It is this youthful sentiment of
Americanism, so happily developed by after circumstances, that we see
operating through all his public life, and making him as tender of what
he considers due to the South as of the rights of his own land of hills.
Franklin Pierce had scarcely reached the legal age for such elevation,
when, in 1837, he was elected to the Senate of the United States. He
took his seat at the commencement of the presidency of Mr. Van Buren.
Never before nor since has the Senate been more venerable for the array
of veteran and celebrated statesmen than at that time. Calhoun, Webster,
and Clay had lost nothing of their intellectual might. Benton, Silas
Wright, Woodbury, Buchanan, and Walker were members; and many even of the
less eminent names were such as have gained historic place--men of
powerful eloquence, and worthy to be leaders of the respective parties
which they espoused. To this dignified body (composed of individuals
some of whom were older in political experience than he in his mortal
life) Pierce came as the youngest member of the Senate. With his usual
tact and exquisite sense of propriety, he saw that it was not the time
for him to step forward prominently on this highest theatre in the land.
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