near Boston, "deeply depressed and mortified," according to a business partner, by the failure of his California investments.65 Despite his wife's wealth, he continued to be dogged by financial problems. A considerable part of the dividends Adeline Ellery Green earned from various stocks was consumed by her husband's business activities. In 1854, she agreed to cover a $5,000 debt to prevent her furniture from being seized, one of many that she paid on behalf of her spendthrift spouse. But as she remarked to one of his creditors, she did so "most cheerfully," and remained ready "to support an honorable husband...."66

Evidently Green's state of melancholy was short lived, for he was soon pursuing a number of opportunities and assiduously cultivating the network of political and business contacts that he had acquired over the years. Following the election of Franklin Pierce, Green, a lifelong Democrat, lobbied unsuccessfully to be appointed U.S. commissioner to Hawaii, then known as the Sandwich Islands. Support for the annexation of Hawaii was strong among Green's California associates, and both U.S. senators from the state backed his candidacy. He may have damaged his chances, however, by peremptorily informing the new president that he would accept the post only if instructed to acquire the islands for the United States.67 Mindful of possible opposition from European powers, Pierce and his secretary of state, William Marcy, appear to have favored a more cautious approach, despite their expansionist views.68

Shortly after his return to the East, Green became involved in a project to build a southern transcontinental railroad headed by Robert J. Walker, the former secretary of the treasury in the Polk administration. In 1852, the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad received a charter from the legislature of Texas to lay track across the state, but as with the Texas Railroad, Navigation and Banking Company, a controversy emerged as to whether the directors were interested in the actual business of railroading or the speculation of land. Ironically, another promoter of the company was Anson Jones, who had played such a pivotal role in the opposition to Green's earlier internal improvements scheme.69

Presumably, Green's participation in the company did not require any financial involvement, as he was at the time being hounded by several creditors he had left behind in California. Walker may have hoped that the presence of several influential Texans on the board would help the company retain its contract, which was contingent on payment to the state of a $300,000 deposit. If so, the strategy backfired, for Green's activities in Texas revived his longstanding feud with Sam Houston, who, predictably, was determined to derail Green's business plans. In 1854, Houston, then a U.S. senator, wrote to Governor E. M. Pease warning him against any involvement with the company, whose directors were "men of notoriously bad character." Of Green and Walker, he wrote, "No one would loan a dollar and no capitalist would risk his reputation in the money market by having any connection with men of such standing....It is time Texas should cease to be the victim of Villains and Villainy."70