Page:Disunion and restoration in Tennessee (IA disunionrestorat00neal).pdf/29

 "That in view of a so decided expression of the will of the people, in whom all power is inherent and on whose authority all free governments are founded, and in the honest conviction that nothing has transpired since that time which should change that deliberate judgment of the people, we have contemplated with peculiar emotions the pertinacity with which those in authority have labored to over-ride the judgment of the people and to bring about the very result which the people themselves had so overwhelmingly condemned.

"That the Legislative Assembly is but the creature of the Constitution of the State, and has no power to enact any laws or to perform any act of sovereignty, except such as may be authorized by that instrument: and believing, as we do, that in their recent legislation, the General Assembly have disregarded the rights of the people and transcended their own legitimate powers, we feel constrained, and we invoke the people throughout the State, as they value their liberties, to visit that hasty, unconsiderate, and unconstitutional legislation with a decided rebuke, by voting on the eighth day of next month against both the Act of Secession and that of Union with the Confederate States.

"That the Legislature of the State, without having first obtained the consent of the people, had no authority to enter a 'Military League' with the 'Confederate States' against the General Government, and by so doing to put the State of Tennessee in hostile array against the Government of which it then was and still is a member. Such legislation is in advance of the expressed will of the people to change their governmental relations, was an act of usurpation, and should be visited with the severest condemnation of the people."

This report was unanimously adopted by the Convention and ordered to be printed, so that it might be circulated among the voters of the State. Before the Convention ad