DRAFT RIOTS OF 1863.
Cause of the Riots--The London _Times_.--Draft called a despotic
Measure.--The despotic Power given to Washington by Congress.--Despotic
Action sometimes Necessary, in order to save the Life of the
Nation.--The Rights of Government.--Drafting the Legitimate Way to raise
an Army--It is not Unequal or Oppressive.
The ostensible cause of the riots of 1863 was hostility to the draft,
because it was a tyrannical, despotic, unjust measure--an act which has
distinguished tyrants the world over, and should never be tolerated by a
free people. Open hostility to oppression was more than once hinted in a
portion of the press--as not only a right, but a duty.
Even the London _Times_ said, "It would have been strange, indeed, if
the American people had submitted to a measure which is a distinctive
mark of the most despotic governments of the Continent." As if the
fact that a measure, because resorted to by a despotic government, was
therefore necessarily wrong. It might as well be said, that because
settling national difficulties by an appeal to arms has always been
a distinctive feature of despotic governments, therefore the American
people should refuse to sustain the government by declaring or
prosecuting any war; or that because it has always been a distinctive
feature of despotic governments to have naval and military schools, to
train men to the art of war, therefore the American people should not
submit to either. It is not of the slightest consequence to us what
despotic governments do or not do; the simple question is, whether the
measure is necessary for the protection of our own government, and the
welfare of the people. To leave this untouched, and talk only about
despotism, the right of the people, and all that, is mere demagogism,
and shows him who utters it to be unfit to control public opinion.
Besides, there is a great difference between measures that are despotic,
which are put forth to save the nation's life, or honor, and those put
forth to destroy freedom, and for selfish ends. Not that, intrinsically,
despotic measures are always not to be deprecated and avoided, if
possible; for if tolerated in one case, they may be exacted in another.
[Illustration: FORT LAFAYETTE, NEW YORK HARBOR.]
[Illustration: FORT HAMILTON, from whence U.S. Troops were sent to aid
in suppressing the Draft Riot of 1863.]
Liberty can never be guarded too carefully, or the barriers erected
around the rights of every individual respected too scrupulously. But
everything in this world is a choice between two evils. The greatest
wisdom cannot avoid _all_ evils; it can only choose the least. Sound
statesmanship regards any stretch of power better than the overthrow of
the nation. Probably there never was a more able and wise body of men
assembled, or more jealous of any exercise of arbitrary power, than the
First Congress of the United States; and yet, almost in the commencement
of our struggle for independence, when events wore such a gloomy aspect
that failure seemed inevitable, rising above its fears of despotic
measures, in its greater fear of total defeat, it conferred on
Washington powers that made him to a large extent military dictator. He
was authorized to raise sixteen battalions of infantry, three thousand
light-horse, three regiments of artillery, together with a corps of
engineers, and _appoint the officers himself_. He had, also, full power,
when he deemed it necessary, to call on the several States for the
militia; to appoint throughout _the entire army all the officers under
brigadiers_; fill up all vacancies; to take whatever he wanted for the
use of his troops, wherever he could find it, with no other restriction
than that he must pay for it, which last was nullified, because he was
empowered to _seize and lock up every man who refused to receive in pay
Continental money_. It would seem impossible that a body of men who were
so extremely sensitive in bestowing power on a military commander, and
so watchful of the rights of individuals, could have committed such an
act; and yet, who does not see that, under the circumstances, it
was wise. Now, granting that conscription is a despotic measure, no
truthful, candid man will deny that, in case of a war, where men must
be had, and can be got in no other way, that it would be the duty of
government to enforce it. It is idle to reply that the supposition is
absurd--that in this country such a thing can never happen; for what has
been in the world can be again. Besides, this does meet the question of
the _right_ of the Government, that must be settled before the emergency
comes. Now, we do not believe there is sounder principle, or one that
every unbiassed mind does not concede with the readiness that it does an
axiom, that, if necessary to protect and save itself, a government may
not only order a draft, but call out _every_ able-bodied man in the
nation. If this right does not inhere in our government, it is built on
a foundation of sand, and the sooner it is abandoned the better.
But we go farther, and deny that a draft is a despotic measure at all,
but is a just and equitable mode of raising an army. True, if troops
enough can be raised on a reasonable bounty, it is more expedient to
do so; but the moment that bounty becomes so exorbitant as to tempt the
cupidity of those in whom neither patriotism nor sense of duty have any
power, volunteering becomes an evil. We found it so in our recent war.
The bounty was a little fortune to a certain class, the benefit of which
they had no idea of losing by being shot, and hence they deserted, or
shammed sickness, so that scarce half the men ever got to the front,
while those who did being influenced by no motive higher than cupidity,
became worthless soldiers. A draft takes in enough men of a higher stamp
to leaven the mass. The first Napoleon, when asked what made his first
"army of Italy" so resistless, replied that almost every man in it was
intelligent enough to act as a clerk. The objection that a rich man, if
drafted, can buy a substitute, while the poor man, with a large family
depending upon him, must go, if of any weight at all, lies against
the whole structure of society, which gives the rich man at every step
immunities over the poor man. When pestilence sweeps through a city, the
rich man can flee to a healthy locality, while the poor man must stay
and die; and when the pestilence of war sweeps over the land, must one
attempt to reverse all this relation between wealth and poverty?
When society gets in that happy state, that the rich man has no
advantages over the poor, there will be no need either of drafting or
volunteering. Yet, after all, it is not so unequal as it at first sight
appears. War must have money as well as men, and the former the rich
have to furnish; and if they do this, it is but fair that they should be
allowed to furnish with it also the men to do their fighting. Besides,
there must be some rule that would exempt the men that carry on the
business of the country.
We have said this much, because the riots in New York, which might have
ended in national destruction, were brought about by preaching views
directly the opposite of these.
The military spirit is so prevalent in the nation, that in any ordinary
war the Government can get all the troops it wants by giving a moderate
bounty, and wages but a little greater than can be secured at any
ordinary business or occupation. Still, the right to raise them
differently should never be denied it.
When the old militia system was given up in the State, and a certain
number of regiments were raised and equipped and drilled for active
duty, and for which the people paid taxes, it was thought they would
furnish all the quota that would ever be called for from the State--and
in any ordinary war will. The crisis, however, in which we found
ourselves had never been anticipated, and hence not provided against,
and when Congress attempted to do it in what seemed to it the best
way, an outcry was raised of injustice and oppression. It was hard,
doubtless, but there are a great many hard things in the world that have
been and have to be borne. The feeling of hostility unquestionably would
have been less intense, had not so many of those to be drafted been
bitterly opposed to the war. Believing it to have been brought about by
the reckless demagogism and fanaticism of their political opponents,
and levied as it was against those who had been their warm political
friends, indeed, chief dependence for political success, it was asking
a good deal, to require them to step to the front, and fight in such a
war. Whether this feeling was right or wrong, had nothing to do with the
influence it actually exerted.
On this feeling was based, in fact, the real hostility to the draft, in
which a portion of the press shared. But, as we said before, we having
nothing to do with the justice or injustice of this belief or feeling;
we only state the fact, with our denial that it furnished any excuse for
the denunciations uttered against the draft as a wrong use of power,
or the refusal to submit to it on that account. The Government, whether
wrong or right, must be supported, or abandoned and given over to
revolution. In ordinary times, denunciation of its measures, and the
most strenuous opposition to them, is the right and often the duty of
every conscientious man. This right, exercised by the press, is one of
the most effectual checks against abuses, and the most powerful lever
to work reform and changes. But in a great crisis, to set one's self
against a measure on which the fate of the nation hangs, is a flagrant
abuse of that right; for the effort, if successful, will not work change
and an improved condition of things, but immediate, irretrievable ruin,
and put the nation beyond the reach of reform.