Plus, get practice tests, quizzes, and personalized coaching to help you Such interference has never been supposed to be within the power of government; nor has it been, in any way, attempted. . I understand him to maintain, that the ultimate power of judging of the constitutional extent of its own authority, is not lodged exclusively in the general government, or any branch of it; but that, on the contrary, the states may lawfully decide for themselves, and each state for itself, whether, in a given case, the act of the general government transcends its power. . 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. New England, the Union, and the Constitution in its integrity, all were triumphantly vindicated. . But still, throughout American history, several debates have captured the nation's attention in a way that would make even Hollywood jealous. Sir, as to the doctrine that the federal government is the exclusive judge of the extent as well as the limitations of its powers, it seems to be utterly subversive of the sovereignty and independence of the states. The great debate, which culminated in Hayne's encounter with Webster, came about in a somewhat casual way. . They will also better understand the debate's political context. . - Women's Rights Facts & Significance, Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points: Definition, Speech & Summary, Fireside Chats: Definition & Significance, JFK's New Frontier: Definition, Speech & Program. 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. Daniel Webster argued against nullification (the idea that states could disobey federal laws) arguing in favor of a strong federal government which would bind the states together under the Constitution. Nullification, Webster maintained, was a political absurdity. Hayne was a great orator, filled with fiery passion and eloquent prose. . Edited and introduced by Jason W. Stevens. Available in hard copy and for download. . . . Drama, suspense, it's all there. . If I had, sir, the powers of a magician, and could, by a wave of my hand, convert this capital into gold for such a purpose, I would not do it. Debate on the Constitutionality of the Mexican War, Letters and Journals from the Oregon Trail. Webster and the northern states saw the Constitution as binding the individual states together as a single union. Understand the 1830 debate's significance through an overview of issues of the Constitution, the Union, and state sovereignty. Their own power over their own instrument remains. . Webster denied it and, attempting to draw Hayne into a direct confrontation, disparaged slavery and attacked the constitutional scruples of southern nullifiers and their apparent willingness to calculate the Union's value in monetary terms. When, however, the gentleman proceeded to contrast the state of Ohio with Kentucky, to the disadvantage of the latter, I listened to him with regret. . . 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. The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions Add Song of the Spinners from the Lowell Offering. . . For Calhoun, see the Speech on Abolition Petitions and the Speech on the Oregon Bill. Sir, I should fear the rebuke of no intelligent gentleman of Kentucky, were I to ask whether, if such an ordinance could have been applied to his own state, while it yet was a wilderness, and before Boone had passed the gap of the Alleghany, he does not suppose it would have contributed to the ultimate greatness of that commonwealth? . Get unlimited access to over 88,000 lessons. sir, this is but the old story. It has always been regarded as a matter of domestic policy, left with the states themselves, and with which the federal government had nothing to do. Webster's speech aroused the latent spirit of patriotism. Webster pursued his objective through a rhetorical strategy that ignored Benton, the principal opponent of New England sectionalism, and that provoked Hayne into an exposition and defense of what became the South Carolina doctrine of nullification. This is the sense in which the Framers of the Constitution use the word consolidation; and in which sense I adopt and cherish it. Some of Webster's personal friends had felt nervous over what appeared to them too hasty a period for preparation. Van Buren responded to the Panic of 1837 with the idea of the independent treasury, which was a. a system of depositing money in select independent banks Speech on the Repeal of the Missouri Compromise. Ostend Manifesto of 1854 Overview & Purpose | What was the Ostend Manifesto? Several state governments or courts, some in the north, had espoused the idea of nullification prior to 1828. This was the man to fire an aristocracy of fellow citizens ready to arm when their interests were in danger, and upon him, it devolved to advance the cause of South Carolina, break down the tariff, and fascinate the Union with the new rattlesnake theories. Wilmot Proviso of 1846: Overview & Significance | What was the Wilmot Proviso? An undefinable dread now went abroad that men were planning against the peace of the nation, that the Union was in danger; and citizens looked more closely after its safety and welfare. 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. I am a Unionist, and in this sense a national Republican. The gentleman, indeed, argues that slavery, in the abstract, is no evil. I understand him to maintain this right, as a right existing under the Constitution; not as a right to overthrow it, on the ground of extreme necessity, such as would justify violent revolution. The debaters were Senator Daniel Webster of Massachusetts and Senator Robert Y. Hayne of South Carolina. Thirty years before the Civil War broke out, disunion appeared to be on the horizon with the Nullification Crisis. To unlock this lesson you must be a Study.com Member. . In 1830, the federal government collected few taxes and had two primary sources of revenue. Southern ships and Southern sailors were not the instruments of bringing slaves to the shores of America, nor did our merchants reap the profits of that accursed traffic.. Perhaps a quotation from a speech in Parliament in 1803 of Lord Castlereagh, Robert Stewart, 2nd Marquess of Londonderry (17691822) during a debate over the conduct of British officials in India. Visit the dark and narrow lanes, and obscure recesses, which have been assigned by common consent as the abodes of those outcasts of the worldthe free people of color. Let their last feeble and lingering glance, rather behold the gorgeous Ensign of the Republic, now known and honored throughout the earth, still full high advanced, its arms and trophies streaming in their original luster, not a stripe erased or polluted, nor a single star obscuredbearing for its motto, no such miserable interrogatory as, what is all this worth? I have but one word more to add. . The 1830 Webster-Hayne debate centered around the South Carolina nullification crisis of the late 1820s, but historians have largely ignored the sectional interests underpinning Webster's argument on behalf of Unionism and a transcendent nationalism. I must now beg to ask, sir, whence is this supposed right of the states derived?where do they find the power to interfere with the laws of the Union? When the gentleman says the Constitution is a compact between the states, he uses language exactly applicable to the old Confederation. Under that system, the legal actionthe application of law to individuals, belonged exclusively to the states. It is, sir, the peoples Constitution, the peoples government; made for the people; made by the people; and answerable to the people. . . . Representatives of the northern states were concerned by the rapid growth of the nation; just 27 years earlier, the Louisiana Purchase had nearly doubled the size of the nation, and the newly elected President Andrew Jackson was hungry for more territory. That led into a debate on the economy, in which Webster attacked the institution of slavery and Hayne labeled the policy of protectionist tariffs as the consolidation of a strong central government, which he called the greatest of evils. Sir, I deprecate and deplore this tone of thinking and acting. To all this, sir, I was disposed most cordially to respond. Having thus distinctly stated the points in dispute between the gentleman and myself, I proceed to examine them. I admit that there is an ultimate violent remedy, above the Constitution, and in defiance of the Constitution, which may be resorted to, when a revolution is to be justified. Union, of itself, is considered by the disciples of this school as hardly a good. For all this, there was not the slightest foundation, in anything said or intimated by me. We do not impose geographical limits to our patriotic feeling or regard; we do not follow rivers and mountains, and lines of latitude, to find boundaries, beyond which public improvements do not benefit us. We see its consequences at this moment, and we shall never cease to see them, perhaps, while the Ohio shall flow. The faction of voters in the North were against slavery and feared it spreading into new territory. . This, sir, is General Washingtons consolidation. Foote Idea To Limit The Sale Of Public Lands In The West To New Settlers. . He joined Hayne in using this opportunity to try to detach the West from the East, and restore the old cooperation of the West and the South against New England. Finally, sir, the honorable gentleman says, that the states will only interfere, by their power, to preserve the Constitution. We, sir, who oppose the Carolina doctrine, do not deny that the people may, if they choose, throw off any government, when it becomes oppressive and intolerable, and erect a better in its stead. . In this regard, Webster anticipated an argument that Abraham Lincoln made in his First Inaugural Address (1861). How do Webster and Hayne differ in regard to their understandings of the proper relationship among the several states and between the states and the national government? The debate continued, in some ways not being fully settled until the completion of the Civil War affirmed the power of the federal government to preserve the Union over the sovereignty of the states to leave it. . The United States, under the Constitution and federal government, was a single, unified nation, not a coalition of sovereign 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. . So soon as the cessions were obtained, it became necessary to make provision for the government and disposition of the territory . The whole form and structure of the federal government, the opinions of the Framers of the Constitution, and the organization of the state governments, demonstrate that though the states have surrendered certain specific powers, they have not surrendered their sovereignty. In the course of my former remarks, I took occasion to deprecate, as one of the greatest of evils, the consolidation of this government. 1824 Presidential Election, Candidates & Significance | Who Won the Election of 1824? . We look upon the states, not as separated, but as united. . I know that there are some persons in the part of the country from which the honorable member comes, who habitually speak of the Union in terms of indifference, or even of disparagement. Will it promote the welfare of the United States to have at our disposal a permanent treasury, not drawn from the pockets of the people, but to be derived from a source independent of them? So what was this debate really about? While the debaters argued about slavery, the economy, protection tariffs, and western land, the real implication was the meaning of the United States Constitution. A state will be restrained by a sincere love of the Union. . The War With Mexico: Speech in the United States H What Are the Colored People Doing for Themselves? The Most Famous Senate Speech January 26, 1830 The debate began simply enough, centering on the seemingly prosaic subjects of tariff and public land policy. It is the servant of four-and-twenty masters, of different wills and different purposes, and yet bound to obey all. And, therefore, I cannot but feel regret at the expression of such opinions as the gentleman has avowed; because I think their obvious tendency is to weaken the bond of our connection. South Carolinas Declaration of the Causes of Secession (1860), Jefferson Daviss Inaugural Address (1861), Documents in Detail: The Webster-Hayne Debates, Remarks in Congress on the Tariff of Abominations, Check out our collection of primary source readers. [was] fixed, forever, the character of the population in the vast regions Northwest of the Ohio, by excluding from them involuntary servitude. This was the tenor of Webster's speech, and nobly did the country respond to it. Then, in January of 1830, a senator from Connecticut introduced a proposal to the Senate stating that the federal government should stop surveying the lands west of the Mississippi River. I hold it to be a popular government, erected by the people; those who administer it responsible to the people; and itself capable of being amended and modified, just as the people may choose it should be. Lincoln-Douglas Debates History & Significance | What Was the Lincoln-Douglas Debate? All regulated governments, all free governments, have been broken up by similar disinterested and well-disposed interference! The 1830 WebsterHayne debate centered around the South Carolina nullification crisis of the late 1820s, but historians have largely ignored the sectional interests underpinning Webster's argument on behalf of Unionism and a transcendent nationalism. Tariff of 1816 History & Significance | What was the Tariff of 1816? . Speech of Senator Robert Y. Hayne of South Carolina, January 25, 1830. . Prejudice Not Natural: The American Colonization "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? . Liberty has been to them the greatest of calamities, the heaviest of curses. . [Its leader] would have a knot before him, which he could not untie. . In contrasting the state of Ohio with Kentucky, for the purpose of pointing out the superiority of the former, and of attributing that superiority to the existence of slavery, in the one state, and its absence in the other, I thought I could discern the very spirit of the Missouri question[1] intruded into this debate, for objects best known to the gentleman himself. bonito size limit florida, 20 facts about favelas,