Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856.

DEBATES OF CONGRESS. 17 JANUARY, 1833.] Proceedings in relation to South Carolina. [SENATE. to accept the services of such volunteers, and call soever. That State is thus relieved from the payinto service such portions of the militia as may be ment of any part of the public burdens, and duties required to meet the emergency. and imposts are not only rendered not uniform The act also provides for accepting the service throughout the United States, but a direct and ruof the volunteers, and organizing the militia, em- inous preference is given to the ports of that State bracing all free white males between the ages of over those of all the other States of the Union, in sixteen and sixty, and for the purchase of arms, manifest violation of the positive provisions of the ordnance and ammunition. It also declares that the constituticn. power conferred on the Governor shall be applica- In point of duration, also, those aggressions upble to all cases of insurrection or invasion, or im- on the authority of Congress, which, by the ordiminent danger thereof, and to cases where the laws nance, are made part of the fundamental law of of the State shall be opposed, and the execution South Carolina, are absolute, indefinite, and withthereof forcibly resisted by combinations too pow- out limitation. They neither prescribe the period erful to be suppressed by the power vested in the when they shall cease, nor indicate any conditions sheriffs and other civil officers; and declares it to upon which those who have thus undertaken to be the duty of the Governor in every such case to arrest the operation of the laws are to retrace their call forth such portions of militia and volunteers steps, and rescind their measures. They offer to as may be necessary promptly to suppress such com- the United States no alternative but unconditional binations, and cause the laws of the State to be submission. If the scope of the ordinance is to be executed. received as the scale of concession, their demands No. 9 is " An act concerning the oath required can be satisfied only by a repeal of the whole sysby the ordinance passed in convention at Columbia, ternm of revenue laws, and by abstaining from the on the 24th of November, 1832." This act pre- collection of any duties and imposts whatsoever scribes the form of the oath, which is, to obey and It is true, that in the address to the people of execute the ordinance, and all acts passed by the the United States by the Convention of South Legislature in pursuance thereof; and directs the Carolina, after announcing " the fixed and final detime and manner of taking it by the officers of the termination of the State in relation to the protectState, civil, judiciary, and military. ing system," they say "that it remains for us to It is believed that other acts have been passed, submit a plan of taxation, in which we would be embracing provisions for enforcing the ordinance, willing to acquiesce, in a liberal spirit of concesbut I have not yet been able to procure them. sion, provided we are met in due time, and in a I transmit, however, a copy of Governor Hamil- becoming spirit, by the States interested in manuton's message to the Legislature of South Carolina, factures." In the opinion of the convention, an of Governor Hayne's inaugural address to the same equitable plan would be, that "the whole list of body, as also of his proclamation, and a general protected articles should be imported free of all order of the Governor and commander-in-chief, duty, and that the revenue derived from import dated the 20th of December, giving public notice duties should be raised exclusively from the unprothat the services of volunteers will be accepted un- tected articles, or that whenever a duty is imposed der the act already referred to. upon protected articles imported, an excise duty of If these measures cannot be defeated and over- the same rate shall be imposed upon all similar arcome by the power conferred by the constitution tides manufactured in the United States." The on the Federal Government, the constitution must address proceeds to state, however, that "they are be considered as incompetent to its own defence, willing to make a large offering to preserve the the supremacy of the laws is at an end, and the Union, and with a distinct declaration that it is a rights and liberties of the citizens can no longer concession on our part, we will consent that the receive protection from the Government of the same rate of duty may be imposed uponthe protected Union. They not only abrogate the acts of Con- articles that shall be imposed upon the unprotected, gress, commonly called the tariff acts of 1828 and provided that no more revenue be raised than is 1832, but they prostrate and sweep away at once, necessary to meet the demands of the Government and without exception, every act, and every part for constitutional purposes, and provided also that of every act, imposing any amount whatever of a duty substantially uniform be imposed upon all duty on any foreign merchandise; and, virtually, foreign imports." every existing act which has ever been passed au- It is also true, that, in his message to the Legisthorizing the collection of the revenue, including lature, when urging the necessity of providing the act of 1816, and also, the collection law of "means of securing their safety by ample resources 1799, the constitutionality of which has never been for repelling force by force," the Governor of South questioned. It is not only those duties which are Carolina observes that he " cannot but think that, charged to have been imposed for the protection on a calm and dispassionate review by Congress, of manufactures that are thereby repealed, but all and the functionaries of the General Government, others, though laid for the purpose of revenue of the true merits of this controversy, the arbitramerely, and upon articles in no degree suspected tion, by a call of a convention of all the States, of being objects of protection. The whole revenue which we sincerely and anxiously seek and desire, system of the United States in South Carolina is will be accorded to us." obstructed and overthrown; and the Government From the diversity of terms indicated in these is absolutely prohibited from collecting any part of two important documents, taken in connection with the public revenue within the limits of that State. the progress of recent events in that quarter, there Henceforth, not only the citizens of South Caro- is too much reason to apprehend, without in any lina and of the United States, but the subjects of manner doubting the intentions of those public foreign States, may import any description or functionaries, that neither the terms proposed in quantity of merchandise into the ports of South the address of the convention, nor those alluded to Carolina, without the payment of any duty what- in the message of the Governor, would appease the VOL. XI.-2