Editor’s Note: This year marks the Bicentennial, 2024-2025, of Lafayette and his farewell tour, “Guest of the Nation”, which took place August 15, 1824-September 7, 1825. To commemorate the occasion, the LaGrange Daily News will be publishing a series of columns by Richard Ingram, a longtime resident of LaGrange and Chair of Friends of Lafayette.
Week of December 9, 1824
On December 9 Lafayette climbed into a carriage at 12:30 PM, to be taken to the Capitol. At exactly 1 PM, as directed by the Committee of Invitation, the Senate doors opened and James Barbour, senator from Orange County, Virginia, and chair of the committee, escorted Lafayette to the center of the chamber, senators all around standing and “bareheaded,” and announced, “We present General Lafayette to the Senate of the United States.” Lafyette was then seated at the right of President Pro Tem John Gaillard of South Carolina. Each senator in turn gave respects to the Nation’s Guest. The next day the House of Representatives followed in like manner, but a much more public affair. The Senate was invited to attend; Senators Andrew Jackson of Tennessee and Martin van Buren of Massachusetts were in the gallery. Daniel Webster was there, chair of the House Judiciary Committee; five years hence, in the Webster-Hayne debates, his “second reply to Hayne” would be considered “the most eloquent speech ever delivered in Congress.” This whole event being special, says Levasseur, “the part of the hall that the Representatives did not occupy had been given over to the ladies invited to the session for this time only.” Speaker of the House Henry Clay offered a rousing rhetorical welcome. Lafayette replied, the first foreign dignitary to address the American Congress…