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CALHOUN, JOHN CALDWELL (1782-185o)
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See also:CALHOUN, See also: In 18o8 and 28o9 he was a member of the South Carolina legislature, and from 1811 to 1817 was a member of the See also:national See also:House of Representatives.
When he entered the latter See also:body the strained relations between See also:Great See also:Britain and the See also:United States formed the most important question for the deliberation of See also:Congress. See also: He believed that the South would See also:share in the See also:general industrial development, not having perceived as yet that See also:slavery was an insuperable obstacle. His opposition to protection in later years resulted from an honest See also:change of convictions. He always denied that in supporting this bill he had been inconsistent, and insisted that it was one for revenue.
From 1827 to 1825 Calhoun was secretary of war under President See also:Monroe. To him is due the fostering and the reforma tion of the National Military See also:Academy at See also:West Point, which he found in disorder, but left in a most efficient state. Calhoun was See also:vice-president of the United States from 1825 to 1832, during the See also:administration of John See also:Quincy See also: Calhoun himself now, perceived that the North and the South represented diverse tendencies. The North was outstripping the South in See also:population and See also:wealth, and already by the tariff acts was, as he believed, selfishly levying taxes for its See also:sole benefit. The minority must, he insisted, be protected from " the tyranny of the See also:majority." In his first important See also:political See also:essay, " The South Carolina Exposition," prepared by him in the summer of 1828, he showed how this should be done. To him it was clear that the Federal Constitution was a limited See also:instrument, by which the See also:sovereign states had delegated to the Federal See also:government certain general See also:powers. The states could not, without violating the constitu= tional compact, interfere with the activities of the Federal government so long as the government confined itself to its proper See also:sphere; but the See also:attempt of Congress, or any other II See also:department of the Federal government, to exercise any See also:power which might alter the nature of the instrument would be an act of usurpation. The right of judging such an infraction belonged to the state, being an attribute of See also:sovereignty of which the state could not be deprived without being reduced to a wholly sub-See also:ordinate See also:condition. As a remedy for such a See also:breach of compact the state might resort to See also:nullification (q.v.), or, as a last resort, to See also:secession from the See also:Union. Such doctrines were not See also:original with Calhoun, but had been held in various parts of the Union from time to time. It remained for him, however, to submit them to a rigid See also:analysis and reduce them to a logical See also:form. Meantime the friendship between Calhoun and Jackson had come to an end. While a member of President Monroe's See also:cabinet, Calhoun had favoured the reprimanding of General Jackson (q.v.) for his high-handed course in See also:Florida in 1818, during the first See also:Seminole War. In 1831 W. H. See also:Crawford, who had been a member of this cabinet, desiring to ruin Calhoun politically by turning Jackson's hostility against him, revealed to Jackson what had taken place thirteen years before. Jackson could See also:brook no See also:criticism from one whom he had considered a friend; Calhoun, moreover, angered the president still further by his evident See also:sanction of the social proscription of Mrs See also:Eaton (q.v.) ; the political views of the two men, furthermore, were becoming more and more divergent, and the rupture between the two became See also:complete.
The failure of the Jackson administration to reduce the Tariff of 1828 See also:drew from Calhoun his " Address to the See also:People of South Carolina " in 1831, in which he elaborated his views of the nature of the Union as given in the " Exposition." In 1832 a new tariff act was passed, which removed the " abominations " of 1828 but left the principle of protection intact. The people of South Carolina were not satisfied, and Calhoun in a third political See also:tract, in the form of a See also:letter to See also:Governor See also: As the result of the conflict, Calhoun was greatly strengthened in his position as the leader of his party in the South. Southern leaders generally were now beginning to perceive, as Calhoun had already seen, that there was a permanent conflict betweer the North and the South, not only a divergence of interests between manufacturing and agricultural sections, but an inevitable struggle between See also:free and slave labour. Should enough free states be admitted into the Union to destroy the See also:balance of power, the North would naturally gain a preponderance in the Senate, as it had in the House, and might, within constitutional limits, legislate as it pleased. The Southern minority recognized, therefore, that they must henceforth See also:direct the policy of the government in all questions affecting their See also:peculiar interests, or their See also:section would undergo a social and economic revolution. The Constitution, if strictly interpreted according to Calhoun'sviews, would secure this See also:control to the minority, and prevent an industrial upheaval. An See also:element of bitterness was now injected into the struggle. The See also:Northern Abolitionists, to whom no contract or agreement was sacred that involved the continuance of slavery, regarded the clauses in the Federal Constitution which maintained the See also:property rights of the slave-owners as See also:treaties with evil, binding on no one, and bitterly attacked the slave-holders and the South generally. Their attacks may be said to have destroyed the moderate party in that section. Any criticism of their peculiar institution now came to be highly offensive to Southern leaders, and Calhoun, who always took the most advanced stand in behalf of Southern rights, urged (but in vain) that the Senate refuse to receive abolitionist petitions. He also advocated the exclusion of abolitionist literature from the mails. Indeed from 1832 until his See also:death Calhoun may be said to have devoted his See also:life to the protection of Southern interests. He became the exponent, the very embodiment, of an See also:idea. It is a See also:mistake, however, to characterize him as an enemy to the Union. His contention was that its preservation depended on the recognition of the rights guaranteed to the states by the Constitution, and that aggression by one section could only end in disruption. Secession, he contended, was the only final remedy left to the weaker. Calhoun was re-elected to the Senate in 1834 and in 184o, serving until 1843. From 1832 to 1837 he was a man without a party. He attacked the " spoils See also:system " inaugurated by President Jackson, opposed the removal of the government deposits from the See also:Bank of the United States, and in general was a severe critic of Jackson's administration. In this period he usually voted with the Whigs, but in 1837 he went over to the Democrats and supported the " See also:independent See also:treasury " See also:scheme of President See also:Van Buren. He was spoken of for the See also:presidency in 1844, but declined to become a See also:candidate, and was appointed as secretary of state in the cabinet pf President See also:Tyler, serving from the 1st of See also:April 1844, throughout the See also:remainder of the See also:term, until the loth of March 1845. While holding this office he devoted his energies chiefly to the acquisition of See also:Texas, in See also:order to preserve the See also:equilibrium between the South and the constantly growing North. One of his last acts as secretary of state was to send a despatch, on the 3rd of March 1845, inviting Texas to accept the terms proposed by Congress. Calhoun was once more elected to the Senate in 1845. The period of his subsequent service covered the See also:settlement of the See also:Oregon dispute with Great Britain and the Mexican War. On the 19th of See also:February 1847 he introduced in the Senate a See also:series of resolutions concerning the territory about to be acquired from See also:Mexico, which marked the most advanced stand as yet taken by the See also:pro-slavery party. The purport of these resolutions was to deny to Congress the power to prohibit slavery in the territories and to declare all previous enactments to this effect unconstitutional. In r85o the Union seemed in imminent danger of See also:dissolution. See also:California was applying for See also:admission to the Union as a state under a constitution which did not permit slavery. Her ad-See also:mission with two Senators would have placed the slave-holding states in the minority. In the midst of the debate on this application Calhoun died, on the 31st of March 185o, in See also:Washington. Calhoun is most often compared with Webster and Clay. The three constitute the trio upon whom the See also:attention of students at this period naturally rests. Calhoun possessed neither Webster's brilliant See also:rhetoric nor his easy versatility, but he surpassed him in the ordered method and logical sequence of his mind. He never equalled Clay in the latter's See also:magnetism of impulse and See also:inspiration of See also:affection, but he far surpassed him in clearness and directness and in tenacity of will. He surpassed them both in the distinctness with which he saw results, and in the boldness with which he formulated and followed his conclusions. Calhoun in See also:person was tall and slender, and in his later years was emaciated. His features were angular and somewhat harsh, but with a striking See also:face and very See also:fine eyes of a brilliant dark See also:blue. To his slaves he was just and See also:kind. He lived the modest, unassuming life of a See also:country planter when at his See also:home, and at Washington lived as unostentatiously as possible, consistent with his public duties and position. His See also:character in other respects was always of stainless integrity. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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