y an unusual assemblage of naval or
military forces in or near the State, or the occurrence of any
circumstances indicating that armed force is about to be employed
against the State or in resistance to its laws, the governor is
authorized to accept the services of such volunteers and call into
service such portions of the militia as may be required to meet the
emergency.

The act also provides for accepting the service of the volunteers and
organizing the militia, embracing all free white males between the ages
of 16 and 60, and for the purchase of arms, ordnance, and ammunition. It
also declares that the power conferred on the governor shall be
applicable to all cases of insurrection or invasion, or imminent danger
thereof, and to cases where the laws of the State shall be opposed and
the execution thereof forcibly resisted by combinations too powerful to
be suppressed by the power vested in the sheriffs and other civil
officers, and declares it to be the duty of the governor in every such
case to call forth such portions of the militia and volunteers as may be
necessary promptly to suppress such combinations and cause the laws of
the State to be executed.

No. 9 is "An act concerning the oath required by the ordinance passed in
convention at Columbia on the 24th of November, 1832."

This act prescribes the form of the oath, which is, to obey and execute
the ordinance and all acts passed by the legislature in pursuance
thereof, and directs the time and manner of taking it by the officers of
the State--civil, judiciary, and military.

It is believed that other acts have been passed embracing provisions for
enforcing the ordinance, but I have not yet been able to procure them.

I transmit, however, a copy of Governor Hamilton's message to the
legislature of South Carolina; of Governor Hayne's inaugural address to
the same body, as also of his proclamation, and a general order of the
governor and commander in chief, dated the 20th of December, giving
public notice that the services of volunteers will be accepted under the
act already referred to.

If these measures can not be defeated and overcome by the power
conferred by the Constitution on the Federal Government, the
Constitution must be considered as incompetent to its own defense, the
supremacy of the laws is at an end, and the rights and liberties of the
citizens can no longer receive protection from the Government of the
Union. They not only abrogate the ac