One Glorious Ambition (37 page)

“It will pass this time.” She adjusted the doily pinned to her hair and worn for modesty in public. “I have confidence in
your
committee, the virtue of this bill, and God’s good graces.”

In the humid summer, she chose a Democrat in the House to sponsor the bill, sticking with her original strategy of getting the party less likely to support her cause to be the one to introduce it before the session. The only changes she made were to ask for ten million acres instead of five.

“Webster suggested it,” she told Mann when he expressed exasperation with the change.

And she chose a war hero from Illinois—William H. Bissell—to introduce her bill in the House. “Did you not know that he criticized a Mississippi regiment during the war?” Mann asked her. “This resulted in the regiment’s commander, Jefferson Davis—yes,
that
Jefferson Davis—to challenge him to a duel. Davis will never go along with a bill associated with Bissell.”

“God will be our mediator,” she insisted. She kept her choice of Democrat to sponsor the bill.

In the Senate, she chose a Marylander to push the bill. Then she waited and resisted the heat by wiping ice cubes on her wrists and throat. She wrote to Anne, “My heart pounds during my daily trek to the halls of Congress. Perhaps I shall collapse and not have to see the fate of these machinations in our capitol.” She quickly added, “But my baby—this bill—calls me forward, and of course, I will not abandon it.”

The Fillmores invited Dorothea to attend a Fourth of July celebration with them. They sat beneath a canopy that did little to protect them from the sweltering heat. Ice from Boston had been shipped down, and chips were added to tall glasses of water, which they all drank liberally. President Taylor and his family sat beneath a neighboring canopy, eating cherries and drinking iced water too.

“I feel like a sieve,” Dorothea told Abigail as the two employed fans and wiped at their perspiration. Dorothea tugged at the collar of the brown linen dress she wore, still dark but hoping not to trap the hot sun as her black merino wools would. She perspired and looked forward to a cool bath whenever she returned to her quarters.

Joseph Henry, the head of the new Smithsonian Institution, and his wife, Harriet, were among the Fillmores’ guests. They were also Dorothea’s hosts in the city. She had given up her boardinghouse life for the pleasantries of the Henry family and for their kindness in allowing her to invite prominent legislators to meet
with her in their parlor. She also loved their wonderful conversations about the Smithsonian mission of “disseminating knowledge among men.”

“Will President Taylor ever resolve the slavery issue so we might move forward?” Dorothea leaned toward Vice President Fillmore and whispered. Firecrackers snapped in the distance.

“He is torn. The president is more independent than either Whig or Democrat,” Millard told her. “He sees both sides, which is a horrible affliction for a man of political persuasion. It can make him look weak.”

They enjoyed the parade and festivities and sauntered back to their quarters at day’s end. Dorothea was tiring of Washington. Nothing happened here except heat and stirring, but there was no baking or final bread to take from the oven. Only the friendships of the Fillmores and Bells brought her any comfort. She sighed as she slipped into a cool bath and washed her arms and legs with lavender-laced soaps.

Four days later, while enjoying her weekly tea with the Fillmores, Dorothea heard the news that was rocking the capital. Before Abigail joined her, Abby said, “The president is ill and has asked for his wife to prepare herself.”

“Prepare for what?”

“His death.”

Dorothea gasped. “Is he so ill?” She had heard that the president had come down with a case of ague after the celebration on the Fourth and that meetings with several congressmen had been canceled.

“He complains of his stomach. Perhaps the water … Cholera? No one knows.”

“How is your father?”

“Well. He’s well. And Mama and me. You aren’t ill, are you? We all drank the same water.”

Dorothea shook her head. “I’m fine. But our ice came from a different bucket. It might have been … but no one else has taken ill? The first lady is all right?”

Abby nodded. She blinked back tears. “He’s such a good man. So fair. Should he die, it will put much weight upon Father.”

Three days later Zachary Taylor did die and Millard Fillmore assumed the presidency.

As much as Dorothea grieved the loss of this popular president, so popular that more than a hundred thousand mourners lined the streets to honor him at the passing of his hearse, Dorothea was also hopeful. She renewed her assurance by reading Scripture that morning, Romans 8:28: “We know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.”

Millard Fillmore was not conflicted about preventing the spread of slavery to the new territories, and he believed as Dorothea did that the federal government must play a role within the states regarding the treatment of the mentally ill. She grieved the president’s passing but also thanked God that He had placed her friend Fillmore on the ticket. She would have her bill passed at last.

The new president moved quickly on the Compromise of 1850, breaking Henry Clay’s proposals into smaller pieces. Each passed, mollifying the South and quieting talk of secession. Dorothea’s friend the president appealed to veterans, providing land grants to them. Oregon Territory settlers were offered free land, and the federal government ceded federal swampland to the states in which they lay. People were thinking about land, and Dorothea was certain her bill would pass and be signed into law by her powerful friend.

“All in God’s timing,” she wrote to Marianna.

“I expected Senator Davis to object,” Dorothea told Fillmore after a day of debate when her bill was introduced. They shared tea in September 1850 in the family quarters. “He does not believe the federal government has any role in the states. He purports the federal government is only a trustee of the states’ rights.”

“At least his old argument of constitutionality held less sway this time,” the president told her, “given that other land grants
have been accepted. But the western states still object to the distribution. You have got to find a way to help them see your light.”

“I simply cannot compromise. It annoys me that people think I can.” She fanned herself against the late summer heat. “How’s Abigail? Has she begun the library in the mansion yet? That was such a grand idea to ask Congress to fund it.”

The president set his cup down. “Her ankle aches, but she finds herself lost in the best of ways by selecting titles for the shelves. Your books are already there.”

“Oh, well, that isn’t necessary.” Dorothea felt her face grow warm.

“Dolly, this stance of yours, not to negotiate”—the president leaned toward her—“not to find ways to appease the states who object to issues in your bill. You must reconsider. It is not a sign of weakness to understand the ways in which bills become laws and adjust accordingly.”

“I appreciate your wisdom, dear friend. But the virtue of the bill itself will be sufficient. Anything less is a concession against those in greatest need and, truly, I see compromise in this as an affront to God.”

“Oh, Dorothea.” The president shook his head, a sympathetic gesture.

“I will continue to bring my full will to bear. I believe you shall have the bill this session to sign.”

Fillmore leaned back and pulled at his watch fob. “I admire
your certainty.” He rose to leave, nodding to his daughter. To Dorothea, he added, “But I pray for your reversal.”

Dorothea left Washington days after the delay of her bill yet one more time by a member of the select committee who said he needed time to study it.

“Outrageous,” Dorothea wrote to Sarah Gibbs in Vermont. “He has already had two years or more to study it. Now they have scheduled it for debate in the
next
session. I no longer expect anything to happen as proposed.”

The president invited her to a tea of consolation. Abigail and Abby helped serve. Legislative attendees attempted to soothe her disappointment. They commented on Dorothea’s stature as a prominent public figure, having tea with the president, how she brought important cultural and social issues to the front of political life “as a woman.” They tended to emphasize the last. How rare it was for a woman to walk the halls of power.

She took small pleasure in the accolades after failing yet again to fulfill her greatest purpose for the Abrams and Madeleines of the country. She had wielded her power for benevolence, for the good of others, and that was woman’s greatest role. Women gained influence in their charity, Dorothea knew. Such kindness should sway the legislature.

“You have decided not to allow Mrs. Hale to write of you in
Godey’s
?” Abby asked after the politicians had left.

“I would think allowing this woman to highlight your accomplishments in her magazine could only assist with your campaign for the mentally ill,” Abigail said. “It would bring in more of the public interest.”

“Never.” Dorothea rose and stared out a window at the green expanse of lawn. Sheep grazed to keep the grass clipped short.

“But she believes in the education of women, in helping young girls become fully prepared for their roles as women,” Abigail said. “As teachers, this can only help our own cause for the future Abbys of the world.”

“A lovely thought, yes. But delicacy and modesty must prevail.” Dorothea turned from the window. “I object to making celebratory stories of women or using our feminine sides to promote causes. The cause itself ought to lead the parade for change.” She smiled at Abby. “Mrs. Hale may write of me when I’m dead.”

Sarah Josepha Hale, however, ignored Dorothea’s objection and published a biography of the reformer, using the occasion to advance her own cause of federal land to be set aside for normal schools for women teachers rather than for the mentally ill.

“You should have let her write of you, Dolly,” Abigail told her at their next gathering. “Perhaps she would not have pushed her own cause quite so hard.”

Dorothea punched the magazine article with her fingers. “I did what I thought was right.”

“You always do.”