The declarations of President Lincoln were received with strongly
contrasted feelings by the three elements which constituted the
membership of the Virginia Convention. The Secessionists hailed his
position as fore-shadowing Federal coercion which in turn would compel
Virginia's withdrawal from the Union. The unconditional Union men
accepted his views as the logical and necessary avowals of his
constitutional duty. The conditional Union men, while denying in a
measure the correctness of his position, both from a constitutional and
ethical standpoint, were yet gratified by the pacific spirit of his
address. They counselled moderation on the part of the Convention and
clung tenaciously to the hope that some adjustment might be perfected
between the authorities of the Union and those of the seceded states and
thus the alternative of submitting to coercion or seceding from the
Union might never be presented to the people of Virginia. This last
element held the balance of power in the Convention. As illustrating
their position, it may be well to insert extracts from the speeches of a
few of their representative men.
James W. Sheffey, speaking five days before President Lincoln's
inauguration, said:
"We love the Union, but we cannot see it maintained by force. They say
the Union must be preserved—she can only be preserved through
fraternal affection. We must take our place—we can't remain neutral.
If it comes to this and they put the question of trying force on the
states which have seceded, we must go out.... We are waiting to see
what will be defined coercion. We wait to see what action the new
President will take."[370]
George Baylor, speaking three days before President Lincoln's
inauguration, said: "Secession is not a constitutional measure; even if
it were, we should delay before using it. Let us stay in the Union where
we have always been. Yet, I am opposed to coercion."[371]
Thomas Branch, speaking the day after President Lincoln's inaugural
address, said:
"My heart has been saddened and every patriotic heart should be
saddened, and every Christian voice raised to heaven in this time of
our trial. After the reception of Mr. Lincoln's inaugural, I saw some
gentlemen rejoicing in the hotels. Rejoicing for what, sir? For
plunging ourselves and our families, our wives and children in civil
war? I pray that I may never rejoice at such a state of things. I pray
that I may never have to march to battle to front my enemies. But I
came here to defend the rights of Virginia and I mean to do it at all
hazards; and if we must go to meet our enemies, I wish to go with the
same deliberation, with the same solemnity that I would bend the knee
in prayer before Almighty God."[372]
Jubal A. Early, speaking on the same day, said:
"I do not approve of the inaugural of Mr. Lincoln and I did not expect
to be able to endorse his policy and I did not think there was a
member of this Convention who expected to endorse it; but, sir, I ask
the gentleman from Halifax and the gentleman from Prince Edward, if it
were not for the fact that six or seven states of this Confederacy
have seceded from this Union, if the declarations of President Lincoln
that he would execute the laws in all the states would not have been
hailed throughout the country as a guarantee that he would perform his
duty, and that we should have peace and protection for our property
and that the Fugitive Slave Law would be faithfully executed? I ask
why is it that we are placed in this perilous condition? And if it is
not solely from the action of these states that have seceded from the
Union without having consulted our views?"[373]
George W. Brent, speaking on the 8th of March, said:
"Abolitionism in the North, trained in the school of Garrison and
Phillips, and affecting to regard the constitution as 'a league with
Hell and a covenant with Death,' has with a steady and untiring hate
sought a disruption of this Union, as the best and surest means for
the accomplishment of the abolition of slavery in the Southern
States.... South Carolina and those leading statesmen of the South who
have been educated in the philosophy of free trade have likewise with
unwearied and constant assiduity pursued their schemes of disunion.
Conscious of their inability to effect their schemes within the Union
they have sought a disruption of the states....
"In these two schools of political philosophy, Mr. President, I trace
all the evils and disastrous troubles which now afflict and disturb
our beloved and unhappy land.... Recognizing as I have always done,
the right of a state to secede, to judge of the violation of its
rights and to appeal to its own mode for redress, I could not uphold
the Federal Government in any attempt to coerce the seceded states to
bring them back in the Union."[374]