CLAY, Henry, American statesman : b. Hanover County, Va., 12 April 1777; d. Wash ington, D. C., 29 June 1852. Clay was born in a region of Virginia which was already de clining and from which people were constantly emigrating. His parents were, however, well to-do owners of slaves. The father, John Clay, was a Baptiit preacher of local reputation as an orator. The elder Clay died when Henry was four years old, leaving the mother with seven small children. Mrs. Clay married a sec ond •time and added six other children to her flock. The stepfather was a gentleman of good social standing and he secured for Henry a position as assistant to the clerk of the Vir ginia High Court of Chancery, where he came under the immediate influence of Chancellor George Wythe who had been the teacher of Jefferson and John Marshall. With the meagre training common to American boys of that day, young Clay began the study of law under the great master. He was licensed to practise at the Virginia bar in 1797 and almost immedi ately thereafter he emigrated to Lexington, Ky. He found a hearty welcome in the new com munity and within a short period he was as sociated with Thomas Hart, a lawyer and real estate speculator known all over the West. In 1799 he married Lucretia Hart, the daughter of his patron. About the same time he began to take an active interest in public affairs, made speeches and wrote newspaper articles on the slavery question and the famous Kentucky reso lutions, thus extending his influence and prepar ing the way for his election to the legislature in 1803. The issue which brought him into pub lic life was prepared by Felix Grundy who was attacking with wide popular support a Lexing ton insurance company which had obtained a charter in surreptitious manner to do a bank- ing business. Banks were extremely unpopular in the West in 1803. Clay championed the cause of the local corporation and waged a successful war in its defense. Although the majority of the assembly had been elected spe cially to annul the charter of the company, Clay defeated that purpose and so discomfited Grundy that he emigrated to Tennessee. Clay was now one of the acknowledged leaders of Kentucky; but he was so ardent a Republican that he fell an easy prey to the blandishments of Aaron Burr who visited Lexington in 1806 seeking recruits for his expedition against Mex ico. Clay became sponsor for Burr's patriot ism and denounced the activity of the Federal ist district attorney who sought to convict the former Vice-President of treason in the Uni ted States court. Clay appeared as Burr's counsel without fee and his friends made a hero of the defendant. But toward the end of the year Clay was elected to the United States Senate to fill an unexpired term. On his way to Washington he read the President's procla mation calling upon all men to assist in the ar rest and detention of Burr as a conspirator against the country. Immediately Clay and all Kentucky reversed their positions and without loss of popularity to Clay who was again elect ed to a short term in the Senate in 1808. Dur ing this period of service in Washington he ad vocated the annexation of Canada and de nounced the United States bank in unmeasured terms; °he was a democrat of the first fire,* as John Quincy Adams contemptuously confided to his diary. But Clay was already a man of mark and when, in 1811, he was elected by the Lexington district to a seat in the national House of Representatives his career as a statesman began. He was then only 34 years
old and a new member, but he was promptly chosen speaker in preference to older members and recognized parliamentarians. For five years Clay had urged upon the government the western program: War with England, the im mediate invasion of Canada and the suppres sion of Indian hostilities on the border which were everywhere supposed to be the result of English intrigues. The recent elections had returned men of this way of thinking to Con gress from nearly all western and southern dis— tricts and Clay was the natural leader of the insuments. He organized the committees of the House so that his war program could be given the right of way, while he and his friends, John C. Calhoun and Peter B. Porter of New 'fork, °stiffened the backs" of the President's advisers and brought the peaceful and long suffering Madison to the point of promising hearty support. Between Clay, as leader of the House, and Madison, the candidate of the party for re-election in November 1812, the reluctant Senate was finally compelled to yield, and war was declared in June. The war proved a fail ure in so far as the annexation of Canada was concerned. Napoleon's great campaign against Russia and England collapsed in 1813 and the situation of the country became critical beyond comparison. To fight Great Britain alone seemed suicidal and Madison looked about for some way of securing an early peace. A com mission to treat with England was appointed. Clay wis made a mcmber notwithstanding all he had done to bring on the war and he has tened to join John Quincy Adams and the other commissioners at such. point as England should designate. After anxious delays and humiliating experiences, the treaty of Ghent was signed. Clay returned to Kentucky in 1815 and was again elected to the House of Representatives of which he became speaker at the opening session. This office he now held with the exception of one term, when he re fused an election, till 1825. His influence was undiminished and he did as much as any other, perhaps, to secure the elevation of James Mon roe to the presidency in 1816. But when•Mon roe was inaugurated he appointed Clay's politi cal opponent, if not open enemy, John Quincy Adams, Secretary of State. This was regarded as settling the succession till 1832 and Clay and his friends were deeply offended. He refused a seat in the Cabinet and all his Western friends likewise refused high appointments from the Adntinistration. As speaker of the House, Clay opposed every important measure of the President and offered policies of his own which threatened to break up the solidarity of the Republican party. Andrew Jackson, who had been sent to Florida to quiet disturbances there and who had carried ffis measures with a high hand, was a special object of Clay's anger. But the long and ominous struggle of the South and the East over the admission of Mis souri, 1819-20, drew him into co-operation with Monroe and he became the principal author of and sponsor for the Missouri Compromise (q.v.). The accepted custom of the party since 1801 to allow the Secretary of State to suc ceed to the presidency was attacked by Clay so bitterly that the different groups fell asunder and each offered its favorite for election in 1824. Clay was the candidate of the West; John Quincy Adams of the East; William H.