of the obnoxious acts from and after February 1, 1833. No case in law or equity, involving either the validity of the ordinance or the action of the legislature under it, might be appealed to the supreme court of the United States; and any attempt to take such appeal was made punishable as for contempt of court. All office-holders, except members of the legislature, were required to take an oath to obey and uphold the ordinance and the laws passed to give it effect.

Finally, to cap the arch of protest, it was declared, in the name of the people of the state, that "we will not submit to the application of force, on the part of the Federal Government, to reduce this State to obedience; but that we will consider the passage, by Congress, of any act authorizing the employment of a military or naval force against the State of South Carolina, her constituted authorities or citizens, or any act abolishing or closing the ports of this State, or any of them, or otherwise obstructing the free ingress of vessels to and from the said ports, or any other act, on the part of the Federal Government, to coerce the State, shut up her ports, destroy or harass her commerce, or to enforce the acts hereby declared to be null and void, otherwise than through the civil tribunals of the country, as inconsistent with the longer continuance of South Carolina in the Union, and that the People of this State will thenceforth hold themselves absolved from all further obligation to maintain or preserve their political connection with the people of the other States, and will forthwith proceed to organize a separate Government, and to do all other acts and things which sovereign and independent States may of right do."

The legislature reassembled November 27, three days after the adjournment of the convention, and promptly passed the acts necessary to give effect to the ordinance.1 A replevin act provided for the recovery of goods seized or detained for non-payment of duties. In case of refusal to deliver the goods, the personal estate of the offender to double the amount of the goods might be seized. Persons arrested or imprisoned on any judgment or decree of any federal court for duties were to be entitled to the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus, with the right to maintain an action for damages. Another act authorized the use of the military force of the state, including volunteers if necessary, under direction of the governor, in case armed force were employed or threatened against the state; the purchase of arms and ammunition was also authorized. A form of oath, especially obnoxious to the Union men, was prescribed for all state officers, both civil and military.

Jackson's message of December 4, 1832, again urged readjustment of the tariff, so that the protection afforded might not exceed "what may be necessary to counteract the regulations of foreign Senate Docs., 22 Cong., 2 Sess., No. 30.

nations and to secure a supply of those articles of manufacture essential to the national independence and safety in time of war." The reference to the situation in South Carolina was brief, but pointed. The opposition to the revenue laws "in one quarter of the United States" had risen, it was said, "to a height which threatens to thwart their execution, if not to endanger the integrity of the Union"; but it was believed that the federal laws were probably sufficient to deal with the matter.

2

December 10, six days later, came Jackson's proclamation to the people of South Carolina. In a bold, vigorous, and admirably reasoned argument, the proclamation swept aside the bad logic and impracticable theory of the ordinance of nullification, and proclaimed the doctrine of the supremacy of the Union. "I consider the power to annul a law of the United States, assumed by one State, incompatible with the existence of the Union, contradicted expressly by the letter of the Constitution, unauthorized by its spirit, inconsistent with every principle on which it was founded, and destructive of the great object for which it was formed"-this was the text, printed in bold type that it might not be overlooked. It is no argument against the tariff, urged the president, that it was passed with improper motive, for the motive of the legislature cannot be ascertained save from the act, nor may any state impugn it. It is no objection that the tariff operates unequally, for so do all taxes which the wisdom of man has ever contrived; or that the proceeds of the tax will be improperly applied, for the law makes no particular disposition of the revenue. As for the compact theory, that can be as little maintained as the theory of secession derived from it. In words of solemn earnestness, the chief magistrate of the nation appealed to the people of South Carolina to beware of the danger into which they were running, and to stop before resort must be had to force.

The proclamation, apparently the joint production of the president and his secretary of state,1 is unquestionably the ablest and most impressive state paper of the Jackson era. If the people of South Carolina who favored nullification had imagined that Jackson would sit quietly by while the state went out of the Union, their eyes must have been holden that they could not see. With Jackson, love for the Union and jealous regard for the dignity of his high office were predominant passions, and an attack upon them was an affront to him. The language of the proclamation was not, indeed, wholly characteristic of Jackson, nor were the constitutional doctrines enunciated in accord at all points with Jackson's views as elsewhere expressed; but there can be no doubt that he approved the general tone and purport. There is no doubt, too, that he 1 Parton, Jackson, III., 466; Tyler, Taney, 188.

was prepared promptly to act under the proclamation. The day before the proclamation was issued he wrote to Poinsett that in forty days "from the date of my orders," if force should become necessary, "I will have forty thousand men in the State of South Carolina" to put down resistance and enforce the law.1

To the nullifiers the proclamation was like a blow in the face, but they did not at once recoil. Hayne, who had resigned from the Senate to become governor of the state, was inaugurated December 13. Two weeks later Calhoun resigned the vice-presidency, and took Hayne's seat in the Senate. December 17 a series of ten resolutions in reply to the proclamation was adopted by the legislature, and the purpose was declared of meeting force with force. Governor Hayne put forth a counterproclamation. A call for a general convention of the states to consider questions of disputed power between the states and the federal government was also issued. The replies of the states, however, through their legislatures, were an emphatic condemnation of nullification and secession, and in most cases also an equally emphatic indorsement of the president's proclamation. South Carolina had taken the lead in attempting to carry its doctrine into effect, only to find that, once the step was

Jackson MSS.

Ames, State Docs. on Federal Relations, IV., 42-44. • The replies are in State Papers on Nullification (Boston, 1834).