John C Calhoun

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John Caldwell Calhoun (March 18, 1782 – March 31, 1850) was an American statesman and political theorist from South Carolina who served as the country's seventh vice president from 1825 to 1832.

He is remembered for his defense of slavery and the advancement of the theory of minority rights in politics, which he did in the context of safeguarding the interests of the white South when it was outnumbered by Northerners.

He began his political career as a nationalist, modernizer, and proponent of a robust national government and tariffs.

His views radically changed in the late 1820s, and he became a leading proponent of states' rights, limited government, nullification, and resistance to high tariffs; he saw Northern acceptance of these policies as a condition of the South remaining in the Union.

The South secession from the Union in 1860–1861 was influenced by his convictions and warnings. Calhoun began his political career in 1810 with an election to the House of Representatives in 1810.

Calhoun, a leading figure of the war hawk group, fought for American dignity against British infractions of American liberty and neutrality during the Napoleonic Wars.

Early life

John Calhoun was born in Abbeville, South Carolina, on March 18, 1782, the fourth child of Patrick Calhoun (1727-1996), and Martha (Caldwell). Patrick Calhoun's father, as well as Patrick Calhoun, immigrated from County Donegal to southwestern Pennsylvania. The family migrated to southwestern Virginia after the death of the elder Patrick in 1741. Following the defeat of British General Edward Braddock at the Battle of the Monongahela in 1755, the family escaped to South Carolina in 1756, fearing Indian attacks.

Patrick Calhoun was a member of the Calhoun clan of the close-knit Scotch-Irish group on the Southern frontier. Since being elected to the South Carolina Legislature, he was known as an Indian warrior and an astute surveyor, planter, and politician. He was a Presbyterian, opposed to the established Anglican planter class based in Charleston. He was not a patriot in the American Revolution and opposed to the ratification of the federal Constitution on account of state rights and personal liberties. Calhoun would eventually follow his father's states' equal rights views.

Young Calhoun demonstrated academic promise, and although schools were limited on the Carolina frontier, he was briefly enrolled in an academy in Appling, Georgia. It was soon decommissioned. He continued his studies in private. When his father died, his brothers were not working, and so the 14-year-old Calhoun took over the family farm and five other farms. He continued his reading, fishing, and fishing for four years. After the academy reopened, the family decided that he should continue his education, and so he restarted studies.

In 1802, he attended Yale College in Connecticut with support from his brothers. Calhoun's first intellectual dialogue that could influence his mind was a serious, robust, well-organized dialogue. President Timothy Dwight, a Federalist who became his mentor, ruled Yale. Calhoun was entranced (and then repelled) by the Dwight's brilliance.

Biographer John Niven says:

Dwight has consistently condemned Jeffersonian democracy, and Calhoun has chastised him in class. Calhoun's pledge to republicanism was impossible, and he could not deny it. "Young man" retorted Dwight, "your skills are of a high order and may be able to justify yourself for any station, but I deeply regret that you do not believe in sound principles better than sophistry—you have a most unfortunate tendency for error." Dwight also spoke out against secession from the Union as a viable alternative for New England's national government in the wake of the nation's impasses.

Calhoun met with others, read a lot, and was a prominent member of Brotherhood in Unity. In 1804, he graduated as a valedictorian. He studied law at Litchfield, Connecticut, where he worked with Tapping Reeve and James Gould. In 1807, he was admitted to the South Carolina bar.

Biographer Margaret Coit argues that:

Personal life

Calhoun married Floride Bonneau Colhoun, a first cousin who was later removed, in January 1811. She was the niece of wealthy United States Senator and counsel John E. Colhoun, a figure of Charleston high society.

The couple had ten children over the age of 18:

Calhoun was not formally religious. He was raised as an orthodox Presbyterian, but he was attracted to Southern varieties of Unitarianism, like Jefferson's. Southern Unitarianism was traditionally less organized than New England's popular variety. He was not outspoken about his religious convictions. Calhoun and his wife attended the Episcopal Church, of which she was a member. He became a founding member of All Souls Unitarian Church in Washington, D.C., in 1821.

"I could never write a love poem, but he did try," explains historian Merrill D. Peterson.

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