After digging into my family tree, I've found that Henry was my great great great great-grandfather (mouthful, I know.) I'm excited to learn more about him.
Henry Clay was an unspoken and unrecognized hero who contributed to the hold of the Union for far longer than it probably would have been. Lincoln admired Clay greatly too and he served as a great inspiration to him.
why do you always say white southerners as if there were no black slave owners. if you know history you know this and yet you always make the point to say white southerners rather than just southerners.
Excellent documentary on Henry Clay and his efforts to hold the Union together over 40 years. I will be trying to learn more about this outstanding American.
It’s almost heartbreaking to think that all the hardwork Henry Clay put in for 30+ years came to nothing in the end, Clay certainly doesn’t get his due for his hard work to bind the Union together. Excellent Documentary!!!
1. Against to be slave owner Clay struggles for a step by step abolution in the border states as Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland. He was not succesful, but I think important to mention. 2. Clay supported industrial protective tariffs, which could only be voted on when 14 senators from the 7 seceding states left Washington in the winter of 1861. 3. When the fire-eating southerners (including Jefferson Davis) wanted to annex all of Mexico and increase the cotton-producing region, Clay as a senator and her party partner Lincoln in the Congress fought for an independent Mexico. 4. I read somewhere, Stephen Douglas visited the sick Clay and told him that his idea for the later Kansas Nebraska act, which was still hidden in his desk drawer, was warned by Clay against this step. Stephen Douglas crossed it in 1854.
I think Henry Clay helped the intact USA after his Death as well. Interesting in the Civil War era Kentucky was the only state among the slave sysem states where very very many higher % slave populated counties were prounionists not only the lower % slave populated counties. Only West part of Kentucky was strong proconfederate in almost all counties and Mid and East Kentucky had very few proconfederate In the Confederacy states the low% percentage slave populated areas were the main prounionist areas. In the other border states the higher % slave populated counties were the main proconfederate sentiment areas as the Little Dixie in Missouri or the main tobbacco producer counties in Maryland. Henry Clay prounionism in the earlier Whig supporter counties was strong effect in Kentucky.
Clay was the greatest member of Congress ever. Nobody accomplished more meaningful work than he did during his tenure and he’d rank among the top 5 American political figures who was never president.
The Treaty with Britain for our Independence and the Articles of Confederation designated the Northwestern Territories as to be without slavery. That established the authority of the Federal Government to regulate or prohibit slavery in the new territories. The seceding states claimed the Federal government did not have that right, which was never true. Abraham Lincoln, native of Kentucky, pointed this out as legal precedent.
Abraham Lincoln was an admitted White Supremacist who wanted the emancipated slaves of african heritage to be repatriated back to western africa - not to be made voters, jurors, or legal equals with White Americans.
@@GH-oi2jf their willingness to reach compromise between the major parties of the time. Also the current Democratic Party literally supported slavery and segregation
Interesting that the question of Missouri was a major catalyst of the civil war, and yet, officially it was a border state. Internally, it’s Democratic Party left Missouri and claimed to be the “state government in exile”
Well done, Sir, and most necessary in these turbulent times as we witness the House arrogantly defying all that we hold dear. Clay's compromises were a testament to his love of country and his dogged determination to keep the inevitable at bay for as long as humanly possible.
Our state seal, here in Clay's Kentucky, bears our motto, "United We Stand, Divided We Fall." By way of hoping we might return to the former as there will be a point of no return, please consider that spoiling for a fight against your countrymen even *here* suggests a degree of party loyalty that neither of the current iteration has earned nor deserves. That's a very small hill for a Republic to die on.
The "border incidents" in Texas were deliberate acts of provocation by Polk. The Nueces River, north of the Rio Grande, had been the traditional southern border of Texas for many years. Polk sen t the army in the disputed territory to prove a military response. When some American troops were killed in this area of Mexico, Polk asked for a declaration of war because "American blood has been spilled on American Soil." Polk had his eyes ion California, with the harbors of Sn Diego and San Francisco, and he saw war with Mexico as the way to get it, and a battle over Texas as a way to get that war. He made these plans clear, and promised he would not run for a second term so that he could focus on these goals. He kept those promises. He was a protege of Andrew Jackson, who invaded Florida and took it from Spain when they would not sell it. Mexico was poor and corrupt, put up a feeble effort and settled for a sizable bribe, to "sell" the northern, richer half of Mexico to the country that took it. .
I have to correct one thing: That he promised to not seek a second term in order to concentrate on his maniac hunger for territory is a myth. It's funny how because of his very successful single term people always laud him for that decision and think it was his free intention. The fact is that the Democrats never ever wanted to nominate him, he was a completely irrelevant person and had only gone to the convention because he hoped that he might with much luck get the vice presidential nomination (but even that was unrealistic). The party strictly wanted to nominate van Buren (who was Jackson's right hand man btw) for a second term and nobody else, but after failing to win the nomination because he couldn't reach the 75 % of delegates needed in the Democratic party, as an expansionist minority opposed him and some splinters wanted to support former Democrat John Tyler, van Buren withdrew after like 40 ballots, and a compromise with the expansionists of the party was needed now. The non-expansionist majority -- only under the explicit condition that he wouldn't run for a second term -- agreed to side with the expansionists to let sparsely known Polk obtain the needed majority. His nomination was just an attempt to finally finish this farce of a convention after more than 40 ballots, the delegates themselves not believing that he had any chance to win the general election, and even if he would they thought that he couldn't achieve (or from their viewpoint destroy) much in 4 years. So they would be able to get back to non-expansionism after his single term, as expansionism wasn't really the Zeitgeist of the time. Whigs were laughing how the Democrats would already have handed them the triumph. Everyone was wrong and after his term expansionism had been irreversibly implemented. I think he can say thanks to obscure John Tyler who had put expansionism to the political center in the second half of his term and had fought for the admission of Texas. Tyler did it for himself hoping to get reelected for that effort, but Polk was the one really benifiting from it, as there is speculation that this decisively shifted the blocking minority in the convention against van Buren. (America would look very different nowadays after a van Buren/Clay election battle -- with both against expansion).
Thanks for watching! It is good music! No question is too weird! Our sound designer used the DeWolfe Music Library, the oldest music licensing library, to design the music for "Henry Clay" and we can't be sure which exact piece it was, but DeWolfe is famous for the Monty Python theme and for other music used in cinema in the 80s and 90s. Enjoy!
Seen in hindsight, perhaps. But nevertheless a remarkable man living in extraordinary times. Other countries, e.g., Great Britain, eliminated slavery without war, so war was not necessarily a foregone conclusion.
Can you do a documentary on the Burr Conspiracy Trials, I only ask because I know some of the most interesting founders were involved such as Burr, Clay, Randolph, and Marshall.
We'd love to work on a film about the Burr Conspiracy Trials. That's been a discussion here. All we need to do is raise the funds! Any ideas on that to share with us? Please let us know!
Fantastic Video!!!!! Henry Clay would make a Great President today he was a very intelligent man. God bless the Whig Party the orginal GOP !!!!!!!!!!!!
The Whig Party was divided over the slavery issue, as was the Democratic Party. The Republican Party was formed out of the anti-slavery faction of both.
Yes, Ms. Fridy, and by that we mean that although John Brown was an abolitionist, he was by no means a pacificist, but rather a rabid aggressor, an insurrectionist, as he would be called today, who plotted violent overthrow of government. He believed that he was destined by God to carry out this violence, and yes, some referred to him as "fanatic".
yes he was a criminal and murderer, an absolute abolitionist fanatic. his crime sprees helped ignite a national war and spook white southerners into seceding to avoid a race war with negro uprisings in the south.
There is no means or authorization for secession of any state anywhere in the Constitution. Any contract defines the terms by which the contract will be null and void; therefore secession is illegal by definition of the terms of joining together. It is not a contract; it is a Constitution. The thing that constitutes the Federal Government.
Completely not true. New York, Rhode Island and Virginia refused to join the union unless they had the right to leave it. It was declared in their ordinances of ratification.The idea of a perpetual union is a myth--just as the idea that secession is "treason."
@@josephtemple1667 not true..maybe up until the civil war the idea of perpetual union was open for debate..but not since. The civil war settled that question.
@@johnj.baranski6553 Sorry pal but Abraham Lincoln is not the supreme arbiter; the Founding Fathers are. And their wishes that any state could leave the Union were made crystal clear.
@@josephtemple1667 Seems Lincoln WAS the “supreme arbiter”, cuz the North won the war, preserved the Union(Constitution intact), and nobody in their right mind would today suggest or defend the right of a state to secede from the Union, so……. Read Lincoln’s Speech to Congress in Special Session, July 4, 1861. Game, set, & match! 🇱🇷🙏🎩
@@timothymeehan181 Perhaps you're right. It's a shame that Lincoln didn't get to finish his second term; we all know that he planned on sending all the blacks to either Africa or Central America. And if that happened, talk about a more perfect Union!
What? What do you suppose we do then? We've just let it go past the time where it has to be course corrected....as the forefathers knew was necessary. It's still the place to call home on the planet.....men of this era are just not prepared to put in the work.....they've got house payments, car notes, and phones to distract them. We've gotten the country we deserve.
![[UNCUT] “บอสณวัฒน์” ลากไส้!! ใครหนุนหลัง "แม่ตั๊ก ป๋าเบียร์" I คนดังนั่งเคลียร์ I 30 ก.ย. 67](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/QlD7mU2KKRk/mqdefault.jpg)
After digging into my family tree, I've found that Henry was my great great great great-grandfather (mouthful, I know.) I'm excited to learn more about him.
That's wonderful. We appreciate hearing when our work inspires others to dig into and learn more about American history.
I am related to him to. I am a distention revlitav and my mother's maiden name is Clay
I found out I’m related to Abraham Lincoln too…. Small world kiddo
@@FactNinja khan? Related to Lincoln’s? Lol
I’m related as well my father’s family are from ky and they moved to Indiana
Henry Clay was an unspoken and unrecognized hero who contributed to the hold of the Union for far longer than it probably would have been. Lincoln admired Clay greatly too and he served as a great inspiration to him.
Thanks for watching and commenting!
Apparently he came to dinner at the Todd house and Mary Todd was an ardent supporter
These Witnessing History programs are simply outstanding!
Thank you. If you are interested in supporting WHEF films, please consider a one-time or monthly donation at www.witnessinghistory.org/donate/
I thought, at first, that it was being narrated by Jimmy Stewart.... This guy sounds just like him..
Thanks for watching! Our narrator, Kent Masterson Brown, has a voice that is often compared to Jimmy Stewart's!
At last I found a history channel that deals with history rather than cartoons, ego manic self promoting channel host and misinformation. Thank You
Thanks for watching!
Looks like alot of people home watching this. Covid19 go away!
why do you always say white southerners as if there were no black slave owners. if you know history you know this and yet you always make the point to say white southerners rather than just southerners.
Thanks for watching and commenting. You are correct.
don't forget the indian slave owners and Jewish plantation owners as well!
I am writing a paper on Henry clay and this was vary well done! Keep up the good work
Thanks for letting us know, Olivia! All the best on your paper!
Thanks
Excellent documentary on Henry Clay and his efforts to hold the Union together over 40 years. I will be trying to learn more about this outstanding American.
Thanks for watching and commenting! It's always great to feature Kentuckians in our work.
It’s almost heartbreaking to think that all the hardwork Henry Clay put in for 30+ years came to nothing in the end, Clay certainly doesn’t get his due for his hard work to bind the Union together. Excellent Documentary!!!
Thanks for watching and commenting!
This is my family
1. Against to be slave owner Clay struggles for a step by step abolution in the border states as Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland. He was not succesful, but I think important to mention.
2. Clay supported industrial protective tariffs, which could only be voted on when 14 senators from the 7 seceding states left Washington in the winter of 1861.
3. When the fire-eating southerners (including Jefferson Davis) wanted to annex all of Mexico and increase the cotton-producing region, Clay as a senator and her party partner Lincoln in the Congress fought for an independent Mexico.
4. I read somewhere, Stephen Douglas visited the sick Clay and told him that his idea for the later Kansas Nebraska act, which was still hidden in his desk drawer, was warned by Clay against this step. Stephen Douglas crossed it in 1854.
I think Henry Clay helped the intact USA after his Death as well. Interesting in the Civil War era Kentucky was the only state among the slave sysem states where very very many higher % slave populated counties were prounionists not only the lower % slave populated counties.
Only West part of Kentucky was strong proconfederate in almost all counties and Mid and East Kentucky had very few proconfederate
In the Confederacy states the low% percentage slave populated areas were the main prounionist areas. In the other border states the higher % slave populated counties were the main proconfederate sentiment areas as the Little Dixie in Missouri or the main tobbacco producer counties in Maryland. Henry Clay prounionism in the earlier Whig supporter counties was strong effect in Kentucky.
Clay was the greatest member of Congress ever. Nobody accomplished more meaningful work than he did during his tenure and he’d rank among the top 5 American political figures who was never president.
Thanks for watching and commenting!
The Treaty with Britain for our Independence and the Articles of Confederation designated the Northwestern Territories as to be without slavery. That established the authority of the Federal Government to regulate or prohibit slavery in the new territories. The seceding states claimed the Federal government did not have that right, which was never true. Abraham Lincoln, native of Kentucky, pointed this out as legal precedent.
You will truly enjoy the WHEF film, "Abraham Lincoln in Illinois." Thanks for watching!
Abraham Lincoln was an admitted White Supremacist who wanted the emancipated slaves of african heritage to be repatriated back to western africa - not to be made voters, jurors, or legal equals with White Americans.
He held off the war for so long. We will be doing some video projects on him soon.
That's great news! Be sure to let us know when they are ready!
@@witnessinghistoryeducation5885 Absolutely, sure will!
3rd Armor Divorced 5th Continent Conquered , Awaiting Ripping cord...no 🪂 oops yep it is PINK Cord.careful old man your pushing 75 now
So Clay served in the Kentucky House of Representatives *and* the US Senate at the same time?
He served in both bodies, successively, not at the same time.
The Whigs are the only hope our country has today, wish they came back
Thanks for watching and commenting!
Is it their anti-Catholic policy or their anti-Mason policy that you admire? Or perhaps their tolerance of slavery?
@@GH-oi2jf their willingness to reach compromise between the major parties of the time. Also the current Democratic Party literally supported slavery and segregation
I have true American blood in my veins 😎 my mothers side are direct descendants of Henry clay
Me too but in my dads side
Fantastic documentary, does anyone know the theme song played during the introduction?
Thanks for watching and commenting!
I'm a descendent of Henry clay
Interesting that the question of Missouri was a major catalyst of the civil war, and yet, officially it was a border state.
Internally, it’s Democratic Party left Missouri and claimed to be the “state government in exile”
Thanks for watching and commenting!
Love your work, Mr. Brown! Do you have any source material for your research on bleeding kansas?
Thanks!
Thank you!
A Kentuckian and a slave owner that loved his country more than anything else.
Well done, Sir, and most necessary in these turbulent times as we witness the House arrogantly defying all that we hold dear. Clay's compromises were a testament to his love of country and his dogged determination to keep the inevitable at bay for as long as humanly possible.
@@whatsyurprob158 Google says 620K dont know where you get ur figure, but whatever
Our state seal, here in Clay's Kentucky, bears our motto, "United We Stand, Divided We Fall."
By way of hoping we might return to the former as there will be a point of no return, please consider that spoiling for a fight against your countrymen even *here* suggests a degree of party loyalty that neither of the current iteration has earned nor deserves. That's a very small hill for a Republic to die on.
The "border incidents" in Texas were deliberate acts of provocation by Polk. The Nueces River, north of the Rio Grande, had been the traditional southern border of Texas for many years. Polk sen t the army in the disputed territory to prove a military response. When some American troops were killed in this area of Mexico, Polk asked for a declaration of war because "American blood has been spilled on American Soil." Polk had his eyes ion California, with the harbors of Sn Diego and San Francisco, and he saw war with Mexico as the way to get it, and a battle over Texas as a way to get that war. He made these plans clear, and promised he would not run for a second term so that he could focus on these goals. He kept those promises. He was a protege of Andrew Jackson, who invaded Florida and took it from Spain when they would not sell it. Mexico was poor and corrupt, put up a feeble effort and settled for a sizable bribe, to "sell" the northern, richer half of Mexico to the country that took it. .
I have to correct one thing: That he promised to not seek a second term in order to concentrate on his maniac hunger for territory is a myth. It's funny how because of his very successful single term people always laud him for that decision and think it was his free intention. The fact is that the Democrats never ever wanted to nominate him, he was a completely irrelevant person and had only gone to the convention because he hoped that he might with much luck get the vice presidential nomination (but even that was unrealistic). The party strictly wanted to nominate van Buren (who was Jackson's right hand man btw) for a second term and nobody else, but after failing to win the nomination because he couldn't reach the 75 % of delegates needed in the Democratic party, as an expansionist minority opposed him and some splinters wanted to support former Democrat John Tyler, van Buren withdrew after like 40 ballots, and a compromise with the expansionists of the party was needed now.
The non-expansionist majority -- only under the explicit condition that he wouldn't run for a second term -- agreed to side with the expansionists to let sparsely known Polk obtain the needed majority. His nomination was just an attempt to finally finish this farce of a convention after more than 40 ballots, the delegates themselves not believing that he had any chance to win the general election, and even if he would they thought that he couldn't achieve (or from their viewpoint destroy) much in 4 years. So they would be able to get back to non-expansionism after his single term, as expansionism wasn't really the Zeitgeist of the time. Whigs were laughing how the Democrats would already have handed them the triumph. Everyone was wrong and after his term expansionism had been irreversibly implemented. I think he can say thanks to obscure John Tyler who had put expansionism to the political center in the second half of his term and had fought for the admission of Texas. Tyler did it for himself hoping to get reelected for that effort, but Polk was the one really benifiting from it, as there is speculation that this decisively shifted the blocking minority in the convention against van Buren. (America would look very different nowadays after a van Buren/Clay election battle -- with both against expansion).
Very interesting. Might be a weird question, but what is the music that starts playing at 15:16? I love how menacing it sounds.
Thanks for watching! It is good music! No question is too weird! Our sound designer used the DeWolfe Music Library, the oldest music licensing library, to design the music for "Henry Clay" and we can't be sure which exact piece it was, but DeWolfe is famous for the Monty Python theme and for other music used in cinema in the 80s and 90s. Enjoy!
Nice music
Another great doc from Kent Masterson Brown!
Thank you!
In the end he always was ensuring the survival and extension of slavery making the civil war inevitable. Not so good perhaps
Seen in hindsight, perhaps. But nevertheless a remarkable man living in extraordinary times. Other countries, e.g., Great Britain, eliminated slavery without war, so war was not necessarily a foregone conclusion.
Can you do a documentary on the Burr Conspiracy Trials, I only ask because I know some of the most interesting founders were involved such as Burr, Clay, Randolph, and Marshall.
We'd love to work on a film about the Burr Conspiracy Trials. That's been a discussion here. All we need to do is raise the funds! Any ideas on that to share with us? Please let us know!
Fantastic Video!!!!! Henry Clay would make a Great President today he was a very intelligent man. God bless the Whig Party the orginal GOP !!!!!!!!!!!!
Thanks for watching and commenting!
The Whig Party was divided over the slavery issue, as was the Democratic Party. The Republican Party was formed out of the anti-slavery faction of both.
I'm grateful to know that BLM, we had to be couuted to be united. That's deep!
Henry Clay was an absolute monster
Lincoln sent troops to Fort Mulberry and Fort Sumter. Acts of aggression.
He not only sent troops, but also reinforcements and extra supplies. You are absolutely correct. Thanks for watching and commenting!
Calling John Brown a fanatic??
Yes, Ms. Fridy, and by that we mean that although John Brown was an abolitionist, he was by no means a pacificist, but rather a rabid aggressor, an insurrectionist, as he would be called today, who plotted violent overthrow of government. He believed that he was destined by God to carry out this violence, and yes, some referred to him as "fanatic".
@@witnessinghistoryeducation5885 Interesting!
yes he was a criminal and murderer, an absolute abolitionist fanatic. his crime sprees helped ignite a national war and spook white southerners into seceding to avoid a race war with negro uprisings in the south.
There is no means or authorization for secession of any state anywhere in the Constitution. Any contract defines the terms by which the contract will be null and void; therefore secession is illegal by definition of the terms of joining together. It is not a contract; it is a Constitution. The thing that constitutes the Federal Government.
Completely not true. New York, Rhode Island and Virginia refused to join the union unless they had the right to leave it. It was declared in their ordinances of ratification.The idea of a perpetual union is a myth--just as the idea that secession is "treason."
@@josephtemple1667 not true..maybe up until the civil war the idea of perpetual union was open for debate..but not since. The civil war settled that question.
@@johnj.baranski6553 Sorry pal but Abraham Lincoln is not the supreme arbiter; the Founding Fathers are. And their wishes that any state could leave the Union were made crystal clear.
@@josephtemple1667 Seems Lincoln WAS the “supreme arbiter”, cuz the North won the war, preserved the Union(Constitution intact), and nobody in their right mind would today suggest or defend the right of a state to secede from the Union, so……. Read Lincoln’s Speech to Congress in Special Session, July 4, 1861. Game, set, & match! 🇱🇷🙏🎩
@@timothymeehan181 Perhaps you're right. It's a shame that Lincoln didn't get to finish his second term; we all know that he planned on sending all the blacks to either Africa or Central America. And if that happened, talk about a more perfect Union!
Sadly it is now crystal clear that this union is no longer worth saving
What? What do you suppose we do then? We've just let it go past the time where it has to be course corrected....as the forefathers knew was necessary. It's still the place to call home on the planet.....men of this era are just not prepared to put in the work.....they've got house payments, car notes, and phones to distract them. We've gotten the country we deserve.