It reads like that. “Hey, if the Federal government oversteps its bounds, we’ll consider the deal to be a part of the the federation of the US off.” More or less.
This is exactly what I’ve been thinking lately, that if the fedgov insists on treating the constitution as a piece of toilet paper, then we have no right to consider it binding on ourselves. That the fedgov has no natural right to rule us, that they do so solely at the point of a gun, as a hostile entity holding the citizens of the several states as hostages. And that secession is a right that we may exercise if and when we figure out a way to succeed at it.
I read the Russian diplomatic corps is reporting to Moscow that the US stands a 55:45 chance of disintegration by 2011.
Just because it hasn’t happened before (which it actually has, but not in our lifetimes), doesn’t mean it won’t.