LETTER TO A PUBLIC MEETING AT THE COOPER INSTITUTE, NEW YORK, MARCH 6,
1862.
This meeting was in pursuance of the following call.
“All citizens of New York who rejoice in the downfall
of treason, and are in favor of sustaining the National
Government in the most energetic exercise of all the rights
and powers of war, in the prosecution of its purpose
to destroy the cause of such treason, and to recover
the territories heretofore occupied by certain States
recently overturned and wholly subverted as members of the
Federal Union by a hostile and traitorous power calling
itself ‘The Confederate States,’ and _all who concur in
the conviction that said traitorous power, instead of
achieving the destruction of the Nation, has thereby
only destroyed Slavery_, and that it is now the sacred
duty of the National Government, as the only means of
securing permanent peace, national unity and well-being,
to provide against its restoration, and _to establish in
said territories Democratic Institutions founded upon
the principles of the Great Declaration_, ‘That all MEN
are created equal, endowed by their Creator with the
unalienable rights of Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of
Happiness,’ are requested to meet at the Cooper Institute,
on the sixth day of March, at eight o’clock, P. M., to
express to the President and Congress their views as to the
measures proper to be adopted in the existing emergency.”
On the day of this great meeting the President communicated to
Congress his Message on Compensated Emancipation, which was his
first public step in the transcendent cause.
The President of the meeting was Hon. James A. Hamilton, the
venerable son of Alexander Hamilton, who agreed with Mr. Sumner
in regard to the death of Slavery and the power of Congress.
There was also a distinguished list of Vice-Presidents,
with George Bancroft at the head. There were letters from
Preston King, Senator of New York, Henry Wilson, Senator of
Massachusetts, David Wilmot, Senator of Pennsylvania, George W.
Julian, Representative in Congress from Indiana, and from Mr.
Sumner. Among the orators were the President of the meeting,
Mr. Martin F. Conway, Representative in Congress from Kansas,
and Carl Schurz, who had recently returned from his Spanish
mission.
The report in the _New York Tribune_ has the caption, “The
Suicide of Slavery.--New York for a Free Republic.”
Mr. Sumner’s letter was a vindication of his Resolutions.
SENATE CHAMBER, March 5, 1862.
DEAR SIR,--Never, except when suffering from positive disability,
have I allowed myself to be absent from my seat in the Senate
for a single day, and now, amid the extraordinary duties of the
present session, I am more than ever bound by this inflexible
rule. If anything could tempt me to depart from it, I should find
apology in the invitation with which you honor me.
The meeting called under such distinguished auspices is needed at
this moment as a rally to those true principles by which alone
this great Rebellion can be permanently suppressed. I should be
truly happy to take part in it, and try to impart something of
the strength of my own convictions.
It is only necessary that people should see things as they are,
and they will easily see how to deal with them. This is the
obvious condition of practical action. Now, beyond all question,
Slavery is the great original malefactor and omnipresent
traitor,--more deadly to the Union than all Rebel leaders,
civil or military. Therefore, as you are in earnest against the
Rebellion, you will not spare Slavery. And happily the way is
plain, so that it cannot be mistaken.
Look throughout the whole Rebel territory, and you do not find
a single officer legally qualified to discharge any function
of Government. By the Constitution of the United States,
“members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive
and judicial officers, both of the United States and of the
several States, shall be bound by oath or affirmation to support
this Constitution.” But these functionaries have all renounced
allegiance to the United States, and taken a new oath to support
the Rebel Government, so that at this moment they cannot be
recognized as constitutionally empowered to act. But a State is
known only through its functionaries, constitutionally empowered
to act; and since all these have ceased to exist, the State,
with its unnatural institutions, has ceased to exist also, or it
exists only in the lifeless parchments by which its Government
was originally established. The action of these functionaries was
impotent to transfer its territory to a pretended confederation.
To destroy the State was all they could do.
In the absence of any legitimate authority in this territory,
Congress must assume the necessary jurisdiction. Not to do so is
abandonment of urgent duty. Some propose a temporary military
government; others propose a temporary provisional government,
with limited powers. These all concede to Congress jurisdiction
over the territory; nor can such jurisdiction be justly
questioned. But I cannot doubt that it is better to follow the
authoritative precedents of our history, and proceed as Congress
is accustomed to proceed in the organization and government of
other territories. This is simple.
And as to Slavery, if there be any doubt that it died
constitutionally and legally with the State from which it drew
its malignant breath, it might be prohibited by the enactment of
that same Jeffersonian ordinance which originally established
Freedom throughout the great Northwest.
Accept my thanks for the honor you have done me, and believe me,
dear Sir,
Faithfully yours,