Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 9.djvu/285

 HE general assembly of Missouri met at Jefferson City on the ad of January, 1861, and the Southern element organized both houses with scarcely a show of opposition. There was but one Republican in the senate, and in the house there were 83 Democrats, 37 Bell men and 12 Republicans. It was conceded that the Secessionists controlled the legislative branch of the government. All that was required to put the State in line with the other Southern States was prompt and decisive action. The people of the State expected such action would be taken and were prepared to uphold the legislature in taking it.

The message of the retiring governor, Robert M. Stewart, was sent to the two houses on January 3d. Governor Stewart was a Northern man—a native of New York—and a fair type of a Northern Democrat. He sympathized with the South but held to the Union. No one, therefore, was surprised that, while he admitted the wrongs the South had suffered at the hands of the North, and the dangers that threatened the country from the intolerant and aggressive spirit of the party about to come into power, he opposed secession on the ground that it was without warrant of law, and the secession of Missouri in particular on the special ground that it had no power to