02319cam a2200337 i 4500 482553519 TxAuBib 20210308120000.0 210210s2021||||||||||||||||||||||||eng|u oc2021000659 9780465096442 HRD 35.00 0465096441 HRD 35.00 TxAuBib rda Elder, Robert, 1981- Calhoun [BOOK] : American heretic / Robert Elder. First edition. New York : Basic Books, 2021. xiv, 640 pages ; 25 cm. txt rdacontent n rdamedia nc rdacarrier Includes bibliographical references and index. John C. Calhoun is among the most notorious and enigmatic figures in American political history. First elected to Congress in 1810, Calhoun went on to serve as secretary of war and vice president. But he is perhaps most known for arguing in favor of slavery as a "positive good" and for his famous doctrine of "state interposition," which laid the groundwork for the South to secede from the Union—and arguably set the nation on course for civil war. Calhoun has catapulted back into the public eye in recent years, as some observers connected the strain of radical politics he developed to the tactics and extremism of the modern Far Right, and as protests over racial injustice have focused on his legacy. In this revelatory biographical study, historian Robert Elder shows that Calhoun is even more broadly significant than these events suggest, and that his story is crucial for understanding the political climate in which we find ourselves today. By excising Calhoun from the mainstream of American history, he argues, we have been left with a distorted understanding of our past and no way to explain our present. Provided by publisher. 20210308. Calhoun, John C John Caldwell 1782-1850. Legislators United States Biography. Vice-Presidents United States Biography. United States Politics and government 1815-1861. South Carolina Politics and government 1775-1865. Biographies.