The nullification crisis was a sectional political crisis in the United States in 1832 and 1833, during the presidency of Andrew Jackson, which involved a confrontation between the state of South Carolina and the federal government. It ensued after South Carolina declared the federal Tariffs of 1828 and 1832 unconstitutional and therefore null and void within the sovereign boundaries of the state. However, courts at the state and federal level, including the U.S. Supreme Court, repeatedly have rejected the theory of nullification by states.
President Jackson again sought to compromise. In March 1833, he signed a new tariff bill that lowered tariffs even further, thereby appeasing the South. But he also signed the Force Bill, which authorized the compulsory collection of import duties from the South—by force of arms if necessary. It was a signal to Southerners that threats of nullification and secession would not be tolerated. Though this effectively brought the constitutional crisis to an end, it did not forestall the eventual outbreak of civil war.
Still, crisis was over, and both sides found reasons to claim victory. The tariff rates were reduced and stayed low to the satisfaction of the South, but the states’ rights doctrine of nullification remained controversial. By the 1850s, the issues of the expansion of slavery into the western territories and the threat to Southern slave owners became the central issues in the nation.