A less able and clear-headed man might have gone wrong at this parting of the ways, just as did Obadiah German and other friends of Clinton; but Van Buren never needed a guide-post to point out to him the safest political road to travel.
Alexander reflects on the political acumen of Van Buren during a critical moment in New York's political history.
Share
More from De Alexander
A keen, exhaustive and merciless criticism of the whole Philippine experiment....
He had been an honest lawyer as well as an upright public official, and the people believed that his stubborn independence and sturdy integrity would make him a real governor, the enemy of rings and bosses, and the foe of avarice and…
More valuable still is his exposition of the Philippine question in its bearings on American life and politics.
Human, dramatic, interesting, absorbing, there is philosophy of national and political life back of it--a philosophy which not only furnished interpretation of past events, but offers guidance for the future....
Other voices in this conversation
