Jackson and the Tariff: The Nullification Controversy

The nullification controversy of 1832 was a major milestone in the national debate over federal versus state authority. Coming at a time when agitation over slavery and other issues that tended to divide the country along sectional lines was growing, the nullification controversy brought the states' rights debate into sharp focus.

The root of the problem of protective tariffs is that they are almost by definition designed to assist certain segments of the economy. In the era in question, the country was distinctly divided along economic lines. Because a large percentage of Southern capital was put into land, cotton, and slaves, less capital was available for investment in manufacturing enterprises. During that volatile period in history, investing in industrial projects was far riskier than putting money in cotton, the prime mover of the booming textile industry. Economists have determined that a reasonable expectation for return on investment in cotton was 10% per annum, an excellent return at any time. But because the cotton South did not produce much in the way of farm equipment, tools or other manufactured goods, they were dependent upon manufactured goods produced mostly in the north or in foreign countries.

High protective tariffs on manufactured goods, designed to aid American manufacturing, had the effect of raising prices on goods purchased throughout the country, but they were needed most heavily in South. Support for manufacturing interests was strong in the North, where the population had grown faster, meaning that there were more members in the House of Representatives from the North than from the South. Thus high protective tariffs were regularly passed.

In 1828 Andrew Jackson's supporters proposed a very high tariff bill that would allow Jackson to look friendly toward manufacturing in the North, while in the South his supporters

Could claim that the proposed tariff was so high that it would never pass, and that they therefore had nothing to worry about. But then the tariff did pass after all. Vice President John C. Calhoun (left) of South Carolina anonymously wrote an "Exposition and Protest" of the Tariff of 1828, which became known as the "Tariff of Abominations." When a tariff bill passed again in 1832, the State of South Carolina decided to nullify it because it was still too high to suit the needs of Southern agricultural interests. They took their action very deliberately, calling a special convention and passing an Ordinance of Nullification that claimed not only that the tariff was not enforceable in South Carolina, but that any attempt to enforce it by state or federal officials would not be permitted John C. Calhoun within South Carolina.50

The Ordinance stated that the tariffs of 1828 and 1832

Are null, void, and no law, nor binding upon this state, its officers, or citizens; and all promises, contracts, and obligations made or entered into, or to be made or entered into, with purpose to secure the duties imposed by said acts, and all judicial proceedings which shall be hereafter had in affirmance thereof, are and shall be held utterly null and void.

South Carolina's ordinance placed the state on a collision course with President Andrew Jackson. Although Jackson was from Tennessee, and thus a Southerner (and slave owner), he was still much more a nationalist than an advocate of states' rights. To Jackson, the notion that a state could nullify a federal law, and that it could furthermore prevent him from exercising his constitutional duty to "see to it that the laws are faithfully executed," was too much. Jackson issued his own Proclamation to the People of South Carolina in which he called their nullification ordinance an "impracticable absurdity." He said:

I consider, then, the power to annul a law of the United States, assumed by one state, incompatible with the existence of the Union, contradicted expressly by the letter of the Constitution, unauthorized by its spirit, inconsistent with every principle on which it was founded, and destructive of the great object for which it was formed.

Congress supported Jackson by passing a Force Bill which explicitly authorized him to use whatever force was necessary to enforce the law in South Carolina. (The Force Bill was more symbolic than real, as Jackson already had authority to enforce the law under the Constitution.) Meanwhile, Henry Clay set about getting a compromise tariff through Congress. South Carolina, realizing that support for its position was weak, and not willing to push the fight any further, relented and repealed its Ordinance of Nullification. But then as slap in the face to President Jackson, it nullified the Force Bill, which was of no consequence since the bill had become moot upon South Carolina's repeal of the Ordinance of Nullification.

Larger Meaning of the Nullification Crisis. The nullification controversy is important because of its focus on the issue of states' rights. Most historians believe that behind South Carolina's nullification of the tariff was a deeper concern over the slavery question. The abolitionist movement was gathering steam, and there was fear throughout the South that somehow the federal government might move to abolish slavery. Nullification of the tariff then was seen by some as a test case as to whether or not nullification was viable. President Jackson's reaction and the support from Congress suggested that nullification could not be sustained. Thus the next logical step in opposing federal authority within a state was the act of secession. Indeed, the Ordinance of Nullification had concluded by stating that if force were used against South Carolina, "the people of this state will thenceforth hold themselves absolved from all further obligation to maintain or preserve their political connection with the people of the other states and will forthwith proceed to organize a separate government, and to do all other acts and things which sovereign and independent states may of right do." South Carolina exercised that option almost 30 years later as the first state to secede from the Union following Abraham Lincoln's election in 1860.

It is worth reading South Carolina's Ordinance of Nullification and Andrew Jackson's proclamation to understand the depth of the arguments on both sides. Jackson's argument carried the day, but for many Southerners the issue of states' rights was still an open question.