uch, not
six--sufficed to estrange the mind of the President from Calhoun, and
implant within him a passion to promote the interests of Van Buren.
Our readers, we presume, all know how this was brought to pass. It was
simply that Mr. Calhoun would _not_, and Mr. Van Buren _would_ call
upon Mrs. Eaton. All the other influences that were brought to bear
upon the President's singular mind were nothing in comparison with
this. Daniel Webster uttered only the truth when he wrote, at the
time, to his friend Dutton, that the "Aaron's serpent among the
President's desires was a settled purpose of making out the lady, of
whom so much has been said, a person of reputation"; and that this
ridiculous affair would "probably determine who should be the
successor to the present chief magistrate." It had precisely that
effect. We have shown elsewhere the successive manoeuvres by which
this was effected, and how vigorously but unskillfully Calhoun
struggled to avert his fate. We cannot and need not repeat the story;
nor can we go over again the history of the Nullification imbroglio,
which began with the South Carolina Exposition in 1828, and ended very
soon after Calhoun had received a private notification that the
instant news reached Washington of an overt act of treason in South
Carolina, the author and fomenter of that treason would be arrested
and held for trial as a traitor.

One fact alone suffices to prove that, in bringing on the
Nullification troubles, Calhoun's motive was factious. When General
Jackson saw the coming storm, he did two things. First, he prepared to
maintain the authority of the United States by force. Secondly, he
used all his influence with Congress to have the cause of Southern
discontent removed. General Jackson felt that the argument of the
anti-tariff men, in view of the speedy extinction of the national
debt, was unanswerable. He believed it was absurd to go on raising ten
or twelve millions a year more than the government could spend, merely
for the sake of protecting Northern manufactures. Accordingly, a bill
was introduced which aimed to do just what the nullifiers had been
clamoring for, that is, to reduce the revenue to the amount required
by the government. If Mr. Calhoun had supported this measure, he could
have carried it. He gave it no support; but exerted all his influence
in favor of the Clay Compromise, which was expressly intended to save
as much of the protective system as could be saved,