One factor compelling South Carolina’s withdrawal from a stance of confrontation was the cool reception the doctrine of nullification received from other southern states. The Alabama legislature, for example, pronounced the doctrine “unsound in theory and dangerous in practice.” Georgia said it was “mischievous,” “rash and revolutionary.” Mississippi lawmakers chided the South Carolinians for acting with “reckless precipitancy.”23 “Nullification is dead,” declared Jackson. But “the next pretext will be the negro, or slavery question.”
