Page:Nullification Controversy in South Carolina.djvu/198

Rh supporters from attempting to enforce it. And yet the State Rights men continually argued that the cry of war and bloodshed as a result of nullification was all beside the mark, for nullification as a remedy had been contemplated and purposely left available by the framers of the Constitution, and it was one that would procure the redress of grievances easily and peaceably. The use of force to bring a nullifying state into subjection to the general government seemed to them a usurpation too flagrant to be worthy of contemplation.

A long letter by John C. Calhoun to Governor James Hamilton, Jr., dated August 28, 1832, was printed widely in the South Carolina press and was looked upon by the State Rights party as the last word on the theory of nullification. It was believed to establish, as clearly and conclusively as any political proposition could be established, not only the federative character of the Union and the right of a state in its sovereign capacity to nullify the usurpations of the federal government, but also the idleness of the apprehension that the central authorities could either