On December 10, 1832, President
Andrew Jackson issued a proclamation to the people
of South Carolina that disputed a states' right to
nullify a federal law. Jackson's proclamation was
written in response to an ordinance issued by a
South Carolina convention that declared that the
tariff acts of 1828 and 1832 "are unauthorized by
the constitution of the United States, and violate
the true meaning and intent thereof and are null,
void, and no law, nor binding upon this State." Led
by John C. Calhoun, Jackson's vice president at the
time, the nullifiers felt that the tariff acts of
1828 and 1832 favored Northern-manufacturing
interests at the expense of Southern farmers. After
Jackson issued his proclamation, Congress passed the
Force Act that authorized the use of military force
against any state that resisted the tariff acts. In
1833, Henry Clay helped broker a compromise bill
with Calhoun that slowly lowered tariffs over the
next decade. The Compromise Tariff of 1833 was
eventually accepted by South Carolina and ended the
nullification crisis.
South Carolina Ordinance of Nullification, November
24, 1832.
An ordinance to nullify certain acts of the Congress
of the United States, purporting to be laws laying
duties and imposts on the importation of foreign
commodities.
Whereas the Congress of the United States by various
acts, purporting to be acts laying duties and
imposts on foreign imports, but in reality intended
for the protection of domestic manufactures and the
giving of bounties to classes and individuals
engaged in particular employments, at the expense
and to the injury and oppression of other classes
and individuals, and by wholly exempting from
taxation certain foreign commodities, such as are
not produced or manufactured in the United States,
to afford a pretext for imposing higher and
excessive duties on articles similar to those
intended to be protected, bath exceeded its just
powers under the constitution, which confers on it
no authority to afford such protection, and bath
violated the true meaning and intent of the
constitution, which provides for equality in
imposing the burdens of taxation upon the several
States and portions of the confederacy: And whereas
the said Congress, exceeding its just power to
impose taxes and collect revenue for the purpose of
effecting and accomplishing the specific objects and
purposes which the constitution of the United States
authorizes it to effect and accomplish, hath raised
and collected unnecessary revenue for objects
unauthorized by the constitution.
We, therefore, the people of the State of South
Carolina, in convention assembled, do declare and
ordain and it is hereby declared and ordained, that
the several acts and parts of acts of the Congress
of the United States, purporting to be laws for the
imposing of duties and imposts on the importation of
foreign commodities, and now having actual operation
and effect within the United States, and, more
especially, an act entitled "An act in alteration of
the several acts imposing duties on imports,"
approved on the nineteenth day of May, one thousand
eight hundred and twenty-eight and also an act
entitled "An act to alter and amend the several acts
imposing duties on imports," approved on the
fourteenth day of July, one thousand eight hundred
and thirty-two, are unauthorized by the constitution
of the United States, and violate the true meaning
and intent thereof and are null, void, and no law,
nor binding upon this State, its officers or
citizens; and all promises, contracts, and
obligations, made or entered into, or to be made or
entered into, with purpose to secure the duties
imposed by said acts, and all judicial proceedings
which shall be hereafter had in affirmance thereof,
are and shall be held utterly null and void.
And it is further ordained, that it shall not be
lawful for any of the constituted authorities,
whether of this State or of the United States, to
enforce the payment of duties imposed by the said
acts within the limits of this State; but it shall
be the duty of the legislature to adopt such
measures and pass such acts as may be necessary to
give full effect to this ordinance, and to prevent
the enforcement and arrest the operation of the said
acts and parts of acts of the Congress of the United
States within the limits of this State, from and
after the first day of February next, and the duties
of all other constituted authorities, and of all
persons residing or being within the limits of this
State, and they are hereby required and enjoined to
obey and give effect to this ordinance, and such
acts and measures of the legislature as may be
passed or adopted in obedience thereto.
And it is further ordained, that in no case of law
or equity, decided in the courts of this State,
wherein shall be drawn in question the authority of
this ordinance, or the validity of such act or acts
of the legislature as may be passed for the purpose
of giving effect thereto, or the validity of the
aforesaid acts of Congress, imposing duties, shall
any appeal be taken or allowed to the Supreme Court
of the United States, nor shall any copy of the
record be permitted or allowed for that purpose; and
if any such appeal shall be attempted to be taken,
the courts of this State shall proceed to execute
and enforce their judgments according to the laws
and usages of the State, without reference to such
attempted appeal, and the person or persons
attempting to take such appeal may be dealt with as
for a contempt of the court.
And it is further ordained, that all persons now
holding any office of honor, profit, or trust, civil
or military, under this State (members of the
legislature excepted), shall, within such time, and
in such manner as the legislature shall prescribe,
take an oath well and truly to obey, execute, and
enforce this ordinance, and such act or acts of the
legislature as may be passed in pursuance thereof,
according to the true intent and meaning of the
same, and on the neglect or omission of any such
person or persons so to do, his or their office or
offices shall be forthwith vacated, and shall be
filled up as if such person or persons were dead or
had resigned; and no person hereafter elected to any
office of honor, profit, or trust, civil or military
(members of the legislature excepted), shall, until
the legislature shall otherwise provide and direct,
enter on the execution of his office, or be he any
respect competent to discharge the duties thereof
until he shall, in like manner, have taken a similar
oath; and no juror shall be impaneled in any of the
courts of this State, in any cause in which shall be
in question this ordinance, or any act of the
legislature passed in pursuance thereof, unless he
shall first, in addition to the usual oath, have
taken an oath that he will well and truly obey,
execute, and enforce this ordinance, and such act or
acts of the legislature as may be passed to carry
the same into operation and effect, according to the
true intent and meaning thereof.
And we, the people of South Carolina, to the end
that it may be fully understood by the government of
the United States, and the people of the co-States,
that we are determined to maintain this our
ordinance and declaration, at every hazard, do
further declare that we will not submit to the
application of force on the part of the federal
government, to reduce this State to obedience, but
that we will consider the passage, by Congress, of
any act authorizing the employment of a military or
naval force against the State of South Carolina, her
constitutional authorities or citizens; or any act
abolishing or closing the ports of this State, or
any of them, or otherwise obstructing the free
ingress and egress of vessels to and from the said
ports, or any other act on the part of the federal
government, to coerce the State, shut up her ports,
destroy or harass her commerce or to enforce the
acts hereby declared to be null and void, otherwise
than through the civil tribunals of the country, as
inconsistent with the longer continuance of South
Carolina in the Union; and that the people of this
State will henceforth hold themselves absolved from
all further obligation to maintain or preserve their
political connection with the people of the other
States; and will forthwith proceed to organize a
separate government, and do all other acts and
things which sovereign and independent States may of
right do.
Done in convention at Columbia, the twenty-fourth
day of November, in the year of our Lord one
thousand eight hundred and thirty-two, and in the
fifty-seventh year of the Declaration of the
Independence of the United States of America.