John Caldwell Calhoun

“ If they, by superior capital and skill, should keep down successful competition on our part, we should be doomed to toil at our unprofitable agriculture, selling at the prices, which a single and limited market might give. But on the other hand, if our necessity should triumph over their capital and skill, if, instead of raw cotton, we should ship to the manufacturing states, cotton yarn, and cotton goods, the thoughtful must see, that it would immediately bring about a state of things, which could not long continue. Those who now make war on our gains would then make it on our labour. ”

“ And what is government itself but a joint stock company, which comprehends every interest, and which as there can be no higher power to restrain its natural operation, if not checked by its peculiar organization, must follow the same law? The actual condition of man in every country at this and all preceding periods, attests the truth of the remark. No government based on the naked principle, that the majority ought to govern, however true the maxim in its proper sense and under proper restrictions, ever preserved its liberty, even for a single generation. ”

“ In order to have a full and clear conception of our institutions, it will be proper to remark, that there is in our system a striking distinction between the government and the sovereign power. Whatever may be the true doctrine in regard to the sovereignty of the states individually, it is unquestionably clear that while the government of the union is vested in its legislative, executive and political departments, the actual sovereign power, resides in the several states, who created it, in their separate and distinct political character. ”

“ It is in fact not at all surprising, that to a people unacquainted with the nature of liberty, and inexperienced in its blessings, all limitation on the supreme power should appear incompatible with its nature, and as tending to feebleness and anarchy.
Nature has not permitted us to doubt the necessity of supreme power in every community. All see and feel it, and are instinctively impelled to its support; but it requires some effort of reason to perceive, that if not controlled, such power must necessarily lead to abuse ”

“ A government like ours of divided powers, must necessarily give great importance to a proper system of construction, but it is perfectly clear that no system of the kind, however perfect, can prescribe bounds to the encroachment of power. They constitute in fact, but an appeal by the minority to the justice of the majority, and if such appeals were sufficient to restrain the avarice, and ambition of those, who are invested with power, then would a system of technical construction be sufficient. ”

“ In fact, to divide power, and to give to one of the parties the exclusive right of judging of the portion allotted to each, is in reality not to divide at all; and to reserve such exclusive right to the general government, (it matters not by what department it be exercised,) is in fact to constitute it one great consolidated government, with unlimited powers, and to reduce the states to mere corporations. It is impossible to understand the force of terms, and to deny these conclusions. ”

“ Forced with an immense sacrifice of capital to abandon our ancient and favorite pursuit, to which our soil, climate, habits and peculiar labor are adapted, we should be compelled without experience or skill, and with a population untried in such pursuits, to attempt to become the rivals instead of the customers of the manufacturing states. ”

“ The duty on imports which is mainly paid out of our labour gives them the means of selling to us at a higher price, while we cannot, to compensate the loss, dispose of our products at the least advance. It is then not a subject of wonder, when properly understood, that one section of country though blessed by a kind Providence with a genial sun and prolific soil, from which spring the richest products, should languish in poverty and sink into decay; while the rest of the Union though less fortunate in natural advantages is flourishing in prosperity beyond example. ”

“ The constitution grants to Congress the power of imposing a duty on imports for revenue; which power is abused by being converted into an instrument for rearing up the industry of one section of the country on the ruins of another. The violation then consists in using a power, granted for one object, to advance another, and that by the sacrifice of the original object. It is, in a word, a violation of perversion, the most dangerous of all, because the most insidious, and difficult to resist. Others cannot be perpetrated without the aid of the judiciary ”

“ Under the operation of this supreme controlling power to whose interposition no one can object, all controversy between the states and general government would be thus adjusted; and the constitution would gradually require by its constant interposition in important cases, all the perfection of which the work of men is susceptible. It is thus that the creative will become the preserving power; and we may rest assured, that it is no less true in politics, than in divinity that the power which creates can alone preserve, and that preservation is perpetual creation. ”

“ They may be comprehended under three, the custom house, the appropriations, and the monopoly of the manufacturers, under the Tariff system, all which are so intimately blended, as to constitute one system, which its advocates, by a perversion of all that is associated with the name, call the American System. The Tariff is the soul of the system. ”

“ Thus the necessity of government and of checks originate in the same great principle of our nature, through which the very selfishness, which would impel those who have power, to desire more than their own, will also, with great energy impel those, on whom power may operate to demand their own; and in the balance of these opposing tendencies from different conditions, but originating in the same principle of action, the one impelling to excess, the other restraining within the bounds of moderation and justice, liberty and happiness must forever depend. ”

“ They were in truth no ordinary men. They were wise and practical men, enlightened by history and their own enlarged experience, acquired in conducting our country through a most important revolution; and understood profoundly the nature of man and of government. They saw and felt that there existed in our nature the necessity of a government, which to effect the object of government must have adequate powers. ”

“ The capitalist, the farmer, the wool grower, the mechanic and labourer in the manufacturing states are all to receive higher rates, while we who consume, are to pay less for the products of their labour and capital. The obvious absurdity of these arguments leaves no room to doubt that those who advance them, are conscious that the proof of the partial and oppressive operation of the system, is unanswerable, if it be conceded that we pay in consequence of it higher prices for what we consume. ”

“ We are thus compelled to produce, be the price what it may, under the penalty of losing our market. Once lost, it may be lost forever. And lose it we must, if we continue to be compelled as we now are, on the one hand by the general competition of the world to sell low, and on the other, by the tariff to buy high. We cannot withstand this double action. Our ruin must follow. In fact our only permanent and safe remedy is, not the rise in the price of what we sell, from which we can receive no aid from our government; but in a reduction in the price of what we buy ”

“ The committee deem it not only the right of the state, but the duty of her representatives under the solemn sanction of an oath, to interpose if no other remedy be applied. They interpret the oath to the Constitution, not simply to impose an obligation to abstain from violation, but if possible to prevent it in others. In their opinion, he is as guilty of violating that sacred instrument, who permits an infraction, when in his power to prevent it, as he who is actually guilty of the infraction. The one may be bolder and the other more timid, but the sense of duty must be equally weak on both. ”

“ But let it be supposed that there was no paramount authority, no court, no government to control, what sober individual, who intended to act honestly, would place his property in joint stock with any number of individuals however respect table, to be disposed of by the unchecked will of the majority, whether acting in a body as stockholders, or through representation by a direction? Who does not see, that sooner or later, a major and a minor interest would spring up, and that the former would in a short time monopolize all the advantages of the concern. ”

“ Thus to prevent rulers from abusing their trust, constituents must controul them through elections; and so to prevent the major from oppressing the minor interests of society, the constitution must provide (as the committee hope to prove it does,) a check founded on the same principle, and equally efficacious. In fact the abuse of delegated power, and the tyranny of the greater over the less interests of society, are the two great dangers, and the only two, to be guarded against; and if they be effectually guarded liberty must be eternal. ”

“ That our industry is controlled by the many, instead of one, by a majority in congress elected by a majority in the community having an opposing interest, instead of hereditary rulers, forms not the slightest mitigation of the evil. In fact, instead of mitigating, it aggravates. In our case one opposing branch of industry cannot prevail without associating others, and thus instead of a single act of oppression we must bear many. ”

“ We consider all powers as delegated from the people and to be controlled by those who are interested in their just and proper exercise; and our governments, both state and general, are but a system of judicious contrivances to bring this fundamental principle into fair practical operation. Among the most permanent of these is the responsibility of representatives to their constituents, through frequent periodical elections. Without such a check in their powers, however clearly they may be defined and distinctly prescribed, our liberty would be but a mockery. ”

“ It is thus, that our political system, recognizing the opposition of geographical interests in the community, has provided the most efficient check against its dangers. Looking to facts and not mere hypothesis, the constitution has made us a community only to the extent of our common interest, leaving the states distinct and independent, as to their peculiar interests, and has drawn the line of separation with consummate skill. ”

“ The circumstances of the country, therefore, are not such as to permit us to calculate on a reduction of prices, as the result of the protecting system—but an enhancement of them by the erection of an artificial monopoly. It is therefore clearly our interest that such a monopoly should not be created, and that our market should afford a free and open competition to all the world. ”

“ A total prohibition of importation by destroying the revenue and thereby the means of making appropriations, would in a short period destroy it. Bat the excess of its loss over its gains, leads to the consolatory reflection, that its abolition would relieve us much more than it would embarrass the manufacturing states. We have suffered too much to desire to see others afflicted, even for our relief, when it can possibly be avoided. We should rejoice to see our manufactures flourish on any constitutional principle consistent with justice and the public liberty. ”

“ But admitting that no other impediment existed, our system itself is an effectual barrier against extensive exports of our manufactured articles. The very means which secures the domestic market, must lose the foreign. High prices are an effectual stimulus, when enforced by a monopoly, as in our own market, but they are fatal to competition in the open and free market of the world. Besides, when manufactured articles are exported, they must follow the same law, to which the products of the soil are subject, when they are also exported. ”

“ The loss of the exports, and with it the imports also, must in truth be the end of the system. If we export, we must import, and the most simple and efficient system to secure the home market, would in fact be to prohibit exports; and as the constitution only prohibits duties on exports, and as duties are not prohibition, we may yet witness this modification of the American system. ”

“ If the minority has a right to select its rule of construction, a majority will exercise the same, but with this striking difference, that the power of the former will be a mere nullity, against that of the latter. But that protection, which the minor interest ever fails to find, in any technical system of construction, where alone in practice it has heretofore been sought, it may find in the reserved rights of the states themselves, if they be properly called into action ”

“ Men ask not for burdens, but for benefits. The tax paid by the duty on imports by which, with the exception of the receipts from the sale of the public lands, the government is wholly supported, and which, in its gross amount, is annually equal to about $23,000,000, is then in truth no tax on them. Whatever portion of it they advance, as consumers of the articles, on which it is imposed, returns to them from the labour of others, with usurious interest, through an artfully contrived system. ”

“ Give us a free and open competition in our own market, and we fear not to encounter like competition in the general markets of the world. If, under all our discouragements, by the acts of our own government, we are still able to contend with these against the world, can it be doubted if the impediment were removed we should force out all competitors, and thus also enlarge our market, not by the oppressions of our fellow citizens of the other states, but by our industry, enterprize and natural advantages. ”