On the day before General Jackson's inauguration Clay put his resignation into the hands of Mr. Adams, and thus ended his career as Secretary of State. It may, on the whole, be called a very creditable one, although its failures were more conspicuous than its successes. His greatest affair, that of the Panama Congress, had entirely miscarried. This, however, was not the fault of his management. He had desired to confide the mission to the best diplomatic mind in America, Albert Gallatin, but Gallatin, after some consideration, declined. John Sergeant of Pennsylvania, of whom we have already heard as an anti-slavery man in the Missouri struggle, and Richard C. Anderson of Kentucky, were then selected. Owing to the long delays in Congress, the envoys did not start on their mission until early in the summer of 1826. Anderson died on the way. In his place Joel R. Poinsett, American Minister in Mexico, was instructed to attend the Congress. When Sergeant arrived at Panama, the Congress had adjourned with a resolution to meet again at Tacubaya, in Mexico. But by the time that meeting was to be held, the attention of our southern sister republics was already fully engaged by internal discords and conflicts. The meeting, therefore, never took place, and Sergeant returned without ever having seen the Congress. To Clay this was a deep disappointment. His zeal in behalf of the Spanish American republics had been generous and ardent. He had sincerely believed that national
