Page:Nullification Controversy in South Carolina.djvu/77

 a law of the general government void and inoperative in that state on account of its unconstitutionality. In other words, they held that authority to pass it was not delegated by the states in the formation of the Union, and, that the state, not having agreed when it entered the confederacy to the exercise of such authority by Congress, would not allow it to be exercised now unless three-fourths of the states, according to the terms of the Constitution, agreed to make this sanction an addition to that Constitution. In that event the state must submit, or rebel against its own stipulations and revolutionize the government. In the case of the tariff the consent of the three-fourths of the states, necessary to give the power to continue to pass tariffs, would not be secured; the southern cause would be triumphant and the republic saved. Surely there was nothing dreadful about that.