William Lowndes

Lowndes, William (Feb. 11, 1782 - Oct. 27, 1822), congressman from South Carolina, was the son of Rawlins Lowndes [q.v.], who was prominent in the affairs of the province and state. When something over fifty years old Rawlins Lowndes married, as his third wife, Sarah, the sixteen-year-old daughter of Col. Charles Jones, of Georgia. Their third child was born at the Horseshoe Plantation in the parish of St. Bartholomew, Colleton County, S. C., and was christened William Jones, but he never used in any form his second baptismal name. In his seventh year he was placed in school in England and, while there, contracted an inflammatory rheumatism that weakened his health all through his life. Returning to South Carolina after three years, he studied in private schools, being especially interested in Latin, Greek, and French. He was early marked for his clear, luminous style of writing and speaking. On Sept. 16, 1802, he married Elizabeth, daughter of Thomas Pinckney [q.v.]. He practised law for a few years but soon gave this up for love of his plantation.

He identified himself with the Republican party, though his wife remained a strong Federalist, and, from 1806 to 1810, he served in the General Assembly. He was in close touch with Joseph Alston, Daniel Huger, Langdon Cheves, and John C. Calhoun. The original draft of the act of 1809 to amend the state system of representation in behalf of the upper country is in his handwriting. Strongly opposing the Embargo and Non-Intercourse policy of Jefferson, he was elected to the Twelfth Congress in 1810 along with Cheves and Calhoun, and these, with David R. Williams and others, formed the nucleus of a war party. In this Congress he served on the committee for commerce and manufactures and on that for military affairs and, in the Thirteenth Congress, as chairman of the committee on naval affairs. He had served, in 1807, as captain of a military company and regretted, in later life, that he had not given himself to a military career. He spoke in behalf of every motion to increase the military and naval strength of the country, and his service on the naval committee added to his reputation. In 1815 he was appointed chairman of the committee on ways and means and served for three years. He supported the creation of the second Bank of the United States, and he reported and, along with Calhoun, advocated the tariff of 1816, avowedly for protection. He was offered the position of secretary of war but declined. He was the author of the sinking fund act, under the operation of which the national debt was paid off in fourteen years. He supported Forsythe's bill of 1817 against privateering and in the next year supported the right of the executive to a free hand in investigating affairs in the South American republics. His speech of Jan. 30, 1819, expressing disapprobation of Andrew Jackson's course in the Seminole War is a fair sample of his style (Annals of Congress, 15 Cong., 2 Sess., cols. 912-22). He argued closely, without heat or passion, stated first the position of his opponent so fairly that John Randolph once said, "He has done that once too often; he can never answer that" (Ravenel, post, pp. 239-40), and then won his argument by logical statement. In this year, 1819, as chairman of a special committee on coinage, he submitted a classic report on the relative value of coins of different nations in relation to our own (Annals of Congress, 15 Cong., 2 Sess., cols. 788-96). The summer of 1819 he spent in European travel in a vain attempt to build up his failing health. In the Sixteenth Congress, 1819, he was appointed chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, and in 1820 was the candidate of his party for speaker of the House. The debate on the Missouri question was the last important public work in which he was engaged. He spoke briefly in the beginning, as one of the conference committee, in favor of the compromise under which Missouri was allowed to make her own constitution. When Missouri offered her constitution at the next session, he was chairman of a committee of three to report on its acceptance. This report took the ground that Missouri was already a state, and he supported it by a speech so calm and dispassionate as to win approval from both sections in the midst of a frenzied debate. After this effort, his health compelled him to entrust the handling of the Missouri question to Clay.

In 1822 he was offered the mission to France but was compelled to decline this, as he had previously declined appointments to Turkey and to Russia. In December 1821, he had been nominated by the South Carolina legislature for the presidency. In this connection he made the statement, often quoted since, "The Presidency is not an office to be either solicited or declined" (Ravenel, post, p. 226). On May 8, 1822, he resigned his seat in Congress and again tried the effect of a sea voyage for his health. When six days out from Philadelphia he died and was buried at sea. Of striking height, over six feet six, he was unusually slender and loose-limbed. Grave and dignified in bearing, he won such a position of leadership in the House that Henry Clay in his old age said, "I think the wisest man I ever knew was William Lowndes" (Ravenel, post, p. 239). He considered his part as one of the "War Hawks" in bringing on the "Second War for Independence" his greatest achievement.