James Grant Wilson

“ Fillmore, to win his way, like Lincoln and Garfield, from almost hopeless poverty to one of the most eminent positions of the world, showed equal determination, often times working, for weeks and months together, till long past midnight, which happily his powers of physical endurance permitted him to do with impunity, and affording a fine illustration of the proud boast of our country, that its loftiest honors are the legitimate objects of ambition to the humblest in the land, as well as to those favored by the gifts of fortune and high birth. ”

“ After leaving Washington for the last time, Webster said to a friend that Fillmore's administration leaving out of the question his own share of its work was no doubt the ablest the country had possessed for many years. The same great statesman, in his speech at the laying of the corner-stone of the capitol extension, said: “President Fillmore, it is your singularly good fortune to perform an act such as that which the earliest of your predecessors performed fifty-eight years ago. You stand where he stood; you lay your hand on the cornerstone he laid. Changed, changed is everything around. ”

“ Streets and avenues have since been laid out and completed, squares and public grounds inclosed and ornamented, until the city, which bears his name, although comparatively inconsiderable in numbers and wealth, has become quite fit to be the seat of government of a great and united people. ”

“ Four years later, while at Rome, he received the news of his nomination for the presidency by the American party. He accepted the nomination, but before the close of the campaign it became evident that the real struggle was between the Republicans and Democrats. Many, with whom Fillmore was the first choice for president, cast their votes for Gen. Frémont or James Buchanan, believing that there was no hope of his election, and, although he received the support of large numbers in all the states, Maryland alone gave him her electoral vote. ”

“ In 1853, while still in Washington, Mr. Fillmore made an arrangement with Henry E. Davies to renew, on retiring from the presidency, the practice of his profession in New York, in partnership with that gentleman, who, after occupying a judge's seat in the court of appeals, returned to the bar. Family afflictions, however, combined with other causes, induced the ex-president to abandon his purpose. There were doubtless at that time men of more genius and greater eloquence at the bar of the great city ”

“ In June, 1848, Millard Fillmore was nominated by the Whig national convention for vice-president, with Gen. Taylor, who had recently won military renown in Mexico, as president, and was in the following November elected, making, with the late occupant of the office, seven vice-presidents of the United States from New York, a greater number than has been yet furnished by any other state. In February, 1849, Fillmore resigned the comptrollership, and on March 5 he was inaugurated as vice-president. ”

“ His gifted contemporary, Henry Clay, thought highly of Fillmore's moderation and wisdom, said his administration was an able and honorable one, and on his death-bed recommended his nomination for the presidency (by the Baltimore convention of 1852) , as being a statesman of large civil experience, and one in whose career there was nothing inconsistent with the highest purity and patriotism. ”

“ During his apprenticeship he was, as the youngest, treated with great injustice, and on one occasion his employer, for some expression of righteous resentment, threatened to chastise him, when the young woodsman, burning with indignation, raised the axe with which he was at work, and told him the attempt would cost him his life. ”

“ When assailed in congress he exhibited a manly self-reliance and a lofty courage which commanded the admiration of every spectator, and yet no one ever manifested deeper sensibility, or more tender sympathy, with a friend in affliction. ”

“ Fillmore and the strong cabinet that he had called around him concurred unanimously in this opinion, and the act was signed, together with the other compromise measures. The fugitive-slave law was exceedingly obnoxious to a large portion of the Whig party of the north, as well as to the anti-slavery men, and its execution was resisted. Slaves in several instances were rescued from the custody of the United States marshals, and a few citizens of Christiana, in Pennsylvania, were killed. ”

“ Working for nine months on the farm, and attending such primitive schools as then existed in that neighborhood for the other three months of the year, he had an opportunity of forgetting during the summer what he acquired in the winter, for in those days there were no newspapers and magazines to be found in pioneers cabins, and his father's library consisted of but two books — the Bible and a collection of hymns. ”

“ Fillmore's political career began and ended with the birth and extinction of the great Whig party. In 1828 he was elected by Erie County to the state legislature of New York, serving for three terms, and retiring with a reputation for ability, integrity, and a conscientious performance of his public duties. ”

“ Fillmore as vice-president and president from March 4, 1849, to March 4, 1853, include many from Daniel Webster, Edward Everett and other of the most distinguished Americans of that period. The writer of the accompanying letter when a citizen of Buffalo and before he became president was the younger Fillmore's most intimate friend:
816 Madison Avenue [New York] , February 3, 1891. My Dear Sir: Powers Fillmore was a man of the kindliest impulses and disposition, but very odd in many ways. ”