446
south, before the senate of the United States, in the year 1833: “The constitution is a compact to which the states were parties in their sovereign capacity; now, whenever a contract is entered into by parties which acknowledge no tribunal above their authority to decide in the last resort, each of them has a right to judge for itself in relation to the nature, extent, and obligations of the instrument.” It is evident that a similar doctrine destroys the very basis of the federal constitution, and brings back all the evils of the old confederation, from which the Americans were supposed to have had a safe deliverance.
When South Carolina perceived that Congress turned a deaf ear to its remonstrances, it threatened to apply the doctrine of nullification to the federal tariff bill. Congress persisted in its former system; and at length the storm broke out. In the course of 1832 the citizens of South Carolina[1] named a national convention, to consult upon the extraordinary measures which they were called upon to take; and on the 24th November of the same year, this convention promulgated a law, under the form of a decree, which annulled the federal law of the tariff, forbade the levy of the imposts which that law commands, and refused to recognise the appeal which might be made to the federal courts of law.[2] This decree was only to be put into execution in the ensuing month of February, and it was intimated, that if Congress modified the tariff before that period. South Carolina might be induced to proceed no farther with her menaces; and a vague desire was afterward ex-
- ↑ That is to say, the majority of the people; for the opposite party, called the Union party, always formed a very strong and active minority. Carolina may contain about 47,000 electors; 30,000 were in favour of nullification, and 17,000 opposed to it.
- ↑
This decree was preceded by a report of the committee by which it was framed,
containing the explanation of the motives and object of the law. The following
pa
rssage occurs in it, p. 34: “When the rights reserved by the constitution to the different states are deliberately violated, it is the duty and the right of those states to interfere, in order to check the progress of the evil, to resist usurpation, and to maintain, within their respective limits, those powers and privileges which belong to them as independent sovereign states. If they were destitute of this right, they would not be sovereign. South Carolina declares that she acknowledges no tribunal upon earth above her authority. She has indeed entered into a solemn compact of union with the other states: but she demands, and will exercise, the right of putting her own construction upon it; and when this compact is violated by her sister states, and by the government which they have created, she is determined to avail herself of the unquestionable right of judging what is the extent of the infraction, and what are the measures best fitted to obtain justice.”
