Roger Brooke Taney General, resigned that oflice, and at
once was appointed Secretary of the Treasury. He issued an order that no further deposits of government funds should be made, but the money deposited
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law in its application to the administra tion of our form of government had be come familiar. Profoundly versed in
the common law, equity jurisprudence,
ran high, and the Senate was under the
and maritime law, he walked with ease where lesser though able lawyers sought their course with chart and compass. Time, and association with his fellows,
control of the Whigs.
had tempered without weakening, moral
was only withdrawn as the needs of the treasury required. Party feeling still His appoint
ment to the Secretaryship had been
and mental qualities which gave him
made during recess, and when, on June
strength and determination for large
3, 1834, his name was sent to the Senate the nomination was promptly rejected, pointment had failed of confirmation.
achievement. Inflexible in purpose when once his line of action had been decided upon, he did not force his way, but by argument and persuasion oftentimes
Taney resigned and retired to Baltimore,
subtle, yet never disingenuous, moved
where he was received with every demon
steadily to the goal.
stration of affection and honor.
If General Jackson never forgave an enemy he never forgot a friend, and Mr. Justice Duvall of Maryland, who had been appointed by President Madison,
being the first time that a Cabinet ap
If the struggle over the bank had ended, personal antagonisms born of the strife survived. Webster in a public
address at Salem spoke of Taney as the
having resigned because of his advanc
"pliant instrument” of Jackson, to which at a public dinner in Baltimore Taney returned this neat retort :—
ing age, in January, 1835, after a judicial
Neither my habits nor my principles lead me to bandy terms of reproach with Mr. Webster or anybody else, but it is well known that he has found the bank a profitable client, and I submit to the public whether the facts I have stated do not furnish ground for be lieving that has has become its “pliant instru ment," and is prepared on all occasions to do its bidding whenever and wherever it may chose to require him. In the situation in which he has placed himself before the public it would far better become him to vindicate himself from imputations to which he stands justly liable then to assail others.
Taney now had been the recipient of distinguished honors. In the atmos phere of large affairs, and in his asso
service of twenty-four years, the Presi dent sent Taney’s name to the Senate to fill the vacancy. Marshall, upon hearing of the nomination,
wrote to
Senator Benjamin W. Leigh of Virginia: “If you have not already made up your
mind on the nomination of Mr. Taney, I have received some information in his favor which I wish to communicate.”
But the Senate took no action until the end of the session, when it voted to
postpone indefinitely, and the nomina
tion expired with the adjournment of Congress. We shall now see how “the Whirligig of time brings in his revenges.” Chief Justice Marshall having died in the summer of 1835, on Dec. 28, Presi
dent Jackson nominated Taney to be Chief Justice. ‘The political complexion
ciation with the leading public men of his time his mind had broadened. His
of the Senate had changed, and though
extensive juristic learning, leavened by
Clay and Webster still vigorously op
this invaluable experience, began to
posed him on political grounds, on March 15, 1836, the nomination was con firmed by a majority of fourteen votes,
take on more and more characteristics of wisdom. The higher ranges of the
