party.[1] He regarded them in a twofold aspect, as offering two modes of resistance, one constitutional and the other revolutionary; the former including all the legal means of arresting a political evil under the federal system, such as declarations, remonstrances, and joint protests by the states; the latter, extra-constitutional in character, recognizing the right of a state to secede when all these regular and constitutional means had failed. This explanation was said to be in exact conformity with James Madison's letter of August, 1830, interpreting those oft-cited resolutions.
In the same oration Drayton took special delight in tearing the Exposition to pieces. In the first place, he supported the Exposition, by an elaborate argument, in its assertion that the tariff acts of 1824 and 1828 were unconstitutional, but
- ↑ Patriot, July 39, 1831; also published in pamphlet form.
a political phenomenon which has perfectly confounded to all intents and purposes the uninfected portion of the citizens of our own and other states. Thus to an eye to which the tariff and internal improvements appear perfectly constitutional and expedient, after a paroxysm of nullification, these laws appear so palpably unconstitutional and oppressive that the most perfect patriotism consists in resisting them. This strange, and to our state novel, disease appears to exert a pantomimic influence upon its victims; hence whenever one becomes nullified he recognizes in his most perfect previous likeness a capapie tory."
