John C. Calhoun

My non-fiction reading seems to be following a course almost of its own. I read William Miller's "Lincoln's Virtues" because Carol and I are going to the Lincoln Forum in Gettysburg next month. That accomplished two things, reading a book by one of the speakers and continuing the process of reading books that I already have as opposed to new ones. Reading about Lincoln's youth and his admiration for Henry Clay motivated me to read Robert Remini's massive biography of the great compromiser - again a book I already owned.

For some reason that I don't completely understand, reading about Clay motivated me to read a biography of John C. Calhoun. When I was in high school, I read Margaret Coit's "John C. Calhoun: American Portrait," but I can't say that I remember much of anything about it. I think part of the reason that I wanted to read about Calhoun is due to the fact that he seems to be one of the few apologists for slavery and the old South who somehow seems to still have some credibility. Charles Niltse's three volume biography of Calhoun seemed like too much so I went to John Niven's "John C. Calhoun and the Price of Union," which was recommended by Remini in the Clay book.

I guess I thought I was going to learn about exactly how Calhoun, who is considered to be an intellectual giant, could justify slavery, but there seemed to be little about that in the book. Niven may have dealt with that issue early on in the book when he said that Calhoun simply ignored the morality of slavery which allowed him to concentrate on issues of minority rights in a democratic society. Since minority rights are, of course, always important that may explain why Calhoun has not been consigned to the dust heap of history with the other demagogic supporters of slavery.

Regardless, however, of how articulate Calhoun may have been about minority rights (and I didn't find a lot of this in Niven's book) it is impossible to separate minority rights from the relevant moral issues. It would seem obvious, perhaps self-evident is a better word, that the rights of the minority don't include the right to enslave another group of people. Both Niven's book and Richard Hofsteder's essay "Calhoun - Marx of the Master Class," point out that Calhoun was adamantly opposed to the natural rights theories of the Declaration - especially the idea that "all men are created equal."

Calhoun might have been more amenable to this if it had said, "all white men are created equal" and, in fact, he and others claimed that slavery supported white equality by liberating all whites from the most menial tasks. It is interesting to note, however, that Calhoun's sons, much like Clay's - another slaveholder, basically led dissolute, unproductive lives. Is it possible that a society and its norms for young men built on the enslavement of millions of people encouraged this kind of behavior? Certainly not impossible I would think.

After finishing Niven's book I had intended to get back to Lincoln since the Forum is only three weeks away. But for some reason I found my self drawn to William Freehling's, "The Road to Disunion: The Secessionists at Bay." This is the first of two volumes about the secession movement and how ultimately a small radical minority (too radical even for Calhoun) moved the South to secession. Already I have learned something interesting - in Jefferson's day, slavery was to some extent looked on as an evil that would/could be eliminated when the conditions were right. By Calhoun's time this was changing into the view that slavery was a good that had to be continued. If this is a gradual progression (or degeneration) of the Southern view, it again illustrates how great a turning point the Civil War was in United States history.