Page:Nullification Controversy in South Carolina.djvu/216

Rh was surely unwarranted for either party to cast imputations on the other.

Early in the year the Union party began to suggest that, in case the Clay tariff prevailed, the entire South should act. The Unionists would support a state convention provided that it would only endeavor to promote a southern convention, for only such action would be effective. The Unionists believed that, had the doctrine of nullification never been ushered in, the South, under the common feeling of a common wrong, would long since have acted in concert and obtained by a dignified but determined course that redress which the intemperate efforts of South Carolina had almost indefinitely postponed. Until South Carolina abandoned her delusion and the South met in convention, no success could be gained.

When General James Blair, a prominent Union man, declared that unless the present session of Congress should relax the system of injustice of which the South complained, it would be advisable for the complaining states to meet in solemn conference on the subject and make a concerted appeal to the justice of the general government,