. Winners and Losers History's Famous Debates - Medium I understand the honorable gentleman from South Carolina to maintain, that it is a right of the state legislatures to interfere, whenever, in their judgment, this government transcends its constitutional limits, and to arrest the operation of its laws. . They ordained such a government; they gave it the name of a Constitution, and therein they established a distribution of powers between this, their general government, and their several state governments. Thirty years before the Civil War broke out, disunion appeared to be on the horizon with the Nullification Crisis. . The dominant historical opinion of the famous debate between Daniel Webster of Massachusetts and Robert Young Hayne of South Carolina which took place in the United States Senate in 1830 has long been that Webster defeated Hayne both as an orator and a statesman. Edited and introduced by Jason W. Stevens. Consolidation, like the tariff, grates upon his ear. Well, the southern states were infuriated. . When the honorable member rose, in his first speech, I paid him the respect of attentive listening; and when he sat down, though surprised, and I must say even astonished, at some of his opinions, nothing was farther from my intention than to commence any personal warfare: and through the whole of the few remarks I made in answer, I avoided, studiously and carefully, everything which I thought possible to be construed into disrespect. Benton was rising in renown as the advocate not only of Western settlers but of a new theory that the public lands should be given away instead of sold to them. Sir, when the gentleman provokes me to such a conflict, I meet him at the threshold. One of those was the Webster-Hayne debate, a series of unplanned speeches presented before the Senate between January 19th and 27th of 1830. So they could finish selling the lands already surveyed. Rush-Bagot Treaty Structure & Effects | What was the Rush-Bagot Agreement? A four-speech debate between Daniel Webster of Massachusetts and Robert Hayne of South Carolina, in January 1830. . In all the efforts that have been made by South Carolina to resist the unconstitutional laws which Congress has extended over them, she has kept steadily in view the preservation of the Union, by the only means by which she believes it can be long preserveda firm, manly, and steady resistance against usurpation. Tariff of 1816 History & Significance | What was the Tariff of 1816? They will also better understand the debate's political context. An undefinable dread now went abroad that men were planning against the peace of the nation, that the Union was in danger; and citizens looked more closely after its safety and welfare. If slavery, as it now exists in this country, be an evil, we of the present day found it ready made to our hands. The Significance of the Frontier in American Histo South Carolinas Ordinance of Nullification. Gloomy and downcast of late, Massachusetts men walked the avenue as though the fife and drum were before them. The following states came from the territory north and west of the Ohio river: Ohio (1803), Indiana (1816), Illinois (1818), Michigan (1837), Wisconsin (1848) and Minnesota (1858). This leads us to inquire into the origin of this government, and the source of its power. Competing Conceptions of Union and Ordered Liberty in The Webster-Hayne Speech on the Repeal of the Missouri Compromise. The United States, under the Constitution and federal government, was a single, unified nation, not a coalition of sovereign states. Battle of Fort Sumter in the Civil War | Who Won the Battle of Fort Sumter? States' rights (South) vs. nationalism (North). But still, throughout American history, several debates have captured the nation's attention in a way that would make even Hollywood jealous. The Webster-Hayne debate was a series of spontaneous speeches presented to the United States Senate by senators Daniel Webster of Massachusetts and Robert Y. Hayne of South Carolina. At the foundation of the constitution of these new Northwestern states, . I said, only, that it was highly wise and useful in legislating for the northwestern country, while it was yet a wilderness, to prohibit the introduction of slaves: and added, that I presumed, in the neighboring state of Kentucky, there was no reflecting and intelligent gentleman, who would doubt, that if the same prohibition had been extended, at the same early period, over that commonwealth, her strength and population would, at this day, have been far greater than they are. The gentleman, indeed, argues that slavery, in the abstract, is no evil. It was a speech delivered before a crowded auditory, and loud were the Southern exultations that he was more than a match for Webster. What started as a debate over the Tariff of Abominations soon morphed into debates over state and federal sovereignty and liberty and disunion. . At the time of the debate, Webster was serving his term as Senator of Massachusetts. This is a delicate and sensitive point, in southern feeling; and of late years it has always been touched, and generally with effect, whenever the object has been to unite the whole South against northern men, or northern measures. The growing support for nullification was quite obvious during the days of the Jackson Administration, as events such as the Webster-Hayne Debate, Tariff of 1832, Order of Nullification, and Worcester v. Georgia all made the tension grow between the North and the South. But I do not admit that, under the Constitution, and in conformity with it, there is any mode in which a state government, as a member of the Union, can interfere and stop the progress of the general government, by force of her own laws, under any circumstances whatever. MTEL Speech: Public Discourse & Debate in the U.S. Certainly, sir, I am, and ever have been of that opinion. His ideas about federalism and his interpretation of the Constitution as a document uniting the states under one supreme law were highly influential in the eyes of his contemporaries and would influence the rebuilding of the nation after the Civil War. Ham, one of Noahs sons, saw him uncovered, for which Noah cursed him by making Hams son, Canaan, a slave to Ham's brothers. . I understand him to maintain an authority, on the part of the states, thus to interfere, for the purpose of correcting the exercise of power by the general government, of checking it, and of compelling it to conform to their opinion of the extent of its powers. The real significance of this debate was in each man's interpretation of the United States Constitution. South Carolinas Declaration of the Causes of Secession (1860), Jefferson Daviss Inaugural Address (1861), Documents in Detail: The Webster-Hayne Debates, Remarks in Congress on the Tariff of Abominations, Check out our collection of primary source readers. The War With Mexico: Speech in the United States H What Are the Colored People Doing for Themselves? Strange was it, however, that in heaping reproaches upon the Hartford Convention he did not mark how nearly its leaders had mapped out the same line of opposition to the national Government that his State now proposed to take, both relying upon the arguments of the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions of 179899. . What interest, asks he, has South Carolina in a canal in Ohio? Sir, this very question is full of significance. The debate was on. It moves vast bodies, and gives to them one and the same direction. Address to the People of the United States, by the What are the main points of difference between Webster and Hayne, especially on the question of the nature of the Union and the Constitution? In January 1830, a debate on the nature of sovereignty in the America. The faction of voters in the North were against slavery and feared it spreading into new territory. We found that we had to deal with a people whose physical, moral, and intellectual habits and character, totally disqualified them from the enjoyment of the blessings of freedom. They undertook to form a general government, which should stand on a new basisnot a confederacy, not a league, not a compact between states, but a Constitution; a popular government, founded in popular election, directly responsible to the people themselves, and divided into branches, with prescribed limits of power, and prescribed duties. Plus, get practice tests, quizzes, and personalized coaching to help you . All regulated governments, all free governments, have been broken up by similar disinterested and well-disposed interference! Some of Webster's personal friends had felt nervous over what appeared to them too hasty a period for preparation. It is only by a strict adherence to the limitations imposed by the Constitution on the federal government, that this system works well, and can answer the great ends for which it was instituted. Create your account. Some of his historical deductions may be questioned; but far above all possible error on the part of her leaders, stood colonial and Revolutionary New England, and the sturdy, intelligent, and thriving people whose loyalty to the Union had never failed, and whose home, should ill befall the nation, would yet prove liberty's last shelter. The Webster-Hayne Debate: Defining Nationhood in the Early American See what I mean? President Andrew Jackson had just been elected, most of the states got rid of property requirements for voting, and an entire new era of democracy was being born. . . . Sir, I will not stop at the border; I will carry the war into the enemys territory, and not consent to lay down my arms, until I shall have obtained indemnity for the past, and security for the future.[4] It is with unfeigned reluctance that I enter upon the performance of this part of my duty. Webster realized that if the social, political, and economic elite of Massachusetts and the Northeast were to once again lay claim to national leadership, he had to justify New England's previous history of sectionalism within a framework of nationalistic progression. Understand the 1830 debate's significance through an overview of issues of the Constitution, the Union, and state sovereignty. [Its leader] would have a knot before him, which he could not untie. The idea of a strong federal government The ability of the people to revolt against an unfair government The theory that the states' may vote against unfair laws The role of the president in commanding the government 2 See answers Advertisement holesstanham Answer: What idea was espoused with the Webster-Hayne debates? And who are its enemies? The people read Webster's speech and marked him as the champion henceforth against all assaults upon the Constitution. Well, it's important to remember that the nation was still young and much different than what we think of today. Robert Young Hayne spent more than two decades in elected offices, including mayor of Charleston, member of South Carolina's legislature, attorney general, and then governor of the state. 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[O]pinions were expressed yesterday on the general subject of the public lands, and on some other subjects, by the gentleman from South Carolina [Senator Robert Hayne], so widely different from my own, that I am not willing to let the occasion pass without some reply. He joined Hayne in using this opportunity to try to detach the West from the East, and restore the old cooperation of the West and the South against New England.