DOCUMENTS.

ten Constitution, and prevents rather than accelerates opportunities CONVENTION for an unnecessary recurrence to revolutionary movements. Under 1832. such a structure of the public sentiment, when the voice of a Sovereign State shall be spoken, "it will be heard in a tone, which virtuous governors will obey, and tyrannical ones shall DREAD." Nothing can more reconcile Nullification to our citizens, than to know, that if we are not proceeding according to the forms of the Constitution, we are, nevertheless, adhering to its spirit. The Convention which framed the Constitution, could not agree upon any mode of settling a dispute like the present. The case was, therefore, left unprovided for, under the conviction, no doubt, as is admitted by Mr. Hamilton in "The Federalist," that if the Federal Government should oppress the states, the State Governments would be ready to check it, by virtue of their own inherent sovereign powers." It may be safely received as an AXIOM in our political system (says Mr. Hamilton) that the State Governments will in all possible contingencies, afford COMPLETE SECURITY against invasion of the public liberty by the national authority. Projects of usurpation cannot be masked under pretences so likely to escape the penetration of select bodies of men, as of the people at large-The LEGISLATURES will have better means of information. They can discover the danger at a distance; and, possessing all the organs of CIVIL POWER, and the confidence of the people, they can at once adopt A REGULAR PLAN OF OPPOSITION, in which they can combine all the resources of the community."

That measure cannot be revolutionary, which is adopted, not with a view to resort to force, but by some decisive measures to call the attention of the co-states to a disputed question, in such a form as to compel them to decide what are, or are not the rights of the States, in a case of a palpable and dangerous infraction of those fundamental principles of liberty, in which they all have an interest.

In the exercise of the right of Nullification, we are not unmindful of the many objections which have been urged against it. That it may embarrass the present majority in Congress, who are fatally bent upon building up the sectional interests of their constituents, upon the ruin of our commerce, we can readily imagine; but these embarrassments, on examination, will be found to proceed rather from an unwillingness, on their part, to adjust the controversy on principles of reason and justice, than from any real difficulty existing in the Constitution. The provisions of the Constitution are ample for taking the sense of the States on a question more important than any which has occurred since the formation of the Government. But if the spirit of justice departs from the councils, to which we have a right to look up, as the guardians of public liberty and the public peace, no provisions of human wisdom can avail. We have heard much of the danger of suffering one State to impede the operations of twenty-three states; but it must be obvious to every considerate man, that the danger can only exist where a State is wrong. If the people of any one State are right in the principles for which they contend, it is desirable that they should impede the operations of Congress, until the sentiments of its co-states shall be had. A higher eulogy could not be bestowed upon our system, than the power of resorting to some conservative principle, that shall stay a disruption of the league. It is no argument, to say that a State may have no grounds on which to place herself upon her sovereign rights. This is a possible, but by no means a probable case. Experience has given us a most instructive lesson on this yery subject-it has taught us, that the danger is not that a State may resort to her sovereign rights too often, but that she will not avail herself of

DOCUMENTS. 1832.

CONVENTION them when necessary. Look, fellow-citizens, to our State. For ten years we have petitioned and remonstrated against the unconstitutionality of the Tariff Acts, and though the conviction has been universal, that the effects of the system would be ruinous to our interests, yet the difficulty has been great, to bring the people to the resisting point.

And so with other objections. It has been maintained by us, that according to the philosophy of the government, and the true spirit of the compact, it becomes Congress in all emergencies like the present, to solicit from the states the call of a Convention. That upon such a convocation, it should be incumbent on the states claiming the doubtful power, to propose an amendment to the Constitution, giving the doubtful power, and on failure to obtain it by a consent of three-fourths of all the states, to regard the power as never having been intended to be given. We must not be understood to say, that this was matter even of implied stipulation, at the formation of the compact. The Constitution is designedly silent on the subject, on account of the extreme difficulty, in the minds of its framers, of appointing a mode of adjusting these differences. This difficulty we now discover was imaginary. It had its source in apprehensions, which an experience of upwards of forty years has proved to be without the shadow of a foundation. Many of the sages of that day were dissatisfied with their work, for a reason which is the very opposite of the truth. They feared, not that the General Government would encroach upon the rights of the states, but that the states would perpetually be disposed to pass their boundaries of power, and finally destroy the confederation.

Had they been blessed with the experience which we have acquired, there could have been no objection to trusting the states, who created the Government, and who would not wilfully embarrass it, with a veto under certain modifications. It seems but reasonable, that a disputed power, which it would have required three-fourths of the states to add to the Constitution, ought not to be insisted on by a majority in Congress, as impliedly conferred, if more than one-fourth should object to it. To deny this, would be to decide finally the validity of a power by a positive majority of the people at large, instead of a concurring majority of the States. There is, it is true, one objection, and only one, to this view, and that is, that under this theory, a majority little beyond the onefourth, as for instance seven states out of twenty-four, might deprive Congress of powers which have been expressly delegated. The answer to this is, that it would be a very extreme case for a single State to claim the resumption of a power which it had clearly delegated in positive terms. But it seems almost beyond the range of possibility, that six other states should be found to sustain a nullifying State in such a pretension. Should such a case ever occur, as upwards of one-fourth of the states resolving to break their pledges, without the slightest pretence, it would show that it was time to dissolve the league. If a spirit of friendship and fair dealing cannot bind together the members of this Union, the sooner it is dissolved the better. So that this objection is rather nominal than substantial. But the evil of this objection is that whilst its admission would relieve us from an imaginary peril, we should be plunged into that certain danger of an unrestricted liberty of Congress to give us, instead of a confederated government, a government without any other limitation upon its power than the will of a majority.

Other objections have been urged against Nullification. It is said that the President or Congress might employ the military and naval force of

DOCUMENTS.

the United States to reduce the nullifying state into obedience, and thus CONVENTION produce a civil dissention amongst the members of the confederacy. We 1832. do not deem it necessary, in a community so conversant with this part of the subject as that of South Carolina, to recapitulate the arguments which have been urged against such an improbable course, both for want of power, and on the ground of expediency. But we cannot pass over one view, which we think sufficient to quiet all apprehension on that score. We live in an age of reason and intellect. The idea of using force on an occasion of this kind, is utterly at variance with the genius and spirit of the American people. In truth, it is becoming repugnant even to the genius and spirit of the governments of the old world. We have lately seen in England one of the greatest reforms achieved, which her history records-a reform which her wisest statesmen twenty years ago, would have predicted could not be accomplished without civil war, brought about by a bloodless revolution. The cause is manifest. Not only are the people every where better informed, but such is the influence which public opinion exerts over constituted authorities, that the rulers of this earth are more swayed by reason and justice than formerly. Under such evident indications of the march of mind and intellect, it would be to pay but a poor compliment to the people of these states, to imagine that a measure taken by a Sovereign State, with the most perfect good feeling to her confederates, and to the perpetuity of the Union, and with no other view than to force upon its members the consideration of a most important constitutional question, should terminate otherwise than peaceably.

Fellow-citizens, it is our honest and firm belief, that nullification will preserve, and not destroy, this Union. But we should regret to conceal from you that if Congress should not be animated with a patriotic and liberal feeling in this conjuncture, they can give to this controversy what issue they please. Admit, then, that there is risk of a serious conflict with the federal government. We know no better way to avoid the chance of hostile measures in our opponents, than to evince a readiness to meet danger, come from what quarter it will. We should think that the American Revolution was indeed to little purpose, if a consideration of this kind were to deter our people from asserting their sovereign rights. That revolution, it is well known, was not entered into by our Southern ancestors from any actual oppression, which the people suffered. It was a contest waged for PRINCIPLE, emphatically for principle. The calamities of revolution, strife, and civil war, were fairly presented to the illustrious patriots of those times, which tried the souls of men. The alternative was either to remain dependent colonies in hopeless servitude, or to become free, sovereign and independent states-To attain such a distinguished rank amongst the nations of the earth, there was but one path, and that the path of glory-the crowning glory of being accounted worthy of all suffering, and of embracing all the calamities of a protracted war abroad, and of domestic evils at home, rather than to surrender their liberties. The result of their labors is known to the world, through the flood of light which that revolution has shed upon the science of government, and the rights of man-in the LESSON it has taught the oppresor, and in the EXAMPLE it has afforded to the oppressed" in the invigoration of the spirit of freedom every where, and in the amelioration it is producing in the social order of mankind.

66

Inestimable are the blessings of that well regulated freedom which permits man to direct his labors and his enterprize to the pursuit or branch

DOCUMENTS.

CONVENTION of industry for which he conceives nature has qualified him, unmolested 1832. by avarice enthroned in power. Such was the freedom for which South Carolina struggled when a dependent colony. Such is the freedom of which she once tasted as the first fruit of that revolutionary triumph which she assisted to achieve. Such is the freedom she reserved to herself on entering into the league. Such is the freedom of which she has been deprived, and to which she must be restored, if her commerce be worth preserving, or the spirit of her Laurens and her Gadsden has not fled forever from our bosoms. It is in vain to tell South Carolina that she can look to any administration of the federal government for the protection of her sovereign rights, or the redress of her southern wrongs. Where the fountain is so polluted, it is not to be expected that the stream will again be pure. The protection to which in all representative governments the people have been accustomed to look, to wit, the responsibility of the governors to the governed, has proved nerveless and illusory-under such a system, nothing but a radical reform in our political institutions can preserve this Union. It is full time that we should know what rights we have under the federal constitution, and more especially ought we to know whether we are to live under a consolidated government, or a confederacy of states-whether the states be sovereign, or their local Legislatures be mere corporations. A FRESH UNDERSTANDING OF THE BARGAIN we deem absolutely NECESSARY. No mode can be devised by which a dispute can be referred to the source of all power, but by some one state taking the lead in the great enterprize of reform. Till some one Southern State tenders to the Federal Government an issue, it will continue to have its "appetite increased by what it feeds on." History admonishes us that rulers never have the forecast to substitute in good time reform for revolution. They forget that it is always more desirable that the just claims of the governed should break in on them "through well contrived and well disposed windows, not through flaws and breaches, through the yawning chasm of their own ruin." One State must, under the awful prospects before us, throw herself into the breach in this gat struggle for constitutional freedom. There is no other mode of awakening the attention of the co-states to grievances which if suffered to accumulate must dismember the Union. It has fallen to our lot, fellow-citizens, first to quit our trenches. Let us go on to the assault with cheerful hearts and undaunted minds.

Fellow-citizens, the die is now cast. We have solemnly resolved on ' the course which it becomes our beloved State to pursue-we have resolved that until these abuses shall be reformed, NO MORE TAXES SHALL BE PAID HERE. "Millions for defence, but not a cent for tribute." And now we call upon our citizens, native and adopted, to prepare for the crisis, and to meet it as becomes men and freemen. We call upon all classes and parties to forget their former differences, and to unite in a solemn determination never to abandon this contest until such a change be effected in the councils of the nation, that all the citizens of this confederacy shall participate equally in the benefits and the burthens of the government. To this solemn duty we now invoke you, in the name of all that is sacred and valuable to man. We invoke you in the name of that LIBERTY which has been acquired by you from an illustrious ancestry, and which it is your duty to transmit unimpaired to the most distant generations. We invoke you in the name of that CONSTITUTION which you profess to venerate, and of that UNION which you are all desirous to perpetuate. By the reverence you bear to these your institutions— by all the love you bear to liberty; by the detestation you have for ser

DOCUMENTS.

1832.

vitude-by all the abiding memorials of your past glories-by the proud CONVENTION association of your exalted and your common triumphs in the first and greatest of our revolutions; by the force of all those sublime truths which that event has inculcated amongst the nations-by the noble flame of republican enthusiasm which warms your bosoms-we conjure you in this mighty struggle to give your hearts and souls and minds to your injured and oppressed State, and to support her cause publicly and privately, with your opinions, your prayers, and your actions. If appeals such as these prove unavailing, we then COMMAND YOUR OBEDIENCE to the laws and the authorities of the State, by a title which none can gain-say. We demand it by that Allegiance, which is reciprocal with the protection you have received from the State. We admit of no obedience to any authority, which shall conflict with that primary allegiance, which every citizen owes to the State of his birth or his adoption. There is not, nor has there ever been, "any direct or immediate allegiance between the citizens of South Carolina and the Federal Government. The relation between them is through the State." South Carolina having entered into the constitutional compact, as a separate, independent, political community, as has already been stated, has the right to declare an unconstitutional act of Congress, null and void―After her sovereign declaration that the act shall not be enforced within her limits, "such a declaration is obligatory on her citizens. As far as its citizens are concerned, the clear right of the State is to declare the extent of the obligation." This declaration once made, the citizen has no course, but TO OBEY. If he refuses obedience, so as to bring himself under the displeasure of his only and lawful sovereign, and within the severe pains and penalties, which by her high sovereign power the Legislature will not fail to provide in her self-defence, the fault and the folly must be his own.

And now, fellow-citizens, having discharged the solemn duty to which we have been summoned, in a crisis big with the most important results to the liberties, peace, safety, and happiness of this once harmonious but now distracted confederacy, we commend our cause to that great Disposer of events, who (if he has not already for some inscrutable purposes of his own, decreed otherwise) will smile on the efforts of truth and justice. We know that "unless the Lord keepeth the city, the watchman waketh but in vain ;" but relying, as we do, in this controversy, on the purity of our motives and the honor of our ends, we make this appeal with all the confidence, which in times of trial and difficulty, ought to inspire the breast of the patriot and the christian. Fellow-citizens, DO YOUR DUTY TO YOUR COUNTRY, AND LEAVE THE CONSEQUENCES TO GOD.

VOL. I.-44.