cotton crop of his plantation six months ahead for
a loan of six thousand dollars, in order to pay the bills outstanding
against him in the capital.

Meanwhile the country came to the election of 1836. From the time of
Van Buren's withdrawal from the Cabinet in 1831 to become, with
Jackson's full approval, a candidate for the vice presidency, there
never was doubt that the New Yorker would be the Democratic
presidential nominee in 1836, or that his election would mean a
continuation, in most respects, of the Jacksonian regime. Never did a
President more clearly pick his successor. There was, of course, some
protest within the party. Van Buren was not popular, and it required
all of the personal and official influence that the President could
bring to bear, backed up by judicious use of the patronage, to carry
his program through. At that, his own State rebelled and, through a
resolution of the Legislature, put itself behind the candidacy of
Senator Hugh L. White. The bold actions of his second Administration,
defiant alike of precedent and opposition, had alienated many of the
President's more intelligent and conservative followers. Yet the
allegiance of the masses was unshaken; and when the Democratic
convention assembled at Baltimore in May, 1835,--a year and a half
before the election--the nomination of Van Buren was secured without a
dissenting vote. There was no need to adopt a platform; everybody
understood that Jackson's policies were the platform, and that Jackson
himself was as truly before the electorate as if he had been a
candidate for a third term. In his letter of acceptance Van Buren met
all expectations by declaring his purpose "to tread generally in the
footsteps of President Jackson."

The anti-Administration forces entered the campaign with no flattering
prospects. Since 1832 their opposition to "executive usurpation" had
won for them a new party name, "Whig." But neither their opposition
nor any other circumstance had given them party solidarity. National
Republicans, anti-Masons, converted Jacksonians, state rights
men--upon what broad and constructive platform could they hope to
unite? They had no lack of able presidential aspirants. There was
Clay, the National Republican candidate in 1832; there was Webster, of
whom Jackson once said that he would never be President because he was
"too far east, knows too much, and is too honest"; and there were
lesser lights, such as Judge John McLean. But, a