Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 1.djvu/559

Rh proclamation calling for 500,000 men for one year to be drafted after September 5th, if not furnished before, sufficiently explained the position of the administration.

A condition was now created which made the theory of &quot;a Union as it was and a Constitution as it is,&quot; impracticable. The conditions existing in 1860 could not be restored by even the combined wisdom and power of all parties in both sections. Human events in their course create political relations wholly new. It was unfortunate for the cause of peace that party fortunes prevented the application of the truths of the times to the facts which had appeared. Reverence for constitutional restrictions on Federal power had fallen in the exigencies of war among the thieves who left it half dead. It was yet but half dead, and might have been restored to life, but it was left on the wayside, where it still lies awaiting the coming of a patriotism which will displace the usurpations of the &quot; higher law &quot; and enthrone constitutional law in the hearts of the American people. Slavery was also as much doomed in July, 1864, as it was at Appomattox in 1865. Neither peace and Union, nor peace and disunion, could have saved the institution. This fact had become so apparent to the Confederate leaders that they would have abolished slavery in order to secure independence. But the words which should have been bravely spoken from housetops on both sides at the risk of imprisonment, banishment and death, were whispered only in closets. Mr. Lincoln whispered union and Mr. Davis called for peace. But the two magnates supreme in the realm of influence stood before the public on only two terms: Mr. Lincoln said "Submission;" Mr. Davis said "Independence.&quot; Probably neither meant all these two words implied.