SECRET HISTORY OF THE "COMPROMISE" OF 1833.
Mr. Calhoun and Mr. Clay were early, and long, rival aspirants for
the Presidency, and antagonistic leaders in opposite political
systems; and the coalition between them in 1833 was only a hollow
truce (embittered by the humiliations to which Mr. Calhoun was
subjected in the protective features of the "compromise") and only
kept alive for a few years by their mutual interest with respect to
General Jackson and Mr. Van Buren. A rupture was foreseen by every
observer; and in a few years it took place, and in open Senate,
and in a way to give the key to the secret motives which led to
that compromise. It became a question between them which had the
upper hand of the other--in their own language--which was master of
the other--on that occasion. Mr. Calhoun declared that he had Mr.
Clay down--had him on his back--was his master. Mr. Clay retorted:
He my master! I would not own him for the meanest of my slaves.
Of course, there were calls to order about that time; but the
question of mastery, and the causes which produced the passage of
the act, were still points of contestation between them, and came
up for altercation in other forms. Mr. Calhoun claimed a controling
influence for the military attitude of South Carolina, and its
intimidating effect upon the federal government. Mr. Clay ridiculed
this idea of intimidation, and said the little boys that muster in
the streets with their tiny wooden swords, had as well pretend to
terrify the grand army of Bonaparte: and afterwards said he would
tell how it happened, which was thus: His friend from Delaware (Mr.
John M. Clayton), said to him one day--these South Carolinians
act very badly, but they are good fellows, and it is a pity to
let Jackson hang them. This was after Mr. Clay had brought in his
bill, and while it lingered without the least apparent chance of
passing--paralyzed by the vehement opposition of the manufacturers:
and he urged Mr. Clay to take a new move with his bill--to get it
referred to a committee--and by them got into a shape in which it
could pass. Mr. Clay did so--had the reference made--and a committee
appointed suitable for the measure--some of strong will, and
earnest for the bill, and some of gentle temperament, inclined to
easy measures on hard occasions. They were: Messrs. Clay, Calhoun,
Clayton, Dallas, Grundy, Rives.
This was the movement, and the inducing cause on one side: now
for the cause on the other. Mr. Letcher, a representative from
Kentucky, was the first to conceive an idea of some compromise
to release South Carolina from her position; and communicated
it to Mr. Clay; who received it at first coolly and doubtfully.
Afterwards, beginning to entertain the idea, he mentioned it to Mr.
Webster, who repulsed it entirely, saying--"It would be yielding
great principles to faction; and that the time had come to test
the strength of the constitution and the government." After that
he was no more consulted. Mr. Clay drew up his bill, and sent it
to Mr. Calhoun through Mr. Letcher--he and Mr. Calhoun not being
on speaking terms. He objected decidedly to parts of the bill;
and said, if Mr. Clay knew his reasons, he certainly would yield
the objectionable parts. Mr. Letcher undertook to arrange an
interview;--which was effected--to take place in Mr. Clay's room.
The meeting was cold, distant and civil. Mr. Clay rose, bowed to his
visitor, and asked him to take a seat. Mr. Letcher, to relieve the
embarrassment, immediately opened the business of the interview:
which ended without results. Mr. Clay remained inflexible, saying
that if he gave up the parts of the bill objected to, it could not
be passed; and that it would be better to give it up at once. In
the mean time Mr. Letcher had seen the President, and sounded him
on the subject of a compromise: the President answered, he would
have no negotiation, and would execute the laws. This was told by
Mr. Letcher to Mr. McDuffie, to go to Mr. Calhoun. Soon after, Mr.
Letcher found himself required to make a direct communication to
Mr. Calhoun. Mr. Josiah S. Johnson, senator from Louisiana, came
to his room in the night, after he had gone to bed--and informed
him of what he had just learnt:--which was, that General Jackson
would admit of no further delay, and was determined to take at once
a decided course with Mr. Calhoun (an arrest and trial for high
treason being understood). Mr. Johnson deemed it of the utmost
moment that Mr. Calhoun should be instantly warned of his danger;
and urged Mr. Letcher to go and apprise him. He went--found Mr.
Calhoun in bed--was admitted to him--informed him. "He was evidently
disturbed." Mr. Letcher and Mr. Clay were in constant communication
with Mr. Clayton.
After the committee had been appointed, Mr. Clayton assembled the
manufacturers, for without their consent nothing could be done;
and in the meeting with them it was resolved to pass the bill,
provided the Southern senators, including the nullifiers, should
vote both for the amendments which should be proposed, and for the
passage of the bill itself--the amendments being the same afterwards
offered in the Senate by Mr. Clay, and especially the home valuation
feature. When these amendments, thus agreed upon by the friends of
the tariff, were proposed in the committee, they were voted down;
and not being able to agree upon any thing, the bill was carried
back to the senate without alteration. But Mr. Clayton did not give
up. Moved by a feeling of concern for those who were in peril, and
for the state of the country, and for the safety of the protective
system of which he was the decided advocate, he determined to have
the same amendments, so agreed upon by the friends of the tariff
and rejected by the committee, offered in the Senate; and, to
help Mr. Clay with the manufacturers, he put them into his hands
to be so offered--notifying Mr. Calhoun and Mr. Clay that unless
the amendments were adopted, and that by the Southern vote, every
nullifier inclusively, that the bill should not pass--that he
himself would move to lay it on the table. His reasons for making
the nullification vote a _sine qua non_ both on the amendments and
on the bill, and for them all, separately and collectively, was to
cut them off from pleading their unconstitutionality after they were
passed; and to make the authors of disturbance and armed resistance,
after resistance, parties upon the record to the measures, and
every part of the measures, which were to pacify them. Unless these
leaders were thus bound, he looked upon any pacification as a hollow
truce, to be succeeded by some new disturbance in a short time; and
therefore he was peremptory with both Mr. Clay and Mr. Calhoun,
denouncing the sacrifice of the bill if his terms were not complied
with; and letting them know that he had friends enough bound to his
support. They wished to know the names of the senators who were to
stand by him in this extreme course--which he refused to give; no
doubt restrained by an injunction of secrecy, there being many men
of gentle temperaments who are unwilling to commit themselves to
a measure until they see its issue, that the eclat of success may
consecrate what the gloom of defeat would damn. Being inexorable in
his claims, Mr. Clay and Mr. Calhoun agreed to the amendments, and
all voted for them, one by one, as Mr. Clay offered them, until it
came to the last--that revolting measure of the home valuation. As
soon as it was proposed, Mr. Calhoun and his friends met it with
violent opposition, declaring it to be unconstitutional, and an
insurmountable obstacle to their votes for the bill if put into
it. It was then late in the day, and the last day but one of the
session, and Mr. Clayton found himself in the predicament which
required the execution of his threat. He executed it, and moved to
lay it on the table, with the declaration that it was to lie there.
Mr. Clay went to him and besought him to withdraw the motion; but
in vain. He remained inflexible; and the bill then appeared to be
dead. In this extremity, the Calhoun wing retired to the colonnade
behind the Vice-President's chair, and held a brief consultation
among themselves: and presently Mr. Bibb, of Kentucky, came out, and
went to Mr. Clayton and asked him to withdraw his motion to give him
time to consider the amendment. Seeing this sign of yielding, Mr.
Clayton withdrew his motion--to be renewed if the amendment was not
voted for. A friend of the parties immediately moved an adjournment,
which was carried; and that night's reflections brought them to
the conclusion that the amendment must be passed; but still with
the belief, that, there being enough to pass it without him, Mr.
Calhoun should be spared the humiliation of appearing on the record
in its favor. This was told to Mr. Clayton, who declared it to be
impossible--that Mr. Calhoun's vote was indispensable, as nothing
would be considered secured by the passage of the bill unless his
vote appeared for every amendment separately, and for the whole
bill collectively. When the Senate met, and the bill was taken up,
it was still unknown what he would do; but his friends fell in, one
after the other, yielding their objections upon different grounds,
and giving their assent to this most flagrant instance (and that a
new one), of that protective legislation, against which they were
then raising troops in South Carolina! and limiting a day, and that
a short one, on which she was to be, _ipso facto_, a seceder from
the Union. Mr. Calhoun remained to the last, and only rose when the
vote was ready to be taken, and prefaced a few remarks with the
very notable declaration that he had then to "determine" which way
he would vote. He then declared in favor of the amendment, but upon
conditions which he desired the reporters to note; and which being
futile in themselves, only showed the desperation of his condition,
and the state of impossibility to which he was reduced. Several
senators let him know immediately the futility of his conditions;
and without saying more, he voted on ayes and noes for the
amendment; and afterwards for the whole bill. And this concluding
scene appears quite correctly reported in the authentic debates.
And thus the question of mastery in this famous "compromise," mooted
in the Senate by Mr. Clay and Mr. Calhoun as a problem between
themselves, is shown by the inside view of this bit of history,
to belong to neither of them, but to Mr. John M. Clayton, under
the instrumentality of Gen. Jackson, who, in the presidential
election, had unhorsed Mr. Clay and all his systems; and, in his
determination to execute the laws upon Mr. Calhoun, had left him
without remedy, except in the resource of this "compromise." Upon
the outside history of this measure which I have compiled, like a
chronicler, from the documentary materials, Mr. Calhoun and Mr.
Clay appear as master spirits, appeasing the storm which they had
raised; on the inside view they appear as subaltern agents dominated
by the necessities of their condition, and providing for themselves
instead of their country--Mr. Clay, in saving the protective policy,
and preserving the support of the manufacturers; and Mr. Calhoun,
in saving himself from the perils of his condition: and both, in
leaving themselves at liberty to act together in future against
General Jackson and Mr. Van Buren.