Calhoun, John C.

Cultural  

1. The leading southern politician of the early nineteenth century; he served as vice president under both John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson and then was elected senator from South Carolina. Calhoun championed slavery and states' rights. During the early 1830s, he led the nullification movement, which maintained that when a state found a federal law unacceptable, the state had the right to declare the law null, or inoperative, within its borders. Nullification was aimed particularly at the high protective tariff of 1828; Calhoun opposed protective tariffs. A man of powerful intellect, Calhoun increasingly became obsessed with the South's minority status and with finding ways to protect slavery. Although he died in 1850, his influence helped point the South toward secession and the Civil War.

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Example Sentences

Calhoun, John C., on popular government, 132; on state rights, 178.

From The Spirit of American Government A Study Of The Constitution: Its Origin, Influence And Relation To Democracy by Smith, J. Allen (James Allen)

Calhoun, John C., his death, 17;   remarks of Mr. Webster, 17;   anecdote, 17;   extract from his speech, "How to save the Union," 55.

From The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government by Davis, Jefferson

Calhoun, John C., State Rights, 49;   demands suppression of Right of Petition, 55;   made Secretary of State, 1844, 60;   Texas, 60;   speaks on Compromise of 1850, 68.

From A History of the Republican Party by Platt, George Washington

Calhoun, John C., Senator, and the doctrine of Nullification, xxv and n., xxvii; 4.

From The Life of Lyman Trumbull by White, Horace

Calhoun, John C., leads war party in Congress, 292; reports from Committee on Foreign Relations in favor of war, 295; denounces Henry affair, 298.

From James Madison by Gay, Sydney Howard