Democracy’s Lawyer: Felix Grundy of the Old Southwest by J. Roderick Heller III (review)

FALL 2010 83 J. Roderick Heller III’s Democracy’s Lawyer: Felix Grundy of the Old Southwest explores the life and political career of Felix Grundy. Despite Grundy’s significant role in the political life and development of nineteenth-century Kentucky and Tennessee, historians have not recognized his contributions nor do they ascribe to him the same significance as his peers Henry Clay and John C. Calhoun. Grundy’s last biographer, Howard Park, wrote Felix Grundy: Champion of Democracy over seventy years ago. Heller seeks to rescue Grundy from his relative historical obscurity, but he has written a dramatically different study than Park. Heller seeks to place Grundy in the social and political context of the early and antebellum West, and in the process offers a more nuanced view of the man and his political achievements. Heller’s biography follows the Grundy family ’s migration from Virginia to Kentucky. Like most settlers, the family searched for a comfortable existence and land on the frontier. Heller argues Grundy’s large and supportive ScotsIrish clan had a profound impact on his political positions. But his early upbringing was not like that of most Kentuckians. Grundy’s father, George, was an influential and prominent businessman and could afford to give his sons the best possible education available on the frontier . Grundy pursued law and politics, tutored by George Nicholas, the father of Kentucky’s constitution and a leading figure in Kentucky’s movement to statehood. He quickly made a name for himself in the Green River region of Kentucky. Here, small farmers and squatters clamored for the right to purchase land on reasonable terms. Grundy defended Green River farmers, earning him their political support and the ire of the Bluegrass elite. After a brief stint as chief justice in Kentucky, Grundy moved to Tennessee where he re-established his law practice . The move brought further political success and Grundy won election to the United States House of Representatives and the Tennessee state legislature in 1811 and 1815, respectively. InWashington, he allied himself with nationalist Book Reviews Democracy’s Lawyer: Felix Grundy of the Old Southwest J. Roderick Heller III J. Roderick Heller III. Democracy’s Lawyer: Felix Grundy of the Old Southwest. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2010. 384 pp. ISBN: 9780807135884 (cloth), $45.00. BOOK REVIEWS 84 OHIO VALLEY HISTORY Republicans like Clay and Calhoun (known as the “Warhawks”), and argued that the United States should declare war against Britain. In the late 1820s, Grundy supported Andrew Jackson and the Democratic Party. Elected to the U.S. Senate, he supported Jackson’s removal of Native Americans east of the Mississippi, his abolition of the Second Bank of the U.S., and during the nullification crisis with South Carolina. Jackson’s policies—particularly his destruction of the national bank—contributed to the economic crisis of the late 1830s and helped fuel the political success of the Whig Party. During the last years of Grundy’s career—he died in 1840—he defended the Democratic Party from Whig attacks. Heller’s well-researched biography draws upon a large number of primary and secondary sources, including many of the journals, letters, and state and federal legislative records that Park employedinhisstudyofGrundy. ButHellerhas the benefit of drawing on the many secondary works published since 1940 about society and politics in the early republic and the Jacksonian era. As a result, Heller explains more fully Grundy’s career trajectory and political affiliations . He notes, for example, that the Grundy family was part of the migration of thousands of easterners over the Alleghany Mountains into the Ohio River Valley in search of land after the American Revolution. And Heller helpfully frames Grundy’s political ascent against the backdrop of entrenched interests and factions in Kentucky and Tennessee. He explores how Grundy defended the interests of Democratic settlers in Kentucky’s Green River against aristocratic Bluegrass interests to fuel his political rise. When Grundy moved to Tennessee, Heller notes, his battle against the entrenched political faction led by William Blount earned him widespread political support. Heller is less successful in explaining the trajectory of Grundy’s political career and does not account for why he abandoned some of his...