Posted on 11/06/2003 7:31:54 PM PST by republicanwizard
Astounding Triumph of Republicanism.
THE NORTH RISING IN INDIGNATION AT THE MENACES OF THE SOUTH
Abraham Lincoln Probably Elected President by a Majority of the Entire Popular Vote
Forty Thousand Majority for the Republican Ticket in New-York
One Hundred Thousand Majority in Pennsylvania
Seventy Thousand Majority in Massachusetts
Corresponding Gains in the Western and North-Western States
Preponderance of John Bell and Conservatism at the South
Results of the Contest upon Congressional and Local Tickets
The canvass for the Presidency of the United States terminated last evening, in all the States of the Union, under the revised regulation of Congress, passed in 1845, and the result, by the vote of New-York, is placed beyond question at once. It elects ABRAHAM LINCOLN of Illinois, President, and HANNIBAL HAMLIN of Maine, Vice-President of the United States, for four years, from the 4th March next, directly by the People.
The election, so far as the City and State of New-York are concerned, will probably stand, hereafter as one of the most remarkable in the political contests of the country; marked, as it is, by far the heaviest popular vote ever cast in the City, and by the sweeping, and almost uniform, Republican majorities in the country.
RELATED HEADLINES
ELECTION DAY IN THE CITY: All Quiet and Orderly At the Polls: Progress of the Voting in the Several Wards: The City After Nightfall: How the News Was Received: Unbounded Enthusiasm of the Republicans and Bell-Everett Headquarters: The Times Office Beseiged: Midnight Display of Wide-Awakes: Bonfires and Illuminations
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
During the period between the civil war and FDR that effectively means two Democrat presidents to "blame" the south for: Woodrow Wilson and Grover Cleveland. Wilson was elected only due to the unusual circumstances of TR's run in 1912 and Cleveland was one of the best presidents we ever had.
I don't know what time of day on the 12th that Anderson agreed to this, but the 15th would have been after he would have been resupplied by the Federal force offshore. And the qualifier at the end of his message above makes it seem like he would not evacuate or might possibly open fire if he got supplies or instructions to that effect.
Beauregard had cabled the Montgomery government on the 11th that Anderson had refused his request for an evacuation date and a 'won't fire first' pledge. This was apparently before Anderson's official reply on the 12th above. Again, there is no time of day stated on the Anderson reply. At 3:20 AM on the 12th Beauregard notified Anderson that Fort Sumter would be fired upon in an hour, and at 4:30 the bombardment began.
Now that's an odd way of reasoning. You are effectively maintaining that all the property of the general government as of 1860 on the eve of secession was in reality property of only the northern part of that government. As a result you demand that, even though the property was previously divided across the entire country prior to the split, it suddenly became the exclusive property of the north after the split and somehow needed to be "purchased" from them by the south.
Oh, and save your usual bullsh*t about the south supposedly leaching off of the north. As I have previously demonstrated to you, most of those forts that the north "claimed" as its own were bought, built, and paid for by the colony of South Carolina and later the state of South Carolina. During the period where they were under federal control, they frequently fell into disrepair and neglect so the feds obviously weren't paying much for their upkeep. And once again, the north got just as many forts built in it as the south did. Charleston got a fort built in the middle of its harbor but so did Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, and practically every other yankee city. Want to talk about mints again? If so, show me the last time there was a gold rush in yankeeland that necessitated a branch mint, however small it may have been, to coin the new extracts from the ground. That's right. There weren't any. Yet mints were built at the location of both major pre-war gold rushes in the United States: North Carolina and California.
Also, the Lincoln administration kept telling Southern representatives and the Governor of South Carolina that Fort Sumter would be evacuated, when it had already decided to make the resupply effort. A majority of the Lincoln cabinet was opposed to the resupply plan and thought it would lead to war, but Lincoln did it anyway.
Not even that - he wouldn't even recieve them unofficially, or through an intermediary negotiator, or through another government official serving as third party. That didn't stop them from trying to meet with Lincoln. They sought meetings for weeks. Two different sitting United States Senators who had not seceded yet and a Supreme Court Justice all offered to act as negotiators between the commissioners and Lincoln. Lincoln refused every single one of them and refused to even meet with sitting US Senators from the south!
After repeated attempts failed the three commissioners returned to Montgomery and filed a report with Davis. They effectively said that it was impossible to work with this man, Lincoln, on anything at all because he would not even acknowledge that they existed.
WASHINGTON, 28th DECEMBER, 1860.Sir: We have the honor to transmit to you a copy of the full powers from the Convention of the People of South Carolina, under which we are "authorized and empowered to treat with the Government of the United States for the delivery of the forts, magazines, light houses and other real estate, with their appurtenances, within the limits of South Carolina, and also for an apportionment of the public debt and for a division of all other property held by the Government of the United States as agent of the confederated States, of which South Carolina was recently a member; and generally to negotiate as to all other measures and arrangements proper to be made and adopted in the existing relation of the parties, and for the continuance of peace and amity between this commonwealth and the Government at Washington."
The main problem that the negotiators had with Buchanan was Robert Anderson. At the time the Charleston command was in Fort Moultrie. Sumter was essentially a mothballed fort with gunpowder stored inside of it in case a war broke out but virtually no permanent garrison. Anderson had been given orders from the war department to simply stay put and keep his command out of harms way while awaiting further instructions. Yet on December 26, acting impulsively and without any order to do so, Anderson slipped his command over into the mothballed Sumter and garrisoned it - an act considered by many to be hostile in it self ala moving troops in the Rhineland, but on a much smaller scale. Anderson had his men spike the guns at Moultrie before they moved out and essentially abandoned the place. The South Carolinians took this as both a hostile act and a sign that Anderson was mobilizing in the island fortress, so they moved in behind him and seized Fort Johnson the next day or so. Interestingly enough, the federal garrison at Fort Johnson at the time was miniscule and the buildings had been in constant need of repair ever since shortly after the feds came in to occupy it 1805. This was itself a violation of the terms of cession in 1805, and by law was grounds in itself for SC to resume control of Fort Johnson. Anderson's act came on the same day the commissioners were scheduled to meet with Buchanan, but since his move into Sumter had not been ordered or scheduled it basically threw Washington into turmoil. A fallout crisis ensued, among it the seizure of Fort Johnson, and as a result Buchanan had to cancel his formal negotiations with the commissioners to avoid public backlash up north.
Meanwhile, the very moment he heard that Fort Johnson was reclaimed by SC and Fort Moultrie after it, president elect Abe Lincoln began devising a military assault in Charleston to eventually recapture it. Lincoln's earliest correspondence on this was in late December 1860 only a few days after Anderson's move. He continued conspiring and sending directives to Winfield Scott throughout January and February 1861 even though he was not even president yet and had no authority yet to command the nation's military.
Charleston was reaping what Jeff Davis sowed about 2 1/2 years before.
There is a difference between holding or expelling people without any threat of bodily harm, as happened with the southern captain and the workers on Sumter, and trying to blow a ship out of the water, as happened with the Star of the West and the Rhoda Shannon. It was only the pathetic marksmanship that kept either ship from being sunk.
What hostile and threatening gestures did the Fort Sumter garrison make?
President Lincoln saw that when blacks fought under the flag, they should have the rights of citizens.
Walt
Good for him.
Walt
Where? Nothing in that document revoked title to Sumter, nor was there an act of the legislature that did that. They just decided to take what they wanted, by any means.
It is the difference between ringing the doorbell and showing up at 2am with a shotgun.
The resupply effort showed up during daylight, hours after the southern attack had begun. What is threatening about that, especially when it was not unexpected. The south knew the resupply effort was underway and what the intentions were.
False.
Instructions to Robert Chew:
"You will proceed directly to Charleston, South Carolina: and if, on your arrival there, the flag of the United States shall be flying over Fort Sumpter (sic), and the Fort shall not have been attacked, you will procure an interview with Governor Pickens and read to him as follows:
'I am directed by the President of the United States to notify you to expect an attempt will be made to supply Fort Sumpter (sic) with provisions only; and that, if such attempt be not resisted, no effort to throw in men, arms, or ammunition will be made, without further notice, or in case of attack on the Fort.'"
Lincoln's actions were made plain, there was nothing Clintonesque about it. The Lincoln administration had made no attempt at landing men or munitions, they had not tried to sneak anything in. The administration had not taken any hostile actions whatsoever, in the face of provocation after provocation on the part of the Davis regime. Lincoln wanted peace, Davis wanted war, it's as simple as that.
Of course that is false.
President Lincoln said clearly in his first inaugural:
"The power confided to me will be used to hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the government..."
So I don't know why you would tell a big lie like that.
Walt
They were traitors.
Walt
Sounds like George Bush talking about Al Gore. Some things never change.
Rightly so.
This was during the Buchanan administration:
"These gentlemen claim to be ambassadors," he [attorney general Stanton] said. "It is preposterous! They cannot be ambassadors; they are lawbreakers, traitors. They should be arrested. You cannot negotiate with them; and yet it seems by this paper that you have been led into that very thing. With all respect to you, Mr. President, I must say that the Attorney General, under his oath of office, dares not to be cognizant of the pending proceedings. Your reply to these so-called ambassadors must not be transmitted as the reply of the president. It is wholly unlawful, and improper; its language is unguarded and to send it as an official document will bring the presidency to the point of usurpation."
-- The Coming Fury, p. 165 by Bruce Catton
Walt
Wrong. The southern commissioners were sent "for the purpose of negotiating friendly relations between that government and the Confederate States of America" and only as a secondary task was the "settlement of all questions of disagreement between the two governments upon principles of right, justice, equity, and good faith." First and foremost was the recognition of the legitimacy of the southern rebellion and that was a non-starter from the beginning.
Now, had the commissioners been sent for the settlement of all questions of disagreement between the states upon principles of right, justice, equity, and good faith, then there is no doubt that Lincoln would had talked with them as long as it took to reach an amicable settlement.
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