Could John C. Calhoun have ever assumed the presidency and if so what would his terms/terms in office look like?
President John C. Calhoun?
- Thread starter KarachiEagle
- Start date
I'm nowhere near as well read on American political history as others here, but I think it would be nearly impossible for him to be elected to the office. Calhoun was far too tied to the South and Southern interests to run in the North. Had Jackson died in the 1827 attempt on his life, Calhoun would have assumed the presidency, and that's about the only way I could realistically see him become president.
Could Calhoun have become president? Sure. All it takes is John Quincy Adams drowning:
"All the fighting and back-stabbing caused JQA to suffer insomnia and indigestion and to lose weight. To relieve the pressure he took daily four-mile walks, swam in the Potomac River—in a fitting metaphor for his presidency, he once almost drowned in the currents—and began gardening, occasionally greeting callers at the White House in dirt-covered clothes.." https://books.google.com/books?id=hikn4BGc2nUC&pg=PA55
"Every day he made room for diary-writing and exercise; during his presidential term this included swimming naked in the Potomac at dawn. (He almost drowned there on June 13, 1825, in a rowboat that suddenly filled with water; the president didn't have time to take off his clothes, which weighed him down.)" https://books.google.com/books?id=jewRDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA245
"All the fighting and back-stabbing caused JQA to suffer insomnia and indigestion and to lose weight. To relieve the pressure he took daily four-mile walks, swam in the Potomac River—in a fitting metaphor for his presidency, he once almost drowned in the currents—and began gardening, occasionally greeting callers at the White House in dirt-covered clothes.." https://books.google.com/books?id=hikn4BGc2nUC&pg=PA55
"Every day he made room for diary-writing and exercise; during his presidential term this included swimming naked in the Potomac at dawn. (He almost drowned there on June 13, 1825, in a rowboat that suddenly filled with water; the president didn't have time to take off his clothes, which weighed him down.)" https://books.google.com/books?id=jewRDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA245
FillyofDelphi
Banned
Andrew Jackson can not be taken down by any mortal force known to man. He'd beat the germs to death with hickory cane
He wasn't even killed by natural causes. He just decided he'd done enough by that point.
Nothing says he can't pick one up. Hopefully the more embarrassing, the better
Anyway, Calhoun actually started his career with a much less sectional bent than that which would come to define him later in life. I've always believed that, once he realized he couldn't win a national race for president, he doubled down on his Southern base of support.
A Calhoun who believes that he has a very real shot at beconing President is going to be one who doesn't go down the road to staunch pro-Southern radicalism.
Skallagrim
Banned
Calhoun actually started as a convinced nationalist. A genuine neo-Hamiltonian, who supported a lot of things he'd later oppose. But his transition was real, and not some cynical ploy. He really came to reverse his views, and it's not because he couldn't win. In fact, if he hadn't changed his views (only moderated them a bit), he'd have stood a better chance at winning a national election! He was an extremist who became disillusioned and radically swung to the other extreme. You see this on occasion. A famous example is Patrick Henry, who did the exact reverse: started as a leading anti-federalist, and became a staunch federalist/nationalist later in life.
Anyway, as I said: if Calhoun had just moderated his orginal views a bit, he'd have stood a real chance. Popular in the North because he supported policies they liked, popular in the South because he was still 'their man', and a defender of slavery. Eminently electable because his defence of slavery gets the Southern elites on board while his support of neo-Hamiltonian policies gets the Northern elites on board. The South, for all its bluster about states' rights, will turn a blind eye to Calhoun's blatent centralism and economic protectionism so long as he is firm on maintaining and even boltering slavery. The North, in turn, will turn a blind eye to that, because they get their way when it comes to basically everything else.
Fortunately (in my opinion), this scenario is extremely unlikely because Calhoun was such a "innate extremist". The kind of man he was can flip from one extreme to the opposite extreme, but cannot easily settle on any middle ground. He wasn't that kind of guy, and that was why he wasn't ever likely to be president. No matter which extreme he embraced, it would always alienate too many people for him to really be a viable candidate.
Or Ben Butler, who famously went from Breckenridge Democrat to Radical Republican.
However, might his accession to the Presidency have affected the *timing* of this change? Might he have stayed as he was long enough to have a chance against Jackson in 1828?
Why not just have 1824-1825 play out so that Adams, Jackson and Clay can't reach an agreement. Therefore Calhoun gets inaugurated because he was chosen/elected Vice President, and ascends to the Presidency.
I mean if this happens 1828 would actually make 1824-1825 look small in comparison given that Jackson, Adams and Clay would all want to have another go especially depending on how Calhoun does as President in those four years...
I mean if this happens 1828 would actually make 1824-1825 look small in comparison given that Jackson, Adams and Clay would all want to have another go especially depending on how Calhoun does as President in those four years...
Or Joe Chamberlain: Radical Liberal to Radical Unionist in just a couple of years.
Andrew Jackson and Teddy Roosevelt, the two men death had to take sleeping and that even butterflies can't kill
Has anyone heard about John Calhoun contacting and colluding with people in Britain and France against the United States? I heard that, but I haven't been able to confirm it.