when he was the president of the United States. There is a deal of humbuggery in politics today as there was in the older days.

In 1836, James Clark was elected governor of Kentucky and Charles A. Wickliffe, lieutenant governor. James Bullock was appointed secretary of state. In 1839 Governor Clark died, and Wickliffe succeeded him. This latter gentleman seemed to have been born under a gubernatorial star. His son, Robert Wickliffe, became governor of Louisiana and his grandson, J. Crepps Wickliffe Beckham, governor of Kentucky.

During the gubernatorial term of Governor Clark, the speculative bubble burst. It had attracted the people of Kentucky until they were heavily involved. When in 1840 and 1841, Robert P. Letcher and Manlius V. Thompson were governor and lieutenant governor, the storm burst upon the people. Nathaniel P. Shaler, a noted Harvard professor and a native Kentuckian, says of the collapse of the financial bubble: "This episode closed the remarkable events in the history of the financial development of the state. From this time on, the Commonwealth banks were singularly sound and efficient institutions. They were commonly domestic in their system; they trusted for their strength to a mixture of control exercised by the state through its ownership of stock and the citizen stockholders. They gave to the people a better currency than existed in any other state west of the mountains. Even in the trial of the Civil war, they stood, as they still stand, unbroken. Their strength is so great that although their currency has been destroyed by the laws of the United States, they remain the mainstays of the business of the Kentucky people, outside one or two of the larger cities."

In 1840 Kentucky found itself in the throes of another heated national campaign and with memories of the days when her sons had followed William Henry Harrison to victory against the English and their Indian al

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lies, the state cast for him 58,489 votes and for his opponent, Martin Van Buren, 32,616. This heavy vote for Harrison was cast upon a military sentiment, notwithstanding that an able and gallant Kentucky soldier, Richard M. Johnson, was the candidate for vice-president upon the Van Buren ticket which fact probably reduced the Whig vote.

In 1844 came the final vote which determined that Mr. Clay, notwithstanding his great ability and popularity, would never be the president of the United States. He carried Kentucky by the meager majority of nine thousand, though Harrison, on the same ticket, four years previously, had carried the state by a majority of 25,873. There was a strong sentiment in favor of the annexation of Texas by the United States. The Democratic party, sympathizing with the struggle the Texans had made and were still making to gain their independence from Mexico, favored annexation. More than one of the prominent leaders of the Texan struggle was a Kentuckian, notable among these being Albert Sidney Johnston, who, before many more years, was to become a national character, known wherever gallant soldierly conduct was recognized. Mr. Clay was earnestly opposed to the extension of slavery, and probably because of this he opposed the annexation of Texas, which he knew, if it came into the Union at all, would come as a slave state. It was this position which brought about his defeat by Mr. Polk of Tennessee, the nominee of the Democratic party, who, by some illinformed writers, desirous of adding force to the downfall of the Kentucky statesman, has been described as an unknown man of small force of character. Mr. Polk had held a high place in the hearts and minds of those who knew him best; had had long service in congress and had been speaker of the national house. Of course, defeat was bitter to Mr. Clay, who was now an old man and who recognized that but few, if any opportunities,

were left him to reach the goal of his ambition, but it is not true that his mind was embittered by the reflection that his defeat had been at the hands of a man of no importance.

The struggle in Texas continued with renewed force after the election of Mr. Polk, and in 1845 congress passed the enabling act which admitted the new state to the Union.

OF THIRD AND FOURTH KENTUCKY.

When on April 21, 1836, General Sam Houston, in command of the troops of the republic of Texas, defeated the Mexican forces. on the Jacinto and captured Gen. Santa Anna. there was born an imperial state, soon to become an integral part of the United States. Gen. Santa Anna, overwhelmed by the magnitude of the losses which his army had sustained, proposed to his captors to recognize the independence of Texas and thus end the war between Mexico and the new republic. But the civil authorities of Mexico refused to agree to the proposed recogition, declaring that they would not consent to the recognition of the independence of Texas. Relations between the Mexicans and Texans remained belligerent and there were frequent collisions between the armed forces of the two countries. Texas, growing weary of a guerrilla warfare, turned naturally toward the United States and asked admission to the Union. Their plea was one difficult to resist.

The white residents of Texas came principally from this country, most of them from the southern states. Gen. Sam Houston was a distinguished Tennesseean, as was the eccentric Davy Crockett who fell at the Alamo. Of the many Kentuckians who had aided the Texans, none perhaps, was more able, from a military standpoint, than Albert Sid

ney Johnston who, in later years, was to meet a soldier's honored death at the head of the Confederate army at Shiloh, in 1862. The sympathies of the people of this country were. naturally with the struggling Texans, as was evidenced in the presidential election of 1844 in which Mr. Polk had defeated Mr. Clay, the issue of the admission of Texas being largely considered. In 1845, recognizing the mandate of the people, congress passed a bill admitting the vast territory of Texas to the Union of states. There could be but one result following this action and that was war.

Many in the northern and eastern states bitterly opposed the action of congress and the war which followed. They would have been equally in opposition had Mexico willingly consented to the acquisition of Texas by the United States. They had ever before them the specter of negro slavery, and were unalterably opposed to the acquisition of additional territory which would add to the political power of the south where slavery prevailed. They were of those who are always most unreasonable and at times the most dangerous-the people of but one idea. Such people, be they right or be they wrong, are always fanatical and beyond the power of calm reason. calm reason. They bitterly opposed the increase of southern territory, and, with equal

bitterness, opposed the war with Mexico which speedily followed. Their day of triumph was in the near future, all unknown to them, yet they awaited its coming with but little of patience and less of judgment.

In 1846, the expected war cloud burst upon the country. Gen. Zachary Taylor, a Kentuckian, under orders from the war department, concentrated the American troops at Corpus Christi, Texas, on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico, and held them ready for defense or aggression as circumstances might demand.

Col. Wm. Preston Johnston, in his "Life of Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston," who was his father, says of this period: "On the 8th of March, 1846, General Taylor made a forward movement to Point Isabel, which commanded the mouth of the Rio Grande. In spite of a protest and some acts of hostility committed by the Mexicans, a fortification was erected opposite Matamoras, Mexico, afterwards known as Fort Brown. On the 12th of April, General Ampudia addressed a letter to General Taylor, requiring him to withdraw to the left bank of the Nueces, or 'that arms alone must decide the question.' A little later, the Mexicans captured Captain Thornton and sixty men and committed other overt acts of war, and finally threatened General Taylor's communications with Point Isabel, the base of supplies. To re-establish his communications and secure his base, General Taylor marched, with his army, to Point Isabel, leaving a small but sufficient garrison in the fort. The Mexicans opened upon the fort with a heavy bombardment by which the commandant, Major Brown, was killed, but the garrison held out until relieved by the successes of the American troops.

"General Taylor started on his return from Point Isabel on May 7th, with 2,300 soldiers, and on the next day at noon, found the Mexican army, under General Ampudia, drawn up on the plain of Palo Alto to dispute his ad

vance. An engagement ensued in which the artillery acted a conspicuous part, ending in the retreat of the Mexican army with loss of 6co men. The American loss was nine killed and fourteen wounded.

"On the next day, the American army again encountered the Mexicans strongly posted in a shallow ravine called Resaca de la Palma. It was a hotly contested fight with 6,000 Mexicans who showed a stout courage, but they were driven from the field with a loss of 1,000 men. The American loss was 100. The war had begun.

"Volunteers were called for and came pouring in from all quarters. The martial enthusiasm of the people of the United States was only equalled by the imbecility of the government in its preparation for the conflict. It was a political regime merely, and in nowise adapted to organize or carry on a successful war; but the ability of the commanders and the splendid valor of the troops supplied all defects and made the Mexican war an heroic episode in our annals. General Taylor, having initiated the struggle by two brilliant victories, was condemned to idleness until September by the Carthaginian policy of the government which failed to supply stores, equipment and transportation."

It may be a matter of interest to know that Fort Brown, built by General Taylor on the Rio Grande opposite Matamoras, Mexico, was, in recent years, the post at which were stationed the negro troops who made a descent upon and "shot up" the town of Brownsville, Texas; an incident which caused widespread excitement throughout the country. President Roosevelt ordered the dismissal from the army of the troops believed to be guilty, and for several years his energetic and very proper action, gave opportunity for bitter attacks upon him by certain enemies in his own party.

When the president issued his call for volunteers, Kentucky's quota was fixed at twen