the rule is, friend or foe, being a defaulter, must go."1 Jackson certainly never abated his claim to the possession of absolute power of removal. A resolution of the Senate, February 3, 1831, declared it inexpedient to appoint citizens of one state to offices in another "without some evident necessity." In March, 1833, Jackson informed the Senate that he should make no further attempt to fill certain offices in Mississippi, because of the rejection of previous nominations under this rule. In a special message of February 10, 1835, he refused to lay before the Senate charges against Gideon Fitz, removed from the office of surveyor-general south of the state of Tennessee, declaring that the repetition of such requests imposed upon him, "as the representative and trustee of the American people, the painful but imperious duty of resisting to the utmost any further encroachment on the rights of the executive." 3 Jackson was not in any sense the originator of the spoils system, but the responsibility of transplanting it from the states to the broader and more fertile field of national politics must rest with him and his advisers. The growth of an office-seeking class dates from his time. There is nothing to show that the mass of the people, whose will Jackson al 1 Van Buren MSS. 'Richardson, Messages and Papers, II., 636. 66 JACKSONIAN DEMOCRACY [1829 ways claimed to interpret inerrantly, viewed the new departure with anything but approbation. The reign of the old statesmanship was ended, and the people were coming into their own. THE CHAPTER V TARIFF AND NULLIFICATION (1816-1829) HE tariff of 1816, while not, as has sometimes been said, the first protective tariff, nevertheless marks the point at which customs duties for revenue, with incidental protection, begin to give place to customs duties laid primarily to afford protection to domestic manufactures. This demand for protection, growing by that which it fed upon, led to a general revision of the tariff in 1824, and to further protection to wool, cotton, hemp, linens, iron, and other articles. The debate on the bill showed a significant change of sentiment in eight years, while the vote in the House indicated a wide sectional divergence and the predominance of local interests over alleged national ones. But the duties of 1824 failed to give either satisfaction or industrial peace, particularly to the woollen interests. To meet the demand for further protection, Mallary, of Vermont, introduced in the House, January 10, 1827, the "woolens bill," which left the existing duty of thirty-three and one-third per cent. ad valorem undisturbed, but proposed extraordinary changes in VOL. XV.-6 the so-called "minimum" principle of valuation.1 It was at once objected that the low-priced fabrics could not be imported, and that the revenue would decline. The bill passed the House, but was laid on the table in the Senate by the casting vote of the vice-president, Calhoun, who lost favor in New York and Pennsylvania in consequence. 2 The defeat of the Mallary bill was the signal for a general agitation in favor of higher duties, in which political and economic interests were inseparably mixed. The resulting tariff act of 1828 was accompanied in its passage by one of the most unprincipled intrigues of which Congress has ever been the forum. The tariff was likely to have far-reaching effects on the presidential campaign already in progress. So far as the three leading candidates-Adams, Clay, and Jackson-were concerned, there was little to choose, since all were on record as favoring protection. The Jackson leaders, however, who were appealing to protectionist Pennsylvania on the one hand and the free-trade south on the other, were anxious that the question should be left open and no bill passed. It was accordingly planned to report a bill imposing such high duties on iron, wool, hemp, etc., as particularly to threaten New England manufacturers, and thus compel New England, it was supposed, to join with the south, now openly opposed to pro 1 Debates of Congress, III., 732. 2 Sumner, Jackson (rev. ed.), 239. On Van Buren's vote, Debates of Congress, III., 388, 496. tection of any sort, and so defeat the bill. The Adams-Clay combination would thus be discredited, while Jackson would be left free to deal with the tariff as he saw fit. Both the expected and the unexpected happened. The bill as reported by the House Committee on Manufactures provided for duties so high as to bear heavily on many established industries in New England and Pennsylvania, and gave the greatest dissatisfaction to the woollen interests; but the strong protection sentiment in the north and west was sufficient to carry the bill through. New England was still divided, 23 of its 39 votes in the House being given against the bill; but Webster, in the Senate, yielding to the changing sentiment of his section, spoke and voted for it, although the Massachusetts members in the House were almost a unit in opposition. The middle states gave 57 votes in favor of the bill to 11 against it, and the west 17 in favor to I against. The total vote in the House was 105 to 94; in the Senate, 26 to 21.1 It has been customary to say that the vote on the tariff of 1828, like that on the tariff of 1824, was sectional rather than partisan, and sheds no special light on national public opinion. It must be remembered, however, that from 1820 to 1830 party lines were loosely drawn and party doctrines but vaguely formulated. The factions and personal 1 See table in Dewey, Financial History of the United States, 180. |