Replies

Read this WLAT....and WEEP!

Slavery and States Rights
Great Speech of Hon. Joseph Wheeler, of Alabama.
From the Richmond, Va., Dispatch, July 31, 1894

Causes Of The War.
Opposition of the Southern Colonists to Slavery, and Their Devotion
to the Union--Advocates of Secession.

On Friday, July 13th, 1894, the House of Representatives
being in Committee of the Whole, on appropriations and expenditures,
and having under consideration the bill to remove the charge of
desertion standing against Patrick Kelleher, late private, Company C,
Thirty-eighth Illinois Volunteers, Mr. Wheeler, of Alabama, as a
member of the Committee on Military Affairs, made a speech which has
since attracted widespread attention. The discussion, which became
animated, led up to the causes of the late war and its immense
expenditures, and Mr. Wheeler brought out some startling historical
facts. He said:
I did not intend or desire to enter into any discussion about
the war, but in reply to the question of the distinguished gentleman
from New York, General Curtis, I will say that these expenditures
were caused by events which I deplored. The armies causing these
immense expenditures were raised for reasons with which I was not in
sympathy, and I regretted very much that they were raised. (Laughter
and applause). I never thought them necessary, because I believed
then, as I believe now, that our appeals should have been heeded when
we went on our knees at the Peace Congress, in Philadelphia, to beg
for arbitration and peace, and to beg that some guarantee should be
given that the Constitution of the country should be regarded.

CHIEF-JUSTICE CHASE IN THE PEACE CONVENTION.

Chief-Justice Chase told our southern people, in his great
speech of February 6, 1861, that neither he nor any of the leaders of
the Republican party, could guarantee to the South that the party
coming into power would obey the clause of the Constitution which
pledged protection to the property of the people of the South.
Mr. Chase said:

The result of the national canvass which recently terminated
in the election of Mr. Lincoln has been spoken of by some as the
effect of a sudden impulse or of some irregular excitement of the
popular mind; and it has been somewhat confidently asserted that,
upon reflection and consideration, the hastily-formed opinions which
brought about the election will be changed.
I cannot take this view of the result of the presidential
election. I believe, and the belief amounts to absolute conviction,
that the election must be regarded as a triumph of principles
cherished in the hearts of the people of the free States.
We have elected him (Mr. Lincoln). After many years of
earnest advocacy and of severe trial we have achieved the triumph of
that principle. By a fair and unquestioned majority we have secured
that triumph. Do you think we, who represent this majority, will
throw it away? Do you think the people will sustain us if we
undertake to throw it away? I must speak to you plainly, gentlemen of
the South. It is not in my heart to deceive you. I, therefore, tell
you explicitly that if we of the North and West would consent to
throw away all that has been gained in the recent triumph of our
principles, the people would not sustain us, and so the consent would
avail you nothing.

Mr. Chase, in that speech, with great force, gave the South
to understand that the Northern States would not, and ought not, to
comply with the obligations of the Federal Constitution.
He said if the leaders attempted an enforcement of that part
of the Constitution which the South demanded, the people of the North
could not sustain them, and they would be powerless.
But he said we may do this: We admit the contract, we admit
the constitutional contract, and we may regard it similar to cases in
chancery where circumstances have arisen that make a party unable to
comply with his contract, and, therefore, the court decrees pecuniary
compensation.
There were many reasons which brought on the conditions which
culminated in the war, which necessitated the vast expenditure of
money which is exhibited in the table.
The doctrine of States rights, protective tariff, internal
improvements, and in fact all the questions upon which the Democratic
party differed with their political opponents, entered into the
question; but as history seems to contend that the existence of
slavery was the main cause, I will comply with my friends' request,
and, from a southern standpoint, give some reasons which come to my
mind, and in doing so I beg that every one present will believe me
when I disclaim any feeling or any disposition to censure any one or
any section.
I know all, and especially I know the soldiers, will accept
my statements in the same good feeling in which they are uttered, and
will appreciate the propriety of a southern man calling attention to
historical facts, which refute allegations made upon this floor, that
the responsibility of the war rested altogether upon the southern
people.
When the people of the South settled on the shores of
Maryland, Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia, they had no intention
of encouraging or even tolerating the institution of slavery.
The thrifty New England seamen, in their voyages to the
Indies and other countries, saw its practical operation, and solely
with the view of profit in the transportation and sale of the
African, they, with characteristic energy, urged upon all the
Colonies the great advantages which would result from utilizing this
character of labor. Their friends in the North readily acceded to
their importunities, but not so with those of the South.

SOUTHERN COLONIES OPPOSED SLAVERY.

Oglethorpe and his colonists were possibly the most
determined in resisting the importation, sale and use of African
slaves; and for twenty years they were successful in the enforcement
of the law which prohibited the landing of slaves in Georgia.
Finally, together with the other Southern States, they succumbed, and
the New England ship owners amassed fortunes by plying the business
of buying negroes in Africa, transporting them to the United States,
and selling them for the most part to southern people.
The evil of this traffic soon became apparent to the people
of the South, and when the Constitution was framed in 1787, the South
demanded that the fundamental law of our land should inhibit this
traffic of importing human beings from Africa. The South was resisted
by the New England slave-traders, and as a compromise, it was agreed
that the trade should be restricted, and after the year 1800,
entirely prohibited, but, by the persistency of New England, the
provision was finally extended to the year 1808.
It has been charged that the opposition of southern slave-
holders, which was manifested in the convention to the continued
importation of slaves, was attributable to their desire to maintain
the value of the slave property they already possessed, but
contemporaneous writing clearly shows that the mass of these people
were actuated by no such selfish motives.
Very soon the people of the North found that their climate
was not adapted to slave labor, and as the Constitution prohibited
the continuance of the profitable business of catching or buying
negroes in Africa and selling them to the people of the South, they
ceased to have any interest in this class of property. I do not say
that the lack of pecuniary interest actuated any one, but about this
time there commenced what history will record as a war upon the
institution of slavery.

NORTHERN STATES NULLIFY THE CONSTITUTION.

Instead of upholding and enforcing the constitutional
guarantee which I have read, many States of the North enacted laws
making it a criminal offence for any official to comply with his oath
of office and comply with the terms of the Constitution, so far as it
affected this question. This was done against the protest of such
great men as Edward Everett and Daniel Webster.
This precise question was discussed by that great statesman,
Daniel Webster, in his Buffalo speech of May 22, 1851. He said:

Then there was the other matter, and that was the fugitive-
slave law. Let me say a word about that. Under the provisions of the
Constitution, during Washington's administration, in the year 1793,
there was passed by general consent a law for the restoration of
fugitive slaves. Hardly any one opposed it at that period; it was
thought to be necessary in order to carry the Constitution into
effect; the great men of New England and New York all concurred in
it. It passed and answered all the purposes expected from it till
about the year 1841 or 1842, when the States interfered to make
enactments in opposition to it.

We see here that Mr. Webster states that these laws, enacted
by Northern States, nullifying this constitutional provision,
commenced as far back as 1841 to 1842. He continued:
Now I undertake, as a lawyer, and on my professional
character, to say to you and to all, that the law of 1850 is
decidedly more favorable to the fugitive than General Washington's
law of 1793. * *
Such is the present law, and, much opposed and maligned as it
is, it is more favorable to the fugitive slave than the law enacted
during Washington's administration in 1793, which was sanctioned by
the North as well as by the South. The present violent opposition has
sprung up in modern times. From whom does this clamor come?
* * * Look at the proceedings of the anti-slavery conventions
in Ohio, Massachusetts, and at Syracuse, in the State of New York.
What do they say? That, so help them God, no colored man shall be
sent from the State of New York back to his master in Virginia. Do
not they say that? And, to the fulfillment of that, they pledge their
lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor. Their sacred honor!
They pledge their sacred honor to violate the Constitution; they
pledge their sacred honor to commit treason against laws of their
country.
We see here that Daniel Webster charged that the agitators
against slavery were guilty of pledging their honor to violate the
Constitution. He said they pledged their sacred honor to commit
treason against the laws of their country. If possible, Mr. Webster
was even more emphatic in his great speech at Capon Springs. This
devoted patriot said:

The leading sentiment in the toast from the chair is the
union of the States. The union of the States. What mind can
comprehend the consequences of that union, past, present, and to
come? The union of these States is the all-absorbing topic of the
day; on it all men write, speak, think, and dilate from the rising of
the sun to the going down thereof. And yet, gentlemen, I fear its
importance has been insufficiently appreciated.

Again, speaking as a constitutional lawyer, Mr. Webster said:

How absurd it is to suppose that when different parties enter
into a compact for certain purposes either can disregard any one
provision, and expect, nevertheless, the other to observe the rest! I
intend, for one, to regard and maintain and carry out to the fullest
extent the Constitution of the United States, which I have sworn to
support in all its parts and all its provisions. It is written in the
Constitution--
"No person held to service or labor in one State under the
laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law
or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but
shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or
labor may be due."
That is as much a part of the Constitution as any other, and
as equally binding and obligatory as any other on all men, public or
private. And who denies this? None but the Abolitionists of the
North. And, pray, what is it they will not deny? They have but the
one idea; and it would seem that these fanatics at the North and the
Secessionists at the South are putting their heads together to devise
means to defeat the good designs of honest, patriotic men. They act
to the same end and the same object, and the Constitution has to take
the fire from both sides.

Mr. Webster then told his hearers that if the Northern States
persisted in their refusal to comply with the Constitution the South
would no longer be bound to observe the constitutional compact He
said:

I have not hesitated to say, and I repeat, that if the
Northern States refuse, willfully and deliberately, to carry into
effect that part of the Constitution which respects the restoration
of fugitive slaves, and Congress provides no remedy, the South would
no longer be bound to observe the compact. A bargain cannot be broken
on one side and still bind the other side. I say to you, gentlemen in
Virginia, as I said on the shores of Lake Erie and in the city of
Boston, as I may say again in that city or elsewhere in the North,
that you of the South, have as much right to recover your fugitive
slaves as the North has to any of its rights and privileges of
navigation and commerce.

Mr. Webster also said:

I am as ready to fight and to fall for the constitutional rights of
Virginia as I am for those of Massachusetts.

Then followed the election of Abraham Lincoln upon a platform
which clearly informed the southern people that the guaranties of the
Constitution, which they revered, and the doctrines of State rights
and other principles of government, which they cherished, were to be
ignored, and that they were to be deprived of the greater part of
their property, and all possibility of continued prosperity.
The South was of necessity alarmed. They were seized with the
fear that the extreme leaders of the Republican party would not stop
at any excess, that they would not be satisfied with depriving them
of their property, but that, so far as possible, they would place the
ignorant slave not only upon equality with, but even above his former
master.
It was but natural that such an impending fate horrified the
people, and that measures to avert it were contemplated and
discussed.

SOUTHERN PEOPLE DEVOTED TO THE UNION.

The southern people loved the Union with a devotion which had
no precedent in the history of the world. It was a work very largely
of their creation. Their blood and treasures were freely given to
secure its independence. The South gave to that sacred cause the
voice and eloquence of Patrick Henry, to arouse the people to action;
the pen of Jefferson, to write the Declaration that we were a free
and independent people; the sword of Washington, to win the battles
which made us one of the nations of the earth; and it also furnished
Chief-Justice Marshall, to proclaim the principles upon which
American jurisprudence and civil liberty are founded.
They were southern with Washington who crossed the
Alleghenies, one hundred and forty-one years ago, to defend the
pioneers who were braving the dangers of the western forest. They
were southern men who, under Captain Gorman, hastened to the defence
of Massachusetts at the first sound of battle at Concord and
Lexington. In the war of 1812 the South gave her undivided support to
the flag, and largely contributed to the success of our arms. The
last battle of that war was fought by a southern general, with
southern men, on southern soil.
In the Indian wars the South always furnished her full share
of soldiers, and in the Mexican war the killed and wounded from the
Southern States in proportion to population was about three times
that of the States of the North. In the war of 1861-'65 the South
furnished 640,000 to the Federal army, a larger number than it
furnished to the Confederate army. This was the only period during
which there was any division of sentiment on this point among the
southern people, for since 1865 they have been as devoted to the flag
and the Union as the people of any part of our land.
The people of the South did not wish to give up the benefits
of a government to the establishment of which they had so largely
contributed. They were loyal and law-abiding, and refused to follow
the example of the participants in the Shay rebellion in New York,
the whiskey rebellion in Pennsylvania, the Dorr rebellion in Rhode
Island, and the Hartford convention rebellion in Connecticut; but
they reluctantly succumbed to the conviction that the party about to
take control would have no respect for their rights. For more than
half a century they had been taught by their northern brethren that
when the people of a State found that it was not to their advantage
to remain in the Union it was not only their privilege but their duty
to peacefully withdraw from it.

SECESSION ADVOCATED BY MASSACHUSETTS.

Ninety years ago the people of Massachusetts expressed
themselves in favor of the principle of secession by the enactment of
the following resolution in the Massachusetts Legislature:
That the annexation of Louisiana to the Union transcends the
constitutional power of the Government of the United States. It
formed a new Confederacy, to which the States united by the former
compact are not bound to adhere.
It is clearly shown by the history of the times that the
people of New England were very pronounced in their expressions that
the Constitution recognized the unquestioned right of a State to
secede from the Union.
At the celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of the
inauguration of Washington, April 30, 1839, ex-President John Quincy
Adams delivered an address which was received with great approval by
the people. In that speech Mr. Adams said:

But the indissoluble union between the several States of this
confederated nation is, after all, not in the right but in the heart.
If the day should ever come (may Heaven avert it!) when the
affections of the people of these States shall be alienated from each
other; when the fraternal spirit shall give way to cold indifference,
or collision of interest shall fester into hatred, the bands of
political asseveration will not long hold together parties no longer
attracted by the magnetism of conciliated interests and kindly
sympathies; and far better will it be for the people of the disunited
States to part in friendship from each other than to be held together
by constraint. Then will be the time for reverting to the precedents
which occurred at the formation and adoption of the Constitution, to
form again a more perfect union by dissolving that which could no
longer bind, and to leave the separated parts to be reunited by the
law of political gravitation to the centre.

It is very evident that Mr. Adams and the people of New
England generally regarded these views as the correct interpretation
of the original compact which bound the people together. I will call
attention to the fact that three years later, January 24, 1842, he
presented a petition to Congress from citizens of Haverhill, Mass. I
read from Congressional Globe, volume XI, page 977:

MONDAY, January 24th.--In the House. Mr. Adams presented the
petition of sundry citizens of Haverhill, in the State of
Massachusetts, praying that Congress will immediately adopt measures
favorably to dissolve the union of these States.
First. Because no union can be agreeable and permanent which
does not present prospects for reciprocal benefit; second, because a
vast proportion of the revenues of one section of the Union is
annually drained to sustain the views and course of another section,
without any adequate return; third, because, judging from the history
of past nations, that union, if persisted in in the present state of
things, will certainly overwhelm the whole nation in destruction.
There was a strong manifestation against receiving the
petition, and by some it was denounced as treason and perjury.

On page 980 Mr. Adams spoke in his own defence and in favor
of the petition. He said:

I hold that it is no perjury, that it is no high-treason, but
the exercise of a sacred right to offer such a petition, and that it
is false in morals, as it is inhuman, to fasten that charge on men
who, under the countenance of such declarations as I have here
quoted, come and ask of this House a redress of grievances. And if
they do mistake their remedy, this government should not turn them
away, and charge them with high-treason and subordination of perjury;
but ought to take it up, to weigh the considerations which can be
urged in their favor; and if there be none but those which are so
eloquently set forth in the pamphlet I have quoted, these should be
considered. If they have mistaken their remedy, the House should do
as the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Marshall) told us he was ready to
do--admit the facts.

Mr. Gilmer, page 983, introduced the following resolution:

Resolved, That in presenting to the consideration of this House a
petition for the dissolution of the Union, the member from
Massachusetts (Mr. Adams) has justly incurred the censure of this
House.

The following resolution was also introduced by Mr. Marshall,
of Kentucky:

Resolved, therefore, That Hon. John Q. Adams, a member from
Massachusetts, in presenting for the consideration of the House of
Representatives of the United States a petition praying the
dissolution of the Union, has offered the deepest indignity to the
House, of which he is a member; an insult to the people of the United
States, of which that House is the legislative organ; and will, if
this outrage is permitted to pass unrebuked and unpunished, have
disgraced his country, through their representatives, in the eyes of
the whole world.

Two weeks were exclusively devoted to Mr. Adam's trial, at the end of
which the entire proceedings were laid on the table. I find the
following note on page 236 of the Globe:

The trial of Mr. Adams, to the exclusion of all other
business, commenced on the 25th of January, and terminated on the 7th
of February, when the whole proceedings were laid on the table,
without deciding a single point. The expenses of the House during
that time, thus wasted, exceeded $26,000.
The failure on the part of the House to even censure Mr.
Adams was construed by many as an admission that Mr. Adams's
construction was correct.

This sentiment in favor of secession continually gained
strength, and five years later the Legislature of Massachusetts
passed another secession resolution. I read from "Acts and
resolutions passed by the Legislature of Massachusetts in the year
1844," page 319:

1. Resolved, That the power to unite an independent foreign State
with the United States is not among the powers delegated to the
General Government by the Constitution of the United States.

2. Resolved, * * * That the project of the annexation of Texas,
unless arrested on the threshold, may drive these States into a
dissolution of the Union.

3. Resolved, That his Excellency, the Governor, be requested to
transmit a copy of the foregoing resolves to each of the Senators and
Members of the House of Representatives of this Commonwealth in the
Congress of the United States.

4. Resolved, That his Excellency, the Governor, be requested to
transmit a copy of the same resolves to the Executive of the United
States and of the several States.

Approved by the Governor, March 15, 1844.

A year later, February 22, 1845, the Legislature of
Massachusetts celebrated Washington's birthday by passing still
another secession resolution.

I read from the same volume, pages 598 and 599:

Resolved, That Massachusetts has never delegated the power to admit
into the Union, States or Territories without or beyond the original
territory of the States and Territories belonging to the Union at the
adoption of the Constitution of the United States.

Resolved, * * * and as the powers of legislation granted in the
Constitution of the United States to Congress do not embrace the case
of the admission of a foreign State or foreign Territory by
legislation into the Union, such an act of admission would have no
binding force whatever on the people of Massachusetts.

Resolved, That his Excellency, the Governor, be requested to transmit
copies of the preceding report and resolves to the President of the
United States, the several Senators and Representatives in Congress
from this Commonwealth, and the Governors of the several States.

Approved by the Governor, February 22, 1845.

I beg to call special attention to the second resolution, and
also to that part of the third resolution which directed the Governor
to transmit copies of the resolution, etc. All this was a part of the
history of our country when Mr. Lincoln was elected by the solid vote
of the States of the North, opposed by the solid vote of the States
of the South.
A large part of the northern press contended that the States
of the South had a full right to secede if the people desired to
withdraw from the Union, and it was common to see in the northern
press the words, "Erring sisters go in peace."

THE NORTHERN PRESS ADVOCATES SECESSION.

Mr. Lincoln's election was fully known on the evening of
November 8, 1860, and the next morning, November 9th, Mr. Greeley's
New York Tribune contained the following:

GOING TO GO.

If the cotton States shall become satisfied that they can do
better out of the Union than in it, we insist on letting them go in
peace. The right to secede may be a revolutionary one, but it exists,
nevertheless.

And again, in the same issue of his widely-circulated and
influential paper, Mr. Greeley said:

We must ever resist the asserted right of any State to remain
in the Union and nullify or defy the laws thereof. To withdraw from
the Union is quite another matter; and whenever a considerable
section of our Union shall deliberately resolve to go out, we shall
resist all coercive measures designed to keep it in. We hope never to
live in a republic whereof one section is pinned to the residue by
bayonets. Let them have both sides of the question fully presented;
let them reflect, deliberate, then vote; and let the action of
secession be the echo of an unmistakable popular fiat. A judgment
thus rendered, a demand for separation so backed, would either be
acquiesced in without the effusion of blood, or those who rushed upon
carnage to defy and defeat it would place themselves clearly in the
wrong.

The New York Tribune of November 16, 1860, again announced
their views to the southern people in an article headed "Secession In
Practice," in which the paper used the following words:

Still we say, in all earnestness and good faith, whenever a
whole section of this republic, whether a half, a third, or only a
fourth, shall truly desire and demand a separation from the residue,
we shall earnestly favor such separation. If the fifteen slave
States, or even the eight cotton States alone, shall quietly,
decisively say to the rest: "We prefer to be henceforth separated
from you," we shall insist that they be permitted to go in peace. War
is a hideous necessity, at best, and a civil conflict, a war of
estranged and embittered fellow-countrymen, is the most hideous of
all wars. Whenever the people of the cotton States shall have
definitely and decisively made up their minds to separate from the
rest of us, we shall urge that the proper steps be taken to give full
effect to their decision.

Three days afterward, on the 19th, the same paper uses these
words:

Now, we believe and maintain that the Union is to be
preserved only so long as it is beneficial and satisfactory to all
parties concerned.
We do not believe that any man, any neighborhood, town,
county, or even State, may break up the Union in any transient gust
of passion; we fully comprehend that secession is an extreme, an
ultimate resort--not a constitutional, but a revolutionary remedy.
But we insist that this Union shall not be held together by force
whenever it shall have ceased to cohere by the mutual attraction of
its parts; and whenever the slave States or the cotton States only
shall unitedly and coolly say to the rest, "We want to get out of the
Union," we shall urge that their request be acceded to.

The New York Herald of Friday, November 23, 1860, said:

THE DISUNION QUESTION--A CONSERVATIVE REACTION IN THE SOUTH.

We publish this morning a significant letter from Governor
Letcher, of Virginia, on the subject of the present disunion
excitement in the South; southern constitutional rights, Northern-
State acts of nullification, and the position of Virginia in this
crisis.* * * * To this end would it not be well for the conservative
Union men of the city of New York to make a demonstration--a northern
movement or conciliation, concession and harmony?
Coercion, in any event, is out of the question. A union held
together by the bayonet would be nothing better than a military
despotism. Conciliation and harmony, through mutual concessions, in a
reconstruction of the fundamental law, between the North and the
South, will restore and perpetuate the union contemplated by the
fathers. So now that the conservative men of the South are moving,
let the Union men of the North second their endeavors, and let New
York, as in the compromise of 1850, lead the way.

And on the following day, November 24th, the Tribune says:

FEDERAL COERCION.

Some of the Washington correspondents telegraph that Mr.
Buchanan is attempting to map out a middle course in which to steer
his bark during the tempest which now howls about him. He is to
condemn the asserted right of secession, but to assert in the same
breath that he is opposed to keeping a State in the Union by what he
calls Federal coercion. Now, we have no desire to prevent secession
by coercion, but we hold this position to be utterly unsupported by
law or reason.
I will also quote an article from the New York Daily Tribune,
Friday, November 30, 1860:

ARE WE GOING TO FIGHT?

But if the cotton States, generally, unite with her in
seceding, we insist that they cannot be prevented, and that the
attempt must not be made. Five millions of people, more than half of
them of the dominant race, of whom at least half a million are able
and willing to shoulder muskets, can never be subdued while fighting
around and over their own hearthstones. If they could be, they would
no longer be equal members of the Union, but conquered dependencies.
* * * We propose to wrest this potent engine from the disunionists by
saying frankly to the slave States:

"If you choose to leave the Union, leave it, but let us have
no quarrel about it. If you think it a curse to you and an unfair
advantage to us, repudiate it, and see if you are not mistaken. If
you are better by yourselves, go, and God speed you. For our part, we
have done very well with you, and are quite willing to keep along
with you, but if the association is irksome to you, we have too much
self-respect to insist on its continuance. We have lived by our
industry thus far, and hope to do so still, even though you leave
us."

We repeat, that only the sheen of northern bayonets can bind
the South wholly to the evils of secession, but that may do it. Let

us be patient, neither speaking daggers nor using them, standing to
our principles, but not to our arms, and all will yet be well.

I will read an extract from an editorial in the New York
Times of December 3, 1860:

By common consent, moreover, the most prominent and tangible
point of offence seems to be the legislation growing out of the
fugitive-slave law. Several of the Northern States have passed
personal-liberty bills, with the alleged intent to prevent the return
of fugitive slaves to their masters.
From Union men in every quarter of the South come up the most
earnest appeals to the Northern States to repeal these laws. Such an
act, we are assured, would have a powerful effect in disarming the
disunion clamor in nearly all the Southern States, and in promoting
the prospects of a peaceful adjustment of all pending differences.

The next day, December 4th, the New York Times publishes another
article, in which it says:

Mr. Weed has stated his opinion of the crisis thus:

1. There is imminent danger of a dissolution of the Union.
2. The danger originated in the ambition and cupidity of men who
desire a southern despotism, and in the fanatic zeal of the northern
Abolitionists, who seek the emancipation of slaves regardless of
consequences.
3. The danger can only be averted by such moderation and forbearance
as will draw out, strengthen and combine the Union sentiment of the
whole country.

Each of these statements will command general assent. The
only question likely to arise relates to the practical measures by
which the" moderation and forbearance" can be displayed.
And while the South Carolina Convention was in session, and
before any State had seceded, and when it was doubted by many whether
such action would be taken, Mr. Greeley said:

If it (the Declaration of Independence) justifies the
secession from the British Empire of three million colonists in 1776,
we do not see why it would not justify the secession of five millions
of southerns from the Federal Union in 1861. If we are mistaken on
this point, why does not some one attempt to show wherein and why?
For our own part, while we deny the right of slave-holders to hold
slaves against the will of the latter, we cannot see how twenty
millions of people can rightfully hold ten, or even five, in a
detested union with them by military force.
In the same issue of Mr. Greeley's paper we read the
following:

If seven or eight contiguous States shall present themselves
authentically at Washington, saying: "We hate the Federal Union; we
have withdrawn from it; we will give you the choice between
acquiescing in our secession and arranging amicably all incidental
questions on the one hand, and attempting to subdue us on the other,"
we could not stand up for coercion, for subjugation, for we do not
think it would be just. We hold the right of self-government even
when invoked in behalf of those who deny it to others. So much for
the question of principle.

This conservative view of the question which Mr. Greeley gave
to the world with such emphasis, and in which he expressed his
opinion of the principle involved, was reiterated for days, weeks and
months, with the characteristic persistence of that able leader.
Mr. Greeley also said:

Any attempt to compel them by force to remain would be
contrary to the principles enunciated in the immortal Declaration of
Independence, contrary to the fundamental ideas on which human
liberty is based.
These articles continued to appear in the northern press for
months after the election of Mr. Lincoln, and until after most of the
Southern States had seceded. They continued until after the people of
the South had adopted a constitution, and organized their new
Confederate Government; after they had raised and equipped an army,
appointed ambassadors to foreign courts, and convened a congress;
after they had taken possession of three fourths of the arsenals and
forts within their territory, enrolled her as one of the nations of
the earth.
After all this, Mr. Greeley's paper continued to indorse the
action of all southern people as fully as it was possible for
language to enable it to do so. Mr. Greeley said:

We have repeatedly said, and we once more insist, that the
great principle embodied by Jefferson in the Declaration of American
Independence, that governments derive their just powers from consent
of the governed, is sound and just; and that if the slave States, the
cotton States, or the gulf States only choose to form an independent
nation, they have a clear, moral right to do so. Whenever it shall be
clear that the great body of southern people have become conclusively
alienated from the Union, and anxious to escape from it, we will do
our best to forward their views.

Mr. Greeley was earnestly and ably supported in his views by
the most prominent men and able editors of Republican papers all over
the North.
I cite the following from the Commercial which was certainly
the leading Republican paper of Ohio. After Mr. Lincoln was
inaugurated, the Commercial said:

We are not in favor of blockading the southern coast. We are
not in favor of retaking by force the property of the United States
now in possession of the seceders. We would recognize the existence
of a government formed of all the slave-holding States, and attempt
to cultivate amicable relations with it.

In addition to all this, the commander of the Federal army,
General Winfield Scott, was very emphatic in endorsing the views of
the New York Tribune and other papers, to the effect that secession
was the proper course for the southern people to pursue, and his oft-
repeated expression, "Wayward sisters, part in peace," seemed to meet
the full approval of the great body of the people of the North. In
obedience to all this advice, the Southern States did secede, and
almost immediately the vast Federal armies were raised, battles were
fought, money expended, and this, let me tell my friend from New
York, was the cause of the vast appropriations regarding which he
asked an explanation.
These appropriations were made to carry on the most
stupendous war recorded in modern history. From April 15, 1861, to
the close of the war, there were called into the service of the
United States 2,865,028 soldiers. Besides this we have had evidence
placed before Congress of numerous organizations called into service
by the Governors or other officials of border States, which would
probably number 500,000 men.
That these men were brave is proved by the terrible
casualties of the battles which they fought.
The struggle from May 5 to May 12, 1864; at the Wilderness
and Spotsylvania, which should really be called one battle, was a
good index of the sanguinary character of the conflict.
The losses of Grant's army in that conflict, as reported in
Scribner's statistical record, was 9,774 killed, 41,150 wounded, and
13,254 missing.
It gives an idea of the magnitude of this conflict to recall
that General Grant's loss in killed and wounded in this battle was
greater than the loss in killed and wounded in all the battles of all
the wars in this country prior to 1861.
The loss in all the battles of the seven years of the
Revolution was 2,200 killed, and 6,500 wounded.
The loss in the army of 1812 was 1,877 killed and 3,737
wounded.
The loss in the war with Mexico was 1,049 killed and 7,929
wounded; in all, only 19,227 men.
Now, if we add all the losses of the Indian wars, including
the French and Indian war, the entire loss would be less than half
the killed and wounded in this great battle.
As another evidence of the gallantry of the officers and
soldiers, I will mention that during that war forty-six generals of
the United States army and seventy-six generals of the Confederate
army were killed at the head of their commands in battle.
I have given an explanation of this matter to the best of my
ability, and from the standpoint of one whose feelings were and are
in entire sympathy with the southern people, but who since the close
of that war has been as devoted to the Union of the States and the
prosperity, welfare, and glory of our country as the most
distinguished soldier who fought in the Federal army from 1861 to
1865.
Source: Southern Historical Society Papers. Vol. XXII. Richmond,
Va., January-December. 1894.

Read this WLAT....and WEEP!

Slavery and States Rights Great Speech of Hon. Joseph Wheeler, of Alabama.

Revision. Excuse making. Pitiful.

"The view of the South as the victim of Northern exploitation seemed to fit what happened *after* the war, when Northern capitalism reigned supreme and the South was very poor. It seemed logical to many people that this was what the South had seceded to resist and the North had fought to bring about. What tended to be forgotten is that in 1860 the South was wealthier than most nations in the world; that in per capita income of its *white* population it was about equal to the North; that it was making considerable progress in industrialization; and that Northern capitalists and bankers, so far from being determined to crush the South, were generally the most pro-Southern element in the Northern population. It was largely secession and the ensuing war which brought about the economic results Southerners later claimed they seceded to prevent."

-- from the moderated ACW Newsgroup

Walt

Great Speech of Hon. Joseph Wheeler, of Alabama.

Wheeler, Wheeler, Wheeler...I've heard that name.

"Wheeler's command drove the Federal advance from Sandersvile after a brief skirmish and settled in the town for the night. This rare, if temporary, success inspired a Sandersville lynch mob to murder some ofWheeler's captives. A mob appeared near midnight -- probably a band of Confederate troops -- pushed aside the frightened guards, carried the Federal prisoners into a nearby field, and shot them down."

--Sherman's March" p. 75, by Burke Davis

"As they had in the previous case of the unknown girl raped by federal soldiers near Aiken, Wheeler's troopers took immediate and impulsive revenge. Galloping along a country road in tbe tracks of bluecoat raiders, the rebel troopers overtook the supposed rapists, killed them at once, cut their throats and left the bodies at the roadside bearing a sign: THESE ARE THE SEVEN.

This incident opened a new phase of grim retribution between the armies. Almost daily, other Federal soldiers were found at the roadside, within plain view of the blue columns, lying with slashed throats. General Slocum reported finding twenty-one bodies of his soldiers tumbled into a ravine.

On February 22, eighteen of Killpatrick's men were killed in this way aad some of the bodies bore crudely lettered messages: DEATH TO FORAGERS. In an effort to halt the murders, Sherman ordered his commander to kill a Confederate prisoner for each such Federal corpse they found, and the impulse to revenge became official army policy.

Sherman realized that his bummers and foragers had prompted the executions by the Confederates, and told his generals: "If our foragers commit excesses, punish them yourself, but never let an enemy judge between our men and the law."

Kilpatrick sent a message to Wheeler describing the murder of eighteen soldiers, all of whom, he said, had been slain after their surrender: "Unless some satisfactory explanation is made to me before sundown, February 23, I will cause 18 of your men, now my prisoners, to be shot at that hour, and if this cowardly act is repeated, I will not only retaliate . . . but there shall not be a house left within reach of my scouting parties on my line of march . . . I know of no other way to intimidate cowards."[ Wheeler agreed to investigate]...Kilpatrick agreed to take no further action at that time, but ended the exchange with a threat that any further murders would be avenged.

--"Sherman's March" pp 187-88 by Burke Davis.

Walt

I guess July 31, 1894 must have been Fantasy History Day. Oglethorpe and his colonists were Englishmen devoted to philanthropic purposes. That they were able to resist the temptation of slavery for a time is commendable, but as philanthropic values faded they did eventually succomb. Slavery had been practiced unofficially and under the table from the earliest years of the colony. Oglethorpe's ban on slavery and rum was unpopular from the beginning and as time went on the clamour for legalizing slavery grew louder and louder. The argument was that Georgia would remain poor unless it followed South Carolina's example. The settlers eventually suceeded in getting Oglethorpe replaced and his policies overturned.

The idea that it required evil, silver-toungued Yankee devils to convince noble Southern hold-outs is absurd. It reflects the black-white, edenic myth behind so much neo-confederate thought. The Fall was universal, and can't be reduced to such simplistic terms. In the first place, most of the slave traders were Englishmen. The slave trade built Liverpool and built-up Bristol and other seaports. New Englanders participated as did Spanish, Portugese and others, but Wheeler's seduction theory is a fantasy. In the second place slavery was already established in Virginia and the other colonies. It was the role of slavery as a path to wealth and power that seduced Georgians and others, not the persuasive "Yankee" serpent. In the third place, South Carolina had many settlers from the West Indies and close ties to the sugar islands of the Caribbean. They were already seduced when they came here. And their slave-based wealth did more to corrupt the poor beggars of Savannah than any New England slave trader could have.

In the Constitutional convention the strongest opposition to ending the slave trade came from Georgia and South Carolina. It is true that Ellsworth and Sherman, Connecticut delegates supported South Carolina, but the reason for this is unclear. They said their support was on "state's rights" grounds. Others have suggested that it was a tactic designed to win Connecticut concessions in its favor on other issues. But the idea that "the North" defeated "the South's" efforts to get rid of the slave trade is simply wrong. Other Northern delegates had no desire to prolong the slave trade and didn't try to.

At this point, Wheeler shifts gears. It's no longer a matter of an anti-slavery South. Now the South is fighting to protect its "right" to own slaves. The right of other communities to ban slavery on their territory gets short shrift from him. But beyond this, why make such exaggerated claims for Southern abolitionist sentiment when the defense of slavery was such an important part of thought and action in the the slave states? Why not just let the chips fall where they fall? To say that Southerners thought that the Constitution guaranteed them return of their slaves is enough. One doesn't have to torture history by turning slaveowners into frustrated and deceived former abolitionists. If they'd been truly serious about abolition, they would have followed through with it.

If John Quincy Adams relayed a petition for dissolution of the union to Congress he was playing a role in the time-honored process of petition for the redress of grievances. His action may not have been popular or the right one to take practically, but it was a far cry from unilateral secession, the seizure of property and raising an army against constitutional government. Freedom of speech and expression certainly allow a community to express its discontent with how things are going in the nation as a whole. A fuller picture of the era would present similar protests by South Carolina, Alabama and other states, communities and individuals and allow us to see the peculiarities, similarities, and differences of such protests, rather than cherry pick incidents from the history of one Northern state or one town within it.

Wheeler's analysis of editorials from four Northern newspapers is also weak. Such papers were willing to accept secession at first -- "advocate" is too strong a word. But by Sumter the situation looked very different to them. Those who had assumed that there was no point in keeping jurisdictions and populations in the union by force or aginst there will came to believe that there was every reason to counter violence undertaken to pull lands and people out of the union and expropriate federal and private property. Neo-confederate arguments tend to assume that the states or some confederacy of them have an absolute sovereignty to do as they wished. Northerners who might have had few problems allowing the Gulf States to go their own way, were provoked to take action when it became clear that the new Confederacy would use force to take property and land. If Wheeler really wanted to understand history, rather than simply craft a defense of his own actions, he would ask what was behind the evolution of Northern opinion.

The positive side of Wheeler's speech is that it shows just how little ground there is for neo-confederate mythmaking. Rather than Southern slaveowners being the first victims of the American empire, they were in the forefront of its creation, whether in 1812 or 1846 or with Wheeler himself in 1898. It shouldn't be presumed that the differences that provoked war in 1861 were permanent or more important than the general agreement about fundamentals that has united Americans throughout their history.