not the slightest notice of the decision of the supreme court. Worcester and his companion Butler had still to spend a year of imprisonment, at hard labor, in company with common criminals. They were finally " pardoned" by gov. Lumpkin, partly because the outlook for a solution of the Cherokee question, in a way satisfactory to Georgia, seemed to render their further imprisonment unnecessary, and partly because their liberation seemed desirable for partisan reasons. For the insolent contempt of the authority of the supreme court, no sort of satisfaction was given, and indeed no sort of satisfaction was demanded. Jackson regarded this issue of the struggle with indifference. Perhaps he even took a quiet, mean joy in it, because Marshall, as he very well knew, was a determined opponent of his re-election.3

Thus for the first time the doctrines of state rights laid down in the Kentucky resolutions had been fully carried out. From the beginning Georgia had chosen as her standpoint the fundamental principles that the federal authorities and the states, that is, the state governments, were "parties" who had no common judge and that therefore each party must "decide for itself." And she-at last indirectly supported by the federal executive-had remained a complete victor.

'Niles' Reg., XLII., p. 78.

Ibid, XLIV., pp. 359, 360.

Depending upon a statement of G. N. Briggs of Massachusetts, who was at the time a member of congress, Greeley (The American Conflict, I., p. 106) relates that Jackson said: "John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!" Senator Miller of South Carolina said, in 1833, in the debate over the so-called force bill: "No reproof for her [Georgia's] refractory spirit was heard; on the contrary, a learned review of the decision came out, attributed to executive countenance and favor." Niles' Reg., XLIII., Suppl., p. 141.

2

CHAPTER XII.

THE DOCTRINE OF NULLIFICATION. THE COMPROMISE BETWEEN SOUTH CAROLINA AND THE FEDERAL GOVERN

MENT.

The pending presidential election had not been without influence upon the issue of the tariff struggle of 1828, and the reception of the latter at the south. The majority of the protectionists was so small that the days of their power were probably numbered, provided the incoming administration should support the opposite party with energy. And the prospects of Jackson, upon whom the antiprotectionists thought they could safely count, grew better every day. Moreover, the extinction of the national debt was close at hand, and the reasonable arguments, as well as the declamations, of the south could reckon on much more willing hearers as soon as the annual financial report showed a regular surplus. The protective system was thus deprived of all the props which had hitherto done it thankworthy service.

The Democrats won a more brilliant victory than they themselves had expected. Jackson received one hundred and eighty-three electoral votes against only eighty-three for Adams, and Calhoun, the irreconcilable enemy of the protectionists, was chosen vice-president by one hundred and seventy-one electoral votes.' It was next to be discovered how far men were justified in seeing in this a triumph of free trade principles. The inaugural address

1 Debates of Congress, X.,

p. 394.

9.66

In New York, Pennsylvania, and the west general Jackson has been supported as the firm friend of the tariff and of internal improve

460

of the new president touched upon this point in a vague and extremely cautious way. It spoke, of course, of "revenue duties," but affirmed that "agriculture, commerce, and manufactures should be equally favored," and added the notable observation that "perhaps the only exception to this rule should consist in the peculiar encouragement of any products of either of them that may be found essential to our national independence." This declaration left both parties unsatisfied. The annual message was awaited with keen expectation. It undeceived the free traders still more completely, without giving the protectionists cause for rejoicing. It expressed an opinion in favor of a “modification" of the tariff, but wished to see the principle that American products must be enabled to compete with foreign adopted as "the general rule to be applied in graduating the duties." In regard to wares which were of especial importance in time of war "even a step beyond this point" ought to be taken. It was only safe to infer from these sayings that Jackson would gladly see a reduction of some duties; the decided rejection, on principle, of the whole protective system, which the south had wished and expected, could in no way be inferred from the general sentences which inclined to every side and said nothing at all decisive. These passages left it uncertain whether he had it in view to exercise even a moderate pressure upon the protectionists. The recommendation for the division of the expected yearly surplus among the states, in proportion to the ratio of representation, for the execution of internal improvements, until a comprehensive change of the tariff brought about again an equality be

2

STATE SOVEREIGNTY AND SLAVERY.

ments; but in the south he has been as zealously sustained, by those who deny the right and constitutionality of these things, as being the friend of southern interests,' believed by them to be seriously injured by the tariff and internal improvement laws." Niles' Reg., XXXV., p. 194.

'Statesman's Manual, I., p. 696.

2 Ibid, II., p. 703.

JOHN C. CALHOUN.

461

tween the income and outgo, scarcely pointed to this, esspecially since he proposed that the federal government should be given the necessary power, if it did not already possess it, by an amendment to the constitution.

Calhoun considered this proposal as a direct bid for the favor of the protectionists, He had not approved of the extreme language used by the meetings at Colleton, Abbeville and other places after the passage of the tariff of 1828, for he had no hope that this wonld exert a favorable influence upon the election, on the issue of which he meant. to make his next plan of action depend. Without seeing in Jackson's election a guaranty for a change of principle in the politico-industrial policy of the country, he yet hoped for so much from it that he favored delay.1 A memorial, which thoroughly discussed, in a quiet and firm way, the economic as well as the constitutional side of the question, seemed to him to best correspond with the demands of the moment.2

Calhoun was a true son of the soil from which he sprang, and he therefore possessed in a high degree the characteristic traits of the Protestant population of the north of Ireland, to which he belonged by descent,-that peculiar primitive energy, in which an enthusiasm more idealistic than ideal is strangely linked with stubborn consistency. The blood flowed in his veins not less hotly than in those of any other Carolinian, but a piercing intelligence and a soaring ambition held it sharply in check when great questions were to be weighed and decided. He had not the breadth of view that characterizes the statesman, but he had extraordinarily keen vision. From the sole of his foot to the crown of his head a speculative politician, he was wholly unaware of the results to which his policy

1 Calhoun, Works, II., p. 215; VI., p. 56.

The draft was adopted, with some alterations, by the legislature and published. It is known as the "South Carolina exposition." Calhoun, Works, VI., p. 1, seq.

462

would inevitably lead; but the practical instinct of the
American race, and a political activity extending over
many years, enabled him to find ways and means for bring-
ing the burning questions of the day to such a solution
that he constantly brought his doctrines nearer and nearer
to a practical realization. He was not idealist enough to
delude himself with the hope of an immediate accomplish-
ment of his whole programme, and not to reconcile him-
self to the withdrawal of half his stake if it appeared that
he could then win the game, and must otherwise lose it
entirely. But he was enough of a fanatic to allow nothing
to interfere with his will, if the choice between going for-
ward and a partial sacrifice of the principles of his doc-
trines was once set before him. In such cases, he was
capable of making "bend or break" his motto, and this
not merely in moments of the highest excitement. His
attitude remained the same, even when the struggle con-
tinued for years. If he had been a visionary, whose sys-
tem was built up in the air, he could scarcely have done
this; the material interests which formed the broad basis
of his doctrines gave him the needed strength, yes, made
this course a necessity. The constitution and the history
of its origin gave him only the formal foundation for the
development of the doctrine of state-rights, and its de-
velopment, with him and with the whole people, did not
rest upon a priori reasoning.
priori reasoning. He was originally by no
means inclined to this opinion. The slavery question drove
him into the path, and with the increasing development of
the slaveholding interest he followed it on to the farthest
consequences. By the light of slavery, and in accordance
with the laws of logic, he worked out the constitutional law
of a democratic federative republic, and the logically correct
result was a systematization of anarchy. He failed to rec-
ognize this fact, because the doctrine was to him a means
to an end, and his whole political reasoning became in course
of time so completely identified with the prosecution of

STATE SOVEREIGNTY AND SLAVERY.