iews which he
expressed in private were usually not slow to reach the public ear. In
a letter to a committee of the Union party in response to an
invitation to attend a Fourth of July dinner the President intimated
that force might properly be employed if nullification should be
attempted. And to a South Carolina Congressman who was setting off on
a trip home he said: "Tell them [the nullifiers] from me that they can
talk and write resolutions and print threats to their hearts' content.
But if one drop of blood be shed there in defiance of the laws of the
United States, I will hang the first man of them I can get my hands on
to the first tree I can find." When Hayne heard of this threat he
expressed in Benton's hearing a doubt as to whether the President
would really hang anybody. "I tell you, Hayne," the Missourian
replied, "when Jackson begins to talk about hanging, they can begin to
look for the ropes."

Meanwhile actual nullification awaited the decision of the Vice
President to surrender himself completely to the cause and to become
its avowed leader. Calhoun did not find this an easy decision to make.
Above all things he wanted to be President. He was not the author of
nullification; and although he did not fully realize until too late
how much his state rights leanings would cost him in the North, he was
shrewd enough to know that his political fortunes would not be
bettered by his becoming involved in a great sectional controversy.
Circumstances worked together, however, to force Calhoun gradually
into the position of chief prominence in the dissenting movement. The
tide of public opinion in his State swept him along with it; the
breach with Jackson severed the last tie with the northern and western
democracy; and his resentment of Van Buren's rise to favor prompted
words and acts which completed the isolation of the South Carolinian.
His party's enthusiastic acceptance of Jackson as a candidate for
reelection in 1832 and of "Little Van" as a candidate for the vice
presidency--and, by all tokens, for the presidency four years
later--was the last straw. Broken and desperate, Calhoun sank back
into the role of an extremist, sectional leader. There was no need of
further concealment; and in midsummer, 1831, he issued his famous
_Address to the People of South Carolina_, and this restatement of the
_Exposition_ of 1828 now became the avowed platform of the
nullification party. The _Fort Hill Letter_ of August 28, 1