0, 
 
 THE OATH OF ALLEGIANCE 
 
 TO THE 
 
 UNITED STATES. 
 
i 
 

 ■T 
 THE OATH OF ALLEGIANCE 
 
 TO THE 
 
 UNITED STATES. 
 
 1 
 Columbia, S. C, Feb. 10, 1863. 
 
 Hon. John Perkins, 
 
 My Dear Sir: The joint resolutions sub- 
 mitted by you on the 13th of January, for 
 the consideration of Congress, "in com- 
 mendation of certain citizens of Louisiana 
 and of other States within the lines of the 
 enemy in refusing to take the oath of alle- 
 giance to the United States," have recently 
 passed under my eye. The impulse cannot 
 be resisted of addressing to you some reflec- 
 tions which have long been maturing in 
 my own mind, and which you are at liberty 
 to use in any way you may think conducive 
 to the public good. 
 
Permit me, in the outset, to express my 
 approval, not only of the matter, but also 
 of the form of your resolutions. It ap- 
 pears to me eminently proper that Con- 
 gress should signalize the fidelity of our 
 fellow-citizens, who have withstood all ap- 
 peals to self-interest and to fear, in their 
 country's darkest trial. But I specially 
 commend the moderation which pretermits 
 in the resolutions any mention of those 
 who have been caught in the snares of the 
 enemy, and duped into concessions which 
 have filled the land with sorrow. So long 
 as these unfortunate parties are debarred 
 the privilege of a hearing — the govern- 
 ment, from paternal lenity, if not from a 
 sense of rigid justice, may well feel itself 
 restrained from open and direct censure. 
 From the language of your paper, the 
 world is not to know that a solitary indi- 
 vidual is excepted from the encomium pro- 
 nounced by Congress. Those familiar with 
 all the facts, cannot fail, indeed, to per- 
 ceive a discrimination in favor of some, 
 which, by implication, contains a censure 
 of others. This, however, is unavoidable, 
 
and those who may writhe beneath the tor- 
 ture of this implied censure, will yet be 
 compelled to admire the generosity which 
 forebore to stigmatize them in the legisla- 
 tive records of the country. Nevertheless, 
 from some quapter, and precisely at this 
 juncture, a protest should be uttered against 
 the weakness of those who have succumbed 
 beneath the tyranny of General Butler and 
 sworn allegiance to the Government of the 
 United States. It may not be too late to 
 rouse those who are involved in this dire 
 calamity, to retrieve their lost position and 
 to wipe off the dishonor which must else 
 cleave to them forever. Or, failing in this, 
 it is still a duty to attempt the arrest of 
 principles which, I fear, are secretly sap- 
 ing in Louisiana, the foundations of public 
 morality, and destroying the basis on which 
 rest at last the permanence and security of 
 all government. I undertake, therefore, 
 in this letter, to present the reverse of your 
 medal, and assume the painful responsi- 
 bility of giving utterance to strictures, 
 from which, as a legislator, you have wisely 
 refrained. Should apology be needed for 
 
 / 
 
this obtrusion of private criticism, let it be 
 found in the relation I have long sustained 
 as a religious teacher to the people of Lou- 
 isiana, and my common participation as a 
 citizen in any reproach which may tarnish 
 the fame of that gallant State. 
 
 We should clearly distinguish betwixt 
 two classes of our fellow-citizens who have 
 submitted to the oath exacted by General 
 Butler. The first class, inconsiderable both 
 as to numbers and influence, embraces those 
 who were never true to our cause. Some 
 of them, from misconception of the rela- 
 tion between the States and the general 
 government, secretly denied the right of 
 secession, and simply drifted with the popu- 
 lar current which they felt it idle to oppose. 
 Of course, upon the first appearance of the 
 enemy, they ranged themselves, without 
 solicitation, upon the side of the Union, to 
 which they were borne by their political 
 affinities. Others,, destitute of all principle, 
 alike political and moral, having no eye 
 but to present gain, and only intent upon 
 opening the obstructed channels of trade, 
 chose to make interest with those who had 
 
blocked their ports. Both these are simply 
 traitors to the South — they went out from 
 us because they were not of us — and it is 
 to be hoped, upon the recovery of our ter- 
 ritory, they will find it convenient to leave 
 with their new allies and purge our society 
 of their presence. The other class em- 
 braces those who, in their secret hearts, 
 are still loyal to the Confederacy, and have 
 taken the oath under constraint, regarding 
 it as one of the necessities of war. The 
 universal compassion felt for their distress, 
 has almost extinguished censure of the act ; 
 whilst the conviction entertained of their 
 substantial loyalty, retains them within the 
 embrace of our affections. The general 
 integrity of many in this class, affords a 
 guarantee that conscience has been snared 
 through the sophistry of the understand- 
 ing ; and that by subtlety of argument they 
 have been persuaded into the policy that 
 the oath could be taken salva fide. In 
 adjudicating this question, I cannot but 
 think some considerations were overlooked, 
 which should have formed an important ele- 
 ment in the decision to be rendered, and if 
 
6 
 
 entertained, must have wholly changed its 
 complexion. 
 
 Before canvassing, however, the grounds 
 upon which this oath-taking has "been justi- 
 fied, that we may make due allowance for 
 human infirmity, let us look at the pecu- 
 liar pressure under which these parties 
 were put. In the first place, the demand 
 made upon them was a novelty; and we 
 all know how men flounder in uncertainty 
 without acknowledged precedents for their 
 guidance. I have in vain searched the 
 records of modern history for its parallel. 
 The famous contest between Philip of Spain 
 and the States of Holland, presents some 
 features of resemblance to the conflict now 
 waging between the North and ourselves. 
 The Spanish power then, as the North does 
 now, branded the attempts of a brave peo- 
 ple to frame their own constitution and 
 laws as flagrant rebellion ; and conducted 
 a long and bitter war to reduce, as they 
 alleged, a revolted province to allegiance. 
 But in no instance did the cruel Alva — 
 fitting tool though he was, of a treacherous 
 and bigoted despot, force a reluctant oath 
 
upon the cities which he conquered. They 
 were held, indeed, hy military garrisons 
 until such time as the State of which they 
 formed a constituent part, should in like 
 manner he reduced. Iso attempt was 
 made to cancel their ties of allegiance, 
 hut through the constituted authorities to 
 whom that allegiance had heen sworn. It 
 has been reserved to our time and to our 
 foes to invent the shameful and cowardly 
 device of dealing with single communities, 
 and even with individual persons, as if 
 they were independent of higher author- 
 ity. A magnanimous enemy might have 
 held New Orleans by right of capture ; 
 but would have refrained from the impo- 
 sition of oaths until the State of Louisiana 
 had been reduced to submission, and as an 
 organic whole, had carried over all the 
 parts of which it is composed. But the 
 refined despotism of the Lincoln govern- 
 ment, adopts the policy of grinding indi- 
 viduals between conflicting jurisdictions as 
 between the burr and nether millstones. 
 Conscious of its impotence to subjugate, it 
 has been satisfied with disgracing those 
 
8 
 
 whom it cannot conquer, and with demo- 
 ralizing those over whom it cannot rule. 
 The satanic boast of General Butler has 
 been in part achieved, of holding up what 
 he is pleased to term a perjured people, to 
 the derision of mankind. I shall recur to 
 this thought in another connection, and 
 present it as a reason why the oath should 
 have been sternly refused. It is mentioned 
 here, only to show how our people were 
 surprised in the historic novelty of their 
 position ; and how they were subjected to 
 the rigor of treatment unknown to the 
 worst despotisms of the past. 
 
 In the next place the craft by which this 
 nefarious design was accomplished, does 
 full credit to the subtlety and malice in 
 which it was conceived. Butler's tyranny 
 opened with a prohibition against more 
 than three persons speaking together upon 
 the streets, under the penalty of being dis- 
 persed as a mob ; the effect of which was 
 to insulate individuals, and to prevent that 
 interchange of views necessary to concert 
 of action. A system of espionage most 
 comprehensive in its sweep, was moreover, 
 
immediately instituted ; so that you could 
 not look your fellow in the face, lest the 
 flash of the eye should betray to a paid in- 
 former, the secret resentment of the soul. 
 Even slaves of the household were suborn- 
 ed under promises of personal freedom, to 
 invent charges against the master, which 
 subjected him to examination and search, 
 accompanied with brutal and insulting 
 threats. With the poison of suspicion thus 
 universally diffused, the infirmity of many 
 yielded to external pressure : as single- 
 handed and alone, they were either bullied 
 or cajoled into a form of submission denied 
 by the heart as often as it was sworn by 
 the lips. But the catalogue of wron 
 only begun. Placing his mailed hand 
 next upon the separate guilds into which 
 society is classified, and resorting at once 
 to the arts of special pleading and to the 
 display of irresponsible power, he extorted 
 Union concessions from each of these — 
 yielded in the vain hope that this would 
 be the end of their humiliation — but 
 which, though small, were sufficient to 
 break the tone of a spirited people. "C'est 
 
10 
 
 le premier pas qui coute ;" when the veil 
 of ^elusion was rent by the imposition of 
 further tests, they found themselves upon 
 an inclined plane, which had no resting 
 place but in abject submission. Nothing 
 was left but consistency in error, and the 
 melancholy confession at the last, " pas a 
 pas on va Men loin." Thus craftily were 
 our unhappy fellow-citizens decoyed into 
 the oath from which, at the beginning, 
 they recoiled with the indignant exclama- 
 tion of Hazael, " What ! is thy servant a 
 dog, that he should do this great thing." 
 The darkest feature, however, in this 
 oppression, is found in the undefined ter- 
 rors which hung like a portentous cloud 
 over this devoted people ; terrors, too, of 
 such a nature as gloomily to impress the 
 imagination and freeze the soul with hor- 
 ror. The infamous order, No. 28, was 
 not, as usually interpreted, the outburst of 
 a brutal and savage nature in a moment of 
 resentment ; but part of a premeditated 
 system to strike universal terror into the 
 heart of the community. The blow was 
 threatened just where the affections are 
 
11 
 
 the most sensitive ; and the violation of 
 the sweetest sanctities of home was set 
 forth as the penalty of resistance to the 
 tyrant's will. Though directed in form 
 against the ladies of Louisiana, its evident 
 design was to reach through them, their 
 .intractable guardians of the other sex. 
 The husband and the father were called 
 to look upon their imprisoned households, 
 and then to survey the hounds of the des- 
 pot by whom they were held at bay. A 
 licentious soldiery drawn from the scum of 
 Northern society, the agrarian element 
 always to be found in the mixed population 
 of a large city, and the drunken helots 
 just emancipated from bondage and trick- 
 ed out in the toggery of their new associ- 
 ates — these were held in the leash to be 
 let loose to sack and plunder at their will, 
 and to gratify the worst passions of the 
 human heart. Doubtless these fears were, 
 to- a large extent imaginary ; for they were 
 never realized by those who openly defied 
 the tyrant's power, who seemed rather to 
 amuse himself with playing upon the fears 
 of men, and with imposing tests of their 
 
12 
 
 moral courage, and with mocking those 
 who faltered and trembled under his 
 frown. But though imaginary, they were 
 nevertheless effective. Our people appear- 
 ed to feel as though the earth was heaving 
 "beneath their tread, and that in a single 
 moment, they might go down together 
 through the parted crust. These nameless, 
 formless horrors, presented by a morbid 
 fancy, with the desire to preserve their 
 property from confiscation, combined to 
 crush the spirit of a people as noble as any 
 beneath the sun. My heart, sir, alternate- 
 ly burns with anger and bleeds in sympa- 
 thy, as I contemplate these accumulated 
 wrongs, which are recited with no design 
 to apologize for the oath, but to show that 
 the censure levelled against it proceeds 
 from no insensibility to the distress by 
 which it was coerced. The same tender- 
 ness which weeps over the sorrows of our 
 friends, pleads with them to retrieve the 
 still heaver disaster of a dishonored name. 
 It is not to be presumed that all were 
 conducted to this fatal step by precisely the 
 same line of argument. Accordingly, we 
 
13 
 
 find it justified upon two grounds, which 
 are not only distinct from, hut even exclu- 
 sive of each other, as the attention hap- 
 pened to be fixed upon one or the other 
 hour of a common deliverance. The dif- 
 ficulty was how to take the oath without 
 surrendering, on the one hand, a conscious 
 loyalty to the Confederacy, and retaining, 
 on the other hand, something like integ- 
 rity of conscience. The path was too nar- 
 row to allow the slightest deflection with- 
 out plunging into one or the other of these 
 two quicksands. Some determined to pre- 
 serve their interest in the country which 
 they loved, even at the expense of truth ; 
 others, to maintain veracity at the hazard 
 of clouding with suspicion their civil fidel- 
 ity. Let us examine both expedients in 
 detail. 
 
 It is alleged, then, by the first of these 
 two classes, that being without liberty of 
 choice, in the hands of an unscrupulous 
 and barbarous enemy, it was lawful to 
 swear an oath with the lips, to which the 
 heart gave no response ; that no faith was 
 to be placed in an oath exacted upon com- 
 
14 
 
 pulsion, and accordingly it might be taken 
 with a mental reservation to break it so 
 soon as opportunity should be afforded of 
 doing it with safety. The case is consid- 
 ered parallel with an oath of secrecy ex- 
 acted by a footpad with his stiletto at our 
 throat, which it is alleged might be given 
 with the firm but secret purpose of bring- 
 ing the outlaw to justice as soon as he 
 should be once more within the protection 
 of society and law. I believe I have here 
 stated the argument in its utmost strength. 
 The oath, say they, was taken, but under 
 circumstances which gave the imposer no 
 confidence in the fidelity of the party sworn, 
 and absolved the latter from all obligation 
 to abide by his pledge. It were far better 
 to let this oath pass without defence, than 
 to justify it by a doctrine so desolating in 
 its consequences. The apparent, or even 
 the real apostacy of many thousands from, 
 our ranks, cannot inflict so severe or last- 
 ing a shock upon the Confederacy as the 
 promulgation of principles like these. We 
 are all willing, in a superabundant charity, 
 to forgive the weakness of those who have 
 
15 
 
 fallen under the cruel oppressions which I 
 have already described ; but we cannot per- 
 mit that weakness to be extolled into a vir- 
 tue, nor to be extenuated upon grounds 
 subversive alike of morality and religion. 
 What is an oath, but an appeal to the 
 omniscient God as a witness to the truth 
 whereof we affirm? In this consists the 
 essence of the sin of perjury: that u the 
 juror has the thought of God and religion 
 upon his mind at the time, so that if he 
 offends, it is in defiance of the sanctions of 
 religion, and implies a disbelief or contempt 
 of God's knowledge, power and justice." 
 Since human society cannot exist without 
 mutual confidence, and this in turn depends 
 upon truth, the oatli has been ordained by 
 God for the attainment of both these ends. 
 To guard, as far as possible, against the 
 temptations to falsehood, the religious sen- 
 timent in man is brought into exercise, and 
 the conscience is surrounded by all those 
 motives which can be drawn from a con- 
 sideration of God and of His retributive 
 justice. The juror (the term being taken 
 in its etymological, not its technical sig- 
 
16 
 
 nification) is cited immediately before the 
 Divine tribunal, that in view of Him who 
 reads the secrets of all hearts, and is 
 pledged to punish fraud as an offence 
 against His authority, he may have the 
 strongest inducement to utter the truth. 
 This, of course, is founded upon the idea 
 that human government itself is not only 
 an ordinance of God, but that it is a dim 
 reflection of the Divine. We could not, 
 indeed, be subjects of human law, if we 
 were not antecedently under the jurisdic- 
 tion of the Supreme Kuler of the world. 
 Hence, human government is not only 
 divinely ordained, but its existence and 
 preservation depend upon those religious 
 convictions which are recognized in the 
 divine law. With all the temporal sanc- 
 tions by which it strives to enforce obe- 
 dience, its control over human conduct is 
 not effectual until it invokes the aid of 
 conscience, and thus places a police in 
 every human breast. Its strongest pro- 
 tection is found in the oath which takes 
 hold of the religious nature in man. It 
 can rise no higher that this. It summons 
 
17 
 
 us into the presence of the infinite God, 
 and sways His awful sceptre over the soul 
 ! as it compels our testimony in sight of those 
 tremendous judgments which fence around 
 the prerogatives of that august Being. 
 Hence, moralists have not hesitated to de- 
 scribe the oath as a twofold covenant made 
 both with society and with God ; and in 
 this latter aspect it rises into the solemnity 
 of an act of religious worship. Thus it is 
 that " men swear by the greater, and an 
 oath for confirmation is to them an end of 
 all strife." The pledge of veracity is de- 
 posited with the Judge of all the earth, 
 and upon its forfeiture are suspended the 
 fearful retributions of eternity. If this does 
 not bind the conscience, nothing can bind, 
 and society is without a guarantee for that 
 truthfulness upon which human intercourse 
 must at last hinge. 
 
 To trifle, therefore, with the sanctity of 
 the oath, is to strike a fatal blow both at 
 religion and at law. It destroys religion 
 by weakening the sense of God's presence 
 in the soul, and by debauching the very 
 faculty to which all her sanctions are ad- 
 2 
 
18 
 
 dressed : "he that cometh unto God must 
 believe that He is, and that He is the re- 
 warder of them that diligently, seek Him." 
 It also undermines the foundation on which 
 civil government is built, which cannot 
 lose its hold upon the conscience without 
 destroying the very source of its authority. 
 No increase of civil penalties can compen- 
 sate for the loss of this moral control ; for, 
 besides the fact that every addition to the 
 criminal legislation of a country only in- 
 creases the friction and wears out the 
 machinery of government, there are many 
 offences which cannot be reached by it ; and 
 in any case, it is but a collateral security 
 which it affords. I freely confess my alarm 
 at the ventilation of a doctrine which thus 
 summarily dispenses with the obligation of 
 the oath. If it be not arrested, the most 
 complete demoralization of our people must 
 ensue, which will render all government 
 impossible, save that of brute physicial 
 force. The prevalence, indeed, of this cor- 
 rupt sentiment, is the remote cause of all 
 the troubles in which we are now involved. 
 Covenants and treaties solemnly instituted 
 
19 
 
 by our forefathers, are no longer inter- 
 preted to their simple and obvious mean- 
 ing. Ingenuity itself was put to the tor- 
 ture to devise expositions which should 
 eviscerate them of the principles which 
 they were ordained to conserve, until at 
 length our modern alchemists found, in 
 the doctrine of "a higher law," the mighty 
 solvent which destroyed the power of oaths 
 and covenants at once. Men swore with 
 due solemnity to uphold the constitution 
 and the laws, but with a mental reserva- 
 tion to uproot these very institutions which 
 that constitution had been framed to de- 
 fend, until the universal perfidy of the 
 North suddenly burst every ligature by 
 which the States were held together in the 
 Federal Union. Are our people willing to 
 walk in the footsteps of our foes. And is 
 it a suitable preparation for a new historic 
 career to inoculate this young nation with 
 the virus of that perfidy which has already 
 destroyed before our eyes, one of the best 
 colossal governments upon earth ? Nor is 
 it difficult to trace the practical operation 
 of this secret poison as it diffuses itself 
 
20 
 
 through the body politic. If the juror may- 
 swear no longer " in animum imponentiSj" 
 but according to a secret intention of his 
 own, then he alone can judge when or how 
 far he is bound. The magistrate may, by 
 this sweeping dispensation, absolve himself 
 from the guilt of malfeasance in office ; the 
 juryman upon the panel, and the witness 
 upon the stand, may combine to defeat all 
 the ends of justice through an oath which 
 opens and shuts conveniently at the bid- 
 ing of caprice, until, in the total overthrow 
 of morality, society itself shall crumble 
 through universal distrust. The applica- 
 tion may be made to the very parties whose 
 plea we are now considering. They swear 
 allegiance to the government at Washing- 
 ton, raising the hand to heaven in attesta- 
 tion of their sincerity ; yet, at the same 
 moment, they require us to believe their 
 affirmation of loyalty to the government 
 at Richmond. Which of these opposing 
 declarations are to be received? Plainly, 
 this cannot be determined without weigh- 
 ing both in the balance of probabilities ; 
 but as far as their naked word is concerned, 
 
21 
 
 how can it challenge confidence when, even 
 under the awful sanction of an oath, it 
 confesses to wilful falsehood ? Can it ever 
 he lawful for men to place themselves in 
 that condition of disability where their 
 simple word can never be accepted as the 
 guage of truth ? This might he enforced 
 by adverting to the peril incurred by sub- 
 scription of the Lincoln oath. Being re- 
 gistered citizens of the United States, sup- 
 pose it had been required of them to bear 
 arms against their brethren of the South, 
 who are now battling for the restoration of 
 that birthright which, in an evil hour, they 
 have bartered away? And what hinders 
 it but the conviction in the tyrant's mind 
 that they cannot be trusted with the very 
 duties which their oath of fealty implies ? 
 A conviction, by the way, which involves 
 him in the still greater disgrace of com- 
 pelling an oath in which he does not con- 
 fide, but which also shows the guilt of 
 subscribing it, since this alone saves from 
 the most fearful crime of lifting the hand 
 against the mother that bore them. 
 
 I come now to the second and entirely 
 
22 
 
 distinct line of defence raised by some who 
 have been entangled in the snare ; among 
 whom are many far too conscientious to 
 assume a position known to be false, or to 
 subscribe an oath with any thing approach- 
 ing to mental reservation. I cannot refrain, 
 in passing, from the remark upon all ques- 
 tions of honor and principle, the first 
 thought of an honest and pure mind is the 
 safest ; for in this the instinct of manliness 
 and truth usually finds expression. The 
 second thoughts which prudence is prone 
 to suggest, are generally the inlets of temp- 
 tation, and turn out to be subterfuges for 
 the evasion of duty. It is alleged then, 
 by this second class, that the control 
 and protection of the Confederacy being, 
 through the fortunes of war, wholly sus- 
 pended upon the principle of submitting 
 to the powers that be, they took the oath 
 to the only authority which de facto ex- 
 isted, and which made this the only con- 
 dition upon which its protection could be 
 enjoyed. They took it, moreover, in good 
 faith, intending to keep it so long as the 
 Federal rule should continue, but in the 
 
23 
 
 hope that this rule would, in due season, 
 terminate and restore them to the civil con- 
 nections from which their hearts were never 
 estranged. This position is impregnable so 
 far as a de facto submission to military force 
 is concerned. Neither the laws of war nor 
 those of reason, oblige men to continue a 
 factitious and unavailing opposition against 
 overwhelming and crushing force ; and no 
 blame could attach to them for simply yield- 
 ing to the rule of warfare, which connects 
 with a surrender the cessation of active 
 hostility. But it is an immense leap from 
 this to the making of a solemn covenant, 
 transforming into a government of law 
 what was before only a government of force ; 
 for the oath of allegiance transferred with 
 the citizenship all its moral obligations, 
 and invested the authority of Butler with 
 the sanctions of a recognized and legal 
 government. Had these parties approached 
 the Federal commander with language sub- 
 stantially this: " as a defenceless people, 
 wholly within your power, we submit with- 
 out resistance to military force, and without 
 conceding this submission to be obedience,' ' 
 
24 
 
 no censure could attach to them : and they 
 would then be embraced within the terms 
 of the eulogy conveyed in the resolutions 
 you have presented before Congress. If it 
 be said that allegiance was the only condi- 
 tion upon which protection would be af- 
 forded to property and life, my answer is, 
 that the hazard should have been incurred 
 along with the thousands who chose to be 
 registered as alien enemies to the United 
 States, rather than forfeit their loyalty to 
 the South. Actual submission to military 
 supremacy was all that could be demanded 
 of them by the rules of civilized warfare ; 
 and it was their privilege to stand upon 
 the assertion of this right before the nations 
 of the earth. Notwithstanding the ghostly 
 terrors by which they were surrounded, the 
 government at Washington dared not, 
 under the eyes of mankind, to exact more. 
 A few victims might, perhaps, be selected 
 from the mass, upon whom to vent disap- 
 pointment and spleen, and a brief persis- 
 tence in tyranny might have tested the 
 endurance of the community ; but a little 
 firmness would have carried them over the 
 
25 
 
 trial, and won for the sufferers an immor- 
 tality of glory ; in proof of which I adduce 
 the fact, that wherever else in the Confed- 
 eracy the enemy has heen stoutly defied 
 with all his bluster, he has been compelled 
 to yield a reluctant acquiescence in the 
 moral code established by civilized nations 
 for the regulation of war. 
 
 But suppose the revise of this, and a long 
 dispensation of suffering to ensue, are we 
 to avow the doctrine that the most cherish- 
 ed convictions of the soul must be surren- 
 dered upon the plea of coercive necessity? 
 I will put the argument in a form most 
 likely to be appreciated by the Christian 
 men who have taken refuge under this 
 plea. Should the days of religious perse- 
 cution again appear, would it be right in 
 order to save property and life, to abjure 
 Christianity, and to offer sacrifices upon 
 the altar of Jupiter, as was done in the 
 second century? The frailty of human 
 nature might yield now, as it did then, 
 under the fiery ordeal ; and knowing that 
 we are men, we might weep tears of com- 
 passion, nay, almost of forgiveness, over 
 
26 
 
 an apostacy thus extorted. But what 
 judgment would we pronounce upon a cool 
 argument framed to justify this defection ? 
 If we could be brought to pardon the one, 
 we could not tolerate the other. Yet, 
 after all, why is not the argument of coer- 
 cive necessity as conclusive in this case, as 
 in that we are now considering ? I freely 
 admit the disparity between the two ; in 
 that one relates to the duties which we owe 
 to God, while the other respects the duties 
 we owe to man ; but I see not why the ob- 
 ligation may not be as imperative to abide 
 by our principles in the one sphere as well 
 as in the other — why duty to our country 
 may not be as paramount in the earthly 
 kingdom, as duty to our God is in the 
 spiritual and heavenly. I have been edu- 
 cated, sir, in a school which regards the 
 obligations which we owe to country as 
 only next to those which we owe to God. 
 Our country ! what does not the term em- 
 brace ? 
 
 It means our homes and the cheerful 
 firesides and the prattling babes that 
 gather round the parental knee ; it means 
 
27 
 
 sweet neighborhood and friendship, and 
 the tender charities which solace life from 
 the cradle to the tomb ; it means the mem- 
 ories of our youth as they grow fresh 
 again in the twilight of age ; it means 
 ancestry and the proud recollection of hon- 
 ored sires, who bequeathed their blessing 
 with the names we inherit ; it means our 
 altars and sanctuaries where we have wor- 
 shipped God and held communion with 
 His saints on earth ; it means the graves 
 where our loved ones are lying, consecrated 
 by the tears of a bitter parting when they 
 were laid out of sight forever ; it means 
 all that the human heart can remember 
 and love, all the associations which spread 
 their secret network over human life ; all 
 the scattered leaves on which are written 
 the sorrows and the joys through which 
 man travels onward to his rest above. 
 Our country and our God ! The two 
 blend evermore in the Christian patriot's 
 thought, and shall it be said there are no 
 martyrdoms for the one, when the gibbet 
 and the flame are welcomed for the other ? 
 True heroism may be displayed in endu- 
 
28 
 
 ranee not less than in action ; and our fel- 
 low-citizens in Louisiana enjoyed a most 
 distinguished opportunity of rendering a 
 service to the Confederacy quite as valuable 
 as that of the army in the field. Can any 
 good reason be assigned why they should 
 not run the hazard of confiscation, of im- 
 prisonment and of death, equally with 
 those who encountered the risk of capture, 
 of wounds, and of death upon the field of 
 slaughter ! If these may be justified in 
 their apostacy because of the perils by 
 which they were surrounded, why may not 
 these be justified on precisely the same 
 grounds for declining the guage of battle 
 in the presence of the foe ? In short, the 
 plea now under discussion seems to resolve 
 patriotism into an aifair of simple contract. 
 The inability of the Confederacy for the 
 time being to protect them, is viewed as 
 dissolving the bond between them and it ; 
 and, like traders in the market, they bar- 
 gain with another party, purchasing pro- 
 tection with loyalty. Upon this principle 
 patriotism is a word without meaning, and 
 allegiance becomes the sport of accident 
 
29 
 
 and chance. I have not the heart to pur- 
 sue the discussion under this aspect. I 
 cannot believe that our friends have delib- 
 erately brought themselves to rest in this 
 bleak and desolate conclusion. By the 
 instinct which recoils from it, let them 
 detect the sophistry of the whole plea from 
 which it is deduced, by the rigor of a re- 
 morseless logic. 
 
 I close this long letter by suggesting 
 two considerations which alone should 
 have deterred these jurors from subscri- 
 bing the oath in question. In the first 
 place, its imposition was in contravention 
 of a right which ought never to have been 
 conceded. I have already stated that the 
 acknowledged laws of warfare required the 
 subjugation of the whole,, before tests of 
 loyalty should be exacted of the constitu- 
 ent parts. Why was not the attempt to 
 establish a contrary precedent, full of mis- 
 chief to the world at large, promptly met 
 with a manly protest and with an appeal 
 to the verdict of mankind ? Duty, not to 
 their country alone but to the race of man, 
 forbade the concession of such a claim. 
 
30 
 
 In the second place, the distinctive ground 
 on which this war is waged by the North 
 is, that the South has embarked in a 
 wicked rebellion, upon crushing which 
 the very life of the nation depends. It 
 totally ignores the authority of sovereign 
 States intervening between the citizen and 
 the central power, and simply for this rea- 
 son an oath of allegiance is exacted of 
 individuals. A monstrous despotism has 
 grown up which swallows up all the States 
 alive, and treats their jurisdiction as no 
 more than that of a municipal corporation. 
 Are the jurors in Louisiana willing to lend 
 the sanction of their names to a doctrine 
 which has already converted the freest 
 government on earth into the most corrupt 
 and reckless despotism upon which the sun 
 ever shone? And are they prepared to 
 brand with the infamy of rebellion that 
 sacred cause for which their own brothers 
 and their own sons are perilling life and 
 limb upon many a field of battle ? Yet the 
 oath they have sworn sanctions this foul 
 culumny pronounced against the heroes 
 and the martyrs of their own blood. 
 
31 
 
 Could my voice, sir, be heard in Lou- 
 isiana, I would say to those who once 
 listened to me with affection and respect, 
 cancel this dreadful oath. Before it is too 
 late, retrieve your position by a bold and 
 manly retraction. Before this war rushes 
 on to its close, say to the Federal authori- 
 ties, we have recovered our manhood, 
 and withdraw our allegiance unjustly and 
 cruelly extorted at our hands. If the 
 dangers of such an act be great, remember 
 that in the greatness of these will consist 
 the amplitude of the reparation you make 
 to an injured cause. There is no alterna- 
 tive but that of a dishonored name cleav- 
 ing to you and to your children as long as 
 history shall last. It is now almost a cen- 
 tury since the first American revolution ; 
 and men to this day point the finger and 
 say, "there goes a man through whose 
 veins the blood of a tory flows." Choose 
 the dungeon and the scaffold a thousand 
 times, rather than transmit the taint of 
 this leprosy to your offspring. But if you 
 have not the nerve for this, if the oath can- 
 not be retrieved, let it go before the country 
 
32 
 
 without a word of defence. Do not, in 
 the attempt at justification, withdraw the 
 under-pinnings of social order, and involve 
 hoth government and religion in a common 
 ruin. Let the act stand forth a confession 
 of human infirmity, and perhaps, like the 
 recording angel whom Sterne describes, 
 your country may write its censure, and 
 then drop the tear of compassion which 
 will blot it out forever. 
 
 I remain, dear sir, most 
 
 respectfully and truly yours, 
 
 B. M. PALMER. 
 Richmond Enquirer. 
 
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