In point of duration, also, those aggressions upon the authority of Congress which by the ordinance are made part of the fundamental law of South Carolina are absolute, indefinite, and without limitation. They neither prescribe the period when they shall cease nor indicate any conditions upon which those who have thus undertaken to arrest the operation of the laws are to retrace their steps and rescind their measures. They offer to the United States no alternative but unconditional submission. If the scope of the ordinance is to be received as the scale of concession, their demands can be satisfied only by a repeal of the whole system of revenue laws and by abstaining from the collection of any duties and imposts whatsoever. It is true that in the address to the people of the United States by the convention of South Carolina, after announcing "the fixed and final determination of the State in relation to the protecting system," they say "that it remains for us to submit a plan of taxation in which we would be willing to acquiesce in a liberal spirit of concession, provided we are met in due time and in a becoming spirit by the States interested in manufactures." In the opinion of the convention, an equitable plan would be that "the whole list of protected articles should be imported free of all duty, and that the revenue derived from import duties should be raised exclusively from the unprotected articles, or that whenever a duty is imposed upon protected articles imported an excise duty of the same rate shall be imposed upon all similar articles manufactured in the United States." The address proceeds to state, however, that "they are willing to make a large offering to preserve the Union, and, with a distinct declaration that it is a concession on our part, we will consent that the same rate of duty may be imposed upon the protected articles that shall be imposed upon the unprotected, provided that no more revenue be raised than is necessary to meet the demands of the Government for constitutional purposes, and provided also that a duty substantially uniform be imposed upon all foreign imports." It is also true that in his message to the legislature, when urging the necessity of providing "means of securing their safety by ample resources for repelling force by force," the governor of South Carolina observes that he "can not but think that on a calm and dispassionate review by Congress and the functionaries of the General Government of the true merits of this controversy the arbitration by a call of a convention of all the States, which we sincerely and anxiously seek and desire, will be accorded to us."