This claim, it was insisted, was in accordance with the will of the people, as expressed in the electoral colleges, and to resist it would be to violate the spirit of the constitution, and to set at nought the fundamental principles of our republican Government.

A sufficient reply to these positions is found in the fact, that Gen.
Jackson did not receive a majority of the electoral votes, and hence a majority of the people could not be considered as desiring his election.
The absolute truth, subsequently obtained on this point, was, that Mr.
Adams had received more of the primary votes of the people than Gen.
Jackson; and thus, according to all republican principles, was entitled to be considered the first choice of the citizens of the United States.
The position of Mr.Clay, in this contest for the presidency, was one of great delicacy and difficulty.

He was precisely in that critical posture, that, whatever course he might pursue, he would be subject to misrepresentation and censure, and could not but raise up a host of enemies.

Originally one of the four candidates for the presidency, he failed, by five electoral votes, in having a sufficient number to be one of the three candidates returned to the House of Representatives, of which he was then Speaker.

In this posture of affairs, it was evident that upon the course which should be pursued by Mr.Clay, and his friends in the House, depended the question who should be elected President.