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The Monroe Doctrine was meant to dissuade the Spanish from attempting to recapture any of their former colonies in South America. It stated: "The American continents are henceforth not to be considered the subjects for future colonization by any European powers." |
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1833 Nullification of SC Tariff
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The tariff crisis continued to simmer. The South which was largely agriculatural and imported most of its goods and thus opposed the tariff, the northern states which were quickly industriailizing supported the tariff.
The South led by Calhoun believed that the staes had the right to nullify laws that they did not accept. Thus South Carolina announced that it was nullify the tariff.
President Jackson responded forcefully. He orderd General Scott to insure that Federal Forts in North Carolina were fully fortified, he ordered federal revenue cutters to Carolina coast to enforce the tarrif,and federal warships to Charleston harbor. He wrote to Joel Poinsett in South Carolina:
No state or states has a right to secede.. nullification therefoure means insurrection and war. I will meet it at the threshold and have the leaders arrested and arraigned for treason.. In forty days I can have with the limits of So. Carolina fifty-thousand mena, and in forty day more another fifty thousand.
At the same time that Jackson was talking tough he recommended a further reduction of the tariff.
Jackson issued a statement on December 9th stating:
The Constitution forms a Government, not a league.. To say that any state may at pleasure secede from the the Union is to say that United States is not a Nation."
Jackson made his possision clear- when asked if he would compromise he stated: I will make no compromise with traitors. I will have no negotiations. I will execute the laws."
He later stated: If one drop of blood be shed in defiance of the laws of the United States, I will hang the first man of them I can get my hands on to the first tree I can find.
Finally a compromise was reached, the tariff would be reduced over a period of ten years. As part of the compromise the opponets of the tariff were forced to vote for the new tariffs. This ended the crisis over the tariff, but it took the Civil war to end the cotroversy over the rights of seccession.
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