The amiable and excellent William R.King, who had entered the Senate when Alabama was admitted in 1819, and who was Colonel Benton's senior in service by two years when he resigned in 1844 to accept the French mission, now returned, and remained until he was chosen Vice-President in 1852.
Hannibal Hamlin had entered the preceding year, and was still leading a bitter fight on the slavery question against a formidable element in his own party headed at home by Nathan Clifford and represented in the Senate by his colleague, James W.Bradbury.
John P.Hale, a New-Hampshire Democrat whom Franklin Pierce had attempted to discipline because as representative in Congress he had opposed the annexation of Texas, had beaten Pierce before the people, defied the Democratic party, and was promoted to the Senate an outspoken Free-Soiler.

Willie P.Mangum and George E.Badger, able, graceful, experienced statesmen, represented the steadfast Union sentiment of the "Old North State" Whigs; while Andrew P.
Butler, impulsive and generous, learned and able, embodied all the heresies of the South-Carolina Nullifiers.

James M.Mason, who seemed to court the hatred of the North, and Robert M.T.

Hunter, who had the cordial respect of all sections, spoke for Virginia.
Pierre Soule came from Louisiana, eloquent even in a language he could not pronounce, but better fitted by temperament for the turbulence of a revolutionary assembly in his native land than for the decorous conservatism of the American Senate.

Sam Houston was present from Texas, with a history full of adventure and singular fortune, while his colleague, Thomas J.Rusk, was daily increasing a reputation which had already marked him in the judgment of Mr.
Webster as first among the younger statesmen of the South.