CALHOUN, John Caldwell, American statesman: b. Abbeville District, S. C, 18 March 1782; d. Washington, D. C., 31 March 1850. He was graduated with distinc tion at Yale College in 1804, and was admitted to the South Carolina bar in 1807. After serv ing for two sessions in the legislature of his native State, he was elected to Congress in 1811. From that time until his death, a period of nearly 40 years, he was seldom absent from Washington, being nearly the whole time in the public service, either in Congress or in the Cabinet. When he first entered Congress the disputes with England were fast approaching actual hostilities, and he immediately took part with that portion of the dominant party whose object was to drive the still reluctant admin istration into a declaration of war. They suc ceeded, and, as a member of the Committee on Foreign Relations, he reported a bill for de claring war, which was passed in June 1812. When Monroe formed his administration in 1817, Calhoun became Secretary of War, a post which he filled with great ability for seven years, reducing the affairs of the department from a state of great confusion to simplicity and order. In 1824 he was chosen Vice-Presi dent of the United States under John Q. Adams, and again in 1828 under General Jack son. In 1828, a protective tariff was enacted which bore very heavily on the agriculturists of the South and hence was known throughout that section as °The Tariff of Abominations.° Mr. Calhoun prepared a paper declaring that the ((United States is not a union of the people, but a league• or compact between sovereign states, any of which has the right to judge when the compact is broken and to pronounce any law to be null and void which violates its con ditions.' This paper was issued by the leg islature of South Carolina and was known as The South Carolina Exposition) This view of the United States constitution as a compact between the States had been many years before strongly expressed in the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions, the former being drawn up by James Madison, often styled the *Father of the Constitution," and the latter by Thomas Jefferson. The Kentucky resolutions had suggested nullification as a remedy. Alex ander Hamilton in The Federalist frequently spoke of the United States as a *Confederate Republic' and a °Confederacy" and called the constitution a °compact." Washington fre quently referred to the constitution as a °compact," and spoke of the Union as a °Con federated Republic.' At the time of the Louisi ana Purchase Hon. Timothy Pickering of Massachusetts advocated the right and advisa bility of secession and Hon. Josiah Quincy of the same State in 1811 expressed similar views. Hence John C. Calhoun propounded no new
or strange doctrine, but one which had found advocates before, and in the North as well as in the South.
In 1828, the friendly relations between Mr. Calhoun and President Jackson were broken off, when the latter ascertained that Calhoun had sought to have him called to account for his acts in the Seminole War. This breach was still further enlarged when Calhoun re fused to co-operate with President Jackson in the effort to reinstate Mrs. Eaton in Washing ton society.
When Mr. Calhoun found that the repeal of the tariff of 1828 could not be secured through President Jackson, he resigned the Vice-Presi dency and entered the Senate from South Caro lina. On 26 July 1831 he published a paper favoring free trade and declaring that the °great conservative principle of Union is nullification' The tariff question was settled by a compromise in 1832.
Mr. Calhoun feared that the slavery quarrel would some day disrupt the Union and there fore endeavored to check all discussion of this issue. He opposed Jackson's removal of the funds from the National Bank and also assailed the °spoils system.° He supported Van Buren's system,' favored his re-election and secured for him the electoral vote of South Carolina. He defended Tyler for vetoing the recharter of the United States Bank and as Secretary of State under that President was largely instrumental in bringing about the an nexation of Texas. He regretted the division of the Union into sections, but, recognizing a fact which already existed, he advocated a dual executive, one from the North, the other from the South, each having the power to veto an act approved by the other; thus preventing the passage of any law offensive to either section. His motive in this was the preservation of the Union, which he dearly loved.
He died 31 Mal-eh 1850, having spent the last few taonths of his life in writing his (Dis quisition on Government) and his (Discussion on the Constitution and Government of the United States' which has been pronounced the most remarkable discussion of the rights of minorities ever written. Mr. Calhoun was of attractive personality and of irreproachable character, to which Daniel Webster testified in his grand eulogy on the great South Carolinian.
His Works' appeared 1853-54, and his correspondence, edited by Jameson, in 1900. Consult Lives by Jenkins (1851) ; Von Hoist (1882) ; Benton, (Thirty Years' (1£354) ; Dodd, 'Statesmen of the Old South) (New York 1911); Hunt, C. Calhoun' (Philadelphia 1908) ' • Peck, H. C., The Jack sonian Epoch' (1906) ; Peck, IL T., Party Leaders' (New York 1914) • and Cal-. houn's correspondence, edited by J. F. Jameson (1900).