THOMAS JEFFERSON AND THE ROOTS OF SOUTHERN SECESSION

by:Bennett Moss

(published in the Summer '03 Ramparts)
The author of the Declaration of Independence was passionately committed to the preservation of the American Union, but several of his actions and pronouncements helped create the climate that led to the secession of the southern states following Lincoln’s election in 1860.
Jefferson served as Secretary of State in President Washington’s first administration. The dominant member of the cabinet was Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton who, with Washington’s support, structured the new nation with a highly centralized, powerful federal government. This was completely contrary to Jefferson’s concept of a more decentralized government. After Washington’s second term, John Adams succeeded to the presidency. He too was a Federalist who continued to support Hamilton’s approach. Moreover, Adams appointed John Marshall as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. For 35 years, Marshall’s court ruled in case after case that the state courts were inferior to the nation’s Supreme Court.
Jefferson made no secret of his hostility to both Hamilton and Marshall. From the very beginning of Adams’ presidency, Jefferson worked to build a constituency for his “Republican” philosophy. He described that philosophy in a letter written just three months before the election of 1800:
“Our country is too large to have all its affairs directed by a single government. Public servants at such a distance, and from under the eye of their constituents, must from the circumstance of distance, be unable to administer and overlook all the details necessary for the good government of the citizens; and the same circumstance, by rendering detection impossible to their constituents, will invite the public agents to corruption, plunder and waste...
“The true theory of our constitution is surely the wisest and best, that the states are independent as to everything within themselves, and united as to everything respecting foreign nations. Let the general government be reduced to foreign concerns only, and let our affairs be disentangled from those of all other nations, except as to commerce, which the merchants will manage the better the more they are left free to manage for themselves, and our general government may be reduced to a very simple organization, and a very unexpensive one - a few plain duties to be performed by a few servants ...”
During the Adams presidency, Congress had passed two acts, the “Alien” and “Sedition” acts, which proved so unpopular that they probably were responsible for Adams’ failure in his bid for reelection. A few states felt that the two acts were in violation of the Constitution. In 1799, Jefferson anonymously provided to the state of Kentucky, through his friend John Breckinridge, language which that state adopted for a resolution declaring that the federal government must not be the sole determiner of what is or is not constitutional. The resolution includes these words:
“...the several states who formed (the Constitution), being sovereign and independent, have the unquestionable right to judge of (an) infraction; and that a nullification by those sovereignties, of all unauthorized acts done under color of that instrument, is the rightful remedy”.
The Kentucky Resolution of 1799, using Jefferson’s wording, asserts that each state is “sovereign and independent”, and has the right to declare a federal law to be unconstitutional, and therefore null and void within that sovereign state. The Kentucky resolution was instigated because of the despised Alien and Sedition Acts, and although that state asserted its right to nullify those acts, it chose not to exercise the right, but merely to register its solemn protest.
State Sovereignty, or “State’s Rights” became the battle cry of the southern states for the next 65 years. In 1830, South Carolina again raised the issue of “nullification.” It became the occasion for the famous Webster - Hayne debates in the U.S. Senate.
Many of the economic and political differences between the original northern and southern states of the Union were products of geographic differences. There were many fine coastal harbors in the north, but only Charleston, in South Carolina, possessed an important seaport. During prehistoric ice ages, glaciers scoured the surface of what became New England, leaving a land that was generally unsuitable for large scale farming. However, the same glaciers did carve out large river valleys where water power would much later be available to drive large industrial mills.
These geographic differences produced an economy in the north which was driven by shipping, trade, industry, business, and small farms. South of the Mason and Dixon line, on the other hand, large expanses of fertile land, and long hot summers lent themselves to the development of sizable plantations requiring large quantities of low cost labor. In the early years of the Union, the principal source of revenue with which to operate the government came from import duties, or tariffs. These tariffs were designed to protect the newly established industries of the North from competition from low cost imported manufactures. These tariffs were a continuing irritant to southern planters because they raised the cost of many of the goods which they needed to buy, but were not produced in the South.
Four of the first five presidents of the Union were slave owning Virginia planters. Of these four, Jefferson was the founder of the Republican party opposed to a strong central government. Madison and Monroe were his disciples and neighbors. In his writings, Jefferson often projected himself as a believer in grass roots democracy. But when pressed for specifics, it became evident that he believed that to qualify as voters, and especially as office holders, one needed to be free, white, male, educated, and a land owner. Jefferson had long believed in the rule of property owners and had scorned urban masses as “mobs of the great cities.” Jefferson’s feelings on suffrage were generally shared throughout the southern states. Even though most of the soldiers who later fought for the Confederacy were not slave owners, most southern legislatures were dominated by the largest property owners who, of course, were also major slave owners.
The tenth amendment to the Constitution specifies that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution ...are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Jefferson and his “strict construction” supporters, relying on this language, maintained that Congress had power to do such things as the Constitution specifically authorized it to do, and no other. On the other hand, the Federalists led by Hamilton and Marshall relied on the clause in the Constitution which states that “The Congress shall have the power to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution... all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States...” as authority for a wide ranging set of acts further strengthening the role of the central government. In spite of his strong convictions on this issue, President Jefferson violated his own principles when, in 1803, he asked Congress to approve the purchase of the Louisiana territory from France for fifteen million dollars.
From the time of the debate over the wording of the Declaration of Independence, the subject of slavery had been a divisive issue between the North and the South. As years passed, slavery was outlawed in most of the northern states, and an abolitionist movement formed. Most southern leaders truly believed that their agrarian economy could not survive without slave labor. Fortunately for the South, there was usually a large enough number of senators from the slave states to forestall any congressional move to ban slavery. Thus the slavery issue did not seem to pose any threat to the continued existence of the Union in the early years of the nineteenth century.
But all of this changed with Jefferson’s acquisition of the Louisiana Territory. Within twenty years of the purchase, the lure of cheap land brought so many settlers to the new lands that new territories were formed that began to clamor for statehood and admission to the Union. This would not appear to affect the status quo as long as at least half of these new states were admitted to the Union as slave states. This all came to a head in 1820 with the application for statehood of the Missouri territory. The House of Representatives, which was controlled by the more populous northern states, wanted Missouri admitted only as a free state. The debate in Congress became rancorous, and passions were aroused throughout the entire nation.
Thomas Jefferson, who was now in his 77th year, was badly shaken by these events. For the first time he sensed that his beloved Union was in danger of collapse. In a letter to Congressman Holmes, Jefferson wrote that the Missouri question “like a fire bell in the night had awakened him from repose and filled him with terror.” To resolve the dispute, Congress finally adopted the Missouri Compromise whereby Missouri would be admitted as a slave state while Maine was admitted as a free state. But Jefferson recognized that “this is a reprieve only, not a final sentence.”
The final sentence was handed down in 1860 when the candidate of the new Republican party won the presidential election. The platform of this party emphatically stated that no more new territories would be admitted to the Union as slave states. Thus, it would be only a matter of time before Congress would be dominated by the free states and be able to finally abolish slavery throughout the United States. Upon learning of the election results, seven of the southern states immediately seceded from the Union. They were soon joined by four more of the slave states.
Thomas Jefferson would have turned over in his grave if he thought that he had in any way contributed to the dissolution of the Union. But he was the original proponent of State Sovereignty and the right of nullification. These theories created a climate of mistrust and hostility between the southern states and the federal government. He was also responsible for the Louisiana Purchase. Would disunion have occurred without these acts? Who can say? But you can rest easy TJ, your Union is now back together and stronger than ever.

The author of this article, Bennett Moss, is the editor of the Fort Macon Ramparts.