THE LIFE AND POLITICAL OPINIONS OF MARTIN VAN BUREN, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. BY WILLIAM M. HOLLAND. SECOND EDITION. HARTFORD. BELKNAP & HAMERSLEY. Harvard College Library April. 8, 1912 Wyman Kneeland Flint, of Milwaukee Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1835, by BELKNAP & HAMERSLEY, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Connecticut. CASE, TIFFANY & CO., PRINTERS. 6863 41-42 DA PREFACE. ASIDE from the present relation of Mr. Van Buren to the people of the United States, the fact of his having risen in times of peace, from the ordinary level of life, to the second office in the government, renders a view of his principles, and of the incidents of his personal history, a matter of reasonable curiosity. The author has therefore, devoted a period of entire vacation from his ordinary duties, to the collection and arrangement of such materials as may fully exhibit the political sentiments of Mr. Van Buren, together with such details of his personal history, as may be published with a due respect for private feelings. In doing this, it has not been the design of the writer merely to contribute to the political elevation of any man; he has aimed, rather to display the spirit and principles of the republican party in this country, and to exhibit, by the history of an individual, the nature of the relation which that party sustains to its public men. He has endeavored, in this way, to throw some light upon the character of our institutions, and to illustrate, in some degree, the spirit of the nation and the age. The philosophy of history is more valuable than its facts. Remarkable, as are the incidents in the life of Mr. Van Buren, they would not have attracted the particular attention of the writer, if he had not believed, that in laying them before the public, an opportunity would be furnished of discussing political principles which are of vital importance to the prosperity of our country. The author, therefore, has no where in the following pages, affected to conceal his strong political bias ; though he has conscientiously endeavored, never to be led by it, into the suppression or misrepresentation of facts. If the conclusions which the writer has drawn from those facts, be not approved of by the reader, he is at liberty to form his own; the means of forming them have been faithfully laid before him. As the author has had recourse only to sources |