; against which the British government has
repeatedly remonstrated, and upon which we have promised them that the
cause of complaint should be removed;--a promise which the obstinate
adherence of the government of South Carolina to their law has
disenabled us from fulfilling. The Governor of South Carolina has not
even answered the letter from the Department of State, transmitting to
them the complaint of the British government against this law. In this
state of things, for me to say anything gratifying to the feelings of
the South Carolinians on this subject, would be to abandon the ground
taken by the administration of Mr. Monroe, and disable us from taking
hereafter measures concerning the law, which we may be compelled to
take. To be silent is not to interfere with any state rights, and
renounces no right of ourselves or others."

[4] In the year 1823 the State of South Carolina passed a law
making it the duty of the sheriff of any district to apprehend any
free negro or person of color, brought into that state by any
vessel, and confine him in jail until such vessel depart, and then
to liberate him only on condition of payment of the expenses of
such detention. To this law William Johnson, a South Carolinian,
and a judge of the Supreme Court of the United States, in a letter
to Mr. Adams, then Secretary of State, called the attention of the
President of the United States, as a violation of the constitution;
and declared his belief "that it had been passed as much for the
pleasure of bringing the functionaries of the United States into
contempt, by exposing their impotence, as from any other cause
whatsoever;" they being precluded from resorting to the writ of
habeas corpus and injunction because the cases assumed the form of
state prosecutions. William Wirt, also, the Attorney-General of
the United States, in a letter to Mr. Adams, then Secretary of
State, pronounced that law "as being against the constitution,
treaties, and laws, and incompatible with the rights of all
nations in amity with the United States."

The same trait of character is evidenced by his persisting in
recommending the application of the superfluous revenue to internal
improvements, notwithstanding he well knew its unpopularity in Virginia,
where it was denounced as realizing the prophecy of Patrick Henry, that
"the Federal governm