Page:Nullification Controversy in South Carolina.djvu/187

168 This prediction as to the demands of the Nullifiers proved in large measure true. They soon rejected the McLane bill on the grounds that it maintained the principle of protection to its full extent and that it was an open avowal that the American system was to be adhered to at all hazards. They believed that the Unionists accepted it simply because of an eagerness to seize on anything which would have the remotest tendency to prevent state interposition.

Next came the Adams bill, as a report from the Committee on Manufactures, which the State Rights men said was worse than the McLane bill. The news that the Adams bill had been enacted reached Charleston while the two parties were holding their Fourth of July celebrations. When the Union orator, at the close of his address, announced "the gratifying intelligence" that "Mr. Adams' Bill" had passed, the news was received with a degree of enthusiasm that evinced the deep anxiety of the assembly for the preservation of the Union. When the State Rights orator, at the close of his address, also informed his audience of the passage of the bill and said