Neither Calhoun nor
Adams, in his opinion, was open to this objection, and neither of
them, he thought, would prefer a protective tariff to a navy as a
means of national defense. While he admitted his ignorance of
Adams's views on the subject of division of power between the
federal and state governments, he declared that Calhoun had no
advantage on this point, for although the latter professed to
consider the distribution of powers between the states and the
central authority as "a distinguishing pre-eminence in our form of
government," yet, in the opinion of Taylor, he destroyed "this pre-
eminence by endowing the federal government with a supremacy over
the state governments whenever they come in conflict." This was
important testimony, following immediately on Calhoun's visit, and
coming from the pen of a man who was primarily interested in the
question.
In spite of these objections, which would seem to be insuperable
from the point of view of this distinguished expositor of state
sovereignty, Taylor was ready to take the initiative in a movement
against Crawford, if Monroe, Jefferson, and Madison agreed.
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