At this time, to quote the after-words of the _Belton Sentinel_, "the horizon of political affairs was darkening, and the clouds that confined the storm destined to shake the fabric of our Union to its foundation, were gathering ominously." The different parties were in a ferment. The Whigs no longer existed--they had given way to an organization originated by the Free-Soilers, and styling themselves Republicans. There were, however, a large number of old Whigs wedded to their prejudices, with a distaste for affiliation with the Democrats and a greater repugnance to a party tainted in any degree with Abolitionism, who looked upon the new movement as an ephemeral ebullition. These individuals, calling themselves "Conservatives," imagined that it required but an effort on their part to still the waters of political strife, and decided to constitute themselves "bulwarks," and "arks of safety." Among these was the Hon. Rufus Heath. Like all men of his stamp, he was utterly opposed to any disturbance of the established order of things. He was perfectly well satisfied with them as they were. As for radicals or reformers, he hated their very name. Such people sprang from the vulgar herd, and were only bent on mischief. His ideal of a proper government was a constitutional monarchy supported by an oligarchy of wealth, and to this form he believed the republic was gradually tending. He was not unobservant of the increasing prestige of birth. Position in the army, navy, or state was gradually tending to perpetuate itself in certain families. The bearers of historic names wielded a certain influence, which increased with time, and would eventually and under certain circumstances crystallize into decided power. Here were the germs of an oligarchy, which needed but a law of entail to perfect itself and institute a class of hereditary legislators, or house of peers--the bulwark indispensable against the agrarianism inherent in a democratic form of government.
In order to exchange views on the condition of the body-politic, and devise means to combat the evil influences then prevailing (to say nothing of advancing his own personal plans), Mr. Heath took advantage of the presence in the vicinity of a statesman who had occupied a very exalted position in the commonwealth, to ask him to meet at dinner sundry other influential and distinguished citizens, and confer on the important subjects in question.