Tariff Wars and the Politics of Jacksonian America by William K. Bolt

Abstract

Reviewed by: Tariff Wars and the Politics of Jacksonian Americaby William K. Bolt Jane Flaherty Tariff Wars and the Politics of Jacksonian America. By William K. Bolt. New Perspectives on Jacksonian History. (Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 2017. Pp. [xviii], 301. Paper, $34.95, ISBN 978-0-8265-2137-8; cloth, $69.95, ISBN 978-0-8265-2136-1.) In Tariff Wars and the Politics of Jacksonian America, William K. Bolt reviews tariff policy debates from the War of 1812 to the Civil War. "The tariff did not cause the Civil War. It did, however, bring countless Americans into the political process," Bolt theorizes (p. 208). As tariffs were the primary source of revenue for the antebellum federal government, tariff legislation remained a fixture in national discourse. Bolt suggests that these tariff debates helped "spread democracy" through public engagement (p. 4). Although Bolt provides an instructive survey of the political maneuvering that led to the passage or failure of the different proposals, a more appropriate title for the book would replace Jacksonian Americawith Antebellum America. The political economy of Jacksonian democracy, defined as "an aversion to moneyed aristocracy, exclusive privileges, . . . and a predilection for the common man," is not as developed in this book as one would expect or has been accomplished elsewhere (William S. Belko, "'A Tax on the Many, to Enrich a Few': Jacksonian Democracy vs. the Protective Tariff," Journal of the History of Economic Thought, 37 [June 2015], p. 278). Bolt concentrates more on the legislators who crafted the bills, rather than the meaning and impact of protection versus free trade within the Jacksonian construct. What benefit did American farmers or laborers have from higher tariffs or free trade? And how [End Page 981]did they participate in these debates? These questions are not explored as fully as the title suggests. Instead, the reader finds a very thorough and readable examination of tariff policy development. In chapter 1 Bolt relates the beginning of protectionist sentiment through passage of the tariff of 1816. John C. Calhoun's role in its passage becomes a point of contrast to his later vitriol against protective tariffs. Bolt describes in chapter 2 how tariff debates "became interwoven with the peculiar institution" through the Missouri Compromise tensions (p. 24). Chapters 3–8 focus on the evolution of the tariffs of 1824 and 1828; the latter, without doubt, was the most contentious of the era. As industrial growth in the North, cotton interests in the South, and agriculture in the West advanced in economic strength, the representatives of each group vied to shape the direction of tariff legislation. Bolt shows the political maneuvering between Andrew Jackson's embrace of a "judicious tariff" and Henry Clay's articulation of the "American System" (pp. 50, 44). Bolt's chapter 6 on the Harrisburg Convention ends with Calhoun "formulating the doctrine of . . . nullification as a means to defeat the protective system" (p. 75). The doctrine was later articulated in Calhoun's South Carolina Exposition, "the final act in Calhoun's transition from nationalism to sectionalism" (p. 97). Chapters 9–13 map the course through the Nullification Crisis to the "Compromise tariff" of 1833. As Bolt summarizes, "Seemingly, every city, town, village, hollow, and hamlet held some form of a meeting" regarding the 1832 tariff (p. 117). Economic distress of the late 1830s led to the embrace of the so-called Whig Tariff of 1842. But as the economy rebounded, the call to lower rates grew, leading to the 1846 free-trade tariff advocated by Secretary of the Treasury Robert J. Walker, which Bolt describes as "a crowning victory" for James K. Polk's administration (p. 184). The demise of the Whigs and rise of the Republicans, with a cursory review of the Morrill tariff, conclude the book. Bolt explains the Republican rationale of higher duties supporting labor as part of the effort to contrast slavery and free labor. This book will enlighten those interested in understanding the politics that forged antebellum tariff legislation. Those looking for an analysis of Jacksonian democracy in action may come away disappointed. Jane Flaherty Texas A&M University Copyright © 2018 The Southern Historical Association