it was these reasons which Tyler used to in-
duce Calhoun to accept, 25 for without such overwhelmingly important issues no one can doubt that the leading Southern Democrat would have immediately refused the offer of the recusant Whig. Texas was a powerful lever both with Calhoun and with his political confidants of the South. It was of such
importance that the Oregon negotiations, so often postponed and hindered, once more had to wait a moment which was not occupied with the Texas treaty, political plans connected with the coming presidential election, routine official duties
and the
like.
Several times
Pakeham called Calhoun's was put off. 26
atten*
tion to the waiting question but he
23 Everett to Nelson, i Apr., No. West Bound. Arb., 33,4. 24 See, e. g., Calhoun to Mrs. T. C. Clemson, o Mar., 1844; W. Lumpkin to For account of how Calhoun, 23 Mar., Correspondence of Calhoun, 576, 942. Tyler came to nominate Calhoun see Wise, Life of Henry A. Wise, 98-101. 25 Tyler to Calhoun, 6 Mar., Correspondence of Calhoun, 938-9. 26 See Pakenham's dispatches in Br. F. St Papers, 34; 59 seq. Ex. Doc. No. 2, 29th Cong, ist Ses.
&
H.
Also in
