Page:Nullification Controversy in South Carolina.djvu/339

 Although the oath as adopted by the legislature did not in so many words demand paramount allegiance to the state, the Union men believed that all circumstances pointed to that interpretation. To them the oath in the military bill

—House vote on the test oath, 1833

was pregnant with a meaning beyond its literal signification; when viewed in connection with the ordinance of the late convention, from which they believed it might be said to have emanated, it became to all intents and purposes an oath of