Passed Vice Presidents - # 7 – John C. Calhoun

Grave of John C. Calhoun (9 March 2014)

Served under John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson

4 March 1825 – 28 December 1832

Preceded by # 6 – Daniel Tompkins

Succeeded by # 8 – Martin Van Buren

Born – 18 March 1782

Died – 31 March 1850 (age 68)

Buried – St. Phillip’s Church, Charleston, SC

Date Visited – 9 March 2014

I was not hunting vice presidents’ graves in 2014. We did this delightful three-day escape to historic and beautiful Charleston. By early March, one can appreciate some southern exposure. And Charleston has done such a good job of preserving its colonial quarters. I like to say Charleston is much like New Orleans...only cleaner.

I wasn’t chasing Chief Justices either but this town played a significant role in this country’s early history and Chief # 2 is here along with signers of the Constitution and Declaration of Independence. Then there’s John C. Calhoun...maybe the most consequential vice president who did not become president.

St. Philip’s Church Dominates the Charleston Skyline (11 March 2014)

Founded in 1680, St. Philip’s Episcopal Church, is the nation’s oldest congregation south of Virginia. The current building was constructed in the 1830’s and the steeple was completed in 1850. In its graveyard, one can also find Edward Rutledge, who signed the Declaration of Independence, and Charles Pinkney, a signer of the Constitution.

St. Philip’s Church Graveyard (9 March 2014)

Senator Calhoun from (“Too-small-to-be-a-country-and-too-big-to-be-an-insane-asylum”) South Carolina is one of only two vice presidents who resigned from that position. We contemporaries remember the other as Spiro T. (“You-can-keep-the-envelopes-coming-to-D.C.”) Agnew.

After a few terms in the House of Representatives, Calhoun served as James Monroe’s Secretary of War before becoming John Quincy Adams’ vice president. When Adams was defeated by Andrew Jackson, Calhoun became the second and last vice president to serve under two presidents. George Clinton (# 4) was the other.

Grave of John C. Calhoun, Charleston, SC (9 March 2014)

J.C. took his ‘state’s rights’ zealotry to new levels when he promoted his ‘nullification’ position, which essentially states that a state can ignore (‘nullify’) any federal law or requirement if it believes it to be unconstitutional. Because he could do more to further his causes away from that useless VP position – or - maybe because he was afraid ‘Old Hickory’ would shoot his ass, Calhoun, in 1832, became the first vice president to resign from office. Except for a very brief stint as John Tyler’s Secretary of State, Calhoun raised hell as Senator, leading the charge to preserve and expand slavery and obstruct any initiative that hindered a state from doing all it damn well pleased. He argued that enslaving the Black race was a positive attribute of a healthy democracy because Whites were superior and had a duty to care for their inferiors.

John C. Calhoun photographed by Mathew Brady

in 1849, shortly before his death

OLD SOURPUSS – I checked out Google Images of Calhoun. Not a one has him expressing anything more pleasant than solemnity. I know early photographic portraits were always serious because it’s easier to hold a serious expression for the many seconds it took to make the picture. But some of his portraits are almost scary.

One should note that Calhoun spent most of his public life as a nationalist. He strongly supported the War of 1812. But he was not a unionist like Jackson. Since he died eleven years before his state was the first to leave the union and start the Civil War, I wonder how he would have felt about his sectionalist divisiveness and its consequences. It is said, in the year he died, he predicted the nation would explode within three presidential terms or twelve years. The man knew what was coming.