Unit 6/Target 3: I can describe the competing views of John Calhoun, Daniel
Webster, and Henry Clay over the nature of the federal government and the
relationship between the states and the federal government.
Henry Clay, John Calhoun, and Daniel Webster each served in the U.S. Congress for
decades. They had deep disagreements over government policy and had a profound
impact on the country. They are known by historians as the “Great Triumvirate” which
really means that they were three important guys in American history.
John Calhoun (1782-1850) was a congressman from South Carolina.
He supported the plantation system of the antebellum South, a weak
federal government, and the strong power of the states.
Calhoun was at the center of two controversial issues: the Tariff o
of Abominations and the Nullification Crisis. In 1828, Congress
passed a new tariff (tax), on imported goods. The purpose of the
tariff was to raise money for the federal government and to protect American
manufacturers (textiles, shoes, etc.) from competition from lower priced foreign goods.
Southerners disliked the tariff because they bought goods from England and sold cotton
to English textile factories. The tariff caused the prices on things they bought to rise and
profits on the cotton they sold to sink. Southerners called the new tariff the Tariff of
Abominations.
In response to the tariff, John Calhoun argued that states had the right to nullify (cancel)
laws if the states believed them to be unconstitutional. This idea was first introduced by
Thomas Jefferson when Congress passed the Alien and Sedition Acts during John
Adams’ presidency. Jefferson helped the states of Kentucky and Virginia write
resolutions nullifying the laws in their states. (This controversy ended when the
Alien and Sedition Acts were repealed.) Like Jefferson, Calhoun argued that the federal
government was created when the states agreed to give up some of their powers but kept
others. Nullification was a way for the states to limit the power of the federal
government. This idea that states had the right to limit the power of the federal
government is called states’ rights.
Calhoun took the idea of nullification a step further, threatening that if nullification was
not accepted or the tariff was not repealed (withdrawn), South Carolina would secede
from the Union. This means that South Carolina would leave the United States and
become its own country.
This crisis was ended when a compromise bill was introduced into Congress and
accepted by southern states. This tariff compromise bill, passed in 1833, was written by
another important guy in American history, Henry Clay.
Henry Clay (1777-1852) was a congressman from Kentucky. When he
was first elected to Congress, Kentucky was considered part of the
West. Clay used his influence in Congress to help pass important
compromises that diffused sectional tensions between the North and
South and prevented the country from breaking apart. This included the tariff
compromise that ended the nullification crisis. Because he often worked to find a middle
ground in political arguments he became known as the Great Compromiser.
Although he was a slave owner, Clay disapproved of slavery as a labor system and
supported the gradual freeing of slaves and their resettlement in Africa. He defended
(unsuccessfully) the right of Native Americans to keep their land in the East, and opposed
the annexation of Texas and the Mexican-American War. Clay supported protective
tariffs to help American business and to fund needed improvements in roads, bridges, and
canals. He ran for president three times but was never elected.
Daniel Webster (1782-1852) was a congressman from Massachusetts
who supported a strong federal (national, central) government. Webster
was a talented speaker and lawyer who argued several cases before the
U.S. Supreme Court. He served as secretary of state and ran
unsuccessfully for president.
Being from the Northeast, Webster supported protective tariffs to advance the interests of
businesses and manufacturing and to provide funding for transportation improvements.
He was opposed to the Mexican-American War and the expansion of slavery into the
western territories.
Webster believed that the people, not the states created the Union. During the
nullification crisis, he rejected nullification and secession when they were proposed by
South Carolina. In response to South Carolina’s threat to secede (withdraw) from the
Union, he gave a famous speech in which he defended the powers of the federal
government over the rights of the states and said, “Liberty and Union, now and forever,
one and inseparable!” In order to save the Union from possible collapse, he supported
Clay’s compromise tariff bill.