Ch. 3.3. Primary Source: The Kentucky Resolutions, 1799

In the same context as the Virginia Resolutions, in late 1798 and 1799 the Kentucky legislature passed similar resolutions. The earliest version of these derived from a draft of Oct., 1798, written by Thomas Jefferson. This draft took a more radical position than the Virginia Resolutions, by asserting that state sovereignty allowed states to “nullify,” or reject unconstitutional federal laws. However, the first version of these resolutions passed by the Kentucky legislature in Nov., 1798, omitted this idea. But then in a later version, of Dec., 1799, which is excerpted here below, the legislature included this idea again.

Although Jefferson died in 1826 before sectional conflict between the North and the South ignited a debate over nullification, he remained discreet about his role in drafting this document and in particular about his authorship of the nullification idea. As a result, the history of these matters has long been controversial.

The representatives of the good people of this commonwealth in general assembly convened, having maturely considered the answers of sundry states in the Union, to their resolutions passed at the last session, respecting certain unconstitutional laws of Congress, commonly called the Alien and Sedition Laws, would be faithless indeed to themselves, and to those they represent, were they silently to acquiesce in principles and doctrines attempted to be maintained in all those answers, that of Virginia only excepted…

Our opinions of those alarming measures of the general government, together with our reasons for those opinions, were detailed with decency and with temper, and submitted to the discussion and judgment of our fellow citizens throughout the Union… Lest however the silence of this commonwealth should be construed into an acquiescence in the doctrines and principles advanced and attempted to be maintained by the said answers, or least those of our fellow citizens throughout the Union, who so widely differ from us on those important subjects, should be deluded by the expectation, that we shall be deterred from what we conceive our duty, or shrink from the principles contained in those resolutions, therefore:

RESOLVED, That this commonwealth considers the federal union, upon the terms and for the purposes specified in the late compact, as conducive to the liberty and happiness of the several states: That it does now unequivocally declare its attachment to the Union, and to that compact, agreeable to its obvious and real intention, and will be among the last to seek its dissolution:

That if those who administer the general government be permitted to transgress the limits fixed by that compact, by a total disregard to the special delegations of power therein contained, annihilation of the state governments, and the erection upon their ruins, of a general consolidated government, will be the inevitable consequence: That the principle and construction contended for by sundry of the state legislatures, that the general government is the exclusive judge of the extent of the powers delegated to it, stop nothing short of despotism; since the discretion of those who adminster the government, and not the constitution, would be the measure of their powers:

That the several states who formed that instrument, being sovereign and independent, have the unquestionable right to judge of its infraction; and that a nullification, by those sovereignties, of all unauthorized acts done under color of that instrument, is the rightful remedy: That this commonwealth does upon the most deliberate reconsideration declare, that the said Alien and Sedition Laws are in their opinion, palpable violations of the said constitution; and however cheerfully it may be disposed to surrender its opinion to a majority of its sister states in matters of ordinary or doubtful policy; yet, in momentous regulations like the present, which so vitally wound the best rights of the citizen, it would consider a silent acquiesecence as highly criminal;

That although this commonwealth as a party to the federal compact; will bow to the laws of the Union, yet it does at the same time declare, that it will not now, nor ever hereafter, cease to oppose in a constitutional manner, every attempt from what quarter soever offered to violate that compact:

AND FINALLY, in order that no pretexts or arguments may be drawn from a supposed acquiescence on the part of this commonwealth in the constitutionality of those laws, and be thereby used as precedents for similar future violations of federal compact; this commonwealth does now enter against them, its SOLEMN PROTEST.

Approved December 3rd, 1799.

Sources: The text here is from the Yale Law School’s website, “The Avalon Project,” under the Kentucky Resolutions. For recent comment on Jefferson’s role, see the editorial note on this document on Princeton University Press’s website for “Thomas Jefferson’s Papers,” under the Kentucky Resolutions.