Calhounism was the Democratic Party ideology that permanently transformed the understanding of slavery away from a necessary evil en route to its ultimate extinction into a prized institution meant to be protected and spread. Its progenator, John C. Calhoun, was one of the most articualte statesman in American history and remade the Democratic Party into the driving force for white supremacy and slavery and laid the ideological foundation for Jim Crow in the 20th century.