In 1830, the federal government collected few taxes and had two primary sources of revenue. South Carolina Ordinance of Nullification 1832 | Crisis, Cause & Issues. The discussion took a wide range, going back to topics that had agitated the country before the Constitution was formed. [Its leader] would have a knot before him, which he could not untie. To them, this was a scheme to give the federal government more control over the cost of land by creating a scarcity. . Sir, I will not stop at the border; I will carry the war into the enemys territory, and not consent to lay down my arms, until I shall have obtained indemnity for the past, and security for the future.[4] It is with unfeigned reluctance that I enter upon the performance of this part of my duty. His speech was indeed a powerful one of its eloquence and personality. . . In The Webster-Hayne Debate, Christopher Childers examines the context of the debate between Daniel Webster of Massachusetts and his Senate colleague Robert S. Hayne of South Carolina in January 1830 . . . . Connecticut's proposal was an attempt to slow the growth of the nation, control westward expansion, and bolster the federal government's revenue. . All of these ideas, however, are only parts of the main point. Well, it's important to remember that the nation was still young and much different than what we think of today. Senator Foote, of Connecticut, submitted a proposition inquiring into the expediency of limiting the sales of public lands to those already in the market. Next, the Union was held up to view in all its strength, symmetry, and integrity, reposing in the ark of the Constitution, no longer an experiment, as in the days when Hamilton and Jefferson contended for shaping its course, but ordained and established by and for the people, to secure the blessings of liberty to all posterity. During the course of the debates, the senators touched on pressing political issues of the daythe tariff, Western lands, internal improvementsbecause behind these and others were two very different understandings of the origin and nature of the American Union. The people of the United States have declared that this Constitution shall be the Supreme Law. On this subject, as in all others, we ask nothing of our Northern brethren but to let us alone; leave us to the undisturbed management of our domestic concerns, and the direction of our own industry, and we will ask no more. I will struggle while I have life, for our altars and our fire sides, and if God gives me strength, I will drive back the invader discomfited. In the course of my former remarks, I took occasion to deprecate, as one of the greatest of evils, the consolidation of this government. What they said I believe; fully and sincerely believe, that the Union of the states is essential to the prosperity and safety of the states. . All rights reserved. When my eyes shall be turned to behold, for the last time, the sun in Heaven, may I not see him shining on the broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union; on states dissevered, discordant, belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood! Then he began his speech, his words flowing on so completely at command that a fellow senator who heard him likened his elocution to the steady flow of molten gold. Sir, I am one of those who believe that the very life of our system is the independence of the states, and that there is no evil more to be deprecated than the consolidation of this government. . . The militia of the state will be called out to sustain the nullifying act. For the next several days, the men traded speeches which contemporaries of the time described as the greatest orations ever delivered in the Senate. The Webster-Hayne debate laid out key issues faced by the Senate in the 1820s and 1830s. In our contemplation, Carolina and Ohio are parts of the same country; states, united under the same general government, having interests, common, associated, intermingled. Nor those other words of delusion and folly,liberty first, and union afterwardsbut everywhere, spread all over in characters of living light, blazing on all its ample folds, as they float over the sea and over the land, and in every wind under the whole Heavens, that other sentiment, dear to every true American heartliberty and union, now and forever, one and inseparable! The debate, which took place between January 19th and January 27th, 1830, encapsulated the major issues facing the newly founded United States in the 1820s and 1830s; the balance of power between the federal and state governments, the development of the democratic process, and the growing tension between Northern and Southern states. His ideas about federalism and his interpretation of the Constitution as a document uniting the states under one supreme law were highly influential in the eyes of his contemporaries and would influence the rebuilding of the nation after the Civil War. . Hayne, South Carolina's foremost Senator, was the chosen champion; and the cause of his State, both in its right and wrong sides, could have found no abler exponent while [Vice President] Calhoun's official station kept him from the floor. . . Create your account, 15 chapters | By means of missionaries and political tracts, the scheme was in a great measure successful. But I do not understand the doctrine now contended for to be that which, for the sake of distinctness, we may call the right of revolution. . Thirty years before the Civil War broke out, disunion appeared to be on the horizon with the Nullification Crisis. The following states came from the territory north and west of the Ohio river: Ohio (1803), Indiana (1816), Illinois (1818), Michigan (1837), Wisconsin (1848) and Minnesota (1858). But I do not admit that, under the Constitution, and in conformity with it, there is any mode in which a state government, as a member of the Union, can interfere and stop the progress of the general government, by force of her own laws, under any circumstances whatever. So soon as the cessions were obtained, it became necessary to make provision for the government and disposition of the territory . The Significance of the Frontier in American Histo South Carolinas Ordinance of Nullification. That's what was happening out West. . . 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Daniel webster, in a dramatic speech, showed the. . The Virginia Resolution asserted that when the federal government undertook the deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of powers not granted to it in the constitution, states had the right and duty to interpose their authority to prevent this evil. . Hayne maintained that the states retained the authority to nullify federal law, Webster that federal law expressed the will of the American people and could not be nullified by a minority of the people in a state. The Webster Hayne Debate. What idea was espoused with the Webster-Hayne debates? The excited crowd which had packed the Senate chamber, filling every seat on the floor and in the galleries, and all the available standing room, dispersed after the orator's last grand apostrophe had died away in the air, with national pride throbbing at the heart. . Web hardcover $30.00 paperback $17.00 kindle nook book ibook. Sir, there does not exist, on the face of the whole earth, a population so poor, so wretched, so vile, so loathsome, so utterly destitute of all the comforts, conveniences, and decencies of life, as the unfortunate blacks of Philadelphia, and New York, and Boston. Those who would confine the federal government strictly within the limits prescribed by the Constitutionwho would preserve to the states and the people all powers not expressly delegatedwho would make this a federal and not a national Unionand who, administering the government in a spirit of equal justice, would make it a blessing and not a curse. Why? One of those was the Webster-Hayne debate, a series of unplanned speeches presented before the Senate between January 19th and 27th of 1830. We will not look back to inquire whether our fathers were guiltless in introducing slaves into this country. He served as a U.S. senator from 1823 to 1832, and was a leading proponent of the states' rights doctrine. On the one side it is contended that the public land ought to be reserved as a permanent fund for revenue, and future distribution among the states, while, on the other, it is insisted that the whole of these lands of right belong to, and ought to be relinquished to, the states in which they lie. Excerpts from Ratification Documents of Virginia a Ratifying Conventions>New York Ratifying Convention. See what I mean? Hayne's few but zealous partizans shielded him still, and South Carolina spoke with pride of him. Democratic Party Platform 1860 (Breckinridge Facti (Southern) Democratic Party Platform Committee. . And now, Mr. President, let me run the honorable gentlemans doctrine a little into its practical application. If this is to become one great consolidated government, swallowing up the rights of the states, and the liberties of the citizen, riding and ruling over the plundered ploughman, and beggared yeomanry,[8] the Union will not be worth preserving. . During his first years in Congress, Webster railed against President James Madison 's war policies, invoking a states' rights argument to oppose a conscription bill that went down to defeat.. Chris has a master's degree in history and teaches at the University of Northern Colorado. Webster-Hayne Debate 1830, an unplanned series of speeches in the Senate, during which Robert Hayne of South Carolina interpreted the Constitution as little more than a treaty between sovereign states, and Daniel Webster expressed the concept of the United States as one nation. But until they shall alter it, it must stand as their will, and is equally binding on the general government and on the states. If I could, by a mere act of my will, put at the disposal of the federal government any amount of treasure which I might think proper to name, I should limit the amount to the means necessary for the legitimate purposes of the government. In fact, Webster's definition of the Constitution as for the People, by the People, and answerable to the People would go on to form one of the most enduring ideas about American democracy. God grant that, in my day, at least, that curtain may not rise. But the topic which became the leading feature of the whole debate and gave it an undying interest was that of nullification, in which Hayne and Webster came forth as chief antagonists. If the government of the United States be the agent of the state governments, then they may control it, provided they can agree in the manner of controlling it; if it be the agent of the people, then the people alone can control it, restrain it, modify, or reform it. This is the true constitutional consolidation. . Northern states intended to strengthen the federal government, binding the states in the union under one supreme law, and eradicating the use of slave labor in the rapidly growing nation. . The other way was through the sale of federally-owned land to private citizens. For Calhoun, see the Speech on Abolition Petitions and the Speech on the Oregon Bill. The WebsterHayne debate was a debate in the United States between Senator Daniel Webster of Massachusetts and Senator Robert Y. Hayne of South Carolina that took place on January 1927, 1830 on the topic of protectionist tariffs. This is the sense in which the Framers of the Constitution use the word consolidation; and in which sense I adopt and cherish it. Ah! We love to dwell on that union, and on the mutual happiness which it has so much promoted, and the common renown which it has so greatly contributed to acquire. Francis O. J. Smith to Secretary of State Dan Special Message to the House of Representatives, Special Message to Congress on Mexican Relations. . This episode was used in nineteenth century America as a Biblical justification for slavery. . Strange was it, however, that in heaping reproaches upon the Hartford Convention he did not mark how nearly its leaders had mapped out the same line of opposition to the national Government that his State now proposed to take, both relying upon the arguments of the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions of 179899. The honorable member himself is not, I trust, and can never be, one of these. It is the common pretense. . . It was not a Union to be torn up without bloodshed; for nerves and arteries were interwoven with its roots and tendrils, sustaining the lives and interests of twelve million inhabitants. This is the sum of what I understand from him, to be the South Carolina doctrine; and the doctrine which he maintains. . The theory that the states' may vote against unfair laws. Webster rose the next day in his seat to make his reply. we find the most opposite and irreconcilable opinions between the two parties which I have before described. Speech of Senator Daniel Webster of Massachusetts, January 26 and 27, 1830. This seemed like an Eastern spasm of jealousy at the progress of the West. The War With Mexico: Speech in the United States H What Are the Colored People Doing for Themselves? It has been said that Hayne was Calhoun's sword and buckler and that he returned to the contest refreshed each morning by nightly communions with the Vice-President, drawing auxiliary supplies from the well-stored arsenal of his powerful and subtle mind. Finding our lot cast among a people, whom God had manifestly committed to our care, we did not sit down to speculate on abstract questions of theoretical liberty. TeachingAmericanHistory.org is a project of the Ashbrook Center at Ashland University, 401 College Avenue, Ashland, Ohio 44805 PHONE (419) 289-5411 TOLL FREE (877) 289-5411 EMAIL [emailprotected], The Congress Sends Twelve Amendments to the States, The Lincoln-Douglas Debates 3rd Debate Part I, The Lincoln-Douglas Debates 3rd Debate Part II, The Lincoln-Douglas Debates 4th Debate Part I, The Lincoln-Douglas Debates 4th Debate Part II, The Lincoln-Douglas Debates 6th Debate Part I, The Lincoln-Douglas Debates 6th Debate Part II, The Lincoln-Douglas Debates 7th Debate Part I, National Disfranchisement of Colored People, William Lloyd Garrison to Thomas Shipley.
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