Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions

Cultural  

1. Statements of principle adopted by two state legislatures in the 1790s; they affirmed states' rights in response to the federal Alien and Sedition Acts. James Madison wrote the Virginia Resolutions, and Thomas Jefferson wrote the Kentucky Resolutions. Jefferson's draft of the Kentucky Resolutions included the statement that nullification was an appropriate course of action for a state in the face of a dangerous increase in the strength of the federal government. Although the Kentucky legislature approved most of his draft, it did not adopt this statement.

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Example Sentences

In that role, he worked to undermine Adams’ controversial Alien and Sedition Acts, designed to halt immigration and suppress “harmful speech,” by drafting the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions with James Madison.

From Time • Aug. 4, 2016

Jefferson and Madison mobilized the response to the acts in the form of statements known as the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions, which argued that the acts were illegal and unconstitutional.

From Textbooks • Dec. 30, 2014

By his efforts, and the aid of the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions, the Constitution and the Union had been saved when "at its last gasp."

From The United States of America, Part 1 by Sparks, Edwin Erle

The real purport of these Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions has been much misunderstood.

From Union and Democracy by Johnson, Allen

The Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions are printed in full in MacDonald's Select Documents, 1776- 1861, pp. 149-160.

From A Brief History of the United States by McMaster, John Bach