Richmond Enquirer

TO THE EDITOR OF THE ENQUIRER.

CHESTERFIELD COUNTY, Aug. 11, 1840.

Yesterday, (our Court day) will be a day long to be remembered by the people of Chesterfield. It being the first Court day that has transpired since the return of our worthy and able Representative from Congress, notice had been previously given that he would address the people on that occasion. This was done without consultation with him, but from the belief of his friends and constituents, that he would be, as on all former occasions he has been, ready and willing to comply with their wishes. They were not mistaken. He did address the people, and the greatest crowd that has been congregated at the Courthouse, since the great election between Elam and Johnson. Mr. Jones's friends believed when he arose, that from the delicate state of his health, his physical strength would not last an hour: but his strength and animation increased with the importance of the subject, and he enchained the attention of his audience for the space of four or five hours with a speech the most powerful, the most argumentative, the most thrillingly eloquent ever listened to in Chesterfield county.

You will in all probability see a different account from this; you may hear that he made a complete failure and was totally demolished. That you may judge of the truth of my statement, I will only refer you to one fact, which I think will not be denied, by friend or foe, and that is, that for the whole time he occupied the stand, he received the earnest, eager and almost undivided attention of the vast crowd collected around him.

I wish I could give you an adequate description of the scene. Would that you could have witnessed it! You would have enjoyed a mental feast and political treat rarely to be met with. He took up the objections urged by our opponents against the Administration, and answered and refuted them in the most satisfactory manner. In the most polite and courteous manner, he brought to view the standing humbugs of the day, (the authors of some of them were present, and with a ridicule the most cutting, and sarcasm the most scorching, he held them up to the just indignation of an intelligent though insulted people.

While speaking on this subject, one of the people called his attention to the case of Lieut. Hooe. He said he was about to pass by this humbug. It was so small a humbug he hardly thought it deserved even a passing notice. But, since his attention had been called to it, he would explain it; and this he did in a manner well calculated to make its author regret that he had ever seen or heard of a Hooe, except, perhaps, a hilling or a grubbing hoe.

In referring to the Whig Executive Committee in Washington, of which Clark, Truman Smith and Saltonstall form prominent members, he spoke in a strain of excoriating and indignant eloquence alike worthy of the subject and the occasion. Says he, "Fellow-citizens, if in times gone by, when Virginians venerated Virginia principles and Virginia institutions, a committee of such materials had been formed to enlighten our intelligent citizens, not only would the united voice of the people been raised against it, but the very stones would have been set in motion and cried aloud in opposition to it."

After a masterly defence of the Administration, he carried the war into Africa, and the manner in which he dealt his blows showed that he knew where to strike and how to strike to make every blow tell. He closed his masterly effort by an appeal to his constituents truly fervid and happy, and which, to judge by the rapturous applause which followed, was forcibly felt and duly appreciated.

When Mr. Jones had concluded, the Hon. John M. Botts took the stand, which, after occupying a few minutes, he yielded to a gentleman, I think, by the name of Daniel, from Richmond. Mr. Daniel read a few pages, from what some believed a spurious life of Van Buren, threw himself into various pugilistic attitudes, abused the Globe and Enquirer, screwed on a cork leg and walked off. He said Mr Jones had crammed the Globe and Enquirer down our throats. Quere? If the little gentleman had remained at home and attended to his business, could the Enquirer have been crammed down his throat at Chesterfield Court-house?

Mr. Botts again arose, and thundered away in his usual strain of eloquent abuse. He abused every body and every thing save his Whig friends and Whig associates, such for instance as Clark, Smith and Saltonstall. He put down all the officers of Government and Administration members of Congress as slaves to power; in truth this was the least abusive epithet he applied to them. If Mr. Botts thinks he can persuade the people of Chesterfield that Mr. Jones is either the slave of power or the slave of any thing else, he must be unacquainted with the fact, that Mr. Jones has lived in the county for the last 20 years, or he is most egregiously deceived in his own powers of oratory. No: Mr. Jones reputation for honor, integrity and independence is too well earned, too well deserved, too well known, placed on too elevated a height, to be reached, much less assaulted by any shaft that may come from the quiver of the honorable Representative of the Richmond District.

When the people come to learn that Mr. Botts has several thousands of dollars staked upon the election of President, they will sooner believe that he is the slave of interest, than that Mr. Jones is the slave of power or the slave of any thing else.

Mr. Leigh next mounted the rostrum, and, wonderful to tell! he neither waged war upon Van Buren nor battled for Harrison, but made a direct attack upon Mr. Jones, as Chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means. The gentleman's course must have been influenced by a certain association of ideas. he must have recollected, that the last time he addressed the people at Chesterfield Court-house, was, when he, as a member of the U.S. Senate, came out to instruct the people not to instruct their delegate to vote against him. John W. Jones, on that occasion, had the daring to oppose him and the good fortune to unhorse him. These recollections are unpleasant, and sometimes give to our thoughts a direction they would not otherwise take.

Mr. Leigh seemed particularly uneasy under the charge, which he said, Mr. Jones had made against him, of Federalism. Now, if Mr. Leigh will only pursue the course on this subject, marked out to him by his candidate for the Presidency, we have no doubt this question can be settled to the satisfaction of Mr. Jones, Mr. Leigh, and the whole people of Chesterfield. How is that? Refer to the history and records of the country, and if they do not prove Mr. Leigh to be a Federalist, and if they be not corroborated by the recollections of some of the older citizens of Chesterfield, then I have no doubt Mr Jones will yield the point, and make the amende honorable, even without the intervention of the anticipated meeting.

The Whig orators complained heavily that Mr. Jones occupied so much time, and charged it upon him as discourteous. Now I imagine if you had heard these Whig orators, you would have thought that they were the last men on earth who should speak of want of courtesy, unless they meant to apply the term to themselves. What: when a representative has been absent from his constituents for the space of eight months in discharge of the duties of an office which they have conferred upon him, shall it be, that strangers shall attempt to prescribe the time he shall occupy in giving an account of his stewardship to those constituents? What presumption: what impudence! But, Sir, we cannot so much wonder at this, as it comes from a party who claim all the talent, wealth and decency in the land. I did not wonder at it much myself. I did not much regret to see it. For, I have spent the most of my leisure hours of late in the sports of the field, and I have observed, that whenever a shot tells well, the first and best evidence you have of it is in the fluttering of the wounded birds.

Mr. Editor, be not uneasy about Chesterfield: Although she may be assailed by the whole Richmond Bar. the Bank Presidents from Petersburg, and the Whig Elector to boot: she is firm, decided, immovable. Be assured, we know our principles and rights, and will maintain them. I have never known our friends so warm, united and determined. We are aiming to double our majority here, and we will do it. Note that!

ONE OF THE PEOPLE.

* Mr. Leigh's native county.