Page:Conspectus of the history of political parties and the federal government - Houghton - 1860.djvu/43

Rh on credentials, which made three reports. The convention having adopted the majority report, the entire delegations of Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, California, and Delaware, and parts of Maryland, Kentucky, and Massachusetts, withdrew. Stephen A. Douglas (Ill.) and Herschel V. Johnson (Ga.) were then nominated. The Democratic platform of 1856 was adopted, with seven explanatory resolutions. [See D. and Pl.] The delegates who had withdrawn met at the Maryland Institute (June 28), and nominated John C. Breckinridge (Ky.) and Joseph Lane (Or.). The Democratic platform of 1856 was reaffirmed, with six explanatory resolutions. [See D. and Pl.] The convention which assembled at Richmond adopted this ticket and platform. The Democratic party was now dismembered. A heated canvass followed these nominations. Mr. Lincoln was elected, though he lacked nearly a million votes of receiving a popular majority.

SECESSION.—When the election of Lincoln was ascertained, the South Carolina legislature called a convention to consider the necessity of immediate secession, and southern members began to resign their seats in Congress. The President denied the right of a state to secede, but did not believe the government had the constitutional power to prevent it. South Carolina seceded Dec. 20, 1860. The next month, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, and Louisiana passed ordinances of secession. Texas withdrew on the first of February. Three days afterwards (Feb. 4), delegates from these states met at Montgomery, Alabama, and organized the Confederate States of America. When a state withdrew, it seized the forts, arsenals, and other Federal property within its limits. Several attempts at conciliation were made in Congress, but certain members declared that “the day for compromises had passed.” The long contest for the balance of power between “Slavery Extension” and “Slavery Restriction” was now culminating in war. The supremacy of the south was lost. “Disunion was the only remedy, and this could be obtained only through war.” Political distinctions were in a measure obliterated, and this administration closed, not on contentions between the Republican and Democratic parties, but on a conflict between Union and and Secession.

INAUGURATION.—Notwithstanding the secession of some of the southern states and the apprehensions of a violent resistance to the inauguration, the ceremony was brilliant and impressive. In his inaugural address, the President declared that “no state, on its own mere motion, could lawfully leave the Union;” and that he should “take care that the laws were faithfully executed in all the states.” He also assured the south that he had no purpose to meddle with their domestic affairs.

PARTY ADJUSTMENTS.—The Constitutional Union party dissolved soon after the election of Lincoln. Some of its members entered the Democratic party, others the Republican; but a large portion of them became Confederates. The Breckinridge Democrats of the south entered the confederacy; those of the north joined the Douglas wing. Some from each division of the party became Republicans.

THE WAR.—The first gun of the civil war was fired at Fort Sumter, on the morning of April 12th, 1861, from a battery in Charleston harbor. On the 15th of April, the President called for 75,000 volunteers, and the civil war began on both sides.

The free states were warmly for the war and the repression of secession by force. The slave states, except the “border states,” were as earnestly for secession. The border states were divided, the Union feeling predominating, except in Virginia, and preventing secession. But in them disunionists were strong, and sent representatives to the Confederate Congress, and a large force of volunteers to aid the south. The Republicans in all the states formed the distinctive “war party.” The Democrats generally gave support to the war, but some denounced it. There was frequent Democratic opposition to war measures in Congress and the state legislatures, and occasional violent demonstrations against it among disaffected people.

OPPOSITION TO THE WAR.—Organized and individual efforts to encourage desertion from the army, and to protect deserters from arrest, were frequent in the west; and the “Knights of the Golden Circle,” reconstructed into the “Sons of Liberty,” formed conspiracies for the release and arming of confederate prisoners for raids in the loyal states.

The worst opposition was excited by the attempts to execute the draft law. In the city of New York, in 1863, a large mob, mainly of foreign-born citizens, attacked the draft office, burned a colored orphan asylum, murdered several citizens, and set the authorities at defiance for three days. The riot was suppressed by troops.

The Habeas Corpus writ was suspended during the war, to give efficiency to the action of the government in suppressing disloyal conduct.

CURRENCY AND FINANCES.—A loan of $250,000,000 was authorized by Congress in the summer of 1861; of this, $50,000,000, subsequently increased to $60,000,000, was to be used as currency. On the 25th of February, 1862, an act authorized the issue of $150,000,000 of legal-tender notes, since known as “greenbacks.” Other issues were made afterwards. The first treasury notes were made receivable for duties, and thus soon taken out of circulation, leaving the “greenbacks” the only money in the country, until the national banks were authorized in 1864; and their bills, the “greenbacks” and the fractional currency remained for fifteen years the sole currency of the country. The opposition to the establishment of the new currency came from the Democrats, and was based mainly on the lack of constitutional power in Congress to make the “greenbacks” a legal-tender. The various loans authorized by Congress were represented by bonds, bearing five and six per cent. interest; and by 7.30 treasury notes convertible into six per cent. bonds. These constitute the national debt, and the basis of the national bank system. The notes of the banks are supplied by the government, and are secured by a deposit of national bonds. In the Democratic party, a strong feeling in favor of taxing national bonds was manifested, but the terms of the loan exempted them from taxation.