In the first place, the ordinance declares the law of last July, and all other laws of the United States laying duties, to be absolutely null and void, and makes it unlawful for the constituted authorities of the United States to enforce the payment of such duties.  It is therefore, Sir, an indictable offence, at this moment, in South Carolina, for any person to be concerned in collecting revenue under the laws of the United States.  It being declared, by what is considered a fundamental law of the State, unlawful to collect these duties, an indictment lies, of course, against any one concerned in such collection; and he is, on general principles, liable to be punished by fine and imprisonment.  The terms, it is true, are, that it is unlawful “to enforce the payment of duties”; but every custom-house officer enforces payment while he detains the goods in order to obtain such payment.  The ordinance, therefore, reaches everybody concerned in the collection of the duties.

This is the first step in the prosecution of the peaceable remedy.  The second is more decisive.  By the act commonly called the replevin law, any person whose goods are seized or detained by the collector for the payment of duties may sue out a writ of replevin, and, by virtue of that writ, the goods are to be restored to him.  A writ of replevin is a writ which the sheriff is bound to execute, and for the execution of which he is bound to employ force, if necessary.  He may call out the posse, and must do so, if resistance be made.  This posse may be armed or unarmed.  It may come forth with military array, and under the lead of military men.  Whatever number of troops may be assembled in Charleston, they may be summoned, with the governor, or commander-in-chief, at their head, to come in aid of the sheriff.  It is evident, then, Sir, that the whole military power of the State is to be employed, if necessary, in dispossessing the custom-house officers, and in seizing and holding the goods, without paying the duties.  This is the second step in the peaceable remedy.

Sir, whatever pretences may be set up to the contrary, this is the direct application of force, and of military force.  It is unlawful, in itself, to replevy goods in the custody of the collectors.  But this unlawful act is to be done, and it is to be done by power.  Here is a plain interposition, by physical force, to resist the laws of the Union.  The legal mode of collecting duties is to detain the goods till such duties are paid or secured.  But force comes, and overpowers the collector and his assistants, and takes away the goods, leaving the duties unpaid.  There cannot be a clearer case of forcible resistance to law.  And it is provided that the goods thus seized shall be held against any attempt to retake them, by the same force which seized them.