ay our
Constitution and our liberty.

This unequal and unjust arrangement was pronounced, both by the
administration, through its proper organ, the Secretary of the
Treasury, and by the opposition, to be a *permanent* adjustment; and it
was thus that all hope of relief through the action of the general
government terminated; and the crisis so long apprehended at length
arrived, at which the State was compelled to choose between absolute
acquiescence in a ruinous system of oppression, or a resort to her
reserved powers--powers of which she alone was the rightful judge, and
which only, in this momentous juncture, could save her. She determined
on the latter.

The consent of two-thirds of her Legislature was necessary for the call
of a convention, which was considered the only legitimate organ through
which the people, in their sovereignty, could speak. After an arduous
struggle the States-rights party succeeded; more than two-thirds of
both branches of the Legislature favorable to a convention were
elected; a convention was called--the ordinance adopted. The
convention was succeeded by a meeting of the Legislature, when the laws
to carry the ordinance into execution were enacted--all of which have
been communicated by the President, have been referred to the Committee
on the Judiciary, and this bill is the result of their labor.

Having now corrected some of the prominent misrepresentations as to the
nature of this controversy, and given a rapid sketch of the movement of
the State in reference to it, I will next proceed to notice some
objections connected with the ordinance and the proceedings under it.

The first and most prominent of these is directed against what is
called the test oath, which an effort has been made to render odious.
So far from deserving the denunciation that has been levelled against
it, I view this provision of the ordinance as but the natural result of
the doctrines entertained by the State, and the position which she
occupies. The people of Carolina believe that the Union is a union of
States, and not of individuals; that it was formed by the States, and
that the citizens of the several States were bound to it through the
acts of their several States; that each State ratified the Constitution
for itself, and that it was only by such ratification of a State that
any obligation was imposed upon its citizens. Thus believing, it is
the opinion of the people of Carolina that it belongs to the