Chapter IX: Part 9

The most potent factor in determining the action of the Convention would be the policy of the incoming Federal administration with respect to the states which had seceded. While a large majority of the Virginia people at the recent election had declared against the secession of their state, yet the organization of the Southern Confederacy had precipitated a problem of extreme delicacy and danger. What would be the attitude of the Federal Government towards these states? If negotiations for their return proved unavailing, would they be permitted to enjoy in peace their new-found independence, or would the Federal Government seek to establish its supremacy over them by force of arms?

Charles Francis Adams alluding to the crisis, says: "So now the issue shifted. It became a question not of slavery, or of the wisdom, or even the expediency of secession, but of the right of the National Government to coerce a sovereign state. This, at the time, was well understood."[369]

No one acquainted with the historic position of Virginia could doubt what her action would be if called to decide for or against coercion. Would the alternative be presented? President Buchanan, while denying the constitutional right of secession, had submitted to Congress the problem of dealing with the states which had seceded and Congress had taken no action. What would be President Lincoln's position? To his forthcoming inaugural address, the country looked for a definite declaration of his policy and by that declaration the course of Virginia would be determined.

-----

Footnote 364:

_Lee at Appomattox and other Papers_, Adams, p. 403.

Footnote 365:

_Lee at Appomattox and Other Papers_, Adams, p. 403.

Footnote 366:

_Idem_, p. 402.

Footnote 367:

_History of United States_, Rhodes, Vol. III, p. 309.

Footnote 368:

_Journal of Virginia Convention_, 1861, p. 8.

Footnote 369:

_Lee at Appomattox and Other Papers_, Adams, p. 404.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

_PART IV_

THE ATTEMPT OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT
TO COERCE THE COTTON STATES—THE
PROXIMATE CAUSE OF VIRGINIA'S
SECESSION

------------------------------------------------------------------------

XXXVIII

THE COERCION OF THE COTTON STATES—VIRGINIA'S
POSITION

PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S FIRST INAUGURAL

President Lincoln's first inaugural address may be safely reckoned among the most notable of American state papers, both for the purity of diction and the earnest patriotism which pervade it. With a spirit of fraternalism appealing and pathetic, he called upon his countrymen to turn from discord and separation to a new lease of brotherhood and a revival of devotion to the Republic consecrated by the sacrifices and labors of their fathers. The address gave assurance that the Federal Government would respect the rights of the states and individuals in regard to slavery, and that no interest or section would be disturbed in any constitutional right by the incoming administration. Upon the great point, however, as to the policy of the Federal Government in regard to coercing the states which had seceded, the address was held by many to be fairly susceptible of different constructions. Thus the President said:

"I, therefore, consider that in view of the constitution and the laws,
the Union is unbroken, and to the extent of my ability I shall take
care, as the constitution itself expressly enjoins upon me, that the
laws of the Union be faithfully executed in all the states. Doing this
I deem to be a simple duty on my part, and I shall perform it so far
as practicable unless my rightful masters, the American People, shall
withhold the requisite means, or in some authoritative manner direct
the contrary."

It must be remembered that at the time these words were uttered the seven Cotton States had withdrawn from the Union; had organized the Southern Confederacy, and that in all the vast region from North Carolina to the Rio Grande, the Confederacy's authority was recognized, except at Fort Sumter and three or four like forts where the flag of the Union still waved. Mr. Lincoln's declaration, therefore, that these states were still in the Union and that he intended to enforce the execution of its laws within their borders was accepted in many quarters as avowing a purpose to coerce these states and their citizens into a recognition of its jurisdiction and authority. Against this construction should be placed other extracts from the address. Thus he said:

"The power confided to me will be used to hold, occupy and possess the
property and places belonging to the Government and to collect the
duties and imposts; but beyond what may be necessary for these objects
there will be no invasion, no using of force, against or among the
people anywhere. Where hostility to the United States in any interior
locality shall be so great and universal as to prevent competent
resident citizens from holding the Federal offices, there will be no
attempt to force obnoxious strangers among the people for that object.
While the strict legal right may exist in the Government to enforce
the exercise of these offices, the attempt to do so would be so
irritating and so nearly impracticable withal that I deem it better to
forego for the time the uses of such offices."

VIEWS OF MEMBERS OF CONVENTION

The declarations of President Lincoln were received with strongly contrasted feelings by the three elements which constituted the membership of the Virginia Convention. The Secessionists hailed his position as fore-shadowing Federal coercion which in turn would compel Virginia's withdrawal from the Union. The unconditional Union men accepted his views as the logical and necessary avowals of his constitutional duty. The conditional Union men, while denying in a measure the correctness of his position, both from a constitutional and ethical standpoint, were yet gratified by the pacific spirit of his address. They counselled moderation on the part of the Convention and clung tenaciously to the hope that some adjustment might be perfected between the authorities of the Union and those of the seceded states and thus the alternative of submitting to coercion or seceding from the Union might never be presented to the people of Virginia. This last element held the balance of power in the Convention. As illustrating their position, it may be well to insert extracts from the speeches of a few of their representative men.

James W. Sheffey, speaking five days before President Lincoln's inauguration, said:

"We love the Union, but we cannot see it maintained by force. They say
the Union must be preserved—she can only be preserved through
fraternal affection. We must take our place—we can't remain neutral.
If it comes to this and they put the question of trying force on the
states which have seceded, we must go out.... We are waiting to see
what will be defined coercion. We wait to see what action the new
President will take."[370]

George Baylor, speaking three days before President Lincoln's inauguration, said: "Secession is not a constitutional measure; even if it were, we should delay before using it. Let us stay in the Union where we have always been. Yet, I am opposed to coercion."[371]

Thomas Branch, speaking the day after President Lincoln's inaugural address, said:

"My heart has been saddened and every patriotic heart should be
saddened, and every Christian voice raised to heaven in this time of
our trial. After the reception of Mr. Lincoln's inaugural, I saw some
gentlemen rejoicing in the hotels. Rejoicing for what, sir? For
plunging ourselves and our families, our wives and children in civil
war? I pray that I may never rejoice at such a state of things. I pray
that I may never have to march to battle to front my enemies. But I
came here to defend the rights of Virginia and I mean to do it at all
hazards; and if we must go to meet our enemies, I wish to go with the
same deliberation, with the same solemnity that I would bend the knee
in prayer before Almighty God."[372]

Jubal A. Early, speaking on the same day, said:

"I do not approve of the inaugural of Mr. Lincoln and I did not expect
to be able to endorse his policy and I did not think there was a
member of this Convention who expected to endorse it; but, sir, I ask
the gentleman from Halifax and the gentleman from Prince Edward, if it
were not for the fact that six or seven states of this Confederacy
have seceded from this Union, if the declarations of President Lincoln
that he would execute the laws in all the states would not have been
hailed throughout the country as a guarantee that he would perform his
duty, and that we should have peace and protection for our property
and that the Fugitive Slave Law would be faithfully executed? I ask
why is it that we are placed in this perilous condition? And if it is
not solely from the action of these states that have seceded from the
Union without having consulted our views?"[373]

George W. Brent, speaking on the 8th of March, said:

"Abolitionism in the North, trained in the school of Garrison and
Phillips, and affecting to regard the constitution as 'a league with
Hell and a covenant with Death,' has with a steady and untiring hate
sought a disruption of this Union, as the best and surest means for
the accomplishment of the abolition of slavery in the Southern
States.... South Carolina and those leading statesmen of the South who
have been educated in the philosophy of free trade have likewise with
unwearied and constant assiduity pursued their schemes of disunion.
Conscious of their inability to effect their schemes within the Union
they have sought a disruption of the states....

"In these two schools of political philosophy, Mr. President, I trace
all the evils and disastrous troubles which now afflict and disturb
our beloved and unhappy land.... Recognizing as I have always done,
the right of a state to secede, to judge of the violation of its
rights and to appeal to its own mode for redress, I could not uphold
the Federal Government in any attempt to coerce the seceded states to
bring them back in the Union."[374]

VIEWS OF A UNION LEADER

The foregoing extracts give some fairly accurate idea of the position of those members of the Convention, who, though looked upon as Union men, yet, when the final test came after President Lincoln called for troops, voted for secession. How close in sympathy with this element were many of the Union men will appear from the following extract from a speech of George W. Summers, who upon the final ballot still voted against secession:

"Where would be the wisdom of passing an ordinance of secession in the
face of the known sentiment of a Virginia constituency? The people do
not mean to adopt such an ordinance until every available measure of
adjustment has been exhausted. Come on then with your plans; and when
all fail, the people of the commonwealth will be united from one end
to the other.... No enlightened statesmanship can compare the
secession of states by conventional authority with insurrectionary
movements in former times. It is a new and unlooked for condition of
things. I am in favor of letting the seceded states alone. The last
news gives encouragement to the hope that the troops will soon be
withdrawn from Fort Sumter, and time will bring back the states into
the common family. It is the duty of Virginia to stand by the Union
until the performance of that duty becomes impossible."[375]

-----

Footnote 370:

See _Richmond Enquirer_, February 28th, 1861.

Footnote 371:

See _Richmond Enquirer_, March 2d, 1861.

Footnote 372:

See _Richmond Enquirer_, March 7th, 1861.

Footnote 373:

See _Richmond Enquirer_, March 7th, 1861.

Footnote 374:

See _Richmond Enquirer_, March 9th, 1861.

Footnote 375:

_Richmond Dispatch_, March 13th, 1861.

XXXIX

THE CONTEST IN THE VIRGINIA CONVENTION FOR AND
AGAINST SECESSION

For nearly a month and a half after President Lincoln's inauguration, the struggle in the Virginia Convention between the advocates and opponents of secession continued—a contest in which the champions of opposing sides living beyond the state sought to make their influence effective. Mr. Rhodes says: "It is easy to understand why both Davis and Lincoln were so anxious for the adhesion of Virginia. Her worth was measured by the quality as well as the number of her men."[376]

COERCION THE PIVOTAL FACT

Henry Wilson records in his _Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America_:

"There was no state concerning whose course there was greater doubt or
more anxious solicitude than Virginia. Her size, position, traditional
influence and past leadership, with the knowledge that in whichever
side of the scale her great weight should be thrown, the fortunes of
the threatened conflict would be seriously affected thereby,
intensified the anxiety felt."[377]

Commissioners from Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana appeared before the Convention on different occasions, and with impassioned eloquence, appealed to Virginia to stand with her sisters of the South.

Mr. Lincoln's efforts were directed through prominent Union members of the Convention. His great object was to secure an adjournment _sine die_ of that body, without the adoption of an ordinance of secession, and without the assurance on his part that no attempt would be made to coerce the Cotton States. John B. Baldwin, a leading Union man in the Convention, was one of its members brought into conference with Mr. Lincoln. On the 6th of April, 1861, Mr. Baldwin went to the White House, where, in response to the President's inquiries, he presented the attitude of the dominant element of the Virginia Convention, and heard the President's appeals and reasonings why that body should immediately adjourn. Mr. Baldwin urged upon Mr. Lincoln the wisdom and necessity of proclaiming to the world that the Federal Government had no intention of coercing the Cotton States: "Only give this assurance," said Mr. Baldwin, "to the country in a proclamation of five lines, and we pledge ourselves that Virginia will stand by you as though you were our own Washington."[378]

How pivotal was the position of the Federal Government with reference to coercion as determining Virginia's action may be gathered not only from the speeches of the members of her Convention, but from other utterances made at the time by her leading men.

Matthew F. Maury, under date of March 4th, 1861, wrote: "Virginia is not at all ready to go out of this Union; and she is not going out for anything that is likely to occur, short of coercion—such is my opinion."[379]

George W. Summers, under date of March 19th, 1861, wrote from Richmond:

"The removal from Fort Sumter (alluding to the report that it would be
evacuated) acted like a charm—it gave us great strength. A reaction
is going on in this state. The outside pressure here has greatly
subsided. We are masters of our position here, and can maintain it, if
left alone."

The same day he wrote: "What delays the removal of Major Anderson (the officer in charge of Fort Sumter)? Is there any truth in the suggestion that the thing is not to be done after all? This would ruin us."[380]

POSITION OF THE CONVENTION

A fairly accurate estimate of the position of the Virginia Convention may be gathered from the report of its Committee on Federal Relations, and the tentative action of that body with respect to the same. Soon after the organization of the Convention, this committee, consisting of twenty-one members, was appointed, and a rule adopted by which all memorials and proposals relating to the secession of the state, or any of the many questions involved in the pending controversies, should be referred to this committee without debate.

CONVENTION DEFEATS SECESSION

On the 16th of March, the report of the committee was taken up for consideration in the Committee of the Whole Convention. The majority report embodied the views of some two-thirds of the membership of the committee. There were several individual reports, but the views of the minority were expressed in the report signed by Messrs. Montague, Harvie and Williams, which simply recommended the immediate adoption of an ordinance providing for the secession of the state.

The report of the majority consisted of fourteen sections, and with it was submitted an amendment to the constitution of the United States, which the states of the Union were requested to endorse and make it a part of that instrument. The discussion with respect to this report and the amendment so proposed, continued from the 16th of March to the 15th of April, when before final and complete action by the Convention, the secession of the state was precipitated, under the conditions hereafter described.

The report of the majority is a lengthy document setting forth the attitude of Virginia with respect to the character of the Federal Government—the rights and powers of the latter in the territories, and over the forts, arsenals, etc.—in the states which had seceded, and all the many questions growing out of the contest over slavery.

The maintenance of peace was declared to be the foremost duty of the hour. "Above all things, at this time, they esteem it of indispensable necessity to maintain the peace of the country, and to avoid everything calculated or tending to produce collision and bloodshed," said the report.

The sixth section of the report deplored the present "distracted condition of the country," and expressed the earnest hope, "That an adjustment may be reached, by which the Union may be preserved in its integrity; and peace, prosperity and fraternal feeling be restored throughout the land."

To this section the report of the minority, providing for Virginia's immediate secession, was offered as a substitute; and on the 4th of April the latter was voted down by a recorded vote of forty-five "Yeas" to eighty-nine "Nays," and the section as reported by the majority adopted by a vote of one hundred and four "Yeas" to thirty-one "Nays."[381]

The eighth section declared:

"The people of Virginia recognize the American principle, that
government is founded in the consent of the governed ... and they will
never consent that the Federal power, which is in part their power,
shall be exerted for the purpose of subjugating the people of such
states (the seceded states) to the Federal authority."

By the eleventh section appeal is made to the states to make response to the position assumed in the resolutions and the proposed amendment to the constitution of the United States, and the warning given that unless satisfactory assurances were forthcoming, Virginia would feel compelled to resume the powers granted by her under the constitution. Time and again the report declares that "any action of the Federal Government tending to produce collision of forces," or any such action on the part of the seceded or confederated states, would be deemed offensive to the state, and greatly to be deplored.

AMENDMENT PROPOSED TO CONSTITUTION

Accompanying this report, as above indicated, was an amendment to the constitution of the United States, the most important features of which dealt with the matter of slavery in the territories, and the institution in the states where it was established by law.

PURPORT OF PROPOSED AMENDMENT

With respect to the first, the amendment provided that in all the territories north of 36 degrees and 30 minutes, slavery should be forever prohibited, and in all the territory south of that line, slavery was to be permitted; any territory, however, south of that line to have the privilege to permit or deny slavery by its constitution adopted preliminary to its admission as a state into the Union.

The amendment also provided that no territory should thereafter be acquired by the United States except for naval and other like depots, without the concurrence of a majority of the Senators from the states which "allowed involuntary servitude and a majority of the Senators from the states which prohibited that relation."

The amendment further provided that Congress should never have the power to abolish slavery in the states where it existed, nor in the District of Columbia without the consent of Maryland and Virginia. The slave trade in the District of Columbia and the foreign slave trade were forever prohibited, as was also the custom of bringing slaves into the District of Columbia for the purpose of their sale or distribution to other parts of the country. Congress should provide for the payment to the owner for any fugitive slave whose return was prevented by mobs or intimidation, after his arrest; and the elective franchise and the right to hold office were not to be accorded persons of the African race.[382]

While no final action had been taken upon this report, with the accompanying amendment, by the Convention at the time of Virginia's secession, yet the votes taken in the Committee of the Whole on the various paragraphs of the report indicated that had not Virginia's secession been precipitated, the report would have been adopted by the body in substantially the form in which it came from the Committee on Federal Relations.

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND COERCION

What would have been the attitude of the other states to the amendment to the constitution so proposed, must, of course, be a matter of conjecture, but the adoption by Congress, though controlled by the Republican Party, of the joint resolution providing for an amendment which should forever prohibit Congress from interfering with slavery in the states where it existed, and the enactment of the statute organizing the territories of Dakota, Colorado and Nevada without prohibition as to slavery, would seem to indicate that the principal provisions of the amendment proposed by Virginia would have met the approval of the requisite number of the states.

FORT SUMTER AND ITS OCCUPATION

As above indicated, the crucial point, with the group holding the balance of power in the Convention, was the position of the Federal Government upon the question of coercing the Cotton States. The employment of force to compel three millions of people to submit to a government not of their own choice, was at war with the Declaration of Independence and repugnant to thousands of the American people North as well as South. That the Federal Government would have been sustained in a bald invasion of the Southern States, may well be questioned. The situation, however, was not quite so embarrassing for the Government. Many of these states had formally ceded to the Union jurisdiction over parcels of land within their respective limits, upon which had been erected forts, post offices or custom houses. These constituted coigns of vantage, where the rights of the Federal Government were of a dignity higher, or at least more manifest, to the popular mind, than those rights which obtained over the whole area of the states or their citizens. Thus in the great drama of diplomacy and play for position which preceded the Civil War, the rights of the nation and of the states in these forts and buildings became matters of imminent moment. When South Carolina seceded, Fort Moultrie was occupied by Federal soldiers. She appointed commissioners to negotiate with the authorities at Washington for the withdrawal of the troops, and the settlement of all questions with respect to the fort and other like properties in the state. Later these troops were transferred by the Federal authorities to Fort Sumter. Upon the organization of the Southern Confederacy, commissioners from it were substituted for those appointed by South Carolina. President Lincoln refused to recognize the Southern Confederacy, or to treat with its representatives. Negotiations, however, semi-official in character, were instituted, and upon the reports which went out from these conferences men gauged the chances of peace or war. If Fort Sumter were evacuated, the prospects of peace would be enhanced. If the Federal Government should decide to hold the fort, and provision and strengthen its garrison, then war would be imminent. Upon these contingencies, stocks rose and fell, and the friends of peace took hope or lost heart.

-----

Footnote 376:

_History of United States_, Rhodes, Vol. III, p. 462.

Footnote 377:

_The Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America_, Wilson, Vol. III,
p. 138.

Footnote 378:

Colonel Baldwin's Interview with Mr. Lincoln, Dabney. _Southern
Historical Papers_, Vol. 1, p. 449.

Footnote 379:

_Life of Matthew F. Maury_, Corbin, p. 186.

Footnote 380:

_History of United States_, Rhodes, Vol. III, p. 345.

Footnote 381:

_Journal of the Committee of the Whole_, Virginia Convention, 1861,
pp. 31-43.

Footnote 382:

See Report of the Committee on Federal Relations, with accompanying
exhibits in the Appendix of the _Journal of the Virginia Convention_,
1861.

XL

THE CONTEST IN THE VIRGINIA CONVENTION FOR AND
AGAINST SECESSION (Concluded)

On the 8th of April, the Virginia Convention adopted the following resolution:

"WHEREAS, in the opinion of this Convention the uncertainty which
prevails in the public mind as to the policy which the Federal
Executive intends to pursue towards the seceded states is extremely
injurious to the industrial and commercial interests of the country,
tends to keep up an excitement which is unfavorable to the adjustment
of pending difficulties, and threatens a disturbance of the public
peace; therefore,

"RESOLVED, That a committee of three delegates be appointed by this
Convention to wait upon the President of the United States and present
to him this Preamble and Resolution, and respectfully ask him to
communicate to this Convention the policy which the Federal Executive
intends to pursue in regard to the Confederate States."[383]

William Ballard Preston, Alexander H. H. Stuart and George W. Randolph were unanimously elected members of the committee thus created.

That this action of the Virginia Convention was not hypercritical, that grave doubts actually existed as to the position of the Federal Government, is a fact of contemporary history. Writing from Washington, March 16, 1861, to Ex-President Buchanan, Edwin M. Stanton said:

"Every day affords proof of the absence of any settled policy or
harmonious concert of action in the Administration. Seward, Bates and
Cameron form one wing; Chase, Welles, Blair, the opposite wing; Smith
is on both sides and Lincoln sometimes on one, sometimes on the other.
There has been agreement in nothing."[384]

W. H. Russell, the well-known correspondent of the _London Times_, notes in his diary under date of March 23d: "The Government (of the United States) appears to be helplessly drifting with the current of events, having neither bow nor stern, neither keel nor deck, neither rudder, compass, sails nor steam."[385]

On the 1st of April, Secretary Seward presented to the President his now famous memorandum, "Some thoughts for the President's consideration," the opening paragraph of which recited: "First. We are at the end of a month's administration, and yet without a policy either foreign or domestic."[386]

On the 15th of April, the Committee of the Virginia Convention appointed to wait on the President submitted its report. It recited that because of violent and protracted storms they had not reached Washington until the 12th; that agreeable to the wishes of the President they appeared before him on the 13th and presented the resolution; and that the President thereupon read to them a paper which embodied his response to the Convention.

LINCOLN'S REPLY TO CONVENTION

In his reply, Mr. Lincoln stated that having, in his inaugural address, defined his intended policy, it was with deep regret and some mortification that he now learned that there was great and injurious uncertainty as to what that policy was; he commended a careful consideration of the document as the best expression he could give of his purpose. Continuing, he said:

"As I then and therein said, I now repeat, 'The power confided to me
will be used to hold, occupy, and possess the property and places
belonging to the Government and to collect the duties and imposts; but
beyond what is necessary for these objects there will be no invasion,
no using of force against or among the people anywhere.'"

THE PRESIDENT'S CALL FOR TROOPS

Continuing, the President said:

"But if, as now appears to be true, in pursuance of a purpose to drive
the United States authority from these places an unprovoked assault
has been made upon Fort Sumter, I shall hold myself at liberty to
repossess if I can like places which had been seized before the
Government was devolved upon me.

"And, in any event, I shall to the extent of my ability repel force by
force.

"In case it proves true that Fort Sumter has been assaulted as
reported, I shall perhaps cause the United States mails to be
withdrawn from all the states which claim to have seceded, believing
that the commencement of actual war against the Government justifies
and possibly demands it."[387]

What effect this reply of the President would have had upon the Virginia Convention it is impossible to say, for on the day of its presentation to that body came the news of his proclamation calling for an army of seventy-five thousand men.

The proclamation recited that the laws of the United States were opposed and their execution obstructed in the states of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas, "by combinations" too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings.

The militia thus called for was apportioned among the several states (except the seven forming the Southern Confederacy) and their governors were requested to furnish forthwith their respective quotas. Despite the somewhat ambiguous character of this proclamation, men everywhere believed that the attempt was now to be made to re-establish by force of arms the supremacy of the National Government over the states of the Southern Confederacy, and that to every commonwealth was presented the solemn alternative of bearing a part for or against this movement.

THE CONFLICT AT FORT SUMTER

President Lincoln justified the immediate issuance of his proclamation because of what he termed the unprovoked attack on Fort Sumter and the wanton insult thus offered the honor and dignity of the nation. On the other hand, it was insisted that his action in breaking off the negotiations, having for their object the peaceful adjustment of all questions relating to Fort Sumter, his notice to the Governor of South Carolina that its garrison would be provisioned, and the arrival off the harbor of Charleston of the Relief Squadron charged with that mission, not only precipitated the conflict, but justified the inauguration by the Southern Confederacy of what would have been, under other circumstances, offensive measures. Had the authorities of the Confederacy been more thoughtful of their interests than their rights, or taken counsel of their caution rather than of their courage, they might have permitted the naval expedition to provision Fort Sumter and reinforce its garrison with men and munitions of war. Such, however, was not the temper and fibre of that people. They met what they deemed a second invasion of their country just as they did four months before, when they fired upon the "Star of the West" in the first attempt to relieve the Fort.

Alexander H. Stephens, Vice-President of the Confederacy, in his work _The War Between the States_, presents the position of his Government with respect to the matter as follows:

"I maintain that it (the war) was inaugurated and begun though no blow
had been struck, when the hostile fleet, styled the 'Relief Squadron,'
with eleven ships carrying two hundred and eighty-five guns and two
thousand four hundred men, was sent out from New York and Norfolk,
with orders from the authorities at Washington to reinforce Fort
Sumter, peaceably, if permitted, but forcibly, if they resist."

VIRGINIA'S SECESSION PRECIPITATED

The action of the Virginia Convention was quick and decisive. On the 17th of April, an ordinance was adopted providing for Virginia's secession from the Union and submitting this action of the Convention to the people for ratification or rejection at a special election to be held on the 23d of May. In the Convention the tentative ordinance was passed by a vote of eighty-eight ayes to fifty-five noes (nine not voting), and before the people a month later it was confirmed by a vote of 128,884 against 32,134. Mr. Rhodes records that, in the concluding hours of the Convention, strong men spoke for or against secession, with sorrowful hearts and in voices trembling with emotion.[388]

This action of the Convention was the logical and inevitable result of the President's proclamation. There had never been any doubt as to Virginia's position. With all her loyalty to the Union, she had repeatedly declared in the most authoritative manner, her opposition to the coercion of the Cotton States and her determination to resist such a policy.

To the requisition upon Virginia for her quota of troops Governor Letcher made reply to the Secretary of War:

"I have only to say that the militia of Virginia will not be furnished
to the powers at Washington for any such use or purpose as they have
in view. Your object is to subjugate the Southern States and the
requisition made upon me for such an object—an object in my judgment
not within the purview of the constitution or the act of 1795, will
not be complied with. You have chosen to inaugurate civil war; and
having done so we will meet you in a spirit as determined as the
Administration has exhibited toward the South."[389]

The Governors of Kentucky, Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee and North Carolina returned like answers to the requisitions of the Federal authorities for troops.

Mr. Henderson, the English writer, in his work from which we have heretofore quoted, says with reference to Virginia's position:

"So far Virginia had given no overt sign of sympathy with the
revolution. But she was now called upon to furnish her quota of
regiments for the Federal Army. To have acceded to the demands would
have been to abjure the most cherished principles of her political
existence.... Neutrality was impossible. She was bound to furnish her
tale of troops and thus belie her principles; or secede at once and
reject, with a clean conscience, the President's mandate. If the
morality of secession may be questioned, if South Carolina acted with
undue haste and without sufficient provocation, if certain of the
Southern politicians desired emancipation for themselves, that they
might continue to enslave others, it can hardly be denied that the
action of Virginia was not only fully justified, but beyond
suspicion...."[390]

-----

Footnote 383:

_Journal of Virginia Convention_, 1861, p. 143.

Footnote 384:

_Life of James Buchanan_, Curtis, Vol. II, p. 534.

Footnote 385:

_My Diary, North and South_, Russell, Vol. I, p. 37.

Footnote 386:

_Speeches, Letters and State Papers of Abraham Lincoln_, N. & H., Vol.
II, p. 29.

Footnote 387:

_Journal of Virginia Convention_, 1861, Document No. XVII.

Footnote 388:

_History of United States_, Rhodes, Vol. III, p. 386.

Footnote 389:

_American Conflict_, Greeley, Vol. I, p. 459.

Footnote 390:

_Stonewall Jackson_, Henderson, Vol. I, p. 122.

XLI

THE ATTEMPTED REINFORCEMENT OF FORT SUMTER
AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE

The relative responsibility for the collision at Fort Sumter we are not concerned to consider except in so far as it may have affected the action of Virginia in withdrawing from the Union. The charge is often heard, that, despite Virginia's professed love for the Union, and her efforts to maintain the peace, she made haste to unite her fortunes with the Southern Confederacy because of this assault by its soldiers upon Fort Sumter. It would seem a most illogical conclusion to all her unquestioned efforts if she were thus led to espouse the cause of the Confederacy and to gird herself for battle by reason of the happening of the very event she had striven so earnestly to avert. It was not the assault upon Fort Sumter, however momentous in its potency, which impelled Virginia, but the proclamation of President Lincoln which followed. The proclamation was the proximate cause of her secession, though her action was stimulated by the previous course of the Federal authorities with respect to the Fort. The people of Virginia regarded the policy of the Administration as characterized by a disregard for the peace of the country, a play for position ill-befitting a great nation at such a solemn crisis. Much has been written in defense of that policy. In support of Virginia's arraignment, the sentiments of Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet ministers may be quoted. Three weeks previous to the issuance of the orders for the relief of Fort Sumter, five of its seven members recorded their opposition and the considerations of prudence and patriotism which impelled them to their position.

On the 15th of March, 1861, President Lincoln submitted the following request in writing to each member of his Cabinet:

"_My dear Sir_:

"Assuming it to be possible to now provision Fort Sumter, under all
the circumstances is it wise to attempt it? Please give me your
opinion in writing on this question.

Your obedient
servant,

A.
LINCOLN."[391]

VIEWS OF CABINET

Secretary Seward, in the course of an extended reply, wrote:

"If it were possible to peaceably provision Fort Sumter, of course, I
should answer that it would be both unwise and inhuman not to attempt
it. But the facts of the case are known to be that the attempt must be
made with the employment of military and marine force which would
provoke combat and probably initiate a civil war which the Government
of the United States would be committed to maintain, through all
changes, to some definite conclusion."...

Continuing, Mr. Seward said:

"Suppose the expedition successful, we have then a garrison in Fort
Sumter that can defy assault for six months. What is it to do then? Is
it to make war by opening its batteries to demolish the defenses of
the Carolinians? Can it demolish them if it tries? If it cannot, what
is the advantage we shall have gained? If it can, how will it serve to
check or prevent disunion? In either case, it seems to me, that we
will have inaugurated a civil war by our own act, without an adequate
object, after which reunion will be hopeless, at least under this
Administration or in any other way than by a popular disavowal both of
the war and of the Administration which unnecessarily commenced it.
Fraternity is the element of union; war the very element of disunion."
...

In conclusion, he said: "If this counsel seems to be impassive and even unpatriotic, I console myself by the reflection that it is such as Chatham gave to his country under circumstances not widely different."[392]

Secretary Cameron wrote he would advise such action if he "did not believe the attempt to carry it into effect would initiate a bloody and protracted conflict."[393]

Secretary Welles wrote:

"By sending or attempting to send provisions into Fort Sumter, will
not war be precipitated? It may be impossible to escape it under any
course of policy that may be pursued, but I am not prepared to advise
a course that would provoke hostilities.... I do not, therefore, under
all the circumstances, think it wise to provision Fort Sumter."[394]

Secretary Smith wrote:

"The commencement of civil war would be a calamity greatly to be
deplored and should be avoided if the just authority of the Government
may be maintained without it. If such a conflict should become
inevitable, it is much better that it should commence by the
resistance of the authorities or the people of South Carolina to the
legal action of the Government in enforcing the laws of the United
States....

"If a conflict should be provoked by the attempt to reinforce Fort
Sumter, a divided sentiment in the North would paralyze the arm of the
Government, while the treason in the Southern States would be openly
encouraged in the North.... I, therefore, respectfully answer the
inquiry of the President by saying that in my opinion it would not be
wise, under all the circumstances, to attempt to provision Fort
Sumter."[395]

Attorney General Bates wrote:

"I am unwilling, under all the circumstances, at this moment, to do
any act which may have the semblance before the world of beginning a
civil war, the terrible consequence of which would, I think, find no
parallel in modern times.... For these reasons, I am willing to
evacuate Fort Sumter, rather than be an active party in the beginning
of civil war.... Upon the whole I do not think it wise now to attempt
to provision Fort Sumter."[396]

Postmaster General Blair and Secretary Chase united in the opinion that it would be wise to make the effort to provision Fort Sumter.

Mr. Blair wrote:

"I believe that Fort Sumter may be provisioned and relieved by Captain
Fox with but little risk; and General Scott's opinion that, with its
war complement, there is no force in South Carolina which can take it,
renders it almost certain that it will not then be attempted. This
would completely demoralize the rebellion.... No expense nor care
should therefore be spared to achieve this success."[397]

Secretary Chase wrote:

"A correct solution must depend, in my judgment, on the degree of
possibility, on the combination of reinforcement with provisioning and
on the probable effects of the measure on the relations of the
disaffected states to the National Government.

"I shall assume what the statements of the distinguished officers
consulted seem to warrant, that the possibility of success amounts to
a reasonable degree of probability; and also that the attempt to
provision is to include an attempt to reinforce; for it seems to be
generally agreed that the provisioning without reinforcements
notwithstanding hostile resistance, will accomplish no substantially
beneficial purpose.

"The probable political effects of the measure allow room for much
fair difference of opinion, and I have not reached my own conclusion
without much difficulty."

The Secretary then proceded to declare, that, if such a step would produce civil war, he could not advise in its favor, but that, in his opinion, such a result was highly improbable, especially if accompanied by a proclamation from the President reiterating the sentiments of his inaugural address. "I, therefore," concluded Mr. Chase, "return an affirmative answer to the question submitted to me."[398]

It will be seen, from the foregoing extracts, that five of the seven members of the Cabinet concurred in the opinion that no attempt should be made to provision or reinforce Fort Sumter, and that such an attempt would in all probability precipitate civil war. As Mr. Seward expressed it: "We will have inaugurated a civil war by our own act without an adequate object"; or in the language of Secretary Welles, "By sending or attempting to send provisions into Fort Sumter, will not war be precipitated?... I am not prepared to advise a course that would provoke hostilities."

If such were the opinions of leading members of President Lincoln's Cabinet, expressed in confidential communications to their chief, as to the character of the proposed action, can it be deemed unreasonable that the people of Virginia held similar views?

Fourteen days later, the President made a verbal request to his Cabinet for an additional expression of their views upon the same subject. Seward and Smith adhered to their former opinions. Chase and Blair were joined by Welles. Bates was noncommittal, and no reply was made by Cameron, so far as the records show.

RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE COLLISION

In the light of the facts and arguments presented by the members of the President's Cabinet, men, not a few, will conclude that, if the explosion occurred at Fort Sumter, the mine was laid at Washington.

-----

Footnote 391:

_Abraham Lincoln, Speeches, Letters and State Papers_, N. & H., Vol.
II, p. 11.

Footnote 392:

_Idem_, pp. 11 and 14.

Footnote 393:

_Idem_, p. 17.

Footnote 394:

_Abraham Lincoln, Speeches, Letters and State Papers_, N. & H., Vol.
II, p. 18.

Footnote 395:

_Idem_, pp. 19 and 20.

Footnote 396:

_Idem_, p. 22.

Footnote 397:

_Idem_, p. 21.

Footnote 398:

_Abraham Lincoln, Speeches, Letters and State Papers_, N. & H., Vol.
II, pp. 14 and 15.

XLII

THE ATTEMPT TO COERCE THE COTTON STATES IMPELS
VIRGINIA'S SECESSION

James Ford Rhodes in his history of the United States, referring to the eventful year of 1861, says:

"There were at this time in the Border States of Virginia, Maryland,
Kentucky and Missouri unconditional Secessionists and unconditional
Union men; but the great body of the people, although believing that
the wrongs of the South were grievous and cried for redress, deemed
secession inexpedient.... All denied either the right or the
feasibility of coercion."[399]

What was the pith and potency of this anti-coercion sentiment among the people of Virginia?

ANTI-COERCION SENTIMENT IN VIRGINIA

There were two distinct schools of thought and yet both denied the right of the Federal Government to coerce the people of the Cotton States.

One school believed in the constitutional right of a state to secede: the Union was formed by the constitution—which was a compact between independent sovereignties; the powers of the Union were those and only those delegated to it by the states; the states never surrendered their sovereignty, nor their right to withdraw from the Union for what they deemed sufficient cause. This, in brief, was the position of the school which maintained the constitutional right of a state to secede.

The other school while denying the constitutionality of secession, yet held that the Federal Government could not reduce to submission a people as numerous as those of the Cotton States, without doing violence to the principles, ethical and political, upon which the Union was founded. This in brief was the position of those who maintained the revolutionary right of the people of the seceded states to fix their own form of government unawed by any outside power.

It is not within the purview of our allotted task to vindicate or even investigate the constitutional right of a state, or of the Cotton States, to secede from the Union, or to accomplish the same end through the right of revolution as inherent in their people. Our discussion is here limited to a consideration of the strong anti-coercion sentiments among the Virginia people, and how these convictions ultimately controlled their action on the question of the secession of their state. It will suffice to say that whether regarded as a constitutional or a revolutionary right, or both combined, the people of Virginia held that the Cotton States, having deliberately and with almost unexampled unanimity, decided to dissolve the political relations which formerly existed between them and their sister commonwealths, that with respect to the legal and ethical character of this action there was no competent court of review this side of the judgment seat of Heaven. The wisdom of their secession might be denied, the morality of their action might be questioned, the disastrous consequences to the Union might be admitted, but still no right existed in any body of men to invade their country and defeat their aspirations by the sword.

Had not a people as numerous and united as those of the Cotton States the inherent right, in the language of the Declaration of Independence, "To assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of Nature and Nature's God entitled them?" Were the just powers of governments derived from the consent of the governed? To the Virginians of 1861 it was a solecism to accord to one body of people a right, and yet acknowledge in another the equal right to defeat its exercise. It was an anachronism to talk in America, after the Declaration of Independence and the war with Great Britain, about the right of self-government in three millions of people as being dependent upon force. This was acknowledged before Samuel Adams and Thomas Jefferson were born, and before the Patriots had made good their great avowals by their heroic struggles from Concord to Yorktown. Force, Virginia insisted, was not the method of holding great masses of American freemen in unwilling association with their fellows; nor the implements of war, the legitimate means for determining great questions of legal and ethical right.

DAVIS ON RIGHT OF REVOLUTION

Jefferson Davis, in his farewell address to the United States Senate, expressed the sentiments of Virginia upon this point when he said:

"Now, sir, we are confusing language very much. Men speak of
revolution; and when they say revolution, they mean blood. Our fathers
meant nothing of the sort. When they spoke of revolution, they meant
an inalienable right. When they declared as an inalienable right, the
power of the people to abrogate and modify their form of government
whenever it did not answer the ends for which it was established, they
did not mean that they were to sustain that by brute force.... Are we,
in this age of civilization and political progress ... are we to roll
back the whole current of human thought and again to return to the
mere brute force which prevails between beasts of prey as the only
method of settling questions between men?...

"Is it to be supposed that the men who fought the battles of the
Revolution for community independence, terminated their great efforts
by transmitting posterity to a condition in which they could only gain
those rights by force? If so, the blood of the Revolution was shed in
vain; no great principles were established; for force was the law of
nature before the battles of the Revolution were fought."[400]

ANTI-COERCION VIEWS OF VIRGINIANS

Such was the attitude of the great body of the Virginia people. That no new principle was asserted to meet the exigencies of the hour, all acquainted with the history of the state will readily appreciate. Even men who denied the constitutional right of secession, joined with those who believed in that right in opposing coercion.

Robert E. Lee, writing on the 23d of January, 1861, said:

"Secession is nothing but revolution. The framers of our constitution
never exhausted so much labor, wisdom and forbearance in its formation
and surrounded it with so many guards and securities if it was
intended to be broken by every member of the Confederacy at will....

"Still a Union that can only be maintained by swords and bayonets and
in which strife and civil war are to take the place of brotherly love
and kindness, has no charm for me. If the Union is dissolved and the
Government disrupted I shall return to my native state and share the
miseries of my people—and save in defense will draw my sword on
none."[401]

William C. Rives, speaking on the 19th of February, 1861, in the Peace Conference at Washington, as one of the Commissioners from Virginia, said:

"I condemn the secession of states, I am not here to justify it. I
detest it, but the fact is still before us. Seven states have gone out
from among us and a President is actually inaugurated to govern the
new Confederacy.... Force will never bring them together. Coercion is
not a word to be used in this connection."[402]

George Baylor, speaking on the 1st of March 1861, in the Virginia Convention, said:

"I have said, Mr. President, that I did not believe in the right of
secession. But whilst I make that assertion, I also say that I am
opposed to coercion on the part of the Federal Government with the
view of bringing the seceded states back into the Union.... I am
opposed to it first because I can find no authority in the
Constitution of the United States delegating that power to the Federal
Government, and second because if the Federal Government had the power
it would be wrong to use it."[403]

The foregoing sentiments were not confined to the Virginia people, either of the Revolutionary or Civil War periods. A few deliverances by men of international reputation made during the three decades preceding the Civil War will serve to illustrate the truth of this suggestion:

M. de Tocqueville, in his work, _Democracy in America_, discussing the subject, says:

"However strong a government may be, it cannot easily escape from the
consequences of a principle which it has once admitted as the
foundation of its constitution. The Union was formed by the voluntary
agreement of the states; and in uniting together they have never
forfeited their nationality nor have they been reduced to the
condition of one and the same people. If one of the states chose to
withdraw its name from the contract, it would be difficult to disprove
its right of doing so; and the Federal Government would have no means
of maintaining its claims directly, either by force or by right."[404]

FOUNDATION OF AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS

Lord Brougham in his _Political Philosophy_, alluding to the unique character of the government created by the constitution of the United States, writes:

"There is not, as with us, a government only and its subjects to be
regarded; but a number of governments, of states, having each a
separate and substantive, and even independent existence, originally
thirteen now six and twenty, and each having a Legislature of its own
with laws differing from those of the other states. It is plainly
impossible to consider the constitution which professes to govern this
whole Union, this federacy of states, as anything other than a
treaty."[405]

John Quincy Adams, speaking before the New York Historical Society in 1839, on the fiftieth anniversary of Washington's inauguration as President of the United States, said:

"To the people alone there is reserved as well the dissolving as the
constituent power and that power can be exercised by them only under
the tie of conscience binding them to the retributive justice of
Heaven.

"With these qualifications we may admit the right as vested in the
people of every state of the Union with reference to the General
Government which was exercised by the people of the United Colonies
with reference to the supreme head of the British Empire of which they
formed a part and under these limitations have the people of each
state of the Union a right to secede from the Confederated Union
itself."[406]