Nullification, Secession, and John Caldwell Calhoun: The Philosophy and Thought Which Led a State

W. Taft Matney, Jr.

November 1997

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction

Calhoun’s Background

Foundations For "Key’s Paradox"

Calhoun As An Example Of "Key’s Paradox"

Conclusion

Appendix

Works Cited

Introduction

The words "nullification" and "secession" either describe the core values of the States’ Rights movement, the means by which the Union was nearly destroyed, or simply have no meaning at all. Definition is relative to the individual interpreter. For those students of history who debate what those words mean and how they had an impact upon the nation, especially in relation to the schism within the United States during the 1800s, one repeating figure will constantly appear.

John C. Calhoun is synonomous with both the States’ Rights and nullification movements and is considered by many to be, according to Dr. Choong Lee of the University of South Carolina-Spartanburg, "the only original American political thinker." An individual of many thoughts, feelings, and desires Calhoun, if for only a brief, period, led his home state and ultimately the entire South into a period which proved to be the most costly in our nation’s history. Calhoun’s philosophy and thought, which allowed the whole to be greater than the sum of his parts, did more than merely lead the South to secession. His central ideas sparked debate in the classrooms and the courtrooms for generations to follow.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the significant impression Calhoun’s ideas had on the policies of South Carolina preceding The War Between the States by briefly summarizing Calhoun’s background to serve as a point of reference and surveying his attitudes and actions in both his earlier and later career (with emphasis on the latter) in terms of what I have labeled "Key’s Paradox."

Calhoun’s Background

Born in the South Carolina countryside during the early spring of 1782, there was never any doubt that Calhoun would ever be anything other than wealthy. His parents, Scotch-Irish immigrants, made their way to the United States prior to the Revolution and made a substantial fortune afterward. In the federal census of 1790, his father Patrick declared thirty-one slaves. In itself, the slaveholding demonstrated the size of the family’s means since other slaveholders throughout the state owned much smaller numbers (Current, 4).

The young John C. may very well have obtained his desire for political prominence from his father who was a major Carolina figure in the opposition of the ratification of the Constitution. The patriarch of the Calhoun clan felt that in no good conscience could he support a system in which legislators from other parts of the new Union could impose a system of taxation on the people of the Great State of South Carolina (Current, 4). To him, unfair taxation and lack of representation was the crux of the American Revolution. He would not allow his sacrifice in war to be for no reason, but Calhoun’s education coupled with his own inherent need to actively serve his state may have been just as influential as his father’s values in promoting him to a career in the political arena.

After completing his primary and secondary educational years at a small cabin school taught by his brother-in-law, Calhoun was intellectually and ideologically challenged at Yale College. The academic bastion of Federalist thought, Yale’s faculty, staff, and student body continuously forced him to defend himself and his States’ Rights thoughts (Current, 5 & Spain, 14). Calhoun remained steadfast in his beliefs and ended his college career as the victor. He was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and the topic of his graduation oration was "the qualifications necessary to constitute the perfect statesman" (Current 5). As Calhoun finished his Yale studies, he entered the school of law administered and owned by Judge Tapping Reeve (Spain 15). Within four years, at the age of twenty-four, John C. Calhoun successfully completed, with honors, both his undergraduate studies and his juris doctorate.

After practicing law in Abbeville, South Carolina, Calhoun decided to use his skills of argumentation and debate as a policy tactician. Once elected to the South Carolina General Assembly in 1807, he decided legislation was not his calling, and he served only two years. From that point forward, John C. Calhoun would never again publicly grace elected politics in his home state. He remained a national figure on what he hoped was the road to the White House. All the while however, he maintained primary loyalty to his home state.

As a national statesman, he was first elected to the United States House of Representatives. Later, he received the appointment to the post of Secretary of War, was elected Vice-President of the United States, was elected US Senator from South Carolina, was appointed Secretary of State, and was again elected to the US Senate (Post, xxxi-xxxiii).

Foundations For "Key’s Paradox"

In his 1949 examination, Southern Politics in State and Nation, V. O. Key, Jr. noted,

Seemingly, an unresolvable paradox would occur if one were to combine Key’s "caricatures." Strangely enough though, with exception, Key very accurately but unintentionally describes a Palmetto State statesman who passed away almost one-hundred years prior to the publishing of Southern Politics. Abbeville native John Caldwell Calhoun was the living embodiment of what I call "Key’s Paradox." Even stranger, it was that antilogy which led the State of South Carolina up to its most turbulent period.

In their book The Conservative Tradition in America, political scientists Charles W. Dunn and J. David Woodard state, "Calhoun knew that true nationalism sprang from a love of one’s own region. Calhoun wanted to preserve the southern heritage, but he feared the expansion of central government as a threat to all areas of the nation" (91).

Calhoun As An Example Of "Key’s Paradox"

Inarguably, most would assume that an individual with as many contrasting ideals as Calhoun held could not be successful in the political arena or, for that matter, even survive. Some believe Calhoun’s views changed in order to mirror those who resided in the state he represented (Houston, 60). Others hold that his views varied as a matter of convenience… separated beneficially between the periods of 1825 and 1827 with the nullification sentiment serving as the dividing point (Spain, 15, 31).

The ideologies of Calhoun during two periods are what formulate Key’s Paradox and Calhoun as its primary example. The post-1827 period in his career that focuses on the nullification controversy and his intertwined leadership role.

The Nationalist Period; 1811-1827

As previously mentioned, Calhoun’s views modified over time and mirrored the sentiment of his constituency. Serving in the Twelfth Congress, Calhoun and his fellow South Carolina "War Hawks" William Lowndes, David R. Williams, and Langdon Cheves, as champions of the War of 1812, prodded President Madison towards aggression with Britain (Freehling, 92 & Spain, 15). During this period, Calhoun, who by this time was the chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Relations, found himself defending his justifications for the war and those of the Madison administration. Daniel Webster was the major opposition of the Federalist policies toward England and France. Webster’s colleague Felix Grundy went to the lengths to assert that the Federalists had committed "moral treason." Calhoun was quick in response. In a series of speeches, he voiced his view that the country was founded on the principle that people can feel free to have their own opinions, but if those opinions were against the policies and procedures of the United States during such a time of war, those dissenters were not only unjust citizens, they "put his country in the power of the enemy" (Niven, 44).

Of Calhoun’s nationalism, John Quincy Adams said that Calhoun was "above all sectional and factious prejudices more than any other statesman of this Union with whom I have ever acted." Adams also felt that from Calhoun, nationalism as an active policy and philosophy that was the superior method of policy implementation because it was best for the country, best for South Carolina, and best for himself (Freehling, 93).

South Carolina Follows Calhoun; 1827-Until Death

Although understanding the nationalist viewpoint of one part of Calhoun’s life is important, his post-nationalist period is equally important if not more so. After the 1828 Tariff Act, Calhoun diverted sharply from those with whom he had been allied. He became linked with many of those who had fought him so pointedly in the past. Upon ideologically separating from those in the nationalist ranks, Calhoun began to formulate the nullification concept on a level that no one had previously done.

Publicist Thomas Cooper, at his 1827 anti-tariff meeting in Columbia, told supporters that through tariffs, wealth from the South was lining the pockets of those in the North. Cooper said, "Wealth is power. Every year of submission rivets the chains upon us, and we shall go on, remonstrating, complaining, and reluctantly submitting, ‘till the remedy now in our power will be looked up to in vain." Stirring emotions, Cooper added, "We shall, before long, be compelled to calculate the value of our Union; and to inquire of what use to us is the most unequal alliance." As the movement began to grow, it was Calhoun’s nationalists who became the leading States’ Rights proponents (Freehling, 130-131).

No doubt the federal tariffs were the surface source of the nullification movement. Those taxes which robbed the Southern man are what began to persuade Sandlappers to consider withdrawing from the Union. In an 1830 letter, Calhoun himself admitted the taxes were

the occasion, rather than the real cause of the present unhappy state of things. The truth can no longer be disguised that the peculiar domestic institutions of the Southern States and the consequent direction which that and her soil and climate have given to her industry, has placed them in regard to taxation and appropriations in opposite relations to the majority of the Union; against the danger of which, if there be no protective power in the reserved rights of the States, they must in the end be forced to rebel or submit to having their permanent interests sacrificed (Ames, 4).

Calhoun was fully aware that if the "peculiar institution" was abolished, his South, his South Carolina, would cease to exist in the way he knew it. The economy of the South, especially in the area of production, was based almost entirely upon slavery. With proponents of slavery in the minority, he must find a mechanism to ensure the economic life of the land below the Mason-Dixon line as the South’s economy had already taken a different path that that of the North (Ames, 5).

Nullification was the control he had sought. According to Ames, nullification was the way in which there could be a "theoretical reconciliation" of individual state sovereignty and the existing federal government (6). After the introduction of the South Carolina Exposition of 1828, a report which Calhoun secretly wrote, the rationale for nullification was explained as preserving our "Union on the fair basis of equality, on which it alone it can stand, and to transmit the blessings of liberty to the remotest posterity is the first great object of all my exertions." That single sentence allowed for Calhoun, at least in his own mind, to reason his personal love for his nation and of his state. Even with his devotion to the United States, Calhoun never removed the option of secession (Ames, 6-7).

What authority did the states have to nullify federal laws? Gordon Post believes that the most basic idea in the theory of nullification is that the states did not give up their sovereign rule when they agreed to enter the Union. Ratification of the Constitution simply allowed limitations on state governments to allow a greater efficiency on the part of the national government. The sovereignty itself is not held by the federal or even state governments. The sovereignty is controlled by the people of the state. The reasoning behind the nullification theory is if the people of a given state decide to reject the originally accepted limitations, they can do so if that is the desire (Post, xvii).

Nullification eventually became a reality in the South, albeit only for a brief time. In the summer of 1831, Calhoun publicly announced his support for nullification in his Fort Hill Letter (Freehling, 155,225) with the realization that any hopes he had of assuming the Presidency were then gone.

The controversy came to a boil at the South Carolina Nullification Convention of 1832. Robert J. Turnbull’s oration declared that though not expressed in the Constitution, nullification is a guaranteed constitutional right. By a vote of 136 Yeas to 26 Nays, the Ordinance of Nullification was passed, and the Tariffs of 1828 and 1832 were "null, void, and no law, nor binding upon this State, its officers, or citizens" (Bancroft, 129). According to the ordinance, if the federal government attempted in any way, shape, or form to collect any monies derives from tariffs - including legislative coercion or force - or any other nullified national laws, the citizens of South Carolina would have all connections and responsibilities to the federal government removed immediately. South Carolina would instantly become a sovereign state with no prescribed political ties to any other member of the Union (Bancroft, 130).

The other Southern states did not share the view of the Palmetto State. Letters from Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Alabama, and Georgia all either overtly or covertly condemned the actions of the South Carolina convention. Alabama legislators wrote that the idea was "unsound in theory and dangerous in practice," and that it would lead to "anarchy and civil discord." Louisiana officials believed the Tariff of 1828 was "constitutionally expedient, and harmless to Southern States." Mississippi leaders wrote nullification was "a heresy fatal to the existence of the Union." Our sister state North Carolina indicted the nullification decree was "revolutionary in its character, subversive of the Constitution of the United States and [a doctrine that] leads to the dissolution of the Union." The strongest rebuke came from Georgia leaders which said, "We abhor the doctrine of nullification as neither a peaceful nor a constitutional remedy but, on the contrary, as tending to civil commotion and disunion." In a difficult period, South Carolina stood alone by proclaiming, "It is within the providence of God that Great truths should be independent of the human agents that promulgate them" (Bancroft, 144,146).

For a time, Calhoun’s ideas were only being taken seriously by those in his home state. Simply said, by 1832, after the unbalanced tariff acts, most South Carolinians no longer felt a part of the nation. There may not have been a hatred toward the Union, but after passing some time, the battle would come (Houston, v).

Conclusion

The final battle did eventually come. Calhoun’s home state seceded from the Union ten years after his 1850 death. The other Southern states, the ones who condemned South Carolina years before for the same thoughts and feelings, followed closely behind. Benjamin F. Perry wrote, "Mr. Calhoun was the author of nullification in South Carolina" (Freehling, 228). Never did the other states believe that the ideas of one man, fostered by others, could lead the nation to its costliest period in history. At the same time, it was that lesson that was bought by money, blood, and sweat that served as the catalyst for healing.

The War Between the States was the North and the South, the Blue and the Gray, one brother and another, industry and agriculture. Each of these is benefited by John C. Calhoun’s contributions. Key spoke of the two caricatures by which we see Southern figures. He also wrote

In both caricatures there is a grain of truth; yet each is false. The South, to be sure, has its share of scoundrels, but saints do not appear to be markedly less numerous there than on the other side of Mason and Dixon’s line. Rather the politics of the South is incredibly complex. Its variety, its nuances, its subtleties range across the political spectrum (Key, 1).

If anyone exhibited complexity and variety, if ever one person could be a scoundrel and a saint, if ever one person could allow such other contradictions to manifest and survive, that person was John Caldwell Calhoun. He and his philosophy and thought led a state.

Works Cited

Ames, Herman V. 1971. Calhoun and the Secession Movement of 1850. Books for Libraries Press; New York.

Bancroft, Frederic. 1966. Calhoun and the South Carolina Nullification Movement. The Johns Hopkins Press; Gloucester, Ma.

Calhoun, John C. (Gordon Post, ed.). 1953. A Disquisition on Government and Selections from the Discourse. Macmillan Publishing Company; New York.

Current, Richard N. 1963. John C. Calhoun. Twayne Publishers, New York.

Dunn, Charles W. and J. David Woodard. 1996. The Conservative Tradition In America. Rowman and Littlefield Publishers; Lanham, Md.

Freehling, William W. 1965. Prelude to Civil War: The Nullification Controversy in South Carolina. Harper Torchbooks; New York.

Houston, David Franklin. 1967. A Critical Study of Nullification in South Carolina. Russell and Russell; New York.

Key, V.O. Jr. 1949. Southern Politics in State and Nation. Random House; New York.

Niven, John. 1988. John C. Calhoun and the Price of Union. Louisiana State University Press; Baton Rouge.

Spain, August O. 1968. The Political Theory of John C. Calhoun. Octagon Books; New York.

Appendix : The Calhoun Calendar

1782 John Caldwell Calhoun born in South Carolina (18 March)

1802 Calhoun began college at Yale College

1804 Calhoun graduated from Yale

1805-06 Calhoun in law school in Litchfield, Connecticut

1806-08 Calhoun practiced law in SC

1808-09 Calhoun served as a member of the South Carolina General Assembly

1811-17 Calhoun served a member of the US House of Representatives (Chairman; Committee on Foreign Relations)

1816 Calhoun supported protective tariff

1817-25 Calhoun appointed and served as Secretary of War

1825-32 Calhoun elected and served as Vice-President of the United States under President J.Q. Adams

1828 Calhoun secretly wrote the South Carolina "Exposition and Protest" to oppose the Tariff Act of 1828

1831 Calhoun penned his "Address to the People of South Carolina" to present his views on the state of the Union

1832-1844 Calhoun served as a member of the US Senate

1844-45 Calhoun appointed and served as Secretary of State

1845-50 Calhoun returned to and served as a member of the US Senate / Worked on A Disquisition on Government and A Discourse on the Constitution and Government of the United States

1850 Calhoun died in Washington, DC

1860 South Carolina seceded from the Union

1861-1865 The War Between the States