The progress of events gave ample opportunity for collision between
the various factions. The crisis of 1819 and the depression of the
succeeding years worked, on the whole, in the interests of Jackson,
inclining the common people to demand a leader and a new
dispensation. Not, perhaps, without a malicious joy did John Quincy
Adams write in his diary at that time that "Crawford has labors and
perils enough before him in the management of the finances for the
three succeeding years."[Footnote: Adams, Memoirs, IV., 391.] From
the negotiation of the Florida treaty in 1819, and especially from
the relinquishment by Spain of her claims to the Pacific coast north
of the forty-second parallel, the secretary of state expected to
reap a harvest of political advantage.[Footnote: Ibid., IV., 238,
273, 451, V., 53, 109, 290; Monroe, Writings, VI., 127.] But Clay,
as well as Benton and the west in general, balked his hopes by
denouncing the treaty as an abandonment of American rights; and,
although Adams won friends in the south by the acquisition of
Florida, Spain's delay of two years in the ratification of the
treaty so far neutralized the credit that the treaty was, after all,
but a feast of Tantalus.
Pages:
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284