Whatever Calhoun in those days did, was boldly and well done; but his speech of June 24, 1812, against commercial restrictions, was perhaps the boldest and the best of his early efforts. Neither great courage nor much intelligence was needed to support war, from the moment war became a party measure; but an attack on the system of commercial restriction was a blow at Madison, which belittled Jefferson, and threw something like contempt on the Republican party from its beginning twenty years before, down to the actual moment. How gently Calhoun did this, and yet how firmly he laid his hands on the rein that was to guide his party into an opposite path, could be seen in his short speech. “The restrictive system, as a mode of resistance,” he said, “and a means of obtaining a redress of our wrongs, has never been a favorite one with me. I wish not to censure the motives which dictated it, or to attribute weakness to those who first resorted to it for a restoration of our rights.... I object to the restrictive system, and for the following reasons,--because it does not suit the genius of our people, or that of our government, or the geographical character of our country.” With a single gesture, this young statesman of the new school swept away the statesmanship of Jefferson and Madison, and waved aside the strongest convictions of his party; but he did it with such temperate statement, and with so serious a manner, that although he said in effect little less than had been said for years by Federalists and enemies, he seemed rather to lead than to oppose. “We have had a peace like a war: in the name of heaven let us not have the only thing that is worse,--a war like a peace.” That his voice should be at once obeyed was not to be expected; but so many Republican members followed Calhoun, Cheves, and Lowndes, that the Federalists came within three votes of carrying their point; and so equally divided was the House that, June 25, when the Federalists returned to the attack and asked for a committee to report a bill repealing the non-importation, the House divided sixty against sixty, and the Speaker’s vote alone defeated the motion. Greatly to the French minister’s relief the storm passed over; but the heroic decision of Congress not only to punish England, but to punish itself by deprivation of everything English,--not only to fight Napoleon’s battles, but also to fight them under every disadvantage that Napoleon chose to exact,--could not but increase the vehemence of Northern hatred against the war, as it was certain to increase Southern hatred against taxes. Gallatin knew not what to expect. June 26 he wrote to a friend,[178]--