In the mean time, what would have been the state of the country during the five years which have been devoted to this tedious, complicated and ineffectual attempt to settle the construction of the Constitution? The revenue would have declined almost to nothing, and there would have been of course an annual deficit of nearly the whole amount necessary to defray the expenses of the Government, and pay the interest and principal of the debt. How would this have been covered? The ordinary resource in cases of deficit is a loan, but it may well be doubted whether, under the circumstances supposed, the credit of the Government would be particularly good. If loans could be obtained, which is the most favorable supposition, we should be saddled with a debt of about a hundred millions, probably at exorbitant interest, as the cost of this political experiment. Were this the only inconvenience, most judicious citizens would be disposed to say, with the Grecian philosopher who was offered, at a pretty high price, the favors of a frail beauty of some celebrity,--that they did not choose to buy repentance so dear. But this debt of a hundred millions would be the least part of the mischief. The importation of foreign goods free of duty for five years would of course destroy all our domestic manufactures, and ruin that part of our population which is employed in them. The value of the manufactures annually produced in this country is estimated by Mr. Gallatin at about $150,000,000,--probably a very low computation. Supposing the ordinary rate of profit in this branch of industry to be at from six to seven per cent., this amount of annual products represents a capital of a thousand million dollars, which would be swept at once into nothing. This is another trifling item to be added to the cost and charges of nullification. Omitting all consideration of the effect upon the happiness of the six or seven hundred thousand persons who depend for subsistence upon these manufactures, and looking merely at the financial results, we must needs say that this is a most expensive, as well as in our opinion unsatisfactory, mode of expounding the Constitution. And these, as we have said, are the results of the process on the most favorable supposition; for if loans could not be obtained, which is a more probable one, the immediate consequence would be a national bankruptcy, which would of course be followed instantaneously by domestic convulsions, a complete breaking up of the Government, and a dissolution of the Union.