the same national Convention which
had annulled the tariff bill, met again, and accepted the proffered
concession; but at the same time it declared it unabated perseverance
in the doctrine of Nullification: and to prove what it said, it annulled
the law investing the President with extraordinary powers, although it
was very certain that the clauses of that law would never be carried
into effect.

Almost all the controversies of which I have been speaking have taken
place under the Presidency of General Jackson; and it cannot be denied
that in the question of the tariff he has supported the claims of the
Union with vigor and with skill. I am, however, of opinion that the
conduct of the individual who now represents the Federal Government may
be reckoned as one of the dangers which threaten its continuance.

Some persons in Europe have formed an opinion of the possible influence
of General Jackson upon the affairs of his country, which appears highly
extravagant to those who have seen more of the subject. We have
been told that General Jackson has won sundry battles, that he is
an energetic man, prone by nature and by habit to the use of force,
covetous of power, and a despot by taste. All this may perhaps be
true; but the inferences which have been drawn from these truths are
exceedingly erroneous. It has been imagined that General Jackson is bent
on establishing a dictatorship in America, on introducing a military
spirit, and on giving a degree of influence to the central authority
which cannot but be dangerous to provincial liberties. But in America
the time for similar undertakings, and the age for men of this kind, is
not yet come: if General Jackson had entertained a hope of exercising
his authority in this manner, he would infallibly have forfeited his
political station, and compromised his life; accordingly he has not been
so imprudent as to make any such attempt.

Far from wishing to extend the federal power, the President belongs
to the party which is desirous of limiting that power to the bare and
precise letter of the Constitution, and which never puts a construction
upon that act favorable to the Government of the Union; far from
standing forth as the champion of centralization, General Jackson is
the agent of all the jealousies of the States; and he was placed in the
lofty station he occupies by the passions of the people which are most
opposed to the central Government. It is by perpetually flattering
t