Produced by David Widger
AMERICAN ELOQUENCE
STUDIES IN AMERICAN POLITICAL HISTORY
Edited with Introduction by Alexander Johnston
Reedited by James Albert Woodburn
Volume IV. (of 4)
VII.--CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION
VIII.--FREE TRADE AND PROTECTION.
IX.--FINANCE AND CIVIL SERVICE REFORM.
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
VII.--CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
First Inaugural Address,
March 4, 1861.
JEFFERSON DAVIS
Inaugural Address. Montgomery, Ala.,
February 18, 1867.
ALEXANDER HAMILTON STEPHENS
The "Corner-Stone" Address
--Atheneum, Savannah, Ga., March 2, 1861.
JOHN CALEB BRECKENRIDGE and
EDWIN D. BAKER
Suppression Of Insurrection
--United States Senate, August 1, 1861.
CLEMENT L. VALLANDIGHAM
On The War And Its Conduct
--House Of Representatives, January 14, 1863.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Address At Liverpool, October 16, 1863.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
The Gettysburgh Address,
November 19, 1863.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
Second Inaugural Address,
March 4, 1865.
HENRY WINTER DAVIS
On Reconstruction ; The First Republican Theory
--House Of Representatives, March 22, 1864.
GEORGE H. PENDLETON
On Reconstruction ; The Democratic Theory
--House Of Representatives, May 4, 1864.
THADDEUS STEVENS
On Reconstruction; Radical Republican Theory
--House Of Representatives-December 18, 1865.
HENRY J. RAYMOND .
On Reconstruction; Administration Republican Theory
--House Of Representatives, December 21, 1865.
THADDEUS STEVENS
On The First Reconstruction Bill
--House Of Representatives, January 3, 1867.
VIII.--FREE TRADE AND PROTECTION.
HENRY CLAY
On The American System
--In The United States Senate, February 2-6,1832.
FRANK H. HURD.
A Tariff For Revenue Only
--House Of Representatives, February 18, 1881.
IX.--FINANCE AND CIVIL SERVICE REFORM.
JUSTIN S. MORRILL
On The Remonetization Of Silver
--United States Senate, January 28, 1878.
JAMES G. BLAINE
On The Remonetization Of Silver
--United States Senate, February 7, 1878
JOHN SHERMAN
On Silver Coinage And Treasury Notes
--United States Senate, June 5, 1890.
JOHN P. JONES
On Silver Coinage And Treasury Notes
--United States Senate, May 12, 1810.
GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS
On The Spoils System And The Progress Of Civil Service Reform
--Address Before The American Social Science Association,
Saratoga, N. Y., September 8, 1881.
CARL SCHURZ
On The Necessity And Progress Of Civil Service Reform
--Address At The Annual Meeting Of The National
Civil Service Reform League, Chicago, Ills.,
December 12, 1894.
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
GEORGE W. CURTIS--Frontispiece
From a painting by SAMUEL LAWRENCE.
JOHN C. BRECKENRIDGE
From a photograph.
HENRY W. BEECHER .
Wood-engraving from photograph.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
Wood-engraving from photograph.
JAMES G. BLAINE
Wood-engraving from photograph.
INTRODUCTION TO THE FOURTH VOLUME.
The fourth and last volume of the American Eloquent e deals with
four great subjects of discussion in our history,--the Civil War and
Reconstruction, Free Trade and Protection, Finance, and Civil Service
Reform. In the division on the Civil War there has been substituted in
the new edition, for Mr. Schurz's speech on the Democratic War
Policy the spirited discussion between Breckenridge and Baker on the
suppression of insurrection. The scene in which these two speeches were
delivered in the United States Senate at the opening of the Civil war
is full of historic and dramatic interest, while the speeches themselves
are examples of superior oratory. Mr. Schurz appears to advantage in
another part of the volume in his address on Civil Service Reform.
The speeches of Thaddeus Stevens and Henry J. Raymond, delivered at the
opening of the Reconstruction struggle under President Johnson, are
also new material in this edition. They are fairly representative of two
distinct views in that period of the controversy. These two speeches are
substituted for the Garfield-Blackburn discussion over a "rider" to
an appropriation bill designed to forbid federal control of elections
within the States. This discussion was only incidental to the problem
of reconstruction, and may be said to have occurred at a time (1879)
subsequent to the close of the Reconstruction period proper.
The material on Free Trade and Protection has been left unchanged
for the reason that it appears to the present editor quite useless to
attempt to secure better material on the tariff discussion. There might
be added valuable similar material from later speeches on the tariff,
but the two speeches of Clay and Hurd may be said to contain the
essential merits of the long-standing tariff debate.
The section of the volume devoted to Finance and Civil Service Reform
is entirely new. The two speeches of Curtis and Schurz are deemed
sufficient to set forth the merits of the movement for the reform of
the Civil Service. The magnitude of our financial controversies during a
century of our history precludes the possibility of securing an adequate
representation of them in speeches which might come within the scope of
such a volume as this. It has, therefore, seemed best to the editor to
confine the selections on Finance to the period since the Civil War, and
to the subject of coinage, rather than to attempt to include also the
kindred subjects of banking and paper currency. The four representative
speeches on the coinage will, however, bring into view the various
principles of finance which have determined the differences and
divisions in party opinion on all phases of this great subject.
J. A. W.
VII.--CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION.
THE transformation of the original secession movement into a _de facto_
nationality made war inevitable, but acts of war had already taken
place, with or without State authority. Seizures of forts, arsenals,
mints, custom-houses, and navy yards, and captures of Federal troops,
had completely extinguished the authority of the United States in
the secession area, except at Fort Sumter in South Carolina, and Fort
Pickens and the forts at Key West in Florida; and active operations to
reduce these had been begun. When an attempt was made, late in January,
1861, to provision Fort Sumter, the provision steamer, Star of the
West, was fired on by the South Carolina batteries and driven back.
Nevertheless, the Buchanan administration succeeded in keeping the peace
until its constitutional expiration in March, 1861, although the rival
and irreconcilable administration at Montgomery was busily engaged in
securing its exclusive authority in the seceding States.
Neither of the two incompatible administrations was anxious to strike
the first blow. Mr. Lincoln's administration began with the policy
outlined in his inaugural address, that of insisting on collection of
the duties on imports, and avoiding all other irritating measures. Mr.
Seward, Secretary of State, even talked of compensating for the loss of
the seceding States by admissions from Canada and elsewhere. The urgent
needs of Fort Sumter, however, soon forced an attempt to provision
it; and this brought on a general attack upon it by the Confederate
batteries around it. After a bombardment of two days, and a vigorous
defence by the fort, in which no one was killed on either side, the fort
surrendered, April 14, 1861. It was now impossible for the United States
to ignore the Confederate States any longer. President Lincoln issued
a call for volunteers, and a proclamation announcing a blockade of the
coast of the seceding States. A similar call on the other side and the
issue of letters of marque and reprisal against the commerce of the
United States were followed by an act of the Confederate Congress
formally recognizing the existence of war with the United States.
The two powers were thus locked in a struggle for life or death, the
Confederate States fighting for existence and recognition, the United
States for the maintenance of recognized boundaries and jurisdiction;
the Confederate States claiming to be at war with a foreign power, the
United States to be engaged in the suppression of individual resistance
to the laws. The event was to decide between the opposing claims; and it
was certain that the event must be the absolute extinction of either the
Confederate States or the United States within the area of secession.
President Lincoln called Congress together in special session, July 4,
1861; and Congress at once undertook to limit the scope of the war
in regard to two most important points, slavery and State rights.
Resolutions passed both Houses, by overwhelming majorities, that slavery
in the seceding States was not to be interfered with, that the autonomy
of the States themselves was to be strictly maintained, and that, when
the Union was made secure, the war ought to cease. If the war had ended
in that month, these resolutions would have been of some value; every
month of the extension of the war made them of less value. They were
repeatedly offered afterward from the Democratic side, but were as
regularly laid on the table. Their theory, however, continued to control
the Democratic policy to the end of the war.
For a time the original policy was to all appearance unaltered. The war
was against individuals only; and peace was to be made with individuals
only, the States remaining untouched, but the Confederate States being
blotted out in the process. The only requisite to recognition of a
seceding State was to be the discovery of enough loyal or pardoned
citizens to set its machinery going again. Thus the delegates from the
forty western counties of Virginia were recognized as competent to
give the assent of Virginia to the erection of the new State of West
Virginia; and the Senators and Representatives of the new State actually
sat in judgment on the reconstruction of the parent State, although
the legality of the parent government was the evident measure of the
constitutional existence of the new State. Such inconsistencies were
the natural results of the changes forced upon the Federal policy by the
events of the war, as it grew wider and more desperate.
The first of these changes was the inevitable attack upon slavery.
The labor system of the seceding States was a mark so tempting that no
belligerent should have been seriously expected to have refrained from
aiming at it. January 1, 1863, after one hundred days' notice, President
Lincoln issued his Emancipation Proclamation, freeing the slaves within
the enemy's lines as rapidly as the Federal arms should advance. This
one break in the original policy involved, as possible consequences, all
the ultimate steps of reconstruction. Read-mission was no longer to be a
simple restoration; abolition of slavery was to be a condition-precedent
which the government could never abandon. If the President could impose
such a condition, who was to put bounds to the power of Congress to
impose limitations on its part? The President had practically declared,
contrary to the original policy, that the war should continue until
slavery was abolished; what was to hinder Congress from declaring that
the war should continue until, in its judgment, the last remnants of the
Confederate States were satisfactorily blotted out? This, in effect,
was the basis of reconstruction, as finally carried out. The steady
opposition of the Democrats only made the final terms the harder.
The principle urged consistently from the beginning of the war by
Thaddeus Stevens, of Pennsylvania, was that serious resistance to the
Constitution implied the suspension of the Constitution in the area
of resistance. No one, he insisted, could truthfully assert that the
Constitution of the United States was then in force in South Carolina;
why should Congress be bound by the Constitution in matters connected
with South Carolina? If the resistance should be successful, the
suspension of the Constitution would evidently be perpetual; Congress
alone could decide when the resistance had so far ceased that
the operations of the Constitution could be resumed. The terms of
readmission were thus to be laid down by Congress. To much the same
effect was the different theory of Charles Sumner, of Massachusetts.
While he held that the seceding States could not remove themselves from
the national jurisdiction, except by successful war, he maintained
that no Territory was obliged to become a State, and that no State was
obliged to remain a State; that the seceding States had repudiated their
State-hood, had committed suicide as States, and had become Territories;
and that the powers of Congress to impose conditions on their
readmission were as absolute as in the case of other Territories.
Neither of these theories was finally followed out in reconstruction,
but both had a strong influence on the final process.
President Lincoln followed the plan subsequently completed by Johnson.
The original (Pierpont) government of Virginia was recognized and
supported. Similar governments were established in Tennessee, Louisiana,
and Arkansas, and an unsuccessful attempt was made to do so in Florida.
The amnesty proclamation of December, 1863, offered to recognize any
State government in the seceding States formed by one tenth of the
former voters who should take the oath of loyalty and support of the
emancipation measures. At the following session of Congress, the first
bill providing for congressional supervision of the readmission of
the seceding States was passed, but the President retained it without
signing it until Congress had adjourned. At the time of President
Lincoln's assassination Congress was not in session, and President
Johnson had six months in which to complete the work. Provisional
governors were appointed, conventions were called, the State
constitutions were amended by the abolition of slavery and the
repudiation of the war debt, and the ordinances of secession were either
voided or repealed. When Congress met in December, 1865, the work had
been completed, the new State governments were in operation, and the
XIIIth Amendment, abolishing slavery, had been ratified by aid of their
votes. Congress, however, still refused to admit their Senators or
Representatives. The first action of many of the new governments had
been to pass labor, contract, stay, and vagrant laws which looked much
like a re-establishment of slavery, and the majority in Congress felt
that further guarantees for the security of the freedmen were necessary
before the war could be truly said to be over.
Early in 1866 President Johnson imprudently carried matters into an open
quarrel with Congress, which united the two thirds Republican majority
in both Houses against him. The elections of the autumn of 1866 showed
that the two thirds majorities were to be continued through the next
Congress; and in March, 1867, the first Reconstruction Act was passed
over the veto. It declared the existing governments in the seceding
States to be provisional only; put the States under military governors
until State conventions, elected with negro suffrage and excluding
the classes named in the proposed XIVth Amendment, should form a State
government satisfactory to Congress, and the State government should
ratify the XIVth Amendment; and made this rule of suffrage imperative
in all elections under the provisional governments until they should be
readmitted. This was a semi-voluntary reconstruction. In the same
month the new Congress, which met immediately on the adjournment of
its predecessor, passed a supplementary act. It directed the military
governors to call the conventions before September 1st following, and
thus enforced an involuntary reconstruction.
Tennessee had been readmitted in 1866. North Carolina, South Carolina,
Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, and Arkansas were reconstructed under the
acts, and were readmitted in 1868. Georgia was also readmitted, but was
remanded again for expelling negro members of her Legislature, and came
in under the secondary terms. Virginia, Georgia, Mississippi, and Texas,
which had refused or broken the first terms, were admitted in 1870, on
the additional terms of ratifying the XVth Amendment, which forbade the
exclusion of the negroes from the elective franchise.
In Georgia the white voters held control of their State from the
beginning. In the other seceding States the government passed, at
various times and by various methods during the next six years after
1871, under control of the whites, who still retain control. One of the
avowed objects of reconstruction has thus failed; but, to one who does
not presume that all things will be accomplished at a single leap, the
scheme, in spite of its manifest blunders and crudities, must seem to
have had a remarkable success. Whatever the political status of the
negro may now be in the seceding States, it may be confidently affirmed
that it is far better than it would have been in the same time under
an unrestricted readmission. The whites, all whose energies have been
strained to secure control of their States, have been glad, in return
for this success to yield a measure of other civil rights to the
freedmen, which is already fuller than ought to have been hoped for in
1867. And, as the general elective franchise is firmly imbedded in the
organic law, its ultimate concession will come more easily and gently
than if it were then an entirely new step.
During this long period of almost continuous exertion of national power
there were many subsidiary measures, such as the laws authorizing the
appointment of supervisors for congressional elections, and the use of
Federal troops as a _posse comitatus_ by Federal supervisors, which
were not at all in line with the earlier theory of the division between
Federal and State powers. The Democratic party gradually abandoned
its opposition to reconstruction, accepting it as a disagreeable but
accomplished fact, but kept up and increased its opposition to the
subsidiary measures. About 1876-7 a reaction became evident, and with
President Hayes' withdrawal of troops from South Carolina, Federal
control of affairs in the Southern States came to an end.
Foreign affairs are not strictly a part of our subject; but, as going to
show one of the dangerous features of the Civil War, the possibility
of the success of the secession sentiment in England in obtaining the
intervention of that country, the speech of Mr. Beecher in Liver-pool,
with the addenda of his audience, has been given.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN,
OF ILLINOIS. (BORN 1809, DIED 1865.)
FIRST INAUGURAL ADDRESS, MARCH 4, 1861.
FELLOW CITIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES:
In compliance with a custom as old as the government itself, I appear
before you to address you briefly, and to take in your presence the oath
prescribed by the Constitution of the United States to be taken by the
President "before he enters on the execution of his office."
I do not consider it necessary at present for me to discuss those
matters of administration about which there is no special anxiety or
excitement.
Apprehension seems to exist, among the people of the Southern States,
that by the accession of a Republican administration their property and
their peace and personal security are to be endangered. There never has
been any reasonable cause for such apprehension. Indeed, the most ample
evidence to the contrary has all the while existed and been open to
their inspection. It is found in nearly all the published speeches of
him who now addresses you. I do but quote from one of those speeches
when I declare that "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to
interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where
it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no
inclination to do so." Those who nominated and elected me did so with
full knowledge that I had made this and many similar declarations, and
had never recanted them. And more than this, they placed in the platform
for my acceptance, and as a law to themselves and to me, the clear and
emphatic resolution which I now read:
"Resolved, That the maintenance inviolate of the rights of the States,
and especially the right of each State to order and control its
own domestic institutions according to its judgment exclusively, is
essential to the balance of power on which the perfection and endurance
of our political fabric depend, and we denounce the lawless invasion by
armed force of the soil of any State or Territory, no matter under what
pretext, as among the gravest of crimes."
I now reiterate these sentiments; and, in doing so, I only press upon
the public attention the most conclusive evidence of which the case is
susceptible, that the property, peace, and security of no section are
to be in any wise endangered by the now incoming administration. I add,
too, that all the protection which, consistently with the Constitution
and the laws, can be given, will be cheerfully given to all the States,
when lawfully demanded, for whatever cause, as cheerfully to one section
as to another.
There is much controversy about the delivering up of fugitives from
service or labor. The clause I now read is as plainly written in the
Constitution as any other of its provisions:
"No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws
thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or
regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall
be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may
be due."
It is scarcely questioned that this provision was intended by those who
made it for the re-claiming of what we call fugitive slaves; and the
intention of the lawgiver is the law. All members of Congress swear
their support to the whole Constitution--to this provision as much as
any other. To the proposition, then, that slaves whose cases come within
the terms of this clause, "shall be delivered up," their oaths are
unanimous. Now, if they would make the effort in good temper, could they
not, with nearly equal unanimity, frame and pass a law by means of which
to keep good that unanimous oath?
There is some difference of opinion whether this clause should be
enforced by National or by State authority; but surely that difference
is not a very material one. If the slave is to be surrendered, it can be
of but little consequence to him, or to others, by what authority it is
done. And should any one, in any case, be content that his oath should
go unkept, on a mere unsubstantial controversy as to how it shall be
kept?
Again, in any law upon this subject, ought not all the safeguards of
liberty known in civilized and humane jurisprudence to be introduced, so
that a free man be not, in any case, surrendered as a slave? And might
it not be well, at the same time, to provide by law for the enforcement
of that clause of the Constitution which guarantees that "the citizens
of each State shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of
citizens in the several States"?
I take the official oath to-day with no mental reservation, and with no
purpose to construe the Constitution or laws by any hypercritical rules.
And while I do not choose now to specify particular acts of Congress as
proper to be enforced, I do suggest that it will be much safer for all,
both in official and private stations, to conform to and abide by all
those acts which stand unrepealed, than to violate any of them, trusting
to find impunity in having them held to be unconstitutional.
It is seventy-two years since the first inauguration of a President
under our National Constitution. During that period, fifteen different
and greatly distinguished citizens have, in succession, administered the
Executive branch of the government. They have conducted it through many
perils, and generally with great success. Yet, with all this scope for
precedent, I now enter upon the same task for the brief constitutional
term of four years, under great and peculiar difficulty. A disruption of
the Federal Union, heretofore only menaced, is now formidably attempted.
I hold that in contemplation of universal law, and of the Constitution,
the Union of these States is perpetual. Perpetuity is implied, if not
expressed, in the fundamental law of all national governments. It is
safe to assert that no government proper ever had a provision in its
organic law for its own termination. Continue to execute all the
express provisions of our National Government, and the Union will endure
forever--it being impossible to destroy it, except by some action not
provided for in the instrument itself.
Again, if the United States be not a government proper, but an
association of States in the nature of contract merely, can it, as a
contract, be peaceably unmade by less than all the parties who made it?
One party to a contract may violate it--break it, so to speak; but does
it not require all to lawfully rescind it?
Descending from these general principles, we find the proposition that,
in legal contemplation, the Union is perpetual, confirmed by the history
of the Union itself. The Union is much older than the Constitution. It
was formed, in fact, by the Articles of Association in 1774.
It was matured and continued by the Declaration of Independence in 1776.
It was further matured, and the faith of all the then thirteen States
expressly plighted and engaged that it should be perpetual, by the
Articles of Confederation in 1778. And, finally, in 1787, one of the
declared objects for ordaining and establishing the Constitution was "to
form a more perfect union."
But if destruction of the Union, by one, or by a part only, of the
States, be lawfully possible, the Union is less perfect than before, the
Constitution having lost the vital element of perpetuity.
It follows, from these views, that no State, upon its own mere motion,
can lawfully get out of the Union; that resolves and ordinances to that
effect are legally void; and that acts of violence within any State or
States, against the authority of the United States, are insurrectionary
or revolutionary, according to circumstances.
I therefore consider that, in view of the Constitution and the laws, the
Union is unbroken, and to the extent of my ability I shall take care, as
the Constitution itself expressly enjoins upon me, that the laws of the
Union be faithfully executed in all the States. Doing this I deem to
be only a simple duty on my part; and I shall perform it, so far as
practicable, unless my rightful masters, the American people, shall
withhold the requisite means, or, in some authoritative manner, direct
the contrary. I trust this will not be regarded as a menace, but only as
the declared purpose of the Union that it will constitutionally defend
and maintain itself. In doing this there need be no blood-shed or
violence; and there shall be none, unless it be forced upon the National
authority. The power confided to me will be used to hold, occupy, and
possess the property and places belonging to the government, and to
collect the duties and imposts; but beyond what may be necessary for
these objects, there will be no invasion, no using of force against or
among the people anywhere. Where hostility to the United States, in
any interior locality, shall be so great and universal as to prevent
competent resident citizens from holding the Federal offices, there will
be no attempt to force obnoxious strangers among the people for that
object. While the strict legal right may exist in the government to
enforce the exercise of these offices, the attempt to do so would be so
irritating, and so nearly impracticable withal, that I deem it better to
forego, for the time, the uses of such offices.
The mails, unless repelled, will continue to be furnished in all parts
of the Union. So far as possible, the people everywhere shall have that
sense of perfect security which is most favorable to calm thought and
reflection. The course here indicated will be followed, unless current
events and experience shall show a modification or change to be proper,
and in every case and exigency my best discretion will be exercised,
according to circumstances actually existing, and with a view and a hope
of a peaceful solution of the National troubles, and the restoration of
fraternal sympathies and affections.
That there are persons in one section or another who seek to destroy
the Union at all events, and are glad of any pretext to do it, I will
neither affirm nor deny; but if there be such, I need address no word to
them. To those, however, who really love the Union, may I not speak?
Before entering upon so grave a matter as the destruction of our
National fabric, with all its benefits, its memories, and its hopes,
would it not be wise to ascertain why we do it? Will you hazard so
desperate a step while there is any possibility that any portion of the
certain ills you fly from have no real existence? Will you, while the
certain ills you fly to are greater than all the real ones you fly
from,--will you risk the omission of so fearful a mistake?
All profess to be content in the Union, if all constitutional rights can
be maintained. Is it true, then, that any right, plainly written in the
Constitution, has been denied? I think not. Happily the human mind is
so constituted that no party can reach to the audacity of doing this.
Think, if you can, of a single instance in which a plainly written
provision of the Constitution has ever been denied. If, by the mere
force of numbers, a majority should deprive a minority of any clearly
written constitutional right, it might, in a moral point of view,
justify revolution--certainly would if such right were a vital one.
But such is not our case. All the vital rights of minorities and
of individuals are so plainly assured to them by affirmations and
negations, guaranties and prohibitions in the Constitution, that
controversies never arise concerning them. But no organic law can ever
be framed with a provision specifically applicable to every question
which may occur in practical administration. No foresight can
anticipate, nor any document of reasonable length contain, express
provisions for all possible questions. Shall fugitives from labor be
surrendered by National or State authority? The Constitution does not
expressly say. May Congress prohibit slavery in the Territories? The
Constitution does not expressly say. Must Congress protect slavery in
the Territories? The Constitution does not expressly say.
From questions of this class spring all our constitutional
controversies, and we divide upon them into majorities and minorities.
If the minority will not acquiesce, the majority must, or the government
must cease. There is no other alternative; for continuing the government
is acquiescence on one side or the other. If a minority in such case
will secede rather than acquiesce, they make a precedent which, in turn,
will divide and ruin them; for a minority of their own will secede from
them whenever a majority refuses to be controlled by such a minority.
For instance, why may not any portion of a new confederacy, a year
or two hence, arbitrarily secede again, precisely as portions of the
present Union now claim to secede from it? All who cherish disunion
sentiments are now being educated to the exact temper of doing this.
Is there such perfect identity of interests among the States to compose
a new Union, as to produce harmony only, and prevent renewed secession?
Plainly, the central idea of secession is the essence of anarchy. A
majority held in restraint by constitutional checks and limitations, and
always changing easily with deliberate changes of popular opinions and
sentiments, is the only true sovereign of a free people. Whoever rejects
it, does, of necessity, fly to anarchy or to despotism. Unanimity is
impossible; the rule of a minority, as a permanent arrangement, is wholly
inadmissible; so that, rejecting the majority principle, anarchy or
despotism, in some form, is all that is left. * * *
Physically speaking, we cannot separate. We cannot remove our respective
sections from each other, nor build an impassable wall between them. A
husband and wife may be divorced, and go out of the presence and beyond
the reach of each other; but the different parts of our country cannot
do this. They cannot but remain face to face, and intercourse, either
amicable or hostile, must continue between them. It is impossible, then,
to make that intercourse more advantageous or more satisfactory after
separation than before. Can aliens make treaties easier than friends can
make laws? Can treaties be more faithfully enforced between aliens than
laws can among friends? Suppose you go to war, you cannot fight always,
and when after much loss on both sides and no gain on either you cease
fighting, the identical old questions as to terms of intercourse are
again upon you.
This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit
it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government they
can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their
revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it. I cannot be ignorant
of the fact that many worthy and patriotic citizens are desirous of
having the National Constitution amended. * * * I understand a proposed
amendment to the Constitution--which amendment, however, I have not
seen--has passed Congress, to the effect that the Federal Government
shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the States,
including that of persons held to service. To avoid misconstruction of
what I have said, I depart from my purpose not to speak of particular
amendments, so far as to say that, holding such a provision now to
be implied constitutional law, I have no objections to its being made
express and irrevocable.'
The Chief Magistrate derives all his authority from the people, and
they have conferred none upon him to fix terms for the separation of the
States. The people themselves can do this also if they choose, but the
Executive, as such, has nothing to do with it. His duty is to administer
the present government as it came to his hands, and to transmit it,
unimpaired by him, to his successor. Why should there not be a patient
confidence in the ultimate justice of the people? Is there any better
or equal hope in the world? In our present differences is either party
without faith of being in the right? If the Almighty Ruler of Nations,
with his eternal truth and justice, be on your side of the North, or
yours of the South, that truth and that justice will surely prevail, by
the judgment of this great tribunal of the American people. By the frame
of the Government under which we live, the same people have wisely given
their public servants but little power for mischief, and have with equal
wisdom provided for the return of that little to their own hands at very
short intervals. While the people retain their virtue and vigilance,
no administration, by any extreme of wickedness or folly, can very
seriously injure the government in the short space of four years.
My countrymen, one and all, think calmly and well upon this whole
subject. Nothing valuable can be lost by taking time. If there be an
object to hurry any of you in hot haste to a step which you would never
take deliberately, that object will be frustrated by taking time; but no
good object can be frustrated by it. Such of you as are now dissatisfied
still have the old Constitution unimpaired, and on the sensitive point,
the laws of your own framing under it; while the new Administration
will have no immediate power, if it would, to change either. If it
were admitted that you who are dissatisfied hold the right side in this
dispute there is still no single good reason for precipitate action.
Intelligence, patriotism, Christianity, and a firm reliance on Him who
has never yet forsaken this favored land are still competent to
adjust in the best way all our present difficulty. In your hands, my
dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and not in mine, are the momentous
issues of civil war. The government will not assail you. You can have
no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no oath
registered in Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the
most solemn one to "preserve, protect, and defend" it.
I am loth to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be
enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break, our
bonds of affection. The mystic cords of memory, stretching from every
battle-field and patriot grave to every living heart and hearth-stone
all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union when
again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our
nature.
JEFFERSON DAVIS,
OF MISSISSIPPI.' (BORN 1808, DIED 1889.)
INAUGURAL ADDRESS, MONTGOMERY, ALA., FEBRUARY 18, 1861.
GENTLEMEN OF THE CONGRESS OF THE CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA, FRIENDS,
AND FELLOW-CITIZENS:
Our present condition, achieved in a manner unprecedented in the history
of nations, illustrates the American idea that governments rest upon the
consent of the governed, and that it is the right of the people to alter
and abolish governments whenever they become destructive to the ends
for which they were established. The declared compact of the Union
from which we have withdrawn was to establish justice, ensure domestic
tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general
welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our
posterity; and when in the judgment of the sovereign States now
composing this Confederacy it has been perverted from the purposes for
which it was ordained, and ceased to answer the ends for which it was
established, a peaceful appeal to the ballot-box declared that, so far
as they were concerned, the government created by that compact should
cease to exist. In this they merely asserted the right which the
Declaration of Independence of 1776 defined to be inalienable. Of the
time and occasion of this exercise they as sovereigns were the final
judges, each for himself. The impartial, enlightened verdict of mankind
will vindicate the rectitude of our conduct; and He who knows the hearts
of men will judge of the sincerity with which we labored to preserve the
government of our fathers in its spirit.
The right solemnly proclaimed at the birth of the States, and which
has been affirmed and reaffirmed in the bills of rights of the States
subsequently admitted into the Union of 1789, undeniably recognizes in
the people the power to resume the authority delegated for the purposes
of government. Thus the sovereign States here represented proceeded to
form this Confederacy; and it is by the abuse of language that their act
has been denominated revolution. They formed a new alliance, but
within each State its government has remained. The rights of person
and property have not been disturbed. The agent through whom they
communicated with foreign nations is changed, but this does not
necessarily interrupt their international relations. Sustained by the
consciousness that the transition from the former Union to the present
Confederacy has not proceeded from a disregard on our part of our just
obligations or any failure to perform every constitutional duty, moved
by no interest or passion to invade the rights of others, anxious to
cultivate peace and commerce with all nations, if we may not hope to
avoid war, we may at least expect that posterity will acquit us of
having needlessly engaged in it. Doubly justified by the absence of
wrong on our part, and by wanton aggression on the part of others, there
can be no use to doubt the courage and patriotism of the people of the
Confederate States will be found equal to any measure of defence which
soon their security may require.
An agricultural people, whose chief interest is the export of a
commodity required in every manufacturing country, our true policy is
peace and the freest trade which our necessities will permit. It is
alike our interest and that of all those to whom we would sell and
from whom we would buy, that there should be the fewest practicable
restrictions upon the interchange of commodities. There can be but
little rivalry between ours and any manufacturing or navigating
community, such as the northeastern States of the American Union. It
must follow, therefore, that mutual interest would invite good-will and
kind offices. If, however, passion or lust of dominion should cloud the
judgment or inflame the ambition of those States, we must prepare to
meet the emergency, and maintain by the final arbitrament of the sword
the position which we have assumed among the nations of the earth.
We have entered upon a career of independence, and it must be inflexibly
pursued through many years of controversy with our late associates of
the Northern States. We have vainly endeavored to secure tranquillity
and obtain respect for the rights to which we were entitled. As a
necessity, not a choice, we have resorted to the remedy of separation,
and henceforth our energies must be directed to the conduct of our own
affairs, and the perpetuity of the Confederacy which we have formed. If
a just perception of mutual interest shall permit us peaceably to pursue
our separate political career, my most earnest desire will have been
fulfilled. But if this be denied us, and the integrity of our territory
and jurisdiction be assailed, it will but remain for us with firm
resolve to appeal to arms and invoke the blessing of Providence on a
just cause. * * *
Actuated solely by a desire to preserve our own rights, and to promote
our own welfare, the separation of the Confederate States has been
marked by no aggression upon others, and followed by no domestic
convulsion. Our industrial pursuits have received no check, the
cultivation of our fields progresses as heretofore, and even should we
be involved in war, there would be no considerable diminution in the
production of the staples which have constituted our exports, in which
the commercial world has an interest scarcely less than our own. This
common interest of producer and consumer can only be intercepted by
an exterior force which should obstruct its transmission to foreign
markets, a course of conduct which would be detrimental to manufacturing
and commercial interests abroad.
Should reason guide the action of the government from which we have
separated, a policy so detrimental to the civilized world, the Northern
States included, could not be dictated by even a stronger desire
to inflict injury upon us; but if it be otherwise, a terrible
responsibility will rest upon it, and the suffering of millions will
bear testimony to the folly and wickedness of our aggressors. In the
meantime there will remain to us, besides the ordinary remedies before
suggested, the well-known resources for retaliation upon the commerce of
an enemy. * * * We have changed the constituent parts but not the system
of our government. The Constitution formed by our fathers is that of
these Confederate States. In their exposition of it, and in the judicial
construction it has received, we have a light which reveals its
true meaning. Thus instructed as to the just interpretation of that
instrument, and ever remembering that all offices are but trusts held
for the people, and that delegated powers are to be strictly construed,
I will hope by due diligence in the performance of my duties, though I
may disappoint your expectation, yet to retain, when retiring, something
of the good-will and confidence which will welcome my entrance into
office.
It is joyous in the midst of perilous times to look around upon a people
united in heart, when one purpose of high resolve animates and actuates
the whole, where the sacrifices to be made are not weighed in the
balance, against honor, right, liberty, and equality. Obstacles may
retard, but they cannot long prevent, the progress of a movement
sanctioned by its justice and sustained by a virtuous people. Reverently
let us invoke the God of our fathers to guide and protect us in our
efforts to perpetuate the principles which by His blessing they were
able to vindicate, establish, and transmit to their posterity; and
with a continuance of His favor, ever gratefully acknowledged, we may
hopefully look forward to success, to peace, to prosperity.
ALEXANDER HAMILTON STEPHENS,
OF GEORGIA. (BORN 1812, DIED 1884.)
THE "CORNER-STONE" ADDRESS;
ATHENAEUM, SAVANNAH, GA., MARCH 21, 1861
MR. MAYOR AND GENTLEMEN:
We are in the midst of one of the greatest epochs in our history. The
last ninety days will mark one of the most interesting eras in the
history of modern civilization. Seven States have in the last three
months thrown off an old government and formed a new. This revolution
has been signally marked, up to this time, by the fact of its having
been accomplished without the loss of a single drop of blood. This new
constitution, or form of government, constitutes the subject to which
your attention will be partly invited.
In reference to it, I make this first general remark: it amply secures
all our ancient rights, franchises, and liberties. All the great
principles of Magna Charta are retained in it. No citizen is deprived of
life, liberty, or property, but by the judgment of his peers under the
laws of the land. The great principle of religious liberty, which was
the honor and pride of the old Constitution, is still maintained and
secured. All the essentials of the old Constitution, which have endeared
it to the hearts of the American people, have been preserved and
perpetuated. Some changes have been made. Some of these I should prefer
not to have seen made; but other important changes do meet my cordial
approbation. They form great improvements upon the old Constitution. So,
taking the whole new constitution, I have no hesitancy in giving it as
my judgment that it is decidedly better than the old.
Allow me briefly to allude to some of these improvements. The question
of building up class interests, or fostering one branch of industry to
the prejudice of another under the exercise of the revenue power, which
gave us so much trouble under the old Constitution, is put at rest
forever under the new. We allow the imposition of no duty with a view of
giving advantage to one class of persons, in any trade or business,
over those of another. All, under our system, stand upon the same broad
principles of perfect equality. Honest labor and enterprise are left
free and unrestricted in whatever pursuit they may be engaged. This old
thorn of the tariff, which was the cause of so much irritation in the
old body politic, is removed forever from the new.