unexplained accidents of which history is so full. The newspapers of the day recounted the astonishment of Mr. Pierce, to whom a boy brought the news as he was on a visit to Mt. Auburn cemetery. The truth is, how ever, it was the successful culmination of an arrangement planned by Mr. Cushing, General Butler, Paul R. George, and a few others, in anticipation of a dead lock at Baltimore, to spring Mr. Pierce's name on the convention. Mr. Cushing had several times visited Mr. Pierce in regard to it, and leading men in different States had been con ferred with, and all the details agreed upon. I had been told this long since by men fam iliar with the inside history of the political events of that period, but all have passed aw.ay who were actors except General Butler. Wishing to verify this statement, and also wishing his opinion of Mr. Cushing, whom he had known so intimately, I addressed him a letter, to which the following is his reply, and is of value as explaining an important event in American history, not before under stood by the public. Boston, May 2, 1891. Dear Sir, — My professional and other engage ments are such that I cannot go into any discussion worthy of General Cushing, yourself, or myself, as to his great endowments as a lawyer and his gTeat learning and ability as a statesman. I hold him in the highest reverence. As to the question you put me in relation to the nomination of Gen. Franklin Pierce as President, the matter was fully considered by the three gentle men you name, and the Hon. Charles G. Atherton, and the Hon. Henry A. Wise, of Virginia, im mediately after the death of Judge Woodbury in 1851, and the means to present his name in the manner it was presented fully determined upon; so that while the presentation of General Pierce's name was a surprise to the general public, it was not to the well informed and active members of the con vention which nominated him. I am very truly yours, Benjamin F. Butler. Many circumstances combined to make the election of Mr. Pierce a triumphant
one, and he received 254 votes to 42 for General Scott. On the formation of his Cabinet, one of great ability, and the only one in our history unbroken during a whole administration, Mr. Cushing was made At torney-General. During Pierce's administration the Antislavery sentiment was continually growing stronger in the North, intensified by the troubles in Kansas, the attack on Mr. Sum ner, and other causes not now to be entered into. The Republican party, just formed on the Anti-slavery issue, was fast gaining control of the North, having absorbed the Whig party and drawn largely from the Democratic. The great moral question of slavery was debated in Congress and at the fireside, by the press and the pulpit, in all its aspects, almost to the exclusion of every other subject, and the historian of this ad ministration will discuss it more with refer ence to this question than any other. Many difficult questions connected with our domes tic and foreign affairs came before the law department, and the ability with which they were met is conceded. The opinions of Mr. Cushing while Attorney-General fill three volumes of the fifteen up to that date, and no less an authority than William Beach Lawrence said, " They constitute in them selves a valuable body of international law." President Pierce stated that, however able Mr. Cushing was in his department, he was equally well fitted for every other position in the cabinet; and it is said that when a question arose about which all the other members were in doubt, it was referred with confidence to Cushing. In 1857, 1858, and 1859, he was a member of the Massachusetts House of Represen tatives, active and attentive to all his duties. A memorable debate on national affairs oc curred between him and the late John A. Andrew. In 1860 he was a delegate to the Demo cratic National Convention at Charleston, S. G, was chosen its president, and was one of the seceders that met at Baltimore. He
