[98] Niles’ _Register_, p. 335, July 20, 1833. Cooper was President of the University of South Carolina. The University of Virginia would not have him as professor on account of his Unitarian belief, though Jefferson wished it. Is it possible that he was the original author of the Kentucky Resolutions, and furnished them to Jefferson? Jefferson’s correspondence, as far as we have examined, shows no belief in that doctrine. We have found nowhere any claim of a right of secession, not even the use of the word, until the threat of South Carolina’s nullification. Any separation before was considered as a disruption of the Union. Jefferson spoke of it as scission. While some hold that Jackson “with his iron heel crushed out secession,” numerous attempts have been made, even recently, to prove that Jackson was not opposed to nullification, that in reality the proclamation was not his but was Edward Livingston’s. Parton, Jefferson’s biographer, tells us, when a pamphlet containing the proceedings of South Carolina reached Jackson, he went to his office and began to dash off page after page of the proclamation. To this was added many more of notes and memoranda which he had been accumulating. The papers were given to Mr. Livingston to draw up in proper form. In three or four days Livingston gave to Jackson a draft of the proclamation for examination. Jackson said that Livingston had not correctly understood his notes and suggested alterations, and had them made.[99] [99] Parton’s _Life of Jackson_, vol. iii., p. 466. The proclamation, whoever wrote it, is a clear, strong statement of the nature of our Union and its nationality; an abler production than Edward Livingston’s speech, when as Senator he spoke on this matter in 1830. If Jackson did not write a line of it he was not totally wanting in knowledge and comprehension, and must have understood the most important question that had arisen in his administration or in any administration since the inception of the government.