US representative, senator, and orator, born in Salisbury, New Hampshire, USA. He studied at Dartmouth College and taught at schools while studying law. Admitted to the bar in 1805, he gained a local reputation as an orator and came to wider notice as an opponent of the USA undertaking the War of 1812. He was then elected to the US House of Representatives (Federalist, New Hampshire, 181317), where he became a leader in opposing the policies of the Democratic-Republication administration. He then moved to Boston to pursue his law career, including appearances before the US Supreme Court. Elected again to the US House of Representatives, but now from Massachusetts (Federalist, 18237), he was a strong supporter of John Quincy Adams.
Elected to the US Senate (National Republican, 182741), he was a supporter of the National Bank, a protectionist, and a champion of the nascent New England woollen cloth industry, as well as an opponent of the annexation of Texas and the Mexican war. Although opposed to slavery, he was denounced by abolitionists for his support of compromises on sectional issues involving the slavery issue. Devoutly pro-union, he denounced the nullification arguments by states' rights advocates in a famous debate in 1830. As secretary of state (18413) he negotiated treaties settling a border dispute with Canada (WebsterAshburton Treaty, 1842) and establishing relations with Chicago. He was re-elected to the US Senate (Whig, Massachusetts, 184550), where he delivered his famous speech (7 Mar 1850) supporting the Compromise of 1850. This led to his being attacked by the anti-slavery forces, but he left the Senate to serve again as secretary of state (18502). He died in that office, greatly admired for his oratory, integrity, and commitment to preserving the union, but never having obtained the broad support that would have gained him the presidency he coveted.
Daniel Webster|
Daniel Webster in 1849 |
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14th United States Secretary of State 19th United States Secretary of State |
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| In office | |
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March 6, 1841 – May 8, 1843 July 23, 1850 – October 24, 1852 |
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| Preceded by |
John Forsyth John M. Upshur Edward Everett |
| Born |
January 18, 1782 Salisbury, New Hampshire, USA |
| Died |
October 25, 1852 Marshfield, Massachusetts, USA |
| Political party | Democrat, Federalist, National Republican, Whig |
| Spouse |
Grace Fletcher Webster Caroline LeRoy Webster |
| Profession | Politician, Lawyer |
Daniel Webster (January 18, 1782 – October 25, 1852) was a prominent American statesman during the nation's antebellum, or Pre-Civil War, era. Webster first rose to regional prominence through his defense of New England shipping interests. His hightening nationalistic views and the his fabulous articulation of them led Webster to become one of the most well-renouned speakers and influential Whig leaders of the Second Party System.
As an attorney he served as legal counsel in several cases that established important constitutional precedents that bolstered the authority of the Federal government. As Secretary of State, Webster negotiated the Webster-Ashburton Treaty that established the definitive Eastern border between the United States and Canada. Primarily recognized for his Senate tenure, Webster was a key figure in the institution's "Golden Age". So well known was his skill as a Senator throughout this period that Webster became a third of what was and still is known today as the "Great Triumvirate", along with his colleagues Henry Clay and John C.
Like Henry Clay, his desire to see the Union preserved and conflict averted led him to search out compromises designed to stave off the sectionalism that threatened war between the North and South. Though Webster made three bids he never achieved the Presidency, his final attempt failing in part because of his compromises. Like his attempts at gaining the White House, Webster's efforts at steering the nation away from civil war toward a definite peace would ultimately prove futile. Despite this, Webster came to be esteemed for his attempts, being officially named by the Senate in 1957 as one of its five most outstanding members.
Early life
Daniel Webster was born January 18, 1782 to Ebenezer and Abigail Webster (née Eastman) in Salisbury, New Hampshire.
Though uneducated, Ebenezer Webster was made a judge on the local court in 1791, a position which carried a salary of four hundred dollars; the Elder Webster resolved to use this money to educate young Daniel. After attending local schools for most of his life, Daniel Webster was subsequently enrolled at the Phillips Exeter Academy at age 14. Kennedy, Webster could "think out a speech, sentence by sentence, correct the sentences in his mind without the use of a pencil, and then deliver it exactly as he thought it out." Webster soon became known throughout Hanover as an orator and in 1800 Webster was invited to give an oration at their Independence Day celebration. Dartmouth graduated Webster as a member of Phi Beta Kappa in 1801.
Rise to prominence
After graduation, Webster was apprenticed to the lawyer Thomas W. Webster was forced to resign and become a schoolmaster (as young men often did then, when public education consisted largely of subsidies to local schoolmasters), when his older brother's own quest for education put a financial strain on the family that consequently required Webster's support. When his brother's education could no longer be sustained, Webster returned to his apprenticeship. Webster left New Hampshire and got employment in Boston under the prominent attorney Christopher Gore in 1804.
In 1805 Webster was accepted into the bar and returned to New Hampshire to set up a practice in Boscawen, in part to be near his ailing father. During this time, Webster took a more active interest in politics. Raised by an ardently Federalist father and taught by a predominantly Federalist leaning faculty at Dartmouth, Webster, like many New Englanders, supported Federalism.
After his father's death in 1806, Webster handed over his practice to his older brother Ezekiel, who had by this time finished his schooling and been admitted to the bar. Webster then moved to the larger town of Portsmouth in 1807, and opened a practice there. As New England was heavily reliant upon commerce with the two nations, the region vehemently opposed Jefferson's attempt at "peaceable coercion," including Webster, who wrote an anonymous pamphlet attacking it. That same year, Daniel Webster gave an address to the Washington Benevolent Society, an oration that proved critical to his career. The speech decried the war and the violation of New England's shipping rights that preceded it, but it also strongly denounced the extremism of those more radical among the unhappy New Englanders who were beginning to call for the region's secession from the Union.
The Washington oration was widely circulated and read throughout New Hampshire, and it led to Webster's 1812 selection to the Rockingham Convention, an assembly that sought to formally declare the state's grievances with President Madison and the federal government.
Webster's efforts on behalf of New England Federalism, shipping interests, and war opposition resulted in his election to the House of Representatives in 1812, where he served two terms ending March 1817.
This opposition was in accordance with a number of his professed beliefs (and the majority of his constituents') including free trade, that the tariff's "great object was to raise revenue, not to foster manufacture," and that it was against "the true spirit of the Constitution" to give "excessive bounties or encouragements to one [industry] over another."
After his second term, Webster did not seek a third, choosing his law practice instead.
Notable Supreme Court cases
Webster had been highly regarded in New Hampshire since his days in Boscawen, and had been respected throughout the House during his service there.
In 1816, Webster was retained by the Federalist trustees of his alma mater, Dartmouth College, to represent them in their case against the newly elected New Hampshire Republican state legislature.
Webster argued Dartmouth College v. The Marshall court, continuing with its history of limiting states rights and reaffirming the supremacy of the Constitutional protection of contract, ruled in favor of Webster and Dartmouth 3–1.
Other notable appearances by Webster before the Supreme Court include his representation of James McCulloch in McCulloch v. Webster's handling of these cases made him one of the era's foremost constitutional lawyers, as well as one of the most highly paid.
Return to politics
Daniel Webster's growing prominence as a constitutional lawyer led to his election as a delegate to the 1820 Massachusetts Constitutional Convention. Joseph Story (also a delegate at the convention) wrote to Jeremiah Mason following the convention saying "Our friend Webster has gained a noble reputation. Webster also spoke at Plymouth commemorating the landing of the Pilgrims in 1620;
In his second term, Webster found himself a leader of the fragmented House Federalists who had split following the failure of the secessionist minded 1814 Hartford Convention that he avoided. Speaker Henry Clay made Webster chairman of the Judicary Committee in an attempt to win his and the Federalists' support.
While a Representative, Webster continued accepting speaking engagements in New England, most notably his oration on the fiftieth anniversary of Bunker Hill (1825) and his eulogy on Adams and Jefferson (1826). With the support of a coalition of both Federalists and Republicans, Webster's record in the House and his celebrity as an orator led to his June 1827 election to the Senate from Massachusetts.
Senate
When Webster returned to the Senate from his wife's funeral, in March 1828, he found the body considering a new tariff bill, that sought to increase the duties on foreign manufactured goods on top of the increases of 1824 and 1816, both of which Webster had opposed. Now however, Webster changed his position to support a protective tariff. Explaining the change, Webster stated that after the failure of the rest of the nation to heed New England's objections in 1816 and 1824, "nothing was left to New England but to conform herself to the will of others," and now consequently being heavily invested in manufacturing, he would not now do them injury. Doenecke that Webster's support of the 1828 tariff was a result of "his new closeness to the rising mill-owning families of the region, the Lawrences and the Lowells." Webster also gave greater approval to Clay's American System, a change that along with his modified view of the tariff brought him closer to Henry Clay.
The passage of the tariff brought increased sectional tensions to the U.S., tensions that were agitated by then Vice President John C.
By 1830, Federal land policy had long been an issue.
The next day, Webster, feeling compelled to respond on New England's behalf, gave his first rebuttal to Hayne, highlighting what he saw as the virtues of the North's policies toward the west and claiming that restrictions on western expansion and growth were primarily the responsibility of southerners. Hayne in turn responded the following day, denouncing Webster's inconsistencies with regards to the American system and personally attacking Webster for his role in the so called "corrupt bargain" of 1824.
On January 26, Webster gave his Second Reply to Hayne, in which Webster openly attacked Nullification, negatively contrasted South Carolina's response to the tariff with that of his native New England's response to the Embargo of 1807, rebutted Hayne's personal attacks against him, and famously concluded in defiance of nullification (which was later embodied in John C. second to our liberty most dear!"), "Liberty and Union, now and for ever, one and inseparable!"
While the debate's philosophical presentation of nullification and Webster's abstract fears of rebellion would be brought into reality in 1832 when Calhoun's native South Carolina passed its Ordinance of Nullification, Webster supported Andrew Jackson's sending of U.S. troops to the borders of South Carolina and the Force Bill, not Henry Clay's 1833 compromise that would eventually defuse the crisis. Webster thought Clay's concessions to be dangerous and would only further embolden the south and legitimize its tactics.
At the same time however, Webster, like Clay, opposed the economic policies of Andrew Jackson, the most famous of those being Jackson's campaign against the Second Bank of the United States in 1832, an institution that held Webster on retainer as legal counsel and whose Boston Branch he was the director of. Clay, Webster, and a number of other former Federalists and National Republicans united as the Whig Party, in defense of the Bank against Jackson's intention to replace it. There was an economic panic in 1837, which converted Webster's heavy speculation in mid-western property into a personal debt from which Webster would never recover.
In 1836, Webster was one of three Whig party candidates to run for the office of President, but he only managed to gain the support of Massachusetts. Webster was offered the vice presidency, but he declined.
As Secretary of State
Following his victory in 1840, President William Henry Harrison appointed Webster to the post of Secretary of State in 1841, a post he retained under President John Tyler after the death of Harrison a month after his inauguration. In September 1841, an internal division amongst the Whigs over the question of the National Bank caused all the Whigs (except Webster who was in Europe at the time) to resign from Tyler's cabinet. Webster succumbed to Whig pressure in May 1842 and finally left the cabinet. Webster was once again offered the vice presidency, but he declined saying, "I do not propose to be buried until I am dead."
The Compromise of 1850 was the Congressional effort led by Clay and Stephen Douglas to compromise the sectional disputes that seemed to be headed toward civil war. On March 7, 1850, Webster gave one of his most famous speeches, characterizing himself "not as a Massachusetts man, nor as a Northern man but as an American...."
Webster was bitterly attacked by abolitionists in New England who felt betrayed by his compromises. James Russell Lowell called Webster "the most meanly and foolishly treacherous man I ever heard of." Webster never recovered the popularity he lost in the aftermath of the Seventh of March speech.
Resigning the Senate under a cloud in 1850, he resumed his former position as Secretary of State in the cabinet of Whig President Millard Fillmore. As chief American diplomat, Webster authored the Hülsemann Letter, in which he defended what he believed to be America's right to take an active interest in the internal politics of Hungary, while still maintaining its neutrality. Though the Seventh of March speech was indeed warmly received throughout the south, the speech made him too polarizing a figure to receive the nomination and Webster was again defeated by a military hero, this time General Winfield Scott.
Historical evaluations and legacy
Ralph Waldo Emerson, who had criticized Webster following the Seventh of March address, remarked in the immediate aftermath of his death that Webster was "the completest man", and that "nature had not in our days or not since Napoleon, cut out such a masterpiece." Kennedy noted Webster's vices, especially the perpetual debt against which he, as Lodge reports, employed "checks or notes for several thousand dollars in token of admiration" from his friends. "This was, of course, utterly wrong and demoralizing, but Mr. Webster came, after a time, to look upon such transactions as natural and proper.
Several historians suggest Webster failed to exercise leadership for any political issue or vision. Lodge describes (with the Rockingham Convention in mind) Webster's "susceptibility to outside influences which formed such an odd trait in the character of a man so imperious by nature. Similarly, Schlesinger cites Webster's letter requesting retainers for fighting for the Bank, one of his most inveterate causes;
He served the interest of the wealthy Boston merchants who elected and supported him, first for free trade, and later, when they had started manufacturing, for protection; Schlesinger remarks that the real miracle of The Devil and Daniel Webster is not a soul sold to the devil, or the jury of ghostly traitors, but Webster speaking against the sanctity of contract.
Webster has garnered respect and admiration for his Seventh of March speech in defense of the 1850 compromise measures that helped to delay the Civil War. In Profiles in Courage, Kennedy called Webster's defense of the compromise, despite the risk to his presidential ambitions and the denuciations he faced from the north, one of the "greatest acts of courageous principle" in the history of the Senate.
More widely agreed upon, notably by both Senator Lodge and President Kennedy, is Webster's skill as an orator with Kennedy praising Webster's "ability to make alive and supreme the latent sense of oneness, of union, that all Americans felt but few could express." Schlesinger however notes that he is also an example of the limitations of formal oratory: Congress heard Webster or Clay with admiration, but they rarely prevailed at the vote. and Webster never approached Jackson's popular appeal.
Webster has been commemorated in numerous forms: the popular short story, play (and movie) The Devil and Daniel Webster by Stephen Vincent Benét; and a college, Daniel Webster College, located in Nashua, New Hampshire. A reference to Webster is also made in the 1939 film Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, when James Stewart's character is amazed to find out that he will be sitting in the same seat that Webster once occupied. In 1957 a senatorial committee chaired by then-Senator Kennedy named Webster as one of their five greatest predecessors, selecting Webster's oval portrait (seen in the infobox above) to adorn the Senate Reception Room off the Senate floor. Daniel Webster and the Supreme Court (1966) Brown, Thomas (1985). Daniel Webster and the Rise of National Conservatism (1955), short biography Curtis, George Ticknor. "Daniel Webster's Epideictic Speaking: A Study in Emerging Whig Virtues" online
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