Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 1.djvu/399

Rh his State; had given his word to Senators Pugh, of Ohio, and Douglas, of Illinois, specially, that he was ready to vote for the Crittenden resolutions and stand by the Union; and but two weeks before had delivered his calm, courteous and able speech of withdrawal from the Senate in obedience to the will of the State. At the moment of his election to the presidency, he was on his farm, preferring not to be the civic head of the Confederacy, but offering himself if needed, to its military service. Mr. Davis had only followed the secession popular movement. He did not lead it. He was thoroughly convinced of the legality of secession and in complete sympathy with Southern feeling, but he was among the last of the statesmen from the Confederate States to abandon all hope of an adjustment which would save the country from the horrors of war. Mr. Stephens was the leader in the South in 1860 of those who counseled political battle in Union against the triumphant sectional party. To the last moment he stood in Georgia against the passage of the act of separate State secession. He was National in his true sentiment as well as in reputation a thorough devotee of the Union under the Constitution, and consistently a firm believer in the legal principles of the State-rights school. Upon the secession of his State, he did not hesitate as to his allegiance, but at once heartily and powerfully entered upon the patriotic duty of assisting in directing the actions of States and people to the establishment of constitutional free Government. Upon such men the seceded States placed administrative power, under a constitution like that which the fathers of the great American Union had fashioned. Their election was greeted with great applause by the crowded assembly which witnessed the voting, and was received in all the South with demonstrations of delight. It satisfied the nations of the world that intelligent statesmen were guiding secession, and should have satisfied the North that the Southern States proposed no act of rebellion, nor any hostility to the United States,