Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume V.djvu/228

 224 CONFEDERATE STATES the northern part of the state. In spite of their opposition, however, the following ordinance of secession was carried by a vote of 61 to 39 : u An Ordinance to dissolve the union between the state of Alabama and other states united under the compact styled ' the constitution of 'the United States of America.' 1 u Whereas the election of Abraham Lincoln and Hannibal Hamlin to the offices of president and vice president of the United States of America, by a sectional party, avowedly hos- tile to the domestic institutions and to the peace and security of the people of the state of Alabama, preceded by many and dangerous infractions of the constitution of the United States by many of the states and people of the northern section, is a political wrong of so insulting and menacing a character as to justify the people of the state of Alabama in the adoption of prompt and decided measures for their future peace and secu- rity: Therefore, " Be it declared and ordained by the people of the state of Alabama in convention assembled, That the state of Ala- bama now withdraws, and is hereby withdrawn, from the onion known as ' the United States of America,' and hence- forth ceases to be one of said United States, and is, and of right ought to be, a sovereign and independent state. " SEC. 2. Be it further declared and ordained by the people of MM state of Alabama in convention assembled, That all the powers over the territory of said state, and over the people thereof, heretofore delegated to the government of the United States of America, be, and they are hereby, with- drawn from said government, and are hereby resumed and vested in the people of the state of Alabama." Georgia, the most populous and powerful of the cotton states, did not secede without con- siderable hesitation on the part of a large pro- portion of her people, nor without solemn warning and earnest remonstrance from her most distinguished citizen, Alexander H. Ste- phens, who on Nov. 11, 1860, addressed her legislature in Milledgeville, which was then the capital of the state, in opposition to the project of calling a secession state convention. His ad- vice was not heeded. A convention was called, which was elected Jan. 4, 1861, and met at Milledgeville on the 16th. Mr. Stephens was a member, and on the second day of the ses- sion made a powerful and almost prophetic speech against secession, in which he said : "This step, secession, once taken, can never be recalled, and all the baleful and withering consequences that must fol- low (as you will see) will rest on this convention for all coming time. When we and our posterity shall see our lovely south desolated by the demon of war, which this act of yours will inevitably provoke, when our green fields and waving harvests shall be trodden down by a murderous soldiery, and the fiery car of war sweeps over our land, our temples of justice laid in ashes, and every horror and desolation upon us, who but this convention will be held responsible for it, and who but him who shall have given his vote for this unwise and ill-timed measure shall be held to a strict account for this suicidal act by the present generation, and be cursed and execrated by posterity in all coming time for the wide and desolating ruin that will inevitably follow this act you now propose to perpe- trate ? Pause, I entreat you, and consider for a moment what reasons you can give that will satisfy yourselves in calmer moments what reasons you can give to your fellow sufferers In the calamity that it will bring upon us. What reasons can you give to the nations of the earth to justify it ? They will be calm and deliberate judges of this case, and to what cause or one overt act can you point on which to rest the plea of justification? What right has the north assailed? what in- terest of the south has been invaded ? what justice has been denied? and what claim, founded in justice and right, has been unsatisfied ? Can any of you name to-day one govern- mental act of wrong, deliberately and purposely done by the government at Washington, of which the south has a right to complain? I challenge an answer. On the other hand, let me show the facts (and believe me, gentlemen, I am not here the advocate of the north, but I am here the friend, the firm friend and lover of the south and her institutions, and for this reason I speak thus plainly and faithfully for yours, mine, and every other man's interest, the words of truth and soberness) of which I wish you to judge, and I will only state facts which are clear and undeniable, and which now stand in the authen- tic records of the history of our country. Whn we of the south demanded the slave trade, or the importation of Afri- cans for the cultivation of our lands, did they not yield the right for twenty years ? When we asked a three-fifths repre- sentation in congress for our section, was it not granted ? When we demanded the return of any fugitive from justice, or the recovery of those persons owing labor or allegiance, was it not incorporated in the constitution, and again ratified and strengthened in the fugitive slave law of 1850 ? Do you reply that in many instances they have violated this compact, and have not been faithful to their engagements ? As individuals and local communities they may have done so, but not by the sanction of government, for that has always been true to southern interests. Again, look at another fact. When we asked that more territory should be added, that we might spread the institution of slavery, did they not yield to our demands in giving us Louisiana, Florida, and Texas, out of which four states have been carved, and ample territory left for four more, to be added in due time, if you by this unwise and impolitic act do not destroy this hope, and perhaps by it lose all, and have your last slave wrenched from you by stern military rule, or by the vindictive decree of a universal eman- cipation, which may reasonably be expected to follow ? But again, gentlemen, what have we to gain by this proposed change of our relation to the general government? We have always had the control of it, and can yet have if we remain in it, and are as united as we have been. "We have had a ma- jority of the presidents chosen from the south, as well as the control and management of most of those chosen from the north. We have had 60 years of southern presidents to their 24, thus controlling the executive department. So of the judges of the supreme court, we have had 18 from the south, and but 11 from the north. Although nearly four fifths of the judicial business has arisen in the free states, yet a majority of the court has always been from the south. This we have required, so as to guard against any interpretation of the con- stitution unfavorable to us. In like manner, we have been equally watchful over our interests in the legislative branch of the government. In choosing the presiding officer (pro tern.) of the senate we have had 24 and they 11 ; speakers of the house, we have had 23 and they 12. While the majority of the representatives, from their greater population, have always been from the north, yet we have generally secured the speaker, because he to a great extent shapes and controls the legislation of the country. Nor have we had less control in every other department of the general government. At- torney generals we have had 14, while the north have had but 5. Foreign ministers we have had 86, and they but 54. While three fourths of the business which demands diplomatic agents abroad is clearly from the free states, because of their greater commercial interests, we have, nevertheless, had the principal embassies, so as to secure the world markets for our cotton, tobacco, sugar, on the best possible terms. We have had a vast majority of the higher officers of both army and navy, while a larger proportion of the soldiers and sailors were drawn from the north. Equally so of clerks, auditors, and comptrollers filling the executive department ; the records show for the last 50 years that of the 8,000 thus employed, we have had more than two thirds, while we have only one third of the white population of the republic. Again, look at another fact, and one, be assured, in which we have a great and vital interest ; it is that of revenue, or means of supporting gov- ernment. From official documents we learn that more than three fourths of the revenue collected has uniformly been raised from the north. Pause now, while you have the op- portunity, to contemplate, carefully and candidly, these im- portant things. Look at another necessary branch of govern- ment, and learn from stern statistical facts how matters stand in that department. I mean the mail and post-office privi- leges that we now enjoy under the general government, as it has been for years past. The expense for the transportation of the mail in the free states was, by the report of the post- master general for 1860, a little over $13,000,000, while the income was $19,000,000. But in the slave states the trans- portation of the mail was $14,716,000, and the revenue from the mail only $8,000,265, leaving a deficit of $6,715,735 to be supplied by the north for our accommodation, and without which we must have been entirely cut off from this most es- sential branch of the government. Leaving out of view for the present the countless millions of dollars you must expend in a war with the north, with tens of thousands of your sons and brothers slain in battle and offered up as sacrifices on the altar of your ambition for what? I ask again. Is it for the overthrow of the American government, established by our common ancestry, cemented and built up by their sweat and blood, and founded on the broad principles of right, justice, and humanity ? I must declare to you here, as I have often done before, and it has also been declared by the greatest and wisest statesmen and patriots of this and other lands, that the American government is the best and freest of all govern- ments, the most equal in Its rights, the most .just in its de- cisions, the most lenient in its measures, and the most inspi- ring in its principles, to elevate the race of men, that the sun of heaven ver shone upon. Now for you to attempt to over-