Kentucky Gazette

An article which appeared in the Boston "Atlas" of the 15th has caused a great fluttering amongst the hoco-poco pigeons. The Atlas is represented as expressing the opinions of Mr. Webster, and it is hence believed that Mr. W. has withdrawn from the presidential contest, and will throw his weight in favor of Gen. Harrison, and oppose the nomination of Mr. Clay. Since the appearance of this article, we have not heard our Godlike namesake so highly lauded by the Lexington whigs, as whilst he was passing through the western wilderness, haranguing the people against the present administration.

The following is extracted from the Atlas article:—

"Mr. Clay, we have ever regarded, as an able, honorable, upright and patriotic statesman, a warm hearted and highminded man. We supported him once for the Presidency and would do so again, were we not in doing so, almost certain of defeat. But Mr. Clay is deficient in popularity. He has been upon the public stage some five and twenty years, and his candid, and sometimes inconsiderate course has often laid him bare to the attacks of his enemies. Prejudices against him of different sorts, most unjust and unfounded, as we believe, have been, by the diligent efforts of his adversaries, so ingrained into the popular mind—in every part of the country, that nothing can eradicate them. The ardor with which he sustains these opinions and these measures which he has adopted, if it has made warm friends, has made hot enemies; and everybody knows how quickly friendship grows cold and benefits are forgotten, while enmity heats by delay, and injuries, or imagined injuries, rankle deeper and deeper into the heart.

Mr. Clay's influence failed to sustain J. Q. Adams in the Presidential chair. With all the efforts made to elect Mr. Clay himself in 1832, he succeeded in obtaining only forty-nine electoral votes; and in the election of 1836, himself and his friends were so well satisfied of his deficiency in popular favor, that they did not attempt to run him at all. Is not this decisive evidence as to Mr. Clay's popularity?

With respect to Mr. Webster, it is not necessary for us to dwell a moment upon our admiration of his talent, and our confidence in his wisdom and virtue. In this respect, we do but sympathise with the great mass of our fellow citizens of Massachusetts, and with large numbers of the best informed and most enlightened of the people, all over the Union. But Mr. Webster is equally deficient with Mr. Clay in the essential requisites of popularity; and like Mr. Clay he is obnoxious to a larger number of inveterate prejudices which have been for years zealously nursed and fostered, by the diligent envy and hatred of those who did not dare to assail him in any other way; and the result of the late Presidential election, joined to more recent indications, furnish conclusive evidence to our minds that Mr. Webster is not an available candidate."

"We therefore decidedly avow ourselves in favor of General Harrison as the Whig candidate for President, on the precise ground, that able and patriotic administration of the Government, while he possesses every quality requisite to an able and patriotic administration of the Government, he far surpasses his other two competitors in the all essential qualifications of popularity. He is the people's candidate."