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In his singular study Whig
Party in the South (1913), historian Arthur Charles Cole outlined five
stages of development of the Party in the South from its birth in the 1830s to
its demise after its disappointing performance in the 1852 election. First and
foremost, Cole stated unequivocally that the Whigs evolved from a disaffected
group of Jacksonians turned anti-Jacksonians, the direct result of Andrew
Jackson’s reaction to John C. Calhoon’s Nullification of the Tariff of 1832.
Though not “nullifiers” per se—indeed, most of these men adamantly opposed the
concept as well as Calhoun’s tactic—these state-rights leaders abandoned the
Jackson camp in the wake of Jackson’s threatened military action against the state of
South Carolina. Their numbers reflected a fair proportion of the South’s
planting class. Briefly, for the sake of future reference, the other four
stages were the Southern Whigs’ acceptance of Clay’s American System, realized
by the year 1844; after 1844, a period of cautious interaction with their
Northern counterparts, the result of the slavery issue; a growing rift between
not only Southern and Northern Whigs, but increased distrust by the Party’s
Southern constituents given the Northern faction’s reaction to abolitionism,
making the Party an unfit champion for Southern interests; the demise of the
National Party following the disastrous election of 1852; and an attempt to
revive the Party on the part of the South until the War Between the States
swept all pretense aside. I argue that there is yet another stage, that being
during Reconstruction and Redemption.
In my last post I referenced Henry
Clay’s need for a cause strong enough to wrest the hearts and minds of the
American people from the popular Andrew Jackson. Two highly charged issues, one
the National Bank, the second the Nullification Crisis—the two intricately
linked by the American System—partially filled Clay’s need.
The American System, so named by its chief partisan, Clay, and the very essence of the National Republican platform, was a
government-assisted economic program the roots of which go back to our first
Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton. Nationalistic in concept, it is characterized by:
(1) a high protective tariff, initially put into effect to
protect burgeoning American industry...
Okay, belay that. Initially it was put into place, with Southern support, in 1816 to
protect and strengthen this young nation’s security against Britain following
the War of 1812. Lasting peace with mother England arrived in the short-term, then came the argument to protect
America’s infant manufacturers. Try as those manufacturers could to deny it
[okay, this is me talking], their infant could remain an infant only so long, so
the pro-tariff argument again morphed, this time into the protection of
“American labor” [yeah, right, more like those who employed the labor]. The Tariff of 1816 didn’t go away; in fact, tariffs kept getting
more protective.
(2) A national bank supported by investments from the
Federal government and private investors, its purpose to stabilize the currency
and reign in risky state banks; and
(3) Federal subsidies for internal improvements, primarily
roads and canals meant to link the nation and foster industry as well as
security.
They all sound great, don’t they? We have them today and
much, much more. One problem, though: such programs can’t be managed (then as
now) without centralization. Popular in New England and Pennsylvania and even
the Midwest where industry/manufacturing blossomed, The American System was out
of sync with the Founder’s federalism. Strict constructionists/state righters, residing
mostly in the South, knew it. State righters, astute victims of the protective
tariff, understood the reason the Founders went to the lengths they did in
framing the Constitution to prevent such shenanigans, and were aware of the
Anti-Federalists pre-ratification warnings as to why the Constitution wouldn’t.
This brings us back full circle to the Old-Jeffersonian concerns about the nation’s direction in the
wake of the War of 1812. The American System opened the door to Federal interference in the
states as well as to political corruption. It was, as those old Jeffersonians
of the day repeatedly warned, a looming threat to our [now] long-lost Federal
Republic.
The matter of the Second National Bank, key to the
American System, can be divided into two events, one being Jackson’s veto of
its re-charter in 1832 followed one year later by his removal of government
deposits from the Bank. Event one, I will relate here. Though an obvious attack on the American System, Jackson’s veto was within his purview and
constitutional; the removal of the deposits, far more egregious, I will detail
in a future post.
Riding high on the wave of good feeling that accompanied
Jackson’s re-election in 1832 and very much aware that Andrew Jackson was no
friend of the National Bank, Nicholas Biddle, the Bank’s president, decided the
time was favorable to present the Bank’s re-charter to the president, despite the
charter’s not expiring for another two years. Considering the popularity of the
bank in the Northeast and among the rich planters in many Southern states,
Biddle was certain Jackson would not dare veto the measure whereas two years
down the road he might. Henry Clay, a bitter foe of Jackson, and Daniel Webster
of Massachusetts encouraged Biddle’s decision for early re-charter because they
were certain Jackson would veto it,
and they were desperate for any conflict that might decrease Jackson’s
popularity with the people. Given Jackson’s antagonism to the banking elite, Clay
considered the man and his administration a threat to the American System.
As Clay and Webster anticipated, Jackson declared the Bank outside
the scope of national authority and unconstitutional. He vetoed the bill,
foiling Biddle. In North Carolina, W. R. Hinton, a Jackson elector, ceased to
back Jackson after the veto, but despite protests such as that presented by
Hinton and others belonging to the wealthy banking elite, Jackson had foiled
Clay and Webster as well. The common folk, regarding the bank a corrupt engine of aristocratic privilege, did not
protest the veto, and the National Republicans did not have the votes to override it. The National
Republicans had lost the National Bank, a serious blow to the “American System,”
and they had nothing to show for it.
On the subject of the National Republicans’ economic agenda,
the American System was about to receive yet another challenge.
An introduction to the Nullification Crisis next time and thanks
for reading,
Charlsie