"ON THE EXPUNGING
RESOLUTION"
Mr. President:
It is now three years since the resolve was adopted by the Senate,
which it is my present motion to expunge from the journal. At the
moment that this resolve was adopted, I gave notice of my intention to
move to expunge it; and then expressed my confident belief that the
motion would eventually prevail. That expression of confidence was not
an ebullition of vanity, or a presumptuous calculation, intended to
accelerate the event it affected to foretell. It was not a vain boast, or an
idle assumption, but was the result of a deep conviction of the injustice
done President Jackson, and a thorough reliance upon the justice of the
American people. I felt that the President had been wronged; and my
heart told me that this wrong would be redressed! The event proves that
I was not mistaken. The question of expunging this resolution has been
carried to the people, and their decision has been had upon it. They
decide in favor of the expurgation; and their decision has been both made
and manifested, and communicated to us in a great variety of ways. A
great number of States have expressly instructed their Senators to vote for
this expurgation. A very great majority of the States have elected
Senators and Representatives to Congress, upon the express ground of
favoring this expurgation. The Bank of the United States, which took the
initiative in the accusation against the President, and furnished the
material, and worked the machinery which was used against him, and
which was then so powerful on this floor, has become more and more
odious to the public mind, and musters now but a slender phalanx of
friends in the two Houses of Congress. The late Presidential election
furnishes additional evidence of public sentiment.