men.[1] The basis for the clamor of the Nullifiers was the following letter, which was secured from a messenger by the Nullifiers and widely published by them. It was dated Abbeville Court House, April 17, 1834, and read:
The committee of five have assigned the five divisions of this state. This district is included in the division assigned to Colonel Robert Cunningham, who has just written to me to urge an immediate and active organization of the regiments of the district, and report to him
- ↑ Messenger, May 14, 1834.
that great law remains unabrogated and the oath referred to unrepealed by any act of the sovereignty of South Carolina, we demand if the proceedings of a convention are of higher authority to the judges than the proceedings of a legislature. The oath in the Constitution of the United States is still there. The people of South Carolina in 1787 bound their judicial servants, in common with their other servants, to observe that oath, as the condition of office. The people of South Carolina have not annulled that sanction, by any formal or informal act. Must their judges take it for granted when anything be done in convention of the people repugnant to the Constitution of the United States, that the declaration of the supremacy of that instrument over state laws and constitutions, and the oath in confirmation of it, are impliedly annulled? Until this be shown, all that is contended for may be safely granted without bringing the advocates of state sovereignty any nearer to the conclusion that, holding allegiance to that sovereignity, they may not set aside an ordinance of a convention equally with an act of the legislature. Judges O'Neall and Johnson are obeying the sovereignty of South Carolina expressly declared in 1787 and not as made out by constructive inference in 1834."
