Page:Nullification Controversy in South Carolina.djvu/377

358 passed. They therefore withdrew their notice of protest and asked all their party to accept the settlement, since the interpretation given the oath did not impair their allegiance to the Constitution and laws of the United States. It was, they declared, under these circumstances and with these views that they had accepted the accommodation in the same spirit of kindness and with the same anxious desire to restore harmony to the distracted state with which they believed it had been tendered. They did not ask the majority to surrender any opinions which they conscientiously but privately held, nor on their part did they intend to surrender theirs. They considered this effort at conciliation an understanding between the two great political parties of the state that the new oath should receive that construction which was consistent with the Constitution of the United States. For themselves, they accepted it in the full confidence that it meant no more than that they would be faithful to the state in performing all her constitutional requisitions and would render her "true allegiance" to the full extent of all her reserved rights and sovereign powers, and that this was not inconsistent with the obligations they owed and