Calhoun

Calhoun, John Caldwell, statesman, was born in 1782 in Abbeville co., S. Carolina. After graduating at Yale College in 1804, he studied law and began to practise in 1807 in his own neighbourhood. Succeeding in his profession, he embarked upon politics, serving in the State Legislature during the period 1808-10, and entering Congress in 1811. He was Secretary for War in Monroe's cabinet 1817-25, Vice-President of the Republic 1825-31, senator in 1831 and 1845-60, and Secretary of State 1844-45. In 1828 he had been a candidate for the Presidency, and in 1831 had issued his Doctrine of State Rights, in which he maintained that the constitution was merely a treaty, and that any state had a right to withdraw from its conditions. He believed in slavery, regarding it as an institution that conferred blessings on all concerned with it. His chief work is a Treatise on the Nature of Government. He died in 1850 at Washington.