what idea was espoused with the webster hayne debates
In our contemplation, Carolina and Ohio are parts of the same country; states, united under the same general government, having interests, common, associated, intermingled. He tells us, we have heard much, of late, about consolidation; that it is the rallying word for all who are endeavoring to weaken the Union by adding to the power of the states. But consolidation, says the gentleman, was the very object for which the Union was formed; and in support of that opinion, he read a passage from the address of the president of the Convention[3] to Congress (which he assumes to be authority on his side of the question.) The debate itself, a nine-day long unplanned exchange between Senators Robert Y. Hayne and Daniel Webster, directly addressed the methods by which the federal government was generating revenue, namely through protective tariffs and the selling of federal lands in the newly acquired western territories. The faction of voters in the North were against slavery and feared it spreading into new territory. I distrust, therefore, sir, the policy of creating a great permanent national treasury, whether to be derived from public lands or from any other source. Webster's "Second Reply to Hayne" was generally regarded as "the most eloquent speech ever delivered in Congress."[1]. 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. . Ham, one of Noahs sons, saw him uncovered, for which Noah cursed him by making Hams son, Canaan, a slave to Ham's brothers. A four-speech debate between Daniel Webster of Massachusetts and Robert Hayne of South Carolina, in January 1830. At the foundation of the constitution of these new Northwestern states, . The honorable gentleman from Massachusetts while he exonerates me personally from the charge, intimates that there is a party in the country who are looking to disunion. President Andrew Jackson had just been elected, most of the states got rid of property requirements for voting, and an entire new era of democracy was being born. 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. My life upon it, sir, they would not. See what I mean? He rose, the image of conscious mastery, after the dull preliminary business of the day was dispatched, and with a happy figurative allusion to the tossed mariner, as he called for a reading of the resolution from which the debate had so far drifted, lifted his audience at once to his level. This feeling, always carefully kept alive, and maintained at too intense a heat to admit discrimination or reflection, is a lever of great power in our political machine. Now, have they given away that right, or agreed to limit or restrict it in any respect? 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. 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. An equally. . 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. . Liberty has been to them the greatest of calamities, the heaviest of curses. Congress could only recommendtheir acts were not of binding force, till the states had adopted and sanctioned them. . She has a BA in political science. 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. But his standpoint was purely local and sectional. 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.. I supposed, that on this point, no two gentlemen in the Senate could entertain different opinions. . Several state governments or courts, some in the north, had espoused the idea of nullification prior to 1828. . Webster's second reply to Hayne, in January 1830, became a famous defense of the federal union: "Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable." Just beneath the surface of this debate lay the elements of the developing sectional crisis between North and South. . They will also better understand the debate's political context. This leads us to inquire into the origin of this government, and the source of its power. . . What was going on? It is to state, and to defend, what I conceive to be the true principles of the Constitution under which we are here assembled. The action, the drama, the suspensewho needs the movies? MTEL Speech: Notable Debates & Speeches in U.S. History, The Lincoln-Douglas Debates of 1858: Summary & Significance, Psychological Research & Experimental Design, All Teacher Certification Test Prep Courses, The Significance of Daniel Webster's Argument, MTEL Speech: Principles of Argument & Debate, MTEL Speech: Understanding Persuasive Communication, MTEL Speech: Public Argument in Democratic Societies. Religious Views: Letter to the Editor of the Illin Democratic Party Platform 1860 (Douglas Faction), (Northern) Democratic Party Platform Committee. . Sir, it is because South Carolina loves the Union, and would preserve it forever, that she is opposing now, while there is hope, those usurpations of the federal government, which, once established, will, sooner or later, tear this Union into fragments. It is the common pretense. Webster and the North treated it as binding the states together as a single union. 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. . . To all this, sir, I was disposed most cordially to respond. [2] We deal in no abstractions. Hayne entered the U.S. Senate in 1823 and soon became prominent as a spokesman for the South and for the . New England, the Union, and the Constitution in its integrity, all were triumphantly vindicated. Robert Young Hayne spent more than two decades in elected offices, including mayor of Charleston, member of South Carolina's legislature, attorney general, and then governor of the state. All regulated governments, all free governments, have been broken up by similar disinterested and well-disposed interference! . . Sir, I may be singularperhaps I stand alone here in the opinion, but it is one I have long entertained, that one of the greatest safeguards of liberty is a jealous watchfulness on the part of the people, over the collection and expenditure of the public moneya watchfulness that can only be secured where the money is drawn by taxation directly from the pockets of the people. 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. . All other trademarks and copyrights are the property of their respective owners. These irreconcilable views of national supremacy and state sovereignty framed the constitutional struggle that led to Civil War thirty years later. Shedding weak tears over sufferings which had existence only in their own sickly imaginations, these friends of humanity set themselves systematically to work to seduce the slaves of the South from their masters. Sir, we will not stop to inquire whether the black man, as some philosophers have contended, is of an inferior race, nor whether his color and condition are the effects of a curse inflicted for the offences of his ancestors. The object of the Framers of the Constitution, as disclosed in that address, was not the consolidation of the government, but the consolidation of the Union. It was not to draw power from the states, in order to transfer it to a great national government, but, in the language of the Constitution itself, to form a more perfect union; and by what means? This absurdity (for it seems no less) arises from a misconception as to the origin of this government and its true character. I will yield to no gentleman here in sincere attachment to the Union,but it is a Union founded on the Constitution, and not such a Union as that gentleman would give us, that is dear to my heart. . Most people of the time supported a small central government and strong state governments, so the federal government was much weaker than you might have expected. . Well, you're not alone. . 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. 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Some of Webster's personal friends had felt nervous over what appeared to them too hasty a period for preparation. .Readers will finish the book with a clear idea of the reason Webster's "Reply" became so influential in its own day. Allow me to say, as a preliminary remark, that I call this the South Carolina doctrine, only because the gentleman himself has so denominated it. There is not, and never has been, a disposition in the North to interfere with these interests of the South. 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! He speaks as if he were in Congress before 1789. This is the sum of what I understand from him, to be the South Carolina doctrine; and the doctrine which he maintains. But, sir, we will pass over all this. 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. Assuredly not. It impressed on the soil itself, while it was yet a wilderness, an incapacity to bear up any other than free men. Webster believed that the Constitution should be viewed as a binding document between the United States rather than an agreement between sovereign states. a. an explanation of natural events that is well supported by scientific evidence b. a set of rules for ethical conduct during an experiment c. a statement that describes how natural events happen d. a possible answer to a scientific question . The idea that a state could nullify a federal law, associated with South Carolina, especially after the publication of John C. Calhouns South Carolina Exposition and Protest (1828) in response to the tariff passed in that year. It cannot be doubted, and is not denied, that before the formation of the constitution, each state was an independent sovereignty, possessing all the rights and powers appertaining to independent nations; nor can it be denied that, after the Constitution was formed, they remained equally sovereign and independent, as to all powers, not expressly delegated to the federal government. . Sir, the opinion which the honorable gentleman maintains, is a notion, founded in a total misapprehension, in my judgment, of the origin of this government, and of the foundation on which it stands. So they could finish selling the lands already surveyed. The other way was through the sale of federally-owned land to private citizens. Under that system, the legal actionthe application of law to individuals, belonged exclusively to the states. . 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. Post-Civil War, as the nation rebuilt and reconciled the balance between federal and state government, federal law became the supreme law of the land, just as Webster desired. . Sir, I deprecate and deplore this tone of thinking and acting. His speech was indeed a powerful one of its eloquence and personality. 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. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll hopefully stay awake until the end of the lesson. Daniel Webster stood as a ready and formidable opponent from the north who, at different stages in his career, represented both the states of New Hampshire and Massachusetts. "The most eloquent speech ever delivered in Congress" may have been Webster's 1830 "Second Reply to Hayne", a South Carolina Senator who had echoed John C. Calhoun's case for state's rights.. While the debaters argued about slavery, the economy, protection tariffs, and western land, the real implication was the meaning of the United States Constitution. . The debates between daniel webster of massachusetts and robert hayne of south carolina gave. . 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. Speech of Senator Daniel Webster of Massachusetts, January 20, 1830. Drama, suspense, it's all there. State governments were in control of their own affairs and expected little intervention from the federal government. . 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. . This, sir, is General Washingtons consolidation. Their own power over their own instrument remains. They will not destroy it, they will not impair itthey will only save, they will only preserve, they will only strengthen it! Create your account. Sir, we narrow-minded people of New England do not reason thus. The measures of the federal government have, it is true, prostrated her interests, and will soon involve the whole South in irretrievable ruin. . Certainly, sir, I am, and ever have been of that opinion. The debate can be seen as a precursor to the debate that became . The purpose of the Constitution was to permit cooperation between states under a shared political standard, but that meant that any growth in a federal government threatened the sovereignty of the states. Rachel Venter is a recent graduate of Metropolitan State University of Denver. The discussion took a wide range, going back to topics that had agitated the country before the Constitution was formed. The Webster-Hayne debate, which again was just one section of this greater discussion in the Senate, is traditionally considered to have begun when South Carolina senator Robert Y. Hayne stood to argue against Connecticut's proposal, accusing the northeastern states of trying to stall development of the West so that southern agricultural interests couldn't expand. We will not look back to inquire whether our fathers were guiltless in introducing slaves into this country.