Benjamnin F. Butler, Butler's Book: Autobiography and Personal Reminiscences of Major-General Benjamin Butler

[117] was in momentary doubt upon the question. I said: “Give Bartlett the secret ballot, and you will vindicate it sufficiently and whip him besides.” He immediately arose and said that those with whom the acted agreed cordially with the proposition of the representative from Boston; so Bartlett's motion passed by a large majority. Upon the next call the sealed envelopes were handed in, and their number was found to correspond exactly with the clerk's tally of the names of members called, showing that neither mistake nor fraud could happen with the secret ballot. But, when the ballots were counted, Sumner was declared elected by one majority. And thus the promise of the “long eel” to the Free-Soiler was confirmed, by a political arrangement more fairly and justly carried out than any other with which I have ever been acquainted.

The fact was, the Hunker Democrats were controlled in their votes by the fear of losing their standing in the Democratic party, which we all believed would, by voting for a Free-Soiler, control the coming presidential election in the autumn of 1852.

They had no doubt of that, because the candidate we all looked for was Judge Levi Woodbury, the friend and twice appointed cabinet officer of Jackson, and the able and upright Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. In this, however, we were unhappily disappointed by his too early death in the following October.

His selection as a Democratic candidate for the presidency in 1848 was undoubtedly prevented by the unhappy controversies in the State of New York, which were carried into the national convention, of which I was a member, and which resulted in the withdrawal of the friends of Mr. Van Buren and the Free-Soil rupture in the party, with Van Buren for a candidate at the election.

Notwithstanding the defeat of the Coalitionists in the election of 1852, the proposition to have a constitutional convention in Massachusetts, which had failed in 1851 by a majority of five thousand votes, was renewed by the legislature of 1852, and was carried by a majority of nearly the same number. The majority rule had caused many double elections for representatives to be held every year, prolonging the election contests substantially for thirty days. A change seemed imperative, and all parties appeared to recognize the necessity for it. The House of Representatives was very large and would bear considerable reduction; and it was thought to be better