m
MIL L

YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

THE LIBRARY ASSOCIATES

Gift of
ABEL CARY THOMAS, Y 'o5

UNION AND ANTI-SLAVERY SPEECHES,

DELIVERED

DURING THE REBELLION

CHARLES D. DRAKE.

PUBLISHED FOR THE BENEFIT OF
THE LADIES' UNION AID SOCIETY OF ST. LOUIS, MO.

CINCINNATI:
APPLEGATE & CO.
1864.

Entered according to Act of CoiigreBH, in the year 1864, by
CHARLES D. DRAKE,
in the Clerk's Office, of the District Court of the United States for the Eastern
District of Missouri.

PREFACE.

It is with no reluctance that I have acceded to the suggestions
of friends in the publication of this book ; nor is any apology
deemed necessary for its appearance. It contains the fruits of
the most earnest labor of my life, and speaks the supreme con
victions of my judgment and conscience, and the intense emotions
of my heart, concerning the terrible struggle through which our
country is now passing. If I know myself in any tolerable
degree, that labor has been prompted solely by a sense of patri
otic duty, regardless of consequences to myself. It has, ^indeed,
been a labor of love for my country, for Truth, Liberty, and
Humanity. I know no valid reason why the utterances flowing
from it, which, in a greater or less degree, secured attention in
almost every part of the loyal States, at the time they appeared
in the public journals of the day, should not, in a more perma
nent form, continue to have such measure of influence as their
arguments and appeals are capable of exerting. My only regret
is, that I could not have thrown into them a hundredfold greater
power. This publication is made under circumstances which forbid my
receiving any pecuniary benefit from it. All the profits of its
sale, therefore, are to go, as the title-page indicates, to a patriotic
and benevolent association of ladies in my own city, to be ex
pended for the relief of such of the brave soldiers of the Republic
as may, through wounds or sickness, need the ministrations of

iv -frefaee.
some of the noblest women that have, by their high-hearted and
self-sacrificing labors during the war, glorified their sex, and
blessed their country in the day of its affliction and mourning.
The reader will probably observe the progressive development
of opinion and feeling in regard to the institution of Slavery,
from the Fourth of July, 1861, when I referred to it only remotely,
to the twenty-second of February, 1864, when I urged its com
plete and final extirpation from the whole land ; and may also
note the advance from the position of April, 1862, in favor of its
gradual removal from Missouri, to that of September, 1863, de
claring for " Emancipation, immediate, unconditional, final," in
that State. These progressions were but the results of an educa
tion by current events, whose power I could no more resist,
than a tree can resist leafing, when the spring sap flows into its
thirsty pores. They indicate such change only as that of the
child into the man; and I pity him who, from'passion, prejudice,
selfishness, ambition, party associations, devotion to Slavery, or
aught else, voluntarily remains a child as to our country's mortal
contest for its life, when, by casting off their shackles, he might
straightway rise to the stature of manhood in patriotism.
It is in no fanatical spirit that the word " anti-Slavery " is
embodied in the title of this book. The conviction is so over
powering within me, that there is no good future to this nation,
but through the total destruction of Slavery, that I do not shrink
from inviting- others, by the title of the book, to scrutinize the
grounds upon which that conviction rests. And in styling them
"Union and anti-Slavery Speeches, " instead of one or the other
alone, I purpose to suggest the absolute inseparability, hence
forth, of Union and anti-Slaveryism ; just as Daniel Webster
by a similar form of expression, pronounced "Union and Liberty"
to be one and inseparable. If that conviction is wrong the
words dictated by it will speedily be forgotten ; but if it is right 
as millions in this land now believe, who did not so believe three

Preface. v
years ago — then its flame will leap from heart to heart through
the nation, until the whole mighty mass of its loyal people, with
one fiery and resistless onset, will sweep Slavery the accursed,
with all its hideous wrongs and remorseless crimes, from America,
to be known there no more for ever.
It will be observed that three of the speeches — those at pages
308, 337, and 377 — have special reference to the phase which the
rebellion, either in its direct workings, or in its collateral influ
ences in connection with Slavery, has assumed in Missouri. Did
they refer merely to local politics, I would not have included
them here ; but it is not so. The contest in that ill-fated State,
which has attracted the attention of the country, has been, and
still is, between Loyalty and Disloyalty : the particular questions
of State policy, concerning which it has occurred, having been
but the occasion for starting into action the innate and irrepres
sible antagonism between those discordant elements. It is only
another form of the conflict which in the South is waged by arms.
Any history of the rebellion will be incomplete which does not
analyze and portray it. Hence, though these speeches treat os
tensibly of Missouri affairs, they relate, in fact, to the rebellion,
in one of its insidious and dangerous forms, under the very folds
of the Old Flag ; and while, because of their seeming local char
acter, they may not as readily as the others attract the notice of
readers in other States, yet they will be found to elucidate mat
ters which it were well for all reading and thinking men to un
derstand, and their insertion here will make the volume more
acceptable to those with whom I have labored for Missouri's re-'
generation. St. Louis, May, 1864.

The Union: Its Nature and its Assailants,  9
Washington's Birthday, North and South,  73
The Rebellion : Its Origin and Life in Slavery,  98
The Rebellion: Its Character, Motive and Aim,  131
Slavery's War upon the Constitution,  173
The Proclamation of Emancipation,  193
Camp Jackson: Its History and Significance,  209
Reply to the Missouri Republican,  246
Speech at Chicago,  .  262
Immediate Emancipation in Missouri,  271
The Missouri State Convention and its Emancipation Work 308
The Wrongs to Missouri's Loyal People,  337
The Call for Rebel Votes,  377
Slavery's Destruction, the Union's Safety,  403

UNION AND ANTI-SLAVERY SPEECHES.

THE UNION:
ITS NATUftE AND ITS ASSAILANTS.*

Fellow Citizens : — Honored by your invitation to
address you on this venerated and cherished anniver
sary, I was led to comply, not less by a sense of duti
ful obligation to our mother land, than by the impulse
of true and reverent affection for those free institu
tions, which have been to the American people only a
fountain of inestimable blessings, but which are now
threatened with disaster, if not subversion and destruc
tion. Clouds and darkness are above us ; the fires of
unholy and reckless passions are around us ; the con
vulsed earth trembles beneath us ; and there is no
Washington !
At such a time, I rejoice — and who that pretends to
patriotism will not rejoice? — that I can still salute you
as /eZfow-citizens, not only of the noble State we inhabit,
* A speech delivered at a Union meeting held at Louisiana,
Missouri, July 4, 1861.
2

10 The Union:
but of those United' States, to the Union of which
Missouri owes her existence as an American State,
and from the Union of which her people have re
ceived untold benefits. The bond of brotherhood be
tween us is not yet severed; and here as brothers,
beneath the glorious flag which symbolizes that Union,
let us devoutly thank the God of our fathers for His
goodness in the past, and humbly implore Him to
keep us brothers yet, and to restore our beloved coun
try to its former high estate.
In the outset I would announce the character in
which I appear before you to-day. I am not here as
a Northern or a Southern man, an Eastern or a West
ern man ; nor as a " Democrat," which I am ; nor as
a " Republican," which I am not, nor ever was ; but
simply as an American citizen; more than content
with the glory of that title, and ambitious only that it
may not, now or ever, be sullied by any act or word
of mine. With profound reverence I have, from my
youth, followed the teachings of the great lights of our
country, from Washington to the present day, and
from them learned to love the Union of the American
people above all other human institutions. It is, with
me, the pre-eminent embodiment of all national wis
dom, beneficence, and greatness. At the age of six
teen I was solemnly sworn to support the Constitution
which sprung from that Union, and on other occasions
since, that oath has been repeated, until, by its influ
ence, combined with that of every year's added ex
perience, fidelity to that Constitution has become an
intimate portion of my very existence; never to be

Its Nature and its Assailants. 11
destroyed, I hope, until that existence shall itself cease.
Here and elsewhere, to you and to all, I declare that
So far as any past or existing causes of dismember
ment are concerned, I am, in life or in death, for the
Union. A third generation has almost passed away, since on
this day eighty-five years ago, the American people
proclaimed themselves to be, as they had already in fact
long been, one people, and solemnly before the world
united their destinies for all future time as A nation —
a new, an independent, a republican, and, as time has
shown, a great nation. Three millions of people were
born as a Nationality on that day, baptizing themselves
in streams of their own best blood, shed for liberty
and national existence : to-day, the same Nation,
grown to more than ten times its original numbers, a
thousandfold increased in physical power, and stand
ing so lately without a superior in moral greatness
among the nations of the earth, stains itself — 0!
Shameful and horrid sight ! — with the blood of its own
people, shed in a strife provoked by passion and mad
ness — a strife such as men have not seen before, and
as the civilized world beholds with perplexity, amaze
ment, and dread.
Under such circumstances, you will not expect that
any other topics than those which so sadly engross
every mind, should be now presented to you. Our
Country and its perils is the absorbing theme ; involv
ing an examination of the nature of' our institutions,
and a discussion of the startling rebellion which has
burst upon us within the past six months, threatening

12 The Union:
their overthrow ; and to that examination and discus
sion, in a frank and fearless spirit, but without exas
peration or passion, I shall now address myself;
earnestly invoking the supremacy of reason and of
conscience, while we faithfully seek to know and un
derstand THE BIGHT.
THE NATURE OF THE UNION.
The Union — offspring of kingly oppression ; nursed
in a cradle of blood and fire, yet, Hercules-like, strong
enough in its infancy to strangle the serpent that would
have crushed it; respected by every foreign nation,
while yet the dew of its youth is upon it; admired
and venerated by the oppressed of other lands; be
loved by every patriotic American ; and alas ! con
temned and hated by none in the whole world but its
own children : what is it ? We were most of us born
in the Union ; we have been reared under its benign
influence; we have daily and hourly experienced its
protection and its benefits ; we enjoy, through it, the
name and heritage of American citizens : and yet we
are constrained in this day, when ungoverned malig
nity assails it on every side, and ruthless hands are
raised for its destruction, to ask the strange and
apparently superfluous question — WJiat is the Union?
My friends, strange as it may appear, upon this ques
tion turns much of the bitter controversy of this dark
epoch in our country's history. It lies in the fore
ground of every discussion of existing complications ;
and those complications have, to a great extent, grown
out of the efforts of ambitious and unscrupulous men

Its Nature and its Assailants. 13
to close the popular mind against what the Union is,
and to lead the people to regard it as what it is not,
and thereby weaken their affection for it: a work
better fitted for fiends than for men, but which fiends
could not have done better than it has been done by
men, who owe to the existence of the Union all the
position and influence which they have sacrilegiously
used for its destruction. As to them, we may leave
them to time and to God ; but with the errors they have
disseminated we may never, without guilt, cease to
contend; for wherever they are implanted, the warm,
all-embracing love of country, which should fill every
American heart, withers and dies.
In the States where secession has been accomplish
ed, so far as ordinances of secession could accomplish
it, a period of more than thirty years has been unin-
termittingly occupied by their leading men, in con
vincing their people^that the Union sprang from the
Constitution of the United States ; that the Constitu
tion is a mere league between separate and sovereign
States, from which any State- has a constitutional right
to withdraw at any moment, for any cause she may
deem sufficient ; that allegiance is due from every man,
primarily and by superior obligation, to the particu
lar State of which he may happen to be a citizen, and
only secondarily and by inferior obligation to the
United States ; and that the Government of the United
States is a mere agent of the States, for particular
purposes, with the privilege in any State to terminate
the agency, as to itself, whenever it pleases.
It is out of my power to conceive of views in regard

14 The Union:
to our system of government, more false in their nature
and more deadly in their effects, than those; and my
undoubting conviction is, that but for their steady
inculcation on the minds of a portion of the American
people, until an entire generation have been educated
to believe in them as fundamental truths, we never
should have seen the terrible events of the present
time. Those doctrines have undermined the broad and
• apparently immovable foundations of the Union in every
heart which has received them, and have accomplished,
by insidious approaches and covert attacks, what open
disloyalty, in the first instance, could never have
effected. They have falsified and degraded the Union
our fathers formed, and the Government they framed
to strengthen and perpetuate it ; and the foreseen and
designed result is, that while, a few years ago, the
whole American people held their National Govern
ment to be the best the world «ver saw, and their
Union the most sacred object of their attachment as
Americans, millions of them are now engaged in a
fierce and desperate effort to destroy both, even though
in doing so they destroy the best hope and refuge of
Freedom on the earth. Against such inexplicable and
suicidal madness, I would appeal to you to-day. In
doing so, I am, more than ever before, deeply con
vinced that a frequent and thoughtful recurrence to
great fundamental doctrines and principles is the very
life of a republic ; and I shall not therefore rest upon the
surface of passing events, but go back to the source of
our grand fabric of Union and Government, and en
deavor to renew our veneration and love for it, by ex-

Its Nature and its Assailants. 15
hibiting the organic and vital principles, upon which
alone I consider it was erected, and resting upon
which I believe it would endure as long as humanity
itself. When was the Union formed ? is a question of far-
reaching import in determining what the Union is ; so
much so, that it is the subject of systematic and per
sistent falsification among those who aim to overthrow
the Union. Their idol doctrine is, that the Union is a
compactor league between sovereign States; and to
sustain and spread the worship of that idol, they must
refer to something written down, as compacts and
leagues between States always are. Therefore, they
fix upon the Constitution, and claim it to have been the
origin of the Union. The South Carolina Convention,
after passing an ordinance of secession, put forth an
address to the people of the slaveholding States, the
first sentence of which is a repetition of historical
error on this point, in these words : " It is now seventy-
three years since the Union between the United States
was made by the Constitution of the United States."
To say that the members of that Convention did not
know this statement to be untrue, is to affirm their
ignorance of history, and of the very first line of the
Constitution. The Constitution itself declares why
it was established — assigns several reasons; the first
of which is, " in order to form a more perfect Union :"
words which are meaningless, if they do not affirm
that a Union had before existed. And the letter of
Washington, as President of the Convention, commu
nicating to Congress the Constitution, stated that the

16 The Union:
Convention had " kept steadily in view that which
appeared to them the greatest interest of every true
American — the consolidation op our Union:" a
form of expression, equally with the other, declaring
the pre-existence of the Union. It is, then, not only
historically true, but explicitly recorded in the Consti
tution, that, so far from the Union springing from the
Constitution, the Constitution was the offspring of the
Union. Searching backward for the beginning of the Union,
we find that on the first day of March, 1781, nearly
five years after the Declaration of Independence, the
Articles of Confederation, which had been formed by
the Continental Congress, in 1777, were finally adopted
by the delegates of the thirteen States, and became,
during the few years of their existence, the bond, but
not the origin, of Union ; for we know from history
that the Union existed before.
Again proceeding backward, we see that the De
claration of Independence began with this remarka
ble expression — "When, in the course of human
events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve
the political bands which have connected them with
another;" and closed with the announcement "that
these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be,
free and independent States." The phrase " one peo
ple" applied to the people of the " United Colonies,"
can leave no doubt of the view they entertained of
their relation to each other. They considered them
selves united, as one people, and they referred to a
Union then already in being.

Its Nature and its Assailants. 17
Looking still farther ' back in the record of events,
we find that on the 5th of September, 1774, the Con
tinental Congress, composed of delegates, from all the
Colonies except Georgia — which was afterwards repre
sented — was convened in Philadelphia.
Though as far back as 1637 the idea of a confede
racy between some of the Colonies had been presented ;
though a convention was held in Boston, in 1643, t,o
form a confederacy among the New England Colonies ;
though in 1754 a Congress of delegates from seven
Colonies was convened at Albany, and unanimously
resolved that a union of the Colonies was, absolutely
necessary for their preservation ; and a similar Con
gress of delegates from nine Colonies was held in
New York, in 1765 ; all indicating the tendency of the
American mind to entrench the separate and scattered
communities within a citadel of union: yet the Congress
which convened in Philadelphia, in 1774, composed of
delegates appointed by the popular or representative
branch of the Colonial legislatures, or by conventions
of the people of the Colonies, and styling themselves
in their more formal acts "the delegates appointed by
the good people of these Colonies," was the first general
or national government which existed in America: and
its very assembling was a declaration of Union, as its
act, nearly two years afterward, was a Declaration
of Independence. That Congress continued in exist
ence, exercising, de facto and de jure, a sovereign
authority, not as the delegated agents of the existing
Colonial governments, but in virtue of original powers
derived from the people, until it was superseded, in

18 The Union:
1781, by the government established under the Articles
of Confederation.
On the day, therefore, of the assembling of that
Congress, the grand idea of American Union attained
its full development, and expanded into action. That
was the birthday of United America — the natal hour
of our hallowed Union. We celebrate the fourth of
July for our Independence ; but we take no note of
the fifth of September for the Union, without which
Independence would never have been achieved, or
perhaps, meditated.
Having thus traced back the stream of Union to its
source, let us observe for a moment the character of
the people who then commingled their fate, and the
circumstances with which they were surrounded. They
were, in language, lineage, and institutions, essentially
one people, as they then organized and consolidated
themselves into one nation. Nearly the whole body
of them were immigrants from Great Britain, or their
descendants. They all acknowledged allegiance to the
British crown, from which they had received their pos
sessions and their chartered privileges ; and all looked
to the common law of England for the regulation and
maintenance of their individual rights of persons and
property. Trade between the Colonies was unre
strained. An inhabitant of one Colony might inherit
from an ancestor or kinsman dying in another. They
were not only bound together by community of origin,
but by ten thousand ties of kindred and affinity, inter
laced through every city, village, and settlement, from
the Piscataqua in the frigid North, to the St. Mary's

Its Nature and its Assailants. 19
in the flowery South. They were, with partial excep
tions, of the same religious faith, and read in their
common language the same Bible. The history of
England was the history of their fathers and their
ancestral institutions, and whatever of glory was there
written was their common inheritance as Englishmen.
They passed from Colony to Colony, and from point to
point, as freemen, and were equally at home in every
place, and equally protected everywhere by similar
laws, framed^ and administered by themselves. There
were among them no transmitted feuds or hereditary
animosities, no strifes of rival leaders or wars of fac
tions, no struggles for lawless supremacy of one Colony
over another, no greed of conquest from each other :
from all these curses, flowing from the unholy passions
of men and of races, they enjoyed in their secluded
home a happy exemption, through their essential unity.
Subjected, as they were, to annoyances and perils from
the savage foes around them, who long threatened their
destruction, they united their forces in the common de
fense, and worked on bravely and sternly, in the common
cause of securing for themselves and their posterity
an abiding and peaceful home, under laws and institu
tions fit to nurture freemen. They were, in short, by
every circumstance surrounding their homes, by their
relations to each other, and by their own expressed
assent, one people ; separated, it is true, into thirteen
several municipal organizations, having in many re
spects diverse interests, but still not the less in mind,
in heart, and in destiny, one.
Now, my friends, you and I are descendants of that

20 The Union:
people ; and I ask you if it is not true — if you do not
in your hearts know it to be true — that when, in the
incipient stages of the Revolution through which they
were called to struggle, they magnanimously put aside
all local differences and jealousies, and with one im
pulse combined their efforts, their fortunes, their lives,
their all, against fearful odds, for the redress of their
common grievances at the hands of the mother country,
and for the Independence which they resolved to achieve,
they evoked an already existing feeling of unity, and
did, in the very essence of the term, form a full, unre
served, and practical union of THE PEOPLE, intended by
themselves to be perpetual ? Did they not, as perfectly
as any people ever did, constitute and declare them
selves a single and undivided Nation ? Is there in all
history an instance of such a union among a people
who did not feel themselves to be, in every important
particular, the same people ? Why, even before the
Union was a fact . in history, the feeling in the North
in reference to it was expressed by James Otis, one of
the leading patriots of Massachusetts, in the Convention
of 1765, in the hope that a Union would be formed,
which should " knit and work together into the very
blood and bones of the original system every region as
fast as settled; and from distant South Carolina great
hearted Christopher Gadsden answered back — " There
ought to be no New England man, no New Yorker, known
on the continent, but all of us Americans." And in
the very hour of the Union's birth-throes, Patrick
Henry flashed upon the Congress of 1774 these light
ning words : "All America is thrown into one mass.

Its Nature and its Assailants. 21
Where are your landmarks — your boundaries of Colo
nies ? They are all thrown down. The distinctions
between Virginians, Pennsylvanians, New Yorkers,
and New Englanders are no more. I am not a Vir
ginian, but an American." And when, after the Union
was a recorded and mighty fact in history, the united
people, through their Congress, organized the first form
of government for the new-born nation, they solemnly
wrote down in the Articles of their Confederation,
" The Union shall be perpetual." If any further
evidence is desired of the character of the Union, and
of the intention that it should endure forever, recur
again to that first line of our noble Constitution, de
claring itself to have been established " in order to form
a more perfect Union" — more perfect in its principles
and its machinery, and more perfect in its adaptedness
for perpetuity.
The question, What is the Union? is answered. It
is no league of States, no compact between different
peoples, no treaty between rival powers, but a volun
tary, complete, and permanent coalescence of the
several parts of one people, for their common defense,
and to secure to themselves and their posterity the
blessings of freedom and self-government. When I
call to your earnest remembrance, that this Union was
formed without any express or formal stipulat:on ; that
it rested in the outset solely upon the good faith of the
people toward each other; that it was consummated
before their Independence was declared, and in advance
of any written form of General Government ; that it
was the freewill offering of the heart of the struggling

22 The Union:
Nation upon the altar of liberty ; and that it was upheld
and consolidated by sacrifices such as only a people
truly united in heart would make for each other ; you
will, I am sure, join with me in ascribing to it a sacred-
ness that should forever protect it against the parricidal
blow. State pride — poor, narrow, vain, and short
sighted State pride ! — rejects this broad and glorious
view of the nature of the Union ; but it is the only one
consistent with history, the only one that can stand
the test of truth, the only one which makes our double
system of governments consistent throughout, the only
one which satisfies the patriotic heart, the only one
which can secure a happy future to this nation, or give
stability to American, liberty.
You will not, I am sure, complain of the time I have
deyoted to the exhibition of the true character of the
Union, as the leading topic of this day's discussion.-
The views I have expressed are, in my judgment,
entwined, as nothing else is, with the very heart-strings
of our whole system of free institutions. It is there
fore vital that the true nature of the Union should be
impressed broadly and deeply upon the American mind.
Error on many other points may exist, and be widely
diffused, without serious injury ; but error on this point
is fatal. It is poisoning the minds of multitudes in
Missouri, as it has already poisoned those of millions
in the insurgent States. I believe it to be undeniably
true, that not one of those States would have put on
the livery of treason, had not a large portion of their
people first been seduced from their fidelity to the"
Union, by the heresies that lurk under the glittering

Its Nature and its Assailants. 23
guise of State Rights. As it is necessary in the
prosecution of the argument that I should assail those
heresies, let me say here that I am as firm a defender
of the constitutional rights of the States as any other
man, and would as resolutely resist by all constitutional
means, any unauthorized infringement of them by the
National Government. But I stand by the Consti
tution ; and in that position it is my duty equally to
resist any attempt by any State to disturb the equi
librium of our system, by arrogating to itself powers
and privileges not belonging to it. That the insurgent
States assert doctrines, and claim rights and attributes,
which are without a semblance of warrant, in or out of
the Constitution, and are at deadly variance with the
principles on which the Union was formed, and on
which its existence depends, is as apparent to me as
my own being; and I am not without hope of making
it apparent to you.
STATE SOVEREIGNTY.
Revolting though it be to State pride, I hold that
no greater or more destroying error has ever been
promulgated in regard to our noble system of govern
ment, than the claim of State Sovereignty, as advanced
in the States which have ordained secession from the
Union ; and yet upon that claim is based the unprece
dented rebellion that convulses this land this day.
Viewed in- any light, there is neither consistency, logic,
nor truth in it. To believe in it, history must be for
gotten, the simplest axioms of government ignored, the
acts and testimony of the fathers of the country

24 The Union:
disregarded, and the plainest language distorted or
contemned ; all which I need not add, has been done
in those States, as I will endeavor to prove.
Sovereignty is the highest power. For a State or
nation to be sovereign, it must govern itself, without
any dependence upon another power. It must have no
superiors. If a State makes a part of another com
munity or State, and is represented with foreign powers
by that community or State of which it is a part, it
is not sovereign. These are the simplest principles of
constitutional and international law, affirmed by the
greatest jurists, and recognized and acted upon by all
civilized nations. Tested by them, no State in the
American Union, except Texas, ever was sovereign, in
any but a limited sense, and that, only within its own
boundaries and over its own local affairs.
As to foreign nations, what act of sovereignty has
any single State in the Union ever performed, from the
Declaration of Independence, when the original thirteen
announced themselves States, to the present time?
Not one : nor could any of them ever have done such
an act, without violating its obligations to the Nation
of which it was a part. By the National Constitution,
to which the people of every State irrevocably bound
themselves, every attribute of external sovereignty is
denied to the individual States, either in express terms,
or by being vested in the United States. No State can
make treaties with foreign powers, regulate commerce
with other nations, declare war, or be represented by
an ambassador, or other diplomatic agent, with any
government on earth. For any purpose of sovereignty,

Its Nature and its Assailants. 25
one of the United States is no more recognized abroad,
than the city of St. Louis is recognized in the State of
Oregon as a sovereign city.
Nor is it otherwise as between the States themselves.
No State can, without the consent of Congress, enter
into any agreement or compact with another State;
or engage in war, unless actually invaded, or in such
imminent danger as will not admit of delay.
In every manner, therefore, the States are stripped
of external sovereignty, which is, by the Constitution,
vested in the Nation, represented by its National
Government. And not only so, but they are, in various respects,
in a condition of dependence upon that government ;
as, for example, for a uniform coinage, for postal
facilities, for an army and navy, for security against
invasion and domestic violence, for the return of fugi
tives from service, and even for the guaranty of a
republican form of government, if an attempt should
be made to deprive them of it.
To speak of States as relatively sovereign, when thus
situated as to foreign powers and as to each other, is
a solecism seldom surpassed.
As to internal sovereignty, it is undoubtedly true
that the States possess it in all matters of a local and
domestic nature, except where prohibited by the Consti
tution of the United States ; but beyond that they have
not a single attribute of it. They may not coin money,
lay imposts or duties on imports or exports, keep
troops or ships of war in time of peace, emit bills of
credit, declare any thing but gold and silver a tender
3

26 The Union:
in payment of debts, or pass a bill of attainder, an
ex post facto law, or a law impairing the obligation of
contracts : all of which are matters of domestic concern
and cognizance.
Why can not any State do any of all these enume
rated acts of sovereignty, as to other nations, as to
other States of the Union, and as to their own people ?
Simply and only, because the Constitution of the
United States, speaking the voice and embodying the
power of the Nation — including in the Nation every
State — forbids it, and in doing so, declares the su
premacy of the Nation over the individual States, even
to the extent of controlling their government of their
own people.
I repeat, therefore, the States are, externally, not
sovereign at all, and, are so internally, only as that
Constitution does not declare otherwise. It matters
not that their internal sovereignty is retained to a
greater extent than it is surrendered or trammeled;
the question is, Have they surrendered, or has the
Nation taken from them any part of that sovereignty ?
If, in forming the Constitution, it took from them or
restricted a single attribute of either branch of sove
reignty, especially that purely domestic, it is their
superior ; if they voluntarily surrendered a single such
attribute to it, or consented to a single such restriction,
they themselves made it their superior. In either case
they are not sovereign.
State pride rebels at the humiliation of the States,
alleged to be involved in this doctrine : but there is no
such humiliation in fact ; for, have not the people of

Its Nature and its Assailants. 27
every State, in entering the Union, assented to this
relative position of the States and the Nation ? What
is a State but a body of people who are a part of the
Nation ? And has not the Nation ordained the Consti- .
tution, which fixes the status of the General and State
governments ? And have not the people of the States,
with every opportunity of self-enlightenment, and with
out the slightest external pressure, by their most free
and voluntary act in entering the Union, acknowledged
the Sovereignty of the Nation over every matter
which the people, in forming the National Constitu
tion, deemed it necessary, for the good of the whole,
to control by the aggregate power of the Nation ? Is
any other view consistent with the Union of the
PEOPLE, which our fathers consummated, and which
has remained unbroken till this time ? If we are one
people, as I have shown we are, shall not that people
ordain in their Constitution, what the whole and what
each part shall be and do, and what the whole and each
part shall -not be and not do ? If not, what becomes
of the fundamental principle of popular government,
that the majority shall govern ?
The radical and pernicious fallacy of the State Rights
doctrine is, in claiming that the people inhabiting a
defined portion of the National domain, on emerging
from their condition of dependence on the National
Government, and entering the Union as a State, instead
of remaining, as they were, a part of the Nation, be
come, through their State organization, segregated
from it, and exalted by the act of Congress admitting
them as a State, to a position of sovereignty higher

28 The Union.
than that of the Nation. From this error flows, as a
necessary consequence, the equally pernicious fallacy,
that the constitutional supremacy of the National Gov-
¦ ernment is something extraneous and. antagonistic,
imposed upon the States without their consent ; when,
in truth, it is the power which the people of the States
have themselves created, and is therefore just as much
their creature as the governments of their States.
They established both, and both, in their respective
spheres, are complete and predominant. While they
remain in their several positions, there can be no col
lision between them. The only conflicts that have ever
arisen between National and State authority, have re
sulted from claiming unconstitutional powers and rights
for the States, not from aggressions upon the States by
the General Government. The claim of State sove
reignty has provoked them all, as it is at the bottom
of the fearful strife now agitating the country; and
permanent peace can not be expected until that claim,
as advanced in the South, is abandoned.
But while this claim of State sovereignty must be
acknowledged by all candid men to be inconsistent with
and subversive of the National Constitution, and at
war with the first principles of the Union, it is boldly
asserted that, aback of all constitutions, and above all
written forms of government, there is a reserved power
of State sovereignty, paramount to that of the Nation,
in virtue of which any State may at any time cast off
its obligations to the Union, and assume a separate
and independent attitude. No higher sovereignty than
this could be claimed ; for it asserts the right of a single

Its Nature and its Assailants. 29
State, a part of the Nation — whether it be Florida
with her 82,000 white inhabitants, or New York with
her 3,800,000 — to abrogate, as to itself, " the supreme
law of the land," ordained by the whole nation. One
would think that merely to state such a proposition
would be to condemn it utterly and forever ; but from
just that absurdity springs the gigantic treason of this
day. In the face of the fact that this is pre-eminently
a country of written constitutions, wherein the people
themselves — not some reigning potentate — grant pow
ers of government, and define the boundaries of au
thority and right ; in spite of the acknowledged fact,
that this claim is not affirmed by. any word in the
National Constitution, or in the Constitution of any
State ; and in disregard of the plainest common sense, ,
teaching us that a government framed with a reserved
right in any part of its people to renounce it at pleas
ure, would merit and receive the contempt of the world
for its incongruity and imbecility ; this dogma of a re
served State sovereignty superior to that" of the Nation,
is flaunted abroad with as much assurance as if its
apostles really believed it themselves, and as greedily
Swallowed by their followers as if it were a new gospel
of freedom. JEFFERSON DAVIS' MESSAGE.
True, the State Rights leaders profess to appeal to
the Constitution itself in support of their views ; but
with such a conscious hopelessness of aid from that
quarter, that they are driven to actual falsification of

30 The- Union:
its terms, plain as they are, and open as they be to
the perusal of every reading man. The latest and
most authoritative, and therefore most flagrant, of all
the efforts to blind and mislead the people on this
subject, is that of Jefferson Davis, in his message of
April 29, 1861, to the Congress of the insurgent
States; wherein he attempts a vindication of this
State Rights doctrine, ostensibly from the words of
the Constitution, but, in fact, with a strange and most
daring perversion and suppression of them ; to which
let us briefly direct attention.
Mr. Davis, referring to the occasion of convening
the Congress, characterizes it as " indeed an extraor
dinary one," and adds — "It justifies me in a brief
review of the relations heretofore existing between us
and the States which now unite in warfare against us,
and in a succinct statement of the events which have
resulted in this warfare ; to the end that mankind may
pass intelligent and impartial judgment on its motives
and objects." -
When the leader of a great rebellion thus appeals
to the public opinion of mankind, all men have a right
to require that he shall, above all things, exhibit a
supreme regard for truth in his statement of facts.
His deductions from premises truly stated may be hon
estly erroneous; but when, in regard to facts, he is
guilty of either suppressio veri or suggestio falsi, he for
feits the respect of the people to whom he appeals.
That such is Mr. Davis' position, seems to me beyond
dispute. His message opens with an argument in support of

Its Nature and its Assailants. 31
the fundamental heresy, which strips the Constitution
of the United States of its character of government,
and degrades it into a mere compact between sovereign
States, creating an agency to manage certain affairs
for them as States, and therefore a mere creature, and
they its creators. I will not stop to dwell upon the
simple language with which the Constitution, in its
first line, refutes this dogma, by declaring itself to
have been formed by "the People of the United
States ;" nor to array before you the repeated judicial
decisions, including those of the Supreme Court of the
United States, and the Court of Appeals of South
Carolina, expressly affirming that the United States
are organized by their Constitution into a Government,
and are, in that respect greatly in advance of the
United States under the Confederation; nor to present
the almost infinite testimony of our Revolutionary
fathers, who framed both systems, that the Constitu
tion superseded the Confederation, because the latter
was, in practical effect, no government, and without
an effective government the nation could not be held
together ; but will direct your minds to the particular
point in which Mr. Davis ventures to defend his
favorite theory, at the sacrifice of truth in the matter
of fact.
Alluding to the Confederation, he remarks :
"In order to guard against any misconstruction of
their compact, the several States made explicit declara
tion, in a distinct article, that ' each State retained its
sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every
power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this

32 The Union:
Confederation expressly delegated to the United States
in Congress assembled.' "
Proceeding then to refer to the adoption of the Con
stitution in lieu of the Confederation, and to "the
earnest desire evinced to impress on the Constitution its
true character — that of a compact between independ
ent States," he presents the following paragraph :
"The Constitution of 1787 having, however, omit
ted the clause already recited from the Articles of
Confederation, which provided in explicit terms that
each State retained its sovereignty and independence,
some alarm was felt in the States when invited to ratify
the Constitution, lest this omission should be con
strued into an abandonment of their cherished princi
ple, and they refused to be satisfied until amendments
were added to the Constitution, placing beyond any
pretense of doubt the reservation by the States of all
their sovereign rights and power not expressly dele
gated to the United States by the Constitution."
Now, my friends, you can judge to what straits Mr.
Davis was driven to sustain himself before the world,
when you note the fact that# though he quoted, in
terms, the " distinct article" of the Confederation to
which he referred, he entirely omitted to quote, in
terms, the amendment to the Constitution upon which
he relied, as "placing beyond any pretense of doubt
the reservation by the States of all their rights and
powers, not expressly delegated to the United States
by the Constitution." When he stood in the world's
forum, and appealed to the world as a judge, why sup
press a material fact in the case ? Why hold out to

Its Nature and its Assailants. 33
view one clause and hide the other, when he asks
mankind to pass' an " intelligent and impartial judg
ment ? " Could he not trust them with the whole truth ?
If not, why keep back any ? Such is not the act of
a man conscious of rectitude and a righteous cause.
No : he knew that the constitutional amendment to
which he referred, without quoting it, did not, like the
Articles of Confederation, declare "the reservation
by the States of all their sovereign rights and powers,
not expressly delegated to the United States by the
Constitution ;" and it therefore suited not his purpose
to set it side by side with the " distinct article" of the
Confederation which he had recited. It would have
been too apparent to all reflecting men, that the two
clauses were widely different in terms and effect; as
we can now see by placing them together.
The second Article of the Confederation is in these
words :
"Each State retains its sovereignty, freedom, and
independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right,
which is not by this Confederation expressly delegated
to the United States, in Congress assembled."
The tenth amendment of the Constitution is in these
words :
" The powers not delegated to the United States by
the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are
reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
Now note, that while the former declares that each
State retains its sovereignty and independence, the
latter does not. The omission to preserve so im
portant a feature, when, according to Mr. Davis, the

34 The Union:
constitutional amendment was adopted under a feeling
of "alarm?' in the States, "lest this omission should
be construed into an abandonment of their cherished
principle," is a fact of clear and great force. Why did
they not reiterate the former declaration? Manifestly
because the idea of State sovereignty and independence,
except in a very limited internal sense, had been ex
ploded by the acknowledged failure of the Confedera
tion ; and the people, convinced that it was inconsistent
with the sovereignty of the Nation, repudiated it in the
formation of the Constitution. Well might they ask ;
why declare a reservation of the sovereignty and in
dependence of the States, when the people of those
very States had deliberately disrobed them of almost
every badge of sovereignty, and declared their depen
dence, in most essential points, on the Government of
the Nation? The letter of Washington, before re
ferred to, communicating the Constitution to the
Congress of the -Confederation, uses language that is
conclusive as to the view then entertained by the
Convention of the actual surrender of State sovereignty.
involved in the adoption of that instrument. " It is
obviously impracticable (says the letter) in the Federal
G-overnment of these States, to secure all rights of in
dependent sovereignty to each, and yet provide for the
interest and safety of all. Individuals, entering into
society, must give up a share of liberty to preserve the
rest." With the true character and effect of the Con
stitution thus distinctly announced, the people of every
State ratified and established it, and in so doino- pro
claimed the will of the Nation, that the States should

Its Nature and its Assailants. 35
no longer claim to be sovereign and independent, as
they had claimed to be under the Confederation.
Equally forcible is the omission of the word
"expressly" from the constitutional amendment above
cited. Under the Confederation, every power, juris
diction, and right, not expressly delegated to the United
States, was retained by the States. Unless it could be
found written down in plain terms in the Articles of
Confederation, that any given power might be exercised
by the Federal Government, it could not be exercised.
Hence the Confederation was feeble, from its very
stringency. The following language addressed to the
public, in 1786, by one of the leading writers of that
day, strikingly exhibits the results of the restricted
terms of the Confederation.
"By this political compact the United States in
Congress have exclusive power for the following pur
poses, without being able to execute one of them.
They may make and conclude treaties; but can only
recommend the observance of them. They may
appoint ambassadors; but cannot defray even the ex
penses of their tables. They may borrow money in
their own name on the faith of the Union ; but cannot
pay a dollar. They may coin money ; but they cannot
purchase an ounce of bullion. They may make war,
and determine what number of troops are necessary;
but cannot raise a single soldier. In short, they may
declare everything, but do nothing."
Why was the Confederation so powerless ? Mainly
because the Congress could do nothing but what was
expressly authorized. Legitimate inference of a power

36 The Union:
not named, from those expressly given, was not allowed.
To every attempt to deduce by necessity an inferred
power, the answer was — "Is it so nominated in the
bond?" Hence, when, with more enlightened views,
the people essayed to create a real and efficient govern
ment instead of a rickety and powerless league, their
Constitution, after enumerating certain defined powers
of Congress, added, that that body should have power
" to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper
for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and
all other powers vested by this Constitution in the
Government of the United States, or in any Depart
ment or officer thereof."
Having thus relieved the Government from the tram
mels imposed on the Confederation by the use of the
word "expressly," it is plain why, in adopting the
tenth amendment, they omitted that word.
What, then, becomes of Mr. Davis' statement, that
the States "refused to be satisfied until amendments
were added to the Constitution, placing beyond any
pretense of doubt the reservation by the States of all
their sovereign rights and powers, not expressly dele
gated to the United States by the Constitution ? " It
takes its place in the long catalogue of falsifications
and frauds, by which he and his coadjutors have excited,
and expect to keep alive, the rebellion they are leading.
The people whom he thus deceives and betrays may
never see the falsehood ; but the cause which rests upon
such a foundation carries its own death within it and
will bring its supporters to sorrow, dismay, and ruin.
But had the second Article of the Confederation

Its Nature and its Assailants. 37
been incorporated in terms into the Constitution, would
it support the right claimed by the South to secede
from the Union at pleasure ? Can it be for a moment
supposed possible, that the people, in forming a govern
ment, reserved to each of the States a right to throw
off that government at its will ? When the people of
the United States declared in the Constitution, that it
was ordained and established "to secure the blessings
of liberty to ourselves and our posterity," did they
mean that a part of the people should have a-constitu-
tional right, the next year, or in ten, twenty, fifty, or
any number of years thereafter, to scatter those bless
ings to the winds, by overthrowing the Constitution
which secured them, and destroying the Union which
the Constitution was designed to perpetuate? Were our
fathers fools, that they engaged in such child's play as
that ? No : when they strove with as elevated a mag
nanimity as history exhibits, to secure those blessings
to their posterity, they believed that an endless succes
sion of generations would gather the precious fruits of
their patriotic labors, and hoped that the sun of the
Constitution would set, only when that of the firmament
should be extinguished in the gloom of an endless night.
NO STATE, EXCEPT TEXAS, EVER WAS
SOVEREIGN.
But if the States are sovereign, in the sense claimed
in the insurgent States, when did they become so ? Re
curring to the principle previously enunciated, that no
State is sovereign that has superiors, I affirm it to be
historically true that no State in this country, except

38 The Union:
Texas, ever has been sovereign, save in a limited sense
over its domestic affairs ; and to this point I will direct
your minds in a series of brief propositions, which
are conclusive.
1. When the people of the Colonies appointed the
delegates who assembled as a Congress on the 5th of
September, 1774, the Colonies were mere dependen
cies of the British crown, and, therefore, were not
sovereign. 2. That Congress was, de jure and de facto, a gov
ernment over all the Colonies, from the date of its
assembling until the Colonies, on the 4th of July, 1776,
assumed the attitude of States, and thenceforward7 it
was a government over the States ; and Colonies and
States were alike subject to its authority, and therefore,
not sovereign. This continued until the 1st of March,
1781, when the Articles of Confederation were finally
ratified by all the States.
3. From the 1st of March, 1781, to the 4th of March,
1789, when the first Congress under the Constitution
assembled, the States were subject to the government
of the Confederation, so far as its weak capacities
justified the name of a government. At any rate the
Confederate Congress exercised all the powers of general
sovereignty which were exercised at all, and the States,
as such, were merged, as to all the rest of the world,
in the United States. The Confederation, too, as after
wards the Constitution, explicitly restricted the domes
tic sovereignty of the States. The sovereignty which
the States declared in the Articles of Confederation
that they retained, was, therefore, at most, only a limited

Its Nature and its Assailants. 39
one over their internal affairs, and did not affect their
relations to the Union, or to the world.
4. From the 4th of March, 1789, to the present day
the government under the Constitution has been in
existence ; under which I have shown that the States
have only such powers of sovereignty, as, in the words
of the Constitution, are not "prohibited by it to the
States." Here, then, from the 5th of September, 1774, to the
present hour, has been a clear and steady assertion of
the sovereign power of the Nation, paramount to the
powers of Colonies and States. During all that period
of time, Colonies and States have all acknowledged the
highest and most important attributes of sovereignty
to reside in the government established by the Nation,
and therefore yielded to the Nation superiority over
the individual States.
The only apparent exception to this, among the ori
ginal thirteen States, is in the case of North Carolina,
by which the Constitution was not adopted until more
than eight months after the government under the
Constitution went into operation ; and of Rhode Island,
by which its adoption was postponed more than four
teen mouths after that event. Still, those States,
during the time they deliberated as to their consent to
the new form of government, remained essentially a
part of the Nation, performing no sovereign function,
except over their internal affairs, and, by the act of
deliberation, expressing their continued adhesion to the
Union. They, therefore, constitute no real exception.
The proposition that no State, except Texas, ever

40 The Union:
was sovereign, is most emphatically true of twenty out
of the twenty-one new States, which have been added
to the original thirteen. Every one of them was com
posed of people previously subject to the National
Government ; — people who were unable to take position
as States without the consent of that Government ; who
were admitted into the Union only in virtue of an act
of Congress ; and who, when admitted as States, volun
tarily took the subordinate position assigned them by
the National Constitution, and which the original States
had previously, of their own volition, taken.
THE SOUTH ITSELF DOES NOT BELIEVE IN
A RESERVED SOVEREIGN RIGHT OF
SECESSION.
But so far as this doctrine of State sovereignty is
used to sustain the right of secession, it isHo my mind
apparent that its supporters in the South do not them
selves believe in it. If there is a reserved right of
secession, paramount to the Constitution, it must have
existed when the Union was formed ; for it has not
been acquired or granted since. If it did exist then,
the Union was entered into with a tacit understanding
that there was such a right. If entered into with such
an understanding, then a State seceding would be guilty
of no legal wrong toward the other States ; it would
do only what it had a right to do. So doing, it would
have no reason to regard itself as an enemy to the
remaining States, or the National Government as an
enemy to it ; and would have just cause of complaint
against either, for taking a hostile attitude to it for

Its Nature and its Assailants. 41
seceding. But what do we find in the seceded States ?
Instantly upon passing their ordinances of secession,
and in some instances in advance of it, they, by their
acts, proclaim themselves the enemies of the United
States, in every way which could signalize them as such.
They proceed to organize a Confederate Government,
to raise armies, to provide for their support, to create
a navy, and to seize the armories, forts, navy yards,
docks, custom-houses, mints, money, and all other
property of the United States within their reach ; they
overpower and capture the United States troops,
wherever they find them in detached bodies too small
for resistance, and hold them as prisoners of war ; they
fire upon a vessel under the National flag, and in the
government service ; they beleaguer, and finally bom
bard and reduce, a National fort, held by a brave half-
starved garrison, one-hundredth part as strong as the
assailing host : and all for what reason ? They were
not assailed by the Government on account of their
secession. No troops were marched against them, no
navy closed their ports, no mails were stopped within
their borders ; they were, for months after their seces
sion, as they asked to be, " let alone ; " — let alone to
commit every form of aggression upon the Nation,
without retaliation or resistance : why did they take
the attitude of enemies ? If, in seceding, they exercised
only a reserved right, they did a lawful act, and had
no occasion to wage war upon the Government they
had renounced ; nor had the Government occasion, for
the act of secession, to attack them. Why, then, did
they wage the war ? Without the least doubt, because

42 The Union:
they knew that their claim of a reserved right in a
State to dissolve the connection with the Union at its
will, was a flimsy and false pretense, which they them
selves had not the slightest faith in ; and because, veil
it however they might from their people, under the
guise of State sovereignty, the leaders knew that
secession was rebellion, and that, sooner or later,
rebellion must be met by "force. In their own con
sciousness, therefore, as exhibited in their acts, the
pretext of a constitutional right of secession is a fal
lacy and a falsehood. As such the on-looking world
regards it, and the intelligence of mankind scouts and
condemns it.
NATIONAL AND STATE ALLEGIANCE.
Having shown that the Nation, as the aggregate of
the united people — not the States as corporate bodies
leagued together — is the source of National sove
reignty, and that the organ of that sovereignty is the
government established by the Nation, through a
Constitution which declares itself, and the laws of the
United States made in pursuance thereof, to be the
supreme law of the land; it is proper that we should
devote a portion of our time to the consideration of
that great, but almost forgotten, principle, which per
vades all the relations between government and citizen,
and is condensed in the single, but most comprehen
sive, word — Allegiance.
Every individual of every nation, barbarian and
civilized, is bound by allegiance to the supreme au
thority which presides over that nation, whether it be

Its Nature and its Assailants. 43
King, Emperor, Grand Duke, Sultan, Tycoon, Chief,
or Constitutional Republican Government. Society
without allegiance is anarchy ; government without
allegiance is a mockery ; people without allegiance are
a mob. It is the principle which gives all force to
law, for it is the principle of obedience to law. It is
impossible to conceive of a supreme government which
does not claim the allegiance of its subjects ; or of a
people acknowledging a supreme government to which
they do not yield allegiance. It is not obedience only,
but something above and beyond that; and has been
rightly defined to be the tie, or ligamen, which binds
the citizen to his government. The breach of this tie is
Treason — the highest crime known to the laws of
man, and which falls under the special condemnation
of the word of God; but which, in this day, Ameri
cans, and, I grieve to say, those who claim to be Chris
tians, rush into, as if it were a merit and a glory to
destroy the best government that ever wielded the des
tinies of a people.
The events of this year of wrath have disclosed as
tounding facts in regard to the allegiance of the Ameri
can people to their National Government. Over an
entire section of the Union they seem, almost in a
mass, to have crushed out of their hearts all sense of
allegiance ; while with a minority there, it has been so
weakened that they are open to treasonable impressions
and influences, which unsettle their loyalty and vitiate
their patriotism ; and in that whole region only a frag
ment remain, to resist openly the torrent of disallegi-
ance, and hold fast to the Constitution and the Union.

44 The Union:
This amazing and inconceivable change in the feel
ings of so large a portion of the Nation, toward a
government which, during its whole existence, has been
controlled almost entirely by that very people, and
which has never oppressed or injured them in any of
their interests, but has always, and especially for the
last thirty years, shaped its policy in conformity with
their demands, is, to him who looks only at the sur
face of things, the great enigma of history ; and to
such it must ever remain an enigma; He, however,
who looks below the surface, has no difficulty in seeing
that the doctrine of primary State allegiance, which
was promulgated by South Carolina, in 1832, and,
though exploded by her own Court of Appeals, in
1834, has since been diligently inculcated through the
entire South, and was put forth by the Governor of
this State, in his recent treasonable proclamation of
war against the United States, lies at the bottom, like
a subterranean fire, burning out the popular heart,
and with earthquake throes upheaving the foundations
of our National institutions. It is no more true that
States exist, than that, but for this shallow heresy,
they would not now have been arrayed against the
National Government. It appeals to home attach
ments, to State pride, to self-interest, to local jealousy,
to sectional animosity, to every passion and feeling
hostile to a broad and patriotic nationality ; and, like
a mighty lens, focalizes the whole upon a single petty
point, burning to. ashes the tie of paramount allegiance
to the Government of the Nation, loosing the warring
elements, and bringing in chaos again. With him who

Its Nature and its Assailants. 45
takes this doctrine to his soul, true, generous, self-
sacrificing love of country is as impossible as for one
born blind to describe a rainbow ; his State is his coun
try, and his American citizenship is a bauble compared
with his citizenship there. Point him to the flag of
his country, and he sees only the one star which typi
fies his State ; every other is, to that, rayless and cold.
Talk to him of the Nation, and he replies "South
Carolina!" Speak of national prosperity and happi
ness, and he responds, "the Old Dominion!" Refer
to the honor of the Nation, and he shouts "Missis
sippi .'" " Arkansas !" " Texas !" Lead his mind where
you will, like a cat he always returns to the particular
spot he inhabits, and which he calls his State ! Ever
regarding that, he raises not his head to behold the
glorious Country, which claims his first devotion as an
American, his highest love as a freeman.
To hold that allegiance is due from a citizen to one
of the United States, otherwise than as the term im
ports mere obedience to its rightful authority while he
resides there, is a gross and incomprehensible perver
sion of the nature and obligation of citizenship. Al
legiance, in its proper sense, can be exacted only by
the supreme power, which in this land, is the govern
ment created by the Constitution of the United States.
To that government every American citizen is bound,
wherever he may be, on land or at sea, at home or
abroad, in the States, or in the Territories beyond the
jurisdiction of any State. But the moment an indi
vidual leaves the soil of a State, with the intention of
residing permanently elsewhere, his citizenship there

46 The Union:
is lost. There is no limit, except his own volition, to
his changes of State citizenship. But wherever he
goes, he is still a citizen of the United States, and a
•thousand changes of domicil can not make him other
wise : through them all he owes unbroken and unquali
fied allegiance to the United States.
This allegiance may not be put on and off, to suit
the convenience or whims of the individual, as he may
assume or cast off State citizenship. Once due it is
always, unless the National Government consent to
its renunciation. The native-born citizen owes it,
from the cradle to the grave ; the naturalized foreigner
from the moment he acquires citizenship till his death.
No such obligation exists toward a State. A State's
power over any citizen begins only with his entrance
upon her territory, and ends with his departure from it.
Will it be said that he who was once a citizen of Flori
da, but removed thence to Missouri, where he has since
resided, may now be called back by Florida to fight her
battles, because of his former citizenship there ? No
sane man will hold such a doctrine ; and yet if Florida
may not do that, there is no allegiance to a State, ex
cept in the sense of obedience to its laws and authori
ties while in it. But the United States have an un
doubted and indestructible right to call forth their
citizens from every spot of their domain, to defend and
and uphold in battle the honor and power of the nation ;
for no citizen can find a place where the tie of allegi
ance does not bind him to the Constitution and flag of
his country.
The citizen owes allegiance in return for protection

Its Nature and its Assailants. 47
by his government, and that protection is his lawful
right, wherever in the world he may be. It was the
certainty and swiftness of Rome's vindication of the
rights of her citizens, that gave such power everywhere
to the simple words "lam aRomcm citizen;" and this
hour, among all civilized nations, to be known as an
American citizen, is a passport and a protection. Why ?
Because the United States are known throughout the
world, as able and ready to protect their citizens. But
on another continent than this, what would it avail to
be known as a citizen of any State of the Union ?
Who, in a foreign land, would, in extremity, proclaim
himself a citizen of one of the States, when his State
has no power to protect him or to avenge his wrongs,
except through the Government of the Union? And
yet men prate of a first allegiance due to their State !
But to what power does the man of foreign birth
assume allegiance when he becomes a citizen? and
was is the character of this citizenship? Does he by
his naturalization become a citizen of any particular
State ? No ; he attains the dignity of American citizen
ship. Does he swear allegiance to any State? No ; he
swears to support the Constitution of the United States.
He is not by that step identified with a part, but with
the whole, of the Nation, and binds himself to the govern
ment which represents the Nation.' And yet that man
is told that he owes primary and paramount allegiance
to the State he lives in, the Constitution of which
he never promised to support, and the obligation of
which upon him ceases the moment heysteps outside
her border!

48 The Union:
In sober verity, there is in this whole dogma of State
allegiance an absurdity so glaring, a perversion of the
true principles of constitutional law so flagrant, a
delusion so pitiful and yet so monstrous, that it is a
world's wonder thatjnen of sense could anywhere be
found to inculcate or even countenance a doctrine, that
any school-boy might refute, and which a jurist or a
statesman would regard as worthy only of ridicule
and contempt. ALLEGIANCE TO KING COTTON.
But my friends, the truth is, that this dogma is but
a cloak for another kind of allegiance, which has usurp
ed the place of that due to the Constitutional Govern
ment of the Union. The people of the insurgent States
have, in great part, renounced allegiance to that
government, and transferred it to their cotton bales and
the system of labor that produces them. With them
Cotton is King, and they bow down to their king
with a reverence denied to their country ! A dream of
the dominion of cotton over three mighty nations — the
American, the French and the British — has filled their
imaginations, until it has assumed to them the form of
a reality. But for this delusion, never was there a
more loyal people than they; with it, never was there
a people more miserable than they are destined to be,
persisting in their unnatural rebellion. No instance
can be found, of great nations being permanently held
tributary to any one spot of this earth, for a production
of the soil indispensable to their comfort and civilization,
when only labor was needed to produce it in unlimited

Its Nature and its Assailants. 49
quantities motherlands; unmindful of this, that people-
plunge into rebellion to clutch the scepter of commercial
power, and, as they clutch, it eludes their grasp, and
passes away forever! The dominion they might have
wielded, as a part of the United States, for many years
to come, was broken in the hour they attempted to
separate themselves from their country. They have
disturbed the commercial equilibrium of great nations ;
and to avoid a recurrence of such disturbance hereafter,
those nations are already searching the earth for new
regions where cotton may be grown, and for the labor
to cultivate it. Both will be found; and when found,
the overthrow of the kingdom of cotton in this republic,
and of the system of labor on which that kingdom rests,
is but a question of time ; and with that overthrow, if
not before, reason will resume its sway, patriotism its
power, and allegiance to the Constitution its supremacy.
RIGHT OF REVOLUTION.
If it be asked, May not a people throw* off their
allegiance, and make for themselves a new govern
ment ? the answer is, of course, they may. The right
of revolution is inherent in every people; but it is
'ultima ratio — the last resort, and is not a remedy which
any people may, without awful crime, needlessly
appeal to. But so perverted are the judgments of
many in the present crisis, and so deeply have their
minds, insensibly to themselves, become imbued with
destructive error, that thousands wildly claim the right
of any portion of a nation to throw off and overturn
their government at their mere pleasure, for any cause

50 The Union:
or no cause, regardless of consequences, and in defiance
of every principle which justifies or upholds any form
of human authority. It were needless to say that such
a doctrine tears up by the roots all social order, and
prostrates like a whirlwind every institution of govern
ment. To see its legitimate and inevitable fruits, you
have only to look at Mexico, were forty years of re
volutions have wrought desolations, which another forty
years of peace and order might not repair. If the
American people are not to take a place alongside of
that poor victim of periodical revolt, let them understand
the principles upon which alone any people may make
themselves the executioners of their own government.
If it be not in vain to hold up the words and example
of our Revolutionary fathers, let us learn from them
when to take the sword; lest, taking it rashly and
without cause, we perish by the sword.
Read their Declaration of Independence, and ponder
these words:
"Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments
long established should not be changed for light and
transient causes ; and, accordingly, all experience hath
shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while
evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolish
ing the forms to which they are accustomed. But,
when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing
invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce
them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is
their duty, to throw off Such Government, and to pro
vide new guards for their future security. Such has
been the patient sufferance of these Colonies, and such

Its Nature and its Assailants. 51
is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their
former systems of Government. The history of the
present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated
injuries and usurpations, all having, in direct object,
THE ESTABLISHMENT OF AN ABSOLUTE TYRANNY OVER
these States. To prove this let facts be submitted
to a candid world."
Now, my friends, upon the principles of that De
claration, and in such an exigency as it portrays, I
would be a revolutionist : he who would resort to re
volution on any other principles is an anarchist, a
social Ishmaelite, whose hand is against every man;
and every man's hand ought to be against him. And
yet, one of the latent elements of mischief at the
present time in this State, is the wide -spread assumption
among intelligent men, of this right.of forcible revolu
tion, whenever the impulse, well or ill-directed, may
seize any portion of the people.
Against a doctrine so destructive of every form of
sound and stable government, I appeal to the wisdom,
the conscienpe, and the hopes of the people. I pro
test against it, as the unpardonable sin against human
liberty, throwing wide open the flood-gates of beastly
license, and sweeping away in indiscrimate destruction
all that we have ever loved or valued, and all that
could make us, or our children after us, good or great,
or even decent in the eyes of mankind.
As, in a republic, the source of power is the
People, the very first principle of every such govern
ment is, that public opinion, not revolutionary vio
lence, shall be invoked to rectify errors and redresa

52 The Union:
grievances. Our whole system rests upon the popular
will, and if that be perverted, the remedy is in restor
ing it to rectitude, not in destroying- the system. There
is no evil connected with the existence of the Union,
(if, indeed, there are any,) for which the National
Constitution, laws, and tribunals do not afford adequate,
certain, and efficient, if not speedy remedy. Every
State became a part of the Union under a solemn
pledge — not, to be sure, written • down, but none the
less binding because implied — to look to that Consti
tution and those laws and tribunals for the redress of
every wrong and the support of every right. Conflicts
of interest and opinion were inevitable ; but every part
of the Nation agreed that the will of the majority,
constitutionally expressed, should govern ; for an ap
peal to the people jvas ever open, and the majority of
to-day might — as it has done a thousand times — dwindle
into a minority to-morrow. The assertion, therefore,
of a right of armed revolution against the decision of
the majority, is a violation so fearful of the vital prin
ciple of a republic, and a blow so deadly at the peace
of the nation, the integrity of the Constitution, and
the perpetuity of popular government, as almost to
crush the heart of the patriot under an infinite weight
of dismay and despair.
When, therefore, within fifteen days after the vote of
the Electoral Colleges was cast for Mr. Lincoln, and
two months and a half before he could be inaugurated,
and while he was yet as powerless as a child for harm,
even though he had been as full of evil intent as Satan
himself, the State of South Carolina raised the war-

Us Nature and its Assailants. 53
cry of rebellion, and announced her rejection of the
authority of the Constitution and her separation from
the Union, an offense was registered in Heaven's chan
cery, before which all preceding outbreaks of popular
wickedness fall into immeasurable insignificance. And .
when, from time to time, ten other States followed her
lead, and raised the standard of revolt against a gov
ernment so mild, so paternal, so beneficent, that their
people hardly knew there was such a government, ex
cept by its blessings, the world could only gaze in
blank amazement at a sacrilege, which threatened to
extinguish the great beacon light of human freedom
forever, and to consign America to boundless and
hopeless ruin.
And the world asks — What justification is pleaded
for this inaredible outrage against the Nation, and, in
deed, against the human race? And the world will
have the question answered. It is in vain to reply
that it is not worth while to inquire who is in the
wrong: — it is worth while. When a son kills his
father, all men inquire the cause ; and they inquire on
until they know it ; for every individual is concerned
to understand the motive for such a deed. And so,
when a stupendous rebellion arrays itself against a
government which the world knows to be the least ex
acting and the least burdensome of all the governments
existing on the earth, mankind demands, Why? and
mankind will be answered. Let us do our part toward
giving the reply.

54 The Union:
THE SOUTH CAROLINA DECLARATION OF
CAUSES FOR SECESSION, REVIEWED.
When the South Carolina Convention passed their
Ordinance of Secession, they put forth " A Declara
tion of causes which induced the secession;" — the
only instance of the kind, within my knowledge, in
the eleven seceded States. And as the other States
followed the lead of South Carolina, it is fair to assume
that the " causes" which impelled her impelled them,
and that they are willing to be judged by the suffi
ciency of her "Declaration." Let us, then, exam
ine it.
After a feeble and futile defense of the right of se
cession, they present the "Personal Liberty laws" of
some of the Northern States as a justification ; concern
ing which they say :
"We assert that fourteen of the States have delib
erately refused for years past to fulfill their constitu
tional obligations, and we refer to their own statutes
for the proof. * * * The States of
Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts,
Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania,
Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Iowa, have
enacted laws, which either nullify the acts of Congress,
or render useless any attempt to execute them. In
many of these States the fugitive is discharged from the
service or labor claimed, and in none of them has the
State Government complied with the stipulation made
in the Constitution. The State of New Jersey at an
early day, passed a law in conformity with her consti-

Its Nature and its Assailants. 55
tutional obligations ; but the current of anti-slavery
feeling has led her more recently to enact laws which
render inoperative the remedies provided by her own
laws and by the laws of Congress."
Now, were this statement true in every particular,
relating as it does, only to the action of particular
States, it would not constitute the shadow of a justifi
cation for rebellion against the General Government.
In 1842 the Supreme Court of the United States
decided that the power of legislation in relation to the
recapture of fugitive slaves, is by the Constitution,
vested exclusively in Congress. In 1850, Congress
enacted a Fugitive Slave Act, prepared by Southern
Senators and Representatives, so stringent in its pro
visions that Mr. Rhett, of South Carolina, one of the
arch-instigators of treason there, expressed doubts of
its constitutionality; and that Act is still in force.
So far, then, as there is constitutional requirement to
provide for legislation for such recapture, it was ful
filled to the letter, by the only body having authority
to act in the premises, and in the very terms prescribed
by the South itself. When, therefore, they allege that
" in none of them [the States named] has the State
Government complied with the stipulation made in the
Constitution," they attribute to the States an authority
and obligation which the Supreme Court has declared
does not exist ; and they proclaim a separation from
those States, because they have not done what that
tribunal holds they have no constitutional right to do.
But that statement is false in a material allegation
of fact — even more so than the message of Jefferson

56 The Union:
Davis, to which I have previously referred. Of all
the fourteen States named, as having " enacted laws
¦which either nullify the acts of Congress, or render
useless any attempt to execute them," it is absolutely
true that only four — Vermont, Massachusetts, Michi
gan, and Wisconsin — had any such laws on their
statute books ! But had such been enacted by every
non-slaveholding State, they were unconstitutional and
void, and the Constitution provides ample means to
have them declared so ; and the laws of the United
States give full redress against all persons who should
undertake to act under them. To that Constitution
and to those laws the South was bound by the most
sacred obligations to appeal, and not to the sword.
The next justification advanced is in the following
words :
" We affirm that these ends for which this Govern
ment was instituted, have been defeated, and the
Government itself has been destructive of them by the
action of the non-slaveholding States. Those States
[mark the words !] those States, have assumed the
right of deciding upon the propriety of our domestic
institutions ; and have denied the rights of property
established in fifteen of the States, and recognized by
the Constitution; they have denounced as sinful the
institution of Slavery ; they have permitted the open
establishment among them of societies, whose avowed
object is to disturb the peace and to eloin the property
of the citizens of other States. They have encouraged
and assisted thousands of our- slaves to leave their
homes; and those who remained have been incited

Its Nature and its Assailants. 57
by emissaries, books, and pictures to servile insur
rection.'' To say nothing of the puerile absurdity of declaring
that the General Government " has been destructive "
of the ends referred to, by the action of the non-slave
holding States" let us look at the charges preferred
here against those States. Without the least hesitation,
it must be declared that the whole list is without foun
dation. That individuals in the Northern States have
done the acts complained of, is certainly true ; but that
any of those States has lent itself to such ignoble work,
is no more true, than that South Carolina was faithless
to the cause of liberty in the Revolution, because within
her borders more Tories were found — and long held
their ground, too — than in almost all the other States
together. And it is impossible that the South Carolina
Convention did not know their charge was unfounded,
unless they were wretchedly ignorant. Let an im
partial world judge what respect is due to the " Decla
ration" of an assembly, which thus slanderously
imputes to an entire body of States the sins of indi
viduals, and for the crimes of a proportionately meagre
troop of fanatics, arraigns twenty millions of people at
the bar of mankind.
The third and last justification presented is in the
following paragraphs :
"For twenty -five years this agitation has been
steadily ^increasing, until it has now secured to its aid
the common Government. Observing the forms of the
Constitution, a sectional .party has found within that
article establishing the Executive Department, the
6

58 The Union:
means of subverting the Constitution itself. A geo
graphical line has been drawn across the Union, and
all the States north of that line have united in the
election of a man to the high office of President of the
United States, whose opinions and purposes are hostile
to Slavery. He is to be intrusted with the adminis
tration of the common Government, because he has
declared that that ' Government can not endure per
manently half slave and half free ;' and that the public
mind must rest in the belief that Slavery is in the
course of ultimate extinction.
" On the 4th of March next, this party will take
possession of the Government. It has announced
that the South shall be excluded from the common
territory, that the judicial tribunal shall be made sec
tional, and that a war must be waged against Slavery
until it shall cease throughout the United States.
" The guaranties of the Constitution will then no
longer exist; the equal rights of the States will then
be lost. The Slaveholding States will - no longer
have the power of self-government, or self-protection,
and the Federal Government will have become their
enemy." This is the great indictment found by the South
against the North, and proclaimed as the all-sufficient
vindication of the rebellion. While it is true in the
main fact alleged — the election of a sectional Presi
dent — it is untrue in other points. I am no defender
of the Republican party, its anti-slavery doctrines, or
its candidates. From the day of the commencement
of the anti-Slavery agitation thirty years ago, till the

Its Nature and its Assailants. 59
present time, I have opposed it without variation. But
I detest falsehood, by whomsoever employed, for what
ever purpose ; and when it is used to justify the destruc
tion of the Government of this Nation, it demands of
me, and of every true man, unbounded execration. Let
us examine this "indictment, and fairly and honorably
decide how far it is, in point of fact, true.
Leaving the main fact — the election of a sectional
President — to be considered last, we will notice in the
first place the allegations made against the party that
elected him. Concerning this party it is averred, that
" it has announced that the South shall be excluded
from the common territory." Taking the Platform of
the Chicago Convention as the criterion of the princi
ples of the Republican party, — and we have a right to
judge it by that, as it has a right to object to being
judged by anything else, — this charge is true ; for in
the eighth resolution of that Platform they " deny the
authority of Congress, of d Territorial Legislature, or
of any individuals, to give legal existence to Slavery in
any Territory of the United States." This, in effect,
excludes the South from the Territories, and so sustains
this charge.
But when they go further, and charge the Republican
party with announcing " that the Judicial tribunal shall
be made sectional," regard for truth requires me to say
that no such announcement is to be found in the Plat
form of that party. True, individuals did give expression
to such an idea ; but no party is ever held resposible
for all that individuals utter, nor can any party venture
to become the endorser of all the sentiments of its

60 The Union:
individual members. As we would be judged, let us
judge others.
A more extraordinary charge is, that the Republican
party announce "that a war must be waged against
Slavery until it shall cease throughout the United
States." The allegation is not, that Abolitionists in
the party proclaim this war, but that the party do so.
But' when I seek for the naked truth, not to uphold or
apologize for that party, but to test the justification
advanced for treason, I discover no act or word which
sustains the charge ; but, on the contrary, I find in the
Chicago Platform a resolution of directly opposite
character, in these words :
" That the maintenance inviolate of the rights of
the States, and especially the right of each State to
order and control its own domestic institutions accord
ing to its own judgment exclusively, is essential to
that balance of powers on which the perfection and
endurance of our political fabric depends ; and we
denounce all lawless invasion by armed force of the
soil of any State or Territory, no matter under what
pretext, as among the gravest of crimes."
Justice and frankness demand that the Republican
party shall have all the benefit of this explicit decla
ration. The cause . of truth and right gains nothing
by resorting to unfairness in dealing with an adversary,
And when a party, after attaining power, acts out the
principles it previously professed, its claim to be
regarded as sincere in professing them, must be con
sidered as established. The above declaration was
made in May, 1860. During the ensuing session of

Its Nature and its Assailants. 61
Congress, the Republicans, by the withdrawal of the
Senators and Representatives of seven seceded States,
were in a majority in both Houses ; and they brought
forward, and passed in both Houses, by a two-thirds vote,
the following amendment to the Constitution :
" NO AMENDMENT SHALL BE MADE TO THE CONSTITU
TION WHICH WILL AUTHORIZE OE GIVE TO CONGRESS
THE POWER TO ABOLISH OR INTERFERE IN ANY STATE,
WITH THE DOMESTIC INSTITUTIONS THEKEOF, INCLUDING
THAT OF PERSONS HELD TO LABOR OR SERVICE BY THE
LAWS OF SAID STATE."
No just man can read this amendment, and know
that it was adopted by a Congress in which there was
a majority of Republicans, and hot see in it a fair
vindication of the sincerity of the party in adopting
the above quoted resolution in regard to Slavery in the
States. As for myself, I am bound in candor to say —
I can not honorably refuse to say — that to my mind the
evidence on that point is conclusive. The Republican
party not only did not announce " that a war must be
waged against Slavery until it shall cease throughout
the United States," but they expressly declared against
any interference by Congress with Slavery in the States ;
and, to guard against any such interference in the fu
ture, this amendment of the Constitution is offered to
the country, which, if adopted, would, without doubt,
endure as long as the Constitution itself.
But the great count in the indictment is the election
of a President by the votes of one section of the Union ;
and this is true. But how came he to be elected? This
question instantly forces itself upon the mind. For

62 The Ui

nion:

thirty years the anti-Slavery agitation had been in
progress, without getting control of the Government ;
and only four years before, the Republican party had
been defeated in a tremendous struggle : how did it
secure a triumph in 1860 ? It is as certain to be re
corded in history, as that the history of that year shall
ever be written, that the action of the South itself was
one of the immediate and prominent causes — if not
the great cause — of that triumph. No fact is more
undeniable, than that the Democratic party was the
only one to which the country could look for numerical
strength to avert that result, except that other fact,
known to you all, that the Cotton States broke up that
party, and thereby rendered the defeat of Mr. Lincoln
impossible. At the very moment when the anti-Slavery
agitation seemed to be approaching victory, and when
it was the stern duty of every man in the opposing
ranks to forget all minor differences, and stand like a
rock against its further progress, those States delibe
rately abandoned their former position, proclaimed
principles which they had previously denied with em
phasis, seceded from the party, and themselves opened
the way for the result upon which they intended to
base their subsequent secession from the Union. Seces
sion was the great object they had aimed at for nearly
a third of a century. The evidence of a deep-laid and
long cherished conspiracy among them to destroy the
Union, is abundant and conclusive. The " proper
moment" to "precipitate the Cotton States into a
revolution," of which Mr. Yancey wrote, in 1858 — the
proper moment to pull a temple down that has been

Its Nature and its Assailants. 63
built three-quarters of a century, and clear the rubbish
away and reconstruct another," as was proclaimed by a
member of the South Carolina Convention — the proper
moment to let slip the dogs of war among children of
the same fathers and people of the same nation — the
proper moment, in a word, to consummate the treason
which had been festering and growing for thirty
years — was seen to have arrived; and the plotters
were not slow to seize it. They had already proclaimed
that the election of a President by the Republican party
would be a sufficient cause for the dissolution of the
Union, and they set themselves to the work of making
that election certain, by their own disruption of the
only party that had the numbers to prevent it. And
they succeeded, to a miracle. Never was game of
duplicity and treachery better played. They betrayed
their previously professed principles, their party, and
their country, all at once ; and at the moment of con
summating the crowning act of their sacrilege, they
turn to the world with an air of injured innocence, and
appeal to mankind to' justify a rebellion based on the
success of their own most devilish machinations !
Has history a parallel to this ?
But were it otherwise — had they done all that men
could do, to prevent the election of a sectional Presi
dent, and such had, nevertheless, been elected, on the
principles alleged by South Carolina in her Declaration,
or even on worse — it was still an ascertained and
indisputable fact, before her secession, that in both
Houses of the present Congress there would be a ma
jority against him, if all the States should stand firm,

64 The Union:
and retain their representation there. In that case,
Mr. Lincoln would have been this day, and certainly
for two years to come, the possessor of a barren power,
except as to official patronage, and utterly impotent to
impress a single principle of his party on the Govern
ment, or to touch in a single point the institution of
Slavery. But what was this to the schemers of trea
son? Their work was to destroy the Union, not to
defend Slavery. If they stopped to do the latter, the
former would be left undone ; if they used their con
stitutional power to protect Slavery, or to obtain
guaranties, the Constitution would be preserved : so
they trampled upon the Constitution, abjured their
allegiance, snapped the bonds of brotherhood, and
seized the sword to redress a grievance, which they
themselves designedly aided to produce ! I need not
ask if history has a parallel to this. It stands out,
in hideous deformity, the monster iniquity of all the
ages, whose dark, deep stain ages can not wash
away. Were anything wanting to give completeness to the
ignominy of this act, it is at hand, furnished by the
leaders in it, at the moment of its perpetration. While
they were putting forth to the world their " Declara
tion," they were engaged, in their debates, in denying
its most solemn allegations. They appealed to man
kind to justify their treason, because a President had
been elected by a sectional vote ; and at the same time
declared, among themselves, that they had for a quarter
of a century been plotting to accomplish the work of
disruption then attained, and that that result had not

Its Nature and its Assailants. 65
Deen produced by that election ! Listen to some of the
many expressions made in the South Carolina Con
vention by its master spirits.
Mr. Parker. " It appears to me, with great defer
ence to the opinions that have been expressed, that the
public mind is fully made up to the great occasion that
now awaits us. It is no spasmodic effort that has come
suddenly upon us, but it has been gradually culminating
for a long series of years, until at last it has come to
that point when we may say the matter is entirely
right." Mr. Inglis. " If there is any gentleman present
who wishes to debate this matter, of course this body
will hear him ; but as to delay for the purpose of dis
cussion, I, for one, am opposed to it. As my friend
(Mr. Parker) has said, most of us have had this mat
ter under consideration for the last twenty years, and I
presume we have by this time arrived at a decision on
the subject."
Mr. Keitt. " We are performing a great act, which
involves not only the stirring present, but embraces
the whole great future of ages to come. I have been
engaged in this movement ever since I entered political
life. I am content with what has been done to-day,
and content with what will take place to-morrow.
We have carried the body of this Union to its last
resting-place, and now we will drop the flag over its
grave." Mr. Rhett. " The secession of South Carolina is
not an event of a day. It is not anything produced
by Mr. Lincoln's election, or by the non-execution

66 The Union:
of the fugitive slave law. It has been a matter
which has been gathering head for thirty years ; and in
the production of this great result the great men who
have passed before us, whose great and patriotic efforts
have signalized the times, in which they lived, have not
been lost. Have the labors of Calhoun been forgotten,
when he declared a few years ago for the secession of
South Carolina ? and that secession would be the con
summation of their liberties ? "
The review I have taken of the causes assigned for
secession, reduces them to three only, which have foun
dation in fact — -the election of a President by a sectional
vote, the Personal Liberty laws of four States, and the
exclusion of the South from the common territory. As
to the first, nothing more need be said : it was pro
duced by the act of the South itself; let not the South
complain. As to the second, it is too insignificant as
a justification of rebellion, to deserve a moment's
notice. Concerning the last, it is as clear to me as the
sunlight around us, that it is a shallow subterfuge, and
that the South, in reality, cared nothing about the
Territories. If the right to take their slaves there was
of such value as, when interfered with, to justify them
to their own consciences in revolutionary violence, can
they tell — can any man tell — why they should take a
step which would inevitably exclude Slavery from the
Territories forever ? Did they believe that an institu
tion could be planted there by war, which they could
not carry there in time of peace ? Did they hope that,
with sword in hand, they could wrest from the govern
ment a vast domain, from which the people of the

Its Nature and its Assailants. 67
North should be shut out, except upon such terms as
the South might, as an independent power, prescribe ?
Did they suppose that fear would grant what justice
and equity refused ? Did they imagine that after
seceding from the Union, and thereby renouncing all
rights flowing from the Union, they could obtain more
easy access to the Territories ? No : they knew that
secession from the Union was secession from the com
mon property of the Union, as well as from its Consti
tution. It is, therefore manifest, that they did not
secede, because the Territories were closed, or were
threatened to be closed against them ; for, by seceding,
they barred and bolted the gates of the Territories
against themselves forever.
THE DUTY OF MISSOURI.
My friends, time does not permit my following any
further this doubling trail of perfidy and treason. I
have endeavored honestly to expose it to your view,
for it is the trail Missouri has been urged by her now
fugitive Governor to follow, and Missourians, when
they take it up, should understand well what they are
after, and where they are to be led. Let him who is
willing to make Missouri the unwelcome appendage of
a Confederacy founded on the principles and erected by
the means I have exhibited to you, take her into that
position when he can. I rejoice to believe that there
yet remains in our State enough of virtue, honor and
patriotism to make the time far distant when it can be
done. I will not discuss the question whether Mis-

68 The Union:
souri — to use a common expression — ought to "go
North" or "go South." Missouri has no going to do.
Her duty is to stand loyal to the Union and the Con
stitution. The National Government has put no wrong
on her, and she has no occasion to wrong herself by
an attempt to change her relations to it. But if, in an
evil hour, she should be betrayed into the contagious
revolt, which has drawn into its vortex other States
that had no part in the original treason of the Cotton
States, let the participants in any such movement
understand that the Government which never before
made its arm really felt, will be felt then, and that to
their discomfiture.

CONCLUDING REMARKS.
A few words more, and I have done. We are in the
midst of an unnatural and consuming civil war. Some
four hundred thousand men are under arms, and we
know not at what moment the land may tremble under
the shock of contending hosts. It is a sight to make
the world weep. The cause of humanity, the claims
of freedom, the spirit of Christianity, all demand that
this terrible conflict should be stayed. But, from
the depths of a troubled spirit, I ask, how can it be ?
A part of the nation rebels — declares its revolt irrecon
cilable — announces that it asks no compromise or
reconstruction, will consider none, even though per
mitted to name its own terms — defies the power of the
Nation — wages war upon the National Government,
and cries out, " all we ask is to be let alone ?"

Its Nature and its Assailants. 69
How can they be let alone, without destroying the
Union and the Constitution? If any man will tell me
that, I will say, let them alone. With unequaled
skill in raising false issues, the secessionists among us
labor to fan the flame of rebellion here, by impressing
upon the minds of all within the reach of their influ
ence, that the controversy of the revolted States is
with "Abe Lincoln," when those States are in arms
against the supreme constitutional authority of the na
tion. They seek by every contrivance to excite odium
against the Government, because " Abe Lincoln " is,
in accordance with the Constitution, at the head of it:
a very sufficient reason for changing the Adminis
tration, at the proper time, by the votes of the people,
if the people desire it, but not the least justification
or apology for rebellion. They stigmatize every man
as a Black Republican or an Abolitionist, who adheres
to the constitutional government of his country, in its
efforts to protect itself from subversion. They are
convulsed with holy horror at the exercise of alleged
unauthorized powers by "Abe Lincoln," to defend
and preserve the Constitution, and in the same breath
they declare that we have no Constitution. They
hypocritically profess a deep concern and sacred
regard for that great charter, and at the same moment
are secretly aiding in the fiendish work of its destruc
tion. "Abe Lincoln," fulfilling his sworn duty to
protect the Constitution, is to them a demon of
darkness: Jeff. Davis, striking deadly blows at that
Constitution, which he has, time and again, sworn to
support, is an angel of light. They profess immacu-

70 The Union:
late loyalty with their tongues, while their hearts are
as traitorous as Benedict Arnold's. They denounce
in unmeasured terms the military preparations of the
Government to meet this rebellion, and exalt the
insurgents as patriots armed. to defend their families
and their firesides; when not a soldier would have
been added to the regular army, or a regiment
marched southward, but for a revolt aiming at the
entire demolition of the Constitution, and the seizure
of the Government by armed usurpation. All these
are but the devilish resorts of treason, to sustain
its desperate cause. I despise and reject the whole
brood of them. I stand by the Constitution of
the United States ; and when it is threatened with
-destruction, I no more stop to inquire who is Presi
dent, than if the police of my city were engaged in
quelling a riot, I would higgle about who is Chief of
Police. The question is, where is the constitutional
authority? To that I am bound to render obedience
and support, without constituting myself the judge as
to whether, in a dire extremity, it restrains itself pre
cisely within the legally-defined limits, when to do so
might leave it at the mercy of foes armed for its sub
jugation. He who arms himself to subvert that
authority, is, by the law of God and man, a rebel
and a traitor, no matter who holds office; and if any
man can find any other way to deal with him than
with the weapons he himself has chosen, let him point
it out; — I know of none. Before God, I take no
pleasure in the necessity which demands such a resort.
All my instincts and principles are against bloodshed;

Its Nature and its Assailants. 71
but no rebellion ever was put down without it; and
this we can hardly expect to be an , exception. Upon
its instigators must rest all the awful consequences of
their appeal to arms. They have challenged the com
bat, and it lies not in their mouths, or in those of its
aiders and abettors here, to complain that the govern
ment defends itself, by extraordinary, or, even, uncon
stitutional means. Had such an attack beeii made
upon it by a foreign foe without being repelled, the
Nation would have stood disgraced before the world
forever: if this rebellious assault be not resisted by
all the power of the loyal portion of the Nation, shall
we meet any other fate? It is, then, no spirit of
malice or vindictiveness which justifies the govern
ment in self-protection by arms. The simple alter
native is, government or anarchy. The latter would
destroy our freedom, perhaps forever, and blight us
with a perpetual curse. We are lost, if our Con
stitution is overthrown. Thenceforward we may bid
farewell to liberty. Never were truer or greater
words uttered by an American statesman, than when
Daniel Webster closed his great speech in defence
of the Constitution, nearly thirty years ago, with that
sublime declaration — " Liberty and Union, now and
FOREVER, ONE and inseparable!" ^ Union gave us
liberty, disunion will take it away. He who strikes
at the Union, strikes at the heart of the Nation.
Shall not the Nation defend its life? And when the
children of the Union come to its rescue, shall they
be denounced? And if denounced, will they quail
before the mere breath of the Union's foes? For

72 The Union.
one, I shrink not from any words of man, save those
which would justly impute to me disloyalty to the
Union and the Constitution. My country is all to
me; but it is no country without the Constitution
which has exalted and glorified it. For the preserva
tion of that Constitution I shall not cease to struggle,
and my life -long prayer will be, God save the Amer
ican Union!

WASHINGTON'S BIRTHDAY,
NORTH AND SOUTH.*

One hundred and thirty years ago, this day, he was
born, whose birth we now commemorate. More than
threescore years have made their records and vanished
away, since his revered form was consigned to the
vault beneath the shades of his own Mount Verrmn;-
but his name still lives, and will live forever. He
came into life a British subject; he left it, an American
citizen. Born with no hereditary claim to eminence,
he departed at the height of a fame more exalted and
pure than that of kings. He was a native of a colony ;
he died the first man of a nation. His eyes first open
ed upon a dependent province ; they closed upon an
independent country, of which he was the acknow
ledged and honored Eather .He entered upon existence
under the reign of a distant monarchy; he left it,
having wielded the executive power of a republic which
he fondly hoped would outlive monarchies. Sharing
in no inheritance of constitutional popular government,
he bequeathed to his countrymen, in successful and
* An Address delivered at the Union Commemoration, in St.
Louis, of Washington's Birthday, February 22, 1862.
7

74 Washington's Birthday,
stately operation, a Constitution, which his influence
had mainly contributed to form, and which challenges
the world for an equal in wisdom, purity, and bene
ficence. He was an American in home, but he became
the property of the human race. We call him ours in
right of his nativity, but all civilized nations call him
theirs, too; for his life is one of the few bright and
unstained pages in the history of fallen humanity. It
is most fit, friends and countrymen, that in the midst
of the din and carnage of the fearful strife with which
a righteous Providence permits us to be afflicted, we
should pause to renew our love and reverence for that
great name, which no strife can take from us, and which
must dwell forever in every true American heart, as
certainly as it is expelled forever from every heart
which harbors the treason that surrounds us now.
There is not room in the same breast — hardly in the
same sentence — for George Washington and Jefferson
Davis; and let us devoutly thank God that, in our
hearts, only Washington finds a welcome this night.
But, repugnant as it is to a patriotic American to
see those names placed so near together, there is an
apparent necessity for it on this occasion ; for this is
the day set apart in the so-called Confederate States,
for the public and defiant induction into office, in
Washington's own beloved Virginia, and on the' anni
versary of his birth, of the man who claims to be the
chief magistrate of a rebel government, imposed upon
a part of that country which Washington fought for,
to the subversion, there, of the Union to which he de
voted the best powers of his life, and the overthrow of

North and South. 75
the Constitution to which he gave the sanction of his
august name ! Oh, what a mockery and a sacrilege,
to enact such a scene, at" such a place, on such a day !
Could no other day be found for such a work, but that
which has heretofore been hallowed by America's re
joicing homage ? Must the memory of Washington,
of all others, be associated henceforth with a desecra
tion which would call his very bones from the tomb, if
the dead could be roused from their repose by the
heartlessness, the treachery, and the crimes of the
living ? Of all the manifestations of daring effrontery
and contemptuous disregard of most holy obligations,
which the wild career of the South has exhibited during
the past fourteen months, this is, in spirit, the most
hypocritical, the most disgusting. It is not enough
that the man who has, again and again, sworn before
the world to support the Constitution of the United
States, now swears to overturn and destroy it ; but he
must, in the selection of the day for his impious ab
juration, strive to cover with seeming sanctity the act
which pollutes his soul with the traitor's oath, and binds
him without recall to the parricide's deadly vocation,
as, if there is a just God, it chains him without hope to
the parricide's swift and ignominous fate.
Fit accomplices with his modern Cataline, in this scene
of shameless apostacy from all the ties of country, and
from all the consecrated memories and bright hopes of
America, are men who, like himself, have, in days gone
by, sworn fidelity to the Government of their fathers,
but who now conspire with him to crush it into frag
ments, and upon its ruins erect another, to be the ex-

76 - Washington's Birthday,
ponent of their distinctive opinions and doctrines, the
representative of their peculiar form of social institu
tions, and the reward, in its offices and emoluments, of
their rapacious and ungodly ambition. They are men
whose names, except as they have descended to degene
rate sons from Revolutionary sires, call up no glorious
historic memories, excite no fire of patriotism, tell of no
great deeds, invite no eulogy, deserve no reverence.
They belong to that class of political adventurers with
whom the greed of political power and place is insatiate,
and country inferior to self ; the curse of any nation, as
they have cursed every nation whose history has yet
been written. They are playing out the closing scenes
of a thirty years' conspiracy against the Constitution
of their country, conducted by most of them while they
were enjoying their country's confidence and honors, and
were bound by sacred oaths to protect and preserve
what they were secretly plotting to destroy. They
are the apostles of the State rights school, which elevates
any part of the Nation, organized as a State, to a dig
nity and power superior to the whole, and, denying that
the American people are a Nation at all, calls the Uniou
a league between thirty-four independent sovereignties
representing thirty-four distinct and independent peo
ples. They are the men who inculcate the profound
conception, that allegiance, in the highest sense^ is due
by every citizen, first, to the Stateof his residence, and
only subordinately to the United States ; when after all
their vaunting over an absurdity unworthy of the logic
of a boy, there stands, in immovable grandeur, like
Chimborazo among mole-hills, the Constitution of the

North and South. 77
United States, resting upon this fundamental, imperish
able declaration, adopted by the whole people ; " This
Constitution, and the laws of the United States, which
shall be made in pursuance thereof, shall be the supreme
law of the land; and the judges in every State shall be
bound thereby, anything in the constitution or laws of
any State to the contrary notwithstanding." They have
astutely discovered that while Washington, Madison,
Hamilton, and their associates supposed, in their sim
plicity, that, in forming a Constitution, they were creat
ing a government for the people of the United States,
and cementing the Union of that people for all future
time they were, in reality, only respectable mechanics in
affairs of state, ingeniously contriving the machinery
of an agency of the States, to manage some matters of
business, which it was not convenient for potent sove
reignties, like South Carolina, Arkansas, or Florida,
to be troubled with. They are the men that ascribe
this attribute of sovereign constituency to twenty-one
States, which were not in existence, or thought of, when
the machine was set in motion, and which have been
brought into existence by the machine itself, apparent
ly for the sole purpose of multiplying in its own off
spring its own masters, and exhibiting to an admiring
world the novel spectacle of a created power begetting
a progeny of its own creators ! They are the men, too,
who have revealed and proclaimed the luminous idea,
that the soil of a state is sacred against the Nation;
and who call it invasion of a State, for the troops of
the Nation to march over a domain which was bought
with the Nation's money, or secured with the Nation's

78 Washington's Birthday,
blood. They are the men who, in foreign lands, reject
ing their nationality, register their names in public
places as from Virginia, or Mississippi, or Texas, or
some other State, and then have to enlighten the
ignorant inquirer after the part of the world that is
honored with their citizenship, by informing him —
no doubt with high disgust — that the mighty sove
reignty which owns them, is one of the United States
of America ! And it is such as they that profane this
National Anniversary, by the attempt to establish
permanently upon the soil of the Union, a Confederacy
based upon violated Constitutions and broken oaths,
conceived in treason, born of outrage and fraud, fed
upon deception and falsehood, and baptized at a font
brimming with fraternal blood.
Around this elect band of audacious conspirators,
or scattered over the South, obedient to their com
mands, are vast bodies of soldiers, who but yesterday
gloried in the title of American citizens, and delighted
to honor the flag of their Country, which had been
their protection from their birth, and which symbolized
in all lands the power and grandeur of United Amer
ica. In their breasts have been, by their leaders,
insidiously kindled a hostility to that flag, to which
they would have been strangers, if their passions had
not been played upon and inflamed by adroit and
atrocious appeals, sweeping judgment, sense, and
patriotism away in one wild wreck, and converting
those who were patriots into the facile instruments of
rebellion, more causeless than the history of modern
civilization has disclosed, and as futile as it must

North and South. 79
inevitably be fatal, alike to deceivers and deceived.
Ranged under a bastard banner, of strange and mean
ingless device, they are armed against the old flag
with weapons stolen from the Nation, after having
.been, by treachery and stealth, placed within their
reach that they might be stolen. Taught to believe
that they were oppressed, though they looked in vain
for a single act or proposal of oppression; excited to
the point of credulity at which they could be convinced
that their liberties were in danger, though not one of
those liberties, from the greatest to the least, had been
assailed, or even remotely threatened; led to regard
the chosen chief magistrate of the Nation, in advance
of his inauguration, as a fanatical tyrant, who would
use the authority entrusted to him to destroy their
domestic institutions, though no act or word of his
gave earnest or hint of such intent, and he would be
officially powerless to do so, even if the intent existed ;
and told from day to day and month to month, that
" The North" was waging a war upon their homes
and their firesides, their wives and their daughters,
to devastate the one and to defile the other, when not
one northern man had volunteered in arms until the
South had, without provocation, hurled the blast of
war at Sumter, and menaced the Nation with humilia
tion and death, if it defended not itself: thus told and
taught and excited, by ambitious and unscrupulous
politicians, to whom they were accustomed to look
with deference, they suffered themselves to be betrayed
into a crime, the bloody consequences of which must
fall upon them in a thousand fold greater proportion

80 Washington's Birthday,
than upon their less numerous, but far more guilty,
leaders ; and bitter and hopeless will be the day, when
they awake to the consciousness at once of the decep
tion to which they have yielded, and of the over
whelming destruction with which the mighty Ameri
can Nation, aroused as it now is, visits every armed
band of insurgents, and sweeps from its soil every
vestige and memorial of this foul and most unnatural
rebellion. Such, my friends, is one of the pictures which our
country presents to the world this day. Too revolt
ing to gaze long upon, let us turn to another, more
pleasing and encouraging. More than six hundred
thousand patriotic American citizens, faithful to the
memory and counsels of Washington, are under arms
on land and sea, called from their quiet homes by the
Nation's constitutional chief, to defend the Nation's
integrity and life. In the annals of the world such a
sight has never before been seen, as such a host, vol
untarily arrayed in so brief a time, from the peaceful
walks of life, to meet the trials and the perils which,
in camp and field and upon the raging deep, make up
the soldier's and the sailor's daily record. They move
under no alien or doubtful standard, but follow the
glorious old flag of the Union, with its four and thirty
flashing stars ; and their cry is not the pitiful " All we
ask is to be let alone," but the thundering and irresisti
ble " All we ask is that those stars be let alone !"
Those brave battalions march to no impudent " Dixie,"
but plant their measured tread to " the music of the
Union," as it swells forth in the grand measure of

North and South. 81
"Hail Columbia" or waves in the flowing strain of
"The Star-spangled Banner," or accelerates "the
double quick" with the nervous thrill of ancient and
homely " Yankee Doodle." Though arrayed against
a foe whose sole watchword is " The South," no war
cry of the " The North," " The East," or " The West"
fills their throats, but marching for their Country's
sake to a soldier's triumph or a soldier's grave, they
roll out in mighty chorus " God save America!"
They go, not to destroy their father's noble work,
but to preserve it for themselves and their children,
against the cruel assaults of those who renounce
America for "the South," and abjure the Constitu
tion for "the peculiar institution." To be sure, some
of Southern blood hold them no gentlemen, and there
fore not fit to fight " the chivalry ;" but certain it is,
there are no stolen arms in their hands, nor is there
pilfered money in their pockets, nor treachery in their
hearts. No, my friends, they are the hardy and honest
sons of the Union, your kinsmen and friends and
mine, the brothers, husbands, lovers, and children of
our sisters and our daughters ; and they are marshal
ed for no holiday work, for no meretricious pageant,
for no vengeful foray, but to fight the battles of their
Country; and they are moving in stern and steady
column, to strike treason dead in the very heart of its
usurped domain; and woe, woe to them that confront
their forward march !
I have thus attempted briefly to portray the salient
features of the lurid panorama of war, which, on this
anniversary of Washington's birth, is moving in the

82 Washington's Birthday,
land of Washington, from North to South, fixing the
interested gaze of the civilized world, and balancing
in the scales of fate the destiny of the great Ameri
can Republic. It is a conflict which will probably
hold the chief place forever in the history of civil
wars, for its gigantic proportions, and for the unequaled
magnitude of the stake at issue. It is a conflict which,
so far as I can see, can end only with the complete
and final extinction of treason, on the one" hand, or of
the Union and the Constitution, on the other. Would
God some heaven-sent messenger of peace might, even
now, speed his flight over the blood-stained land, stay
ing the serried columns, assuaging the bitter strife,
and restoring the entire Nation to its former serenity,
its ancient brotherhood, and its early devotion to the
Constitution; but alas, it is too late, too late! We
can neither "let alone" nor be let alone, while armed
legions are battering at the foundations of the great
temple of our liberties; nor can they stay their sacri-
ligious work, without abandoning their chiefs to the
traitor's fate; and this they will not yet do. Nothing
is left us but to yield all, or carry all at the bayonet's
point and cannon's mouth. No more terrible alterna
tive could be forced upon our choice. Let the loyal
part of the Nation meet it like men, and proclaim
that not a tithe of a hair's breadth shall ever be yielded
to treason, and that the Flag of the Union shall wave
again, unassailed and unquestioned, over every square
foot of our Country's soil! Less than this we will
not take; more than this we do not ask; just this, God
helping us, shall be !

North and South. 83
But, my countrymen, it is important, not only that
this inexorable and resistless purpose should exist, but
that we should be able to vindicate the right of our
cause, at the bar of the world's opinion, in the forum
of conscience, and before the throne of God. Whatever
our power, however brilliant our feats of arms or
triumphant our final success, they are, at last, but a
poor possession, if justice and .truth be not with us.
Let us, then, give a portion of this hour to a brief
review of the causes of this internecine war, and
let the truth be spoken in simplicity, sincerity, and
courage. In the first place, let us dispose of one or two falla
cies, which have obtained lodgment in the minds of
many, and, so far, distorted their view of the present
crisis. It is not unusual to hear this war spoken of
as a matter of politics ; as if we were in the midst of a
Presidential canvass, and to convert the nation into
armies, and the land into camps and battle-fields, were
legitimate and brotherly modes of settling political
controversies, discovered by our happy people in the
science of self-government ! This word politics is a
favorite, in this connection, with some preachers of
the Gospel, whose " Southern sympathies" shrink from
" declaring the whole counsel of God," when it calls
for preaching divine truth as contained in the opening
verses of the thirteenth chapter of the Epistle to the
Romans. To enforce from the pulpit allegiance to^
established government as a Bible duty is, with them,
to "preach politics," of which they have a special, if
not a holy, horror. But may not the modern preacher

84 Washington's 'Birthday,
preach what inspired Paul, of old time wrote, and,
doubtless, preached too ? When Paul said, "Let every
soul be subject unto the higher powers," he left on record
God's precept on the subject of allegiance, for the
guidance of Christians to the end of time. And he
adds this reason for the injunction : " There is no power
but of God : the powers that be are ordained of God."
And he follows this with the stern declaration :
" Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the
ordinance of God : and they that resist shall receive to
themselves damnation." Plain words, at least to plain
men, which Paul was moved by inspiration to record
as a rule of Christian duty, but to inculcate which,
here and now, is to " preach politics," which, under
present circumstances, is not pleasant to disloyal ears !
But, leaving the ministry to square their action with
their ' own consciences and Holy Scripture, I wholly
reject the idea that the people of the United States are
at war over a matter of party politics, or politics of
any kind. The question is not how the Government
shall be carried on, — which is the appropriate field of
politics, — but whether the Constitution and Govern
ment shall be carried off by a turbid and raging flood
of revolt and treason. The strife is not for the best
mode of keeping the government upright in its position
and action, but to keep it standing at all. It is not a
war of rivalry between patriots for the wisest and
safest administration of our national affairs, but a
struggle — a life-and- death struggle — between disrup
tion, anarchy, and dissolution, on one side, and the
Constitution, order, stability, and freedom, on the other.

North and South. 85
And, in the words of the great and lamented Douglas,
uttered almost as he descended to his tomb, " There
are only two sides to the question. Every man must be
for the United States or against it. There can be no
neutrals in this war ; only patriots — -or traitors."
Another fallacious idea, which has found place in
some minds, showing an utter misapprehension, or ex
ceedingly perverted estimate, of the pending conflict,
and tending only to weaken the detestation of patriots
for treason, and shake their fidelity to their govern
ment, and to assign to the war the low rank of a petty
squabble, is, that it is a mere family quarrel ! That is,
according to them, " Cousin Sally" likes " niggers,"
and " Uncle Sam " don't, and Cousin Sally has gone to
scratching Uncle Sam's face about it, and Uncle Sam
is "putting in his best licks" to keep Cousin Sally
from doing it ! Pardon such seeming levity in such an
hour as this ! But how could this frowzy and unkempt
brat be otherwise dealt with, than by raking its stolid
features with the back teeth of a currycomb of ridi
cule ? And yet you will find people who have so utterly
failed, after nearly a year of civil war, to form any
right conception of its origin, purpose, and imminent
results, as to permit those features to be photographed
upon their minds, and' to give form, as of necessity
they must, to their opinions and feelings in regard
to a contest involving the very being of their
country, and their most precious interests, and those
of their posterity, even to remote generations ! Let
us hope that upon such the light may yet break, and
disclose to them the frightful precipice down which

86 Washington's Birthday,
traitors are striving to dash the institutions of their
country. With- these two points disposed of, let us proceed. In
any review of the causes of the rebellion it is proper
to notice the grievances alleged by the South in
defense of its parricidal acts. There is not time now,
however, to discuss them at large. On the last anni
versary of our National Independence, in addressing
an assemblage of loyal citizens in the interior of this
State, I gave such attention as my ability enabled to
the "Declaration of the Causes of Secession," put forth
by the South Carolina Convention, — the only one pro
ceeding from any of the seceded States, of which I
have knowledge, — and endeavored to demonstrate, as
I am not without hope I did, at least to loyal minds,
that the matters therein paraded before the world were
no more the causes of secession, than they were the
semblance of a justification of the crime they were
intended to vindicate. After a somewhat extended
examination of that document, it appeared that the
whole array of their complaints summed itself up in
these three points : 1. The election of a President of
the United States by the votes solely of the non-slave
holding States ; a result directly and designedly pro
duced by the South itself, so far as Southern action
could produce it, and planted as the fulcrum of the
great lever which should heave the Southern States
from their orbits, and inaugurate the chaos whence
should spring matured and full-armed, a Southern
Confederacy : 2. The enactment, years before, of
Personal Liberty laws in four Northern States (in-

North and South. 87
stead of fourteen, as falsely alleged,) concerning which
the South, up to that time, had made little or no
complaint : and 3. The position assumed by the
Republican party in favor of the exclusion of Slavery
from the Territories. Concerning these allegations it
is needless that your time be now further occupied,
than to remark, that were they the real causes of seces
sion, they would exhibit the paltriest palliation ever
offered of the most stupendous of popular crimes.
But it is one of the most revolting features of South
Carolina's dark' dishonor, that in the very hour of her
Convention's adoption of that Declaration, the same
men who sent it forth, openly and exultingly declared,
on the floor of the Convention, that these were not the
causes of her secession, but that the blow then aimed
at the Union was ">a matter which had been gathering
head for thirty years," and " had at last come to that
point when they might say it was entirely right!" Thus
did they, in the act of disruption blazon their hypocrisy,
and, adding falsehood to treason, link themselves to a
historic infamy, compared with which'that of Benedict
Arnold is no longer supreme.
But, to reiterate, these are no more the causes of
Southern treason, than fire is the cause of ice, or the
the sun the origin of darkness. Its cause lies deeper
down than that. It is only at the surface that the
vexed ocean rolls and dashes under the tempest's power;
but when the submerged volcano bursts forth, it heaves
upward the whole incumbent mass of waters and shakes
land and sea with a convulsive shock. And so, when,
we look for the causes of this rebellion, we find them,

88 Washington's Birthday,
not in the storms which at intervals sweep over the
popular mind, lashing the billows of partizan passion
into temporary fury, but in a fire surrounding the very
foundations of the social structure, hitherto confined to
subterranean recesses, but now surging upward with
flame and smoke, fiery hail and seething lava, ominous
of death to American liberty, and blazing with dismay
to the votaries of freedom in all the world. Let us
calmly survey the movements and analyze the elements
of this devouring force.
The observer of our national character and develop
ment will have noticed that, from his early recollection,
the American people have been divided into two distinct
yet not dissevered, parts, by a line representing no
geographical or climatic boundary, but following the
borders of certain States, irregularly, from East to
West. On either side of that line is found a part of
the same people, descended from a common ancestry,
inheriting the same institutions, speaking the same
tongue, subject to the same national laws, and in their
local constitutions exhibiting, hardly with a variation,
the same principles and machinery of government. In
the diversified associations and interests of life they
were practically one; passing and repassing from side
to side freely, and bound together by countless ties of
friendship, of parental, filial, and fraternal affection,
and of wedded love. More than once they have fought,
hand in hand, under the same flag, and never did the
soldiery of one gain a victory that was not shared by
that cf the other. Did calamity overtake one, the other
was ready to minister relief; did prosperity smile on

North and South. 89
one, its warmth cheered' the other: did danger threaten
all, they vied with each other in repelling it. But still,
there was the line; and in the course of years, on either
side, there gradually grew up opinions upon social and
political questions, variant from those prevailing on the
other. The difference, at first tolerated, if not kindly
borne with, became at length the source of annoyance.
One grew meddlesome, the other, restive and intolerant.
Ultraism and pertinacity in a comparative few on one
side, was met by an almost unanimous defiance and
assertion of superiority on the other ; which naturally
expanded into a demand that its opinions should control,
its political dogmas predominate, and its hand direct
the movements of the common Government, though its
free citizens hardly numbered a fourth of those of the
whole country. From time to time in the course of a
third of a century, a spirit of discontent with the Union
which had covered all with blessings, betrayed itself;
only to be followed quickly by imperious exactions,
with the alternative of disruption and dissolution. It
is within the knowledge of all, that for the last thirty
years those exactions have been complied with, almost
without intermission. The arrogant will of the minority
controlled the majority. The Nation spoke through
organs chosen at the dictation of its smaller part. But
at last, in the mutations of events, this ascendacy ceased;
the executive power was transferred to the majority ;
and before even the constitutional forms of its investi
ture could be observed, the haughty minority revolted
against the authority it had failed to retain, and plunged
the nation into the intolerable horrors of civil war

90 Washington's Birthday,
rather than tolerate the four years' chief magistracy of
a constitutionally elected President !
My friends, if this be not a true and fair statement
of the rise of this war, I confess my inability to make
one. But this does not indicate the cause of the war.
Other questions still arise. Why should disunion and
its train of incalculable evils be embraced on one side,
but never purposed, or even dreamed of, except by
some poor fanatics, on the other ? Whence the ven
omous influence that could so pervert the loyalty of
one part, while the other remained steadfast to the
Constitution ? How is it that one proclaims and defends
the right of secession, and the other denies it? Why
should one be ready to fly to arms in rebellion, and the
other touch not a weapon until war is driven into its
very teeth ? For such radical differences between two
parts of the same nation, leading to such fatal issues,
surely no light or transient cause suffices. To say that
they spring from contests of expediency, or from col
lisions of political dogmas or principles, or from the
rivalries of partizan leaders, is only to skim the surface,
and to reach not the vital spring that lies beneath.
My countrymen, before Earth and Heaven there is but
one cause for this hideous rebellion, and that cause is —
Slavery. That is the key to Southern unanimity in
opinion, feeling, and policy; the secret of the intense
cohesion of Southern people at home, and of their one
ness of sentiment wherever scattered; the foundation
of the pestilent heresy of State allegiance, which, in the
critical hour, snatched from our flag a host of able and
accomplished officers of our army and navy, to fight the

North and South. 91
country which had made them; the explanation of
Southern demands for the supremacy of the minority ;
the source of that fell spirit of domination, which would
have all or destroy all; in short, the one sole impelling
force which precipitated the South against the bulwarks
of the Constitution, and fills the land this day with
confusion, lamentation, and death. '
When Mr. Stephens, of Georgia, in March, 1861,
in his speech at Savannah, declared that Slavery was
THE CHIEF STONE OF THE CORNER IN THE NEW EDI
FICE of Government which the South had just then
reared, in defiance of that which the fathers had
framed, he threw off all disguises, and laid bare to the
world the cause and the spirit of the re-volt, in which
he stands second in rank only to its desperate chief.
Give me your attention while I recall to your remem
brance a few sentences of that remarkable speech.
He was indicating-to his hearers the points of differ
ence between the rebel Constitution and that which
Washington had aided to establish, and the South was
wickedly attempting to destroy, and he spoke as follows :
"But not to be tedious in enumerating the numer
ous changes for the better, allow me to allude to one
other — though last, not least: the new Constitution
has put at rest forever all the agitating questions
relating to our peculiar institutions — African slavery
as it exists among us — the proper status of the negro
in our form of civilization. This was the immedi
ate CAUSE OF THE LATE RUPTURE AND REVOLUTION.
Jefferson, in his forecast, had anticipated this as .the
' rock upon which the old Union would split !' He was

92 Washington's Birthday,
right. What was conjecture with him is now a realized
fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great
truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be
doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him
and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the
formation of the old Constitution were, that the
enslavement of the African was in violation of the
laws of nature ; that it was wrong in principle, socially,
morally, and politically. It was an evil they knew not
well how to deal with; but the general opinion of the
men of that day was, that, somehow or other, in the
order of Providence, the institution would be evanes
cent and pass away. This idea, though not incorpo
rated in the Constitution, was the prevailing idea at
the time. The Constitution, it is true, secured every
essential guarantee to the institution while it should
last, and hence no argument can be justly used against
the constitutional guarantees thus secured, because of
the common sentiment of the day. Those ideas, how
ever, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon
the assumption of the equality of races. This was an
error. It was a sandy foundation, and the idea of a
Government built upon it, — when the ' storm came and
the wind blew, it fell ! ' Our new Government is founded
upon exactly the opposite ideas; its foundations are
laid, its corner stone rests, upon the great truth that
the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery —
subordination to a superior race — is his natural and
moral condition. This, our new Government, is the
firsfa in the history of the world, based upon this great
physical, philosophical, and moral truth."

North and South. 93
Now, were each and every one of us totally igno
rant of every previous fact in our country's history,
we could not, after reading those utterances of one of
the South's most trusted and most gifted, as he once
seemed one of her most patriotic, sons, suppress the
conviction that Slavery is the first, last, and only
cause of the rebellion, of which he stood forth the
able and acknowledged exponent. It is in vain to say,
as ,,many do, that Slavery is the pretext, and not the
cause. Why did they seek the pretext? What should
excite the desire for it? The spirit and intent of
treason were there ; whence came these ? Is there yet
some other influence, not. avowed, but more potent
than that of Slavery, and dwarfing it into the little
ness of a mere pretext? No, not so. In that "pecu
liar institution " is found, not only that without which
the rebellion would never have shown its horrid front,
but the creating and vitalizing power which gave it
life and hurried forward its blasting steps. When the
insurgents clamor for "the right of self-government,"
in the face of the fact that no government has ever
been over them for an hour, but that of their own
choice or their own making, they mean of self-govern
ment as identified with Slavery, separate from any
possible form of government not so identified. When
they vauntingly profess to be fighting for "Inde
pendence" it is for independence of the Government
of their own free and cordial adoption, because " the
chief stone of its corner " is not Slavery. When they
grind "the old Constitution" beneath their war-clad
heels, and over its prostrate columns erect another,

94 \ Washington's Birthday,
it is that the blood-stained portals of the new may be
the perpetual refuge and citadel of Slavery. When
they renounce the country of their birth, and call that
part of it their country, which they can cut off with
the sword, it means that where Slavery is not, shall
not be their country ; and it says to Slavery, " Whither
thou goest, we will go : where thou lodgest, we will
lodge: thy people shall be our people: where thou diest,
will we die, and there will we be buried!"
Do me not the injustice, my friends, to suppose that
I thus speak in any spirit of fanaticism against the
institution of slavery, or from any former unison of
sentiment with those who have so long disturbed
the country with demands for its abolition. The
views I have entertained for thirty years on that sub
ject remain unchanged. But this WAR against the
Constitution of my Country has driven me to the
conclusion I have expressed, as it has tens of thousands
of others, who, like myself, were never associated
with any party which avowed antagonism to Slavery
as an article of its political faith. I have uttered the
deliberate convictions of my judgment, on a subject
which could not be thrust aside in any «. discussion of
the present aspects of our National affairs; and I
should have held myself faithless to the solemn require
ments of this hour, if I had failed to speak what I
believe to be the truth, lest perchance, it set some
teeth on edge, or bring down imprecations on my
head. What, then, it may be asked, shall be done with this
pernicious cause of revolt and treason? Shall it, as

North and South. 95
some have urged, be summarily destroyed by the
strong arm of military power, and the Nation at once
relieved from its baneful influence? In my judgment,
No ! The Nation need not fear to let it live out the
remainder of its allotted time, and is abundantly able
to keep it within its legitimate sphere, and hold it in
due subjection to constitutional rule. This accursed
rebellion can and will be subdued, without resorting
to a measure, which would involve the country in
serious complication. And we owe a meed of kind
ness to our loyal and faithful brethren in the insur
gent States, — many thousands in number, — who, over
borne by the ruthless and despotic sway which ever
presides over rebellion, have been forced to stand mute
and tearful spectators of their Country's dishonor,
and to accept the bitter choice of impoverishment,
perhaps death, or a silent submission to a power they
detest, and whose prostration they will be the first to
welcome. Let not the glorious old Stars and Stripes
in their victorious progress Southward, be the harbin
ger to them of the loss of what • the pirate flag they
hate had spared. Let them not be reduced to the
level of the traitors who have dominated their land,
nor made to feel that the Country, for whose triumph
they have sighed and prayed, beggars while it embraces
them. But let it once be manifest that rebellion can not be
otherwise subdued, and that we are shut up to choose
between our noble Country with its priceless Consti
tution, and Slavery; then, with every fibre of my
heart and every energy of my nature, I will pass

96 t Washington's Birthday,
along the universal cry of all patriots — Down with
Slavery forever! I would then no more hesitate
which to choose, than, in view of death, I would
balance between eternal life and eternal perdition. But,
manifestly, the time is not yet, when the American
people must make that choice. They have but just got
ready to strike the rebellion, and already the monster
recoils and staggers under stunning blows. The power
of this stalwart Nation is but beginning to be felt. The
hundred days, which began at Fort Henry, and have
already recorded the glory of Eort Donnelson, and,
with God's help, will be vivid with an unbroken series of
like achievements, may suffice to strike off the hydra's
hundred heads ; but whether at their end or after, the
Nation will come forth from the conflict, "fair as the
moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with
banners." Let us be patient like Washington, and we shall
triumph as Washington! Let us not convert this
war for the Constitution into a war against Slavery,
until it is evident that the former can not be saved
without the extirpation of the latter. Let us not be
quick to destroy what has, in effect, already destroyed
itself. The doom of Slavery was sealed by the South
itself, on the day that South Carolina, in her ordin
ance of secession, led off in this dance of death. The
venom of treason then entered its vitals, and its days,
whether many or few, are numbered. But were it
certain to live in this land yet a thousand years, it is
just as certain that never again will the impious attempt
be made, to barter away our resplendent Union for an

North and South. 97
oligarchy of Slavery. The aristocracy of the kingdom
of Cotton has struck its first blow at American Repub
licanism, and it will be its last. The Nation sleeps no
more over its liberties. Taught, as never before, the
incalculable value of its free institutions, and the
source of their danger, it has already mounted guard
over them; and evermore hereafter, by day and by
night, in sunshine and in gloom, the cheery "All's
well" of freedom will ring out on the same air that
wafts to Mount Vernon the Nation's benedictions on
the name of Washington.
9

THE REBELLION:
ITS ORIGIN AND LIFE IN SLAYJSRY.

In the placid bay, on the south-eastern coast of the
United States, stands a noble fortress, erected by the
American Government, for the protection of a Southern
commercial capital and the interior region connected
with it. Through many years and at vast expense,
New England granite was quarried, and by tens of
thousands of tons transported ocean-wise, to drop into
that bay the foundations of that fortress, and upon
them to build its massive walls. It was completed; and
behind its frowning battlements that commercial capital
reposed in security, odorous of southern flowers and
warm with the rays of a southern sun.
That fortress was Sumter — that capital, Charles
ton ; one named for a patriot of '76, the other for a
British King ; each appropriately named. The plain
and solid granite fabric looked the republican hero — the
ornate and aristocratic city typified the king. Both
were destined to historic immortality.
* A Speech delivered in Mercantile Library Hall, St. Louis,
April 14, 1862 ; having been previously spoken, in substance at
Union, Mo., April 7, 1862.

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 99
In the fortress was a little band of seventy men,
with less than three days' food in store, and above
them waved the American flag ; on the neighboring
shores, behind ominous batteries, under a banner till
then unknown, were a hundred times their number, in
warlike array. It was night. The silent stars looked
down upon the bay, the city, the batteries, the fortress,
the seven thousand men, and the seventy ; and nothing
told them that ere they shone upon the brow of another
night, a shock would thrill from that spot along the
world's nerves, which might not cease to vibrate while
the world stands.
The surrender of that fortress was demanded, — ruth
lessly and unrighteously demanded, — and righteously,
as well as bravely, refused; and in the dark hour pre
ceding dawn the seven thousand warn the seventy,
that in one hour from that time they will open fire
from their batteries upon the fortress, behind which
slumbered the city of kingly name. It was an hour
of treason's demoniac preparation for attack, of pa
triotism's calm and steady readiness for defense ; an
hour of years to the angel host that viewed from
their starlit heights the nearing triumph of traitors
over their country ; an hour of wild exultation among
the infernal host, over the coming revelry of war and
death. The hour ended; and as the awakening day gave
light to the seven thousand, those batteries, north and
south, east and west, thundered forth, and Peace fled
affrighted and weeping from that placid bay and from
America ! For four and forty hours there beat upon

100 The Rebellion:
that fortress a horrible tempest, above and below, out
side and inside, of deadly missiles, bomb and shell,
cold and hot ; but the seventy stood firm. But human
endurance, though endowed with superhuman courage,
can not long resist a hundred times its strength. In
the five and fortieth hour, wasted and worn by brave
labor and exhausting vigils, the seventy — greater in
defeat than all the seven thousand in triumph — capitu-
. lated with honor, and bearing Sumter's untarnished
flag in their loving arms, marched forth from that
granite fortress, and sailed from that southern bay, to
receive a nation's admiring thanks, and to live with
Leonidas and his Spartan three hundred, in historic
renown for ever.
' Such was the scene which, this day a twelvemonth
since, closed the first assault of Americans upon their
Country — the first humiliation of America's flag by
her own children. As the tale was told over the world,
nations started in astonishment and awe. Tyrants
laughed, for it bespoke the downfall of republics ; the
votaries of freedom wept, for it seemed the knell of
liberty. The people who loved that dishonored flag
sprang to their feet with one mighty impulse, and
every heart swelled with the stern resolve to wipe out
the disgrace, and punish the traitors who had inflicted
it. Twenty millions of them answered those thunder
ing batteries with a shout that shook the earth.
Hundreds of thousands arrayed themselves in the
unaccustomed panoply of war, and, leaving kindred,
friends, and home, took up the line of march to victory
or death, under that flag, for that flag ! It was such

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 101
an uprising of a great people as no nation, barbarian
or civilized, pagan or Christian had ever before beheld.
It was far beyond and above anything that the traitors
"had dreamed of. It was a noble tribute to a flag which
symbolized only justice, honor, and national glory,
wherever it waved. It is right that we remember the
anniversary of that day, and while we recall its humi
liating scenes, think also of the glorious response of the
twenty millions. It tells us where the defenders of Ame
rican liberty may be found, in the hour of need.
The unprovoked attack on Sumter was not the be
ginning ; it was only a necessary sequence of pre
ceding events. Sixteen months ago from this time
began the treasonable work, of which that was but the
outbreak : a period of time which I can not look back
upon, without the feelings of one who, from having
gazed all his life upon bright and beautiful scenes of
peace and happiness, has been suddenly compelled to
turn to one of wrath and misery and death, arid witness
its pageantry of woe pass before him for long and
weary months, sickening his days and haunting his
nights, until his heart almost bursts with grief over the
ruin, before his eyes, of what he held most dear. The
20th day of December, 1860, dawned upon a happy
and united nation ; its sun went down upon a people
with treason-fires lighted in their midst. From that
day — when South Carolina struck her ferocious blow
at the Constitution, and mocked and spit upon the
flag of the Union, to this, — the great American nation
has struggled for its life. We proudly thought the
nation immortal ; but we find that its existence, like

102 The Rebellion:
*
our own, must be defended against the assassin's stab.
We trusted, and, as we now know, blindly trusted to
America's sons for America's protection ; but they
became her bitterest assailants, and would be her
murderers. We believed her Constitution safe in the
hearts of all the people ; but we have lived to see that
a part of that people had been educated to destroy, at
the bidding of unprincipled and remorseless leaders,
that which distinguished this above all preceding na
tions — its written charter of government. We had faith
in the virtue of the people : we find it, in a wide sec
tion, perverted and gone. We confided in a universal
patriotism : we discover that in that section patriotism
means cotton ! We reposed in the strength of a
true and pervading allegiance : we are taught that
there allegiance is paramount adhesion to Slavery!
We looked for love, and were met with hate ; for
truth, and were confronted with brazen falsehood ; for
fair dealing, and were ensnared by treachery ; for
forbearance, and were assailed with threats, and taunts,
and domineering exactions ; for open-handed and high-
toned chivalry, and were opposed with chicanery and
fraud, too subtle to be understood by honest men — too
audacious and unscrupulous to be by upright people
believed possible. Such, in brief, is the experience
through which loyal citizens have, since that fatal
twentieth of December, 1860, been called to pass. In
the history of civilized nations it has no modern
parallel. It comprehends every ingredient which could
give bitterness to the cup, every shadow that could
fix intense gloom upon the retrospect, every element

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 103
which could becloud the future with discouragement
and dismay.
But why dwell on the gloomy aspects of these evil
times? Through a year of civil war we have beheld
its terrible devastations, and nothing is wanting to im
press upon our minds the dread realities of which we
have, during day time, been daily witnesses. Every
succeeding day but widens the circle of destruction and
mourning, and enlarges the dark record left by the
crime of that day. And long, it may be, that record
is to continue to be written ; until those that read it
might pray for the appalling scroll to be shut out for
ever from their view, in the night of a welcome death.
But, heart-sickening as it is, we must still look upon
the deadly strife; and our children and the world must
behold it, too; and with us, and with them, and with
all in the wide earth, the question starts up unbidden,
will not be kept down, will be heard along the line of
coming ages — Whence the origin, what the life of this
dire outbreak of popular fury, this satanic onslaught
upon the best of human governments ? This inquiry
can never be out of time, or out of place. We can not
know how to estimate or deal with a present calamity,
if we know not its cause and nature ; nor will our pos
terity be wiser in some evil day which, perchance, may
come to them, if they comprehend not what brought
these days upon us. Let us, then, endeavor, with some
what of fullness, to answer this ever recurring question.
If ever a people were averse to believe that treason
was rife among them, it was the American people, prior
to South Carolina's desperate plunge into the fiery gulf

104 The Rebellion:
of secession. Again and again, in the heated conflicts
of parties, through a long series of years, Southern
threats of disunion had broken harshly upon the public
ear; but the North, even up to the last moment of hope,
refased to recognize the possibility of their attempted
execution. But, in the light of the past year's events,
no thinking man can fail now to see that, sooner or
later, such an attempt was inevitable; for reasons
which I will proceed to state.
You know, and all candid observers know, that the
people of the United States present two distinct, and in
some respects, uncongenial developments. Without
attempting to trace these in all their courses, it is
enough for this occasion to refer to their bearings upon
our political organization as a nation, under a common
government. Of the two developments one is in
its nature and principles essentially democratic (not
using the word in a party sense) ; the other, in those
points, essentially aristocratic; the former belonging
to the Northern States, the latter to the Southern.
Each obeyed the law of its own condition. The absence
of Slavery and the universality of free labor in the
North stimulated a democratic outgrowth; while the
opposite order in the South fostered a social aristocracy,
which, by a resistless tendency, became also political.
The whole history of the country since it achieved
Independence has proved this. Indeed, I am not aware
that intelligent Southerners deny — but, on the contrary,
they seem rather to boast — that the legitimate and cer
tain effect of Slavery is to create an essential aristocracy.
He that was born to authority, and has been accustomed

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 105
to implicit obedience from large numbers of dependents,
may ever be expected to become, in a greater or less
degree, tenacious of power, ambitious for its increase
in his hands, impatient of restraint, and imperious in
subjecting others Jo his will.
These two elements, opposite in their organic prin
ciples and their tendencies, might have co-existed in
the same nation without dangerous conflict, but for the
important fact that the democratic section steadily and
rapidly gained in numbers upon the other, until the
slaveholding interest, even when combined as a unit,
was a minority, and apparently, indeed certainly,
destined to remain so. Had Mr. Calhoun's idea of a
minority veto upon the will of the majority been
engrafted upon our national Constitution, the South
would never have dreamed of secession, for it would
forever have governed the nation. But as the Consti
tution is that of a republic, based upon the fundamental
principle that the majority shall govern, the aristocracy
revolted at the approaching application of that prin
ciple to themselves ; and, rather than tolerate a majority
not controlled by them, whether its rule were right or
wrong, just or unjust, resolved to cast off the Consti
tution of their own adoption, and, by revolutionary
violence, erect a separate government for themselves,
which should be, as they term it, homogeneous ; that is
should represent slaveholding communities only, and
reflect their aristocratic features and sentiments.
Now, my friends, uninfluenced, if I know myself, by
passion or prejudice, I hold this to be a candid and
true statement of the case. It is presented because
10

106 The Rebellion:
we can get no intelligent view of the cause of the
rebellion, without considering those facts. My propo
sition is, that the present conflict was, sooner or later,
certain to come. Not because the Northern majority
would attempt to subvert the rights of the slaveholding
States, but because the aristocratic minority would,
with absolute certainty, separate itself, by violence, if
necessary, from the democratic majority, the very hour
it could no longer subject that majority to its will.
It is folly to shut our eyes to this inevitable operation
of an invariable law of humanity. No aristocracy-
ever yet failed to grasp at power, or ever surrendered
it without a struggle, and none ever will. If neces
sary, it will fight to retain it. For many years we
refused to believe that the Southern aristocracy would
seek that terrible resort, because it seemed out of the
range of any imaginable possibility that the descend
ants of our Revolutionary sires could ever strike at the
life of their glorious Country. How bitterly we were
mistaken, let the past year's history tell ! We forgot
that an aristocracy ruled the South, and that aristo
cracies stop not at blood to hold and perpetuate their
predominance. We forgot that the lust of power
regards not the ties that keep just men to the path of
right. And while the loyal portion of the nation hesi
tated, doubted, wondered, and desired conciliation, the
Southern aristocrats struck the blow which precipi
tated this war. They aimed it deliberately, with many
years' premeditation, and with a relentless purpose to
destroy. At their door lies the awful account of the
most causeless and most indefensible of all rebellions.

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 107
Not one of all the thousands of valuable lives sacrificed
in this mortal stjpggle,- but is chargeable to them.
Not a groan or a sigh escapes suffering hearts, but
rises to Heaven in accusing thunder-tones against that
aristocratic minority, which threw "firebrands, arrows,
and death" into the midst of a happy people, with
out a shadow of justification, without even a provoca
tion. My friends, it is vain to say, as many do, that the
anti-Slavery agitation whichhas existed in the Northern
States for many years, was the cause of Southern
rebellion. I admit the existence and pernicious char
acter of that agitation, and have always condemned it.
From its first manifestation to the present time, I have
uniformly opposed it. But I do not intend, if I can
prevent it, that treason shall hide its hideous linea
ments behind Abolitionism. The latter is bad enough ;
but the former is ten thousand times worse. The
latter would destroy Slavery if it could, but is without
the least power to it : the former would disrupt thfi
Union, overthrow the Constitution, and split the nation
into hostile fragments ; and its power has shown itself
such as to require half the military force of the loyal
States to crush it. If Abolitionism is to be charged
with causing this rebellion, it should have preceded
Southern disunionism. But the whole world knows
that Andrew Jackson beat down nullification and seces
sion, in 1832, when there was not a known — certainly
not a meddlesome — Abolitionist in all the free States,
no* had there been heard a whisper of anti-Slavery
agitation there. Treason, then, was in the South before

108 The Rebellion:
Abolitionism was in the North. And if the history of
the last thirty years proves arrythiri£, it is that though
the secession monster recoiled before the " old hero's "
blows, it was only to crouch in its lair, and watch, and
wait. The spirit of disunion which, in 1832, made the
tariff the pretext for nullification, and threatened seces
sion if the government attempted to execute in South
Carolina the law of Congress which the Convention of
that State had declared null and void within her bor
ders, never slept for a single moment. It lived and
grew in Southern hearts, extended its control over
Southern minds, was a perpetual- spring of Southern
policy, and long held up a Southern Confederacy as the
realization of a Southern millennium. When the tariff
question failed to afford it a foothold, it fulfilled Jack
son's prophecy that its next attempt would be in
connection with the subject of Slavery. Unhappily the
Northern agitation on that subject, which began in
1834, — though limited in extent and of feeble propor
tions, and for many years hardly respectable in the
number of its adherents, — furnished that pretext only
too soon. Southern traitors saw in it their best hope,
and the disunion spirit acquired new life. It presented
a rallying point, around which they hoped and labored
to gather to disunion the whole body of. the slave
States. But it was the point of revival, not of origin.
I believe- there has not been a moment of time for fifty
years, when disunion was not, to a greater or less
extent, the ruling thought of leading Southern politi
cians. If this be true, it stamps with the basest hypo
crisy all the Southern clamor about violated rights, and

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 109
brands Southern leaders as the worst of traitors. That
it is true, I will endeavor briefly to show.
No man will deny that the attempt of South Carolina,
in 1832, to exercise the assumed State right to nullify
within her borders a law of Congress, was to every
intent and purpose, disunion. I assume, and the
propriety of the assumption will hardly be questioned,
that it was impossible for the people of any State, to
have been suddenly brought to participate in, or con
sent to, disunion. The enormity of the act, viewed in
any light, was too great, and its probable consequences
too portentous, for it to have found easy favor with
any portion of the people. It was necessary to educate
them to it. Hence, were we without any direct evi
dence whatever, we could not doubt that the spirit of
disunion existed in South Carolina, some time before
its abortive effort in 1832. How long before, we can
not know conjecturally ; but, certainly, some years.
But among the materials for history which this rebel
lion has brought to light, is that which, fortunately for
the cause of truth, fixes a time long before 1832, when
the thought of disunion was revolving in burning
courses through the brain that afterwards exerted a
more controlling influence over the South, than that of
any other man. I need hardly say that I refer to
John C. Calhoun. He, at least, if no other, as far
back as the year 1812, entertained and uttered the
thought of disunion. Whether it originated with him,
can not be told. It is enough, that he gave expression
to it early in his public life, and that the idea has
never died since ; but has been cherished in his State,

110 The Rebellion:
until it culminated in the incomparable crime of the
twentieth of December, 1860. The evidence of his
having at so early a day — and, be it remarked, during
our last war with Great Britain — yielded his great
mind to the lure of treason, is 1^ be found in a letter
of the venerable Commodore Charles Stewart, of
the United States Navy, dated May 4, 1861, and pub
lished extensively at the time. In that letter Commo
dore Stew art gives his reminiscences of a conversa
tion which took place in 1812, between him and Mr.
Calhoun, then a Representative in Congress. It
would be interesting to read the whole letter, but there
is not time for that. I must content myself with that
part of it which relates to the matter in hand.
In the conversation, Commodore Stewart said :
"You* in the South and South-west are decidedly
the aristocratic portion of this Union ; you are so in
holding persons in perpetuity in slavery; you are so
in every domestic quality; so in every habit in your
lives, living and actions; so in habits, customs, inter
course and manners ; you neither work with your
hands, heads, nor any machinery, but live and have
your living, not in accordance with the will of your
Creator, but by the sweat of slavery ; and yet you
assume all the attributes, professions and advantages
of democracy."
To this Mr. Calhoun replied :
" I see that you speak from the head of a young states
man, and from the heart of a patriot, but you lose
sight of the politician and the sectional policy of the
people. I admit your conclusions in respect to us

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. Ill
Southrons. That we are essentially aristocratic I can
not deny, but we can and do yield much to democracy.
This is our sectional policy ; we are from necessity
thrown upon and solemnly wedded to that party (how
ever it may occasionally clash with our feelings), for
the conservation of our interests. It is through our
affiliation with that party, in the Middle and Western
Slates, that we hold power; but when we cease thus
to control this nation, through a disjointed democracy,
or any material obstacle in that party which shall tend
to throw us out of that rule and control, we shall then
resort to the dissolution of the Union. The com
promises of the Constitution, under the circumstances,
were sufficient for our fathers ; but, under the altered
condition of our country from that period, leave to the
South no resource but dissolution : for no amendments
to the Constitution could be reached through a conven
tion of the people under the three-fourths rule."
It is upon the evidence furnished by this letter, as
well as by reasoning from the necessity of educating
the people of South Carolina up to disunion, prior to
1832, that I base my conviction that that fatal idea
has influenced the Southern mind, more or less, for a
full half-century past. Whether so or not, however,
the other position remains — concerning which there
can be no possible doubt — that disunionism preceded
Abolitibnism several years; and therefore the latter
can not be the cause of the rebellion whose flames
encircle us now, bursting out from fires kindled more
than thirty years ago, that have never once gone out
in all that time.

112 The Rebellion:
Let us now glance at a few points in the history of
the United States from the days of nullification to the
present time. Through that entire period disunionism
has had but one home in this land, and that was in the
South. If there were any in the North who entertained
the wretched thought, they were so few and so feeble in
influence, as to occasion not a moment's uneasiness to
to any but themselves. The South, and pre-eminently
South Carolina, has all the honor of the monster's
paternity ; and the chord which, from the first, was
touched, was that which would easily vibrate through
Southern hearts — the apprehended loss of Southern
control in the national Government. It is very remarka
ble that the prominent thought in the speech with
which Mr. Calhoun, in the Senate, on the 15th of
February, 1833, laid the foundation for the succeeding
movement toward disunion, was the very same used by
the South Carolina Convention, in December, 1860, to
seduce the other slave States into secession. Both
exhibited a lively dread of the South's being in a
minority. It was the old spectacle of an aristocracy
clinging to power; the convulsive struggle of hands
accustomed to the sceptre, to keep it. In that speech
the great Southerner elaborated his theory of a minority
veto upon the will of the majority, and illustrated it
from Roman and Jewish history. From it I present a
few sentences, which you will agree with me were a fit
prelude to that deep-laid plot, which, long after his
voice ceased to be heard on earth, bore the burning
fruits of treason. He said :
" But to return to the general government : we have

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. - 113
now sufficient experience to ascertain that the tendency
to conflict in this action is between Southern and other
sections. The latter having a decided majority, must
habitually be possessed of the powers of the govern
ment, both in this and in the other House ; and being
governed by that instinctive love of power so natural
to the human breast, they must become the advocates
of the power of government, and in the same degree
opposed to the limitations ; while the other and weaker
section is necessarily thrown on the side of the limita
tions. In one word, the one section is the natural
guardian of the delegated powers, and the other of the
reserved; and the struggle on the side of the former
will be to enlarge the powers, while that on the oppo
site side will be to restrain them within the constitutional
limits. The contest will, in fact, be a contest between
power and liberty, and such he considered the present;
a contest in which the weaker section, with its PECULIAR
labor, productions, and situation, has at stake all that
can be dear to freemen. Should they be able to main
tain in their full vigor their reserved rights, liberty and
prosperity will be their portion; but if they yield, and
permit the stronger interest to consolidate within itself
all the powers of the government, then will its fate be
more wretched than that of the aborigines whom they
have expelled, or of their slaves. * * * *
Every Southern man, true to the interests of his section
and faithful to the duties which Providence has alloted
him, will be forever excluded from the honors and
emoluments of this government, which will be reserved
for those only who have qualified themselves by politi-

114 * The Rebellion:
cal prostitution for admission into the Magdalen Asy
lums." Bitter, severe words ! with a depth of meaning not
then fathomed, even by the great statesmen around
him in the Senate, but in the light of this day appall
ingly clear. They were spoken just as nullification was
quailing before Jackson's tremendous charge, in his
well remembered Proclamation, of December, 1832,
atid before the slightest ripple of anti-slaveryism
had disturbed the surface of the nation. They
were spoken by the universally acknowledged cham
pion of the South, and were meant to influence and
shape Southern action; for the speech was such as no
sane man would have delivered, with expectation of
its acceptance in the North or the West. Indeed, the
evident design was to array the sentiment of the
"weaker section," the South, against the stronger
sections, the North and West. And what was refer
red to, to produce the desired effect? "The pecu
liar labor, productions and situation" of the
South. That topic was adroitly sprung upon the
Southern mind, to take the place of the then defunct
tariff issue; sprung before the South knew experi
mentally what anti-slaveryism was; sprung in connec
tion with a quasi demand for a minority control of
the government; and, beyond all question, intended
as the rallying 'cry of the South, from that time forth,
until, in Mr. Yancey's words, " at the proper moment,
by one organized concerted action, they could precipi
tate the cotton States into a revolution !"
Now, my friends, if that was not the very beginning

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 115
of the agitation on the subject of Slavery, I confess
that I am not well informed. Of course I do not forget
the trouble connected with the admission of our own
State into the Union; but that had passed away a
dozen of years before, leaving no dregs behind. I
refer to that excitement which has distempered nearly
the last thirty years of our history; and I say that the
first disturbing movement in reference to Slavery was
by Southern men, for the purpose — made abundantly
obvious by subsequent events — of consolidating the
slave States into a disunion phalanx, to be ready at
the beck of their leaders, when " the proper moment"
should arrive, to precipitate revolution, and bring into
existence a Southern Confederacy. Let us look at
those subsequent events.
The first opportunity, after 1833, for an active mani
festation of Southern disunionism, was in 1844, in
connection with the question of annexing Texas. You
will remember that the South, with great unanimity,
urged the annexation, while the North, to a large
extent, was opposed to it. It was no secret that the
course of the South was dictated by a desire to enlarge
the area of slave, territory and increase the number
of slave States. The disunion^tiger, that had appa
rently slept, roused himself, unfleshed his claws, and
growled the old growl^ of nullification days. At
Ashley, in South Carolina, a great meeting was held,
in May, 1814, at which resolutions were adopted, pro
posing a convention, "to deliberate and decide upon
the action to be taken by the slave States on the ques
tion of annexation; and to appoint delegates to a

116 The Rebellion:
convention of the slave States, with instructions to
carry into effect the behests of the people." What
those behests would be, was distinctly indicated in the
two following resolutions, the third and fourth of the
series :
3 " That a convention of the slave States, by dele
gations from each, should be called, to meet at some
central position, to take into consideration the ques
tion of annexing Texas to the Union, if the Union
will accept it; or, if the Union will not accept it, then
of annexing Texas to the Southern Slates.
4. " That the President of the United States be re
quested by the general convention of the slave States,
to call Congress together immediately ; when the final
issue shall be made up, and the alternative distinctly
presented to the free States, either to admit Texas
into the Union, or to proceed peaceably and calmly to
arrange the terms of a dissolution of the Union."
About the same time another large meeting was
held at Beaufort, in the same State, which declared —
"If we are not permitted to bring Texas into our
Union peacefully and legitimately, as now we may,
then we solemnly announce to the world that we will
dissolve this Union sooner than abandon Texas."
Another meeting in the Williamsburg district, in
that State, declared — "We hold it to be better and
more to the interest of the southern and southwestern
portion of the Confederacy, to be out of the Union with
Texas, than in it without her."
These are but specimens of that out-spoken dis
unionism of South Carolinia in 1844; and they were

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 117
responded to, in like spirit, in other Southern States.
These fresh manifestations of the old spirit fully justi
fied the denunciation they received at the time from
Colonel Benton, in the Senate, in the following words,
which it had been well if the people of the United
States had heeded :
"And here, Mr. President, I must speak out. The
time has come for those to speak out, who neither
fear or count consequences when their country is in
danger. Nullification and disunion are revived under
circumstances which menace more danger than ever,
since coupled with a peculiar question which gives to
the plotters the hones* sympathies of the patriotic
millions. I have often intimated it before, but now
proclaim it. Disunion is at the bottom of this long-
concealed Texas machination. Intrigue and specula
tion co-operate; but disunion is at the bottom, and I
denounce it to the American people. Under the pre
text of getting Texas into the Union, the scheme is to
get the South out of it."
The next occasion when disunionism exhibited itself,
was in the memorable conflict of 1850, over the ques
tion of Slavery in the Territories. It would be instruc
tive to review that eventful struggle, terminating in the
adoption of a series of compromise measures, which
lulled the storm for a season ; but time does not per
mit. It must answer for the present, to recall to your
recollection the imminent danger which apparently then
overhung the country. The South, as had been its
custom, meanced disunion ; the North and the West
labored to avert it. The greatest statesmen of the

118 The Rebellion:
land exerted their influence to subdue the conflict.
Once more peace was seemingly restored ; not because
Southern treason was any less living and resolute than
before, but because "the proper moment" had not
arrived. No opportunity had yet existed for stealing
the arms of the nation, without which, rebellion would
be hopeless. To obtain them, it Was necessary for the
South to regain the control of the Government. And
so they were constrained to bide their time.
The election of General Pierce to the Presidency,
in 1852, placed the War Department under the con
trol of Jefferson Davis for four years ; and it was well
understood that if Fremont ha*l been elected in 1856,
the South would then have revolted. But his defeat
deprived them of the requisite pretext ; and the
appointment of Floyd to succeed Davis in that
Department, under the President who, elected by
the votes of an almost unanimous , South, had not the
disposition, or lacked force of will, to control his
traitorous plans and movements, afforded an Oppor
tunity too advantageous to be. lost, of completing the
preparations for the outbreak of the treason, which
had so long been secretly undermining the founda
tions of the Union.
At last, " the proper moment " was seen by the con
spirators to be at hand. _ Eight years' control of the
army, the fortifications, and the arms of the nation, had
given them all they desired. The South was armed,
not only with the intent of treason, but with the weapons
to give it effect. Only one thing was wanting, and that
was the occasion. That came with the recurrence of

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 119
the Presidential election, in 1860. The election of a
President by the Republican party was to be the signal
for revolt. It was indispensable that that result should
be secured beyond all peradventure. Should the Demo
cratic party continue united, the Republican candidate
might be defeated, and then the conspiracy would fail,
for want of a sufficient pretext. So, early in 1860,
throughout the cotton States, in connection with the
appointment of delegates to the Democratic National
Convention to be held at Charleston, in May, the plans
were laid, which resulted in the disruption of that party,
and made the election of the Republican candidate a
foregone certainty. He was elected; and what followed
we know but too well. The schemes of the traitors
were at last near their fruition ; the dark day for Ame
rica had come; the star of her hope could hardly be seen
in the blackness which settled down upon the land;
and while the loyal part of the nation seemed to labor
under a paralysis, the demons of treason, loosed from
all restraint, burst upon the South, and, sweeping away
constitutions and laws, and dashing down honor, justice,
humanity, and truth, gave themselves up to a revelry
of falsehood and robbery, treachery and destruction,
which, it were hardly a hyperbole to say, the devils
gazed at from their infernal abode with envy.
I trust,- my friends, that the foregoing review of the
leading points in the rise and progressive movements
of Southern disunionism, through more than the life of
a generation, to their issue in secession and civil war,
may not have been without interest to you. My object
in it, as you will have perceived, was to establish by

120 The Rebellion:
incontrovertible historical proofs, that Southern treason
ante-dates all the grievances urged in its justification,
and has only waited for a United South to execute its
fell purpose. Let him who will, deliberately ignore the
facts I have presented; but I will not stultify myself
by shutting out from my knowledge, what history will
be faithless if it do not record. No: it is already
burnt into American annals too deep ever to be re
moved, that disunion has been a cardinal policy in the
South, without intermission, for more than a third of a
century; fostered, upheld, and Urged on, year after
year, with almost super-human constancy, by men who
all the time were under oath to support the Constitu
tion they were laboring to overthrow, and were bound
by the holiest obligations to defend and protect the
Country, whose ruin was the first and greatest object
of their machinations !
But still the great question remains — Whence the
origin, what the life of the rebellion, which inaugurated
the war now devastating the land? In the Address
which it was my privilege to deliver in this place, on
the recent anniversary of Washington's birth, I did not
hesitate to declare my conviction that Slavery was its
one sole cause; and I have not one word to retract or
modify, of what I then said. I believe it, and can not
help believing it. And I desire now to state, more fully
than I then could, the specific grounds of my conviction;
confident that. they will be deemed by you ample and
conclusive. When the people of a number of States are found
united in principles, policy, and acts, the plainest sense

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 121
instantly looks for some influence common to them all.
Signally is this true, when they so far renounce all the
ties which from their birth have clustered around their
hearts, as to combine in treason. Now, who can de
signate any influence in the insurgent States, other than
Slavery, capable of producing such a result ? It is the
only one present in all — -the only institution, domestic,
social, or political,, which could bind them all together
in such a war as this. This single view is enough with
me, and should be enough with every man whose mind
is free to reach a right conolusion. But I do not rest
merely upon this. The historical retrospect which ,has
occupied our attention, is itself conclusive proof that,
from the hour that nullification failed in South Carolina,
the South has, through Slavery, been gradually but
surely linked to the cause of disunion.
Recall the facts, and remark that in every instance
after Mr. Calhoun's speech in February, 1833, the
disunion agitations were directly connected with Slavery,
and with nothing else. In 1844, disunion was threaten
ed, unless the slave territory of Texas were added to the
Union. In 1850, it was more alarmingly menaced, if
Slavery were not permitted unrestricted access to the
Territories. In 1856, it took the form of a widely-con
certed plot to resist, with arms, the inauguration <?f
Fremont as President, solely on the pretense of dan
ger to Slavery. In 1860, it broke out in actual rebel
lion, on the same pretense, because of the election of
Mr. Lincoln ; and every defense of the rebellion, and
every appeal to the South for-^o-operation in it, was
based upon considerations appertaining to Slavery,
11

122 The Rebellion:
But not to confine ourselves to the course of events
in the South, let us come nearer home, and look, for a
moment, at the position taken in Missouri. You all
remember that on the twelfth of January, 1861, while
the secession tempest was sweeping over the South, a
monster meeting was held in St. Louis, which was called
a Union meeting. A number of resolutions were there
adopted, some of which expressed Union sentiments.
But there was one which betrayed the cloven foot of
treason, and gave to that meeting the unenviable pa
ternity of that double-facedmongrel, Conditional Union
ism; through which a wound was inflicted upon the
Union cause in this State, which has not to this day
healed. The patriots of Missouri looked, and had a right
to look to St. Louis, for the moral support of a clear
and soul-stirring declaration of loyalty to the Constitu
tion and the Union ; but those who, in conclave, pre
pared the resolutions for that meeting — some of whom
have since -been and still are in arms against the Union
— treated them to poorly-disguised secessionism, in
the following declaration :
" That the possession of slave property is a consti
tutional right, and as such ought to be ever recognized
by the Federal Government. That if the Federal
Government shall fail and refuse to secure this right,
the Southern States should be found united in its- defense
— IN WHICH EVENT MISSOURI WILL SHARE THE COMMON
DUTIES AND COMMON DANGER OF THE SOUTH."
This declaration was, in effect, a direct committal of
Missouri, so far as that meeting could commit her, to
secession ; and that upon the ground of a failure by the

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 123
general Government to secure to the people the consti
tutional right to hold slave property ; a right which,
those astute resolution-mongers in their eagerness for
got, depends not upon the Constitution of the United
States, or the action of the Federal Government, but
upon local constitutions or laws, and therefore neither
needs, nor is entitled to demand, security from the
Government of the nation.
Thus, you see, not only in the cotton States, but up
in the latitude of Missouri, where cotton is not king,
the disunionists had but one watchword, and that wa3
Slavery. I could, if necessary, accumulate evidence
before you till to-morrow's sunset, that Slavery has,
from first to last, been the grand, sole key-note of the
Southern traitors ; but I must desist. There is, how
ever, one document, which played so important a
part in promoting secession, that I will crave your
indulgence while I present a few lines from it. I
allude to the "Address of the people of South Carolina,
assembled in Convention, December, 1860, to the people
of the slaveholdiny StaLs." Listen to the following
words there found :
" Citizens of the slaveholding States of the United
States : Circumstances beyond our control have placed
us in the van of the great controversy between the
Northern and Southern States. We would have pre
ferred that other States should have assumed the
position we now occupy. Independent ourselves, we
disclaim any desire or design to lead the counsels of
the other Southern States. Providence has cast our
lot together, by extending over us an identity of pur-

124 The Rebellion :
suits, interests and institutions. South Carolina desires
no destiny separate from yours. To be one of a great
slaveholding Confederacy, stretching its arms over
a territory larger than any power in Europe pos
sesses — with a population four times greater than that
of the whole United States when they achieved their
independence of the British empire — with productions
which make our existence more important to the world
than that of any other people who inhabit it — with
common institutions to defend and common dangers
to encounter — we ask your sympathy and confedera
tion. * * * United together, and we must be
the most independent, as we are the most important,
among the nations of the- world. United together, and
we require no other instrument to conquer peace than
our beneficent productions. United together, and we
must be a great, free and prosperous people, whose
renown must spread throughout the civilized world and
pass down, we trust, to the remotest ages. We ask
you to join us in forming A CONFEDERACY OF
SLAVEHOLDING STATES."
Now, my friends, I ask, in the sincerest candor, if
any man who will allow himself dispassionate reflection
upon the facts as they exist, can in his conscience say
that any thing else than Slavery was the origin and
cause of this rebellion ? What I have presented is, as
it were, but the title-page of the vast volume of similar
matter, which the records and annals of our country
contain; records and annals which, for the honor of
America and of the human race should be wiped out
of existence and erased from memory forever. They

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 125
present one of the most startling exhibitions of de
praved public morality that can be found in history ;
not because the South loves its " peculiar labor, pro
ductions, and situation, " but because it exalts them
above Constitution and Country ! Southern leaders,
and a large part of the Southern people, have shown
themselves willing and resolved to immolate all that
makes them respected as Americans — the unity and
combined power of America ; and for what ? Not,
as they falsely affirm, to protect Slavery against the
" northern Vandals," or, as they less classically term
them, " the damned Yankees ;" but that the aristocratic
and overbearing spirit which Slavery engenders and
stimulates,' may have free scope, unchecked by that
pestilent democratic element, which loves country
more than any material interest, and is too much of
" mud-sill " nature to comprehend how or why, in a
republic, an arrogant minority should lord it over an
equally free and intelligent majority. Puffed up with
the notion that, organized as a " slaveholding con
federacy," they would be " the most important among
the nations of the world," they are utterly reckless of
the fact, that, to attain that end, they must sunder,
with bloody and heartless violence, the nation through
whose Union they and their " peculiar institutions "
have been protected and developed. Apparently, as
oblivious as the grave of the obligation of every people
to live and act for the good of mankind as well as for
their own, their every utterance breathes only of self,
and their every blow is struck for their own inordinate
aggrandisement. A vision of wealth to flow to them

126 The Rebellion:
from a tributary world, of power to be wielded by them
over cringing nations, through their " beneficent pro
ductions," blinds them to the damnable wrong of
despoiling their own nation of the very soil from which
those productions are to spring ; much the greater
part of which the nation bought, and for a large
portion of which the nation fought. In a word, " the
divinity which stirs within them," impelling to treason,
robbery, and blood, is that which neither. Europe, Asia,
or Africa worships, but which it was reserved for
Americans to bow down to — the half-civilized NEGRO !
If any one within the sourM of my voice supposes,
from what I have uow or heretofore said, that I am, or
ever have been, in any degree imbued with bitterness
toward Slavery as a domestic institution, he greatly
wrongs me. Some years of my youth were spent in
Kentucky, and nearly half of my life has been passed
in this State. I have, therefore, long been familiar with
Slavery in Jwo.of the border slave States. As a system
of domestic servitude, while I believe it unprofitable
there, my mind is free from any fanatical or intolerant
bias against it. But when it is attempted to use it as
a foundation for amassing political power — when those
interested in the dollars it yields, evince that they
love the negro more than their country, and, for the
sake of the former, would dissever and degrade the
latter — when the masters of the slaves demand, though
a minority, to be also the masters of a nation of white
men, and because the nation refuses, go about with fire
and sword to destroy it ; then I resist, and will resist
to the last moment of my life, and with all the powers

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 127
which God may give me. In that case, what men may
say of me, what proscription they may visit me with,
what enmity they may exhibit, what denunciations
they may hurl, are all matters of the most profound
indifference to me. I will speak and act for my Coun
try, as duty demands, with no more consciousness of
those things, than the dead have of the storms that
oversweep their graves.
Thus far, fellow-citizens, I have confined my remarks
to the national aspects of our affairs. I should deem
my obligations unfulfilled, were I to omit a distinct
reference to the position and policy of Missouri in the
present crisis. We belong to a State which, in the
elements of material greatness, takes a front rank in
our country. Some of us have lived here many years,
some all their lives, and all of us are attached to our
home. Through the criminal machinations of a
traitorous Governor and Legislature, — now happily
deposed from power by the people, — Missouri became
a battle-field. She has been wasted by the tread of
war, till over a large part of her surface devastation
and misery prevail. Thousands of her people have
endured untold sufferings, and her interests, in every
department, have been grievously shattered. The im
poverishment which inevitably follows civil war, has
fallen crushingly upon her citizens. Her wealth is
probably not one-half now, what it was considered to
be eighteen months ago. In every light her condition
is deplorable ; and it was made so by the insane
attempt, in the face of a clear impossibility, to pre
cipitate her into the whirlpool of Southern treason.

128 The Rebellion:
To restore her to her former high estate must be the
work of years, and be done by her own people. It is,
therefore, our manifest duty to bring ourselves, with
all our powers, to the earnest consideration of what
will best achieve her restoration, and most conduce to
the welfare, present and future, of ourselves and our
children. On this subject, coming so directly home
to every heart, I have a few sincere and plain words
to leave with you.
In the first place, every man, woman, and child
within our borders, might as well at once dismiss all
thought of Missouri's ever becoming a part of the
" Southern Confederacy," even if that death-stricken
abortion should be resuscitated, and exist till the end
of time. She has no interest in common with them,
which should, or ever will, lead her " to share the
common danger of the South." She is, in latitude,
climate, and productions, a northern State, and were
she this moment severed from the northern and united
with the southern portion of the country, the severance
would be so utterly unnatural, so completely ruinous
to her, that her people would, by tens of thousands,
desert her territory, and seek better homes within the
Union ; and their places would never be filled from the
South. But besides this, Missouri lies directly in the
path between the Atlantic and Pacific sections of the
Union ; and the national government would wage
endless war, — and ought to do so, — rather than suffer
her to become the possession of any foreign power.
Her destiny, therefore, is fixed, finally and irrevocably,
in the Union.

Its Origin and Life in Slavery. 129
Such being the case, how shall we best and soonest
restore her, in the Union, to sound and stable pros
perity ? In my opinion, there is no serious difficulty in
answering this question. As it has, for many years,
been generally conceded by cool-headed and sagacious
men, slaveholders among us, that Slavery is not essen
tial to our prosperity, and, indeed, has but a limited
field here in which it is profitable as a system of
labor; as it is known to retard immigration to our
State ; as it is, beyond doubt, the origin and life of
this horrible rebellion ; as it is undeniably true, that,
but for its existence among us, we should have been
almost wholly exempt from the immediate presence
of this war within our boundaries ; and as, judging
from the past and the present, it may be expected to
be a fruitful source of trouble in the future ; it appears
to me, in the exercise of the best judgment I possess,
that, to provide, in some well-considered, equitable, and
gradual way, for its eventual removal from our soil,
would do more than all other things, to lift Missouri
speedily out of her present unhappy condition, and
start her forward in a fresh and higher career of \
prosperity. As to when this subject should be brought
before the people for practical discussion, or ' how the
result should be effected, or when the process should
begin, or when the day of final extinction should be
fixed, I have nothing now to say. To express my
opinion upon the main question, is enough for the
present. This, however, should be said — that when
ever presented to the popular mind, no fanatical, radi
cal, or impetuous views should have influence ; for it
12

130 The Rebellion.
is a subject which will tax the best and purest minds
of our State to their utmost, to deal with it in wisdom
and justice. Such views certainly have no influence
upon me. I consider the question with reference
solely to our interest as a people ; having no opinions
concerning it which I would force upon others, nor
any intolerance toward those who may differ from me.
Our fortunes are closely linked together, and, humanly
speaking, our destiny must be carved out by our
selves. We should, therefore, in a fraternal spirit,
consider what will bring the greatest amount of
permanent benefit to all. For my part, I will be
faithful in the calm pursuit of what may at any time
seem to me for the highest good of our whole State;
and, appealing to Heaven for the sincerity and purity
of my motives, will cheerfully commit the issue to the
hands of an all-wise and gracious Providence.

THE REBELLION:
ITS CHARACTER, MOTIVE, AND AIM.*

With nations, as with individuals, there are turning-
points, at which their destiny hangs upon present loy
alty to honor, truth, and duty, and their prosperity,
perhaps, their existence, depends upon the courage
and fidelity of a single hour. In all the history of
the world there can probably be found no more emin
ent illustration of this truth, than that which, eighty-
six years ago, made the Fourth of July memorable
for all after time. An infant Nation was then strug
gling into existence, and the great problem was, whether
it should exist, or be strangled in its cradle. That ques
tion, so far as involved in the exercise of human will
and human efforts, rested with fifty-six men, selected
from three millions constituting the nation, and charged
with the most momentous interests of humanity, in
their own day and in the ages that were to come.
Had they been faithless to their high trust, or too
feeble in heart and hand for the new and perilous
exigency, the infant nation would have been smoth
ered at its birth, and you and I might this day have
* An Oration delivered at Washington, Missouri, July 4, 1862.

132 The Rebellion:
been subject to the British Crown. But in the hour
of trial those patriot fathers were faithful and strong.
They declared to the world that the Colonies they
represented were, and of right ought to be, free and
independent States; and through them the people of
those States avowed themselves one people, united in
feeling and in fact forever. Thus was announced the
Union, which the people of the American Colonies,
under the pressure of a common necessity, and the
impulse of a common antagonism to regal oppression,
had, nearly two years before, been compelled to form,
but which was not authoritatively and irrevocably pro
claimed until the 4th of July, 1776. As there had
not been such a union recorded in history, so there
could not be one more sincere, brave, and honest than
that. It rested upon the clearest principles of right,
demanded the most unselfish consecration to its main
tenance, and was established upon the most earnest
and unreserved pledges of devotion by the whole
people to each other and to the whole cause that united
them. Its formation was the first turning-point with
this nation. The people who, disunited, were power
less, found in union strength to resist external attack,
and the Nation lived.
He who has so inattentively read the history of his
country, as to suppose that the Union of 1774 was
formed by a people of identical interests, habits and
feelings, should go back and read that history again,
that he may better appreciate the nature and value
of that Union, so little understood in this day by the
mass of those who have all their lives enjoyed its

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 133
blessings. Of the many fundamental errors of the
rebellion whose deadly footsteps have marked our
land with blood through the dreary twelve month past,
the most incomprehensible to me is, that diversity of
interests, difference of domestic institutions, and dis
cordance of feelings and habits, justify revolution, for
the sake of social separation; an error as necessarily
fatal to all social unity, as in the days of our fathers,
it would have been an insuperable barrier to union, if
they had entertained it. For there is nothing in our
history more true, than that just such diversities existed
then as now ; but they were not counted as a feather's
weight in the scale against the benefits which union
offered, and which without union were impossible of
attainment. And it was that very disregard of diver
sities of character, manners, and interests, in view of
the magnificent rewards of a cordial union, which con
stituted one of the Union's brightest glories. For
freedom's sake, the struggling colonists reconciled
every difference and yielded every conflict of interest;
little dreaming that what they gladly offered as only
too small a sacrifice for their country's life, would, in
the third generation of their descendants, rise again
to threaten that country with death.
Let us dwell for a moment upon that grand old
assemblage of patriots, which presided over the infant
nation from 1774 to 1781, and is known in our annals
as the Continental Congress; for it is one of the
sublime features of our country's history. It was
a voluntary assemblage of delegates, fresh from a
people whose hearts were united in the one great idea

134 The Rebellion:
and purpose of making America free. Each section
there represented dearly loved its own peculiar insti
tutions and interests, but, to their glory be it said,
each loved American freedom more. The North said
not to the South, "Do this, or we will depart;" nor
did the South say to the North, as it has since, " Yield,
or we will secede;" but North and South met, delibe
rated, and acted in equality and fraternity, for the
sake of liberty. The Puritan and the Cavalier, the
Catholic and the Huguenot, the Churchman and the
Quaker, the Englishman, the Dutchman, and the
Frenchman, the slaveholder and non- slaveholder, were
there in strange and unexampled harmony; all past
differences forgotten in the absorbing interest of the
mighty present, and every heart full of the hopes
which irradiated the future of the budding Republic.
They came from the chilly regions of Memphremagog,
from the temperate shores of Chesapeake, from Pam
lico's odorous pineries, from Savannah's flowery banks;
each with his votive offering for his Country, and that
country not the poor strip of land inhabited by his
colony, but the whole broad domain, which the energy,
the bravery, and the perseverance of all, within their
respective limits, had redeemed from barbarism, and
consecrated to civilization and freedom. Plymouth
Rock, Manhattan, James Town, Albemarle, and Port
Royal met in the City of Brotherly Love, and athwart
the clouded sky Freedom's bow of promise spanned
the front of the continent, the type in his faultless
proportions and its distinct but commingled hues, of
that Union of many in one, into which then and there

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 135
the God of Nations breathed the breath of a new and
endless life. Think you that in that assembly jealousies ,
prejudices, antagonisms, and jarring interests could
have had no place ? As well expect men in this fallen
world to be angels, or human nature to be divine this
side of heaven. No: the very same discordant ele
ments were present at the birth of the nation as now
would administer at its death : but they shrank away
before the blaze of patriotism which glorified the land,
as the withered grass of our prairies before the fire's
devouring march. The fathers of the Republic had no
heart for such low and sordid schemes of selfishness
and ambition, as have made Absaloms of their sons
and Jezebels of their daughters in these evil days.
Forget not that glorious band of heroes ; for, under
God, we owe our existence as a nation io their courage,
wisdom, and unselfish fidelity.
Look around ua now, and see the Nation at the
second turning-point in its history. Again its life is
at stake ! Suffer not the mind to be diverted from
this the great, the only issue of the bloody conflict of
this day. The nation will come out of it alive or dead
— one or the other — nothing less, nothing else. If its
integrity be maintained, it will live; if rebellion tri
umph, it dies as a nation, though its dissevered fragments
should survive in separate existence. It began in
unity, in unity it has lived, and without unity it has
no present life nor hope of future being. If one
branch may be dismembered to-day, another may to
morrow, and another again the next day, and so, from
time to time, its parts may, one by one, fall away, till,

136 The Rebellion:
when the Centenary of Independence dawns upon the
earth, men will look in vain among the nations for the
United States of America. The continent will be
here, but where the Nation ? The old flag may still
float over some part of it, but with how many stars in
its azure field ? People may be here, but what people ?
Will they be free ? No human being can say ! Will
they be citizens of a republic, even in name? God
only knows ! The future is impenetrable ; but all his
tory is without instruction, if it teach not that national -
decay unerringly waits upon national disintegration,
and that national disintegration proceeding from internal
causes, is national death. We stand this hour face to
FACE WITH THE ISSUE OF LIFE OR DEATH TO AMERICA !
The fate, not of an individual, a family, or a commu
nity, but of a nation, is this day in the hands of loyal
Americans. It is an awful — I had almost saidr a hor
rible responsibility. None such ever rested upon any
other people ; for never was committed to another
nation so great and precious a charge for the good of
the human race. May the Almighty Ruler of heaven
and earth give the nation heart and arm to bear it safe
through this its second ordeal of fire !
My friends, think it not strange that this convulsion
shakes the nation. Our government, though popular
in its origin and form, and incomparably the most
carefully-guarded and beneficent the world has ever
seen, could not expect to be the only one in history to
escape rebellion. Unspeakably causeless and wicked
as this rebellion is, in origin, motive, purpose, and acts,
its breaking but has only fulfilled the law which, sooner

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 137
or later, tests the ability of all human institutions to
resist the evil passions of men. If any government
might hope to be spared that test, surely ours might ;
but the trial, it appears, was ordained for it, as for
every other. There is, however, a world-wide differ
ence between this 'rebellion and any which the history
of the Old World records. There, no instance, I
believe, can be found of popular uprising in arms
against government, except for oppression, real or sup
posed ; here, there is not even a decent pretense, much
less the actual fact of oppression. There, rebellion
has aimed to overthrow a monarch or a ruling aristo
cracy ; here, there is no monarch to depose, and it is
the aristocracy revolting against the people ; and hence,
in part, the trans- Atlantic sympathy of royalty and
the nobility with the South. There, the people sought
to throw off governments in whose establishment they
had no voice ; here, the rebels strike at the government
themselves voluntarily established. There, rebelling
nations demanded written Constitutions to protect them
against arbitrary rule ; here, the insurgents aim to
destroy the first written Constitution ever adopted,
and which, from the day of its adoption to this the world
has admired and venerated as the grandest of human
conceptions in government. Behold, then, the immea
surable difference in the eyes of God and men, between
the popular rebellions of the Old World and the aris
tocratic rebellion of the South; between the Revolution
of '76 and the revolt of 1861 ! I can appreciate the
former, for there is in them a manifest and a just
cause; I can sympathize with a people aspiring to,

138 The Rebellion:
and fitted for, freedom, for they have a right to be free ;
I can cheer on the struggles of an oppressed nation
against their oppressors ; I can understand that a peo
ple might be so situated as to justify them in dethroning
a monarch, though not an oppressor, where they deemed
it best to take the powers of government into their
own hands ; I can even see how a people might, under
a government of their own creation, take up arms to
hurl from place their own public servants, wielding
power to their intolerable injury, when the means and
opportunity for lawful redress could not be reached
before irremediable wrongs might be perpetrated; but
for a portion of a free, intelligent, and educated nation,
living under a government whose form and spirit ema
nated from themselves, which had never inflicted on
them one single wrong, and in the control of which
they enjoyed just the constitutional measure of power,
which, by their own most free and most solemn cove
nant, they agreed to, and a far greater weight of actual
influence than that measure of power justified — for
them to kindle the flames of civil war, and become
murderers of their own kindred and destroyers, of
their own Constitution, merely to satisfy a lawless
craving for a separate nationality, is a manifestation
of folly and crime having no approach to a parallel in
history, and capable of no explanation but that which
brands its authors as the most atrocious of parricides,
and consigns them to the lowest depths of infamy.
Were this rebellion a sudden outbreak of overwrought,
though unprovoked and unjustifiable, passion, we might
be disposed to abate somewhat in its denunciation.

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 139
Every man knows enough of his own frailties to make
him merciful to the frailties of others. Every system
of laws distinguishes between the premeditated willful
act, and the act that proceeds from an onset of sud
denly excited feeling. But this rebellion can lay no
claim to have sprung from the latter source ; though it
is doubtless true that tens of thousands of its armed
defenders have acted under a blind impulse, produced
by the torrent of devilish falsehoods with which their
reason and patriotism have been overwhelmed. With
the leaders, however, it has been a matter of cool,
deliberate calculation, and steady, persistent effort, for
more than thirty years. Children have been born into
it, and educated for it. The plan and the intent have
been transmitted Jrom father to son, from mother to
daughter, and nursed between brother and sister, and
mingled with the friendships and loves of a whole
section of the country, during all that long period of
preparation for the day, always expected and always
kept in view, when the causeless and brutal assault of
Americans upon their country should be made. When,
in the hour that the rebellion took shape and life in
the South Carolina Convention, one of the traitors
there proclaimed, " The secession of South Carolina is
not an event of a day — it has been gathering head for
thirty years;" and another, doubtless more exact as to
time, cried, " We have now accomplished the work after
FORTY years ; " and another, ambitious to signalize his
devotion to treason, boasted, " I have been engaged in
this movement ever since I entered political life;" and
another, unwilling that the iniquity of one should

140 The Rebellion:
assume pre-eminence, declared, " Most of us have had
this matter under consideration for the last twenty
years ; " and another exultingly exclaimed, " At last it
has come to that point when we may say the matter is
entirely right ; " they, with inexplicable insanity, adver
tised the age and growth of their diabolical conspiracy,
and silenced forever the least plea of mercy for the
sudden spring of an overpowering excitement. To
such as they mercy were a crime — swift, stern, relent
less vengeance the highest virtue.
When a people assume to set on foot an armed
revolution, involving, as it always does, not only the
possible overthrow of an established government, but
a frightful sacrifice of life, an incalculable destruction
of property, a dreadful accumulation of enduring ani
mosities, a wide-spread demoralization, and a grievous
debasement of religious sentiment, the intellect and the
conscience of all men demand that two things should
plainly appear to justify the act; first, that the attempted
revolution rests upon some acknowledged principle of
right; and second, that there is manifest cause for
asserting that principle by arms. If no such principle be
involved, or if it could be successfully asserted by
peaceful and lawful means, the movement is only one
of savage and satanic passion, which the whole human
race is profoundly interested in crushing down, just as
each community is interested in imprisoning or destroy
ing the incendiary, the robber, and the assassin. Our
fathers felt the necessity of justifying their revolt
before mankind, and they did it by asserting great prin
ciples, and exhibiting the violations of those principles,

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 141
unredressed and incapable of redress by peaceful means,
whieh impelled them to arms. If they so felt, when
revolting against a kingly sway, wielded tyrannically
by a distant monarch, whose dominion over them was
not of their choice, much more should such a justifica
tion be rigidly demanded of republican citizens, who
take up arms to throw off a government which sprung
from themselves, and whose principles and attributes
they had declared and bestowed.
In their irreverent ambition to liken their unprincipled
revolt to the Revolutionary struggle of their fathers, the
rebel leaders attempt to meet this just demand, in part,
by an incessant reiteration of the right of the South to
freedom and self -government ; and they have so adroitly
and boldly rung this' in the ears of the people, that
thousands have yielded to the cruel deception, and fol
lowed the standard of rebellion to an untimely and
dishonored grave. My countrymen, need I say to you
that this is but the audacious resort of lying and despe
rate traitors, to obtain and hold ascendancy over the
unenlightened masses, from which the armies of the
rebellion are to be recruited? When William W.
Boyce, Representative from South Carolina in the rebel
Congress, proclaimed there, " Audacity ! audacity !
audacity ! is the key to success," he fitly characterized
the whole spirit and action of the South, from the
beginning of secession — and indeed long before — up
to this hour. At every step, they have exhibited an
unequaled audacity in trampling upon honor and truth,
religion and morality, virtue and patriotism ; and in few
things has this spirit been more shamelessly displayed,

142 The Rebellion:
than in this clamor for freedom and self-government.
When, pray, did the citizens of the South cease to be
free ? and when was their freedom assailed from any
quarter? Name the time and place. When did the
general Government ever restrain men in the South of
their freedom ? I was about to say, never ; but I do
recall one occasion, memorable and well remembered,
when the freedom of the South Carolina Chivalry was
promptly and most effectively restrained by an old hero
named Andrew JAckson, whom they have probably
not forgotten to this day : but it was upon the freedom
they arrogantly claimed to nullify the laws and defy
the power of the nation, that he set his foot and crush
ed it to death. The freedom now exacted is akin to
that, but more lawless and ferocious, — freedom to over
turn the Constitution, to tear down and tear in pieces
the national Flag, and to plunder the nation of its
arms, munitions of war, ships, forts, and money, and
with them wage war against it, for the establishment
upon its own domain of a foreign and hostile power.
This is the freedom which the South demands now, and
in which " all they ask is to be let alone" — the freedom
of organized filibustering against their own Govern
ment and people, on a scale so gigantic, that, in com
parison, ten thousand "John Brown raids" were a
harmless pastime. And it is upon that kind of freedom
that this great nation of freedom-loving Americans
marches this day ; and they will tread it down and make
an end of it for ever and ever.
And when, pray, has the South been deprived of the
right or the exercise of self-government ? Who . has

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 143
governed them, if not themselves ? Who but they
formed the Constitutions of their States, or brought
them into the Union under the Constitution of the
United States ? What power has governed them in
any form, without their own direct authority, freely
given ? My friends, you and I know — there is not a
white man in the nation so ignorant of the nature of
our institutions as not to know — that we have no
government in this country but that which proceeds
from the people themselves ; that, in fact, there is
not in the wide world a people holding the reins of
government in their own hands so completely as do
the American people in all their parts. What, then,
mean this impudent cry about the right of self-govern
ment? It has but one meaning and object — to ensnare
the unthinking and unwary, by deluding them into the
belief that that cherished right is in danger. It is a
shallow and contemptible device, but unfortunately it
has lured thousands into the toils of treason, and there
fore only is it worthy of notice. When the inhabitants
of a defined portion of the land establish a State Con
stitution, they exercise the right of self-government
as to their State ; and when the nation adopts the
national Constitution, it exercises the right of self-
government as to national affairs ; and in both instances
the people have always acted with the most untram-
meled freedom. And when a Constitution, either
State or national, is once adopted, it is forever binding,
until lawfully abrogated by the people that made it.
For a part of the people to attempt its abrogation by
violence, is not self-government, but revolution; for

144 TJie Rebellion:
the minority to revolt against the lawfully-expressed
will of the majority, is not self-government, but rebel
lion ; and in either case, law and order, justice and
right, are instantly overwhelmed in anarchy. It is just
this that brought upon our happy country the wild
horrors of civil war. With the Southern aristocrats,
not to govern the nation is to be deprived of the right
of self-government — not to rule the whole, is to lose
their natural prerogative ! It is their crime, that,
while they have with the most comprehensive liberty
exercised self-government in affairs of state, they have
utterly renounced self-government over their own
proud and- ferocious passions. In every possible way
they have exhibited a rapacity for power, which defies
alike the restraints of Constitutions and of conscience,
and sets their lordly will above all laws, divine or
human. They have yet to learn through the bloody
teachings of the war themselves began, that the very
first principle of popular government is, that the ma
jority, whether "mud-sill" or aristocratic, rules, and
that they who refuse to bow to that principle will be
broken into submission to it.
Had the Government, or the people of the North,
committed aggressions upon the rights of the South,
and the South had in a fever of resentment appealed
to arms, there would be some show of palliation for
their crime, but not the least justification ; for the
constitutional remedy of the ballot-box was open to their
appeal. But I have shown out of their own mouths
that it was no fever fit that was on them, but an old
inflammation, which they were nursing to a head for

' Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 145
thirty or forty years ; all the while mouthing great
words about Northern aggressions, and all the time
knowing that those words were but a cheat and a delu
sion, to inflame their own people, and hide from the
world the inconceivable crime that was in preparation.
To say that any of their constitutional rights had been
abridged in one single jot or tittle, is simply to assert
a naked and shameless falsehood. Let him who makes
the charge point to the time when and the way in which
it was done, if he can. If, in matters of policy, they
complain of the tariff, I say that the legislative history
of the country for forty years proves that the tariff
has been shaped and reshaped, unshaped arid mis
shaped, from time to time, just as the South itself
demanded. If they talk about fugitive slaves, the fact
is known to every intelligent man that the Fugitive
Slave Act of Congress was drawn up by themselves,
and passed with the help of Northern votes. If they
say that the North excluded Slavery from the Terri
tories, the answer is, that no law of that description
was in existence when the rebellion broke out, and
the Supreme Court of the United States had declared
such a law unconstitutional. If they turn to the elec
tion of a President by the votes of the free States
alone, they stand denounced as double traitors, to
their party and their country ; for they broke up their
party to clear the way with absolute certainty for that
result, with the sole purpose of using it as an excuse
for, and an incitement to, secession. If they professed
to fear aggressions from the President so elected, or
his party, they knew the profession was utterly false,
13

146 The Rebellion:
for they and their friends were a majority in Congress,
and might have kept him and his party in effectual
check. If they express apprehension for the continuance
of Slavery in their States, because Mr. Lincoln, in a
speech made in 1858, when he was not thought of for
the Presidency, said, " I believe this Government can
not endure permanently, half slave and half free," and
because Mr. Seward made his famous " irrepressible
conflict " speech, the answer is fourfold : first, that the
party which elected Mr. Lincoln, did, in their party
platform, explicitly affirm " the right of each State
to order and control its own domestic institu
tions according to its own judgment exclusively;"
second, that the last Congress, when the secession of
seven States had left a Republican majority in both
Houses, did, by a two-thirds vote in both, pass an
amendment to the Constitution, declaring that " NO
AMENDMENT SHOULD BE MADE TO THE CONSTITUTION
WHICH WILL AUTHORIZE OR GIVE TO CONGRESS THE
POWER TO ABOLISH OR INTERFERE, WITHIN ANY STATE,
WITH THE DOMESTIC INSTITUTIONS THEREOF, INCLUDING
THAT OF PERSONS HELD TO LABOR OR SERVICE BY THE
LAWS OF said state ; " third, that the rebel Commis
sioners, sent over the sea to solicit European recog
nition of the rebel government, did, in a letter on that
subject to Earl Russell, in August, 1861, declare,
" It was from no fear that the slaves would be
LIBERATED THAT SECESSION TOOK PLACE ; " and fourth,
that the proof is overwhelming, that the South, while
professing rampant indignation at those words of
Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward, was everywhere plot-

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 147
ting, contriving, and laboring, with exhaustless ingenuity
and perseverance, to foster and intensify the " irrepres
sible conflict," and hurry the nation into that other
and far more terrible conflict in which it is now
involved. If. they point to the Personal Liberty laws
of four Northern States, the reply is, that, wrong in
spirit and pernicious in effect as those laws undoubtedly
were, still if not repugnant to the Constitution of the
United States, those States had a constitutional right
to pass them, however reprehensible the exercise of
that right; but if they were repugnant to that Con
stitution, they were utterly void. In either case they
damaged no rights of the South; or, if they did, the
South had a constitutional redress ; and had no more
right for that cause to snap the ties of the Union, than
I would have to throw society into warring chaos, be
cause a robber plundered me, or a ruffian aimed a
deadly blow at my life.
N But, some one may say — "What about the Aboli
tionists? Have they not for thirty years denounced
Slavery, and vilified the South, and preached up that
the Constitution is a covenant with hell, because it
prevents the abolition of Slavery in the States -by
Congress, and said ten thousand other things to exas
perate the South? and shall the South stand all that?"
Well, my friend, restrain your indignation for a
moment, and let us take a calm view of this matter.
I will not discuss with you whether the words and
acts of the Abolitionists have been good or bad, wise
or foolish, just or unjust; but, assuming them to be as
bad, and foolish, and unjust as you could possibly

148 The Rebellion:
regard them, I utterly deny that they constitute a
justification, or even an apology for this heinous
rebellion. You might as well say, that because your
brother talks hard words at you for owning a negro,
you are justified in burning down your father's house,
in which you both live. The two cases are identical in
principle ; and if you could not justify such a crime
as that, by such a provocation, you can not justify or
defend Southern treason by the fanatical talk of the
Abolitionists ; and they were powerless for anything
but talk. I pray you beware of that specious and
insidious appeal to your passions ; beware of whatever
tends to warp or cloud your judgment; and especially
beware of him, whoever he may be, that, in discussing
the inconceivably momentous questions of the day,
urges upon you that Abolition speeches and publica
tions were the cause of our national troubles. No
man takes that chute who is not at heart disloyal, or
bidding for disloyal votes, or both. Why, what is it,
when you sift it down and gather its true character,
but an attempt to defend and justify the crime of
rebellion, by the mere words of fanatics? Set him
down as traitorous in heart who does that thing, and
shake him off as Paul the Apostle, at Melita, shook
off into the fire the viper that had fastened on his
hand. If, then, this rebellion is not of recent origin, but
dates far back ; nor the offspring of sudden excitement,
but of long continued and "careful preparation; and if
it has no defense or palliation in the matters to
which I have referred; every thinking man finds his

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 149
mind instinctively drawn to the investigation of its
cause. If you see a man who does not wish to know
the cause, he is one that fears to know it, lest it be
found in something "peculiar," in which he has a
warmer interest than in his country. For my part, I
desire to know the cause, and to know it now, while
this rebellious war is in hand, not after it is over,
when nobody will care to investigate it; and I have
deemed it my duty, even while the roar of battle
sounds through the land, to discuss that question, and
to speak before the people my views of the cause of
a revolt, which has no type but that in which the rebel
angels " With ambitious aim,
Against the throne and monarchy of God
Raised impious war in heaven."
I have not hesitated to declare publicly on former
occasions, nor do. I shrink from reiterating here to-day,
with a clear perception of the position I occupy
before you, my solemn and immovable conviction, that
this rebellion came from one cause, and no other —
Slavery, and the aristocratic, exclusive, and over
bearing spirit which springs from it. On the 7th of
April last, at your county seat, I appealed to history
to establish this point, and I need not now repeat the
historical proofs then presented, and which stand,
undisputed in their conclusiveness. It is sufficient at
this time to recapitulate the general considerations
which lead the mind to this conclusion.
When I look abroad over the land, and find that
where Slavery is, there is disloyalty and treason, and

150 ' The Rebellion:
where Slavery is not, the whole body of the people,
with hardly an exception, are true to the Constitu
tion; when I see that exactly in proportion to the
intensity of devotion in any State to Slavery, is the
intensity of hostility to the Union; when I find that
nowhere, except in the slave States, is the right of
secession claimed; that thence only, during the whole
existence of the Union, have threats of its dissolution
proceeded ; that such threats have uniformly, for the
past thirty years, been connected with contests about
Slavery; that only there have traces of treasonable
conspiracy been discovered; that only by Southern
hands has the flag of the Union been assailed and
humiliated; and that every defense of the rebellion
and every appeal in its favor is based on Slavery
interests alone; I should regard myself as incapable
of reasoning from effects to cause, if I did not see in
Slavery the only institution and influence which could
possibly so shape the character, mould the opinions,
inflame the passions, and dictate the policy of five
millions of American citizens. And when I look fur
ther, and find that in every part of the land, and,
indeed, of the whole world, disloyalty to the Union is
the prevailing characteristic of Southern-bred men
and women ; and that as soon as secession began its
traitorous course, multitudes of officers of our army
and navy from slave States — as well those that had
not seceded as those that had — treacherously deserted
the service of their country, and impiously rushed to
arms against her, in favor of a mere buccaniering
'usurpation, having — as we shall presently see — but

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 151
one great object, " the formation of a slave Repub
lic;" I can not shut my eyes to the existence in
Slavery of a poisonous influence, as potent over its sub
jects as it is fatal to the republican principles and insti
tutions which constitute America's best and and bright
est inheritance. And when I ask myself, would this
rebellion have existed if there had been no Slavery
among us ? and judgment and conscience both answer,
never! I am forced, whether I will or no, to lay at
the door of that institution the mountain load of the
iniquity of Southern treason, in the assured conviction
that the sentence placing it there will stand affirmed
by the world's opinion, and approved at the bar of
God. I have endeavored to make apparent to you that this
rebellion bears no resemblance to the popular uprisings
in Europe against oppression, or to the Revolution of
our fathers ; that it is no sudden outburst of passion,
but a conspiracy which for age, deliberation, audacity,
and treachery will stand forever without a rival ; that
it rests upon no principle by which it can be justified;
that there was no provocation by which it can be palli
ated, or to which even it can be traced ; that, in one
word, it was, in any and every just view, absolutely
causeless, and therefore inconceivably atrocious. If
these views be correct, of which I have not the least
doubt, nor ever expect to have, it is a point of exceed
ing interest to know the why of such an unheard of
popular outbreak. The mind can not conceive of its
existence without a motive and a purpose, any more
than it can of the fall of a tree without gravitation.

152 The Rebellion:
As the causes assigned in their authentic publications,
so far as they have made any, have been shown a thou
sand times to be frivolous and base ; as they know, as
well as they know their own existence, that they never
suffered willful wrong at the hands of the people of the
North : as they do not, with all their* audacity, pretend
to charge the general Government with wronging them ;
and as all men know that the slave States have, with
scarcely an intermission, controlled that Government
from its formation to the present time ; there must be
somewhere a hidden spring, a subtle power, not com
prehended by the world, but constituting the driving
force of the whole wild movement. Had they boldly
and frankly avowed themselves rebels, for assigned
causes and with a definite and declared aim, we should
have understood the motive, and known that when they
were subdued, or the causes removed, or the aim ac
complished, the rebellion would end, and peace return.
But they deny being rebels, and brazenly affirm that
secession is not rebellion, but simply the exercise of a
right, which each State reserved to itself — mentally
reserved, of course, for it is nowhere written down —
to secede, that is, to walk out, back out, kick out, or
fight out of the Union, at its own mere will and plea
sure ; and that it is an outrageous invasion of their
right of freedom and self-government, to attempt to
hold them to their constitutional obligations; and
a piece of presumptuous insolence to question the
supreme right of South Carolina, with a patch of land
half as big as Missouri, inhabited by 400,000 "niggers"
aud 300,000 whites, to declare, as she did, that she

Its Character, Motive and Aim. 153
" had resumed her position among the nations of the
world, as a separate and independent State!" a position
she never for one moment had, and therefore could not
resume, and which, if she had had, she never could have
maintained for a single year. It is by such pretentious
and high-sounding snobbishness in State affairs, that
secession is sought to be lifted out of the mire of un
mitigated crime, and dignified with the white robe of an
immaculate right ! But I can not pause to expose the
senseless folly and shapeless deformity of this misera
ble heresy. The question for solution is, What is the
motive of secession ? Why should South Carolina, or
any other State, desire a separate and independent
position among the nations of the world? As it can
not be successfully denied that Slavery is the one sole
cause of secession, it must needs be that- the motive
springs from the same source; and it is found, not in
wrongs, actual or apprehended, not in fears, real or
feigned, not in injustice suffered or justice denied, but
in the social separation of an aristocratic from a demo
cratic people — the supercilious exclusion of a people
among whom labor is honorable and universal, from
social equality and contact with a people .among whom
labor belongs to a subject and menial race — the haughty
withdrawal of " the peculiar institution " to itself, that
it may be "let alone" to erect upon the ravished domain
of the Union, and that afterwards added by forced
purchase or marauding conquest, A gigantic Empire
of Slavery.
I ask you not to accept this as my view of the
motive of secession. Plainly inferable as it is from
14

154 The Rebellion:
facts with which you are all familiar, it need not rest
upon inference merely. It was published in the words
of one of their own leaders, in February, 1861, just
after the seven States which led off in secession had
banded together under the Provisional Constitution of
the Southern Confederacy. In that Constitution was
a provision prohibiting "the importation of African
negroes from any foreign country other than the slave-
holding States of the United States;" concerning which
Mr. L.W. Spratt, of Charleston, addressed an elaborate
and ably written letter to a member of the rebel Con
gress, designed to produce the abandonment of that pro
hibition, and the re-opening of African slave trade.
Mr. Spratt was a member of the South Carolina Con
vention, and was by that body deputed as one of its
Commissioners to visit the Convention of Florida, to
induce it to follow South Carolina's treasonable lead.
His words, therefore, are entitled to be regarded as
authoritative, when he assumes to expound the purport
and motives of the revolt in which he acted so promi
nent a part. I beg your earnest and candid attention
to every word of that portion of his letter, which I now
present, as follows :
" The South is now in the formation of a Slave Repub
lic. This, perhaps, is not admitted generally. There
are many contented to believe that the South as a
geographical section is in mere assertion of its inde
pendence; that it is instinct with no special truth —
pregnant of no distinct social nature ; that for some
unaccountable reason the two sections have become
opposed to each other ; that, for reasons equally insuf
ficient, there is a disagreement between the peoples that

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 155
direct them ; and that from no overruling necessity, no
impossibility of co-existence, but as a mere matter of
policy, it has been considered best for the South to
strike out for herself, and establish an independence of
her own. This, I fear, is an inadequate conception of
the controversy.
" The contest is not between the North and South
as geographical sections, for between such sections
merely there can be no contest ; nor between the peo
ple of the North and the people of the South, for our
relations have been pleasant, and on neutral grounds
there is still nothing to estrange us. We eat together,
trade together, and practice yet, in intercourse, with
great respect, the courtesies of common life. But the real
contest is between the two forms of society which have
become established, the one at the North and the other
at the South. * * * * The one is a society
composed of one race, the other of two raee3. The
one is bound together but by the two great social rela
tions of husband and wife and parent and child; the
other by the three relations of husband and wife, and
parent and child, and master and slave. The one em
bodies in its political structure the principal that
equality is the right of man ; the other that it is the
right of equals only. The one embodying the princi
ple that equality is the right of man, expands upon
the horizontal plane of pure democracy ; the other,
embodying the principle that it is not the right of
man, but of equals only, has taken to itself the rounded
form of a social aristocracy. In the one there is hire
ling labor, in the other slave labor; in the one, therefore,
in theory at least, labor is voluntary, in the other
involuntary ; in the labor of the one there is the elec
tive franchise, in the other there is not ; and, as labor
is always in excess of direction, in the one the power
of the Government is only with the lower classes ; in
the other with the upper. In the one therefore, the

156 The Rebellion:
reins of the Government come from the heels, in the
other from the head of the society ; in the one it is
guided by the worst, in the other by the best intelli
gence ; in the one it is from those that have the least,
in the other from those who have the greatest stake
in the continuance of existing order. In the one the
pauper laborer has the power to rise and appropriate
by law the goods protected by the State — when pres
sure comes, as come it must, there will be the motive
to exert it — and thus the ship of State turns bottom
upwards. In the other there is no pauper labor with
power of rising ; the ship of State has the ballast of
a disfranchised class ; there is no possibility of -politi
cal upheaval, therefore, and it is reasonably certain
that, so steadied, it will sail erect and onward to an
indefinitely distant period.
" Such are the two forms of society which had come
to contest within the structure of the recent Union.
And the contest for existence was inevitable. Neither
could concur in the requisitions of the other ; neither
could expand within the forms of a single government
without encroachment on the other. * * * * The
principle that races are unequal, and that among
unequals inequality is right, would have been destruc
tive to the form of pure democracy at the North.
The principle that all men are equal and equality right,
would have been destructive of Slavery at the South.
Each required the element suited to its social nature.
The natural expansion of the one must become encroach
ment on the other, and so the contest was inevitable.
Seward and Lincoln,, in theory at least, whatever be
their aim, are right. I realized the fact and so declared
the conflict irrepressible, years before either ventured to
advance that proposition. Upon that declaration I have
always acted, and the recent experience of my country
has not induced me to question the correctness of that
first conception.

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 157

" Such, then, being the nature of the contest,
Union has been disrupted in the effort of slave society
to emancipate itself; and the momentous question now
to be determined is, shall that effort be successful?
That the Republic of the South shall sustain her inde
pendence, there is little question. The form of our
society is too pregnant of intellectual resources and
military strength to be subdued, if, in its products, it
did not hold the bonds of amity and. peace upon all the
leading nations of the world. But in the independence
of the South is there surely the emancipation of domes
tic Slavery? That is greatly to be doubted. Our
property in slaves will be established. But will it be
established as a normal institution of society, and stand
the sole exclusive social system of the South? That
is the impending question, and the fact is yet to be
recorded. That it will so stand somewhere at the
South, I do not entertain the slightest question. It
may be overlooked or disregarded now. It HAS been
THE VITAL AGENT OF THIS GREAT CONTROVERSY. It has
energized the arm of every man who acts a part in this
great drama. We may shrink from recognition of the
fact ; we may decline to admit the source of our
authority, refuse to Slavery an invitation to the table
which she herself has so bountifully spread; but not
for that will it remain powerless or unhonored.
*p 2|C ^c 5jc y^ jjc jjc
" Slavery within the seceding States at least is now
emancipated, if men put forward as its agents have
intrepidity to realize the fact and act upon it. It is
free to choose its constitution and its policy, and you
and others are now elected to the high office of that
determination. If you shall elect Slavery, avow it and
affirm it ; not as an existing fact, but as a principle of
social order, and assert its right, not to toleration only,
but to extension and to political recognition among the
nations of the earth. If, in short, you shall own Sla-

158 • The Rebellion:
very as the source of your authority, and act for it,
and erect, as you are commissioned to erect, not only a
Southern, but a Slave Republic, the work will be
accomplished. Those States intending to espouse and
perpetuate the institution will enter your Confederacy ;
those that do not, will not. Your Republic will not
require the pruning process of another revolution; but,
poised upon its institutions, will move on to a career
of greatness and of glory unapproached by any other
nation in the world.
"But if you shall not; if you shall commence by
ignoring Slavery, or shall be content to edge it on by
indirection ; if you shall exhibit care but for a republic,
respect but for a democracy ; if you shall stipulate for
the toleration of Slavery as an existing evil, by admit
ting assumptions to its prejudice and restrictions to its
power and progress, you re-inaugurate the blunder of
1789 ; you will combine States, whether true or not,
to Slavery; you will have no tests of faith; some will
find it to their interest to abandon it; slave labor will
be fettered; hirelmg labor will be free; your Confed
eracy is again divided into antagonistic societies; the
irrepressible conflict is again commenced; and as Sla
very can sustain the structure of a stable government,
and will sustain such structure, and as it will sustain
no structure but its own, another revolution comes —
but whether in the order and propriety of this, is
gravely to be doubted.
"Is it, then, in the just performance of your office,
that you would impose a constitutional restriction
against the foreign slave trade ? Will you affirm Slavery
by reprobating the means of its formation? Will you
extend Slavery by introducing the means of its extinc
tion? * * * * Will you do this, and yet say
that you elect Slavery and affirm it, and, in your min
istrations at its altar, own it as the true and only
source of your authority?"

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 159
Every word full of meaning— every word a text —
every word an exposition of the heart and mind of
secession — every word a proof that Slavery is the
whole life, soul, breath, and strength of this hideous
rebellion! Let us recapitulate its points. Slavery
"has bes-n the vital agent of this great controversy."
Slavery "has energized the arm of every man who
acts a part in this great drama." Slavery is " the true
and only source of their authority. Slavery "bounti
fully spreads their table." Slavery furnishes "the
ship of State with the ballast of a disfranchised class,
with which it will sail erect and onward to an indefi
nitely distant period." Slavery " is a living principle
of social order." Slavery gives "the rounded form of
a social aristocracy." Slavery rejects a democracy,
where "the reins of government come from the heels."
Slavery recoils from a society "in the labor of which
there is the elective franchise." Slavery announces
association with a people among whom "the power of
the government is only with the lower classes." Sla
very must "be established as a normal institution of
society, and stand the sole exclusive social system of
the South." " This Union has been disrupted in the
effort of slave society to emancipate itself" from that
Northern society which " expands upon the horizontal
plane of pure democracy." Slavery " asserts its right,
not to toleration only, but to extension and political
recognition among the nations of the earth." And
Slavery commissions the South, and the South accepts
the commission, "to erect not only a Southern, but a
Slave Republic," upon territory wrenched by bloody

160 The Rebellion:
violence from the nation, of which, for nearly a hun
dred years, Slavery has been the spoiled and petted
child! My countrymen, to use no exaggerated terms, I am
filled with amazement at this picture which Slavery
paints of itself. I know not how to characterize, what
to call it, for it is like nothing which the dark history
of the human race had before disclosed. Without one
ray of light from the warm affections or the generous
impulses, it is all cold and proud and heartless. Not
one word breathes magnanimity, not one touches a
gentle sympathy ; every one appeals to pride, to sel
fishness, to that " covetousness which is idolatry," to
those impulses which, uncontrolled, make men pirates
and murderers. No thought of country finds expres
sion there; no kind inquiry for the nation's good;
no backward glance of gratitude to the patriot sires
who made us a nation and gave us a country; but
a contemptuous slur at the " blunder of 1789," which
"tolerated Slavery as an existing evil," instead of
"espousing and perpetuating it as a living principle
of social order." No recognition of kinship with
the democracy of North appears ; no admission of ties
of affinity; no remembrance of the Northern homes
from which they had gathered so many fair flowers
to adorn "the rounded form of their social aristo
cracy ;" no memory of friendships there, which threw
open Northern mansions to them with more than
Southern hospitality; no thought of the great army
of Northern citizens, that through long years had bat
tled at the ballot-box for the South : all, all forgotten,

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 161
in the demoniac eagerness to kindle the fires which,
encircling the foundations of the Union, and wrapping
the pillars of the Constitution, should burn into ashes
one-half of the mighty fabric of America's free insti
tutions, and leave upon Southern soil only a blood
stained Empire of Slavery !
My friends, let us further unfold the character of
this fiendish attempt at the destruction of America.
Here was a nation bound together by ties such .as
never united any other thirty-one millions of people
on earth. Less than a century ago — only yesterday
in the life of a nation — the three millions,, from whom
came the thirty-one millions, stood up before the world,
and, in the presence of kingdoms, potentates, and
powers, declared — we are united, we are one ! God
gave them a continent for their habitation, and com
missioned them there, far from the contact and influ
ence of despotisms, to work out the great unsolved
problem of man's capacity for self-government. From
His hand they received the boon of their freedom, and
to Him they reverently held themselves bound to ren
der account of their great trust. Through their early
struggles they invoked His holy name, and His
mighty arm was with them until they achieved the
Independence to which they had pledged themselves
and their all. Their appeal and their vows rang
through the nations, startling the spirit of freedom,
and arousing oppressed peoples to follow their sublime
lead. They became free, more free than any other
nation, free from foreign domination, free to form
their own political and social institutions, free to shape

162 The Rebellion:
their own destiny, for glory or for shame. Enfran
chised America sprang at once to a position of great
ness among the powers of the earth. The winged
messengers of a young and vigorous commerce flew
from her shores to every land, awakening the drowsy
nations, and returning with the rich rewards of un
shackled industry and enterprise. The flag of the new
Republic floated on every sea, and with it went the
wondrous tale of a young nation with no king, a
country with no lords, that was rising to the world's
view, and leading in the race of empires. All the
world looked toward the new constellation that illu
minated the western sky, and from all countries the
stream of people flowed to the new home of Liberty
beneath the setting sun. There, under the grateful
shade of a Constitution of innate and unlimited benefi
cence, they who had not known what a Constitution
was, sat down to enjoy in full measure a freedom,
such as they had never tasted in the kingdoms whence
they came. They were welcomed to our shores and
our Union, by those who had emancipated the one and
established the other, and from year to year, as each
Fourth of July dawned, all proclaimed anew — we are
united, we are one ! That great truth made the nation
great. Internal peace, fraternity, and prosperity went
hand in hand. The nation grew, as never nation grew
before, in weath, in power, and in the world's consider
ation. At one stride it stretched its sway across the
continent. The morning sun awoke its sleeping chil
dren on the shores of the Atlantic, at the moment that
the waves of the Pacific, three thousand miles away,

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 163
were lulling the wild denizens of the forest to their
midnight slumbers ; and over all, sleeping or waking,
the Constitution, never sleeping, still gently shed the
dew of its perennial blessings. Throughout all that
vast expanse, not one human being breathed a com
plaint against the Government our fathers had be
queathed to us, or heaved a sigh for a return to royal
rule, or whispered a thought that our voluntary and
blood-bought Union might, or possibly could, cease to
be. All was peace, all was harmony, for all was unity.
And when, on the Fourth of July, 1826, amidst the
nation's joyful observance of the fiftieth anniversary
of its Independence, the spirits of John Adams and
Thomas Jefferson bade farewell together to the
country they had loved and served so well, the last
sound of earth that fell upon their closing ears, was
the voice of the universal acclaim — we are united, we
are one! Oh, that upon such a scene should ever
fall a shadow ! Oh, that with such sounds should ever
mingle the wild discord of treason's harsh and bitter
cry ! But not a day too soon were those illustrious
patriots taken from the evil to come. Hardly had the
people ceased to mourn over their tombs, when the
spirit of evil began to breathe his envenomed breath
over a part of the nation. In the "Sunny South"
the madness seized them that they had a King ! It
was not a king elected, nor a king by right of birth,
nor a constitutional king, nor a king by usurpation,
nor a king governing by terror or by love ; but a king
that grew from the earth, that sat enthroned in the
pocket, that ruled through dollars, that bought its

164 The Rebellion:
triumphs, that exacted obedience through greed, that
proclaimed itself king of the kings, and even demand
ed that free republican America should do it homage!
And truly America, that had thrown off the yoke of
King George, did bend her neck to receive the yoke of
King Cotton ! It was no light yoke, gently fitted by
the hand of love, but a heavy, hard yoke, thrust on
by hands accustomed to mastery over the negro, and
held there by fierce threats of disunion. It was the
aristocracy of Slavery ruling the people through their
love for the Union, and subjecting the nation, through
its patriotism, to the domination of a ruthless minority.
In all the world never was there such a sight before.
It was too unnatural and repugnant to right to last
long. The majority could not always consent to a
minority rule, without abandoning in disgrace the fun
damental axiom of republics. They asserted at the
ballot-box their constitutional right to wield the. Gov
ernment, and elected a President acceptable to them
selves. And now, Americans, hear the damnable
sequel ! Hardly was the will of the majority promul
gated by the constituted authorities, in perfect accord
ance with the Constitution and laws, when the subjects
of that mammon king, before even the elected Chief
Magistrate could be installed in office, refused his rule,
hurled defiance at laws and Constitution, ferociously
snapped the cords which bound them to united America,
arid proclaimed that the part of the land inhabited by
them should be Slavery's land severed from that where
Slavery is not — King Cotton's realm, over which the
Constitution should abide, the Flag of the Union wave,

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 165
no more forever ! With weapons of death in their
hands, stolen from the nation, they denounced death
to the Union to which they were parties, to the Con
stitution to which they owed allegiance, and to the
nation of which they were born a part; and opened
against their country a war, whose blazing scenes still
glare before the bewildered gaze of men, and whose
spirit gives a foretaste of that of the infernal pit from
whence it sprang. The nation, true, thank God ! to
its great calling and its glorious traditions, and faith
ful to Constitution and liberty, girds itself to the
stern duty of war, and goes forth in its power to
smite treason down ; and from day to day, and month
to month, as the tide of battle swells and roars, now
in the East, now in the West, now in the centre, but
ever onward and Southward, the world holds its breath
over the yet undecided, but never for a moment doubt
ful, issue of this dread struggle for life between the
Constitution and the king.
Such, my friends and countrymen, is the true charac
ter of the war which the janissaries of King Cotton are
waging against the Constitution of the United States,
and, through it, against you and me, against your
children and my children, against all in this land who
love that Constitution and against their children,
against free government here and over the whole earth,
and against every hope of human liberty, now and
hereafter ! It is a war begun without a cause, but it
is destined to have effects such as never followed war
before, if the American people prove themselves true —
as they will — to the memory of their fathers, to their

166 The Rebellion:
country, and to the claims of humanity. It is a war
in which they dare not fail to conquer. Bound up in
the issue are the dearest interests of generations yet
to come, which we can not, without terrible guilt, trifle
with or overlook. It is a war whose cost is not to be
counted ; it must be urged to a successful termination,
cost what it may. Better beggar this generation, and
leave to our posterity an unimpaired inheritance of
Constitution and country, than save ourselves, and
bequeath to them the ignominy of our unfaithfulness,
with a legacy of perpetual feud. It is a war in which
there can be no compromise. Compromise with rebel
lion is capitulation to it. Count him a traitor who
counsels compromise ! We have no compromise to
make. We fight, not from choice, but because they
forced arms into our unwilling hands ; and we will not
cease fighting till all arms are forced out of their
parricidal hands. We fight for the Union and the
Constitution; and if by unmanly compromise — and
any compromise would be unmanly — we suffer the one
to be dismembered or the other overthrown, in ever so
small a degree, what a hiss of scorn would rise from
the whole world at the twenty millions that truckled to
five millions ! But let it be understood that we do not
fight for " the Union as it was," if my understanding
of that much used phrase is correct. If it means — as
I believe it does with those who so trippingly use it —
the Union dominated by Slavery, then we fight for no
such Union, nor can such ever again exist. We fight
for the primal Union, the true Union, the Union that
was before King Cotton raised his iron sceptre, and

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 167
before an arrogant aristocracy lorded it over us ; when,
however we might differ on questions of policy, all
were intent on the good of the whole country, and all
willingly bowed to the voice of the majority. For that
Union we fight ; and no other will emerge from this
contest. The war for this is one whose end we can not
now see, but we must see it out to its end. It is vain
to cry, as many do, "Peace! peace! Oh, let us have
peace!" There can be, ought to be, must be no peace,
but that which follows unconditional submission to the
Constitution over the whole land. Any other would
be but the beginning of war. When a merciful God
grants us peace, let it" not be based on the recognition
of a piratical Confederacy, but upon its annihilation.
Then only will it endure. And, my friends, it is em
phatically a war of subjugation. One side or the other
must be subjugated. There is no middle ground,
where the combatants may lay down their arms, retire
from the contest, and leave things as they were. The
Constitution must subjugate the king, or the king the
Constitution. Both can not be supreme in this land.
And as the whole land rightfully belongs to the Consti
tution, and the whole nation has, in its different parts,
with universal consent, declared the Constitution su
preme, the king must bow to its authority — must be,
will be subjugated. But it is not a war against
Slavery, though Slavery is warring against the Union.
I call you to witness that the Government has borne
itself, from the first, with eminent forbearance toward
that which is the origin, the life, and the sustaining
force of the rebellion. Were the slaves of the South

168 The Rebellion:
now removed from the continent, the rebellion would
not strike another blow. And yet the Government
has solemnly declared that it wars not upon Slavery.
But let us look at things as they are. We have all
learned much since this war began, and we have much
more to learn before its end. The friends of Slavery
in the loyal States are not now, in numbers, what they
were at the outbreak of the rebellion. The attempt
of the South at revolution, for Slavery has worked a
portentous revolution in sentiment against Slavery, in
the border slave States and the free States. Let us
not willfully shut our eyes to this, but bravely confront
the truth. Slowly and reluctantly, but certainly, the
mind of the nation opens to the apprehension that
Slavery and the Constitution can not live together,
and that Slavery must perish. I speak of this as a
fact which I believe to exist, not as a result I aim to
produce, or desire to see. I shrink from the thought
that the time may come when the united voice of
patriots throughout the land will demand the extirpa
tion of Slavery. I would shun that day, if possible.
But I declare my conviction, that if the South wages
this war another twelvemonth, Slavery may not survive
that period anywhere within the limits of the Union.
God grant that before the day of forbearance shall
have passed away, the deluded people of the South
may see their error, and, expelling their traitorous
leaders from their midst, return to their place in the
nation, never again to depart thence while the world
stands. My friends, never has there been a period in our

Its Cliaracter, Motive, and Aim. 169
history, when the People — those who do the voting
and the fighting — should take public affairs into their
own consideration and keeping, half as much as now.
They should, without hesitation or reserve, renounce
the lead and counsels of politicians, who approach them
with propositions to reorganize old political parties.
We want no party now, but that which will sustain
the Chief Magistrate of the nation in asserting . the
nation's supremacy. He has proved himself a true man
and a true patriot, in a period of incomparable trial.
I did not support his election, but I honor him for his
honesty, his bravery, his firmness, his steadfast ad
herence to law, and his fidelity to the Union. I have
no sympathy with, or respect for, the sentiment once
expressed to me by a leading politician ; in this State,
who said he was " for the Union, but against Lincoln."
I am for the Union and Lincoln both ; for he has
shown himself a wise, earnest, fearless, and faithful
President. Had the great Douglas lived, he would
have been a giant in support of Lincoln. After Sum
ter's fall he recognized only two parties in this coun
try — Patriots and Traitors; and that is the only
true division now. I was a Democrat, and look with
satisfaction at the support I gave the lamented states
man of Illinois ; but I remember with shame that
secession proceeded from Democrats, was inaugurated
in a Democratic National Convention, was permitted,
if not encouraged, by a Democratic President, and re
ceived its weapons through the traitorous machinations
of a Democratic Secretary of War. We can do without
the Democratic or any other mere political party until
15

170 The Rebellion:
treason is exterminated and the Union triumphantly
vindicated. Any party but a great Union Party,
organized now, would be organized only as an Oppo-.
sition; and the country needs no opposition, except to
treason. Save the country first, and then mind its
politics. Mr. Lincoln is entitled to the support of the
whole loyal people of the land, in his efforts to sustain
the honor and existence of the nation. It were an
unworthy proceeding to clog his administration with an
opposition which could only impair its power to crush
the rebellion ; and a deep wrong to make him ask from
avowed opponents the means of doing so. We want no
courting, in advance, of the votes of a consolidated
South, when the Union is restored. We want no intrigues
of politicians for future advancement by those who
trampled and spit upon the Flag of the Union, and
slew them that rushed to its rescue. The latter have
declared war against their country, and every patriot
should declare war against their domination. The
country needs only patriots nowr and they are to be
found only' among those who, discarding for the time
old party names and platforms and predilections, take
their stations reverently and honestly beneath that
Flag, to hold up the hands of its constitutional de
fender, whoever he may be, till the last hour of this
infamous rebellion.
But, my friends and countrymen, there is a brighter
and more cheering view of this wretched period in our
country's history. We may not scan too closely the
mysterious ways of Him who rules in the affairs of
nations ; but we may hope that he has great purposes

Its Character, Motive, and Aim. 171
for our national good iri this our heavy calamity. I
doubt it not, and am thankful that I do not. I believe
that, whatever else may" result from this war, two
things will stand gloriously demonstrated to the world ;
themselves worth all the blood and treasure which this
war may cost ; for, once demonstrated, they establish
the American Nation forever. The first is, the invul
nerability of the nation to foreign attack, and the second
is, the impregnability of the Constitution against domes
tic assault. No nation ever exhibited such warlike
spirit and resources as the- American people have dis
played since the day that Sumter fell ; and yet they have
put forth but a part of their strength. Peace with us
is now, more than ever, the interest of all nations.
None will desire war with a people that, with scarcely
the nucleus of an army, brought into the field, in three
months, more than half a million of as brave and effec
tive soldiers as the world has seen ; and that, with only
a pitiful apology for a navy, now floats its flag from
nearly three hundred vessels of war. They have, for
the first time, seen what America is, and henceforth
she walks erect among them, their undoubted peer in
war, as she long has been in peace. But the other
and greater problem has received its triumphant and
final solution, without which it could not be said that
the nation was certainly established. Glory to God,
the Constitution is impregnable ! As long as it
was uncertain whether that great citadel of our liber
ties was capable of resisting domestic assault, our
prosperity rested upon an unsubstantial, because a
doubtful basis. Its firmness had to be demonstrated,

172 The Rebellion.
before we could abide in steadfast faith of the future.
Behold that demonstration in the history of the past
year ! Time, much time, may be required to crush
rebellion ; but already we know that the foundations
of the Constitution lie deep and solid in the hearts of
the people, and that they have the courage and the
power to guard and preserve it. Such knowledge is
of infinite value. It strengthens the nation's heart
more than a thousand victories over foreign foes.
From the days of this rebellion we may date the steady
onward career of the American people. They have
shown that they are fit to be free, that they can
govern themselves, and that they can and will defend
against every attack the priceless birthright of their
free institutions ; and in high and unshaken fidelity
to the great charge committed to their hands, they
have sent forth the irrevocable decree, that, in all the
years to come, over every foot of their rightful pos
sessions, East and West, North and South, the Stars
and Stripes shall wave, the glorious symbol of a
Union indivisible, a Constitution imperishable, and a
Nation immortal.

SLAVERY'S WAR
UPON THE CONSTITUTION.*

Three-quarters of a century ago, that noble body of
American statesmen and patriots, over which the
Father of his Country presided, completed the form
ation of the Constitution of the United States, and
presented it for adoption by the American people, as a
form of Government and a bond of Union which they
believed would endure through all future time. It was
the first written Constitution ever adopted by any
nation; and it has, in the world's judgment, stood,
from that day to this, as the noblest monument ever
reared by freemen to their own wisdom and patriotism.
It has shed upon our country unnumbered blessings,
and has afforded a light to other nations struggling into
the exercise of self-government. Under its benign sway
every expectation of its framers for the good of Ame
rica and of humanity has been fully realized ; and there
is not a hope that a patriot could cherish for his country,
which would not be more than fulfilled by its continued
existence. * An Address delivered in St. Louis, on the Anniversary of the
Constitution, September 17, 1862.

174 Slavery's War
And yet, while there are those still living who lived
at the day of its formation, the nation for which that
Constitution was made is precipitated into a terrible
struggle for its preservation from destruction by its own
children ! And it is while the land trembles beneath
the tread of armed legions, and the air is rent with
the roar of battle for and against the Union it was
designed to cement and perpetuate, that we meet to
observe as patriots the recurring anniversary of the
great step which our fathers took towards making the
American Nation what it was and is yet capable of
being, the glory of freedom and of the human race.
Under any other circumstances than such as now fill
our beloved land with grief and dread, it would be a
work of love to trace the history ^ of our Constitution,
and endeavor to set forth the great principles which
pervade its entire frame ; but how could this be done,
with the oppressed mind wandering every moment to
the fiendish assault upon it now in progress, and swayed
continually by alternate hopes and fears, as it follows
the shifting scenes and changing tides of the war which
is to end in its complete and final vindication or its
destruction ? It is impossible. The theme most promi
nent under such circumstances is not the origin and
principles of the Constitution, but the origin and prin
ciples of the war now waged against it. To that let us
then direct our attention.
The American people have reached a point where an
overpowering necessity is laid upon them to remove
every film from their eyes, and look with perfectly
clear and steady vision at what is around and before

Upon the Constitution. 175
them. I have a profound and painful impression, that
nothwithstanding all said and written and seen and
heard during the last twenty months, there are multi
tudes everywhere, especially in the border slave States,
who have no correct idea of what this war really means,
or to what it directly tends. God help them, if this
continues much longer.
Light — light upon the motives, aims, and 'ends of the
South in the beginning and the prosecution of this war,
is what the people want. You may hurl denouncing
generalities at the rebellion forever, and do little good :
the people require tangible particulars. You can not
feed a starving man on the fumes of a kitchen : he must
have food or die. Supernatural eloquence were but as
fumes, if the public mind he not imbued with know
ledge of the true character and actual intent of Southern
treason. The popular heart answers truth with mighty
throbs: it answers nothing else so. It may flutter for
a while under a transient stimulus, but it is the tremor
of weakness. Truth alone makes it strong. I dare
not approach it with aught but truth ; with that I dare
seek its innermost recesses. I intend to speak the
truth now. I will speak it here, in this city, face to
face with that pestilent element of treachery and trea
son, which, last year, in the first months of the rebellion,
bore so high a head, and which, yet unexpelled, scowls
through our streets by day, and, in nightly conclave
of the Knights of the Golden Circle, schemes to build
an Empire of Slavery over our country's grave !
Frequently' as I have spoken of Slavery as connected
with this rebellion, it is of that I shall now speak again.

176 Slavery's War
When Cato, ever after his visit to Carthage, ended his
every speech with the well-known words, " Prmterea
censeo Carthaginem esse delendam," it was to impress
continually upon Rome that her only safety was in the
destruction of her great rival. When, in addressing
the people in this crisis, I recur again and again to
Slavery, it is because I believe nothing with a more
unbidden and resistless conviction, than that Slavery
was the one sole cause, and is now the single life-prin
ciple and the great sustaining power, of the rebellion ;
and that the safety of the country demands that the
people know and never forget those truths.
So speaking, I refer not to Slavery as a system of
domestic labor, nor to any of its ordinary moral, soeial,
or economical aspects, nor to the wrongs, oppressions,
sins, and barbarisms which have been laid to its charge.
I am on higher ground than that. Passing by every
other view of Slavery, I deal with it now only in its
relations to the rebellion. It is of Slavery the "pe
culiar institution," loved more than country by the
South — of Slavery as the foundation and instrument
of aggressive political power — of Slavery as the hot
bed of a "social aristocracy," alien in spirit to our
free institutions — of Slavery speaking and acting through
its perfidious votaries — of Slavery in its faithless
abandonment of all honor, duty, and patriotism, for
the sake of its own advancement — of Slavery plotting
treason for thirty years — of Slavery false to coun
try and therefore false to everything — of Slavery
the secessionist, the rebel, the traitor, the parricide,
the fillibuster, the guerrilla, the demon of destruction,

Upon the Constitution. 177
that I speak, and, with God's help, will continue to
speak; for I dare not smother down the burning con
victions forced into my soul by this hell-born rebel
lion. »
My friends, but the other day our country was tran
quil, prosperous, and united; to-day, ic writhes and
quivers under the deadly blows of Slavery, the armed
destroyer; blows causeless, and therefore most cruel;
blows struck with all the power of unprovoked and
savage malignity ; blows aimed at the very life of a, nation
that had nourished Slavery as a child ; blows which,
if successful, will batter down into a shapeless mass of
ruins all that makes our country worthy of our love,
or of the respect of mankind ! It is the Samson of
Slavery heaving at the pillars of the Constitution — the
Lucifer of Slavery desolating the realm it can not
rule ! Search the world's records and traditions for a
parallel, and desist in despair; for never was there a
crime approaching it in distant and feeble comparison.
It comprehends every other, and overtops them all.
American Slavery has made itself the Cain of the
human race : some time its wail will be heard, " Behold,
thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the
earth!" Can there be any lingering doubt that Slavery is the
wanton aggressor in this mortal strife ? Not for an
instant, with him who looks and reads and thinks; not
for an instant, with him who is open to truth; not for
an instant, with any but those who will not see; and
many such there are, with whom all argument and
appeal is vain. Not to such do I speak ; but to those who
16

178 Slavery's War
hearing will heed, and heeding will embrace the truth,
for its own and their country's sake. Of such there
are tens of thousands, who love the Union with their
whole hearts, but do not yet distinctly recognize the
Union's enemy. They know that the Union is assail
ed, and they give their sons and their substance for its
defense, but still do not fully see what assails it.
They hear by day, and dream by night, of horrid war
between opposing hosts, that yesterday were brothers,
and ought to be brothers 4;o-day, to-morrow, and
always ; but know not how all this came about, or why
it should be. Let them clear away the mists which
becloud tkfiir vision, and see that Slavery, in the
reckless ambition, the heartless selfishness, the fierce
intolerance, the tyrannical will, and the piratical greed
of its remorseless aristocracy, must alone bear the
ignominy of this unmatched crime forever.
And yet there are those who deny this, and those
that ignore it. Of the first class, besides the host of
Slavery's devotees, and the attendant retinue of poli
ticians, greedy for votes and office, each and all frown
ing upon or sneering at the idea of Slavery's respon
sibility in any way for our present calamities, I have
observed, among men of note, so distinguished and
venerable a man as Amos Kendall, in a letter to the
President of the United States, denying that Slavery
was the cause of the rebellion ! In the second class
are found newspapers, which, reserving their light
nings for the Abolitionists, the Black Republicans and
the Radicals, launch promiscuous thunder at the rebel
lion, but betray not the least consciousness that

Upon the Constitution. 179
Slavery has anything on earth to do with it; and
eloquent orators, who enthrall admiring crowds with
ornate discourse about every element and feature of
the rebellion, save just that insignificant one of
Slavery ; and a numberless crowd of " weak brethren "
instantly aghast at the slightest question of the virgin
purity of the "peculiar institution;" all opposing,
but vainly, the resistance of a dead silence to that
mighty public opinion, which 'marches straight forward
to burn into the brow of Slavery the eternal brand of
the traitor and the parricide. Dare I confront such
odds? Yes, and a thousand times more; for truth
shuns no conflict, fears no foes ; nor, armed with truth
do I. That I am so armed, it is now my duty to show.
In doing so I must needs use some facts which I
have before used in public. No matter; they do not
grow old, nor will they ever lose their point.
In a commercial Convention of delegates from eight
Southern States, held' at Vicksburg, in May, 1860,
Mr. Spratt, of South Carolina, in advocating resolu
tions in favor of re-opening the African slave-trade,
used these words :
" It might be said that the slave trade could not be
legalized within the Union, and that to re-establish it
the Union would have to be dissolved. Let it be so.
The men of the South have higher trusts than
to preserve the union."
There was a day when such words would, even in
Vicksburg, have called down a storm of indignation
and reproach upon their utterer ; but then and there
they received the direct sanction of the body to which

180 Slavery's War
they were addressed, by its adoption of the resolu
tions referred to ; thereby proclaiming defiance to the
Constitution which prohibits that trade. Mr. Spratt
was a representative there of that " social aristocracy,"
about which, less than a year later, he wrote a letter,
that is probably the most vivid and truthful exposition
of the spirit and aims of secession that exists. He
spoke the simple, undisguised, and most execrable
truth, as held by his class, when he said, " the men of
the South had higher trusts than to preserve the Union."
He announced himself, in advance, a traitor in heart,
as afterwards he became one in act. And it was for
Slavery, and, far worse, for the renewal of that ac
cursed traffic, against which the anathemas of civilized
nations are hurled, that he proclaimed his treason.
He renounced the Constitution of his country, and
defied the conscience -of Christendom, for the sake of
a return, in this enlightened age and land, to that
diabolical piracy of human beings, upon which, more
than seventy years before, the fathers of this nation
had set the seal of irrevocable condemnation. This was
one of the " higher trusts," which the men of the South
held to be above the preservation of the Union !
If this fact stood alone, it would be the enigma
of the age; but it ceases to excite our special won
der, when we see in it but the natural fruit of nearly
thirty years' effort to enshrine Slavery in the Southern
mind, not only as the unfailing spring of material
prosperity, but as the normal condition of society, and
as a blessing divinely ordained to perpetuation and
diffusion, and worthy to be made " the chief stone

Upon the Constitution. 181
in the corner" of a republican form of government
emanating from Americans, in the latter half of the
Nineteenth Century !
Fifteen years before, " men of the South " had de
clared that they preferred the annexation of Texas — a
vast domain dedicated to, and desired by them for the
spread of, Slavery — to the preservation of the Union.
Five years later, they threatened the Union, unless
Slavery were allowed unrestricted access to the Terri
tories. Six years nearer the present time, they were
ready for revolt, if the Republican candidate should
be elected President. Four years still nearer, they did
revolt, when another Republican candidate, through
their own design and their own intrigue was elected
to that high office. Through all these periods of agi
tation and danger, the animating and sole incentive
of Southern action was the extension and perpetuation
of Slavery. Upon this, and for this alone, the idea and
purpose of a Southern Confederacy were announced,
not only to the people of the South, but in the halls
of Congress. Hear some of the utterances of Southern
aristocrats on this point.
Senator Iverson, of Georgia, said in the Senate :
" There is but one path of safety for the South ; but
one mode of preserving her institution of domestic
Slavery; and that is a confederacy of States having
no incongruous and opposing elements — a confederacy
of slave States alone, with homogeneous language,
laws, interests, and institutions. Under such a con
federated Republic, with a Constitution which should
shut out the approach and entrance of all incongruous
and conflicting elements, which should protect the

182 Slavery's War
institution from change, and keep the whole nation
bfiund to its preservation, by an unchangeable funda
mental law, the fifteen slave States, with their power
of expansion, would present to the world the most
free, prosperous, and happy nation on the face of the
wide earth."
Mr. Brooks, Representative in Congress from South
Carolina, said:
" We have the issue upon us now ; and how are we
to meet it ? I tell you, from the bottom of my heart,
that the only mode which I can think available for
meeting it is just to tear the Constitution of the
United States, trample it under foot, and form a
Southern Confederacy, every State of which shall be
a slaveholding State."
The South Carolina Convention, in December, 1860,
in an address to the people of the slaveholding States,
urged them to secession in the following terms :
" Citizens of the Slaveholding States of the
United States : Circumstances beyond our control
have placed us in the van of the great controversy
between the Northern and Southern States. We would
have preferred that other States should have assumed
the position we now occupy. Independent ourselves,
we disclaim any desire or design to lead the counsels of
the other Southern States. , Providence has cast our
lot together, by extending over us an identity of pur
pose, interests and institutions. South Carolina desires
no destiny separate from yours. To be one of a GREAT
slaveholding Confederacy, stretching its arms over
a territory larger than any power in Europe pos
sesses — with a population four times greater than that
of the whole United States when they achieved their
independence of the British empire — with productions
which make our existence more important to the world

Upon the Constitution. 183
than that of any other people who inhabit it — with
common institutions to defend and common dangers to
encounter — we ask your sympathy and confederation.
* * * United together, and we must be
the most independent, as we are the most important,
among the nations of the world. United together, and
we require no other instrument to conquer peace than
our beneficent productions. United together, and we
must be a great, free and prosperous people, whose
renown must spread throughout the civilized world
and pass down, we trust, to the remotest ages. We
ask YOU TO Join us in forming A CONFEDERACY
OF SLAVEHOLDING STATES."
In these three brief specimens you have the spirit
which impelled the South into disunion. A volume
of such treasonable and incendiary expressions might
be compiled ; but these are enough for this occasion.
They teach too plainly for any one to doubt, that the
glittering price of treason was a Confederacy living,
moving, and having its being in Slavery ; where, free
from " incongruous and conflicting elements," the
aristocrats of Slavery might mature and execute
schemes of expansion and conquest, which should
eclipse those of Cortez and Pizarro, and start Sla
very forward in its anticipated career of universal
dominion. For, my friends, let no man deceive himself with the
fancy, that a Southern Confederacy meant only a
Confederacy of such slave States as could be wrenched
from our Union. Men who had fiercely struggled" in
the Union, through long years, for the expansion of
Slavery here, were not the men to abide its restriction
to the limits of those States out of the Union. Nor did

184 Slavery's War
they profess any such intention. Emboldened by the
near approach of the consummation of their wicked
machinations, they declared that to confine Slavery to
that area would destroy it, and daringly avowed the
fixed purpose, at every hazard, to push it into adjacent
regions, belonging to foreign nations in amity with the
American Government and people. Secession, then,
was not the exodus of the South from the presence of
the Pharaoh of Abolitionism, but the beginning of a
career of buccaneering subjugation, in which the pillar
of cloud by day and of fire by night should lead on and
on to the enslavement of contiguous non-slaveholding
nations, for the extension, establishment, and perpetu
ation of African Slavery. Listen to some of their
declarations of this audacious and infernal purpose.
Senator Iverson said :
" In a confederated government of their own, the
Southern States would enjoy sources of wealth, pros
perity, and power, unsurpassed by any nation on earth.
No neutrality laws would restrain our adventurous sons.
Our expanding policy would stretch far beyond present
limits. Central America would join her destiny to ours,
and so would Cuba, now withheld from us by the voice
and votes of Abolition enemies."
Senator Brown, of Mississippi said :
" I want Cuba ; I want Tamaulipas, Potosi, and one
or two other Mexican States ; and I want them all for
the same reason — -for the planting and spreading of
Slavery. And a footing in Central America will
wonderfully aid us in acquiring those other States.
Yes ; I want those countries for the spread OF
Slavery. I would spread the blessings of Slavery,
like the religion of our Divine Master, to the uttermost
ends of the earth. * * * Whether we can obtain

Upon the Constitution. 185
the territory while the Union lasts, I do not know ; I
fear we can not. But I would make an honest effort,
and if we failed, I would go out of the Union, and try
it there." Ex-Gov. Call, of Florida, said :
" Slavery can not be stopped in its career of use
fulness to the whole world. It can not be confined to
its present limits. Dire and uncontrollable necessity
Will- compel the master and the slave to cut their way
through every barrier which may be thrown around it,
or perish together in the attempt. * * * It may
be in the Providence of God that the American Union,
which has cheered the whole world with its promises,
like the star which stood for a while over the cradle of
Bethlehem, may fall and lose its light forever. It may
be in His dispensation of human events, that the great
American family shall be divided into many nations.
But divided or united, the path of destiny must lead the
Anglo-Saxon race to the mastery of this whole conti
nent. And if the whole column should not advance,
this division of the race will, with the institution of
African Slavery, advance from the banks of the Rio
Grande to the line under the sun, establishing the way-
marks of progress, the altars of the reformed religion,
the temples of a higher civilization, a purer liberty,
and a better system of human government."
And last, but very far from least, hear the words
of John S. Preston, secession Commissioner from
South Carolina, addressed to the Virginia Convention,
to induce that body to pass an ordinance of secession :
"Virginia will take her place in the front ranks.
She will be as she has been for one hundred years, the
foremost in the world in the cause of liberty. She will
stand here with her uplifted arm, not only as a barrier,
but the guiding star to an empire, stretching from her
feet to the tropics, from the Atlantic to the Pacific —

186 Slavery's War
grander in proportions, stronger in power, freer in
right, than any which has preceded it; which will
divide the rule of the Atlantic,, be felt in the far -heaving
waves of the Pacific, and will own the Gulf of Mexico
and the Carribean Sea."
My friends and countrymen, in this exposition, out
of Southern mouths, of the real spirit, scope, and aim
of secession, is the undoubted and authentic explanation
of that memorable anouncement by Southern leaders,
in the winter of 1860-61, that they would not remain
in the Union, if a sheet of blank paper were given them,
and they were allowed to write on it their own terms!
Those infamous conspirators had ulterior objects of
unhallowed and base ambition, which they knew were
unattainable in the Union, and they resolved, without
hesitation or remorse, to immolate the Union, because
it held them back. Not, then, for any wrongs received
or feared, but for the sake of the grand destiny they
had marked out for themselves and Slavery, all arrange
ment, all compromise, all conciliation, all relenting was
renounced, that they might, over the ruins of the Con
stitution, carve their way with the sword to their dazzling
goal. Can any one whose judgment is not wholly
perverted, whose conscience is not thoroughly petrified,
look upon such a picture, without recoiling as from an
open view of the bottomless pit ? What principle of
honor, or morality, or common decency, vindicates
such a scheme of willful and measureless wrong ? or
rather, what principle of honor, morality, decency,
religion, or law, is not trampled under foot by it? It
smites the laws of the country into the dust, it outrages
the Constitution, it degrades the American name, it

Upon the Constitution. 187
affronts the public sentiment of the world, it violates
all international law, it spits upon the Bible, it spurns
the teachings of Christ, it defies the throne of Eternal
Justice; and all. in the name of Slavery, and for the
compulsory spread of Slavery over nations, which had
long ago banished it from their borders, and devoted
their domains to the inhabitation of free men, as they
hoped and believed, throughout all generations ! Had
this been foretold thirty years ago, every man in the
South, would, like Hazael, have exclaimed, " What! is
thy servant' a dog, that he should do this great thing ?"
and yet they do it now, not only without compunc
tion or shame, but with a claim of right, -and with
an insolent demand to be "let alone" in doing it!
And more amazing still, it is done in the name of " a
higher civilization, and a purer liberty ; " as if higher
civilization and negro bondage were inseparable, and
Liberty and Slavery had become synonyms in the
vocabulary of this day ! And, that the picture may
want no height of coloring or depth of shadow, they
march to their hellish work over the outraged flag of
their country, and the prostrate bodies of their brothers,
murdered by scores of thousands, as they rally in arms
to defend their country against its own degenerate and
piratical sons !
Think you this is all? Far, very far, from it.
With their "Slave Republic" once established, and
extended Southward to " the line under the sun," and
with the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean Sea, and
the mouth of the Mississippi under their control, will
they rest there? Not for a day, except to gather

188 Slavery's War
strength for new forays for Slavery. " An empire,
grander in proportions, stronger in power, freer in
right than any which has preceded it," is the gorgeous
prize, and will they not clutch at it? Conquest for
Slavery! is their slogan; and how long will it he
until, backed by nations bound to them through their
cotton, and sympathising with their aristocratic impul
ses and principles, they will turn northward, to subju
gate the nation that failed when it might to subjugate
them? My friends, call not this an idle apprehen
sion — a groundless fear. If this gigantic piracy be
not exterminated now, it will, at no distant day after
establishing itself, aim at " the mastery of this whole
continent," and its consequent subjection to the domin
ion of Slavery! Remember, Slavery is not fighting
to repel attack, but for extension and perpetuity:
where will be its point of repose in the Western hemi
sphere ? Just where, like Alexander, it can sit down
and weep that there is no more to conquer. Say not
that their aim is impossible. Great as America is,
she may not be equal to such a combination as the
South might form, and this day expects to form, with
European nations, through promised commercial ad
vantages, and congeniality of hatred toward those free
institutions, whose life depends upon the fidelity, the
bravery, and endurance of her loyal people in this
conflict. Awake to the terrible consciousness, that
the success of the rebellion is death to America!
Awake to the certainty, that unless a more mighty
effort than has yet been put forth be made, there is
danger of its success ! Awake to the conviction that

Upon the Constitution. 189
the nation must give itself up to this conflict, or despair
of triumph! Awake to the stern reality, that this
destroying assault by Slavery upon all that we hold
dear must be repulsed, and the assailants defeated,
scattered, subjugated, and, if need be, exterminated, or
we become the slaves of Slavery !
My friends, it is a startling truth that never since
Sumter's fall has the nation fully risen to the height
of the great occasion. Not only has it not seen in
its true light the damnable spirit and purpose of the
rebel aristocracy, underlying the whole surface of
the rebellion, and scorning all patriotic and brotherly
appeals, and yet carefully excluded from all their
official pronunciamentos, in order to blind the world
to their real intent and object; but it has borne a heavy
weight of long-accustomed deference to Slavery, and
been restrained by an honest, but as we now see, mis
taken and unavailing, conservatism, toward that insti
tution, which exhibits no conservatism except of itself,
and brooks no radicalism but that itself employs to
destroy the Union, and clear the way for its own
lawless domination and expansion. And the nation
has constantly underrated the military strength of the
rebellion, and under-estimated the aid afforded it by the
three million and a half of slaves that remain at home.
We counted them as a dead weight upon the South in
this war; but they have so far proved its most buoy
ant and most effective support. And there has lurked
through the public mind, especially in the border slave
States, a notion that some how or other, no one could
tell how, this frightful conflict would pass away with

190 Slavery's War
" nobody hurt " much, and with Slavery restored to
its old position in "the Union as it was." It is
impossible to estimate the evil which this mischievous
idea has wrought, in shaping the course of men to
propitiate Slavery and its votaries. Politicians keep
one eye half open for the country, and the other wide
open for disloyal votes, when they shall again be
available. Merchants balance between loyalty and
trade, often .holding the former at a discount. Law
yers watch for the fees of disloyal clients, and doctors
for the calls of traitorous, patients, more than for the
honor of our flag. Preachers refuse either prayer or
sermon for the Government, lest disloyal ears should
be offended. Thousands hang back from avowed loy
alty, to .escape traitors' frowns; and thousands pro
fessing loyalty yield a grudging and feeble support to
the Union in its peril, that they may commend them
selves to the Union's enemies. All this, so disgrace
ful to the American character, so degrading to all true
manhood, so false to every dictate of patriotism, and
so injurious to the Government in this mortal struggle,
has proceeded from the cherished belief that Slavery
is to survive this war, and resume its former influence.
It is time that this belief yield somewhat of its
strength. It is time that every man should see that
the nation will, in all human probability, be driven,
by the inexorable law of self preservation, to destroy
Slavery. In common with hundreds of thousands of loyal citi
zens, I have earnestly hoped that this conflict might
stop short of that point ; but hope has been weU-nigh

Upon the Constitution. 191
quenched within me by the growing conviction, in
view of the facts I have laid before you, and of the
extremity to which the South has waged this war,'
that Slavery or my country must perish. When that
dread alternative shall be fully presented, God forbid
that I should hesitate one moment which to choose !
My country must live, though slavery die a thousand
deaths. Tell me not that we war only for the Consti
tution and the Union. I know it well; but can they
be saved now, and for all coming time, and save
Slavery, their enemy, too ? If not, let Slavery end its
days here and now, whatever may follow. A war for
the mere manumission of negroes — *a war to obliterate
Slavery as a mere domestic institution, the nation
would not and should not wage; but against Slavery
the rebel and traitor in arms I fear it must, if it would
itself live. I almost despair of the nation's life, but
by the death of Slavery. Time was, in the early
period of the rebellion, when its suppression or aban
donment might have left Slavery unshaken by its own
horrible crime ; but that time is hopelessly past. I see
no day of adjustment, restoration, or conciliation in
the future. Slavery proclaims that it conciliates only
with the sword — adjusts only at the cannon's mouth.
He who expects adjustment, except by the uncondi
tional submission of the South, knows little of the
character and temper of the loyal portion of the
nation. He who looks for a restoration of the terri
torial integrity of the Union otherwise than by subju
gating the rebels from the Potomac to the Rio Grande,
knows not what it is for an aristocracy to risk its all

192 Slavery's War.
upon such a desperate venture as this. The first step
in secession placed them beyond all hope, but in the
complete establishment of their slave empire. They
know this well. They have never asked restoration
to the Union on any terms, and they would not accept
it now, were it freely^ and cordially offered, with unre
stricted amnesty to all. They hate the Union, because
it is not "homogeneous;" that is, not all under the
sway of Slavery. They loathe the " pure democracy"
of the North, because it is uncongenial to their " social
aristocracy," and because they hold that there "the
reins of Government come from the heels of society,"
as they term the free white laborer. Ten thousand
times they have declared that they never will unite with
the North again, and it is certain that they are in
earnest. Away, then, with idle talk about concilia
tion and adjustment ! Let the nation brace itself up
to fight this war through to the perfect and absolute
restoration of the authority of the Constitution, or
give up the contest at once, and resign itself to perpe
tual disgrace. If to accomplish the former we must
strike down slavery, as well as its armies, the world
will commend the act; and the voice of our own loyal
people will' burst forth in the midst of their mourning
for sons and brothers dead in battle, with the unhesi
tating and firm response, " Let It be so ! The men
of the North have higher trusts than to pre
serve Slavery!"

THE PROCLAMATION
OF EMANCIPATION.*

Never has it been my duty to address a popular
assemblage, under circumstances more solemn and
momentous than those in which the American people
are now placed. Were I to give way to expressions
of mere personal feelings, it would be difficult to define
the mingled emotions with which I have accepted the
invitation to appear before you on this occasion. But
I have endeavored to put aside all feeling, save that
which yearns toward my beloved and suffering country,
and every purpose but that which binds me, in life or
in death, to her welfare and honor. I am no politician ;
I belong to no party ; I have nothing to ask for my
self at the hands of the people, but to be recognized as
one ready to do anything in that holy cause, and to
be anything that is farthest removed from a traitor,
whether such as skulk from.our soil southward, to help
slay their patriot brothers, or such as hang back under
the folds of the old Flag, that they may, while enjoying
its protection, more surely aid in betraying and dis-
* A Speech delivered in Turners' Hall, St. Louis, January 28,
1863. 17

194 The Proclamation
honoring it. Between such -and me, I thank God !
there is not, nor ever can be, any more concord than
between fire and water ; but discord, antagonism, and
strife, now and evermore, until the venom of treason
shall cease to poison their hearts, and to fire their
brain with parricidal madness.
Indulge me, however, in a single remark as to my
past position with reference to the subject which rises
in this hour above every other — the institution of
Slavery. I desire to preface the words which I deem
it my duty to utter here, with the reiterated declara
tion, that I am not, nor ever have been, a fanatic
against Slavery as a domestic institution, nor have I
ever been connected for an hour with any party or
association, which struck at Slavery in that character.
I have always, however, believed Slavery a sore evil
and a vast misfortune to our country, and was ready
to hail its removal by proper means, as one of the
greatest blessings which a kind Providence could
vouchsafe us. When, therefore, I speak as I shall
to-night, of Slavery, let no man say that I give utter
ance to any other than the opinions and convictions,
which the horrid scenes of the last, two years have
fairly burned into my mind and heart, against the
preconceptions of nearly thirty years. When I strike
at Slavery, it is because Slavery strikes at my country;
and for that I would strike it down !
During those two years, we have witnessed the
bloody climax of a conspiracy, begun in the preceding
generation, to enthrone Slavery as a political power
in this land, and to extend its sway over adjacent

Of Emancipation. 195
countries, in the wild hope that, in the grasp and
under the lead of the indomitable Anglo-Saxon race,
it might become — what it had failed to become in any
other hands — a Power in the earth. It is too late in
the day for the arch-traitor, Jefferson Davis, to delude
the world with such lying words as those quoted in
one of the resolutions reported by your committee,
affirming that he and his armies " are not engaged in
a conflict for conquest, or for aggrandizement'' Does
he comprehend the import of language ? Does he know
what conquest means ? Does he suppose that the world
has turned idiot, not to see that the South is aiming to
strip by conquest from the United States a large part
of its territory, three thousand miles of its. sea-coast,
and the mouth of that great Mississippi, whose waters
roll in ceaseless and stately flow past this city of our
habitation ? Is there no vision of aggrandizement in
that empire of the " Golden Circle" which, sweeping
from the capes of Virginia down to Cape Sable, and
careering round the shores of the Gulf of Mexico and
the Caribbean Sea, was to plant its farthest standard in
some yet unthought of point in South American wilds ?
And does he believe humanity in its dotage, that it can
not see that this standard is to be borne onward, in
its blood-stained march of piracy and subjugation, by
Slavery and for Slavery ? No, my friends, he believes
no such miserable stuff. He knew, long years ago,
and he knows now, better than any but his co-con
spirators could know, that a vast Empire of Slavery
was the promise of his and their treachery to the noble
Republic of Freedom, which gave them birth, and

196 The Proclamation
nurtured them into men of mark, only, as time has
proved, that they might be more powerful and dan
gerous than common men in their accursed treason.
It suits their purpose to deny now what two years ago
they defiantly proclaimed ; but men do not forget, nor
can the world be mocked. The Ethiopian does not
change his skin, nor the leopard his spots ; nor have
Southern traitors abandoned the infinitely atrocious
purpose to destroy this blood-bought Union, for " the
spread of Slavery."
Your committee have, therefore, rightly judged, that
in the very forefront of the declarations of this meeting
should be proclaimed anew the great and solemn truth,
that it is Southern Slavery, embodied in and acting
through its lawless and conscienceless aristocracy, that
has drenched this land in blood. Why should not that
truth be declared, not only here and now, but every
where and all the time ? Of what avail is it to us, to
our country, or to the cause of humanity, to bury it
out of sight, and parade before our eyes some specious
pretext for this rebellion, which we know to be false ?
Shall we fear to own the truth, because some muzzled
traitor scowls in impotent wrath, or because his vote
may some day be denied us, for having been true to
truth ? Let him who will shirk this mighty issue ; I
meet it, at all times and in all places, alike. If there
was never before an occasion when it should be fairly
' and fearlessly- met, that occasion is here and now.
My voice is, and ever will be, that Southern Slavery
alone is the cause of the horrible calamities of this
civil war, and the human race in all the future will

Of Emancipation. 197
join without dissent in that verdict. I would say
otherwise, if I could ; but like Martin Luther before
the.Diet of Worms, I answer : " Here I stand, I can
DO NO OTHER ; MAY GoD HELP ME ! AMEN."
What then is the essential character of this war ?
My friends, the judgment and conscience of the whole
civilized world, when the question comes to be fully
understood, never can be, never will be, aught else
than that it is a war of the aristocratic against the
democratic -principle ; a war of an aristocratic form
of society, resting upon and vitalized by a system of
human Slavery, against a form of society in which
each individual is as free as every other ; a war based
upon the sacrilegious idea that Slavery is a Divine
institution, and that — in the words of Albert G. Brown,
late Senator from Mississippi — its "blessings should
be spread, like the religion of our Divine Master, tc
the uttermost ends of the earth;" a war for the spread
of those blessings, " hot as " the religion of our
Divine Master " goes forth, on the wings of a dove,
bearing " peace on earth and good will toward men,"
but as that of the False Prophet, with intolerance,
wrath, fire, and sword ; a war, in one word, of human
Slavery, as a dominant and aggressive power, against
human Freedom, as a bulwark of human rights — of
Africanized Americans against Americanized Ameri
cans — of a proud, conceited, and ferocious aristocracy
against the people here, and against all peoples,
everywhere, that would be free.
And it is not a war of to-day merely. . It has already
borne fruits which, for good or for ill, will never die.

198 The Proclamation
Were it terminated this hour, its influence must reach
onward into the unexplored future, blessing or cursing,
freeing or enslaving, brightening or darkening, till the
last hour of recorded time. There is no difficulty in
deciding on which side is the light, and on which the
darkness. It was the light of Freedom which illumined
the pathway of our fathers, in their mighty struggle,
and in the formation of that grand and unequaled
fabric of Government we are now defending ; and it is
the darkness of Slavery under which that glorious fabric
is now sought to be buried by its own children !
The conflict is, indeed, irrepressible ; as irrepressible
as that between good and evil, between right and wrong,
between truth and falsehood, between Heaven and Hell.
And who made it so ? None but they who made of Slave
ry " AN image of gold," and " set it up in the plain " of
the South, and because the North would not " fall down
and worship the golden image" that this Southern
" Nebuchadnezzar had set up," decreed that this noble
country should " be cast into the midst of the burning
fiery furnace " of this cruel and devouring war. This,
my friends, is God's own truth about this unnatural
and amazing conflict. History has yet to record, that
they who cast America into this furnace were themselves
slain by its "seven times heated" flame, while she
"walked in the midst" with no "smell of fire" upon
her resplendent robes.
If in this war Slavery was and is the aggressor; if
the war was begun and is continued for " the planting
and spreading of Slavery ; " if Slavery has become the
" golden image " which the South bows down to, and

Of Emancipation. 199
wars with us because we too will not worship it ; if
Slavery feeds and clothes the armies of the South; if
the Southern heart is envenomed against the North for
the sake of Slavery ; if our free institutions, and all the
hopes of ourselves and our children are imperiled, that
Slavery may be exalted, diffused, and perpetuated;
about all of which there is no more room for doubt,
4
than there is to doubt that this war exists ; then is
this nation bound to destroy Slavery, wherever
it is in armed rebellion. Turn which way you may,
there is no escape from this alternative, except in cow
ardly and abject submission to the demands of the
South. If you wish peace, it can be had to-morrow,
by giving up all that the South exacts ; but for how
long ? Not a day longer than it would take the parties
to prepare for a renewal of the conflict. Divide this
great Interior Valley of North America, either North
and South, or East and West, and there is no more
peace. God has decreed its permanent dismemberment
to be a geographical impossibility. From every State
west and south of New England, except New Jersey,
Delaware, South Carolina, and Florida, the Almighty
has sent the waters of this great continent flowing from
myriads of fountains down this mighty Valley, which
must forever belong to one people, and share one destiny.
It is impossible for one people to own the trunk of the
Mississippi, and a hostile people its mouth. There is
no room for two discordant nations between the great
Northern lakes and the Gulf of Mexico. The same
political institutions must prevail over that entire region.
While the South was satisfied to let Slavery retain its

200 The Proclamation
original character as a mere system of domestic labor,
there was no more necessity for discord, than there is
between me, a non-slaveholder, and my neighbor, a
slaveholder; but when the South made a political god of
"the peculiar institution," and determined, if Slavery
could not expand its dominion here, to rive this nation
asunder, and take up its line of march through devas
tation and carnage to the final subjugation of the
Western hemisphere to that institution, then it became
manifest to reflecting men that the die was irrevocably
cast, and that upon this generation was devolved by an
All- wise Providence the dire conflict between Freedom
and Slavery, which is to decide forever the fate of
America. Slavery presents that issue at the point of
the sword ; let Slavery perish by the sword !
We have long enough struck blows as in dreams at
this. h6"rrid revolt, and held back the home thrust at its
vital point. We have slain the soldiers of Slavery by
thousands, but bowed, with hat in hand, to Slavery
-itself. We have braved death in every form for our
noble country, but found it hard learning to brave the
destruction of her relentless foe. We have wielded
every weapon against the rebellion, but the very one
that would be fatal to it. We have attacked armies of
white men in the front, but left untouched a more
numerous army of black men behind them, without
which the rebellion would never have existed, or,
existing, could not have lived a month. While we
fight the rebellion we must also watch foreign Govern
ments, which, as we are not the subjects of a dynasty,
but republican freemen, have no sympathy with our

Of Emancipation. 201
struggle for our national life ; but rather would rejoice
at our humiliation and dismemberment, even, at the
hands of that institution, toward which they and their
subjects profess unbounded hostility. And so it will
ever be, as long as we ourselves hold Slavery too
sacred to be assailed, though warring for our destruc
tion. But when we learn to treat Slavery as a Con
stitution-breaker, a traitor, a marauder, a pirate, and
a disturber of the peace of nations, and pronounce
for its extirpation because it is all these, then we
touch the world's heart, and the popular voice in
other lands will be heard in tones which no govern
ment, however despotic, will dare defy.
That time has come — that lesson has been learned.
On the first day of January, in this year of our Lord
one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, the Pres
ident of the United States, " by virtue of the power
in him vested, as Commander-in-Chief of the Army and
Navy of the United States, in the time of actual armed
rebellion against the authority and Government of the
United States, and as a fit and necessary war measure
for suppressing said rebellion," did by a solemn pro
clamation, "aver and declare that all persons held as
slaves within designated States and parts of States,
ARE, AND HENCEFORWARD SHALL BE FREE, and that
the Executive Government of the United States, includ
ing the military and naval authorities thereof, will
recognize and maintain the freedom of said persons."
Upon this act, which the President declares is "sin
cerely believed to be an act of justice, warranted by
the Constitution — upon military necessity — he invokes
18

202 The Proclamation
the considerate judgment of mankind, and the gracious
favor of Almighty God."
My friends, if any words have, in the history of the
world, emanated from the ruler of any people, which
had a more august and enduring import than those, I
know not of them. An involuntary feeling of awe
rises within me as I read them, and endeavor to scan
their probable influence upon the future of America
and of humanity. They ring out the glad peal of this
nation's deliverance, or toll the knell of its downfall.
Not because the fate of the American people depends
upon the mere question whether some millions of
negroes shall be held in slavery in a portion of our
domain ; but because it does depend upon the ques
tion whether the masters of those negroes — a meagre
minority of this nation — shall, over the ruins 'of our
glorious patrimony of Freedom, erect an aggressive,
warlike, and ruthless empire of Slavery. That is the
vast and momentous issue which this Proclamation lays
before the American people and the world, and con
cerning which the President of the United States
" invokes the considerate judgment of mankind." As
a part of that people we have met to express our judg
ment of his act. It is our high privilege and our duty
to do so. Not that our action can give it additional
effect; but, as ours is a Government of the people,
that he may see — that all men may see, whether
we are for or against this blow at the enemies of our
country. And now, my countrymen, with as deep a
sense as I ever entertained of the importance of a
right judgment in regard to any question of public

Of Emancipation. 203
moment, I hesitate not to declare my firm and unques
tioning conviction, that that Proclamation was Con
stitutional, expedient, and just, and ought to be
enforced with all the strength of the Army and Navy
of the United States ; to the end that the power of
Southern traitors shall be broken, shattered, and
¦crushed, forever and ever !
I am not unaware that there are true Unionists who
do not approve of the action of the President. To
such I would say, whatever your past judgment as, to
the expediency of such a measure, this is not the time
to moot that point. The question is not, shall the act
be done ? " It is done ! The point is, will you stand
up to it like patriots, or will you falter in your devo
tion to the Union, because henceforth its flag is to carry
freedom to the slaves that make the very thews and
sinews of the rebellion ?
Do you withhold approval because you do not see
that the Constitution authorizes it? Then take that
instrument, and read and study every line and word
of it, and find, if you can, one syllable that restrains
the Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy, in
keeping his sacred oath "to preserve, protect, and
defend the Constitution," from the exercise to the very
last degree of the war power of the nation, against
the nation's enemies in arms. Our fathers did not
make that Constitution as a shield to its foes ; and
none but its foes now demand its protection against
the power of the Government, wielded to preserve its
own life.
Do you hold back because you do not perceive the

204 The Proclamation
necessity for the step ? But the Commander-in Chief
surveying the whole field of the rebellion, in its cause
and probable results, and in its relations to this coun
try and to other countries, did consider it necessary,
and it was for him alone to judge. Will you revolt
against his judgment ?
Are you in doubt as to the efficiency of the meas
ure ? What avail such doubts ? Do they promote the
Union cause ? Do they make you any better patriot ?
Does your devotion to your country recruit itself
from their companionship ? Nay, is it not weakened
by their presence ?
Do you say, " What is the use of the Proclamation,
when we have not the possession of the regions in
which it is to operate, and it is therefore powerless ?"
I answer, that the same course of reasoning would
enervate every blow ; for Omniscience only can foresee
whether any blow will be effectual or not. It is not
for those aiming it to decide in advance that it will
fail. So to decide is to insure failure.
Do you shrink from the picture Which rushes upon
your vision, of the maddening horrors of a servile
insurrection ? So do I, and so does every man with
the least spark of humanity in his nature : but if such
an insurrection follows the promulgation of a measure
that is demanded to save the life of the nation, let the
dread responsibility rest where, before God and men,
it rightfully belongs — upon those whose treason creates
the terrible necessity.
Are you troubled to know what shall be done with
the millions of Southern negroes after they become

• Of Emancipation. 205
free ? I answer, that it is not the present question ;
but What shall be done with the rebellion? Soldiers
ask not in battle " What shall we do with the prison
ers and the spoils when the fight is over ?" but " How
shall we whip the enemy ?" To debate what shall
become of the negro, is to put that problem in the
scale against your country's life, whether you intend it
or not. Leave the future to the future : the present is
our care. The instant demand of the hour is, by every
available means, to overwhelm, scatter, rout, and
destroy traitors. Self-preservation demands that Slave
ry, their idol, and the right arm of their power, be
wrested from them ; for their feet are on the war-path,
to which we can see no end, while Slavery bears them
onward. The destiny of the enfranchised negroes none
but God can appoint: leave it, then, to His all-ruling
Providence. But there are those who see in this measure only
a deeper embitterment of the South, and an increased
hopelessness of restoring the Union ? Is that true ?
What hope has there ever been since Sumter fell, that
the Union would be preserved otherwise than by the
resistless agency of powder, ball, and bayonet ? Is
there a human being who still hugs the delusion, that
peace is to smile upon this country again as a united
country, except by the subjugation of this damnable
rebellion ? If there is, let him drop that folly from his
embrace, and open his eyes to the utter hopelessness
of every attempt to conciliate that aristocracy, which,
with a deliberate purpose, formed in some Southern
minds fifty years ago, and controlling Southern action

206 The Proclamation
With steady sway through the past thirty years, re
solved that this Union should be relentlessly destroyed,
and supplanted in that fair Southern clime by " a
Confederacy of slaveholding States," to be, as
they fondly hoped, " the most important among the
nations of the world." Half a century of treason,
plotted and pursued through every form of duplicity,
falsehood, and treachery, and blazing out at last in
robbery, fire, and blood, is not to be conciliated, but
with the full fruition of its desperate schemes. This
Proclamation, then, makes no more hopeless what
was hopeless from the moment of the rebellion's
outbreak. But, my friends, whatever the portents of this hour,
in connection with this Proclamation, or with aught
else under the sky, the true, earnest patriot has but
one line of duty, and that is, by every act, by every
word, by every thought, by every purpose, by every
power granted him, to hold up the hands of the
President in this war against the enemies of our
country and the destroyers of our free institutions.
As there is nothing in human history so horribly
atrocious as this rebellion, so the imagination of man
can conceive of nothing which would so shroud the
world in gloom, as the blotting out of this Sun of
Freedom from the firmament of nations. Wreck this
Republic, and you wreck every hope of freedom in
every human breast. For nearly three hundred years
the hand of the Great Creator has shaped the destiny
of America, as the home of Liberty and the refuge of
the oppressed. From every country and every clime,

Of Emancipation. 207
from the heavy tread of oligarchies, from the sharp
fangs of despots, from the woes and fears of bloody
revolutions, from poverty, heart-brokenness, and living
death, millions have found here that freedom, which
they sighed for as their richest boon in life, and the
most blessed inheritance they could transmit to their
children. Here has grown into gigantic proportions a
nation presenting the grandest development the world
has ever seen of human intelligence and progress, and
holding in its outstretched hands to all the earth the
choicest fruits man has ever tasted of regulated and
constitutional liberty. To mortal prescience that
nation seemed immortal — those fruits perennial and
undecaying. But in the midst of peace, prosperity^
and seeming contentment, all is plunged into confusion
and dismay. The lurid cloud of war envelopes the
land, the tread»of armed legions shakes the earth, the
thunders of battle fill the air, blood stains the ground,
the groans of the dying fill the ears of night, and the
wails of the bereaved rise to heaven from countless
habitations ! What enemy has done this ? Have the
despotisms of the Old World, tired of America's
example and glory, massed their mighty columns to
bear her down into the dust? Has her ancient foe
challenged her to a third war of Independence ? Has
any other nation invaded her peaceful shores ? No, my
friends ; would God it were any or all of these, rather
than what it is ! Her own sons are her assailants !
Americans are pouring out the life-blood of America !
The heirs of liberty are destroying their precious
birthright ! The children of the Constitution are

208 The Proclamation of Emancipation.
hacking and battering that glorious fabric, every seam
of which was cemented with their fathers' blood, and
every arch of which is vocal with the prayers and
benedictions of the illustrious dead ! And all for
what ? Who has oppressed, who wronged them ? The
voice of the universal brotherhood of man acquits this
nation of wrong to them. What, then, urges on this
demoniac onslaught? Let us not fear to speak the
word again. Let us be true, though we die for it !
Speak it, write it, print it, proclaim it, that it is
the aristocracy of Slavery hurling itself against
the buttresses of the Constitution, to clear it out of
their pathway to empire ! It is the lust of power, the
-greed of gain, the arbitrary will of inborn despots,
that hurries them on in their hellish work. Will they
triumph ? Not if the sons of America, native and
adopted, are faithful, and brave, and enduring. And
shall we not be so ? Shall we falter in the trying
hour ? Shall we fear to go forward ? Fear, ten thou
sand times more, to go backward a single step ! The
Star of Hope leads onward ; then let our march and
our cry be Onwaed ! ever Onward !

CAMP JACKSON:
ITS HISTORY AND SIGNIFICANCE.*

Great events make anniversaries, and all civilized
peoples observe and commemorate them. To St. Louis,
now in the hundredth year of its existence, no day has
become more memorable than the tenth day of May,
eighteen hundred and sixty-one; when was witnessed
by her citizens, on this spot, within her own corporate
limits, the first collision between our noble Union, and
those recreant State authorities, which desired and
intended to wrest Missouri by violence from the Union's
embrace. This generation in St. Louis will not forget
that day. The Secessionists of St. Louis will remember
it as a day that suddenly nipped the treason of their
leaders in the bud; and her patriots will cherish it as
the day that rescued them and Missouri from the grasp
of traitors, which, once fixed upon her, might not to
this hour have been thrown off. History, too, will
assign that day a position of prime importance in the
course of events succeeding the fall of Sumter; for had
the designs which caused the assemblage of citizen-
* An Oration delivered in St. Louis, May 11, ' 1863, on the
Anniversary of the Capture of Camp Jackson.

210 Camp Jackson:
soldiery at Camp Jackson been accomplished, who can
estimate the extent of the injury to the Union cause in
Missouri, and throughout this great Central Valley?
God only knows whether the whole course of the dread
conflict which has now been waged for more than two
years, might not have been changed, disastrously to
our country. Let us then render devout thanks to
Him, for the day itself, and for the privilege of meeting
here in peace to commemorate it !
You will not, my friends, fail to remember the wild
excitement in our city and State, which followed the
capture of Camp Jackson, and the use which was, only
too successfully, made of that event, to inflame disloy
alty and rebellion through all the borders of Missouri.
To have attended to what was then said and written in
denunciation of the capture, one would have thought
that such an outrage as the world had not before known,
had been perpetrated upon an innocent body of citizen
soldiers, lawfully convened for a laudable purpose ; and
that those who composed the capturing force were
demons in human shape, worthy only of execration in
time, and of damnation in eternity; to the latter of
which Missouri traitors would gladly and quickly have
consigned them — if they could !
As to the character of the soldiery mustered at
Camp Jackson, it is not just or true to class them
all as traitors, or secessionists, or sympathizers with
secession. While it is impossible to say at this time,
even if it could ever have been said, who of the officers
and men composing the encampment were loyal to the
flag which floated over them, and who were-not, it is,

Its History and Significance. 211
I doubt not, strictly true that many were there who
were loyal ; who were unaware of the infamous designs
of those who ordered their assembling ; and who would
have been deeply shocked, had they been led forth to
do the work which the State authorities purposed should
be done. Of them, as they were prior to, and upon
the day of, the capture of Camp Jackson — not as many
of them afterwards became — I would use no other words
than those of pity for the unfortunate association which
made them the victims of cunning and unscrupulous
traitors. JBut of those there who knew the design of
the encampment, and lent themselves to the first organ
ized attempt to array Missouri against the glorious flag
under which they were born, and by the protection of
which they had lived and prospered, it is enough to say,
that more -devilish traitors never lived; and that such
of them as have not already fallen in the rebel ranks, by
Union ball or bayonet, should be thankful to their
dying hour that the surrender of Camp Jackson saved
them then from the traitor's ignominious fate, if, indeed,
their being saved should be a ground of thankfulness in
them, or anybody else on earth.
It is important, my friends, to put on record, so far
as an address like this can accomplish it, the true
character of that ill-starred camp, and of the men who
planned and executed its capture. Diligent efforts have
been made to cover up the truth about it, and to trans
mit its history to the future in a cloud. One aim of
this discourse will be to set forth the simple truth, in
connected form, so that whosoever may hear or read it,
may know assuredly that the suppression of Camp

212 Camp Jackson:
Jackson was not only authorized by the dictates of self-
preservation, but was an act of military sagacity and
heroism, which will forever stand out prominently in
the history of this rebellion. In carrying out this
purpose, it will be necessary to present documents of
that period, at a somewhat greater length than is usual
on such an occasion ; but I do not apprehend that you
will bestow grudgingly the time an.d attention which
may be requisite to a clear array of the facts of its
interesting history.
That Camp Jackson may not be without a hearing at
the bar of public opinion, present and future, I will
recall and record the larger part of an editorial article
which appeared in the columns of the Missouri Repub
lican, on the 13th of May, 1861, three days after that
of the capture, and which bears evident marks of care
ful and deliberate preparation. Whatever may have
been the impression of our citizens concerning it at the
time, it has now, as an item of history, a peculiar
interest. It is as follows :
" Now that there is quiet in the city — that the work
of ' blood-letting ' has ceased for the present — that the
grave has opened to receive the dead men, women, and
children ruthlessly slaughtered at Camp Jackson on
Friday afternoon last — at a time when, possibly, this
sacrifice is deemed sufficient to impress the people of
St. Louis, and of the State, and the Union, with a
knowledge of the energy and the power which is to be
exerted over all of us — it may be permitted to us,
before martial law is proclaimed, and, it may be, a
censorship of the press established, to review the trans
actions of the last few days in St. Louis. We propose
to confine ourselves to the events connected with the

Its History and Significance. 213
attack upon, and the surrender of Camp Jackson, and
the murder of unoffending men, women, and children,
which followed that event.
" Camp Jackson was established, as every citizen of
Missouri knows, in strict obedience to the laws of this
State. A similar encampment, a year ago, excited
no remark, except as evidence of a desire on the part
of the volunteers to perfect themselves in a system of
military tactics which, while it rendered them efficient in
service, also contributed to their health, and to that
esprit du corps, which is always necessary to success.
There is no evidence to show that there was any object
beyond these legitimate results in contemplation, when
the order was given for the formation of Camp Jackson.
Every order, from those of the Commander-in-chief,
down to that of each of the companies has been made
public, and not one of them contained the most remote
allusion to any other purpose than that of perfection
of military discipline, made necessary on the part of
Missouri, at this time, by the fact that all the other
States in the Union were arming, organizing, and dis
ciplining the militia of their respective States. With
no other object in view, Camp Jackson was established
as a school of discipline and exercise, under the laws of
the State. The opening was auspicious. The flag of
the United States floated over the entire camp. No
other national flag was permitted to be displayed. The
men who formed the encampment, each and all of them,
had taken the oath to support the Constitution of the
United States and of this State. There was no quali
fication or mental reservation. For at least four days
everything went on pleasantly at the camp ; thousands
of persons, men, women, and children, flocking thither
to view the military field, and to interchange civilities
with those who occupied. But it would seem that
malignant spirits had determined that this state of
things should not be continued and that Camp Jackson

214 Camp Jackson:
must be attacked, and the citizen soldiery taken pris
oners of war, no matter what the- pretext might be.
Rumors of this kind got wing on Wednesday, but they
did not fix themselves on the public mind with any
distinctness. All knew that the city was loyal to the
Union, and that this had been shown in many ways.
Still the rumors continued to obtain circulation, and
next day were more prolific than ever. On Friday
morning General Frost, in command of his encamp
ment, felt it his duty to address the following note to
Captain Lyon, in command of the Arsenal:
' Headquarters, Camp Jackson, \
Missouri Militia, May 10, 1861. J
' Capt. N Lyon, commanding United States troops in
and about St. Louis Arsenal.
1 Sir : — I am continually in receipt of information
that you contemplate an attack upon my camp, whilst
I understand that you are impressed with an idea that
an attack upon the Arsenal and United States troops
is intended on the part of the Militia of Missouri.
I am greatly at a great loss to know what could justify
you in attacking citizens of the United States who are
m the lawful performance of duties devolving upon them
under the Constitution, in organizing and instructing
the militia of the State in obedience to her laws, and
therefore have been disposed to doubt the correctness
of the information I have received. I would be glad to
know from you personally whether there is any truth
in the statements that are constantly poured into my
ears. ' So far as regards any hostility being intended to
wards the United States, or its property or represen
tatives, by any portion of my command, or, as far as
I can learn (and I think I am fully informed), of any
other part oT the State forces, I can say positively that
the idea has never been entertained. On the contrary,

Its History and Significance. 215
prior to your taking command of the Arsenal, I prof
fered to Major Bell, then in command of the very few
troops constituting its guard, the services of myself and
all my command, and, if necessary, the whole power
of the State to protect the United States in the full
possession of all her property. Upon Gen. Harney's
taking command of this department, I made the same
proffer of services to him, and authorized his Adjutant
General, Captain Williams, to communicate the fact
that such had been done, to the War Department. I
have had no occasion since to change any of the views
I entertained at that time, neither of my own volition,
nor through orders of my constitutional commander.
I trust that after this explicit statement we may be
able, by fully understanding each other, to keep far from
our borders the misfortunes which so unfortunately
afflict our common country.
' This communication will be handed to you by
Colonel Bowen, my Chief of Staff, who will be able to
explain anything not fully set forth in the foregoing.
' I am, sir, very respectfully your obed't servant,
Brig. Gen. D. M. FROST,
Commanding Camp Jackson, M. V. M.'
" Captain Lyon- refused to receive this note. If he
had done so, it would have destroyed the programme
already resolved upon, and which looked to the capture
of Camp Jackson, and the degradation of citizens as
loyal to the flag of the Union, as respectable in every
sense, as brave and chivalric as Capt. Lyon, or any one
of his advisers. They were to be disgraced, in order
to strike terror into the people of the State ; and the
flag of the Union which waved over Camp Jackson was
to be struck in the presence of men, nine-tenths of
whom were born under a foreign flag, and had grown
up acknowledging allegiance to the worst and most
despotic Governments of Europe."

216 Camp Jackson:
Such is the contemporaneous vindication of Camp
Jackson. It is probably all that could have been said
in its defense. -The reader of it, with no other know
ledge of the current history of the period, would not
hesitate to condemn " those malignant spirits " who
planned and executed " the degradation of citizens as
loyal to the flag of the Union, as respectable in every
sense, as brave and chivalric, as Captain Lyon, or any
one of his advisers." But, however the writer of that
defense may, at the time, have believed his statements
to be true, — which to me, I confess, seems very diffi
cult, in view of the events which preceded the formation
of that camp, — subsequent disclosures have established,
beyond the possibility of question, that Camp Jacksou
was a treasonable assemblage, which required only
some increase of strength to have been marched forth
to subject Missouri to the domination of traitors, and
whirl her off into the destroying abyss of secession.
Let us briefly glance at the march of events in Mis
souri preceding Camp Jackson.
On the 20th day of December, 1860, South Caro
lina — may one of the results of this war be, that that
name be blotted out, and some other given to the
territory it represents ! on that day South Carolina
declared her secession from the Union, the very forma
tion of which the great historian of the United States,
in a separate chapter, attributes directly to her. As
she started on her fiery career, she flung abroad a
blazing invitation to the people of the slaveholding
States, to join her in forming a Confederacy of such
States.

Its History and Significance. 217
On the 30th day of December, 1860, the Legislature
of Missouri met in regular session. Up to that day no
response, so far as I now remember, had been heard in
this State to South Carolina's demoniac cry.
The next day, however, the proposition was dis
tinctly presented, editorially in the same public journal
from which I have quoted the apology for Camp Jack
son, that, in a certain contingency, Missouri should
follow South Carolina's damning lead. Let us, as a
part of the history of the 1>ime, record its words,
addressed to the Legislature then just convened. They
are as follows :
" We assume as a fact beyond dispute, that there is
no considerable body of men in this State who desire
the dissolution of the Union, for the causes which have
up to this time been presented to the country. We
maintain now, as we have always maintained, that [the
people of] the Northern States have greatly wronged
those of the slave States, and that those wrongs must
be redressed before there can be any settlement of the
issues between them — any restoration of those kindly
feelings which ought to exist between brethren of the
same political family. And hence it becomes the duty
of the one party to ponder well upon the grievances of
which they have cause of complaint, to submit them to
the party which has oppressed them, and if they reject
them, or treat them with contempt, thenceforward
they will be justified in complete alienation from them.
This position being admitted, it will be the duty of the
Legislature of Missouri, we humbly submit, to take
such steps as will, in the first place, secure the co
operation of the slave States in some definite plan of
action, and then to carry out resolutely whatever
may be agreed upon. As the first movement of this
19

218 Camp Jackson:
political drama, it would well comport with the position
of Missouri, to pass an act, at an early day of the
session, calling a Convention of commissioners from
all the slave States in the Union, at Baltimore, to
consider and decide upon the matters in controversy,
and to state explicitly the grievances and aggressions
of the North, to which such States will no longer submit;
The commission need not be a large one, say one from
each electoral district, to be appointed by the Governor.
His own sense of the responsibility of his position
will dictate to him the propriety of selecting the ablest
and purest men in the State — and he will do it. In
the same act let provision be made -for a State Con
vention to be elected and assembled on the call of the
Governor, to consider such constitutional amendments
as may be proposed by Congress for the settlement of
all these difficulties ; or, if all constitutional and patri
otic expedients should be exhausted before the 4th of
March next, then to declare a separation from
the States of the Confederacy. A commission,
such as we have suggested, selected for their wisdom,
their regard for the rights of the States, so wantonly
trifled with and invaded, coming from States repre
senting the largest population and the most wealth, and
which have suffered most from the aggressions of the
North — would not fail to agree upon the propositions to
be made to the adverse party, and there is every reason
to believe that such propositions would be agreed to.
If they should not, then the alternative would remain,
and the fifteen States would be justified in the eyes of the
world in declaring separation forever."
Three days after the publication of these words,
Claiborne F. Jackson was installed Governor of Mis
souri, and in his Inaugural Address said :
" The destiny of the slaveholding States of this
Union is one and the- same. So long as the State con-

Its History and Significance. > 219
Unices to maintain Slavery within her limits, it is im
possible to separate her fate from that of her sister
States who have the same social organization. * *
* * Missouri will not be found to shrink
from the duty which her position upon the border
imposes ; her honor, her interests, and her sympathies
point alike in one direction, and determine her to stand
by the South."
On the 21st of January, 1861, the Legislature of
Missouri passed an act providing for the election, by
the people, of delegates to a State Convention ; and
such delegates were elected, in pursuance thereof, on
the following 18th of February, and the body convened
on the 28th of that month. Its composition sorely
disappointed and vexed the traitors who, with diabolical
intent, were plotting to drag Missouri into secession.
On the 19th day of March, after mature deliberation,
it gave a death-blow to all their hopes, by the adop
tion, with only one dissenting voice, of the following
feeble, but effectual, expression of adhesion to the
Union :
"Resolved, That at present there is no adequate
cause to impel Missouri to dissolve her connection with
the Federal Union ; but on the contrary she will labor
for such an adjustment of existing troubles, as will
secure the peace, as well as the rights and equality, of
all the States."
Here was such a declaration of the direct will of the
people of Missouri, as should have silenced her trait
ors, at least until the Convention should have found
the time, hinted at in the resolution, when there should
be " adequate cause, to impel Missouri to dissolve her

220 v Camp Jackson:
connection with the Federal Union." But with a sedi
tious and treacherous Governor, Lieutenant Governor,
and Legislature, it was not difficult to carry forward
those schemes of treason which led on to Camp Jackson,
and to all the untold horrors which have fallen upon
the people of Missouri, since the day Camp Jackson,
fell. A few more links and the chain will be com
plete. Sumter fell on the 14th of April, 1861. On the fol
lowing day, President Lincoln issued a proclamation
calling for 75,000 men to suppress the rebellion, which
had opened its first batteries upon that ill -fated fortress;
and on the same day the Secretary of War telegraphed
to Governor Jackson a requisition upon Missouri for
four regiments of troops.
Two days afterward that Governor replied to the
Secretary in these words :
" Your dispatch of the 15th instant, making a call
on Missouri for four regiments of men for immediate
service has been received. There can be, I apprehend,
rio doubt but these men are intended to form part of
the President's army to make war upon the people of
the seceded States. Your requisition in my judgment,
is illegal, unconstitutional, and revolutionary; in its
object inhuman and diabolical, and can not be complied
with. Not one man will the State of Missouri furnish
to carry on any such unholy crusade."
The public journal previously quoted from laid
before its readers this impudent and insurrectionary
dispatch of Missouri's rebel "Governor, with the follow
ing introduction :
" The Journal, of yesterday, published the following

Its History and Significance. 221
as the response of Governor Jackson to the demand of
Mr. President Lincoln for four regiments of men to
aid in subjugating the revolutionary States. Nobody
expected any other response from him, and the people
of Missouri will indorse it. They may not approve of
the early course of the Southern States, but they
denounce and defy the action of Mr. Lincoln in pro
posing to call out 75,000 men for the purpose of coer
cing the seceded States of the Union. Whatever else
, may happen, he gets no men from the border States
to carry on such a war."
The standard of revolt was thus fairly raised on the
soil of Missouri. Her Governor resolved that she should
". stand by the South," though her people, in Conven
tion, had solemnly resolved to stand, by the Union.
The issue, which brought such deep disaster to that
people, was made up, and had to be decided. He deter
mined to invoke the aid of the Legislature, elected in
August, 1858, and August 1860, which he knew he
cpuld control, against the Convention elected in Feb
ruary, 1861, which he could not control. Five days
after his contumacious reply to the Secretary, of War,
he issued his proclamation, requiring the Legislature
to convene on the 2d of May, "for the purpose of
enacting such laws, and adopting such measures as
may be deemed necessary and proper for the more
perfect organization and equipment of the militia of
this State, and to raise the money and such other
means as may be required to place the State in a proper
attitude of defense." And on the same day he issued
a General Order, requiring the military companies
throughout the State to go into camp on the 3d of

222 Camp Jackson:
May, and ordering the light battery then attached to
the Southwest battalion, and one company of mounted
riflemen, including all officers and soldiers belonging
to the First District (St. Louis county) to proceed
forthwith to St. Louis, and report to General D. M.
Frost for duty: all of which, in Governor Jackson's
words, was " to attain a greater degree of efficiency
and perfection in organization and discipline;" but in
Governor Jackson's heart it was to sweep Missouri
out of the Union, and into that bastard abortion — the
Southern Confederacy. Under this order Camp Jack
son was formed. The day before that assigned for its
formation, the Legislature met under the Governor's
proclamation, and received from him a message, in
which he denounced the President's action in calling
out 75,000 men, as "unconstitutional and illegal," and
proclaimed his treason in the following words :
" The great patriotic State of Virginia, after having
failed in all her efforts to re-adjust the Union, has, at
last, yielded in despair, and seceded from the old Fed
eral Union. North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkan
sas, it is believed, will rapidly follow in the footsteps
of -Virginia; and Kentucky is profoundly moved in
this great question. Our interests and our sympathies
are identical with those of the slave-holding States,
and necessarily unite our destiny with theirs. The
similarity of our social and political institutions — our
industrial interests — our sympathies, habits and tastes,
our common origin and territorial contiguity, all concur
in pointing out our duty in regard to the separation
which is now taking place between the States of the
old Federal Union. In the meantime, it is in my
judgment, indispensable to our safety, that we should

Its History and Significance. 223
emulate the policy of all the other States in arming
our people, and placing the State in a proper attitude
of defense."
Here, my friends, I close the historical summary of
events preceding the formation of Camp Jackson. If
its recital has interested you as much as its investiga
tion did me, I am not without hope of having contributed
to the triumph of truth in regard to the period which has
been reviewed. Before proceeding to other facts,
allow me a word in comment. I am grievously mis
taken, if the historical facts which have been presen
ted do not wholly overthrow the main points in the vin
dication of Camp Jackson, which I have just laid before
you. I can not agree with the writer of that vindi
cation in the position that there was, when he wrote,
"no evidence to show that there was any object beyond
these legitimate results (viz : improvement in military
taatics, in health, and esprit du corps) in contempla
tion, when the order was given for the formation of
Camp Jackson." In my judgment, the open historical
evidence was then conclusive, and remains to this day,
and must forever remain without any aid from any other
quarter, invincibly conclusive, that there was an object
in contemplation beyond those; and that that object
was, to carry out in Missouri the same ferocious plan
of compelling secession by armed force, which had
been successfully practised already in some of the
Southern States. I am willing to leave that point to
the judgment of impartial history, upon, the facts I
have already presented, without reference to any yet
to be mentioned.

224 Camp Jackson:
True, as stated in the defense, that " not one order
contained the most remote allusion to any other pur
pose than that of perfection of military discipline:"
but who ever expected inchoate treason to advertise
itself in military orders ?
True, as stated there, that " the flag of the United
States floated over the entire camp :" but it hung there,
as it has since often been hung out by St. Louis Cop
perheads, to conceal their venomous perfidy to their too
forbearing Government and country. May their re
maining days in this city be " few and full of trouble !"
True, as stated there, that " no other national flag was
permitted to be displayed :" but was no other there ready
to be displayed, when the "proper moment" came,
as you might probably now find hundreds of such flags
in secesh habitations in this city, prepared to be
thrown to the breeze " when Price's army comes ?"
True, as stated there, that " the men who formed
the encampment, each and all of them, had taken the
oath to support the Constitution of the United States
and of this State :" but what signifies a traitor's oath
of loyalty ? Is he not next of kin to the father of
lies?" But to proceed. Having shown the leading events
which preceded the capture of Camp Jackson, let us
now see what was in Camp Jackson. On this point I
can do no better than present the official language of
General Harney. He resumed command at St. Louis
the day after the capture; and on the 14th of May
issued a Proclamation to the People of Missouri, in
which he used the following words :

Its History and Significance. 225
"In this connection I desire to direct attention to
one subject, which no doubt will be made the pretext
for more or less popular excitement. I allude to the
recent transactions at Camp Jackson, near St. Louis.
It is not proper for me to Comment upon the official
conduct of my predecessor in command of this Depart
ment but it is right and proper for the people of Mis
souri to know that the main avenue of Camp Jackson,
recently under command of General Frost, had the
name of Davis, and a principal street of the same
camp that of Beauregard ; that a body of men had been
received into that camp by its commander, which had
been notoriously organized in the interests of the seces
sionists, the men openly wearing the dress and badge
distinguishing the army of the so-called Southern Con
federacy. It is also a notorious fact that a quantity
of arms had been received into the camp, which Were
unlawfully taken from the United States arsenal at
Baton Rouge, and surreptitiously passed up the river
in boxes marked marble.
" Upon facts like these, and having in view what
occurred at Liberty, the people can draw their own
inferences, and it can not be difficult for any one to
arrive at a correct conclusion as to ' the character and
ultimate purpose of that encampment. No Govern
ment in the world would be entitled to respect, that
Would tolerate for a moment such open treasonable
preparations." True, fearless words ! uttered by a veteran soldier,
who saw the treason that lurked in Camp Jackson,
and did not shrink from exposing it, though the com
mander of that camp was his near family connection !
Is more needed to delineate the real character of that
encampment ? Not a word more : but the history is
not yet complete. I must tax your time to present the
20 -

22,6 Camp Jackson:
final and blasting proof, which, after the flight of
Governor Jackson from our seat of Government, was,
by a most remarkable accident, saved from the burnt
and smoking mass of papers, which he committed to
the flames, that the evidence of his treason, and that
of his instruments throughout the State, might never
rise in judgment against them.
You will remember the words of General Frost,
addressed to Captain Lyon, in a letter written on the
day of the eapture, and embodied in the defense of
Camp Jackson, previously presented. Hear them
again: " So far as regards any hostilities being intended
towards the United States, or its property, or repre
sentatives, by any portion of my command, or as far
as I can learn (and I think I am fully informed), of
any other part of the State forces, I can say positively
¦ that the idea has never been entertained''
It could hardly be believed that he who wrote thus
on the 10th of May, had on the 15th of the previous
month, addressed a letter to Governor Jackson, such
as I am about to read to you, and which is the docu
ment that escaped the flames at Jefferson City. I
would not trespass upon your time by presenting it
entire, but that I see no part of it that could well
be omitted, and I apprehend there are many thousands
of the people of Missouri who have never seen it ; for
I believe I am right in saying that, though long -since
given to the world, it has never been published in the
public journal from which the defense of Camp Jack
son was quoted. This is the letter :

Its History and Significance. 227
"St. Louis, Mo., April 15, 1861.
"His Excellency C. F. Jackson, Gov. of Mo.:
" Sir : You have doubtless observed by this morning's
dispatches, that the President, by calling out seventy-
five thousand of the militia of the different States into
the service of the Government, proposes to inaugurate
civil war on a comprehensive plan.
"Under the circumstances, I have thought it not
inappropriate that I should offer some suggestions to
your Excellency, in my capacity of commanding officer
of the first military district.
" Presuming that Mr. Lincoln will be advised by
good military talent, he will doubtless regard this
place as next in importance, in a stragetic point of
view, to Charleston or Pensacola. * He will, therefore,
retain at the Arsenal all of the troops now there, and
augment it as soon as possible. The commanding
officer of that place, as you are perhaps aware, has
strengthened his position by the erection of numerous
batteries on earth works. You are not, however,
aware that he has recently put in position guns of a
heavy calibre, to command the approaches to the city
by the river, as well as heavy ten-inch mortars, with
which he Could at any moment bombard our town.
" If, therefore, he is permitted to go on strengthening
his position, whilst the Government increases his force,
it will be but a short time before he will have this town
and the commerce of the Mississippi at his mercy.
You will readily see how this complete possession and
control of our commercial metropolis might, and in all
probab:lity would, affect any future action that the
State might otherwise feel disposed to take.
"I fully appreciate the very delicate position occu
pied by your Excellency, and do not expect you to
take any action or do anything not legal and proper
to be done under the circumstances ; but, nevertheless,

228 Camp Jackson:
would respectfully suggest the following as both legal
and proper, viz :
" 1st. To call the Legislature together at once, for
the purpose of placing the State in a condition to enable
you to suppress insurrection or repel invasion.
"2d. To send an agent to the Governor of Louis
iana (or further, if necessary), to ascertain if mortars
and siege guns could be obtained from" Baton Rouge,
or other points.
" 3d. To send an agent to Liberty, to see what is
there, and put the people of that vicinity on their guard,
to prevent its being garrisoned, as several companies
of U. S. troops will be at Fort Leavenworth, from Fort
Kearney, in ten or fifteen days from this time.
" 4th. Publish a proclamation to the people of the
State, warning them that the President has acted ille
gally in calling out troops, thus arrogating to himself
the war-making power ; that he has illegally ordered
the secret issue of public arms (to the number of 5,000)
to societies in the State, who have declared their inten
tion to resist the constituted authorities whenever those
authorities may adopt a course distasteful to them;
and that they are, therefore, by no means bound to
give him aid or comfort in his attempt to subjugate, by
force of arms, a people who are still free ; but, on the
contrary, that they should prepare themselves to main
tain all their rights as citizens of Missouri.
" 5th. Authorize, or order, the commanding officer
of the present military district, to form a military camp
of instruction at or near the city of St. Louis, to muster
military companies into the service of the State, to
erect batteries, and do all things necessary and proper
to be done to maintain the peace, dignity, and sove
reignty of the State.
" 6th. Order Colonel Bowen's whole command to
proceed at once to the said camp and report to the
commanding officer for duty.

Its History and Significance. 229
"Doubtless, many things which ought to be done
will occur to your Excellency which have not to me,
and your Excellency may deem what I have suggested
as improper or unnecessary. If so, I can only say,
that I have been actuated solely by a sense of official
duty in saying what I have, and will most cheerfully
acquiesce in whatever course your Excellency may lay
down for my government.
" I would not have presumed to have advised your
Excellency, but for the fact that you were kind enough
to express a desire to consult with me upon these sub
jects on your recent visit to this city.
" I am, sir, very respectfully, your obed't servant,
D. M. Frost, Brig. Gen.
Commanding 1st Mil. Dis't of Missouri."
Such was the programme sketched out by this Briga
dier General of Missouri Militia — who, be it remember
ed, had " taken the oath ! " — to accomplish the infamous
purpose of forcing Missouri into rebellion, in open
defiance of the solemn action of her Convention less
than a month before he wrote ! It was carried out in
nearly every item, save that of issuing a proclamation.
The Legislature was called together ; a messenger was
sent southward for arms, whose presence there for that
purpose was announced, on the 3d of May, in a Southern
newspaper ; on the 20th of April the unguarded arsenal
at Liberty, in Clay county, was delivered up, at the
demand of citizens of that county ; a military camp of
instruction — in treason ! — Camp Jackson, was formed
on the spot where we are now assembled ; Col. Bowen
with his command was there; military companies were
mustered into the service of the State; and time only

230 Camp Jackson:
was wanting to enable them " to erect batteries, and do
all things necessary and proper to be done to maintain
the peace, dignity, and sovereignty of the State : " that
is, to maintain her peace by plunging her into war; to
stain her dignity with the blood of fratricidal conflict ;
and to prostitute her sovereignty to the destruction of
that Union which alone gave her the least title to
sovereignty !
The immediate object of intended attack in St. Louis
was the Arsenal of the United States; then containing
about sixty thousand stand of arms, with large accu
mulations of munitions of war ; which, once in traitor
ous hands, would have furnished to the then unarmed
rebels of Missouri, the means of overpowering at every
point'all resistance to their desperate designs. In all
the history of the rebellion there can be found no
instance of more infatuated audacity. To form an
encampment within the very corporate limits of a city
of hundred and seventy thousand inhabitants, — the
commercial metropolis of a State which had pronounced
its adherence to the Union, — with the design of employ
ing her own citizen soldiery, armed with weapons
partly furnished by, and partly stolen from, the nation
of which they were citizens, to capture one of the
nation's depots of arms, for the purpose of turning its
contents against the nation's life, and at the same time
to protest innocence of any knowledge or thought of
any such devilish scheme, was certainly one of the most
daring exhibitions of mingled folly, treason and false
hood, that the history of civilized nations records.
Had the Arsenal at that critical moment been under

Its History and Significance. 231
the command of one whose devotion to the institution
of Slavery had perverted his intellectual and moral
faculties to a belief in the damnable heresy of paramount
allegiance to some slave State, no mortal ken could
have foretold the disaster to Missouri and the Union,
which would have followed with lightning speed upon
the establishment of Camp Jackson, if, indeed, it had
not preceded it. But, my friends, you and I, and every
inhabitant of our city and State, have reason for pro
found gratitude to Almighty God, that in his good
providence an officer was there, whose allegiance to his
country was not perverted by the miserable fooleries
of State rights, whose eagle vision pierced through every
traitorous disguise, whose bravery was equal to every
emergency, and whose stern and steady adherence to
duty defied all blandishments and all opposition. Let
us bow with profound reverence at the name and
memory of Nathaniel Lyon ! Brief as was his career
in the fiery scenes of this satanic rebellion, it was illus
trious in his steadfast devotion to the flag of his country,
brilliant in his achievements under its resplendent folds,
and glorious in its termination on one of the conse
crated fields of America's bloody conflict for her life.
No brighter name will emerge from the smoke and
tumult of this awful strife — no nobler record will be
transmitted from this evil day to our posterity, reading
the luminous history of America's triumph over her
intestine foes, than that which tells that Lyon gave his
life for, and in his will bequeathed all his estate to,
his country.
But let us not forget the " malignant spirits," who

232 Camp Jackson:
" determined that Camp Jackson should be attacked, and
the citizen soldiery taken prisoners of war." They,
too, deserve our grateful remembrance. To their honor
be it said, that if they were malignant, it was only
against the enemies of their country, of their race, and
of liberty. St. Louis may well be proud of such
spirits, as all traitors have reason to fear them. Could
this fiendish rebellion have been everywhere confronted
in its inception by such, its life would have been short,
and its destruction swift and sure. *
Nor let us be unmindful of the officers and soldiers,
suddenly called and promptly rallying to the defense
of their country's flag, who stood in stern array around
Camp Jackson to enforce their Chief's demand for its
surrender. Who were they? Whence came they?
Almost to a man they were our own fellow-citizens of
St. Louis, and volunteers for their country's defense,
with hardly a battalion of regular troops among them.

* Sinoe the delivery of this Oration, I have learned that the
omission to mention by name any of the parties who were stigma
tized as " malignant spirits," has been objected to by friends of
those parties. I feel confident that no one of the gentlemen in
question would consider that injustice had been done him by the
omission; and much more do I feel assured that no one of them
would helieve me capable of intentionally witholding the just
need of praise due him for his part in the important transactions
I was reviewing. The simple and only reason why I named no
one but the lamented Lyon was, that, as the whole responsibility
of the occasion, to Government, people, and history, rested on him
alone, so he alone was entitled to the credit of leading on the
achievement. This view of the matter was suggested to me, while
preparing the Oration, by a gentleman who held an important
position, both advisory and executive, near, the person of Lyon,
before and at the time of the capture.. It seemed to me, not only
magnanimous, but just, and I acted upon it in framing this pass
age of tb,« discourse.

Its History and Significance. 233
But " nine-tenths of them were born under a foreign
flag, and had grown up acknowledging allegiance to
the worst and most despotic governments of Europe;"
and were they to be the instruments of " the degrada
tion of citizens as loyal to the flag of the Union; as
respectable in every sense, as brave and chivalric, as
Captain Lyon, or any of his advisers ? " My friends, I
can not stop to discuss relative terms of commendation
or reproach. Enough, for shame, that Americans by
birth were false to their country and its flag ; enough,
for rejoicing and pride, that Americans by adoption
were true to both. The former, though my brother by
blood, is my enemy, and I am his ; the latter, though
an alien by birth, becomes my brother by the holier
tie of a common devotion to our noble country. All
honor then, say I, to the volunteer rank and file of
the captors of Camp Jackson, and to the gallant
officers under whom they marched on the 10th of May,
eighteen hundred and sixty-one.
I suppose, my friends, that I might here close my
words-, without seeming to fail in a due performance
of the service assigned me. But my sense of duty does
not so permit. Bear with me, then, yet a little longer,
while I present what seems to me a fit conclusion of
this commemorative address.
You have listened to the history connected with
Camp Jackson : let us now endeavor, with firm hand
and steady heart, to portray the significance of Camp
Jackson. It had an origin and a meaning, which no
citizen of Missouri should fail to see and comprehend ;
and I should consider my duty unperformed, if I

234 Camp Jackson:
omitted to exhibit that origin and meaning ; and that
I ought to be branded as a craven, if I shrunk from
the effort to impress upon the minds of others the
immovable convictions which have sunk, unsought and
unforced, into my own.
Camp Jackson was not a mere manifestation of
insurrectionary spirit against the Constitution and
Government of the Union. That Constitution had
brought only blessings to the citizen soldiers there
assembled — the hand of that Government had rested
on them, only with a paternal touch. Not one of
them could probably have been lured or forced into a
revolt against the latter, for the sole purpose of
resisting its authority ; much less into an assault upon
the former, wantonly to destroy it. To assume the
possibility of either, would be to pronounce them born
devils, intent, for its own sake, on a work of destruc
tion, such as the universe never saw attempted since
Lucifer struck at the throne of God. No : they were
moved by a far different spirit, and were bent upon an
object, which could be attained only by the overthrow
of both Government and Constitution, and therefore
they were ready to assail both. Let me unfold that
object, in the light of a brief historical review of what
has been done in the name of Missouri, in regard to
the institution of Slavery.
As you are all aware, Missouri was brought into the
family of the Union through a great conflict, growing
out of her being a slaveholding State. The ferment
attending that event led to the incorporation in her
Constitution of provisions intended to fasten Slavery

Its History and Significance. 235
upon her permanently, and to preclude the agitation by
her people, at any after period, of the question of its
removal from her limits. The Constitution provided
thus : '
" The General Assembly shall have no power to
pass laws —
" First,~ For the emancipation of slaves, without
the consent of their owners, or without paying them,
before such emancipation, a full equivalent for such
slaves so emancipated; and,
" Second, To prevent bona fide emigrants to this
State, or actual settlers therein, from bringing from
any of the United States, or from any of their Ter
ritories, such persons as may there be deemed to be
slaves, so long as any persons of the same description
are allowed to be held as slaves by the laws of this
State." Under the influence of these provisions, and of a
large immigration from other slave States, Slavery
remained predominant in Missouri, and no attempt was
made to lead her people to consider whether it was
their, interest to retain it. In the progress of years
the political power of Slavery began to develop itself
in the country. From standing on the defensive, it
assumed the aggressive, in connection with the question
of its extension, with special reference to the outlying
Territories of the Union. The right of Congress to
pass any law prohibiting it there, came to be ques
tioned, after an acquiescence in it, in every section,
for many years. In 1849, the Legislature of this
State under the lead of the same Claiborne F. Jackson,
from whose deeds as Governor we have so deeply
suffered, passed a series of *" Resolutions on the subject

236 Camp Jackson:
of Slavery," ever since known by his name ; in which
the ground was assumed that " any organization of
the territorial governments, excluding the citizens of
any part of the Union from removing to such terri
tories with their property, would be an exercise of
power, by Congress, inconsistent with the spirit upon
which our Federal compact was based, insulting to the
sovereignty and dignity of the States thus affected,
calculated to alienate one portion of the United States
from another, and tending ultimately to disunion ; "
and in connection with this avowal with one more sig
nificant, concerning the relations of Missouri to the
other slave States, in these terms :
" That in the event of the passage of any act of
Congress conflicting with the principles herein ex
pressed, Missouri will be found in hearty co-operation
with the slaveholding States, in such measures as may
be deemed necessary for our mutual protection against
the encroachments of Northern fanaticism."
In the light of subsequent history, we see now,
what Missouri's great Senator, Thomas H. Benton,
saw then — that those resolutions were a part of the
scheme of disunion, which was then shaping itself in
the South, and was so clearly seen by Mr. Calhoun
to be approaching its execution, that in commenting,
in the Senate, upon President Taylor's reference to
the Union, in his first and only annual message, he
used these noted words :
" It [the Union] can not then be saved by eulogies
upon it, however splendid or numerous. The cry of
'• Union, Union, the glorious Union ! ' can no more
prevent disunion, than the cry of ' Health, Health,

Its History and Significance. 237
glorious Health ! ' on the part of a physician can save
a patient from dying that is lying dangerously ill."
From the date of the adoption of the Jackson Reso
lutions, but more especially from that of the subsequent
defeat of Col. Benton's re-election to the Senate, at
the expiration of a continuous service there of thirty
years, Missouri seemed bound hand and foot to the
South and to Slavery forever. And as if to make
this doubly sure, the Legislature, eight years later,
sought to crush the idea of Emancipation — then begin
ning to find expression among us — by the adoption of
another resolution, which, with its preamble, was as
follows :
" Whereas, circumstances have rendered it neces
sary, and it is due to the constituent body of our
fellow-citizens of the State of Missouri, that the Legis
lature of the State should give an unequivocal expres
sion of opinion in regard to the subject of the
emancipation of the slaves in the State :
" Be it therefore resolved by the General Assembly
of the State of Missouri, That the emancipation of the
slaves held as property in this State would be not only
impracticable, but that any movement having such
an object in view would be inexpedient, impolitic,
unwise, and unjust, and should in the opinion of this
General Assembly, be disqountenanced by the people
of the State."
This resolution was passed in the Senate by a vote
of 25 to 4, and in the House of Representatives by a
vote of 107 to 12 ; six to one in the former — nine to
one in the latter ! It was intended to throttle Eman
cipation in its cradle, and to rivet and clinch Slavery
upon our people with an eternal clamp.

238 Camp Jackson:
' Here, my friends, I can not resist the impulse to
digress for a moment, to bring into view and proclaim
the names of those four Senators and twelve Repre
sentatives, who, against such enormous odds, bravely
wrote down on the records of their State their dissent
from that sweeping blast against Emancipation. With
two exceptions, they represented St. Louis County in
that General Assembly. Let no frail memory of the
people forget to honor the deed, or cease to bear in
recollection that it was done by Senators Henry T.
Blow, Robert Holmes, Charles S. Rannells, and
John D. Stevenson, and by Representatives Barton
Able, Thos. J. Albright, B. Gratz Brown, Patrick
E. Burke, Henry A. Clover, Franklin A. Dick,
Benjamin Farrar, Samuel H. Gardner, Jesse Jen
nings, of Taney, Madison Miller, James 0. Sitton,
of Gasconade, and Lewis Winkelmaier.
Resuming the thread of history, we find that on the
12th of January, 1861, twenty-three days after South
Carolina's ordinance of secession was passed, and while
the roar of the secession tornado was resounding
through the whole South, a meeting was held at the
Court House in this city, which will be remembered as
among the largest^ever seen in this community. Its
great magnitude, the expression it ,made concerning
matters of incomparable importance at that critical
juncture, and the unhappy influence it exerted through
out this State, entitle it to a prominent position in the
history of that period. It was heralded as a Union
meeting ; but God save us from such Unionism as it
inculcated ! Passing by, as mere chaff, its empty pro-

Its History and Significance. 239
fessions of attachment to the Union, it is sufficient for
the present occasion to exhume from its dead and
buried proceedings a single resolution, as indicative of
a then living and unshaken purpose to hold Missouri
fast to Slavery, even if it led her into secession. No one
who was known or suspected to be in favor of Coercion,
as it was then opprobriously called, — that is, of sus
taining the Government and Constitution, by every
possible means and to the utmost extremity, against
the destruction then threatening them, — was permit
ted to participate in the private preparations for the
action of that meeting ; all of which were arranged in
secret, by men whose deep and unscrupulous disloy
alty afterwards became manifest ; some of whom, early
in the rebellion, betrayed their country's cause for
that of Slavery, by taking up arms in the rebel ser
vice, where, if yet living, they are still engaged. It
is not, therefore, to be wondered at, that in such hands,
the meeting became — what it never would have become,
if the people of St. Louis had been advised of its real
design — a powerful instrument of traitorous mischief
in Missouri. How it became so, you will have no dif
ficulty in perceiving when I recall to your recollection
that one of its resolutions was the following :
"That the possession of slave property is a consti
tutional right, and as such ought to be ever recognized
by the Federal Government. That if the Federal Gov
ernment shall fail and refuse to secure this right, the
Southern States should be found united in its defense,
in which event Missouri will share the common
DUTIES AND COMMON DANGER OF THE SOUTH."
This was, in effect, a revival in St. Louis of the

240 Camp Jackson:
Jackson Resolutions of 1849. It was the very embodi
ment of Southern sophistry, imperiousness, and trea
son. It opens with the utterly unfounded and falla
cious dogma, that the possession of slave property is
a "constitutional right" if reference is made to the
Constitution of the United States; for that nowhere
confers, but only recognizes, that right. It proceeds to
declare the obligation of the Federal Government to
recognize that right; but as if, on "sober second
thought," that was not enough, it next impliedly, but
with all the force of a direct affirmation, declares the
duty of that Government "to secure this right;" when
no man lives who can find in the National Constitution
one word enjoining such a duty, except in regard to
fugitive slaves; to which it is impossible reference
oould have been intended, because there then stood
upon the statute books of the nation the Fugitive Slave
Act of 1850, which had been prepared for and dicta
ted to, Congress, by the most radical, exacting, and
overbearing champions of Slavery that the Southern
States had ever sent to that body. And, finally, it
closes with an undoubted committal of Missouri to
secession, if the National Government refused or failed
to perform this duty, which it was under no constitu
tional obligation to perform, except in the single par
ticular of fugitive slaves, and for which, beyond that
point, it had no semblance of constitutional power!
And this is what the people of St. Louis were by
adroit management led to say; but what they never
would have said, had they in any degree understood
the plot then thickening around them.

Its History and Significance. 241
We need not be surprised to find that immediately
after this demonstration in St. Louis, the Legislature
of this State, in February, 1861, by a solemn resolu
tion — prompted, no doubt, as it was officially approved,
by Governor Jackson, and adopting the policy which
his resolutions, twelve years before, had foreshadowed —
bound Missouri, so far as that body could bind it, to
revolt against the Government of the United States
and to disunion. Attend to this last expression of*
Missouri's legislative traitors against their country,
for the sake of Slavery :
" Whereas, We have learned, with profound regret,
that the States of New York and Ohio have recently
tendered men and money to the President of the
United States, for the avowed purpose of coercing
certain sovereign States of the South, which have
seceded, or may secede from the Federal Union, into
obedience to the Federal Government; therefore,
" Resolved by the House of Representatives, the
Senate concurring therein, That we regard with the
utm6st abhorrence the doctrine of coercion, as indi
cated by the action of the States aforesaid, believing
that the same would result in civil war, and forever
destroy any hope of reconstructing the Federal Union.
So believing, we deem it our duty to declare, that if
there is any invasion of the slave States, for the pur
pose of carrying such doctrines into effect, it is the opin
ion of this General Assembly that the people of Mis
souri will instantly rally on the side of their Southern
brethren, to resist the invaders at all hazards and to
the last extremity."
Thus ends the historical review, which was necessary
to the proper understanding, in this day and in the
future, of the origin and significance of Camp Jackson.
21

242 Camp Jackson:
In the light of the facts, as presented, I reiterate, that
the formation of that camp proceeded from no mere
hostility to the Constitution and Government of the
Union ; nor did it spring from any mischievous impulse
for the mere sake of mischief; nor did it express any
form of passionate popular outbreak ; nor yet was it
the offspring of any need or purpose to redress any
grievance, or to avenge any wrong done in the name
or by the authority of the United States, to the State
of Missouri, or to any part of her people. In the
name of Heaven, then, it may be asked, if it proceeded
from none of these, what did it proceed from? My
friendsrlook at the facts — at the formal declarations
of the Legislature of Missouri and the words of
Governor Jackson, as I have laid them before you;
at his refusal of a single soldier to defend the Union
against the rebellious and savage assault of the
aristocracy of Southern Slavery, while, at the same
instant, he called the militia of Missouri to arms ; at
the steady and overbearing effort of forty years to tie
Missouri and Slavery together in indestructible bonds ;
at the solemn resolve that she should, in spite of her
own declared will, make common cause with the South,
on the ground that " the destiny of the slaveholding
States of this Union is one and the same:" look at
these things, and say if in the whole wide field of
human research or conjecture, you can find any other
origin of Camp Jackson than in the institution of
Slavery — any other significance than that of a fierce
and deliberate purpose to join the Southern aristocracy
in their hellish attempt to strike down our glorious

Its History and Significance. 243
heritage of Freedom, for the sake of rearing over its
ruins a bloody, aggressive, and relentless Empire of
Slavery ! This great truth concerning Southern trea
son should never for one moment be lost sight of.
It struggled into the view of the people of Missouri
through, the heavy clouds of life-long association with,
and attachment to, the " peculiar institution ; " but it
has emerged, at last, into the clear open sky, and shines
into every habitation where Slavery is not enshrined
as a household god, and into every mind which has not
become hopelessly abject in its devotion to that god.
The scales have fallen from the eyes of tens of thousands
of that people — nay, from those of a vast majority —
and they see, with startled gaze, that they have nursed
in their bosom the only viper that could ever have
inflicted upon them such deadly wounds, as have caused
them for two long and terrible years to bleed at every
pore. And they will never unlearn that truth. Every
day disseminates it more widely, and makes it more
powerful. As well attempt to roll back the Missis
sippi to its source, as to stem the mighty swell of that
enfranchised opinion, which, throughout Missouri,
presses home upon Slavery all the woes and tears, the
ravages and dismay,, which have made these two years
hideous and insufferable to her people.
And, praised be God ! with the growth of that libe
rated opinion has come the high and steady purpose
that Missouri shall be liberated from her long thralldom
to Slavery. We have borne and suffered enough from
it and for it. Her people do not now believe — even if
they ever did — what their Legislature declared in

244 Camp Jackson:
1857, that " the emancipation of the slaves would be
impracticable ; " much less do they believe that " any
movement having such an object in view, would be
inexpedient, impolitic, unwise, and unjust, and should
be discountenanced." On the contrary, they are
resolved not only to make such a movement, but to
make it so that it shall never be unmade. The power
of their will makes itself felt in all places, high and
low. Our Provisional Governor, who opened his
Administration, in August, 1861, with the proclama
tion that his selection for that office would " satisfy
all that no countenance would be afforded to ANY
SCHEME or to ANY CONDUCT calculated in any degree to
interfere with the institution of slavery existing in the
State, and that to the very utmost extent of Execu
tive POWER, THAT INSTITUTION WOULD BE PROTECTED,"
now calls the State Convention together, " to consult
and act upon the subject of the emancipation of
slaves," because — and I thank him for the change ! —
he considers it " of the highest importance to the
interests of the State that some scheme of Emancipa
tion should be adopted." And mark you, when that
body assembles, there will be no more " killing Eman
cipation at the first pop ! " The subject will be dis
cussed in all its bearings, freely and fearlessly ; and
my confidence is that " some scheme of Emancipation
will be adopted." And yet it may be defeated there ;
but woe to them by whom it is defeated. The people
will not quietly submit to the thwarting of their will
in 1863, by a body elected in 1861. If this Conven
tion fails them, they will have another that will not.

Its History and Significance. 245
The time has gone by when a batch of leaders can
control them on this subject. The conviction is uni
versal, that there is no more peace, and consequently
no more prosperity, for our State, while Slavery sits
firm on our soil, to kindle anew every day the fires of
civil strife, and invite perpetual incursions from the
South. They have Deen compelled to do their own
fighting, and hereafter they will do their own voting,
too. Let him who dares disregard their will concern
ing Emancipation ! The Car of Juggernaut never
rolled over its self-immolating devotee with more
deadly crush, than will the public opinion of Missouri
over every man that ventures that experiment. Let
men idolize and cling to Slavery as they please, Eman
cipation in Missouri is already decreed : the Convention
has only to record the decree. Not by some feeble
scheme, winding up in the Twentieth Century ; but by
some wise, equitable and well-considered plan, worthy
of humanity and of statesmanship, which shall bring
to this generation, through Emancipation, some recom
pense for the horrible ills it has endured through Sla
very. Let this be done, and, with God's blessing, all
will yet be well with us and with our children !

REPLY
TO THE MISSOURI REPUBLICAN.

[The publication of the Oration on "Camp Jackson, its His
tory and Significance," caused the appearance, the next day, in
the editorial columns of the Missouri Republican, of an attack on
Mr. Drake ; which he considered it his duty to reply to ; and it
is deemed not inappropriate that the Reply sho uld be embraced
in this volume, in connection with that which led to the attack.]
Mr. N. Paschall, Editor of the Mo. Republican:
Sir: You would hardly expect, nor would the com
munity, that the bitter personal attack upon me in the
leading editorial article of the Republican of Wednes
day, should pass unnoticed by me. I shall notice it
and you, in such a manner as duty to the public seems to
me to require ; not because I have the least need to vindi
cate myself before the people of St. Louis from such
aspersions as those with which you have deliberately
severed the ties of many years' association and friend
ship. Though I may have no " celebrity," and though
for of whatever " notoriety " I possess, I may, as you
claim, be indebted to the Missouri Republican, you
will probably find that I have a foundation of char
acter .here, which will withstand this assault, or any

Reply to the Missouri Republican. 247
that the Republican may hereafter make. If I have
not, truly the best years of my life have been lived
here in vain.
In one respect, Sir, I shall not imitate your course
toward me. You denounce me for the Oration which
I delivered last Monday, but do not publish it, so that
your readers may judge between us. You did not
relish the resuscitation there of the Republican's history,
which fidelity to truth required. In this reply I shall
not follow your example,- by withholding from thjse
who may read my words the opportunity at the same
time of reading yours. I have no record which I fear
should be brought to light, nor do I shrink from tell
ing the world what is said against me. You shall,
therefore, have all the benefit here of every word of it.
Here it is : "MR. CHARLES D. DRAKE.
" For whatever of position this gentleman may have
in this community, we think it may safely be assumed
he is indebted to the sustaining influence and exer
tions of this paper in his behalf ; and hence the public
who are alive to this fact, will be surprised at the bit
terness of invective in which he indulged in his Ora
tion at Camp Jackson grounds last Monday. We are
not going to open the wounds scarcely cicatrized, nor
to discuss the propriety of the military movements
originated by Mr. (now Gen.) F. P. Blair, whose name,
strangely enough, was scarcely heard in the proceed
ings of Monday, for the simple reason that he is not
now radical enough for the time, and is in the field
fighting the battles of his country, while those who
are politically opposed to him are using his thunder
to destroy him. When this civil war has been brought

248 Reply to the Missouri Republican.
to an end, and time and history have done their office
in recording all the facts connected with the rebellion,
and the incidents preceding and growing out of it—
when to each party and every individual engaged in it,
whether high or low, in civil or military life — is assign
ed his particular place in the grand drama which has
convulsed the Union — those who come after us will be
better prepared to understand the motives and the
actions of men. Here we leave this branch of the
subject, only to recur to Mr. Drake himself. This
gentleman, as we have said above, is more indebted to
us for the notoriety — it would be a misnomer to call it
celebrity — which he enjoys, than all other causes com
bined. When those who are now petting him were
cursing him, and heaping epithets of the most oppro
brious character upon him, in the spirit of persistent
friendship we came to his rescue and defended him
from their reproaches. Whenever an opportunity
offered to advance his interests, none were more prompt
to do it. Confessedly the most unpopular man in St.
Louis, politically, professionally, and socially, this did
not prevent us from interposing our influence in his
behalf, and when, three or four years ago, he was,- by
our assistance, elected to the Legislature — the only
place of trust he ever acquired directly from the peo
ple — he had not been in his seat a month before he
broke down under the weight of his own measures of
social reform, and he was only tolerated for the remain
der of the session. The Democrat, now fulsome in
its praise of him, then ridiculed and denounced him
unmercifully. The German press, now referring to
him complacently, never alluded to his course in the
Legislature except in language of abuse to which there
was no license. Those with whom he is now hob
nobbing, and is apparently on the best terms of social
intercourse, were then held up by him to public ridi
cule for their Sunday diversions, and their wives and

Reply to the Missouri Republican. 249
daughters presented in the most revolting situations.
The debates on this subject between Mr. Drake and
Mr. Kribben, can hardly be forgotten by those who
read them at the time. That session of the legislature
unhorsed Mr. D. as a politician forever, and although
he has since sought place, even that of Senator in Con
gress, nobody has yet been found willing to hazard his
reputation by putting him in nomination. Changing
from party to party until he has run through the whole
catalogue and become a Charcoal, his accession has
always been the signal for defeat and disaster, and the
Charcoals themselves may well tremble for their suc
cess hereafter. Faithless to his friends, it is not sur
prising that distrust of his motives should follow his
every movement. Disappointed in all the aspirations
of a selfish ambition — a failure in everything — it is not
to be wondered at that he hardened his heart, and
become callous to all the impulses of a high-minded
gentleman and Christian. We quit him here."
Can it be, Mr. Paschall, that no sense of shame,
np twinge of conscience, disturbed you while you
penned those ungracious words? Is it possible that
you did not perceive how open they laid you to retort?
Is it, indeed, true that your usual good sense has, in
your advanced years, forsaken you ? I will not bandy
epithets with you ; but I may be permitted respectfully
to suggest, that if that editorial indicates the amount of
candor, truthfulness, and sagacity, which is hereafter
to characterize the Republican, it were well for those
interested in its publication to consider the expediency
of your retirement to the shades of private life. The
loyal citizens of St. Louis have long had a very definite
opinion on that point, which may have found some little

250 Reply to the Missouri Republican.
expression at Camp Jackson last Monday. Perhaps
that was the sting of that day to you, Mr. Paschall.
You assume in the outset, that the public will " be
surprised at the bitterness of invective in which I
indulged in my oration at Camp Jackson grounds last
Monday." What "bitterness of invective" did I
indulge in there, Mr. Paschall ? Against the Mis
souri Republican, or you, or any one connected with it ?
Not a word of such can be found in the Oration. .1
mentioned your paper historically and respectfully ;
my invective was against the traitors in Camp Jackson
two years ago. That invective you resent. Do you
thereby intend to affirm, or admit, that there was at that
time in Camp Jackson any one connected with the
Republican, who deserved that title ? I did not so affirm ;
but have you not impliedly done so, by resenting my
invective against the traitors there ? Or do you mean
to be understood, at this day and in this city, as defend
ing those traitors still, as you did immediately after their
capture ? If you do, I can only pity the infatuation which
still binds you to an ignoble and desperate cause.
Whether I am " indebted to the sustaining influence
and exertions " of the Republican " for whatever posi
tion I may have in this community," I leave to that
community to say. I have endeavored to lead in St.
Louis an upright life. If, in the estimation of her
people, I have done so, I needed not the Republican's
" influence and exertions," or those of any other paper,
to give me " position ; " if I had not, and the Republi
can, notwithstanding, wielded its influence to give me
"position" of which I was unworthy, what shall be

Reply to the Missouri Republican. 251
said of the Republican, and of you, its editor ? But,
Sir, no human being in this city believes, or ever will
believe, that your paper has given me the standing I
now occupy, whatever it may be, in this city. All I
ha.ve gained here, socially or professionally^ I have
labored for through many years of toilsome devotion to
duty. For you to claim to have given me position
here, only makes people who know you and me laugh
at you, Mr. Paschall.
But, Sir, when and where were "the sustaining
influence and exertions " of your paper put forth on my
behalf for my sake? Acknowledging many acts of
kindness received from the Republican, I affirm that all
the influence it ever exerted to give me position, was
exerted that your own views and plans in regard to
public affairs, and the prosperity of the paper you con
ducted, might be better promoted. You sustained me
as long as I sustained you — not a moment before, not
a moment after ; and you did it in order more effectu
ally to sustain yourself. For your paper, as many
well know, I have first and last, performed many months
of gratuitous, exhausting, and, to you, ever acceptable
labor, of which the world knew nothing, except as it
appeared in your editorial columns, and augmented
their influence over your readers. That those labors
were not without direct and lasting benefit to you, no
man living knows better than yourself; that their bene
fit to me, if any, was only incidental, never pecuniary,
no man knows better than I do. If the Republican
helped to give me position, I helped to give it position.
You profit substantially every day by my past efforts

252 Reply to the Missouri Republican.
on your behalf, put forth at one period, as you well
know, when you were reduced to positive bankruptcy ;
I profit not one penny by the position which you imagine
you have given me.
You claim a credit to yourself, in no sense your due,
when you use the following words :
" When those who are now petting him were cursing
him, and heaping epithets of the most opprobrious char
acter upon him, in the spirit of a persistent friendship
we came to his rescue, and defended him from their
reproaches." No such state of things has at any time existed
during my residence in this city, except in connection
with my service in the Legislature ; and my memory
fails to recall one line in the Republican defending me
then. You are not accustomed, Mr. Paschall, as this
community knows, to espouse the cause of a falling
man, or to identify your paper with an " unhorsed
politician." If, however, you came to my rescue at
that period, it was not because you remembered kindly
that I had, to the extent of my ability, come to your
aid in the days of your adversity, nor because you
cared a straw what befell me; but because it suited
your purpose as a partisan editor, to sustain one who
belonged to your own party, and whose overthrow
could confer no benefit upon that party, but perhaps
injury. But in spite of all the " position " you have conferred
upon me, it seems that I am " confessedly the most
unpopular man in St. Louis, politically, professionally,
and personally ! " How poorly, Mr. Paschall, that

Reply to the Missouri 'Republican. 253
fact, if true, speaks for your influence and that of your
paper in this city ! Is it possible that all your efforts
to write me up, have only resulted in writing me down ?
If so, am I under obligations to you for your " persist
ent friendship ? " But you did not talk or think that
way, when, in 1859, in order to secure a Democratic
triumph, you induced me, against my inclination, and
to the serious injury of my private interests, to suffer
myself to be announced as a candidate for the Legis
lature, only four days before the election ; much less
when I beat my competitor more than 1,800 votes !
Still, it may be true now; and if it is, I can only say
that at no period of my life has popularity been my aim.
I desire the approbation of my fellow-citizens ; but only
so far as it may be earned by an honest and steady
adherence to what I believe to be right, regardless of
personal consequences to myself; and I think the peo
ple of St. Louis believe this of me, whether I am popu
lar with them or not. Do they believe so of you,
Mr. Paschall?
Prominent among your flings at me is, that "chang
ing from party to party until I have run through the
whole catalogue, and become a Charcoal, my accession
has always been the signal for defeat and disaster."
If this be true, Mr. Paschall, pray how has it been
with you and the Republican ? We were together, Sir,
from 1834 to 1861. Were the defeats and disasters of
the parties with which we were connected, and for
which we jointly labored, during those twenty-seven
years, all owing to me, a private citizen, and none to
you, the editor of a widely-circulated and powerful

254 Reply to the Missouri Republican.
journal ? You did not say or think this, in August,
1800, when you introduced my Victoria speech, in favor
of Mr. Douglas to your readers, as the very ablest
campaign document ever produced in this country, and
announced that you would print 50,000 copies of it, in
pamphlet form, for sale ; nor in November following,
when as I believe, largely through the instrumentality
of that speech, Missouri was found to be the only State
in the Union that gave an electoral vote to Mr. Doug
las, except the fractional vote he received in New
Jersey. In fact, Mr. Paschall, it is only since December,
1860, that you have discovered my unpopularity. On
the 31st of that month — as I showed in the Oration
last Monday — you shocked the loyal portion of this
community beyond expression, by committing the
Republican to the cause of Secession. No man in St.
Louis felt the shock more keenly than I did; for, for
nearly two months before the Presidential election in
November, your editorial columns received almost daily
from me contributions attacking Secession and defend
ing the Union, into which I threw all the power of my
mind, all the vigor of my pen, and all the force of the
undying love for the Union, which then, as now, fired
my whole nature. And more than this. The Victoria
speech, which you extolled so highly, exposed in advance
the very scheme of disunion which South Carolina
carried out on the 20th of December. In the face of
all this, on the 31st of that month, the Republican stood
before the world the advocate of the secession of Mis
souri ! I felt at the time almost as if hell had yawned

Reply to the Missouri Republican. 255
before me. From that day our paths have diverged,
never, I suppose, to meet again. You took your stand
against your country — I took mine for it. You struck
hands with traitors — I have fallen into association with
those, between whom and myself there had previously
been sharp political antagonism. I have not stopped
for an instant to inquire whether the Democrat had
"ridiculed and denounced" me, nor whether the Ger
man press had used toward me " language of abuse."
All I sought to know was, where the friends of my
country and the defenders of the Union could be found;
and never, since that day, have I found or heard of one
connected with the editorial management of the-Repub-
lican. Nor have,! ever stopped to inquire whether I
am popular with the Union men of St. Louis. Having
never asked, and never intending to ask, the least favor
at their hands, or those of the people of Missouri, — it
being especially FALSE that I have sought to be Senator
in Congress, — the question of my popularity is the very .
last that has engaged my attention. I am not, how
ever, unaware that with traitors and Missouri Repub
lican Unionists I am unpopular: and God forbid it
should ever be otherwise ! Such unpopularity I joy
fully accept, as the highest evidence that I have done
something for my country — the richest treasure of my
remaining years, the most precious legacy I can
bequeath to my children. Can you, dare you, Mr.
Paschall, say as much of the popularity you receive
at their hands.
There was a wondrous temerity, as well as most
egregious folly, in your attack upon me. You forgot

256 Reply to the Missouri Republican.
that the record of the Republican since the 31st of
December, 1860, is written indelibly in the memory of
the loyal people of St. Louis, and that my course
during that period is well known to them. You forgot
that not only did you on that day sound the first seces
sion blast heard in Missouri, in response to South
Carolina's fiendish invocation to the slave States ; but
for months after that day, and until the apprehension
of the suppression of the Republican by military power
overcame your real impulses, and compelled you to
assume the mask of a thin and perfidious loyalty, that
sheet was the most artful and dangerous enemy the
National Government and the Union had in the whole
Valley of the Mississippi. You forgot, what I do not
forget, that its columns were loaded from day to day
with- everything, original and selected, which tended to
impair the confidence of the people in the Government,
and weaken their attachment for the Union and their
faith in its triumph over its enemies. You forgot
that the frown of the Republican was upon every man
believed to be unconditionally loyal, while its smiles
were radiant upon those known to be feeble and shaky
Unionists, or traitors in heart; so that, at last, no man's
reputation for sincere 'and earnest loyalty survived
your praise. You forgot that the Republican became
the organ of every exaggerated complaint which open
traitors or skulking bushwhackers and their friends,
throughout the State, wished to pour into the public
ear, against the efficient action of the military forces,
pursuing them to their overthrow. You forgot that
the monster meeting at the Court House in this city,

Reply to the Missouri Republican. 257
on the 12th of January, 1861, which, with hollow pre
tensions of Unionism, was in reality a secession demon
stration, was your work, called by you, managed by
your influence, and glorified by you in the Republican.
You forgot the Republican's denouncement and defiance
of President Lincoln's call, after the bombardment of
Sumter, for 75,000 men to suppress the rebellion, your
commendation of Governor Jackson for his refusal of
Missouri's quota of four regiments under that call^,and
your impudent declaration that the people of Missouri
would indorse that refusal. You forgot that the
Republican gave unmistakable evidence of gratification
at the Bull Run disaster to the army of the Union.
You forgot its insane fury over the suppression, by
military force, of that treasonable sheet, the Missouri
State Journal. But why should I undertake to
enumerate the atrocious sins of the Republican, since
December, 1 860, against the Constitution, the Union,
and the Government, as well as against loyalty, patri
otism, and truth? Are they not history, which can
never be erased ? Are they not held in public remem
brance, with a tenacity which only the lapse of many
years can weaken ? They make such a record against
you, Mr. Paschall, and against the Republican, as
I would not have against me, for the payment down
to-day, of a sum of money equal to the anticipated
profits of the Republican office for a hundred years
to come. The thirty pieces of silver for which Judas
Iscariot betrayed his Lord, did not keep down the
pangs of remorse, under which " he went and hanged
himself."

258 Reply to the Missouri Republican^
There is, however, Mr. Paschall, one sin lying at
your door, which I owe to the public and to the cause
of historic truth to make a distinct mention of. In my
address last Monday, I stated that I believed I was
right in saying that the letter of General Frost to
Governor Jackson, which I then read, had never been
published in the columns of the Republican. ' Your
reporter, in his account of the proceedings on that day,
said that statement was " at war with the truth of his
tory — said letter having appeared in the columns of the
Republican on several occasions." It has since been
stated to me, that during the late session of the Legis
lature of this State, in February perhaps, R. F. Win-
gate, Esq., incorporated that letter in a speech he
delivered there, which was published in your paper.
If that information is correct, you are entitled to the
benefit of it, such as it is, and I give it to you here.
But, Sir, there is a wide difference between publishing
such a document, as a matter of public information, at
the time it comes to light, and publishing it in some
body's speech eighteen months afterward. I charge
you, Mr. Paschall, with deliberately keeping that let
ter out of the Republican, as an item of information
to your readers, from the day it transpired to this, with
the intention that those who had read your vindication
of Camp Jackson, in May, 1861, should never learn
through your agency of the existence of a document,
which proved that vindication false in its essential
features, as you could not help knowing it to be when
you wrote it. You will not forget, Sir, a conversation
on the street between you and myself about that letter,

Reply to the -Missouri Republican. 259
when it appeared in the other papers of this city.
I asked you why you did not publish it in the Repub
lican? You replied — " I have no quarrel with General
Frost ! " And when I urged that that was not the
question, and that the letter ought to be published
there, as an important part of the history of the day,
you replied again — " Well, I don't like the way they got
possession of it!" And these were the reasons you
assigned, with steady face, for withholding from your
readers, so far as your silence could, all knowledge of
that document ! This single fact, sir, should damn your
paper in the eyes of all patriots and all honest men ; as
I well know its promulgation will exalt and glorify
you in those of Copperheads and traitors.
And now, sir, in conclusion, I recommend you to
a more careful study of your position and that of the
Republican, in this city and State. Realize, if you
can, that you are both on the down-hill grade. The
secession cause, which you espoused on the 31st of
December, 1860, and have never since, in heart, aban
doned for a moment, whatever may have been the
outward seeming of your paper, is going down, down,
down ! and ta'ke heed that you do not go down with it !
You have not breathed one truly loyal breath, nor has
one truly loyal number of your paper been published,
since that day. Had justice been meted out to the
Republican, as it was to the Journal and the Herald,
it would long since have been suppressed, and you,
perhaps, again a bankrupt. You owe, this day, a life
long debt of gratitude to the military authorities for
their forbearance. You have done more to excite and

260 Reply to the Missouri Republican.
foster treason and disloyalty in Missouri than any
hundred men in it ; for you governed an engine of
tremendous power. There is an immeasurable distance
between the evil you have done, and the good you
might have done, with it. Had you, after the election
of Mr. Lincoln, kept the same high ground of devotion
to the Union, which you suffered me to take in your
columns before that event, how noble and exalted
would have been your position, how full of blessing to
your country, and how much bloodshed would have
been saved in Missouri, whose stain, I greatly fear, is
on your skirts !
You, Mr. Paschall, have long wielded a potent
influence in Missouri; but it can reach patriots no
more. The time is past when the Republican can
write any loyal man down, or any disloyal man up.
I neither fear its hostility nor court its favor. I will
go on my way, combating treason and disloyalty,
traitors and Copperheads, falsehood and hypocrisy,
come what may to me. You may go on yours,
denouncing me, and those like me in devotion to
country ; ignoring every noble development of patri
otism ; giving conspicuousness to all insidious incite
ments to disloyalty ; striking at all who do not cling
to Slavery in its damnable crusade against the Union
and Liberty ; chuckling over " the killing of Eman
cipation at the first pop : " and sneering at every
prayerful appeal of an afflicted people to the Throne
of Mercy for the overthrow of this savage rebellion :
but all will come to an end ere long, and our respec
tive records of life will be closed, and passed to the

Reply to the Missouri Republican. 261
Judgment-seat on high. Mine, I trust, will be that of
one who strove with his best ability and truest heart to
be a patriot. Have you no fears, Mr. Paschall, that
yours may be that of an able, wily, and unscrupulous
TRAITOR ?
C. D. Drake.
*
St. Louis, May 14, 1863.

SPEECH AT CHICAGO

On the 2d day of June, 1863, a Mass Convention
assembled in the City of Chicago, to promote the con
struction of a Ship Canal connecting the waters of
Lake Michigan and the Mississippi River. On the
afternoon of that day, the Convention having no busi
ness ready for its action, a motion was made by a mem
ber from Iowa, that the remainder of the afternoon
session should be occupied in hearing remarks from
distinguished gentlemen present; which motion was
carried. Gen. Hiram Walbridge, of New York, was
first called upon, and addressed the Convention for a
short time.
At the conclusion of his remarks, there were loud
calls for Mr. Drake, who appeared upon the stand,
and was introduced by the President of the Conven
tion, Hon. Hannibal Hamlin, of Maine, Vice Presi
dent of the United States, in these words :
" I take pleasure in presenting to you our friend
Mr. Drake, from that noble and loyal city of the West,
St. Louis, that bright star which shall shine ' brighter
and brighter unto the perfect day.' "
Mr. Drake said :
Mr. President, in behalf of that noble city which I

Speech at Chicago. 263
have the honor to represent in part here, I thank you
for the testimony you have so kindly borne to her
tried and steadfast loyalty. You have not said too
much in her praise. If you were acquainted with,
and would consider, all the circumstances that have
surrounded St. Louis, from the day that the traitor
Governor of Missouri was installed, in January, 1861,
to the present time ; if you could know them as we
who live there have known them, you would say, with
me, that no city in this land deserves higher praise
for loyalty, than St. Louis.
Sir, St. Louis, in the persons of her delegation here,
greets the loyal men of the land in this assemblage,
convened under such circumstances as have probably
hardly been known in the past history of the world.
She extends to you the hand of friendship and frater
nity, feeling that her interests are bound up with
yours, and resolved to live with you, and, if need be,
to die with you. Never, I say, was a body like this
convened under such circumstances as have brought
us together here, on the margin of this fair lake, in
this young but queenly city of the valley of the St.
Lawrence. One part of the nation, covered with
blood, is waging a conflict with the nation's deadly
domestic foes, while another part is-assembled here, by
its representative men, to consider measures which are
to promote the enduring prosperity, in peace and in war,
of our noble and beloved country. With other people,
would such a thing be possible ? Could any other nation
fight, with one hand, a battle for its life, and, with the
other, so fashion and dispense the blessings of peace ?

264 Speech at Chicago.
If I had never before been proud of the title of an
American citizen, I ought to be proud of it now, and so
ought every one of you. We have a right to be proud of
that title. We have a right, too, to be proud of this
glorious valley, which casts its watery wealth over
Niagara ; and of that other and greater valley, which
extending nearly across the continent, pours its tide
of living waters from the high North into the sea
beneath the sun of the tropics ; and we look for the
day when these two continental vales shall, in their
mingling waters, be blended, as it were, into one. We
have a right to be proud of every development of
enegy, enterprise, and improvement; for they all
dignify and elevate us as a people, and give us power
at home, and consideration, yes, and power, too, abroad.
And among all the developments productive of these
results, few have exceeded the simultaneous exhibitions,
warlike and peaceful, of this day.
Is it not wonderful, in view of the last thirty years'
history of this country, that so many separate States,
so many classes of men, so many diverse, if not con
flicting, interests, and so many forms of political
opinion, should "he harmoniously represented in such a
body as this ? Not long ago, the scowl of the South
would have rested upon this assembly, either in the
persons of delegates from that region, or of those who
feared that scowl whenever and wherever it fell upon
them. This body could not then have come here, as
it does now, with one mind and one heart, because,
forsooth, South Carolina, or Virginia, or Arkansas,
and others of those strict-construction, treason-brew-

Speech at , Chicago. 265
Jng States, would have frowned upon the attempt ; and
your politicians would not have dared to come. Now,
unshackled, we stand here freemen — free from South
ern domination, and intending to sweep it, with its
authors, into the Gulf of Mexico. Its day is done.
Never again are we to hear in the Councils of the nation
such words of overbearing defiance of our efforts to
develop the resources of. this .great country through
its national power, as we have heard in times past.
Never more are the freemen of the North to be brow
beaten and humiliated by the slave-driving tyrants of
the South. One of the glorious results of this war,
itself largely compensating . for all the blood the, war
pours out, and for all the treasure it exhausts, is our
perpetual freedom from Southern dictation and control.
Henceforth we can talk and act about such things as
have brought us here to-day, exactly as it pleases our
selves. I do. not propose just now to discuss the matter of
Canals. That will come up in order to-morrow. This
is, as I understand it, a "free fight" here this after
noon. I suppose, Mr. President, we may consider our
selves as in some sense in "Committee of the Whole,"
to use a Congressional phrase ?
The President. Every latitude of debate is allowed.
Mr. Drake. The President says that we may say
exaptly what we please and introduce just such topics
as we choose.
I know of nothing more likely to interest an Ameri*
can audience, — I mean & patriotic American audience —
than some remarks about the war, which has now been
23

266 Speech at Chicago.
waged more than two years against all that we value,
and all that makes our country a blessing to us or a
hope to our posterity. And in the outset of such
remarks, I would take leave to suggest that if there
are any of those interesting characters called Copper
heads in this assembly, it were perhaps as well for
them to retire, if they do not wish to hear some plain
truth about themselves. I do not intend to pay any
particular respect to their feelings.
[At this point there was some disturbance at the end of the
tent, caused by some offensive remarks made by one of the audi
ence. There were calls to "put him out, put him out!" while
some one else was in favor of letting him stay and be converted.
At length order was restored, and several persons called out to
the speaker to "go on."]
Mr. Drake (resuming). I am going on, gentlemen.
I do not come from a place where men are afraid to
speak their minds. I came from a place where Union
men have spoken their minds, in peril, for mbre than
two years ; and I am going to speak my mind here.
The great point in connection with this war to which
I will call your attention, is one which, for some cause
or other, millions of the people of this country seem
to be totally unconscious of or else are shoving it
behind them, so that they shall not look at it. This
is, that we are at this time sustaining a conflict for the
life of this Nation with the institution of Slavery, as
it exists and acts in the Southern States. Yes, it is
Slavery that is battling to destroy our country and its
Constitution! And when I tell you that in 1860
I was a Douglas Democrat, and that I never in my

Speech at Chicago. 267
life had anything to do with an anti-Slavery party
until after Fort Sumter fell, you will understand that
I am no old time anti-Slavery fanatic, undertaking to
harangue you this afternoon. I am telling you the
sober truth when I say to you, that nothing on earth is
assailing your country this hour but the institution of
Southern Slavery. When, then, you hear any one
talk about the " damned Abolitionists," you may know
that he is a traitor or Copperhead.
And now the question is, whether we shall suffer
Slavery to destroy our Constitution and our Union, or
whether we shall destroy it? For my part, I say he
deserves double damnation Whp hesitates one moment
on that point. And now, when -you go home, put
your finger on every beggarly politician who attempts
to convince people that the " damned Abolitionists "
have got up this war, and just wipe him out, so that
he will never be heard of again as long as you live,
or he lives either. You will find such scattered about
all through the loyal States. The Lord only knows
how many there are in this crowd ; for I am very sure
that they have too much impudence to have accepted
my invitation to leave the premises before I began to
talk about them. Look at their complexion. It is not
that of a white man. It is not that of a poor negro.
It is copper, copper, copper all over ! They belong
to the meanest class of reptiles that crawl in the
woods — the Copperhead. And I have a strong notion,
that if we could institute a full investigation into the
history of the case, we should find that it was one of
them that betrayed our mother Eve in the: garden of

268 Speech at Chicago.
Eden. And now I'll tell you what to do with such.
To use a homely phrase, "scotch him!" That is, take
a forked stick, and pin him with it by the neck to the
ground, and leave him there to lash his tail about, as
much as he pleases. His fangs will be -of no use any
more. But that is only half your work. It is what you
have to do here at home. But there is a greater work
than that to be done in the South ; and it calls for all
the power, all the energy, all the resources, all the
bravery, and all the constancy of the American
people, from this time forth, until the jubilee shall
sound for a nation triumphant over its intestine foes.
And I am sure you- will do that work.
There has been talk about Northern men resisting
a draft, if one should be ordered. I tell those men
who dream of such resistance, that whenever the Con
scription law is put into execution, and they attempt
to resist it, it were better for them that they had never
been born. It has taken the Northern people a long
time to be educated up to the demands of this terrible
exigency ; but in the face of defeat and disaster — in
the face of the Copperhead election triumphs that dis
graced some Northern States last year — in the face of
every discouragement, the sentiment of the American
people for the preservation of their Union and Govern
ment, at every hazard and every sacrifice, is now far
in advance of what it has ever- been at any time since
the outbreak of the rebellion. And it is marching on,
marching on, to victory and to glory, and to the utter
destruction of all who stand in its way.

Speech, at Chicago. 269
But every man must1 become a man of iron. Away
with your puling nonsense about Conservatism !
What patriot wants conservatism, in this day, of any
thing but that glorious flag, and the mighty nationality
it represents ? Do you think that your noble Consti
tution haS no innate power to maintain itself, that
Copperheads must become its conservators ? All that
I have to say to you is, that when you go, in your
way, to spending your energies in conservatism of the
Constitution, you are spending them in the conserva
tion of this damnable rebellion. We want no <euch
help in maintaining the Constitution ; nor do we want
such men as you at the helm of the ship of State in
these Stormy days. We want iron men ; and not men
of cold iron either; but men of hot iron, burning
bright with patriotism, and fired with every impulse
that can give strength, force, and elevation to the
American character. And we will have them. We
want no more men to manage public affairs, who are .
so, desperately afraid of hurting Slavery, or offending
its advocates. We want no politicians, looking to the
time of the Union's restoration, and wondering if
they can't then get the Southern vote to help them
along in something, and commend themselves to
Southern lordlings, by being able to say, " Oh, I
never was a Radical against you — I was always a
Conservative." For my part, I reject and despise every impulse of
that kind, and every man that entertains it. He and I
stand the antipodes of each other — I wrapped around,
from head to foot, with my country's flag ; he cover-

270 Speech at Chicago.
ing half his face with his country's flag, and half with
the flag of rebeldom. We want no such men. We
want in every position men of true and earnest stamp.
We want locomotive men, not stage-coach men. We
want men with go-ahead in them. We want men
who have the fire burning within them. We want
men who have steam -power m at their command. We
Want, when we strike, that every blow shall be a blow
that tells — every movement a movement that crushes
rebels: Woe betide the man that holds back one
single atom from consecrating himself and his all to
his country's good! Woe to that politician who trifles
with the great interests of this nation for the sake of
his party ! Woe to him who would dishonor himself
with any emotion of his. heart, or movement of his
hand, in favor of the rebellion which has so deeply
cursed us !
Let us, my friends, improve this auspicious occa
sion. Let us be, here, what We ought to be every
where, and what I doubt not the great mass of you
are, living and earnest patriots. Let us be all that
our country demands of us. Let us not fail to carry
with us, on all occasions, the deepest conviction, that
the only enemy we have to fight in this, rebellion is
the institution of Slavery. When the whole people
shall come to understand this great truth, — when every
man shall see that every other man is fully imbued
with it, then will come our day of deliverance. Then,
too, a halo of glory will encircle the Continent, which
shall be seen brightly glowing in the long vista of
future ages.

IMMEDIATE EMANCIPATION
IN MISSOURI.*

Mr. Drake introduced into the Convention the fol
lowing resolution :
"Resolved, That it is expedient that an ordinance
should be passed by this Convention, providing as fol
lows :
" First. For the emancipation of all slaves in this
State on the first day of January, A. D. 1864 :
" Second. For the perpetual prohibition of negro
Slavery in this State, from and after that date :
" Third. For a system of apprenticeship of the slaves
so emancipated, for such period as may be sufficient to
avoid any serious inconvenience to those interests with
which slave la'bor is now connected, and to prepare the
emancipated blacks for complete freedom :
" Fourth. For submitting said ordinance to a vote of
the people for their ratification or rejection, on the first
Monday of August next."
Upon this resolution Mr. Drake spoke as follows :
The intention of presenting this resolution is to
ascertain, as soon as practicable, the sense of this body
* A speech delivered in the Missouri State Convention, June 16,
1863.

272 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
on the important subject in regard to which, princi
pally, we are called together. Of course I do not
indulge the hope of its escaping opposition. I there
fore deem it proper to accompany its presentation with
an exposition of the reasons which have influenced me
to offer it. I will, first, briefly refer to my own posi
tion, and then state-, with such fullness as may seem
to me necessary, the grounds upon which I favor a
plan of Emancipation such as this resolution points to.
I respectfully crave the candid attention of the Con
vention. Entering this assembly a stranger to two-thirds of
its members, it is fit that I should indicate my . past
position and present views in regard to the institution
of Slavery, in order that all may understand that in
no respect am I influenced, nor shall at any time will
ingly permit myself to be, by any fanatical opinions
or feelings against it as a system of labor. If I know
myself, I approach the subject with as much coolness
of head and calmness of spirit, as if it had never been,
with me or others, a matter of excited discussion. I
know nothing of my own mind and heart, if I am not
actuated by a sincere desire to see the path of duty
here, and to walk in it because it is the path of duty.
And I mean not duty shaped by foregone conclusions,
by party behests, or by unregulated enthusiasm ; but
duty to the highest and purest dictates which can influ
ence me, in view of my responsibility to the people of
Missouri, to posterity, and to God. That duty I will
strive to follow, wherever it may lead, and whatever
the consequences.

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 273
At no period of my life, until after our national flag
was lowered — but not degraded — at Sumter, was I, in
the commonly understood acceptation of the term, an
anti-Slavery man ; much less could it ever have been
truly said of me, before that event or since, that I was
an Abolitionist, in the sense in which that name was
applied and understood for many years before the out
break of the rebellion which now wars upon the Union,
and has brought such accumulated wretchedness to our
own State. But from the day of Sumter's fall, I
hesitate not to declare here, as I have, in effect in other
places, that my preconception in regard to the charac
ter of the Institution of Slavery have been gradually
swept away before the ever-swelling tide of conviction,
that there never was any other origin of this rebellion,
nor any other sustaining power upholding it, than the
wide-spread, long-formed, deliberate and audacious pur
pose to build upon Slavery a mighty Empire, which
beginning its march on the shores of the Gulf of Mex
ico, and spreading first westward and southward, should
in the course of years, as it gained establishment, influ
ence, and power, turn northward, to invest Slavery for
ever with " the mastery of this whole continent." As
that conviction slowly but certainly fixed itself on my
mind, another grew up there, equally forcible and stead
fast — that the movement which Slavery made, in such
godless defiance of all obligations, human and Divine,
to establish itself by the sword as a Power upon this
continent, presented to every human being in the land
the instant and unavoidable alternative of suffering
this great nation to be destroyed or of destroying
24

274 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri,
Slavery, its assailant, wherever it was in arms against
the Union. When that became apparent to me, I
became the foe of Slavery, without a moment's mis
giving, wavering, or thought of change. I saw it was
Country or Slavery ; and I should have held myself a
coward and a traitor, if so seeing, I had hesitated one
second of time as to my course.
In this brief statement you have the explanation of
my present hostility to Slavery. I announce it at the
opening of my service in this body, for two reasons :
First, that my compeers here may fully understand why
I, once a political defender of Slavery, am now its
enemy ; and Secondly, that if there are any here who,
in this desperate conflict between American Slavery
and American Liberty, are on the side of Slavery,
they may make it known. This is the time and this
the place for every man to show under which banner
he ranges.
But, perhaps, there may be those who, agreeing with
me as to Southern Slavery, are yet of the opinion
that Missouri Slavery does not deserve a like condem
nation. Were I of that opinion, it might modify my
views and action here; but my judgment is, that the
spirit of American Slavery is everywhere essentially
the same, and that the history of this rebellion proves
it. Look at our sister State on the East, and mark
the contrast between her. and Missouri during this
war. We have been ravaged, while she sits composed
and unharmed in her queenly beauty. Our soil has
drunk blood like water, while hardly a stain of it is
on hers. Armies have marched and countermarched,

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 275
skirmished and fought within our borders, while not a
battle, great or small, has been waged within hers.
Whole sections of Missouri present tenantless houses,
while her habitations are filled with prosperous and
happy people. Here thousands of deserted farms are
overgrown with weeds; there the whole land yields
bounteously to the hand of peaceful and thrifty labor.
By every roadside in Missouri lie the bones of those slain
by the stealthy shot from the bush, while the citizens
of Illinois, old and young, male and female, travel her
quiet highways, as free from molestation or fear, as if
Slavery were waging no war against their country.
And while no incendiary fires light up her bloom
ing prairies, the guerrilla's fiendish work blazes
almost nightly in lonely spots in our devoted State.
Never did river divide two such variant scenes in the
midst of one people. What means this most striking
difference ? Every member of this Convention knows,
or may know, with clear and undoubting certainty,
that there is but one possible solution of the contrast,
and that is, that Slavery is in Missouri, and is not in
Illinois ! That is what has brought upon our people
the aggravated horrors of the last two years ; that is
what renders life and property in many parts of Mis
souri more insecure than it would be in our Indian
territory; that is what requires our militia to be
armed and alert ; that is what arms multitudes in Mis
souri in defense of their homes and their lives ; that
is what fills our noble State with a bitter and biting
curse, wasting away her very life, and making her, in
many parts, but the stark skeleton of her former self:

276 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
and it is with that we have to deal in this body, rep
resenting the personality and the power of her wronged
and afflicted people. Who doubts, then, that the spirit
of Slavery is everywhere the same ? True, it may be
more actively ferocious and implacable in one region
than in another, as the surrounding circumstances
excite or repress its action ; but still in all places it is
essentially identical. And as Missouri Slavery has,
through many of its votaries and defenders, shown
itself even more rapacious and relentless than Slavery
in other border States, I can perceive no title it can
urge to a stay of that execution of Slavery here, as
over this whole land, by warlike or by peaceful means,
which is to mark its retribution as a traitor and a par
ricide. The institution of Slavery in the United States was
doomed to extinction when South Carolina, by her
ordinance of secession, attempted to make "it the cor
ner- stone of " a confederacy of slaveholding States "
on this continent. From that hour, what had before
been, not only tolerated, but courted and caressed,
lost its hold upon the patriots of the nation, and has
finally become intolerable. The President's Proclama
tion of Emancipation was but the result of a resistless
necessity laid upon the nation to crush its only intes
tine foe. That Proclamation declared Slavery extinct
throughout rebeldom on the first day of this year, and,
practically, it there ceased to be, from the day that
thunderbolt fell upon it. No power on earth can
resuscitate it there; and it lives in the loyal slave
States, only until their people can, by their own peace-

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 277
ful action, do for it among themselves what the Presi
dent, by warlike means, has done for it elsewhere.
The crime which invoked his action was not merely that
of men acting in the interest of Slavery — it was the
crime of the institution itself, which creates and fosters
a passion for predominance and power ; and for that
crime the institution must fall, everywhere throughout
this land. To leave it standing on any spot of this
country, is to leave the way open for future revolts,
disturbing the peace of the nation and threatening the
life of our free institutions. The people begin, at
last, to comprehend this fully, and they are willing to
abandon Slavery to its fate, and thereby save their
country. Pre-eminently and nobly is it true of the
people of Missouri. They are resolved and ready to
sacrifice Slavery on the altar of patriotism. Their
recent manifestations, in my view, leave little room
for cavil or doubt on this point. In their minds there
is no holding back, whatever is in the minds of politi
cians. Their will may possibly be baffled for a time,
but it will certainly conquer. We, their legally dele
gated representatives, will do well to heed their voice.
I, for one, will do so.
The circumstances under which we are called to con
sider the subject of the emancipation of slaves in this
State are without precedent, unless the recent move
ment in West -Virginia should be considered in some
sense a precedent. We are to act under the influence
of a conviction, forced upon us by the peril threaten
ing our nation, and because it is manifest that as long
as this war continues, and Missouri is a slave State,

278 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
she will, for that reason, be subject to incursions from
abroad and convulsions within, which will cripple
her energies, waste her resources, and cover her peo
ple with disaster and grief. In previous instances,
Emancipation has been accomplished in the midst of
peace. There is therefore no similarity of condition
between Missouri and any of the States of the Union
which, in former years adopted gradual systems of
Emancipation. -With them, the whole case was within
their own grasp, free from external pressure; with
us, external circumstances, over which we can exercise
no efficient control, combine with our internal condi
tion to create the exigency which calls for Emancipa
tion. Their modes of action, therefore, should not, in
my judgment, be a criterion for ours. They could
afford to take _ their own time to put Slavery away;
with us, time is not at our disposal, if we would place
Missouri completely and forever beyond the hope of
Southern traitors, and free her from the curse of home
bred treason. The times demand early, direct, and
effective action — in my opinion, demand immediate
Emancipation, and the final exclusion of Slavery from
our territory. I am quite aware that this is a propo
sition to revolutionize, in a considerable degree, the
social organization of our State; but it is a revolution
to save us from blood, instead of plunging us into it;
a revolution for peace, not for war ; a* revolution for
prosperity, not for adversity. If I can succeed in
inducing others to view it in this light, I shall not
doubt the ultimate issue of the action of this body.
I do not intend at this time to discuss to any extent

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 279
the statistics of Missouri Slavery; nor does it now
appear to me important to discuss them at all. Should
my views on this point undergo a change, I may here
after participate in statistical discussions, if they arise.
There are great general aspects of this most weighty
subject, which seem to me to take in enough to sustain
the position I have assumed, and I shall therefore
at present confine myself to them.
In the first place, it has ever been a cardinal doc
trine of the Southern advocates of Slavery, that it
must have room for unrestricted territorial expansion.
I admit if it is to exist at all, as it exists in the South,
it must have such room. The tendency of Slavery is
to large landed estates, with few whites and many
slaves. This requires constant extension of the terri
tory occupied by Slavery. And such is the greater
ratio of increase of slave population than of the white
race, in some parts of the country, that to restrict
Slavery there to certain defined and inexorable limits
would, in the course of time, result in the exclusion of
the whites, and the abandonment of the country to the
blacks, or their constant subjugation by armed force
to the dominion of their masters. Though these views
may not apply as forcibly to Missouri as to the South,
still while Slavery exists there, and here also, she is a
party to their demand for the territorial extension of
Slavery. And now, what is her present, and what is to
be her future, position on this point ? Let us frankly
meet the truth as it stands. She is totally cut off from
the possibility of aiding in expanding slave territory, or
of being a participant in such extension, or in any pos-

280 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
sible scheme having that end in view. I can conceive of
no circumstances under which she can be severed from
the Union. As I said in a public address in April,
1862, so I say now, that " the National Government
would wage endless war — and ought to do so — rather
than suffer her to become the possession of any foreign
power. Her destiny, therefore, is fixed, finally and
irrevocably, in the Union." In considering her rela
tions to Slavery, we are, therefore, to regard her as
isolated from the insurgent States, as absolutely as if
an ocean rolled- between her and them. With terri
tory on her eastern, northern and western borders
made free by the will of the people there, and with
territory on her southern border made free by the
power of the nation through the laws of war, she is
to have no part or lot hereafter forever in any plan,
or hope, or dream of Slavery extension. Hence one
great ligament binding her to that institution is
broken never to be reunited. We are, therefore, to
deal with this subject in the light of that most import
ant fact. And what is its significance to us? In
my judgment, it points to a severance of all the ties
of sympathy between us and an institution which by
its war upon the Union, has, within two years, brought
calamities upon the country vastly overbalancing
all the benefits which its most ardent friends could
claim to have resulted from its whole existence in
this land.
With this primary point settled, two inquiries, close
ly allied to each other, arise, viz : 1. What has Mis
souri gained by the existence of Slavery within her

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 281
borders ? and 2. What can she expect to gain by its
continuance there?
If you point, in the past, to her agricultural produc
tions, largely the result of slave labor, I admit the fact ;
but direct you to the far greater amount produced by
Illinois, in less time, with free labor. If you refer to
her rapidly increasing population, I refer to you to the
marked superiority of Illinois, and even Iowa, in that
respect. The latter, twenty-seven years ago, had
hardly a white inhabitant ; now it is the home of nearly
700,000 people — more than half as many as sixty years
of American occupancy have brought to Missouri. If
you look at her railroads, which have entailed a debt
of more than twenty millions of dollars upon her, I
show you half as much in Iowa, and three times as
much in Illinois, without a dollar of State debt upon
either for them. You can probably name no particular,
except the culture of hemp and tobacco, in which Mis
souri is not far behind her adjacent neighbor on the
east, and soon will be behind her northern neighbor,
if Slavery remains among us. In regard to those two
items of production, she has been placed by slave labor
in the advance; but already since, for the sake of
Slavery, she was dragged into the arena of this fratri
cidal war, she has probably lost ten times more than
all the profits of her hemp and tobacco ever since she
became a State. How then stands the account of profit
and loss in the past from her connection with Slavery ?
Does any one — can any one doubt that the loss of what
she might have been more than she is, and the actual
loss in war of what she had, will more than outweigh

282 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
the largest estimate of the profit she has derived from
Slavery ?
Does the future offer any more cheering prospect ?
With Slavery remaining among us, are we to gain upon,
or even keep up with, our neighbors in the race of pro
gress and improvement? Are we to move forward
with any more rapidity than in the past ? Heretofore,
with as fertile lands as Illinois or Iowa, at less than
half the price of theirs, the tide of emigration has, to a
large extent, avoided Missouri. What is to make it
different in the future ? After this war for Slavery
extension and empire shall have ended in the complete
and final overthrow of Slavery throughout the rebel
States, — as it certainly will, — is it likely that the
adventurous sons of the free States will be so enamored
of Slavery, as to seek homes in the few remaining
States which still cling to this arch-enemy of the Union?
No thoughtful man expects or. believes that they will.
It is therefore as certain as anything future can be,
that, as a slave State, Missouri is still to be, as she has
been, a laggard in the march of progress — is to be far
behind what as a free State she is capable of being — is
to be ever struggling with a self-imposed burden, press
ing her down and paralyzing her energies, till, in some
more favored hour, her people rise with one mighty
impulse, and shame us by doing what we had it in our
power, but lacked wisdom or nerve, to do. In the
meantime, who can estimate the loss to Missouri, by
her failure to assume a position of equality with her
neighbor States ? How much hemp and tobacco, raised
by slave labor, will balance the account? We want

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 283
population! We want it for our immense territory,
hardly yet begun to be developed ; we want it for our
deserted farms and abandoned homesteads ; we want it
to unearth our exhaustless stores of mineral wealth ; we
want it to replace the thousands of our people who
have fallen, and are yet to fall, victims to this cruel
war; we want it to renovate our drooping commerce,
to complete and sustain our improvements, to give
increased value to our lands, to help pay our debt; we
want in short, to make Missouri as great in her mature
development as she is in her native resources ; and in
my deliberate judgment, we shall not get it while
Slavery is among us, and shall get it, certainly and
soon, if we put Slavery away from us.
These are the general views which implant within
me the resolute purpose for the good of Missouri, to
contribute, in every way I can, to remove from her
territory an institution which, I verily believe, has
injured, incomparably more than it has benefited her ;
which promises no compensation to her people for past
calamities ; and which so long as it abides among us,
is to repress her vigor, retard her growth, and stimu
late treason, disloyalty, and rapine. In these views I
am satisfied the great majority of the loyal people of
this State concur.
But while it may be conceded by others that a large
majority of the loyal people of Missouri are for Eman
cipation in some form,- it may be denied that such a
majority exists for Immediate Emancipation. This I
propose to leave to their decision at the ballot-box.
To that decision, if adverse, I will bow with the respect

284 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
due from every man in a republic to the fairly expressed
will of the majority. I desire, however, to place before
the people's delegates, and eventually before the people
themselves, the considerations which influence me to
espouse immediate Emancipation.
In the first place, I believe it of the highest import
ance in reference to the peace of Missouri, that Eman
cipation should be immediate. It is of the utmost
interest to our people, not only to be themselves
assured that Missouri is to remain forever a part of the
Union, but to feel that the whole country has that
assurance. Especially is it of the gravest moment to
them, that all rebeldom should know, past all perad-
venture, that all attempts to entangle her in their meshes
are, and are forever to be, utterly futile. It is most
evident that the rebel leaders have not yet come to know
or believe that she is beyond their grasp. A part of
their plans has been to make the Missouri river their
northern boundary; and it requires something more
than fighting to make them yield that idea. As long
as their piratical power remains unbroken, they will
strive to subject Southern Missouri to their dominion.
And as long as there is any belief among our people of
the possibility of the accomplishment of that object, so
long will the spirit of revolt and plunder be rife among
us, making life and property insecure, unsettling the
foundations of our prosperity, driving valuable popula
tion into the surrounding States for safety, and prevent
ing accessions of people from abroad, except to those
populous places which have within themselves the
capacity of self-defense. Every attempt, too, by the

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 285
rebels to establish themselves within our limits, whether
successful or not, must be attended with terrible injury
to our people; to say nothing of the horrible outrages
of the guerrilla and the bushwacker, carrying fear and
desolation into almost every neighborhood ; or of the
murderous affrays between individuals, which have
already caused so much bloodshed, and threaten so
much more. I wish, if- possible, to put a speedy and
final end to all this, by destroying that which, in my
opinion, is its sole cause. I do not suppose there is a
member of this body, who believes that if Missouri had
been a free State she would have been subjected to the
five-hundredth part of the evils that have befallen her.
Bordering southward upon Arkansas, with no natural
boundary separating her from that State, we could not
have expected such immunity from invasion as Illinois
has enjoyed, with the Ohio river on her south; but still,
without that advantage, we should have been compara
tively free from rebel incursion, if there had been no
Slavery among us. It was our being a slave State
that caused the attempt to take Missouri into the rebel
confederacy; it was our being a slave State that led
some fifteen thousand of our citizens into "Price's
Army ; " it was our being a slave State that invited
that army into our borders ; it was our being a slave
State that has filled our woods with thieving and mur
derous banditti ; in fact, it may be said, without exag- ¦
geration, that hardly a misfortune has befallen our
State within the last two years, which is not directly
and fairly due to the existence of Slavery among us.
And to me it is equally apparent that these calamities

286 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
will cease almost instantly upon the final and irre
vocable displacement of Slavery from our soil. I wish
them to cease at the earliest available moment ; and
every patriot, every Christian, every humane man must
join in that wish. It will be gratified, if Slavery is put
away from us, in such a way as to leave no hope of its
return. A gradual system of Emancipation, extending
through a series of years, would invite agitation for its
repeal the moment this war is ended : a declaration of
immediate Emancipation closes the door forever against
all agitation, and gives us peace. Let no one say that
such agitation will be impossible after the adoption of
an ordinance of gradual emancipation. It will be pos
sible, and probable too, whenever the General Assembly
shall repeal the test-oath ordinance of June, 1862, and
restore to the privileges of citizenship the blood-thirsty
marauders who have ravaged almost every part of
Missouri ; as, in my opinion, that body will do, when
ever by dissimulation, cajolery, and fraud, disloyalty
shall be — as it probably will be, unless baffled by some
action of this Convention — in the ascendant there again.
I would lift from off our State the deadly incubus
which weighs it down, and at the same time leave not
the least ray of hope of its ever being again imposed
upon us. In my judgment immediate Emancipation
will do this, and I can not see that anything else will.
For the sake, therefore, of present peace and lasting
repose, I am for immediate Emancipation.
But not alone on the plea for peace to our people do
I base my advocacy of this policy. As a mere ques
tion of political economy, I hold it to be directly and

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 287
greatly to the interest of our State to declare imme
diate Emancipation. As we all know, the slaves of
Missouri are, to a large extent, its agricultural and
domestic laborers ; in some sections almost its only
ones. I understand, I think, nearly as well as the
people of those sections, that to take from them sud
denly those laborers, without replacing them with
others, would work extended and serious injury ; and,
paradoxical as it may seem to some, it is to avoid that
very result that I would make Emancipation imme
diate. If it be asked how this is to be done, I point
to the condition of our slave population, as known to
every observing and reading man. In whole sections
of the State they are in a ferment ; while in no section,
so far as I can learn, are they in the quiet condition
of two years ago. They are moving or being moved,
all over our territory. From the eastern, northern,
and western borders they are being moved by their
masters to the center, to prevent their moving them
selves beyond the circumference into the free States.
From the center they are being moved into Kentucky,
ostensibly to be employed in raising tobacco, but
really to escape Emancipation. From every part they
are moving themselves into regions where they may
find the freedom they desire, and of which they have
discovered that they can, in our present unsettled
condition, easily avail themselves. There is at this
moment hardly a slave owner in our State, who can lie
down at night with any well-grounded confidence that
the morning will find him in possession of as many
slaves as when he went to sleep-.. The State is daily

288 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
losing its slave laborers, and no man can tell when the
exodus will cease. And what is more momentous, it
is the young, and the vigorous middle-aged men, that
are departing, leaving the old men, the women, and
the children, to be cared for by their masters. What
is to stay this movement ? With war imminent at any
moment ; with an internal condition so disturbed that
pursuit of fugitive slaves is, beyond precedent, of
doubtful result ; with every road beset by marauders
and murderers ; it is notorious that slaves possess,
and know that they possess, facilities for escape, such
as they never had before ; and that they are availing
themselves of them, as they never did before. We
will do well to look at these things as they are. It is
folly to shut our eyes to them. We might as well
realize that our State is rapidly losing its agricultural
laboring strength, and that ere long, in all human
probability, it will lose it entirely, unless some barrier
to this exodus- be interposed. And as we are in no
condition to employ, as effectually as heretofore, a
barrier of force, my view is to take from the slaves
the inducement to seek freedom by flight, by making
them free here. It is not from Missouri they are fly
ing, but from Slavery ; it is not Illinois, Iowa, or Kansas
they are seeking, but freedom ; and for this they leave
old and familiar homes, wives, children, and friends,
to enter upon new scenes among strangers, not know
ing what will be their condition, nor caring what their
fate, so it be met in freedom.
And now, as a merely economical question — as a
simple matter of dollars and cents, I ask if it is not the

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 289
interest of our State to keep those laborers among
us ? What are we to gain by their self-deportation ?
Could we transfer them all, to-day, to another con
tinent, and receive an equivalent accession of white
laborers, we should, I think, be immensely the gainers
by the exchange ; but that is not the point. The
question is, whether we shall quietly see the effective
labor of our agriculture march away from us with
nothing to replace it, or whether we shall pursue such
a policy as will retain it until its place can be sup
plied ? For my part I can see no two sides to such a
question. No sane man believes that a substitute for
a servile population of 80,000 or 100,000 souls can
be obtained in any country or State in a period short
of years ; and least of all in a country that is losing
by war so much of its bone and muscle as this country
is losing now. It is therefore our clear interest, as a
simple matter of political economy, to keep the negroes
here until their places can be filled by white laborers.
If the slaves understand that they are to remain slaves
for an indefinite or a protracted period, they will con
tinue to flee ; and how are we to stop them ? They go
now, day by day, and night by night, and we are
powerless to prevent it. When will this cease ? Not,
I verily believe, until you give them, on our own soil,
at their old homes, the freedom they are seeking else
where ; the aspiration for which has received, in two
years of war for the extension and dominion of Slavery,
a hundred-fold greater impulse, than all the efforts
and appliances of Abolitionists for a quarter of a cen
tury could have given.
25

290 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
It is to avoid this drain of the laboring strength of
our State, and at the same time prevent too severe a
shock to our social organization, from so sudden a
change in our system of labor, that I couple with
immediate Emancipation the idea of a system of ap
prenticeship, which shall retain the negroes in their
positions for a limited period. I desire that Eman
cipation should work as little injury as practicable,
and accomplish for both races the greatest possible
amount of good. I do not think it would be wise or
humane to invest so large a slave population as that
of Missouri, with the instant right of uncontrolled
freedom. In many respects they are like children,' and
need to be educated into a fitness for such freedom.
This is my judgment, founded upon the observation
of more than forty years. But while I would have
them pass through an apprenticeship, I would not
extend that period a day beyond the time necessary to
fit them measurably for entire freedom, and to afford
opportunity for replacing them with white laborers.
If their apprenticeship is to benefit them, or those for
whom they labor, it should not be of such long dura
tion as not to be distinguished by them from a state of
permanent slavery, nor so short as to defeat the great
object of obtaining white labor, equal to the demand,
before the negro' labor is left entirely to its own con
trol. - If the negroes are to remain among us, it is at
once humane toward them and profitable to those for
whom they work, that they should work in hope. My
belief is, that properly managed and influenced, they
are capable of being made, probably, as valuable a

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 291
peasantry as exists. Give them something to live
for — let them feel that they are preparing better to
live for themselves, and I have confidence that they
will be found more capable of enjoying and profiting
by their freedom, than many are accustomed to sup
pose. It should be remembered that we may reason
ably hope for better results of Emancipation here,
than have attended it in other countries, so far as
the negroes are concerned. They have been reared,
and will remain, under better influences of morality
and religion among us, than the slaves emancipated by
England or France were subjected to in the colonial
possessions of those countries. We may hope and
believe that those influences will continue to be
exerted, and be effective, for the elevation of our
black race. I, for one, am sanguine on that point.
It is our interest to teach the blacks all the good, and
as little of evil, as we can. It is our duty as philan
thropists and Christians to do so. And when Christian
duty and self-interest combine, we may well expect
great results. It is to give full opportunity for this,
as well as on account of the other considerations
adverted to, that I desire this class of our population
to come gradually to full freedom ; not through a
slowly expiring system of slavery, but through a
period of apprenticeship, the end of which they can
see to be not far off, and the time spent in which
shall be a time of advancement, not of retrogression,
with them.
This plan ought to, and it seems to me would, avoid
much of the difficulty anticipated by many, of contact

292 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
with so large a population reared in servitude and
then set free. I have met persons who seemed to be
haunted by the idea of dreadful inconvenience, injury,
and peril, to result from the surrounding presence of
free blacks. So far as this relates to rural life, I
confess I have not had such experience as to enable
me to speak advisedly ; but through my whole life I
have been familiar with this subject in cities ; and my
belief is, that much less mischief proceeds from the
free colored population there, than from any equal
number of white people in corresponding condition of
life. Nor am I aware of any moral or physical reason
why their presence among us, after emancipation,
should be so dreaded as some seem to dread it. But
were all their apprehensions well-founded, I claim
that we are just as capable of managing free negroes,
through our laws and our judicial and ministerial
authorities, as of managing the same number of white
people. But were it otherwise, I take the broad
ground that it is far better for the people of Missouri
to encounter all the inconvenience, all the trouble, and
all the hazard of the presence of a large free black
population, through the period of perhaps not more
than a, single generation, than to entail upon future
generations an institution which, as long as it exists,
is to hang like a mill-stone upon our State, and at
some future day, perhaps, bring down upon it again
such disasters as have during the past two years, made
it a field of blood.
I have endeavored, in a spirit of candor, to set
forth the views which lead me to favor immediate

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 293
Emancipation. I doubt if they will be shown to be
intrinsically unsound; and I doubt also whether an
attempt will be made to do so. It is more probable
that the effort will be to decry this policy, on the
ground of its supposed injustice, not to the million
and more of non-slaveholders in our State, but to the
25,000, or less, of our slaveholders. I have heard much
of this alleged injustice, and I expect to hear more of
it here. It is the old clamor by which the interests
of our noble country have been long subordinated to
those of a small fraction of its people ; and I look for
it to play its accustomed part in this great struggle
for the liberation of Missouri from thralldom to " the
peculiar institution." It is proper that it should be
met at the threshold of this discussion, and I will
endeavor to meet it.
It is considered to be a great wrong to the slave
holder to deprive him immediately of his right of
property in his slaves ; and this is by many held to
be a sufficient reason why the best interests of a
great State should be disregarded, or, at any rate,
postponed. What is its real meaning ? That depends
upon the connection in which it is found. In regard
to the question of Emancipation or no Emancipation,
it means no Emancipation under any circumstances —
no tampering with the Divine right of holding the
negro in bondage — no interference with the absolute
privilege of Slavery to establish, extend, and perpetuate
itself wherever it once gains a footing. In regard to
the question of immediate or gradual Emancipation,
it means gradual — the most gradual that can possibly

294 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
be obtained — tha remotest period and the slowest
process that the people can, by the cry of injustice to
the slaveholder be induced to allow. If this is not
its meaning, I confess myself unable to discover it.
Whether so or not, however, I propose to consider this
question of injustice. The views I take of it may be
erroneous, but until their error is made clear to me
I must be guided by them. No impulse of injustice
governs me ; neither do I intend that my judgment
shall be warped by a groundless fear of doing injustice
to those, upon whom it is my honest purpose to confer
what appears to me a signal benefit.
The value of a slave to his owner is two-fold : first,
in the profit of his labor over and above taxation and
the expense of supporting and taking care of him ;
and secondly, in the amount for which, as property,
he can be sold. Let us consider this subject in both
these aspects.
As long as the labor of a slave yields more than the
necessary outlay on his account, the mere compu
tation of income is in favor of his employment as a slave.
But whenever he costs more than his labor is worth,
the account changes, and he becomes a burden to his
owner. Tested by this simple rule, I am of the opinion
that a great majority of the Slaves in Missouri are this
day unprofitable to their owners. But setting aside
the old, the infirm, and the very young, and fixing
attention upon those who yield the largest profit, I am
satisfied that their labor, in freedom, would be far more
valuable than it has ever been in bondage. Repeated
experiments have been made in the Southern States, of

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 295
paying slaves for their labor, and requiring them to
support themselves. In every such instance which has
come to my knowledge, either through publications or
private sources, it has been found that the negro worked
better and produced more, when paid, than when not.
This is a most instructive and pregnant fact. It teaches
us that, regarding the negro merely as a laborer, there
is not the least injustice to the owner in changing him
from a bond to a hired laborer ; but, on the contrary,
a positive benefit. For we have no reason to doubt
that the same result which has followed experimental
changes of that description, would attend a similar
change in our entire system. It is no answer to this
view, to say that the negro will not work, unless compel
led by authority, or driven to it by his necessities. We
do not know that ; but, on the other hand, we know
that free negroes, all over this country, do work, as
white men work, for the support of themselves and their
families, and do exhibit steady industry and thoughtful
frugality. There is then no injustice to the slaveholder
in changing his relation to the negro, so as to pay for
his labor, and thereby realize a larger profit from it,
than if the latter were a slave.
The alleged injustice must therefore be, in depriving
the owner, by the emancipation of his slave, of the right
of selling the slave as a chattel. On this pomt the fact
of deprivation can not be denied, if the slave remains
in this State up to the day mentioned in the resolution.
But he who does not wish his slaves to be freed on that
day, will previously remove them to some other State,
where he can sell them, or, if he please, retain them in

296 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
slavery. The inconvenience to him of such removal is
no just ground for delaying a measure that is fraught
with the most momentous results to the present and
future people of this State.
But suppose no slaves should be removed before the
day named, and all then in the State should become
free, how would the matter stand? Assuming the
President's Proclamation of January 1st, 1863, to be
operative and effectual, as I certainly do, the Southern
market for the slaves of the border States is gone for
ever, and with it has gone a large part of the market
value of Missouri slaves. This may be an unpalatable
truth, but it is, nevertheless, the truth. The presence
of war in this State, creating exceeding insecurity of
slave property, tends still further to diminish its
marketable value. It is, therefore, I conceive, entirely
fair to consider the market value of Missouri slaves
reduced at this time to an average of one-half, or less,
of what it was in 1860. And when you throw out
of the consideration the question of injustice to the
slave owners, the large number of such who have parti
cipated actively in this rebellion, or given it aid and
comfort, and whose slaves are therefore in fact free,
under the Act of Congress of July 17, 1862, though
still held in bondage; and also put aside the vast throng
of other disloyal owners, who are not entitled to any
consideration whatever at. our hands;, and also lay out
of view, first, the large number of slaveholders who, in
violation of law, let their slaves hire their own time,
and by that violation disentitle themselves to our favor;
and second, the other large numbers who are totally

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 297
indifferent as to whether they retain their slaves or not ;
and third, the still larger number, as I would hope and
believe, of true and earnest patriots, who either desire,
or will cordially agree to, immediate Emancipation, for
the sake of the Union and of peace: when you put
aside the grand array of slaveholders embraced in these
various, classes, you would find, if a correct result could
be arrived at, that only a very small proportion of the
supposed number of 25,000 slaveholders in the State
would be entitled or disposed to complain of the injus
tice done them by immediate Emancipation. Concern
ing them I would say, first, that if they are landholders
— as, doubtless, nine-tenths of them are— they will
certainly, as a body, and probably in each individual
case, be far more than compensated for the loss upon
their slaves, by the increased value of their lands, pro
duced by Emancipation ; and secondly, if they are not
landholders, they will be more than compensated by the
general flow of prosperity, beyond anything previously
known, which will assuredly result from Missouri's
becoming a free State.
But even supposing these views untenable, and
admitting all the injury to the slaveholders which i3
claimed, then I close this branch of the discussion with
the distinct announcement that, in my opinion, in such
a dire emergency as that now upon us, individual inter
ests, and interests of classes, must give way to the
general good. Were it in my power, by any act of
mine, to accomplish immediate Emancipation without
inconvenience to any single loyal slaveholder in our
State, I would joyfully do it; but I have no such
26

298 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
power. My duty here is to legislate, not for individuals
or classes, but for the whole of our people; not for the
Missouri of to-day merely, but for the Missouri that is
to be here, perhaps, for ages to come; not for the
present generation only, but for the unborn generations
that are to fill our extended territory in the long future ;
not for our State alone, but for our whole glorious
country ; not for the sordid behests of expiring, but still
grasping, Slavery, but for the beneficent expansion
and perpetuation of an ennobling and deathless Freedom.
I endeavor to rise to the height of the great occasion,
and with such distant approach to statesmanship as I
can make, to view the mighty interests staked on our
action ; and I neither can nor will suffer myself to be
swerved from the path of duty, as it seems plain to me,
by an undue deference to individuals or classes. In
this great conflict for the redemption of a State fit to
be in itself an Empire, private interests must be sacri
ficed, if necessary, to those of the vast aggregate, pres
ent and prospective, whose enduring welfare demands
our first care and our highest consideration. This is
my standard of duty, and by it I will stand or fall.
And now I will close my remarks on this particular
topic, with a notice of the moral aspect of an appeal
against immediate Emancipation, based on injustice to
slaveholders. The whole foundation of this allegation
of injustice, if it has any, is in immediately taking away
from one man the right to hold another man in bondage,
and to sell him as a slave, instead of taking it away at
a distant day. I have no comments to make here upon
the morality of Slavery ; for itssins are infinitely more

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 299
heinous in my view, than any intrinsic immorality
which may be attributed to it; and they are enough
for all my purposes now. I therefore pass by the
moral questions involved in Slavery itself, to direct
your attention to the true character of any appeal to
you on the score of injustice to slaveholders. You will
agree with me, that in all the history of the world, no
nation was ever so threatened, assailed, and endangered
by intestine enemies, as this nation has been for more
than two years. You will agree with me, that it has
struggled and is still ^struggling for its life. You will
agree with me, — perhaps, not all, but most of you, —
that it is the institution of Slavery, and nothing else,
that menaces our national existence. You will agree
with me, — perhaps not all, but most of you, — that
every drop of blood which has been shed, every life
that has been sacrificed, every ghastly wound that has?
been inflicted, every widow and orphan that has been
made, every house that has been desolated, lays its
account, before God and man, at the door of Slavery.
You will agree with me, all of you, that Missouri has
suffered her full share of these dreadful afflictions ;
so that were the signs of mourning to mark every
habitation upon which they have fallen, our whole State
should be draped in black this day. And you will
agree with me, — perhaps not unanimously, — that as
long as Slavery exists here, this torrent of unheard-of
misery is to continue to pour upon us, and that it will
cease when Slavery ceases with us, and not before.
And now, in the full light of all this, you will probably
be appealed to, to stay the emancipating act for years,

300 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
perhaps many years, because it is unjust to a few thou
sands of our more than a million of people, to deprive
them suddenly of the right to hold men and women as
their property, and of the privilege of profiting by the
continuance among us of that institution, which is " the
cause of all our woe ! " What is this, in plain terms,
but an invocation of continued feud, war, rapine, and
death, rather than that the small part of our population
who are slaveholders should now, instead of years hence,
cease to have the right to sell the negro as a slave?
Can you make aught else of it? If you can, show it;
if you can not, then agree with me that the spirit of
Slavery is everywhere the same ; that it is always sel
fish, greedy, and remorseless ; that in Missouri it is
not less so than elsewhere ; and that it is as impossible
for devotion to Slavery and vital generous patriotism
to co-exist in the same heart, as it is for fire to rest
unquenched upon the bosom of the great river that
laves the base of the capitol in which we sit.
It will not have escaped notice, that I have made no
reference to compensation by the State to the owners
of slaves. On that subject my words will be very
few. In the first place, there is no Constitutional
injunction upon this body, as there is upon the Legis
lature, to provide such compensation, as a pre-requis-
ite to Emancipation ; and there is therefore no Consti
tutional obligation upon us to consider the question.
In the next place, compensation by the State, out of
her own resources, is an absolute impossibility; and
therefore it is useless to discuss it. It could be got
from the people of Missouri only by long-continued

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 301
and most grievous taxation, which they would not
bear, and which I never would, by any act of mine,
help to impose upon them. Should the nation, in pur
suance of the resolution adopted by the last Congress,
hereafter grant money or bonds to compensate our
few thousand loyal slaveholders for doing what patri
otism and humanity ought to make them do without
compensation, let them receive the money, if they
please. Were I a slaveholder, I would scorn to touch
a dime of it. And there is one other contingency in
which I would vote compensation to loyal slaveholders,
and that is, when our rebel and traitorous slavehold
ers, and their sympathizing pro-Slavery friends, shall,
in any way they may devise, — about which "no ques
tions asked," — obtain and pay into the State Treasury,
in " Bankable Funds " or in "greenbacks," gold not
required, — a sum sufficient to indemnify Missouri for
all the ravage, destruction, and misery she has endur
ed through their efforts to drag her out of the Union.
When official information is obtained that Slavery has
thus balanced its accounts with Missouri, there will be
little difficulty about compensation. Until that fund
is provided — which I confess does not seem to me very
near at hand; or the nation comes to our aid— of
which I am not hopeful ; compensation is a fantasy,
or, in less elegant phrase, a humbug, and might as well
be treated as such, here and elsewhere.
Having thus, gentlemen of the Convention, placed
before you the views I entertain on this most import-
ant subject, I invoke you to a calm and deliberate con
sideration of our position as a body in_ reference to

302 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
Slavery. Why are we called together now? Less
than two years ago, on the 3d of August, 1861, our
present Governor, in a Proclamation to the people of
Missouri, issued upon his taking the reins of the
Provisional Government, declared that his appoint
ment as Provisional Governor would " satisfy all, that
no countenance would be afforded to any scheme, or
any conduct calculated in any degree to interfere with
the institution of Slavery existing in the State, and
that to the very utmost extent of Executive power
that institution would be protected." From any man
such language could not be misunderstood; but from
a man who during forty years of life as a lawyer had
bent the energies of a keen and powerful mind to the
study of the meaning and use of words, it had, to my
mind, and I believe to the whole mind of Missouri, a
most distinct and unmistakable import. I do not sup
pose that an intelligent man ever read the sentence,
who did not receive from it the impression that our
State Administration had passed into the hands of a
pro-Slavery man, and would be conducted by him in
the interest of Slavery. On the 13th of June, 1862,
the same Governor transmitted to this body a message
suggesting that its action in laying on the table an
ordinance providing for submitting to a vote of the
people a gradual scheme of Emancipation, after Con
gress had, at the suggestion of the President, passed
a resolution offering national aid to any of the slave
States that might see proper to adopt such a measure,
might "be represented as rudely discourteous to the
President and Congress; and that some "direct

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 303
response " should be made, as " an act of courtesy to
the authorities of our Government, who had made a
proposition which, if it ever be carried into effect,
would exhibit the greatest liberality." In that roes-
sage the Governor intimated to the Convention that its
members might, before their constituents, justify the
refusal to allow the question of Emancipation to be
discussed, and the laying of the proposed ordinance
on the table, by taking the position, that it was " well
warranted in declining to act upon the proposition,
upon the ground that the people, in choosing the Con
vention, never intended or imagined that the body
would undertake any social revolution wholly uncon
nected with the relations between the State and the
General Government." And so confident was the
Governor in the correctness of this position, that he
added the significant declaration, that " no person who
understands the principles of our Government would
object to such action, unless it be one who is willing
to disregard all principle to accomplish a desired end."
Ten months and, two days after that message was sent,
the Governor issues a call for this Convention to
assemble, "to consult and act upon the subject of
the Emancipation of Slaves ;" declaring it " of the
highest importance to the interest of the State that
some scheme of Emancipation should be adopted;"
and his message to this body yesterday reiterates that
opinion in emphatic and impressive terms.
I refer to these acts and declarations of the Gover
nor, not because I think his change in any degree
unworthy of his high character and position, but for

304 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
reasons which I will proceed to state. In the first
place, the people do not understand why he should
call us together to overthrow the institution of Slave
ry, when he had previously declared " that to the very
utmost extent of Executive power, that institution
would be protected." Nor do they understand why
this Convention, nearly nine-tenths of whose members
were elected two years and four months ago, — as he
considered for other purposes, — should now be invoked
to act on Emancipation, while a proposition is still
pending before our Legislature, — which is to reassem
ble in November next, — for the election of another
Convention, which would come fresh from the people,
and certainly represent their views. Nor do they
understand why he should convene this body, which,
one year ago, he declared to have no power over the
subject ; and which then signalized its opposition to
Emancipation, by relentlessly stifling debate upon it,
against the entreaties and remonstrances of its friends,
and laying upon the table, by a vote of nearly three to
one a scheme of very gradual emancipation. The people
do not understand these things ; nor do they entertain
much hope of good to Emancipation from this body.
They fear that its call at this time, though perhaps not
so intended, may result in the practical defeat of Eman
cipation, by the adoption of some scheme so feeble
and inert as to prolong Slavery in this State, with a
continuance of the wretchedness it has brought upon
us, until some distant day; when, with rebels, guer
rillas, and bushwhackers restored to the privilege of a
ballot, Emancipation will be repealed, our State given

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 305
over again to the dominion of Slavery, and anti-
Slavery men and Union men driven from its borders,
or trampled under foot. I do not say that this was
the purpose, or even in the mind, of the Executive in
convening us now ; but that the great mass of our
loyal people fear that, such may be the result of our
assembling. And as one of the few in this body who
represent the latest expression of a part of our people,
directly upon the all-engrossing topic of Emancipa
tion, I ask this Convention to be cautious how it gives,
by its action, any confirmation of the popular belief
and fears to which I have referred. The people are
in no mood to be trifled with in this matter. They
have their eyes upon us, and they will not take them
off. They know what Emancipation means, and they
likewise know what bogus Emancipation means. They
know that the former will bring them relief from the
incalculable sufferings they have endured through two
nightmare years ; and that the latter will but prolong
those sufferings. And now, not in the spirit of bravado
or menace, but to say with all plainness of speech what
the circumstances seem to me to require, I say that
whoever here misrepresents the will of his constitu
ents on this subject, is as certainly a doomed man with
them, as he is doomed some time to die ! . To those
original members who represent districts that have
recently filled vacancies by electing immediate Emanci
pationists, this matter seems to me to commend itself in
a very special manner. I know well that they do not
stand or fall by my judgment, but by the judgment
of their constituents ; and that will be a judgment of

306 Immediate Emancipation in Missouri.
approval or condemnation, just as their last-expressed
will is obeyed or contemned. Let him beware of the
future who contemns it !
Another object I had in view in referring to those
acts and declarations of the Governor, was to point
you to the significance of his complete and auspicious
change of mind in regard to Emancipation. Do you
not see that he moves with public opinion against
Slavery? Do you not see the hand-writing on the
wall? If not, I pray you to open your eyes to it, and
read the doom of Slavery in Missouri, written by her
loyal people, in characters never to be effaced. Read
it in the changed views and action of the Executive;
in the results of recent elections to fill vacancies in
this body; in the primary assemblies of the people;
in the tone of the public press, with few exceptions,
throughout our State ; in the sudden and precipitate
abandonment of Slavery's defense by obstinate pro-
Slavery men in every quarter; in every form and
phase in which the stern and steady resolve that
Slavery shall cease to exist on our soil, and that right
early, can make itself known. You can not protect
it, or prop it up, or defend it. Its prestige is gone;
it has lost its power ; it is in disgrace. It stands at
the bar of public opinion in Missouri condemned by its
fruits, hopelessly and without possibility of appeal.
It has ever been a clog upon our advance and prosper
ity. It has allied us to the insurrectionary States. It
has made our territory the field of civil war. It keeps
up the domestic strife now desolating our State, when
the rebel armies are at a hopeless distance. It fills

Immediate Emancipation in Missouri. 307
our woods with robbing and murdering hordes, who
are fed, clothed, and sheltered, warned of approaching
danger, and guided to pillage and blood, by the neigh
bors of their victims. It transforms our men, and,
God forgive them! our women, too,, into implacable
enemies of Union men, into treacherous betrayers of
their former friends, into spies and informers, into pur
veyors of revenge, rapine, and assassination. Against
this common enemy, all classes of our people make
common cause. Every great interest in our State
wars upon it. Farmers, mechanics, merchants, manu
facturers, professional men, speculators, land owners,
steamboat men, railroad men, and multitudes of slave
holders, all combine to attack it. Reason, evidence,
and experience are against it. The past condemns it;
the future rejects it; the present deals it deadly blows.
The people are marching over it. Politicians abandon
it, as rats a falling house. It is iri fact dead! We
are here to bury it. They who cling to it cling to a
corpse, and will be buried with it. No man who
upholds it now will be trusted by the people, except
perhaps in a few spots of our State, from this time
forward. You can not save it, but you may lose your
self in the effort. When the wrecked vessel goes
down, it is they who cling to it to the last, that go
down with it.

THE MISSOURI CONVENTION,

AND ITS EMANCIPATION WORK.*

I do not appear before you this evening to give
account of my performance of the service in our State
Convention, to which I was assigned by the voters of
this city and county. My acts, and, in a very small
part, my words in that body, during the fifteen momen
tous days of its session, have been given to the world,
and the judgment of my constituents has passed, or
soon will pass upon them. I am not here to ask what
that judgment is or will be ; nor to defend any of my
acts ; nor to challenge applause for any. I performed
my duty conscientiously, according to my best judg
ment, and that is enough for me to know. If any
man thinks he could have shown a better judgment on
any point, had he filled my place, I can only regret
that he was not there to do it.
My object in responding to the invitation to address
you this evening is, in as few and plain words as may
be, to convey to your minds a definite and distinct
impression of the spirit and acts of that body, which,
* A Speech delivered in St. Loais, July 9, i863.

The Missouri Convention. 309
elected in February, 1861, for certain well-understood
purposes, was called together in June, 1863, for other
and far different purposes. It is due to the truth of
history that this matter should be understood; and, if
you will give me your attention, I am confident you will
understand it in its true light.
I will not stop to discuss the question whether under
the law authorizing the election of a Convention, that
body, when elected and convened, had the rightful
power to act upon the subject of the emancipation of
slaves. That is a point to be settled by the Judiciary,
not by the people. It is sufficient to say that it is an
open question, which the Judiciary may sometime be
required to determine, and upon which your opinion
or mine, expressed in popular meetings, can have no
weight. Conceding for the present the power, I turn
to other matters properly cognizable by the people in
their primary assemblies.
The Convention, it is universally agreed, was not
elected with any reference to the subject of Emanci
pation. Throughout the whole State, not one single
voter, in February, 1861, dreamed that it would ever
be called to act upon that subject. It held three
separate sessions, in February, July, and October, 1861,
without a word being said by a single member about
Emancipation. A historian, examining its journal and
proceedings during those three sessions, would not
suppose that it had any more to do with Emancipation
in Missouri, than in the kingdom of Dahomey. It met
again in June, 1862. During that session, on the 7th
day of June, Judge Breckinridge introduced into the

310 The Missouri Convention.

Convention "An Ordinance to provide for submitting
to a vote of the people of Missouri certain amendments
to the Constitution, and a scheme for the gradual eman
cipation of slaves;" and accompanied its introduction
with a speech in its favor. At the conclusion of that
speech, Judge Hall of Randolph, moved to lay the
Ordinance on the table, which was done by a vote of
52 to 19; and so ended the first attempt to bring the
subject of Emancipation before the Convention. The
motion to lay on the table cut off debate, and the
speech of Judge Breckinridge was therefore aU that
was said about Emancipation, pro or con, in the Con
vention, from the day it first met, in February, 1861,
to the day it closed its fourth session in June, 1862.
I am thus particular in this statement, because it
will be presently seen to connect with other facts, of
interest in the elucidation of the spirit and purpose of
Governor Gamble in calling the Convention together,
and of the Convention when it met in pursuance of his
call. The tabling of Judge Breckinridge's Ordinance
meant that the Convention was, on the 7th of June,
1862, opposed to any action on the subject of Emanci
pation; so much opposed that it would not even listen
to a word from any other member than him; and
doubtless he was listened to, only because he had the
floor before the motion of Judge Hall could be made.
Soon after the Convention had so disposed of Judge
Breckinridge's proposition, the Governor became aware
that, in one respect, a mistake had been committed,
which it was important should be rectified. You will
remember that on the 10th of April, 1862, the Congress

And its Emancipation Work. 311
of the United States, at the solicitation of the Presi
dent, passed a joint resolution, in the following words :
" That the United States ought to co-operate with
any State which may adopt gradual abolishment of
Slavery, giving to such State pecuniary aid, to be
used by such State in its discretion, to compensate for
the inconveniences, public and private, produced by
such change of system."
This resolution was characterized by Governor Gam
ble as "a proposition of unexampled liberality;" and
he saw that the action of the Convention on Judge
Breckinridge's Ordinance was but a poor return, on
the part of Missouri, for an offer which was as gener
ous as it was unprecedented. On the 13th of June,
1862, therefore, he sent a message to the Convention,
calling attention to the fact that its action "would
without doubt, be so misrepresented as to excite a hos
tile feeling to the State among all those in authority
who favor Emancipation, and thus injuriously affect
the interests of the State. And as no reason could
be given upon the motion by which the ordinance was
disposed of, the result might be represented as rudely
discourteous to the President and Congress."
You will notice in this language of the Governor no
reference to the policy or expediency of Emancipation,
though the general Government had offered aid in the
work. I do not say that the circumstances demanded
such a reference ; nor do I reproach or criticize him
for the absence of it; but refer to it as a singular fea
ture of his message, when brought into view along with
the succeeding portion of that document, to which I
will now call your attention.

312 Thi Missouri Convention,
The object of the message, manifest upon its face,
was to furnish the Convention with prepared excuses
for their action, not only to the President and Congress,
but to their constituents. It was an amiable service
on the part of the Governor, which was doubtless
appreciated by the Convention; particularly as that
body, intensely pro-Slavery as it was, could not have
been blind, any more than he was, to the rising feeling
in favor of Emancipation, which was making itself
manifest over the whole State, in such a way as not to
be disregarded.
The Governor first suggests excuses in the following
terms :
"If, in the understanding of the Convention it was
not contemplated by the people, when electing the
body, that it should ever act upon the subject of Sla
very in the State,, and therefore such action would be
improper; or, if the Convention believes that the public
mind is so agitated already that the proposal of any
scheme of Emancipation would produce dangerous
excitement, there can be no objection to assigning
either as a reason for abstaining from action upon the
subject, and leaving it to a different body or another
time." Now, assuming the Governor to have been sincere
in these suggestions, as I certainly do, what is their
meaning? The form in which they are put is, to be
sure, that of a supposition that the Convention might
think as he there suggests ; but no man can read those
sentences without being convinced that they expressed
the Governor's own sentiments; which may be thus
compendiously stated :
1. It was not contemplated by the people, when

And its Emancipation Work. 313
electing the Convention, that it should ever act upon the
subject of Slavery in the State, and therefore such
action would be improper : and
2. The public mind was so agitated already, that
the proposal of any scheme of Emancipation would
produce dangerous excitement.
Such were the Executive suggestions, embodying
the Executive opinions. But the Governor did not
stop at suggesting excuses : he volunteered to furnish
the Convention with an argument, which I present in
his own words, as follows :
"In theory, conventions are understood to possess
all political power, but in actual practice they confine
themselves to the measures upon which the people, at
the time of their election, expected them to act. When
this Convention was chosen, the subject before the
public mind was the relation between the State and the
general Government. Acting upon this subject, the
Convention deposed a Governor and Legislature,
because they were trying to disturb those relations;
militia ordinances were adopted, because a military
force was necessary to maintain those relations; the'
offices of all persons who refused to take an oath
of allegiance were vacated, because official power in
the hands of disloyal persons might be employed to
disturb such relations; laws were vacated, because they
had been passed for the purpose of bringing on a col
lision with the general Government — in fine, the action
of the Convention has been mainly addressed to the
one subject which it was elected to consider, and to
those which arose out of it.
" When, then, it is asked to entertain a proposition,
which is to effect a radical change in the social organi
zation of the State, it is well warranted in declining to
27

314 The Missouri Convention,
act upon the proposition, upon the ground that the
people, in choosing the Convention never intended or
imagined that the body would undertake any social revo
lution- wholly unconnected with the relations between
the State and the general Government. No person
who understands the principles of our Government
would object to such action, unless it be one who is
willing to disregard all principle to accomplish a desired
end." This language, you will remember, came from Gov
ernor Gamble — a man who has been more than forty
years a lawyer, who was at one time Presiding . Judge
of the Supreme Court of this State, and who was,
when he wrote it, in the full possession of his intel
lectual faculties. It sums itself up in these five distinct
propositions, to which he gave the full sanction of his
personal, legal, and official character, to-wit:
1. That Emancipation is a social revolution.
2. That it is wholly unconnected with the relations
between the State and the general Government.
3. That the people in choosing the Convention
never intended or imagined that it would undertake to
act on the subject of Emancipation.
4. That, therefore, the Convention was well -war
ranted in declining to act upon it.
5. That, whoever, understanding the principles of
our government, would object to the Convention's so
declining to act, is willing to disregard all principle to
accomplish a desired end.
Such were the doctrines promulgated by the Gover
nor, on the 13th of June, 1862. I reproduce them
now, not as new matter, with which this audience may

And its Emancipation Work. 315
not have become acquainted, but because it is impor
tant that they should be viewed in the connection in
which I am about to place them. Remark, that not
one of those propositions is of a temporary character,
which might be good in 1862, but not in 1863. They,
each and all, go to the root of the matter, and strike
at the propriety of the Convention's acting at all upon
the subject of Emancipation at any time, or under any
circumstances ; for the manifest reason that the people
" never intended or imagined " that it should act upon
that subject. In other words, the Convention was
not elected for any such purpose, and therefore should
not touch the subject. This was his opinion then,
and it has never since been disavowed, that I have
heard of.
Why, then, did Governor Gamble, in April, 1863,
call that Convention together again, for the express
purpose of acting upon that very subject? Were the
reasons which, ten months before, seemed to him so
potent against such action, any less potent when he
issued that call ? Did he, in his message to the Con
vention, when it was assembled under that call, tell
that body wherein those reasons had ceased to be valid?
Nothing of that kind appears in that document. For
aught that has come from him, they were just as valid
when the Convention met, on the 15th of June, 1863,
as when he sent in his message on the 13th of June,
1862. Such being the case, he stands self-convicted
of inviting the Convention to do an act which he be
lieved it wrong for that body to do ; which the people
never intended or imagined it should do ; which it

316 The Missouri Convention,
never could do, without his Executive call ; and which
he had, in effect, solemnly declared no man would have
it do, who was not willing to disregard all principle !
The question returns, then, Why did he re-assemble
that Convention, to act upon Emancipation ? What is
the explanation of such an act ? When he became
Governor, he proclaimed to the world that " no coun
tenance would be afforded to any scheme or any
conduct calculated in any degree to interfere with the
institution of Slavery existing in this State : " why
should he set in motion the machinery that was, not
only to interfere with, but destroy that institution?
He knew that the Convention was not only not elected
with reference to Emancipation, but that it had before
" killed Emancipation at the first pop : " why call it
to bring Emancipation to life again ? He knew that it
was an incorrigible pro-Slavery body, a clear majority
of all of whose members had, in 1862, promptly
crushed the life out of a very feeble scheme calculated
to interfere with the institution of Slavery : " why
did he call upon those same men to take the exactly
opposite course, and crush the life out of Slavery?
Why did he do this, when there was at the very time
he did it, and still is, pending in our Legislature, which
is to re-assemble in November next, a proposition to
elect a new Convention, for the express purpose of
acting on that particular subject ?
My friends, I do not know what was in Governor
Gamble's mind when he issued the call for that Con
vention, elected in February, 1861, to meet in June,
1863, to deal with a subject which he considered, in

And its Emancipation Work. 317
June, 1862, it ought not to deal with at all ; for he has
never declared it publicly, -or to me individually. I
can only look at the facts as they are, and draw my
own conclusions from them ; such conclusions as an
impartial historian would deduce ; such as, in my
opinion, every sensible and straightforward man is
justified in deducing ; such as, I have no doubt, the
world's opinion will settle down upon. The whole
matter lies in a nutshell. Governor Gamble, and
those who act with him, saw that a public sentiment
was rising, over our whole State, in favor of the removal
of the curse of Slavery from our soil ; that the people
were rapidly .wheeling into line in favor of immediate
Emancipation ; and that they also demanded the elec
tion of a Governor and other State officers, in lieu of
those set over them by the Convention. It was neces
sary, in some way or other, to thwart this movement,
or it would sweep the Governor and his party over
board, whenever the people should have access to the
ballot-box. How was it to be done? To take issue
with it, was certain destruction to him and his parti
sans. There was only one other way, and that was to
take the wind out of the sails of the Emancipationists,
by calling the old, almost defunct, pro-Slavery Con
vention together, and let it ordain Emancipation, at
such time as it could be cajoled or frightened into
adopting, no matter how distant or protracted, and
then go before the people as they are now doing, and
demand and urge acquiescence in its action as a final
settlement of the whole matter ! It was a cunning
game, well played, and doubtless expected to be sue-

318 The Missouri Convention,
*
cessful. It was a bold game, too, as it had need to be ;
for upon its success depended, perhaps, the mainte
nance and consolidation of enormous power in the
hands of the Governor and his parasites. But it was
no honest game, and it will not win, if the people come
to understand it, as I doubt not they will.
When such a Convention met, under such auspices,
what could be expected from it ? It took but a single
day to discover that it was a packed, compact, and
thoroughly-drilled body. Every man who could he
relied on by the pro-Slavery leaders was in his place,
and knew his position and his work. Men were there
who had absented themselves, from previous sessions.
Men of known disloyalty were there, too. The imme
diate Emancipationists were not one-fourth of the whole.
Among them it so happened that I was almost the
only one who had been much accustomed to engaging
in debate; while on the other side were some half-
dozen able debaters, with the Governor at their head.
The odds were tremendously against us. And yet, on
the first day of the session, an attempt was made
to induce the Convention to ask General Schofield to
extend the parole of Mr. Marmaduke, a pro-Slavery
member, and an avowed Secessionist, then under mili
tary durance in this city, so as to allow him to take
his seat in the Convention. I resisted it, from 'first to
last ; and though the .Convention finally declared that
it had no desire, upon the facts before it, that Mr. Mar
maduke should be prevented by military restraint from
attending its sessions, it seems that General Schofield
had such a desire, upon the facts before him; for, instead

And its Emancipation Work. 319
of allowing the gentleman to visit Jefferson City and
sit in the Convention, he gave him a free passage to
Dixie, with full privilege to sit in any Convention he
can find in that happy land.
I mention this, as a circumstance indicating the effort
to array the whole pro-Slavery strength of the body.
All that strength was there, that could be got there ;
was there for a specific purpose ; was there to destroy
the Radical Emancipation party, by seeming to do its
work; was there to ordain bogus Emancipation, in the
hope that the people could be made to accept it as
genuine ; was there to practice a " confidence game "
upon the people, and then " garotte " them, so that
their voice should never be heard ; was there to set up
the will of a majority of eighty-odd men over the will
of a majority of the people ; was there to subject the
people, in effect, to the relentless sway of a dyirig
pro-Slavery oligarchy ; which, thank God ! died within
an hour after it did the work it was called to do.
Rejoice, Missouri, that the re-assembling of that Con
vention is forever impossible !
Having thus shown you the true character of that
body, I will briefly refer to its proceedings and acts.
They were characterized by as determined a disregard
of the popular will, as probably was ever shown by a
deliberative body in this country. It was evident to
me, from the first, that nothing was to be hoped from
it in accordance with the will of the great mass of the
people. Two great objects held the majority together :
First, the continuance of the present State Adminis
tration in power, in spite of the demand of the people

320 The Missouri Convention,
to be permitted to choose their own rulers ; and
Second, the adoption of some scheme of Emancipation,
no matter how distant in its operation, with which to
stifle the cry of the people for action on that subject :
both to be pursued with the purpose of breaking up
the Radical party.
In connection with the first-named object, a very
solemn farce was enacted. The Governor resigned
his office ; was asked to take his resignation back ;
took it back ; and is Governor yet ! It required but the
sagacity of a mouse to foresee that result, from the
moment the Governor's message was read, declaring
his resignation to take effect upon the last day of that
session. There were those there, however, who were
willing to take the Governor at his word. On the
third day of the session, Mr. Eitzen introduced an
Ordinance, providing for 'the election, on the first
Monday of August next, of a Governor, Lieutenant
Governor and other State officers, which, on motion of
Judge Hall, was incontinently laid on the table, where
it sleeps yet. On the 22d of June, I introduced a
resolution for the appointment of a committee to report
an Ordinance for the election, on the 6th of October
next, of a Governor, Lieutenant Governor and Secre
tary of State — the officers that had been appointed
by the Convention. This was debated for a day and
a half without coming to a conclusion. I advocated
it on the broad principle that the people had a right
to elect their own rulers ; and had it been determined
on the ground of principle merely, the resolution would
probably have been adopted, at least as to the office

And its Emancipation Work. 321
of Governor. But the second act of the solemn farce
was to be- enacted. Mr. Comingo offered a substitute
for my resolution, returning the Governor's resigna
tion to him, with a request that he would continue in
office until November, 1864, and until his successor
should be elected and qualified. The issue was changed
from one of principle to a personal one ; and, of course,
the principle went under. Mr. Comingo's resolution
was substituted for mine, and that was the last of effort
to give back to the people the privilege of electing their
Own rulers. The vote of St. Louis members on the
question of substitution was : Ayes-~ Messrs. Breckin
ridge, Gantt, Holmes, How, Long, and Shackleford;
Noes — Messrs. Bridge, Bush, Drake, Hitchcock, Lin
ton, Meyer, and Smith.
A brief history of the proceedings on the subject of
Emancipation will close my review of the action of the
Convention. A Committee on Emancipation of one
from each Congressional District was elected by the
Convention, with the Governor at its head. A ma
jority of its members had voted, in 1862, to lay Judge
Breckinridge's Ordinance on the table, and were there
fore peculiarly fitted for a committee to prepare an
Ordinance of Emancipation. One immediate Emanci
pationist, Mr. Bush, of this city, was allowed a place
on the committee.
After about a week's deliberation, the committee
reported a bill declaring Emancipation on the Fourth
of July, 1876 ! It was, for any good to this generation,
about equivalent to declaring it in the next century.
It is needless for me to review the different steps
28

322 The Missouri Convention,
which led finally to the adoption of the Ordinance as
it now stands. It has been before you in all the
newspapers, and you have doubtless all read it. No
man need read it twice to comprehend its true charac
ter. It is a mere subterfuge, designed to delude the
people with the idea that the question has been settled,
and therefore they should give the matter up, and
turn their thoughts to something else. It continues
Slavery in this State, as it is now, until the Fourth of
July, 1870, and thenceforward, as to all slaves over
forty years of age, during their lives. All then under
twelve years of age are to remain in servitude until
they reach the age of twenty-three ; and all between
the ages of twelve and forty, until the Fourth of July,
1876. It is a scheme which, in a period of peace,
might answer well enough ; but in such an era as this,
when seven months are inore in public affairs than
seven years in other times, it is such *a scheme as no
true Emancipationist would devise. It was shaped
and carried by pro-Slavery men, in the expectation
that it would accomplish the destruction of the Eman
cipation party, and in due time, after all rebels should
be restored to the elective franchise, be repealed before
it should take effect. It declares all slaves in this
State on the Fourth of July, 1870, free ; and in the
same section imposes upon them subsequent periods
of servitude to their late owners, during which the
owners are to have the same authority and control
over them, for the purpose of securing their posses
sion and services, that are now held absolutely by the
master in respect to his slave. That is, the eman-

And its Emancipation Work. 323
cipated negro is to be, in fact, a slave, until the period
of his servitude shall cease. The laws now regulating
the relation of master and slave are to remain in force
during all that period — until the very last slave in the
State on the Fourth of July, 1870, escapes or dies.
The Legislature will have no power to modify them in
a single particular, as to the right of the master to
the possession and services of the negro. The latter
will be the subject of sale, as heretofore, except that,
after the day set for nominal emancipation, he can not
be sold to a non-resident of, nor removed from, this
State, and if Under forty years of age, can be sold for
the period of his servitude only.
The only provisions of the Ordinance which have
any direct present tendency to destroy the institution
of Slavery among us, are those which declare that " all
slaves hereafter brought into this State, and not now
belonging to citizens of this State, shall thereupon be
free ; " and that " all slaves removed by consent of
their owners to any seceded State, after the passage
by such State of an act or ordinance of secession, and
hereafter brought into this State by their owners, shall
thereupon be free." For so much let us be grateful to
our masters of the Convention.
But not so, not so, for that cap-sheaf of their work,
which, from the date of the ordinance, exempts slaves
from taxation through all future time. The master
may hold the slave, and profit by, live upon, luxuriate
in the avails of his labor, with the protection of the
State, and every other benefit that taxation is designed
to procure, but not a cent of tax is he to pay upon

324 The Missouri Convention,
his slaves. He may thus profit by his slave, with
entire immunity from taxation, up to the very day
before that fixed for Emancipation, and then remove
him from the State, and sell him as a slave for life,
and pocket the price of his flesh and blood. The
owner of a house which may be destroyed by tempest
or fire at any moment; the owner of horses or cattle,
which are his means ef living, and which may die at
any time, must pay tax upon his house, horses and
cattle, just as if they were to be his always ; but the
slave owner is to pay none upon his slave, because,
seven years hence, the slave is to be transmuted into
a servant. The white laborer is to be taxed out of
his hard-earned pittance, but the profit from slave
labor is to be diminished by taxation never a single
cent. The very institution which has blasted Missouri
is to be henceforth her untaxed pet. Property assess
ed in 1860 at some fifty millions of dollars, and even
now, in the midst of war, claimed by slaveholders,
when they would portray the wrong to them of Eman
cipation, to be worth that amount, is withdrawn from
taxation, and the deficiency of revenue consequent
thereon is to be made up by increased levy upon all
other property and all vocations. And, Worst of all,
this immunity is directly and almost wholly m favor
of rebels and rebel sympathizers; for it is to such that
the great mass of slaves in Missouri belong. What
is this but a premium set upon Slavery, a reward ten
dered to disloyalty, a sop thrown to traitors? Did
that Convention suppose that in this exemption in
favor of those who have brought measureless calami-

And its Emancipation Work. 325
ties upon Missouri, they represented her loyal people ?
No, they knew they did not. But it was a body bound
by association, feeling, and interest to Slavery, and,
true to its instincts, it made this last grab in favor of
an institution, which, if taxed to day to the full value
of all the slaves in Missouri, would not repay her
Union men what it has cost them in these two years
of war, spoliation, and death. Shame upon such
heartless rapacity ! Down with that which breeds it !
Away with those who ordain it as a fundamental law
in Missouri !
But there are other acts of that Convention which
demand special notice. If ever the rights of a people
were trampled upon by their own servants, it was by that
body, in its persistent refusal to allow the people of
Missouri any voice in deciding upon that Ordinance of
Emancipation. If ever there was a measure which
should have been submitted to a vote of the people,
it was that. If ever there was a body which should
have asked for a popular vote upon its action, it was
that Convention. Of all its members only eleven were
elected in this year, and seven of them voted against
that Ordinance. In every way in my power I strove
to obtain a vote of the people upon it, and at one time
it was carried ; but a night's manipulation enabled the
contemners of popular rights to triumph, and to send
their edict abroad without the present possibility of an
appeal to the people against it. They were resolved
that the voice of the people should be stifled, and it
was done ! It is important that the facts in this con
nection should be exhibited circumstantially; and I

326 The Missouri Convention,
beg your attention while I state them, and show you
how and by whom the gag was applied. You are
interested, especially, in knowing how your own repre
sentatives there stood on this subject.
Let me first recall to your recollection that the
Ordinance presented by Judge Breckinridge, in June,
1862, provided for a submission of the question of
Emancipation to a vote of the people, on the first
Monday of August, 1864. It is important that this
be borne in mind, as well as that, on motion to lay
that Ordinance on the table, the vote of the St. Louis
members was as follows: Ayes — Messrs. Long and
Shackleford. Noes — Messrs. Breckinridge, Bridge,
Broadhead, Bush, Hitchcock, Holmes, How, Linton,
Meyer, and Smith. Ten were then in favor of a vote ¦
in 1864, and two against it.
When the present Ordinance was before the Con
vention, Mr. Woolfolk moved an amendment, to the
effect that the question should be submitted to a vote
of the people at the general election in November,
1 864. I immediately offered a substitute, fixing the
time at the Judicial Election in November, 1863, and
it was adopted, by the following vote:
Ayes — Messrs. Baker, Bartlett, Bast, Bonnifield,
Bush, Doniphan, Drake of St. Louis, Dunn, Eitzen,
Frayser, Foster, Gorin, Gravelly, Henderson, Hough,
Isbell, Jackson, Jamison, Johnson, Kidd, Leeper, Lin-
denbower, Linton, Marvin, McClurg, McCormack,
McDowell, Meyer, Morrow, Noell, Norton, Orr, Ran
kin, Ritchey, Rowland, Schofield, Scott, Shanklin,
Smith of Linn, Stewart, Van Buskirk, Waller, Walker,
Woolfolk, and Mr. President— 46.

And its Emancipation Work. 327
Noes — Messrs. Bass, Birch, Bogy, Breckinridge,
Bridge, Broadhead, Calhoun, Cayce, Comingo, Deal,
Devol, Douglas, Drake of Moniteau, Flood, Gamble,
Gantt, Hall of Randolph, Hitchcock, Holmes, Holt,
How, Howell, Irwin, Long, Matson, McFerran, Mc-
Lane, .Moss, Moxley, Phillips, Pomeroy, Prewitt,
Ross, Sayre, Shackleford of Howard, Shackleford of
St. Louis, Sheeley, and Smith of St. Louis — 38.
Four St. Louis members, Messrs. Bush, Drake, Lin
ton, and Meyer, voted for a submission to the people ;
and eleven against it, to-wit : Messrs. Breckinridge,
Bridge, Broadhead, Gamble, Gantt, Hitchcock, Holmes,
How, Long, Shackleford, and Smith.
The next day, on motion of Mr. Henderson, the
vote was reconsidered; and upon putting the question
again, my amendment was lost, by the following vote :
Ayes — Messrs. Allen, Baker, Bartlett, Bast, Bonni-
field, Bush, Doniphan, Drake of St. Louis, Dunn,
Eitzen, Frayser, Foster, Holt, Hough, Isbell, Jackson,
Jamison, Johnson, Leeper, Lindenbower, Linton, Mar
vin, McClurg, McLane, Meyer, Morrow, Orr, Ray,
Schofield, Scott, Shanklin, Smith of St. Louis, Stew
art, Van Buskirk, Waller, Walker, and Mr. Presi
dent— 37.
Noes — Messrs. Bass, Birch, Bogy, Breckinridge,
Bridge, Broadhead, Calhoun, Cayce, Comingo, Deal,
Devol, Douglas, Drake of Moniteau, Flood, Gamble,
Gantt, Gorin, Hall of Randolph, Henderson, Hitch
cock, Holmes, How, Howell, Irwin, Matson, McDowell,
McFerran, Moxley, Noell, Pomeroy, Prewitt, Ritchey,
Ross, Sayre, Shackleford of Howard, Shackleford of
St. Louis, Sheeley, Smith of Linn, Welch, Woodson,
and Woolfolk— 41.
This time, five St. Louis members were for referring
the matter to the people, to-wit : Messrs. Bush, Drake,

328 The Missouri Convention,
Linton, Meyer, and Smith ; and nine against it, to-wit :
Messrs. Breckinridge, Bridge, Broadhead, Gamble,
Gantt, Hitchcock, Holmes, How, and Shackleford;
Mr. Long not voting.
This was the last effort made to procure a vote of
the people directly upon the Ordinance. On the last
day of the session, however, I made another effort
in a different way, by proposing a substitute for the
entire bill, providing for the election of another Con
vention on the Tuesday next after the first Monday of
November next, and the taking of a vote of the peo
ple, at the same time, for and against Emancipation.
If the majority of votes were for Emancipation, the
new Convention should meet on the last Tuesday of
December next ; if the majority were against Eman
cipation, it should not meet at all. This substitute
was lost, by a vote of 19 to 61.
Now, my friends, there is one strange thing about
the votes of the St. Louis members on the proposition
to submit the Ordinance to a popular vote. In June,
1862, Messrs. Breckinridge, Bridge, Broadhead, Hitch
cock, Holmes, and How voted against laying on the
table Judge Breckinridge's ordinance, providing for
taking a vote of the people in August, 1804, and may
be fairly considered as then in favor of taking the
sense of the people on the subject. But when we
came, in June, 1863, to the question of taking a vote
of the people in November, 1863, as to the Ordinance
about to be passed, they all voted against it, and
Messrs. Gamble, Gantt, Long and Shackleford went
with them ; my friend, Sol. Smith voting both ways —

And its Emancipation Work. 329
first against, at last for it. I do not assume to declare
the motives which led those gentlemen to oppose a
popular vote. They can do that, and when they do,
you can judge what respect those motives are entitled
to. But I will state the grounds taken in the discus
sion of the question.
In favor of a vote by the people, it was urged that
the question was the most important ever brought up
in Missouri, except that of secession; that the Con
vention was not elected with reference to it, except
eleven members chosen in May and June of this year ;
that a number of the members did not represent by
their votes the known wishes of their constituents in
regard to Emancipation ; that there was no good rea
son why, if the Judges of the Supreme and Circuit
Courts could be elected in November next, the people
might not, at the same time, vote upon this question ;
that they had a right to be heard on it; and that it
was an outrage, for a body not elected with reference
to Emancipation, to pass an Ordinance on the subject,
and force it upon a muzzled people, who might be
opposed to its terms, and would naturally desire the
work to be done by men elected for that purpose.
Against taking a popular vote, it was urged that the
State is in no condition for taking such a vote ; that
the disorder is such, that no fair expression could be
had; that it was possible for Grant to be defeated at
Vicksburg, and for Lee to take Baltimore and Wash
ington ; and if those things should happen, Price would
invade Missouri, and the rebels would rise throughout
the State! These were, in substance, the general

330 The Missouri Convention,
objections, but not the controlling ones. The real
ground of opposition, which Messrs. Gamble and Hen
derson did not hesitate to avow, was, that if the Ordi
nance were submitted to the people, it would be
rejected ! And so the majority resolved to force it
upon the people, whether they liked it or not, and
gagged the people, because they would reject it!
Fellow citizens, if any such contemptuous disregard
of the rights of the people has at any time been
exhibited among us, I am ignorant of it. A body
elected for a purpose which was expected to have been
accomplished in the first six months of 1861, prolongs
its own existence more than two years, and on the first
of July, 1863, without any intermediate expression, in
authentic form, by the people, and while the people
are meditating the call of another Convention expressly
to pass upon the subject of Emancipation, takes that
subject out of their hands, adopts Constitutional pro
visions in relation to it, which are to bind the people
forever, and. refuses to allow them yea or nay on the
subject! And that body, let it be remembered, had,
one year before, in effect, declared its work done, its
mission accomplished; for, on the 13th of June, 1862,
it resolved that when it adjourned that session, it
would adjourn to the Fourth of July, 1863, on which
day it should, without assembling, stand adjourned
sine die. No man then expected it would ever meet
again, nor did any man suppose there would ever be
occasion for it to do so. Nevertheless, to guard against
unforeseen contingencies, the Governor was authorized ,
to convene the body again, at any time prior to July 4,

And its Emancipation Work. 331
1863, when in his judgment the public exigencies
might require it. And upon his call, and moved by
his sole will, it was re-convened, in June, 1863, to act
upon the very last subject that any of its members, in
June, 1862, would have imagined, after the Governor's
message, on the 13th of that month, to which I have
before referred, he ever would have called them to act
upon ; and the very last that they, if the matter had
then been suggested as a ground of their re-assembling,
would ever have consented to come together again to
consider. For, had they not, only six days before
they resolved to adjourn to the 4th of July, 1863,
pitilessly slaughtered the only proposition of Emanci
pation that had ever been brought before them? And
would they, on the heels of that act, have willingly
left the door open for the re-introduction of that sub
ject at any future day ? Not they ! not they ! And
yet the Governor who then put words into their mouths
to justify their refusal to touch the subject of Emanci
pation, and recorded his personal and legal opinion
that it was a matter upon which they ought not to act,
because the people never intended or imagined that
they might, could, should, or would ever act upon it,
convenes them, within nineteen days of the period they
had set for their own dissolution, and invokes them to
act upon that subject, and himself takes a leading
part in their action upon it, and in opposition to the
people's having the least voice in determining whether
that action should bind them, or not ! That body, to
be sure, was elected by the people ; but did it represent
the present mind of the people on this subject? If it

332 The Missouri Convention,
did, why not let the people say so, and thereby calm
the public mind? If it did not, why gag the people?
Who ever before heard in this country of a body
elected to carry out the people's will on one point, sub
stituting its will for theirs on another point, and then
muzzling them, so that they can not speak if they die
for it? My friends, what will you call this? For
my part, let others call it what they may, I call it
despotism — the exercise of absolute power, the wield
ing of authority unlimited and uncontrolled by men,
constitutions, or laws, and depending alone upon the
will of those who wield it. That is the definition of
despotism, whether exercised by one man, holding
absolute and irresponsible sway, or by many men,
acting above and in disregard of the people's will;
and as such I denounce it here in the presence of my
constituents, and before the whole people of this State !
I beg you to notice by whom this was done, and
the spirit in which it was done. Had you sat in the
Convention, or witnessed its proceedings, you would
have seen, as I did, that it was controlled by a solid
column of pro-Slavery men, who knew that they were
called together to take the work of Emancipation out
of the hands of the people, and who performed the
job as completely as if it had been done by a single
man. It was a remarkable feature of the session, that
the pro-Slavery members took very little part in the
debates ; and yet they moved as if impelled by a single
will. On the call of the ayes and noes, their names
followed in such uniform sequence together, that one
could soon learn them and their order by heart. It

And its Emancipation Work. 333
was as plain as daylight that no argument or appeal
could disturb their fixed purpose to consummate the
object of their convocation. They were bound together
by a common and well-understood aim; and when the
vote of the first of their number on the roll was heard,
you might usually know how the rest would go. And
yet, while there, I heard not of any caucus held by
them, nor do I suppose they held or needed any. Each
man knew what was to be done, and he wandered not
from the path marked out for him. It was a consolidated
phalanx, thinking, speaking, and acting in the interest
of an institution, which they knew was rapidly nearing
extinction in Missouri, and were determined to keep
alive as long as they could, knowing that that was
much longer than the people would allow, if once they
could reach it. It was the same bold, resolute, and
defiant disregard of the popular will, that was displayed
by Southern leaders in precipitating the war which has
so afflicted our country. They would have done worse,
had they dared : they could not have done better, and
be true to the spirit of domination, with which the
champions of Slavery are ever ready to . bear down
opposition, and subject the majority to the arrogant
will of an overbearing minority.
And now, fellow-citizens, in view of the case as it
thus stands, the great and momentous question arises —
What shall be done by the people of Missouri, thus
deprived of their cherished right to be heard in the
choice of their own rulers, and in the shaping of their
own internal policy in regard to the infinitely important
Subject of Emancipation? No man could approach

334 The Missouri Convention.
this question with a more profound sense of its impor
tance, than I do. It involved results which connect
themselves with the whole future destiny of Missouri.
It is not merely whether a particular scheme of Eman
cipation shall stand, but whether popular sovereignty
shall stand. The people here are, theoretically, practi
cally, and constitutionally, the source of power; and
any body of men setting themselves up to make fun
damental laws in defiance of the people's will, become
thereby, in the particular case, despots in fact, what
ever their intent. I do not say that each and every
member of the Convention who voted to refuse the
people a voice in the selection of their rulers, and in
deciding upon the Convention's act of Emancipation,
was actuated by a despotic spirit ; but I do say that
his action was, in fact, despotic, in the true sense of
the term; because it was simply an arbitrary exercise
of a power which was granted him for other ends;
which the people never supposed would be exercised as
it has been; which was wielded for the purpose of
intercepting and defeating their action ; and which was
consummated with a direct and obstinate refusal to grant
them the privilege of ratifying or rejecting the work
of their servant-masters. And now it is demanded of
us to submit quietly to all this, on peril of being
branded as rebels ! And this is flaunted in our teeth
by men and public journals, which, for the greater part
of the two years of this civil war, have nursed in them
selves, and inculcated upon others, the spirit of rebel
lion, till they have forgotten the difference between an
appeal to the ballot and an appeal to the bullet,, and

And its Emancipation Work. 335
can see in the former only a fit prelude to the latter.
Such things are as meaningless to me as
"Fee, f aw, f um !
I smell the blood of an Englishman;
Dead or alive I'll have some I"
I know what the sovereignty of the people is, and
how to maintain it. I know the obligation of consti
tutions and laws, and how to uphold them. I know
that the power of the people is in orderly and lawful
action, and to that alone I appeal. I have nothing to
do with any other sort. Leave violence, insubordina
tion, and rebellion to the minions of Slavery; we have
had enough of them from that quarter. But we have
a right to invoke the people to reverse the action of
their own servants. We have a right to demand of
our Legislature the calling of another Convention to
declare and execute the People's will in regard to
Emancipation. We have a right to vindicate popular
liberty by every peaceful and lawful means, and we
seek to do it only by such means. We have a right to
arouse the people to a sense of the wrong they have
sustained, and the dangers that threaten them. And
we will do it ! If by rightful appeals and agencies
we can reach the popular mind, and turn it to the
great work of rescuing popular sovereignty from the
peril assailing it, we will do it ! If by legitimate pro
cesses we can strike down the defenses of Slavery, and
at the same time defend and re-establish the rights of
the people, we will do it ! We have not sought this
issue. We struggled hard to have the people speak,
but they have been silenced; to have them free, but

836 The Missouri Convention,
they have been bound; silenced and bound by their
own trusted agents ! But they will be heard, and will
snap the cords with which it is attempted to tie them.
And when they do so, let those stand out of the way,
who, for the sake of the corpse of Slavery, tried to
muzzle and manacle a free people !

THE WRONGS
TO MISSOURI'S LOYAL PEOPLE.*

I respond, without hesitation, to your invitation to
address you; and as the period of our session must
necessarily be brief, I will claim your attention no
longer than may be necessary for a sufficient and truth
ful discussion of the circumstances which have led to
our assembling.
Every member of this body will agree with me that
those circumstances are extraordinary. From nearly
thirty years' intimate acquaintance with Missouri, I am
prepared to affirm that no Mass Convention of her
people ever assembled under circumstances so extraor
dinary as those which surround us now. I congratu
late you that you have the nerve and the patriotism to
come from your distant homes, to show the world that
you are able and willing to meet like men the exigency
which is upon you.
We are loyal Union men, without any qualification
or conditions ; and we are, and are not afraid to declare
that we are, Radicals. That is, we are for going to
* A Speech before the Radical Mass Convention at Jefferson
City, September 1, 1863.
29

338 The Wrongs
the root of the infamous rebellion which has distracted
our land for more than two years, and are for destroy
ing that as well as the rebellion. That root is the
institution of Slavery. From it the rebellion sprung,
by it has been sustained, in it lives, and with it will die.
And until that root is pulled up and destroyed, there
is no hope of permanent peace in- our country. There
fore I am for pulling it up, every fiber of it. And that
is what I understand it is to be Radical. By that I
stand or fall. The position is one which necessarily
admits of no compromise. It is Country or Slavery ;
and he is a traitor who will compromise between them.
This, in a few words, is what I hold to be our char
acter and position here to-day. I am not afraid to go
before the world upon it. I should despise myself, if
I took any other. It follows that I am for using every
legitimate means to destroy the rebellion, and to crush
down, wipe out, and utterly annihilate every develop
ment, form, and hue of disloyalty. I would pursue
disloyalty through all its infinitive turnings and twist-
ings, and hunt it down, ferret it out, and drive it forth,
till throughout our State and our land no disloyal hand
should be raised, nor disloyal tongue speak, against our
glorious Union.
It follows, further, that I uphold the Proclamation
of Emancipation issued by President Lincoln on the
1st of January, 1863. I believe that Proclamation to
have been a Constitutional- exercise of the war power
of the Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy of
the United States, against public enemies. Were they
foreign enemies, no American would question his right

To Missouri's Loyal People. 339
to strike at their main support: I affirm his rio-ht
to strike at any and every support of our domestic
enemies — the worse, by far, of the two. And it was
a righteous exercise of his power. Slavery assailed the
nation of which he was the head, and he was bound to
assail Slavery in turn, even to its very death. And I
hold that his Proclamation did, in law, free every slave
in all the region it covered, on the very day it was
issued. Not one of them has been lawfully held in
Slavery since that day; nor can one of them, in my
opinion, ever be lawfully enslaved again. The Procla
mation is irrevocable — as irrevocable as death. No
attempt at its revocation can ever make slaves again
of those it made free. I accept and uphold it as the
end of Slavery in the rebellious States, and I demand
its enforcement there by the whole warlike power of
the loyal people of the nation, as the only means of
restoring abiding peace to our bleeding country.
And holding it right to use every lawful means to
overwhelm rebellion, I rejoice that the President is
enrolling among our country's armed hosts those whom
his proclamation freed. I have no squeamishness
about arming the negro. I am no half-breed Unionist,
sensitive about seeing white men fight alongside of the
"American citizen of African descent." No traitor is
too good to be killed by a negro, nor has any traitor a
right to insist on being killed by a white man. If for
the sake of Slavery he turns traitor, let former slaves
be his executioners; it is a just and fit retribution.
Disaffection, if not disloyalty, lurks in him who opposes
the arming of the negro, let him call himself what he

340 The Wrongs
may. For my part, I say the President, Go on in this
good work, till the army of blacks shall be large enough
to hold every rebel in subjection; and then rebellion is
at an end for ever and ever in this land.
I have been thus plain in the expression of these
views, because I believe them to be the views heartily
entertained by the entire body of the Radical Union
men of Missouri. I do not believe there is one such
man in our State who does not hold them, and who is
not determined to stand by them. They spring from
the deepest convictions of stern duty to our country
and to the cause of Liberty. With him who opposes
them we have nothing to do but to oppose him, and by
all rightful means put him down. And that, my friends,
is just the work which the Radicals of Missouri have
before them.
To us are opposed a portion of the people of Mis
souri, who style themselves Conservatives. And who
are they ? Let the plain truth be spoken. They
embrace all the disloyal. Every rebel in the State is
with them. Every open or secret Secessionist is with
them. Every guerrilla and bushwhacker is with them.
Every Copperhead is with them. Every man who
opposes the radical policy of the Government against
the rebellion is with them. Every man who is under
bond for disloyal practices or sentiments, is with them.
Every sympathizer with the rebellion is with them.
Almost every pro-Slavery man is with them. And
nine-tenths of the slaveholders, I believe, are with them.
And along with this motley gang of open enemies to,
or faint-hearted friends of, the Union cause, are asso-

To Missouri's Loyal People. 341
ciated just enough of real Union men to save the con
cern from going down instantly under the weight of its
inherent and envenomed disloyalty. Nothing keeps
that party alive this day but the presence of those
Union men in its ranks, and the concentration of official
patronage and influence, State and National, in their
hands. They are the sugar-coat to the poison-pill
which is sought to be administered to the people of
Missouri. They alone give character to Conservatism
in Missouri. They have suffered themselves to be iden
tified with that class of our population, which would
drag Missouri out of the Union in a moment, if they
could; and they are supported and urged on by every
man in the State whose hand or heart has been or is
against his country. I profoundly regret that any of
them should ever have been found in such company ;
but they are there, and must share the fate which
surely awaits every disloyal man, whenever Missouri's
loyal people can once have access to the ballot-box.
Such, my fellow-citizens, is what you and I know to
be the position of parties in Missouri this day. It is
not a matter of conjecture or supposition ; we know it.
We know that throughout this whole State there is not
one single disloyal man in the Radical ranks. We
know that every disloyal man in the State is a Conser
vative. We know, and desire the whole world to know,
that the struggle now going on here, though ostensibly
connected with the subject of Emancipation, is, in real
ity, between Loyalty-and Disloyalty. The Union cause
is at stake again, and the result will determine whether
the destiny of this great commonwealth is to remain in

342 The Wrongs
the hands of its loyal people. For one, I will struggle,
against all odds, in every lawful way, and to the last
available moment, before I will yield the control of
Missouri to her traitorous inhabitants. No such dis
grace and disaster shall befall her, if in my power to
prevent it.
As, from the moment of the outbreak of the rebellion,
the spirit pf shameless lying has characterized those
engaged it, and those who are with it in heart, so now
the main weapon of the Conservatives of Missouri
against the Radicals is atrocious and persistent false
hood. We are charged, as a body, with purposes
winch we have never expressed or entertained. A
strenuous effort has been made, upon the basis of false
and wholly groundless imputations, to build up in
opposition to us a so-called "Law and Order party;"
and "Law and Order meetings" have been held in
some counties, at which the Radical Union men have
been denounced in the same category with rebels and
bushwhackers. We have been stigmatized as "Jaco
bins;" as "revolutionary factionists ; " as "engaged
in schemes looking to revolution and violence ; " as " in
rebellion against the Union and the Constitution ; " as
" attempting to overthrow the State Government ; " as
" the party of commotion, and violence, and crime, and
anarchy, and disregard of all law : " and " men of all
parties, who are in favor of preserving the peace of the
State, of enforcing the laws, and protecting citizens
from violations of the laws," are invited to attend "Law
and Order meetings ; " where the " erring brother "
returned from " Price's army," the bushwhacker, the

To Missouri's Loyal People. 343
Secessionist, the Copperhead and the " Southern sym
pathizer " skulk in, to help men claiming loyalty pass
resolutions defaming and denouncing the Radical Union
men of Missouri ! It is the old game of the pursued
thief crying " stop thief ! " There is but one way to
meet it, and I have so met it wherever I have spoken
in this State. I say here, in the capitol of the State,
as I have repeatedly said elsewhere, that whoever,
directly or by implication, in speech, in writing, or in
print, charges upon the Radical Union party of Mis
souri any intent of revolutionary violence or unlawful
act, utters an atrocious lie. I like not to use that word
in a public address : but the circumstances, in my
opinion, demand it. The true Union men of Missouri
have suffered enough of outrage and defamation at the
hands of her disloyal people. We ought not quietly to
submit any longer to be branded as unfaithful to our
obligations as law-abiding and patriotic citizens. We
are in heart and soul loyal to our country, to law, to
duty, to honor, and to truth : and that is infinitely
more than he who has been, in fact or in feeling, with
this hell-born rebellion, can say, or in his conscience —
if he has any — would dare to say he is.
My friends, that there is excitement among the loyal
people of Missouri can not be denied. The presence
here to-day of this large Mass Convention, from every
part of the State, affirms it. And there is cause for
excitement. The loyal inhabitants of this ill-fated
State have suffered more than those of any other State
that has adhered to the Union. They have endured
every form of aggravated and unmerited wrong.

344 The Wrongs
Loyalty to the Constitution and the Union has brought
bitterness to them. Their property has been wrested
from them by pillaging bands of traitors ; their habita
tions have been given to the flames ; they have been
murdered in cold blood ; and they have been disarmed
by the authorities in whose support they were ready
and willing to do all and risk all ; thereby becoming
an easier prey to the blood-thirsty fiends that infest
wide districts of our^State. Surrounded by treachery
the most adroit and cruel ; beset by devilish marauders,
whose appearance they know not when or where to
guard against ; trerhbling by day and by night for
their possessions and their families ; worn and wasted
by robbery, arson, and every outrage ; and apparently
given over utterly in many places to the grasp of the
guerrilla and the bushwhacker; they are, in large
portions of the State, harassed, impoverished, and
overborne by accumulated calamity, beyond any con
ception of those who only read the meager reports
which find their way into the public journals of the
day. Is it a marvel that they are excited ? Would it
not be wonderful if they were not ? What other people
ever endured so much without excitement ? Shall men
sit quietly down and with indifference see themselves
despoiled, beggared, and driven forth as fugitives from
their homes ? Have we got to that point when fathers
can look with stoicism upon the slaying of their sons,
and wives upon the murder of their husbands ? If we
have, then has the time come when popular excitement
should be put down, as detrimental to the body politic.
But that point is not yet reached. Our hearts are

To Missouri's Loyal People. 345
not yet callous to our own miseries, or to those Of
others. We are not able to see why such '•full,
heaping measure of wrong should be dealt out to loyal
people, while the disloyal eat and drink and sleep and
work and journey in peace and safety. We do not
comprehend why protection should be so fully accorded,
as we know it to be, to men -of known disloyalty,
while the loyal citizen is not only not protected, but
has been required to forego his Constitutional right to
bear arms, and to surrender to the military power the
weapons upon which alone he could depend for pro
tecting himself, his family, and his property. We do
not understand why military officers who pursued the
miscreants of blood and plunder with an energy that
threatened their extermination, should, without a word
of explanation, be relieved of their commands, or
mustered out of service, in the midst of their career,
and succeeded by men under whose administration
the work of spoliation and blood is plied with renewed
vigor and success. We do not see why large numbers
of men — or indeed any — who at the onset of the rebel
lion were outspoken and offensive Secessionists, should
be appointed to high military positions under the State
Government, while men always and unconditionally
for the Union are refused such positions, or thrust
from them. We do not perceive why men of thorough
and consistent loyalty should be arrested and im
prisoned by the military authorities, for no assigned
cause, of for so small a cause as questioning the
wisdom and purity of Governor Gamble's administra
tion and policy ; and we resent such arrests, and ought
30

346 The Wrongs
to- resent them. And least of all do we comprehend
why the earnest and beseeching appeals. of Missouri's
loyal and suffering people to the head of the nation
for protection, should, apparently, be intercepted or
neutralized, and he be made to believe that they
proceed from a " pestilent faction," whose aim is to
" torment " him. It is because of all these things that
there is excitement among the loyal people of Mis
souri ; and I say that they would deserve to suffer on,
if they were not excited. But it is not an excitement
which threatens or looks to any lawless or reckless
proceeding. It asks only redress for incalculable
evils, by lawful means ; and this Convention is one
of the means it takes to make itself heard and felt in
quarters where, to hear and feel it, may remove or
mitigate the sore trials under which our people have
suffered. God grant that those in power may give
heed to the voice of Missouri's loyal people, before
that burden becomes intolerable !
But not in these matters alone, bitter and hard to
be borne as they are, have the loyal Union people of
Missouri been wronged. While Conservative policy has
left them to be pillaged and murdered, it has gathered
its strength and put forth its hand to wrest from them
their rightful control in the affairs of Missouri, and to
shape the fundamental law and the organic institutions
of our State, according to the behests of her disloyal
people. A coalition has been formed to overthrow the
Radical Union party, and deliver the State over to
the dominion of that Conservative party, which con
tains all the disloyalty of Missouri. At the head of

To Missouri's Loyal People. 347
that coalition is Governor Gamble ; and he is sustained
in it by almost every Federal office-holder of any note
in the State ; by a host of State officers appointed
by himself to positions of high importance, civil and
military ; and by an army of politicians, who are
seeking their own advancement, and know that from
the Radical Union men of Missouri they have nothing
to hope. No such combination has anywhere been
made against the loyal people of any loyal State.
It is the great feature of the day in Missouri. It is
known to every observing man in the State, and it
attracts the attention of the country. I wish- to por
tray its course of wrong to Missouri's loyal people.
I will do it plainly, fairly, and thoroughly ; for I
deem it of the greatest moment that, in this State
and throughout the loyal States, the position of our
affairs, and that of the men who have wronged that
people, should be clearly understood. I will endeavor
to present a historical summary of the leading facts,
in such simple and connected form, that no man can
fail to comprehend the whole matter.
The point at which I begin is the accession of Gov
ernor Gamble to the Provisional Chief Magistracy of
Missouri, on the 31st of July, 1861 ; for from that
time the course of public affairs in this State has con
nected itself directly with the circumstances of the
present period. His first public declaration as Gover
nor was significant of his own opinions and feelings, and
of those of the people he was appointed to govern. On
the 4th of August, 1861, he issued a proclamation to
that people, in which, referring to his appointment, he

348 The Wrongs
said it "would satisfy all that no countenance would be
afforded to any scheme or any conduct calculated in any
degree to interfere with the institution of Slavery exist
ing in the State, and that to the utmost extent of Exec
utive power that institution would be protected." Con
cerning this remarkable declaration two things are
apparent : first, that Governor Gamble was then, and
desired it to be known that he was, a pro-Slavery
man, and intended to be a pro-Slavery Governor ; and
second, that he believed the people of Missouri to be
a pro-Slavery people ; as, in my opinion, a large major
ity — perhaps seven-eighths — of them then were. This
proclamation is the first point to be borne in mind;
for it assumes importance in connection with subse
quent events.
The sentiments of the people of Missouri in regard
to the institution of Slavery underwent a radical
change, not many months after that proclamation was
issued. They came, by slow but sure degrees, to
understand that this rebellion had but one origin and
purpose — the aggrandizement of Slavery as a political
power, the destruction of the noble Republic inherited
xfrom our fathers, and the substitution for it in the South
of a great and strange Empire, based on Slavery,
and intended for subjugation, piracy, and eventual
dominion over this whole continent. When they saw
it announced authoritatively by the 'parties engaged in
the work of founding that empire, that they were only
consummating what had been in conspiracy for forty
years ; when they saw that for Slavery the Southern
aristocrats were striving to overturn the liberties of

To Missouri's Loyal People. 349
the American people, disrupt their Union, and destroy
their Constitution; when they perceived that the suc
cess of this unexampled and incomparable scheme of
outrage, fraud, perjury, and treason, would plunge this
nation into perpetual war, and that as long as Mis
souri should be a slave State, she would be one of the
chief victims of that war ; when, I say, all these things
became manifest to the loyal people of Missouri, a
mighty revolution in their opinions concerning Slavery
began, and from month to month moved on with tre
mendous rapidity and force. Never, I will venture to
affirm, was there witnessed in this country so marked
and swift a revolution of public sentiment in regard to
so important a matter. And it was all the more glo
rious, because it sprung from a glowing and vital*
patriotism, which rejoiced in any sacrifice of opinion
or interest in so holy a cause. While Southern trait
ors were demanding the emancipation of Slavery from
contact with the free institutions of the North, the
loyal people of Missouri demanded her emancipation ¦
from contact with that institution, which they recog
nized as aiming fatal blows at all they lovecLjn the
country, all they cherished in memory, and all they
clung to in hope for themselves and their posterity.
The tendency of the public mind to the removal of
Slavery from Missouri received a decided impulse in
April, 1862, in consequence of the passage by Con
gress, upon the recommendation of the President, of
a resolution, declaring " that the United States ought
to co-operate with any State which may adopt gradual
abolishment of Slavery, giving to such State pecuniary

350 * The Wrongs
aid, to be used by such State in its discretion, to com
pensate for the inconveniences, public and private,
produced by such change of system." The great
obstacle to Emancipation in Missouri was the provi
sion in her Constitution, prohibiting the Legislature
from passing any law " for the emancipation of slaves,
without the consent of their owners, or without paying
them, before such emancipation, a -full equivalent for
such slaves so emancipated." As such compensation
from our own resources was an impossibility, the reso
lution of Congress held out the hope of its coming from
the National treasury, and feeling in favor of Eman
cipation received therefrom increased force and exten
sion. With the loyal sentiment of Missouri in this transi
tion state from decided pro -SI a very ism to radical anti-
Slaveryism, the State Convention assembled on the
2d of June, 1862, on the call of the Governor. On
the 7th of that month, Judge Breckinridge introduced
into that body an Ordinance proposing a plan of grad
ual Emancipation, to be submitted to the people for
their ratification or rejection, on the first Monday of
August, 1864, and supported it in a speech; at the
close of which, on motion of Judge Hall, of Ran
dolph, the Ordinance was laid on the table, by a vote
of 52 to 19; and to use a well-known and significant
expression exultingly applied, at the time, to the act,
Emancipation was "killed at the first pop." The Con
vention thereby pronounced itself opposed to Emanci
pation. It was a pro-Slavery body, and of course
intolerant. It would hear no more on the subject than

To Missouri's Loyal People. 351
what Judge Breckinridge had a parliamentary right
to urge, and having heard that, it was prepared to
consign his proposition, and did consign it, to a tomb
from which there should be no resurrection.
Six days after this act of the Convention, on the
13th of June, Governor Gamble sent a message to ,
that body, relating entirely to its action on Judge
Breckinridge's Ordinance. He saw that that action
" might be represented as rudely discourteous to the
President and Congress," and " would, without doubt,
be so misrepresented as to excite a hostile feeling to
the State, among all those in authority who favor
Emancipation, and thus injuriously affect the interests
of the Slate." The object of that message, manifest
upon its face, was to tell the members of the Conven
tion how they might get out of the twofold scrape
they had got into, with the National Government and
with their own people. Not a word indicated the least
sympathy with emancipation ; not a word took off the
keen edge of the pro-Slavery proclamation of August,
1861. The Governor was still Missouri's pro-Slavery
Governor. Eighteen months of Slavery's war upon
the Union had, apparently, implanted in his mind no
sentiment against the peculiar institution^ here or else
where ; his sole anxiety was, that there should be " no
appearance of a design to treat the offer of the Presi
dent and Congress with neglect." He suggested, and
most truly, that " it was not contemplated by the peo
ple, when electing the body, that it should ever act
upon the subject of Slavery in the State, and there
fore such action would be improper ;" a reason as valid

352 The Wrongs
for all future time, as then. He suggested further,
that " the public mind was so agitated already, that
the proposal of any scheme of Emancipation would
produce dangerous excitement; a reason for non
action fully as forcible in June, 1863, as in June,
1862. These suggestions he accompanied with the fol
lowing remarks : i
" In theory, Conventions are understood to possess
all political power, but in actual practice they confine
themselves to the measures upon which the people at
the time of their election expected them to act, When
this Convention was chosen, the subject before the
public mind was the relations between the State and
the general Government. Acting upon this subject,
the Convention deposed a Governor and Legislature,
because they were trying to disturb those relations ;
militia ordinances were adopted, because a military
force was necessary to maintain those relations ; the
offices of all persons who refused to take an oath of
allegiance were vacated, because official power in the
hands of disloyal persons might be employed to dis
turb such relations ; laws were vacated, because they
had been passed for the purpose of bringing on a col
lision with the general Government — in fine, the action
of the Convention has been mainly addressed to the
one subject which it Avas elected to consider, and to
those which arose out of it.
"When, then, it is asked to entertain a proposition,
which is to effect a radical change in the social organi
zation of the State, it is well warranted in declining
to act upon the proposition, upon the ground that the
people, in choosing the Convention, never intended or
imagined that the body would undertake any social
revolution wholly unconnected with the relations
between the State and General Government. No per-

To Missouri's Loyal People. 353
son who understands the principles of our Government
would object to such action, unless it be one who is
willing to disregard all principle to accomplish a desired
end." As I said on a former occasion, so I reiterate now,
that this language embodies and affirms the following
five propositions :
1. That Emancipation is a social revolution.
2. That it is wholly unconnected with the relations
between the State and general Government.
3. That the people, in choosing the Convention, never
intended or imagined that it would undertake to act
on the subject of Emancipation.
4. That, therefore, the Convention was well war
ranted in declining to act upon it.
5. That whoever, understanding the principles of
our Government, would object to the Convention's so
declining to act, is willing to disregard all principle to
' accomplish a desired end.
No grounds could have been assumed more fatal to
the propriety or expediency of any action by that
Convention, at any time, upon the subject of Emanci
pation. We shall see, as we proceed, how the Gover
nor maintained his own voluntarily-assumed position.
There is a striking fact disclosed by the Journal of
the Convention in connection with the paragraphs just
quoted from the Governor's message. The Conven
tion, acting upon his suggestion, proceeded to consider
how it should respond to the resolution of Congress.
A committee was appointed, which reported a pream
ble and resolutions. Lieutenant Governor Hall

354 The Wrongs
offered, as a substitute for the report of the committee,
a preamble and resolution, the latter of which was as
follows :
"Resolved, That while this Convention recognizes
the liberality of the Government of the United States
fn the action referred to, yet the Convention thinks it
should not act upon the subject of Emancipation, for
the following among other reasons."
The resolution then copies, word for word, the para
graphs of the Governor's message above cited, except
the first and last sentences. On the vote upon the
adoption of that substitute, every member who voted for
it declared himself emphatically as sustaining the Gov
ernor's objections to any action by that Convention, at
any time, on the subject of Emancipation. And yet,
one year afterward, Lieut. Gov. Hall was one of the
committee that reported an Ordinance of Emancipa
tion for that body to pass ; and fifteen of those who
voted for his resolution in June, 1862, changed front
in June, 1863, and voted for the ordinance then passed
by that Convention !
Having seemingly given a death-blow to Emancipa
tion in that body, the Convention adjourned to the 4th
day of July, 1863, when, without reassembling, it
was to stand adjourned sine die. It declared its work
done, and each man went his way, never expecting to
return. But the door was left open for the reassem
bling of the body, upon the call of the Governor. One
man held the power to reinstate at any moment the
rule of that Convention; and we shall see how he exer
cised it.

To Missouri's Loyal People. 355
Five months after the Convention's action upon
Judge Breckinridge's proposition, an election was '
held for members of the General Assembly. They
were months of steady and rapid progress in the popu
lar mind in favor of Emancipation. Every day the
loyal people of Missouri grew more radical in senti
ment against Slavery, their country's enemy. Mis
souri's Emancipation army was " marching on." The
election resulted in the choice of a decided majority of
Emancipationists in each House ; but unfortun ately>
mainly through the machinations of Federal office
holders, high in position in our State, differences of
opinion as to plans of Emancipation were created.
The Legislature met on the 29th of December, 1862,
and on the following day received the Governor's mes
sage. To the surprise of many who remembered his
proclamation of August, 1861, and his message to the
Convention in June, 1862, he declared himself in favor
of Emancipation, and recommended action by the Legis
lature in relation to it. But he felt the embarrass
ment produced by the Constitutional limitation upon \
the power of the Legislature, before referred to. As
it was impossible for the State, unaided, to pay any
such equivalent for the slaves emancipated as that pro
vision required, the Governor recommended that an
act should be passed, providing that the children of
slave women, born thereafter, should be born free, and
should remain in custody and under the control of the
owner of their mothers until attaining a certain age ;
which plan, he considered, would require no compensa
tion to be paid to the slaveholder but for " the dimin-

356 The Wrongs
ished value of the female slaves thus rendered incapa
ble of bearing slaves." And such an act, so utterly
impotent to remove Slavery from our soil, — for, stand
ing by itself, it would never have secured freedom to
one-tenth of the children born after jts passage, — he
intimated might be made to take effect, upon this pro
vision being made by Congress for the small amount
of compensation required !
This was gravely proposed by Governor Gamble as
a plan of Emancipation; proposed as an "effectual
mode of extinguishing the desire of the rebel leaders
to have this State within the pretended Confederacy;"
proposed as a means of "encouraging immigration
from the free States!" It would have been about
equal in its effects to dropping a homeopathic pill into
the proboscis of a sick elephant. I refer to it, because
it is a fact connected with the wrong done to the loyal
people of Missouri, which is to be exposed.
The Legislature sat from the 29th of December,
1862, to the 23d of March, 1863, and then adjourned
over to the 10th of November next, having done no
thing to advance the cause of Emancipation. On the
18th of March, the Senate, by a vote of 17 to 15,
passed a Concurrent Resolution, requesting the Gov
ernor to call the Convention together at an early period,
for the purpose of taking into consideration the subject
of Emancipation; every Conservative voting for it, and,
aided by two Radicals, passing it. No attempt was
ever made to take up this resolution in the House, nor
could any such attempt have been successful. On the
same day, the Senate passed a bill for the election of

To Missouri's Loyal People. 357
a new Convention, provided the old Convention- did
not, before the succeeding first of July, adopt a scheme
of Emancipation. Two attempts were made to get
this bill up in the House ; but it required a two-thirds
vote to suspend the rules; and each time the effort
failed by a single vote. And with both resolution and
bill thus pending in the House, and open for action
when the Legislature should re-convene in November,
the adjournment took place. But let it not be sup
posed that the effort in the House to get the bill up,
indicated any desire among the Emancipationists there
to pass it in the shape in which it came from the Senate.
On the contrary, it was perfectly understood that if it
had been got up, the provision referring to the old
Convention would have been certainly struck out.
The facts which I have thus stated in detail are all
necessary to a correct understanding #f the case. Let
us now examine their bearings upon the main point —
the wrong done to the loyal people of Missouri.
I have placed before you Governor Gamble's mes
sage to the Convention in June, 1862, and his mes
sage to the Legislature in the following December;
and how does the matter stand? Why, thus. In his
judgment, at the former period, the Convention had no
business to act upon Emancipation at all, because the
people, in choosing it, never intended or imagined it
would undertake to act upon that subject; and there
fore the Convention was well warranted in killing Judge
Breckinridge's Ordinance ; and no one would find fault
with it for so doing, unless he was willing to disregard
all principle. So much for the Convention. Then, as

358 The Wrongs
to the Legislature, he finds that it is hampered by a
Constitutional provision, which precluded any action
on its part, except to declare that after-born children
of slave mothers should be born free ; and that action
was suggested to take effect only when Congress should
provide the means for paying the owners of the mothers
for the injury resulting to them from making the
mothers incapable of breeding any more slaves. Here,
then, was a Governor declaring himself in favor of
Emancipation, and arguing in favor of it to a Legisla
ture that was in favor of it, but almost powerless to
do anything for it, which Legislature represented a
people that were overwhelmingly in favor of it : what
was the course he should have taken ? Can any right-
minded man hesitate in declaring that, if the Governor
was earnestly an Emancipationist, he should and would
have pointed the Legislature to some way by which
the popular will might be carried into effect? As
matters then stood he found the way blocked : why did
he ignore the only way that lay wide open — a direct
appeal to the people, in the election of a new Conven
tion ?
This is no idle question. Every man knows that he
can often judge another as well by what he does not,
as by what he does. If a man is drowning, and you
do not throw a rope to him when you have one, because
you have tried to save him with your hand and failed,
would not all the world say, and say justly, that you
were indifferent to his fate, or wanted him to drown?
And so, when Governor Gamble recommended Eman
cipation to the Legislature which was powerless, and

To Missouri's Loyal People. - 359
also held that the Convention ought not to act upon
the subject, because it was not elected for any such
purpose, and at the same time said not one word in
favor of, or in allusion to, that other course which if
pursued, would have secured Emancipation, and secured
it as the people desired it, and so settled the matter
forever : I demand, and have a right to demand, why
he preserved that silence? Will it be said it was not
his province? He is required by the Constitution of
the State to "recommend to their consideration such
measures as he may deem necessary and expedient."
Will it be said it was not proper for him to suggest
that particular mode of action ? Why not ? He could
suggest to the Convention excuses and arguments to
sustain their action on Judge Breckinridge's Ordi
nance; and he could suggest Emancipation to the
General Assembly, and argue in favor of it: why not
suggest and support the only means of obtaining Eman
cipation in such way as to satisfy the people? Will it
be said that he could not have known that a recom
mendation from him on that point would have helped
the measure? He had no right, for that reason, to
withhold it, any more than to refuse to recommend
any other measure, because he didn't know whether it
would be adopted. But nothing is more certain, than
that, if he had advocated a new Convention, an act
providing for it would have been passed. But here
came in a bugbear, that was paraded, during the whole
session of the Legislature, to defeat the bill for a new
Convention, viz : that if a new Convention should be
called, there might arise a conflict between it and the

360 The Wrongs
old Convention. But that was impossible, unless Gov
ernor Gamble, after the new Convention was authorized,'
should call the old one together again; for it never
could meet again, except upon his call. And so it
was perfectly in his power to have procured a new
Convention, and also to have prevented the reassemb
ling of the old one. Why did he not so do ? I can
not say upon his authority, for he has never told me,
or, so far as I know, told the world. I am forced to
conclusions upon the facts as they are known to the
public. If my conclusions are unjust to Governor
Gamble, I am sorry for it ; I do not seek them. I say,
citizens of Missouri, that I can see no other reason
for his utter silence in regard to a new Convention,
than that- he did not intend that the people should have
any further opportunity to say or do anything what
ever, practically, on the subject of Emancipation. In
other words, he determined, if possible, to wrest the
whole matter out of their hands, and force Emancipa
tion upon them through the old Convention, regardless
of their wishes, and in defiance of their sacred right
to shape their own fundamental law and their own
domestic institutions. This is the only conclusion I
can arrive at, and before God, I believe it to be a right
one. That it was Governor Gamble's purpose so to use
the old Convention, is manifest from subsequent events.
The Legislature adjourned on the 23d of March, 1863,
and on the 15th of April he issued his call for the
Convention to meet on the 15th of June, to " consult
and act upon the subject of Emancipation of slaves,

To Missouri's Loyal People. 361
and such other matters as may be connected with the
peace and prosperity of the State." In his judgment,
it was " of the highest importance to the interest of
the State that some scheme of Emancipation should
be adopted."
My friends, looking at this act of the Governor in
the light of his previous declarations, and of the then
condition of things in the State, I can not but regard
it as one of the most extraordinary exercises of Execu
tive power that have ever fallen under my observation ;
and as indefensible as it was extraordinary. Why, look
at it. Only ten months and two days before the date
of that call, he had solemnly declared to the Conven
tion, that the people, in choosing that body, never
intended or — mark the word — imagined that it would
undertake to act on the subject of Emancipation : and
now he calls them to do that very thing ! He had told
the Convention, moreover, that it was justified in killing
an Ordinance of Emancipation in the way it did; and
yet he calls it together to pass such an Ordinance.
He had, with a severity of expression unusual for him,
declared, in effect, that no man of principle would have
that Convention act on that subject; and yet he con
venes it for that very purpose! What does this mean?
Was it the same man speaking in June, 1862, in con
demnation of any action by that Convention upon that
subject, who, in April, 1863, called them to act upon
it? Yes, it was the same Governor Gamble in body,
but unfortunately not in mind. A change, a wondrous
change, had come over his opinions in that brief time.
He no longer saw that it was wrong for that Conven-
31

362 The Wrongs
tion to take Emancipation in hand and act upon it, but
contrariwise saw it was right ; though the grounds upon
which he based his previous opinion remained precisely
the same. He no longer held that any man who wanted
it so to act was an unprincipled man ; for he wanted
that very thing. He saw no more that Emancipation
was a social revolution, wholly unconnected with the
relations between the State and the general Govern
ment, which the people, in choosing that Convention,
never dreamed it would undertake. Arid, above all,
he forgot that for such a body, so elected, to assume
to act upon such a subject, was a grievous wrong to a
people who were at that very time represented by
another set of men, in their General Assembly; who
had been elected twenty-one months after the Conven
tion, and actually had pending before them propositions
looking to a settlement of the whole matter by a new
Convention, to be elected for that express end.
It is due to Governor Gamble, and to the cause of
truth and fair discussion, that I should take time and
space to present whatever grounds I find anywhere
taken by him in defense of his recall of that Conven
tion, as it were, from the brink of its grave. He has
twice expressed himself in relation to that matter;
first, in his message to the Convention, at the opening
of the late session; and secondly, in a speech he made
in the Convention on the 27th of June. In his mes
sage he used the following language :
" The importance of the subject [Emancipation], in
its relation to all the interests of the State, demanded,
in my judgment, very speedy action by a body capable

To Missouri's Loyal People. 363
of finally disposing of it, by the adoption of some wise
and just scheme of Emancipation. The Senate passed
a joint resolution requesting me to call the Convention
together, and also a bill for the election of delegates to
a new Convention, provided your body should not,
before the first day of July next, adopt a scheme of
Emancipation. Although neither of these measures
was acted upon in the House of Representatives, yet
the friends of Emancipation in the House exhibited
the greatest earnestness in endeavoring to have the
bill which came from the Senate acted upon by the
House, and were only foiled by the application of
stringent parliamentary rules. This action in the
Assembly gave strength to my own conviction, that
you should be called together, rather than wait until
the Assembly should again convene in November
next, and then initiate measures of Emancipation,
which might require some time before they could have
effect." In his speech in the Convention he thus expressed
himself :
" This Convention is called in this city that there
should be Emancipation — that there shall be Emanci
pation. "It is said that this is in conflict with the com
munication I made to this body last session. What is
that communication in its general scope ? I say that
an answer is demanded to the offer of the General
Government. The present position of the question
here is such that you can not act upon it ; and why ?
Because you have laid it upon the table, which is
a final disposition of the subject. I state reasons
which you might assign as reasons for the course you
adopted. " The suggestions offered were made for the benefit

364 The Wrongs
of the Convention, and to make a courteous answer to
the President and to Congress."
In these two extracts we have all that the Governor
has said, so far as I know, in defense of his calling
that Convention to act on the subject of Emancipation.
The singular vapidness of the latter will attract atten
tion. It gives no answer to the charge of inconsis
tency, takes back nothing, explains nothing. His
justification, if any, is to be found in the passage
quoted from his message to the Convention ; and let
us examine that.
He says he called the Convention together, because,
first, in his judgment, " very speedy action " was
demanded ; second, because the Senate had, by a
majority of two votes, passed a resolution requesting
him to do so ; third, because the Senate had passed
a bill for the election of a new Convention, provided
the old one did not, before the first of July, 1863, adopt
a scheme of Emancipation ; and fourth, because the
friends of Emancipation in the House exhibited the
greatest earnestness in endeavoring to have that bill
acted upon by the House.
My friends, I confess to a feeling of sadness and
humiliation at such an exhibition on the part of one
so high in station, for whom, for more than a quarter
of a century, I had entertained the highest respect.
Never before, probably, did a high public officer in
this country more expose himself -to criticism and
condemnation, than did Governor Gamble in that
assignment of reasons for that act. The utter insuf
ficiency, the absolute puerility of such a defense, must

To Missouri's Loyal People. 365
be apparent to the most limited comprehension. Nay,
more and worse, does it not bear the plainest marks
of insincerity ? Why was " very speedy action " neces
sary ? What circumstances forbade that Emancipation
should be postponed until the people could act upon it
through a new Convention ? He states none, nor can
any man designate any. But if they existed when he
issued his call on the 15th of April, they must have
existed before the adjournment of the Legislature on
the 23d of March : why, if there was such urgency, did
he not communicate it to that body, and let it provide
for the exigency ? The old Convention was elected
twenty-eight days, and assembled thirty-eight days,
after the passage of the act authorizing it ; what was
to prevent a like promptness in the election and
assembling of a new Convention ? Had the Legislature
passed an act to call a new Convention, it might have
have met, passed an Ordinance of Emancipation, and
adjourned, before the day he fixed for the old Conven
tion to assemble; and so the "very speedy action"
would have been had, sooner than it was had at the
hands of the body which assembled in obedience to
his sole will. As to the reasons based on the pro
ceedings in the two branches of the General Assembly,
they are not worthy of argument or notice. To the
whole batch I simply oppose his own declaration, in
1862, " that the people in choosing the Convention never
intended or imagined that the body would undertake
any social revolution wholly unconnected with the rela
tions between the State and the general Government;"
and his still more emphatic announcement, in the

366 The Wrongs
same paragraph, that " no person who understands the
principles of our Government would object to such
action [as that upon Judge Breckinridge's Ordinance^
unless it be one who is willing to disregard all prin
ciple to accomplish a desired end." Let Governor
Gamble reconcile himself with himself, if he can. If
he can escape his own denunciation, it is more than I
could, were I in his position.
But not alone on the grounds so stated by Governor
Gamble was it a wrong to the loyal people of Missouri
to summon that Convention to the great work of
Emancipation. Even if those grounds had not existed,
there were others which made it offensive and inju
rious to the people for that body to handle that great
subject. Elected in February, 1861, it was in no
respect, except in the persons of the eleven members
elected in May and June, 1863, to fill vacancies, an
authentic exponent of the public sentiment of Missouri
when it assembled to make its final record. The con
stituency of 1863 was, in' law and in fact, wholly
different from the constituency of 1861. The Conven
tion itself, in June, 1862, had prescribed new conditions
for the exercise of the elective franchise, requiring the
taking of a solemn and searching oath of allegiance,
and expurgation from complicity in the rebellion after
the 17th of December, 1861, as a pre-requisite to the
right of voting. Every man who would not take that
oath was banished from the polls, was disfranchised
as a voter, was not one of the people whose will was to
be considered. The control of the State had passed,
by fundamental Constitutional enactments, into the

To Missouri's Loyal People. 367
hands of its loyal people, or those who would stand
that test of their loyalty. That Convention, therefore,
was no embodiment or representative of the will of the
rightful constituency of 1863, but of a former and a
different constituency ; a large proportion of which
was then in the armies of the rebellion, or pursuing
the bloody work of the bushwhacker, or skulking at
home in self-imposed abstinence from the right of
suffrage, because he dared not appeal to God to witness
its freedom from the stain of treason, or the sincerity
of its allegiance to the noblest Government He ever
vouchsafed to man. When, therefore, the Governor
convened that body to perform the glorious work of
Emancipation, he convened a body which, whatever its
legil power, had no more moral right to do that work,
without submitting its action to the present constitu
ency, that is, the loyal people of Missouri, than the
Legislature of Maine or Minnesota would have had.
Not only so, but more. It was a body which had
shown itself, a year before, opposed to the considera
tion even of the subject of Emancipation, and it has
never signified that its views had changed on that
point. True, it ordained what it termed Emancipation ;
but not because it desired or favored that great
measure; but because it was resolved to prevent its
accomplishment by, and according to the desire of, the
loyal people of the State. No man lives who dares
affirm that a majority of that Convention were for
Emancipation on principle, from conviction, or in
feeling. It was essentially a pro-Slavery body. Of
the fifty-one members who voted for the ordinance

368 The Wrongs
passed, forty were slaveholders ; a few of whom should
be honored for their advocacy of the cause of Freedom
for its own sake : all the rest were but playing a part.
And it was a body, the control of which was in the
hands of men whose past acts there gave evident token
of disloyalty. Eighteen were there, who voted in July,
1861, against the deposition of Governor Jackson ; and
sixteen of them — all who were present at the time, and
more than enough to have changed the result in each
case — voted, in 1863, against an election of a Governor
and other State officers by the people, and for the
exemption of slave property from taxation ; and eight
of them — more than enough to have changed the
result — against submitting the ordinance of Emanci
pation to the people for ratification. Twenty-one were
there, who voted, in 1861, against turning out the
traitorous Legislature of that year. Sixteen were
there, who voted against the abrogation by the Con
vention of the treasonable laws enacted by that
Legislature. Twenty -two were there, who voted
against the test-oath ordinance of June 10, 1862,
intended to exclude traitors from the polls. Sixteen
were there, who had voted against allowing our brave
soldiers to vote in their camps beyond the limits of the
State. The efficient control, in fact, was in the hands
of those who had in such ways signalized their dis
loyalty ; aided by seventeen, who were bound to the
Gamble dynasty by offices of trust and profit received
from it. And this was the body which, as Colonel
Doniphan said at Liberty, after its adjournment, was
convened by Governor Gamble, on the request of " cer-

To Missouri's Loyal People. 369
tain wealthy slaveholders residing in different parts of
the State." For what purpose ? To ordain Emanci
pation according to the will of the State's loyal people?
No ; but that " something should be done to save slave
property from utter waste and spoliation, and give to
slaveholders a brief opportunity to make the best dispo
sition in their power of their slaves ! "
From such a body, convened on such a principle,
controlled by such influences, and working to such ends,
what could be expected, other than has been realized ?
Called ostensibly to destroy Slavery, it labored disloy
ally for its preservation from the early doom which the
loyalty of Missouri, if it could have spoken, would have
awarded it, and postponed Emancipation, nominally,
until the 4th of July, 1870, but in fact for a quarter
of a century longer. While there were those who
desired and labored for Emancipation for its own sake,
and for the sake of Missouri and the Union, the poten
tial influence was, at heart, against Emancipation on
any grounds, and equally against every radical measure
against Slavery anywhere. Few there yielded their
pro-Slavery views in obedience to the anti-Slavery sen
timents of their people ; but there were numbers there
who knew that they utterly misrepresented the popu
lar will in the districts whence they came. Nothing
concerning the body was more true or more apparent,
than that, pretending to favor Emancipation, it was
resolved to postpone it to the last possible moment,
and to yield it on the least possible injurious terms to
the slaveholder. And even that was done with the
open avowal by some, that before the period fixed for
32

370 The Wrongs
the emancipation of the negro from slavery, and his
transmission to a condition of servitude, the people
would elect three Legislatures; justifying the inference
that, before that period should arrive, the work of the
Convention might be repealed. Of Emancipation
obtained at the hands of such a body, in the form it
was pleased to grant, — pro-Slavery Emancipation, if
such a solecism is allowable, — Governor Gamble was
the chief engineer ; showing himself still, to my mind,
to be, as he was in 1861, Missouri's pro-Slavery Gover
nor. True, the date he at one time proposed for
Slavery to cease, nominally, in Missouri, was not that
finally fixed; but even in the same breath that he
expressed himself as desiring the 4th of July, 1867, he
announced with remarkable accommodativeness, " I am
willing to receive any action that, in your judgment, is
best." But some action he was resolved should be had,
then and there, and he staked his official position as
Governor upon it. In his speech to the Convention,
on the 27th of June, this paragraph occurs :
" If, after having exercised my best judgment upon
this subject, I have called this Convention together for
the purpose of action, and it should separate with the
expression of a contrary opinion, or without adopting
any scheme of Emancipation, I would not feel myself
at liberty to continue in the exercise of the Executive
function. I would feel, as a Minister in England, when
a proposition of his is voted down in the Commons,
that it is a denial of the correctness of his judgment as
to the proper policy of the State, and he resigns at
once; so I would not feel at liberty to continue in the
Executive office, if the Convention did not pass some
scheme of Emancipation; because it would be a judg-

To Missouri's Loyal People. 371
ment adverse to what I think should be the policy of
the State."
And the pro-Slavery Convention, the balance of
power in which was held by men whose past acts there
proclaim them disloyal at heart, bowed to the Gover
nor's demand for "some scheme of Emancipation,"
because his continuance in office was necessary to them
and their plans, and the price of it was any scheme of
Emancipation they might choose to adopt ! Easy terms !
facile Governor ! pliant Convention ! and all that " some
thing should be done to save slave property from utter
waste and spoliation, and give to slaveholders a brief
opportunity to make the best disposition in their power
of their slaves."
Had Governor Gamble been half as solicitous for
the people's approval of his administration, as he was
for the Convention's — half as fearful of a popular
" denial of the correctness of his judgment as to the
proper policy of the State," as he was of such a denial
by the Convention, he would have been a wiser man
and a better Governor. He would then have known
that the loyal people of Missouri long ago abandoned
all hope of him as a defender and supporter of true,
uncompromising loyalty in our distressed and ravaged
State; and that since what he deemed "the proper
policy of the State" has been inaugurated by him,
there is not a disloyal man or woman in all Missouri
that is not his backer. Truly, " the laborer is worthy
of his hire," and the Governor has received his. He
enjoys position, power, influence, but at what a terrible
price! But all his other mispolicies are of transient

372 The Wrongs
moment, compared with that upon which he put his
hazard in that Convention. Almost the life-breath of
Missouri hung upon action there. His influence shaped
that action, not for the cause of Emancipation and the
Union, — one and the same in Missouri — but for Slavery,
the Union's enemy, and for slaveholders, almost all its
enemies, too. He lent the weight of his age and office,
his name and his personal character, to a scheme for
the support of Slavery, and the overthrow of the great
loyal party in Missouri, and in that Convention he
won, but lost all with loyal Missourians. To a man
hastening on to threescore and ten and the grave, what
earthly gain can overbalance such a loss ?
I have thus, my friends, endeavored to place before
you the circumstances of the wrongs suffered by the
loyal people of- Missouri, through the policy of Gov
ernor Gamble, and the acts of the dead Convention,
which he — the only man on earth that could do it —
called to life again. In all American history there is
no parallel to it, except in some of those Southern
States, where secession and rebellion were forced upon
the people by the aristocrats of Slavery.. Thank God!
however, there is virtue enough left in the loyal people
of Missouri to raise their voice against the attempt to
trample upon their most sacred rights. They raise it
here to-day ; not in revolutionary shouts, not in sedi
tion, not in disregard of law, not in derogation of the
duties of true citizenship, not in any unlawful cr
unauthorized way ; but with the high and holy purpose
that despotism shall be forced to recoil before the
moral power of an aroused people. We are here to

To Missouri's Loyal People. 373
speak, to judge, and to do what becomes freemen, in a
manner suited to freemen. The cry of the arch-traitor
was, "All we ask is to be let alone!" and the pro-
Slavery emancipationists of the defunct Convention
shout the same cry. But they are not to be let alone.
They are to be made to feel that they can not commit
treason against Popular Sovereignty, and be let alone.
They are to learn that there is a People, to whom they
are accountable, and upon whose necks they can not
put their feet with impunity. They are to be taught
that they can not snatch the work of Missouri's regen
eration out of the hands of her loyal men, and then
sing them to sleep. They are to understand that their
work is rejected by the people, and they, too. They
ask us to accept their ordinances as a finality : we do
accept it as a finality — of them ! But, conceived, as it
was, in wrong to the people; planned as it was, in the
interest of Slavery; brought forth, as it was, by a
body which was so conscious of its wrong, that it
refused to let the people pass upon it, avowing through
their leaders that the people would reject it ; and upheld,
as it is, by every rebel, Secessionist, bushwhacker, and
Copperhead in the State; we, loyal men of Missouri,
who love our country more than Slavery — who have
borne patiently all that has befallen us, for the sake of
the Union — who have consecrated our all to the main
tenance of that Union against all enemies — and who
are determined, come what may, to rebuke, denounce,
and overthrow disloyalty, whatever form or guise it
may assume — we reject that Ordinance as a finality of
the question. We, and our brethren in loyalty in

374 The Wrongs
Missouri, are able to*manage the affairs of Missouri,
and we will do it. We ask no interference or help
from traitors or their friends, in office or not. We will
bide our time, as loyal men should, looking for the day
'of deliverance. It will surely come. This is the day
of the office-holders and the politicians, the rebels and
their sympathizers, the pro-Slavery men and their
courtiers ; the day of the People will come, and with it
confusion, dismay, and defeat to all who have dared to
take part in the attempt of that Convention to dominate
Missouri in the interest of Slavery. Let it not be said,
as Mr. Henderson is reported to have said, that the
Ordinance is the best that could be procured under
the circumstances ! Who made the circumstances ? Who
but he and those who acted with him ? And shall they
make the circumstances, and then plead them in their
own extenuation ? Let them stand aside, and the people
will make other circumstances, from which something
better will come forth, of measures and of men.
Let us not, my friends, lose sight of the great and
vital truth, that not only is this a struggle for Popular
Sovereignty, but for loyal supremacy in Missouri. In
that view no man can compute its importance to us as
a people. If we sleep now, all is lost. The loyal
men of Missouri are her rightful sovereigns. If true
to themselves and to the great cause which in the provi
dence of God is committed to their keeping, all will be
well. Missouri loyalty has become an honored name
in the land. It imports all of dauntless bravery, stern
resolution, and heroic fortitude, that could illustrate
the character and glorify the history of any people.

To Missouri's Loyal People. 375
'Let us be true to our record and our fame, through to
the end. If we have no country, we are wanderers,
if we have no Government, we are a prey to tyrants;
if we have no Union, we have neither country nor Gov
ernment. All lives or dies with the Union. Let our
souls cling to it, our fortunes sustain it, our hands
uphold it, and, if need be, our blood flow for it. For
nearly three years we have had to defend it. Let us
defend it thrice three more, if such be the will of God ;
defend it against the traitor in arms and the traitor in
heart; against the open and the secret foe; against
the wily politician, the cunning plotter, the unscrupu
lous schemer, though he wrap himself in the bright
folds of the Stars and Stripes ; against perfidy, treachery,
and disloyalty in every form, everywhere, always, to
the glorious end that awaits us, if we are true. This
our work is not in the South — =it is here, in Missouri.
We are beset on every side by the armed rebel, the
prowling bushwhacker, the Southern sympathizer, the
devotee of Slavery, all, openly or covertly, the Union's
enemies. And they are ours, too. They are striving
for the mastery in Missouri. The calling of that Con
vention to ordain Emancipation was a part of their
game. The next move will be to secure a Legislature
that will repeal the test-oath ordinance, which excludes
them from the polls; and then will come the reign of
disloyalty, the repeal of Emancipation, the triumph of
Slavery, the hunting down and driving out of Union
men — all, all will come. Meet the issue here and now.
Proclaim that Loyalty shall govern Missouri. Demand
of the General Assembly a law authorizing the election

376 The Wrongs to Missouri's Loyal People.
of a new Convention, wherein the people, not politi
cians and office-holders, shall speak. Demand that the
people be permitted to elect their own rulers. Demand
Emancipation, immediate, unconditional, final. Demand
the perpetual disfranchisement of every man who has
taken part, here or elsewhere, in this damnable rebel
lion. Enforce your demand by every lawful agency,
device, and influence, with energy and fidelity, with
firm confidence and steady perseverance; and there is
no power on earth that can resist you. Justice and
right are with you; every loyal heart in the land is
with you; the great and precious principles of free
government are with you ; the mighty People are with
you; and, in the not distant future, victory will be
with you, and defeat and oblivion with all in Missouri
who oppose the sacred cause of Popular Sovereignty
and the Union.

THE CALL FOR REBEL VOTES *

The hour is so late that I should decline to trespass
upon your time to-night, had I not learned this after
noon at five o'clock of the publication in the Missouri
Republican of this morning — my copy of which" was not
left at my residence, — of a document, which is so evtra-
ordinary, so atrocious in its character, that it demands
notice by some one on the first occasion when it can be
brought before the public mind. Short as the time has
been since it met my eye, I propose to attend some
what to it now.
The document to which I referred, was published to
day over the signatures of Samuel T. Glover, 0. D.
Filley, John How, William Carson, Austin A.
King, William A. Hall, John S. Phelps and R.
C. Vaughan. It is too long to read to you; but I
advise all of you to obtain and read it, and say whether
I have not spoken truly in pronouncing it one of the
most atrocious publications ever made in Missouri.
My friends the whole object of that document, addressed
though it is to " the loyal people of Missouri," is to
array the disloyal against the loyal people of this State.
It is a bid, a shameless and defiant bid for the support
* A speech delivered in St. Louis, October 17, 1863.

378 The Call for Rebel Votes.
of. the whole disloyal population of Missouri, in the
election to take place on the 3d day of next month.
And this bid is made by men who have heretofore been
counted loyal — who have, indeed, in times past, done
good service to the cause of their country ! Time was
when the Unconditional Union men of Missouri loved
to honor some of the men whose names are signed to
that paper ; but now what is the position of those men ?
By that publication they have placed themselves in the
van of Missouri disloyalty, and stand before the world
as the leaders of that party which, with a small body
of recognized Union men, in it, embraces every Seces
sionist, bushwhacker, guerrilla, and rebel in Missouri !
Those Union men are to screen from the world's view
the hosts of disloyalty they are leading on against the
true patriots, the Unconditional Union men of our
State ! Yes, it is that, and nothing else. I defy them
to point to a single man in the Radical Union party in
this State, whose hands are stained with loyal blood, or
whose garments smell of the smoke and fire of loyal
habitations. But this invocation is intended to reach
thousands upon whom that stain rests; thousands who
have been robbing and murdering Union men, and
burning their houses, and turning their wives and chil
dren abroad upon the world's cold charity; thousands
who in this cruel war have sympathized with rebellion ;
thousands who from the day Sumter fell to this, have
never drawn a loyal breath, or done a seemingly loyal
act, except under compulsion. Has anything like this
been seen before ? Who would have believed that it
would ever have been seen in Missouri ?

The Call for Rebel Votes. 379
This document is a libel upon Missouri's loyal men,
more infamous than ever was concocted in this State
before. Let these men, and all who affiliate with them,
beware ! - Let traitors of every hue beware ! They
talk about our being a revolutionary party : it is infam
ously false. But, though we are no revolutionary
party, let them beware ! There is a point beyond
which the endurance of the most patriotic and law-
abiding man, and that of the most earnest Christian
will not go. Never have a loyal people endured more
than have the loyal people of Missouri at the hands of
her disloyal men. Traduced and vilified on every hand ;
hunted down in many quarters almost like criminals
under the hue and cry ; scanning every bush on the
roadside, for fear it may conceal the fiend whose steal
thy shot may be their death ; going to bed at night
with their doors barricaded and their guns laid beside
them in their beds; persecuted by men in office, and
almost proscribed by a Governor who claims to be
loyal ; and all because they are radical Union men :
such is a faint outline of what the patriots of Missouri
have had to endure at the hands of those to whom this
rallying cry has been this day addressed, by men who
have in time past been held to be loyal ! Again, I say,
let them beware ! The day may come, which many,
with devilish purpose, have been seeking to bring on,
when patriotism and duty can restrain no longer.
They have pressed Union men on every side, with every
form of aggression, indignity, and wrong, all the while
howling that they were Jacobins and revolutionists,
and all the time hoping that some retaliation, wrung

380 The Call for Rebel Votes.
from Union men, would give them the opportunity of
shouting — " There, did we not tell you that this was a
revolutionary party f" I hope in God that no such
day will come ; but if it does, let no man lay it to the
charge of the Radical Union men of Missouri ; but to
that of the men who for more than a year past have
carried on an infernal war upon them.
This document sets out with informing the loyal
people of Missouri, that " in the present condition of
our political affairs there is cause for both congratula
tion and alarm." You will see presently what is their
cause for congratulation. Their cause for alarm is,
that the day is at hand when the Radicals of Missouri
will, at the polls, sweep away the disloyalty of Mis
souri like a cobweb ; and hence they invoke the aid of
every disloyal man, and of every man who has hereto
fore stayed away from the polls because he dared not
perjure himself by taking the oath required of every
voter. This is the cause for their alarm. Let them
tremble under it until the 3d of November, and then
exchange it for despair.
This document goes on to say — " A few straggling
and marauding guerrillas, formidable only bythesmall-
ness of their nufmbers and the stealth and rapidity of
their movements, constitute all that remains of the great
armed outbreak of 1861." " A few straggling and
marauding guerrillas ! " That is to say, twelve hundred
men led by Coffey and Shelby, march from the south
ern border through the populous counties of the South
west, to the city of Boonville, plunder it to their hearts'
content, and march out of Cooper county with one

The Call for Rebel Votes. 381
hundred and fifty thousand dollars worth of booty!
How did they get there? Who let them go there?
Where were the militia to whom Governor Gamble has
been so anxious to commit the keeping of Missouri's
peace, and by which he declared " he could hold the State
as quiet as a sleeping child in a nurse's arms ? " Where
were they ? That twelve hundred men could march
into the very center of Missouri, pillaging, burning and
slaying, is a brilliant commentary upon this text of
Messrs. Glover & Co. " A few straggling guerrillas "
forsooth ! If that is their estimate of the twelve hun
dred whose raid is the fresh event of yesterday, what
would they say of twelve thousand? Perhaps they
would count them a little bigger affair, but no great
thing after all. And this is " all that remains of the
great armed outbreak of 1861," is it? What has
become of the lesser bands of guerrillas and bushwhack
ers, that prowl through large sections of our State ?
And what has become of the thousands, yea, tens of
thousands of traitors that inhabit the State, more
unmolested, more protected, more courted by certain
classes of politicians, than ever true Union men were ?
What has become of the multitudes of them now swarmed
into this city from exposed parts of the State ? What
has become, of the thousands and thousands who,- living
in peace in every part of the State, are the feeders,
guides, spies, informers, and protectors of those " few
straggling and marauding guerrillas," those incarnate
devils whose deeds are as dark as hell itself? They
are still among us — the Secesh Home Guard of Mis
souri ! They are here, too, to vote in answer to this

382 The Call for Rebel Votes.
call. And they are more dangerous than the men in the
bush. They meet you, shake hands with you, inquire
after your health, find out where you are going, and
point one of the " few straggling and marauding guer
rillas " to the track of your lonely journey, and the
next that is heard of you is that you lie murdered on
the highway. This is no exaggerated picture. It has
its original in many parts of Missouri. You in St.
Louis can form no conception of the condition of those
parts of our State, until you go near enough to them
to learn the daily facts. There you will find the mid
night murderer of the Union men, plowing the next day
in the field, and when told of the murder he himself
committed, will, as Colonel Jennison remarked to-night,
be the most astonished man in the county. And there
you will find thousands such as I have described, to
whom this address of these eight gentlemen is an invi
tation to come to the polls, and by their votes on the
3d of November, practically disfranchise just so many
thousands of the loyal men of Missouri.
My friends, these gentlemen know very well whom
they are talking to; very well, indeed. Listen how
they talk to them :
" The secessionists of Missouri are manifestly tired
of the war, which, in a period of violent, and unrea
soning passion, they inaugurated against the peace
of the State and their own pecuniary and social inter
ests. History hardly furnishes an example of rash
ness equal to that of the secession war in Missouri.
* * * At length they see their folly,
and despair of success, and, with few exceptions, have

The Call for Rebel Votes. 383
abandoned secession, and now have no other wish than
to remain at peace."
Now, mark ! they speak of the war which the seces
sionists of Missouri inaugurated, as begun " in a period
of violent and unreasoning passion," and say that
"history hardly furnishes an example of rashness
equal to that;" and that the secessionists now "see
their folly" but they have not one word of condem
nation for their act as a hellish crime against their
country ! Who can not bear to be told that he has
acted in violent and unreasoning passion, and been
guilty of rashness and folly ? But tell him he is a
traitor, guilty of the highest crime known to human
laws ; that his hands are red with the blood of Union
men; that he has burned his neighbor's house and
driven his wife and children forth homeless and desti
tute ; that he has betrayed his friend to his death ; that
he has warred against the best Government the world
" ever saw ; in one word, that he is a monster and a vil-
lian, and ought to be put to death any hour of the day ;
this he don't like to hear, and this is just what these
eight loyal gentlemen don't tell them. Why not ? Is
there any conceivable reason, but that the votes of
just such creatures are wanted on the 3d of next
month to overwhelm the Radicals ? I can see none.
And that is the way the thousands of Missouri's dis
loyal people are to be marshaled to that work. But
I glory in believing that on that day they will, meet
a complete and disastrous overthrow.
But they " have abandoned Secession, and now have
no other wish than to remain at peace !" Abandoned

384 The Call for Rebel Votes.
Secession ! In heart ? No, not for an hour ! Sirs, I
tell you they are as vile traitors, at heart, this day, as
they ever were before, though they take ten thousand
oaths, and give millions of dollars of bonds. They
drop Secession as the flying thief drops his booty, to
save himself. For more than two years they have
been warring against their country, and now they come
back and drop their arms, and set up for good citizens,
unwashed of the loyal blood on their hands, unpar
doned by God or man of the fiendish crime that has
polluted and depraved their souls. They came not
back because they love the institutions of freedom
under which they were born, and which they have
vainly tried to destroy ; but because they see that Seces
sion is going to perdition, and they do not care to go
there, too. And " they have no other wish than to
remain at peace !" Wonderful meekness ! They have
fought and killed patriots as long as it promised to be
profitable, and now they are for peace ! who would not
be for peace, when he could get it on such cheap terms,
and have his vote courted by loyal men in the bar
gain !
But "thousands and thousands of them have
renewed their allegiance to the Government and become
obedient to the laws." That is, they have walked up
and taken the oath ! And what is a traitor's oath of
allegiance worth? As well expect Lucifer to respect
an oath of allegiance to Heaven, if he could be induced
to take it. In multitudes of instances this has been
shown, by finding upon these persons when they have
been killed in arms, the written evidence of their hav-

The Call for Rebel Votes. 385
ing before " renewed their allegiance." And this is
one of the classes of men whom these eight gentlemen
address, as loyal people of Missouri, and whose votes
are to be cast on the 3d of next month against the
Radicals. I agree with those gentlemen, that in the
return of those " thousands and thousands " there is
"cause for congratulation;" not to our country or our
State — not to the cause of freedom — not to loyal men
here or anywhere; but to all who wish, on the shoul
ders of these blood-stained traitors and murderers,
to ride into power in Missouri. But their congratula
tion will be turned into mourning before another month
goes by; unless, indeed, our "erring brethren" should
be much more numerous than I expect.
The gentlemen who have signed this document are not
the only ones who seem to find cause for congratulation
in the return of those " thousands and thousands " of
peace-loving traitors. Major General Blair made a
speech in this city recently, in which he expressed
himself on this point in such terms as to leave no
doubt of his willingness to receive back into full citi
zenship the men who are now warring against their
Government and country, and at whose hands he may
at any moment meet his own death on the field of bat
tle. He says :
"Those are the sentiments of the patriots of New
York. They declare that whilst they will listen to no
terms from rebels and make no tender of peace to
rebels in arms, yet when they lay down their arms
they may resume their places in the American Union.
Is that the language held by a faction of a party in
this State ? Why, there are some men in this State
33

386 The Call for Rebel Votes.
who appear to be alarmed lest the rebels should lay
down their arms and come back into the American
Union. They are alarmed lest they may do that.
They say that it is a thing to be inourned, and to be
provided against beforehand — that they must be dis
franchised. No such language comes from the patri
otic Union men of the great North."
No wonder that no such language comes from the
North ; for there nothing is felt or known of the evil
which these returning rebels bring with them. We
have occasion to be alarmed, when the danger faces
us of Missouri's passing under disloyal control, through
the votes of these rebels. And here is the very evi
dence of that danger. General Blair is willing to
receive them back, and Messrs. Glover & Co. issue
an address placing them on a par with you, ever-loyal
citizens, because, after a career of incomparable crime,
they "have renewed their allegiance" by oath and
bond, and "have no other wish than to remain at
peace?" For offenses of lesser grade than treason
men are disfranchised ; but that crime of all crimes is
to be overlooked, forgotten, forgiven, being only an
outbreak of " violent and unreasoning passion," only
" rashness," only " folly ! " I say, cut them off from
all participation in the rights of the citizenship they
have degraded — from all control in the Government
they have aimed to destroy — disfranchise them at
least for a term of years, or until a general amnesty
restores them to the privileges they have forfeited.-
Having thus made fair weather with the whole brood
of traitors, guerrillas, and bushwhackers, these gen-

The Call for Rebel 'Votes. 387
tlemen turn upon the Radical party, in such terms as
the following :
"A radical, revolutionary party has arisen in your
State, hostile to order and good government, and
whose principles and policies are averse to peace.
They are unwilling that men who have at any time
sympathized with the South, however anxious they
may be to obey the laws and remain in allegiance to
the Government, shall do so, unless they are willing
to unite in their party organization and adopt .their
political heresies."
Now, I will venture to speak for the Radicals of
Missouri, and you will bear me out in it, and if I could
be heard by every one of them, every one would say
Amen, when I say that the Radical party does not
wish in its ranks a single one of those who have been
traitors under any circumstances whatever. If we
can't manage Missouri's affairs without their help, we
don't care to manage them at all. But there are
among us those who have sympathized with the South,
and have honestly quit sympathizing with it; and I
defy any man to show when or where any Radical
ever showed himself unwilling to have such obey the
laws and remain in allegiance to the Government. It
is a foul and baseless slander.
But the signers of this document go further, and
charge us with " urging that the military power shall
continue to wage war upon these people, seize and take
away their property, and cast them into prison or exile,
or shoot or hang them." Who are meant by these
people? "Men who have at any time sympathized
with the South." There is not a man here who does

388 The Call for Rebel Votes.
not know that that charge is false. Missouri is full of
those sympathizers ; and when has the military power
"waged war" upon them, merely because they were
sympathizers ? Never. Some of them have had some
of their money taken from them by military power, to
make a better use of it than they would themselves;
and some, of peculiarly offensive stripe, have been
imprisoned or exiled ; but not half as much of either
has been done as ought to have been. But there are
thousands of sympathizers, — enrolled as such, too, to
avoid military duty, — who have lived in the enjoyment
of greater peace and security than many Union men,
and no man has urged or counseled military interfer
ence with them, as long as they only sympathized with
the South.
But, say these gentlemen, — "In many portions of your
State, the most atrocious murders have been committed
upon such persons [that is, sympathizers^ in a spirit of
revenge" Very well admit it to be true. I see in
this crowd a number of gentlemen from the interior of
the State, who know about this matter. I ask you,
gentlemen, — if the room were full of such, I would
ask them all, — is it not true that for every disloyal
man murdered in the interior, twenty Union men have
met their death by murder! [Cries of "Yes" from
many quarters.] And worse than that. While it is
true that disloyal men have been murdered in the spirit
of revenge, the Union men of Missouri have been
slain by thousands, not in the spirit of revenge, but
because they were Union men. Is it not so, men from
the country? [Cries of " yes, yes."] True, true, every

The Call for Rebel Votes. 389
word of it. Slain in cold blood and not in the heat of
revenge — slain because they chose to be patriots instead
of traitors !
And here is another charge. "Let a wrong be done
by a guerrilla in any neighborhood, and the policy of
this party is. to visit the punishment due the guerrilla
upon every man who ever sympathized with the rebellion,
regardless of his present status, and in fact upon whole
classes of persons, making no discrimination between
the guilty -and the innocent." This refers to a military
policy adopted at one time in this State, of making
disloyal men in a particular county responsible for
outrages committed upon Union men in such county.
I am sorry that that policy ever was abandoned. It
was, in my opinion, a great mistake to abandon it.
Had it been persevered in rigidly over our State,
thousands of lives of Union men and hundreds of
thousands of dollars worth of property of Union men,
would have been saved. At Baltimore, recently, I
saw my old friend, General Schenck, Commander of
the Military Department which includes the State of
Maryland, and learned from him the effect of such a
policy in that State. After he assumed command
there, the barns of some Union men were burned, and
all attempts to discover the perpetrators of the deed
were fruitless. General Schenck obtained a list of all
the disloyal men in the neighborhood, and assessed
the damage upon them, according to their ability, col
lected the money from them, and paid the Union men
for their barns. The Secesh complained, of course,
of the injustice of making them pay for that which

390 The Call for Rebel Votes.
they had no hand in doing. " But gentlemen," said
that noble General, " you are disloyal to your country,
and your disloyalty encourages others to such deeds ;
and you must be an Insurance Company, to insure
every loyal man's property in your neighborhood."
And since that day there has not been a barn burned
in Maryland. And so, if we had a General in this
Department who would do that, there would be peace
and security for Union men in Missouri.
But, my friends, what means this labored effort by
these eight gentlemen on behalf of sympathizers with
the South? Is it not wonderful that such true and
loyal men as Samuel T. Glover, 0. D. Filley, and
John How, should, all at once, be filled with sympathy
for these sympathizers ? What is the secret of it ?
The votes of sympathizers are wanted in the coming
election, and " that's what's the matter ! " And to get
them, these gentlemen must sound the depth of every
disloyal heart, and array every man in the State, who
ever was disloyal, against Missouri's loyal citizens !
And I say to them, I accept the gage of battle thus
thrown down. No better time than now to meet that
issue. If Missouri is to be dominated by Disloyalty,
let us know it now. If, while Pennsylvania, Ohio and
Iowa thunder their rejection of Disloyalty in the ears
of the nation, poor Missouri is to be delivered over
to the accursed dominion of rebels, traitors, bush
whackers, and their sympathizers, led on by recog
nized Union men, let her go ; but let her not go without
a loyal, brave and faithful struggle.
And now I come to the charge even more atrocious

The Call for Rebel Votes. 391
than some I have noticed. "If any man {no matter
how loyal he may be,) owns a slave, he, in their opinion,
is necessarily a rebel, and his life and property are
both endangered." I say that that is utterly false, in
whole and in all its parts. I believe it to be true —
and every man here believes it to be true — that nine-
tenths of the slaveholders of Missouri have been and
are to-day disloyal, as far as they dare to be. But I
do not say, and never have said, nor do I know any
one that ever has said, that every man who owns a
slave is necessarily a rebel. I know slaveholders
who are as truly and firmly loyal as any non-slave
holders in the State ; and I honor them for it. But
" his life and property are both endangered," are they ?
Sirs, I call upon every man here to bear witness that,
in large portions of Missouri, a disloyal man is far
safer in his person and property than a loyal man ;
and that, too, after two years of the administration
of a Governor who sets the great seal of the State to
a vindication of his loyalty. But what is this charge,
but a renewed appeal to every disloyal man to come
to their support? What is it but a rallying cry to
slaveholders to fight anew on Missouri soil the battle
of Slavery against their country? It is just these
things, and nothing else. I, for one, accept the
defiance, and will see the conflict out to the end, be the
result what it may.
Further on, these gentlemen say that we call the
Provisional Government of this State a usurpation.
Upon this point I have a word to say. I recognize
the legality of the Provisional Government. I do not,

392 The Call for Rebel Votes.
therefore, hold it to be a usurpation in the legal
acceptation of the term. But while I admit the legal
right to be in Governor Gamble, to exercise the'
powers of Governor, I say that in point of moral right
his government is as clear a usurpation, as ever was
on earth. Why ? Because though appointed to office
with the understanding that an election for Governor
was to be had, as our Constitution requires, the
Convention ordered that he should continue Governor
until November, 1864; and when, in June last, he
resigned his office, that body, representing a constitu
ency of February, 1861, which was entirely different,
in law and in fact, from the constituency of 1863,
refused to allow the people to elect his successor, and
asked him to withdraw his resignation. That Con
vention (only eleven of whose members were elected
in ] 863), when it was about to die, fastened upon the
. people a government which their votes had no agency
in placing in power: deliberately and audaciously
refusing to give back to the people the power originally
entrusted to it, and never expected to be wielded to
any such end. I say that the men who will retain
power under such circumstances, and the party that
kept them in power, are all parties to a moral usurpa
tion, and the public sentiment of mankind will stamp
the act with condemnation.
Again, these gentlemen say, " They counsel armed
resistance to the authority of the Provisional Govern
ment." " They ? " Who are " they ? " I know none
who so counsel. Why do not these gentlemen name
the men who do? I deny the fact and demand the

The Call for Rebel Voles. 393
proof. I say that the man who utters that charge is
a calumniator. But, my friends, here is the most precious tit-bit in
this whole document. "It is proper, however, to
remark that the most of those who have been so indus
triously engaged in vilifying and misrepresenting all of
the acts of the State Government are disappointed
aspirants to office, or ingrates who have held office under
the Government, and been dismissed for misconduct
or incompetency." Who have vilified or misrepresented
the acts of the State Government? God knows, no
man need resort to vilification or misrepresentation of
those acts : let him speak the truth, and that is enough.
But there are " disappointed aspirants to office," are
there, assailing the State Government ? Verily, people
who live in glass houses should take care how they
throw stones. Who signed this document? Why,
there's Samuel T. Glover, who was beaten last year
for the Legislature, and failed last winter, in the
Legislature, to be elected United States Senator ! And
there's 0. D. Filley, who was beaten last spring for
Mayor of St. Louis, by the young Chauncey Filley
here. And there's John How, who was beaten some
time ago for the same office. And there's John
S. Phelps, who was beaten last November for Con
gress by " Pony " Boyd, and couldn't get elected
Senator of the United States last winter. An interest
ing quartette to talk about " disappointed aspirants to
office," truly !
But to proceed. This document further v says :
" You will also find that these wholesale slanders
34

394 TJie Call for Rebel Votes.
against the Government are unsupported by a single
fact susceptible of proof." Well, I don't know what
slanders they refer to ; but perhaps they hold to the
old English law doctrine, that the greater the truth the
greater the libel. If so, Governor Gamble's adminis
tration is the best libeled administration in the
country. If it is a slander to say that Governor
Gamble's policy is to grasp enormous power, then I
am a slanderer. Look at his power of removing all
officers of the Missouri State Militia, exercised under
authority of the War Department, granted at his
request. Look at the exercise of that power over
Radical Union men, displaced without cause, to make
room for Conservatives. And look at the enormous
power he wields ' through the Enrolled Militia, a body
of troops organized and brought into the field under
his mandate, and compelled to serve without authority
of law. Look at the management of that force all
over this State. See the effort made everywhere1 to
put Radical men out of command, to make way for
Conservatives, numbers of whom were formerly out
spoken Secessionists. Who does not believe that
General Loan was mustered out of service, because
he was, in Governor Gamble's judgment, too severe
upon rebels and their sympathizers ? Who does not
believe that Colonel Penick shared the same fate for
the same cause ? Who does not know that his regi
ment was broken up, because the men were too
Radical? Who does not know that as soon as an
officer is understood to be a Radical he is ousted ; and
that when the men of a company show themselves

The Call for Rebel Votes. 395
Radicals, they are disbanded or scattered among other
companies where they will be under more Conservative
influences ? And does not everybody know that, through
the agency of Governor Gamble or his partisans,
General Curtis was removed from the Department of
the Missouri, because of his radical measures ao-ainst
the disloyal ?
But not to pursue this enumeration, I have some
documents to lay before you, which I think have not
before seen the light. On the 5th of March last there
was published in the Kansas City Journal of Commerce
an editorial article, of which the following is the mate
rial part :
"governor gamble.
" To the observer who scans the operations of the mili
tary under the Governor Gamble's control closely, it is
clearly apparent that a certain line of policy has been
adopted which is more like a grasp after political power,
by courting popularity with the secession sympathizers,
than an effort for the suppression of the rebellion and
the restoration of peace and the enforcement of the
civil laws. Governor Gamble, as he evinces by every
act, adheres strongly to the " State Rights " doctrine ;
and the question now is, whether Gamble is trying to
accomplish covertly what Claiborne F. Jackson endea
vored to do openly. That Gamble is no better Union
man naturally than Jackson was, is believed by many.
The difference between them is considered to be, that
Gamble has undertaken to do by strategy, what he had
the good sense to know Jackson, nor no other man,
could accomplish by force. The signs of the times
indicate, that if Gamble has been playing his cards to
that end, he will fail, for if he shall pursue the course
hitherto followed by him, it will necessarily end in
his being impeached and deposed — or another revo-

396 The Call for Rebel Votes.
lution in Missouri. The people of the State can
not and will not suffer themselves to be robbed, tor
tured, and murdered, for years, to give time to the
heartless politicians to build political nests, which
shall be filled with golden eggs and despotic power.
The time will soon come when the loyal portion of the
State will demand a change of tactics, and they will get
it if they have to take it by force. Gamble has managed
to ingratiate himself into the good graces of President
Lincoln, and consequently the President has no ear for
any one but Gamble, and therefore the loyal people of
Missouri remain unheard.
" It may be asked by some, if this is so, why do not
the loyal papers and officers of St. Louis agitate the
matter ? The reason is plain enough. They are not,
strictly speaking, under the Governor's jurisdiction;
they do not feel the pressure of the thousands of little
thumbscrews that the Governor is constantly applying,
through his minions all over the State. They know
nothing of the doings of his appointees, only as it
comes to them in smothered mutterings occasionally.
They have little idea of the manner in which the ten or
twenty thousand soldiers in the State, who, divided up
into hundreds of little squads, are used (unwittingly)
not to put down the rebellion, but rather to keep it
alive by so controlling as to give the bushwhackers an
opportunity to utterly annihilate Union men in slow
but sure degrees. The proof of all this is but too con
vincing. What are Generals McNeil, Loan, Colonel
Penick and others doing now — the only officers that
have ever given us even the semblance of peace?
Their hands are tied ; and they are helpless. Where
is the army of the Southwest, and General Schofield ?
Echo answers, where ? Governor Gamble is responsi
ble for this condition of things. If we wanted to know
the secret spring that moves him in this action, and we
should look into his heart, we have no doubt we should

The Call for Rebel Votes. 397
find an inscription on its tablet to the following effect :
" I believe the United States confederacy will be divided
into thirty-four sections, and if they are, Missouri
belongs to me."
Concerning this article I am free to say, that had I
been the editor of that paper, I would not have pub
lished or written it. In some of its features I regard
it as unjust to Governor Gamble, and its general tenor
is, in my judgment, injudicious. But still I do not
think it any just cause for the course which the Gover
nor saw fit to pursue concerning it, as indicated in the
following letter which he wrote to Colonel Dick, then
Provost Marshal General of Missouri :
Jefferson City, March 14th, 1 863.
"Lieutenant Colonel Dick, Provost Marshal General:
" Colonel : I enclose you a slip from the Kansas
City Journal of Commerce of the 5th instant, of which
paper Mr. D. K. Abeel is the editor and proprietor.
" While the State Government is and has been earn
estly and faithfully engaged in co-operation with the
Government of the United States in suppressing rebel
lion, it is manifest that any attempt to excite what this
editor calls " a new revolution" is an attempt to involve
the State in a war among its own citizens, which will
but aid the common enemy in overrunning and reduc
ing us to subjection.
" I do not intend to enter upon any vindication ot
my loyalty. None but a knave of the blackest dye can
doubt it. But with a view to the peace of the State
and the maintenance of the authority of the United
States, I wish you to have this man Abeel immediately
arrested and brought to St. Louis, to be confined
during the war.
"Verv respectfully, your obedient servant,
J "H R. Gamble."

398 The Call for Rebel Votes.
In this letter you have a fair sample of what might
be expected, if the supreme power were lodged in the
hands of our Provisional Governor. Fortunately he
addressed on that occasion an officer who had too much
sense, and too good a knowledge of his official duties, to
allow himself to be used to inflict the Governor's ven
geance. The following was Colonel Dick's reply:
"Headquarters Department of the Missouri, 1
Office of the Provost Marshal General, \
St. Louis, Mo., March 18, 1863. J
'• H. R. Gamble, Governor:
" I received yesterday the letter of your Excellency
of the 18th, enclosing an article from the Kansas City
Journal of Commerce ; for the publication of which you
request me to cause the editor of that paper to be
arrested, brought to St. Louis, and imprisioned for the
war. " I can not concur in the opinion of your Excellency
that such a course of dealing with the editor would con
duce to the peace of the State.
" There has been continuously through the war in
the newspapers, much violent and malevolent abuse of
those in authority, of which the President has come in
for his full share.
"Although the article in question meets with my
disapproval, and I entertain no doubt of the loyalty of
your Excellency, yet I can not believe it wise to pro
ceed in the premises by military power. A large
party in the State who would condemn the attack upon
your Excellency, yet would not regard the writer as
actuated by motives of disloyalty to the Government,
and might, by such proceedings as you propose, be
excited to a point of actual hostility of the State
authorities. " I am not clear either that as an officer in the ser-

The Call for Rebel Votes. 399
vice of the United States I have jurisdiction of the
matter. "Whatever may be the views of the Administration
as to interfering with the abuse of the freedom of the
press, I have never been informed of them, and could
not, unless I believed that serious disaster would result,
adopt measures to place the press under restraint.
" I have the honor to be,
"Your Excellency's obedient servant,
"F. A. Dick,
"Lieutenant Colonel, Provost Marshal General."
For that letter let Colonel Dick be honored. The
time has not yet come when the Executive of Missouri
can not be talked about and written about, concerning
his official policy. When that time does come, let
every honest patriot move out of the State, and leave
him to rule over traitors.
There is a subsequent history, which connects itself -
with this correspondence, and which gives further indi
cation" of Governor Gamble's disposition. Colonel Dick
had, during General Curtis's administration of this
Department, performed the Duties of Provost Marshal
General under a commission which brought him no
compensation. When General Schofield succeeded to
the command, he desired to retain Colonel Dick in his
position ; but the latter could not continue in it, unless
he should receive a commission whish would bring
him some compensation for his services. Governor
Gamble refused to give him a commission suitable
to the position; but found one readily for Colonel
Broadhead, concerning whom it has been published in
a newspaper in this city, and never denied, that he said,

400 The Call for Rebel Votes.
within the past six months, that " Every damned Abo
litionist in the country ought to be hung, with Chase
and Stanton at the head of them ! " This is the choice
which the Governor makes between men. Let him go
on thus while he may, but in November, 1864, the
waves of popular condemnation will overwhelm him
and all who adhere to him, and engulf them out of
sight forever.
Let us, my friends, late though it be, dissect this pre
cious document yet a little farther. It says " Another
prominent characteristic of the revolutionists is their
intolerance, and in this respect they have outstripped
the Secessionists." Intolerance toward whom ? Toward
loyal citizens ? Where is the evidence of it ? When have
we had the power to be either tolerant or intolerant?
Governor Gamble has had all the power, and intolerance
of Radical Union men has marked every step of his
administration. If Radicals are intolerant, it is toward
rebels, rebel sympathizers, disloyalists of every kind.
The man who preaches toleration toward them, further
than the law of the land requires, is no better than they.
Are we to be branded as intolerant, because we don't
want bloody-handed rebels to come back into the State
and be our equals socially and politically ? Because
we regard a traitor as a fiend, worthy of death, are we
intolerant ? Because we scorn to court his vote, or to
seek political powe'r by his help, are we intolerant ?
Sirs, I glory in such intolerance. And I glory in the
belief that just such intolerance will, in due time, by
the mere force of an omnipotent public sentiment of
loyalty, make Missouri too hot for all such creatures.

The Call for Rebel Votes. 401
My friends, midnight approaches, and though you
have listened to me with extraordinary attention, and
though there is much more in this document, which
might be commented upon and ought to be exposed, I
feel that I can not trespass longer on your patience.
These men have flung down the gauntlet of defiance to
Missouri's loyal people. Why have they not done it
before ? Because they lacked the numerical strength.
Why have they done it now ? Because they have got
their rebel reinforcements. They have arrived, and are
ready for the conflict with the Loyalty of Missouri in
the field of civil contest. I will show you where, in
this document, these gentlemen say it. Listen. " Thou
sands and thousands of them have renewed their allegi
ance to the Government, and become obedient to the laws,
and many of them have evinced a desire to serve in the
Federal army. Certainly this is a cause for congratu
lation." There is the secret of this ferocious assault
upon the Radical Union men of Missouri, and this
daring attempt to rally every disloyal man in the State
to the polls. Who in Missouri, who in the wide world,
can any longer doubt that the contest before us is
between Loyalty and Disloyalty — between the hosts of
Missouri's unconditionally loyal men, on the one hand,
and her hordes of traitors, led on by a few men of
heretofore recognized loyalty, on the other ? My friends,
let us rejoice that it is our privilege to stand up for
truth and right in such a cause. There is more glory
in it than on the battle-field. Let us remember our
duty on the 3d of November, and do it like men. Let
us emulate the noble patriots of our sister States, the

402 The Call for Rebel Votes.
tones of whose splendid triumphs are yet heard through
the land. Let us bravely defend the purity of the
ballot-box on the day of our trial, and, I believe, of our
victory. Guard the polls on that day, to the last extrem
ity, against illegal voting. See that no man votes
who does not take the oath prescribed by law ; and
remember that every vote illegally given robs a loyal
citizen of his franchise. Mark every man who has
taken part in the rebellion, and yet takes the oath ; and
bring him to justice afterward for perjury. Pass the
word over the whole State, that every Radical Union
man is ready to sacrifice his life, if need be, in defense
of the purity of the election, and these traitors will slink
away, and patriots will resume their just control in our
Government. Proclaim anew as our watchword — Loy
alty shall govern Missouri! Make it good by your
acts, your words, and your votes, and then will Mis
souri stand forth as noble in accomplished results, as
she is in the spirit of her loyal people.

SLAVERY'S DESTRUCTION,
THE UNION'S SAFETY.*

The presence of this Convention in this city betokens
progress, signals deliverance, and heralds freedom; pro
gress in patriotism and fraternity, deliverance of the
white man's mind and conscience from long thralldom
to a despotic system of human Slavery, and freedom —
universal freedom — to the American black man, after
more than two centuries of bondage. The great mis
sion of the nineteenth century to America approaches
its fruition ; and the first centenary of American Inde
pendence, which many here may live to witness, will
resound with the rejoicings of white and black men,
over a land from which the stain of Slavery has been
wiped out. We could not have come here in peace three
years ago on such an errand: we shall not need to
come again three years hence ; for before that day the
mighty work will be done ; Slavery will have ceased
to be in this land ; and every foot of American soil,
*A speech before the Freedom Convention in Louisville, Ken
tucky, February 22, 1864.

404 Slavery's Destruction,
purified by fire and blood, will be Liberty's consecrat
ed home for all the ages to come.
Such is the glorious prospect, as we stand to-day
on this " Lookout Mountain " of time, and high above
the clouds through which we have fought our way to
its summit, peer into the near future, from which the
veil is being rent. Simple words and few, in the expres
sion of emotions, befit this hour. We should first
ascribe to Him the glory, whose mighty arm has thus
far held the American Nation up, and whose purpose
that the wrath of man shall praise Him was never
more manifest in the history of nations, than in the
swift vengeance He is taking of the idol, for which the
aristocrats of Southern Slavery shrouded this land in
gloom. But as there is no night in heaven, so man
can make no gloom on earth that Omnipotence can not
pierce. The sun is rising; the mists of error are
drifting away; the Nation throws off the shackles of
, enslavement to Slavery; and to-morrow, as it were,
the noontide of freedom will blaze over a country
where no man shall ever again be called, or be, a
slave. It is fit, my friends, that we meet here on the soil
of Kentucky — Old Kentucky — brave and generous
Kentucky — but, alas ! in the hour of her country's
dire need, " Armed Neutrality" Kentucky. She stood
neutral once between treason and loyalty, and dreamed
that the fires of war could sweep all around her, and
yet leave her gardens unscathed. She thought to arm
her noble sons for herself, but hosts of them armed
themselves for the Union and Liberty. She looked

The Union's Safety. 405
upon her country, and remembered her warriors' glory
on many a bloody field under the Stars and Stripes,
and her mighty heart would have yearned to that old
flag again ; but in an evil hour she looked upon herself,
and the grand Union throb of that heart dwindled, for
within herself was Slavery ! She hesitated to be loyal,
for Slavery was disloyal ; she wavered in the path of
duty for Slavery jostled her; she well-nigh chose to
be conquered by force; but at last she stood erect and
firm, and so she will stand to the end. Let us not too
severely censure this good old State, for the indeci
sion of that trying day. No man knows, but by expe
rience, the power of Slavery over a people among
whom it is a fixed institution; or can otherwise com
prehend the bondage of thought and feeling it imposes
on those who have been reared in its presence, and
under its influence. I have experienced it in my youth
in this very State, and afterward, for many years, in
Missouri : and it makes me charitable toward indeci
sion and hesitancy, there or here, in the first onset of
the rebellion. But that day is past. Three years of
Slavery's war upon the Union are enough to wean a
world from Slavery; and old Kentucky must, like
Missouri and Arkansas, and Maryland, be weaned
from it — must cast off its traitorous embrace — must
help to slay and bury it out of sight forever. Ken-
tuckians, this is no idle talk. In all sincerity I say
again, — yet not as an individual, but as the interpreter
of passing events,— I say again, Kentucky must. She
can not abide as she is; she must rise into complete
and absolute freedom; for she can not, if she would,

406 Slavery's Destruction,
become a part of the Empire of Slavery for which the
South is fighting, but which, instead, is this hour as
certain to be a region of freedom as if no slave had
ever trod its soil ; and out of that empire, and in the
Union, and hemmed in, as she soon will be, on every
side, by soil devoted to freedom, it were the miracle of
all history, if she alone of all the sisterhood of States
could defy the power of events, and hold to her bosom
an institution, which everywhere else withers under
the ban of the human race and the frown of outraged
heaven. But I am not here to speak to Kentuckians, so much
as to Americans. Nor do I come to speak of Ken
tucky Slavery, so much as of American Slavery. This
war has stripped the Slavery question of its local and
State character, and made it a national matter.
The point is no longer whether Slavery shall be a
local institution, but whether it shall be at all. The
issue is not now whether State policy, State Constitu
tions, and State laws shall protect and perpetuate
Slavery in spite of the Nation; but whether, having
proved itself a traitor, and steeped itself to the very
lips in the blood of patriots, the Nation shall per
mit it to live. The other day this question could not
have been safely discussed here ; to-day it can. Trea
son and rebellion have left no " sacred soil " of Slavery
on this continent. Freedom to assail Slavery is now
as irrefragable a right, as freedom to worship God
according to the dictates of conscience. Slavery is
one and indivisible; and to assail it in Missouri or
Maryland, is to assail it in Kentucky or Tennessee.

[The Union's Safety. 407
What it knows in one place, what it feels in one place,
what it does in one place, what it demands in one
place, it knows, feels, does, and demands, in greater
or less degree, in every other place of its dominions.
Everywhere it knows its own interest before any
other; feels and asserts its own unscrupulous power;
does its own work of domination and aggression.; and
demands its own supreme aggrandizement. Every
where it is an aristocrat ; everywhere the foe of the
poor, and the companion and parasite of the rich;
everywhere ambitious, selfish, and rapacious; every
where intolerant and proscriptive ; and, as the history
of the past three years has verified, everywhere that
it dared, cruel, bloodthirsty, and treacherous. In one
word, it is written in blood all over this land, that
Slavery is a Public Enemy; and the whole mass of
loyal Americans proclaim, in a voice like mighty
thunderings, that Slavery shall be destroyed: and it
will be destroyed, not in revolted States alone, but
in Missouri, in Maryland, in Delaware, and in Ken
tucky, too.
Treating Slavery thus as a public enemy, it seems
to me now, as it did not on the 1st of January, 1863,
that the President of the United States, in the Procla
mation which made that day perpetually memorable,
came short of the stern demands of the tremendous
exigency he strove to meet. In that Proclamation he
dealt with slaves, as adjuncts and supports of the
rebellion; when, in my poor judgment, as I see the
case now, he should have dealt with the institution of
Slavery, as the rebellion's source and strength. The

408 Slavery's Destruction,
rebellion was the crime of that institution; and for
that crime the institution should have received at his
hands the death-blow in the entire land; for it is every
where essentially the same in its relations to this war.
It were as wise to attempt to execute sentence of death
upon a condemned malefactor, by cutting off a hand
or a foot, as, under the circumstances of this time, to
liberate slaves in the insurgent regions, and yet leave
the Slavery system untouched. Had the President
proclaimed the instant and universal extirpation of the
system, it would have been but the logical sequence of
holding Slavery to be the cause of the rebellion; and
the logic would have swept the heart of the Nation
and the public sentiment of the world with resistless
and boundless power. The Border slave States might
for a time have demurred, perhaps growled, possibly
attempted to resist; but, ere this, loyalty-and patriotism
would have vindicated the justice of totally destroying,
for the country's sake, what aimed to destroy the
country, and of exacting from the institution, as a
whole, the penalty of its unparalleled crime against
Liberty, Humanity, and God.
Not for censure upon the President, have I thus
adverted to what I consider the defect of his great act
of Emancipation. I thank him for that act, the human
race is his debtor for it, and for it history will honor
him. I only regret that he should not "have seen his
way clear to pronounce the doom of Slavery in the
whole land. But yet, may it not be that the completion
of this grand work has been left by Providence to' the
loyal people of the Border States, as their special privi-

The Union's Safety. 409
lege and peculiar glory ? They have sent forth their
sons to every battle-field for the Union; but so has the
North. They have poured out their wealth for the
cause of free institutions ; but so has the North. They
have mourned over their slain in the battles under the
old flag; but so has the North. In all these things
the free States of the North, and the Border slave
States have moved together, sharing the toils, the dan
gers, the sorrows, and the sacrifices of this unequaled
war. But besides all this, it is for those Border States
to lay upon their country's altar a nobler sacrifice
than any the North can bring; it is for them to give
the final, exterminating blow to that institution, which
has wound itself into the deepest recesses of their
domestic and social life, and their organized existence,
and proclaim at once emancipation to the black race,
and deathless freedom to the white.
I say the final, exterminating blow, because it is for
those States to give it, so far as separate State action
is concerned. With the full assent to my deliberate
judgment, I hold that the Proclamation of Emanci
pation was a constitutional exercise of the war power
of the Nation, and that in law, it did, at the moment
of its issue, free every slave in the whole region
embraced in its terms. And I hold, moreover, that it
was no temporary expedient, like the marching of an
army forward to-day, to be countermarched to-morrow,
if strategy require; but a fiat of instant and eternal
Emancipation, never to be recalled, and not possible
to be recalled, so as thereby to lose a jot of its original
and binding force. And such, I believe, will be the
35

410 Slavery's Destruction,
judgment of the Supreme Court of the United States,
whenever the validity and force of that Proclamation
shall be contested there. But whether so or not, the
Proclamation is backed up by half a million of most
potent arguments, tipped with steel, which will never
be sheathed, and ought never to be, till Slavery is
admittedly extinct, in theory and in fact, in all rebel-
doni, and buried beneath new-formed Constitutions of
Freedom, pronouncing its resurrection eternally impos
sible. If such be parricidal Slavery's righteous retri
bution, the limits of its territorial possessions are
already dwindled to those of the Border States. To
end it there, ends it everywhere in America. And
there, powerless and cringing, it awaits the final,
exterminating blow from the patriots of those States;
and shall they not give it? That, my friends, is with
us the great question of the hour. The source, the
power, the very life of the rebellion is Slavery, and
the rebellion will not survive Slavery's death. A
bleeding country calls aloud for its destruction; the
vengeful halloo of Justice is on its track; the Angel
of Liberty ¦ brandishes her flaming sword across its
path; History pants to record its downfall; and shall
we shrink from letting fall the blow? Shall we, to
whom is left only the hem of this poisoned garment,
refuse to exchange it for the full robes of a freedom,
for which we would be conscious of paying a price
above what other patriots paid? Is the Constitution
worth so little, that we will refuse to sacrifice this
blood-stained institution for it? Is the Union so small
in value, that we will balance it in one hand and Sla-

:a Tfie Union's Safety. 411
very in the other, hesitating which to choose ? Is the
transcendent honor of guardianship over Human Free
dom such a bauble in our eyes, that we will prove
faithless to the trust rather than abandon Slavery?
For one, I say, in the words of Kentucky's noblest
and greatest son, when asked under what circumstances
he would consent to a dissolution of the Union —
" Never, never, never ! " And from the graves of
the Revolution, could our fathers speak, would come
to us this hour the quick and stern response, "Never,
never, never ! "
But it is not -to be denied, that in every Border
slave State there are many who deliberately prefer
Slavery to the Union, and in their blind devotion to
the former, can see no higher law of patriotism conse
crating them to the latter. They are Traitors, what
ever they may seem. Others there are who profess
Unionism, but long for Slavery with the Union ; yield
ing to the strange delusion, that, after all the horrible
record of the last three years, there is yet room on .
this continent for both. They are but little better
than the first. Others, again, love the Union, but,
like Lot's wife, can not forbear to look back upon the
Sodom of Slavery, though fire is raining upon it, and
they stand, like her, congealed, with their steps toward
the Union, but their faces toward Slavery. Still
others deny unwillingness to give up Slavery for the
Union's sake, but whine at losing their "niggers."
without being paid for them, and quote emphatically
the Constitutional declaration that private property
shall not be taken for public use without just compen-

412 Slavery's Destruction, [.
sation ; but do not remember, that, until Slavery pays
back to the Nation the thousands of millions of treasure
which its war upon the Union has cost the Republic,
there is "no money in the Treasury not otherwise
appropriated," out of which to pay for slaves freed by
Slavery's own most wicked act. Others, again fall in
with the advancing tide of loyal sentiment against
Slavery; but see endless complications in the future
of the enfranchised negro, and are vexed, by day and
by night, with hideous apprehensions of negro laziness,
negro pauperism, negro vice, and, above all, negro
equality ; and, bewildered and befogged, they wander
in a maze, ever returning upon their own tracks ; when
a single glance at the star of the Union, like that of a
storm-tossed mariner at his star friend in the northern
sky, would point them to the haven, where the Union
is the firm anchoring ground of every hope, and the
still waters of patriotism give the only sure repose.
Meantime, the steady and impetuous torrent of
events wears away the bared foundations of Slavery
throughout the land, and the huge, unsightly fabric
totters to its fall. Not a volley is fired in battle, on
either side, but pours death into the vitals of Slavery.
Not a bugle-blast sounds to the onset, but signals a
charge upon Slavery. Not a shell flies through the
startled air, but shrieks out the doom of Slavery.
'Not a moan of the wounded and dying on the gory
field, but undertones the dirge of Slavery. Not a
cheer of victory for the Union, but swells the world's
rejoicing cry over Slavery, prostrate and given up to
annihilation. And when that cheer bursts from the

The Union's Safety. 413
throats of the hundred thousand slaves of yesterday —
now the freed men and brave soldiers of the Republic ;
beside whom, before another anniversary of Washing
ton's birth, will stand another hundred thousand of
their black brothers, armed to defend their new-found
freedom and the country that bestowed it ; then may
all who still cling to Slavery know, that it were as
easy to call the unnumbered dead of this war from
their graves, as to reinfuse life into the dead corpse
of American Slavery ! Is this fanaticism ? Is it
enthusiasm ? Is it exaggeration ? Is it even extrava
gance ? No, my friends, it is sober, solemn truth —
such truth as ought to be spoken from the house-tops
through all the Border States, and nowhere more than
in this ancient Commonwealth. The people of all
those States will be wise to hear and heed it.
Presently, like the imprisoned drop of water, which,
acted upon by fire, has expansive power to rend a
mountain, it will hurl the battlements of Slavery from
their solid base, and upon their crushed and shapeless
fragments will rise a new temple of Liberty, with this
grand inscription over its wide and open portals —
" Here was Slavery : Here is Freedom ! "
Let ns pursue yet further a train of thought which
the reference to the colored troops of the Nation pre
sents. I recall no instance in history of so signal a
retribution, as impends over the Southern people at
the hands of their former slaves. They raised the cry
of revolt, dreaming not that on their own plantations,
in their own cities, towns, and villages, at their own
firesides, in their very parlors and chambers, there

414 Slavery's Destruction,
was a dormant army of freedom, which, once waked
up, would never sleep again. They marched forth to
battle for Slavery, leaving slaves behind them, and
look back to see them free. They left human chattels
in their rear ; and behold, the chattels have become
men. They held them to be soulless masses of bone
and muscle ; and lo, a life and a soul have been
breathed into them. They parted with abject menials,
who now confront them as stalwart soldiers, never
again to call them '* Master ! " These soldiers have
sprung, as it were, from the dragon's teeth of rebel
lion, sown broadcast over the South, in the fury of a
savage onslaught upon Freedom for the sake of
Slavery. Mark in this the self-invoked vengeance
upon crime. These dark columns of the sons of
Africa are the counter-revolution which is to paralyze
Southern treason. From the day when the arms of the
Union were confided to their hands, and they marched
under the grand old flag to the conflict with its foes,
if never before, the fate of the rebellion and of Slavery
was irrevocably sealed, and the foot of the black man
was destined to tramp down the earth into the grave
where both shall lie dead together. From that day
the black race in America felt the power- of a new
manhood, and stepped firmly into the arena of a higher
and a better life. Think you that race will ever again
return to what it was ? Think you that here in Ken
tucky, or there in Missouri, or Tennessee, or Maryland,
you can forge fetters strong enough to keep one part
of that race enslaved, when it knows that another part
of itself is free, because it has fought for freedom ? As

The Union's Safely. 415
well expect to reduce a part of the white race in this
land to bondage. The negroes buy with their blood
the freedom of their race, and the Nation will secure
it to the race forever; and when this great Nation
speaks the word of enfranchisement, States will stand
aside jn silence. Justice, honor, generosity, all
enforce the claim of the black race to respect, to con
fidence, to consideration, and to freedom. Let us face
the logical result. The black man is henceforth to
assume a new status among us, and to be dealt with
on principles wholly different from those which, in the
slave States, have heretofore shaped the conditions of
his existence. He is to be hereafter a man, not a
chattel, and he is to feel that he is a man. I say not
that he is to be lifted into equality with the white
man ; but that he is to be assigned a position above
that of former days ; and that disqualifications, pro
hibitions, and degradations are to be removed, and
privileges conferred, that he may know that the
freedom he has won by his fidelity and valor is no
empty name, but a tangible, steadfast, and inestimable
reality. And now, in view of these inevitable and most
pregnant results, where is the wisdom of attempting
to prop up a staggering institution, which must cer
tainly fall ? Why dream of lengthening out the brief
span of time that remains to Slavery in this land ?
Why hope for good from its continuance, when you"
know that in a few more years at most — perchance
in a few more months — it must ignominiously cease to
be ? Why not rather sacrifice the pitiful remnant of

416 Slavery's Destruction,
it now, and redeem the precious time, by shaping the
destiny of the enfranchised race which is to dwell among
us, so as to make its four millions of men, women, and
children a blessing, instead of a curse, to themselves
and to the nation ? My friends, these are momentous
questions to us and to our country. Seldon* have
greater been presented to any people. Let us not
shrink from the high responsibilities involved in their
solution ; but taking courage from the very difficulties
that surround us, go bravely forward in the path of
duty, rugged and thorny though it be, trusting, through
God, to the early and final overthrow of every form
of Slavery, and the glorious establishment in its stead
of a true and universal freedom.
My friends, when in an after age the historian shall
review this wonderful era in American history, he will
be forced to declare, that nothing has been recorded in
the world's annals like the changes which the feelings
and opinions of loyal Americans have, from time to
time, undergone, within the brief period of thirty-six
months. They have not been the slow and labored
mutations of years, nor the less tardy transmutations
of a single year; but from month to month — yes, from
week to week — as the ever-changing tide of affairs
has rushed by them, men have put aside former views,
and embraced others to which they had previously been
strangers. This was no weakness or vacillation, but
the obedience of the emancipated judgment to the
impress of the times. And not the least remarkable,
and certainly to every patriot the most cheering and
inspiring, feature of these kaleidoscopic movements of

The Union's Safety. 417
the public mind was, that there was no step backward.
From the day of the secession of South Carolina to
this, the loyal mind of the nation has moved steadily
forward — not always rapidly, not always confidently,
but always resolutely and sternly forward. In the
beginning, our greatest statesmen were willing to
< make, and did make, concessions to Southern ferocity,
for the sake of peace, which few now would venture
to support or propose. Then, and long after actual
war had been waged, you heard little from any quarter
of the agency of Slavery in precipitating a conflict
which convulsed the Nation and astounded the world ;
but you did hear much of the Abolitionists, as its
provokers and abettors ; until it really seemed that
they would be written down the head devils of this civil
strife, and the rebel leaders be canonized as heroic
saints in the martyrology of Liberty. No wonder
this ; for the North had not yet begun to cast off the
fetters, with which, from the foundation of the Govern
ment, the South had most adroitly bound it to the
cause of Slavery. Do you not remember the prompt
ness with which the President, in September, 1861,
commanded Fremont to revoke his General Order
declaring that the slaves of rebels should be freed?
Do you forget the President's Proclamation, in May,
1862, annulling Hunter's declaration of freedom to
the slaves in South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida?
Both of these acts chilled and depressed the rising
sentiment of the Nation against Slavery, and accumu
lated formidable obstacles to its progress. But the
policy which they indicated could not be adhered to ;
36

418 Slavery's Destruction,
for you will remember, also, the President's warning
to the South, in September, 1862, of the coming
Proclamation of Freedom, and the issue of that
Proclamation at the appointed time ; and you will
concur with me, that up to the day when he decided to
strike at the rebellion through its slaves', the Nation
had, in sentiment, advanced little toward the heart
of the tremendous conflict into which it had been
forced. From the day, however, that it knew it would
not be held back by its Chief, it has gone upward
and onward; hourly strengthening in the conviction
that this is Slavery's rebellion, hourly taking a more
advanced position of antagonism to Slavery, and
hourly growing more rigid in the purpose that Slavery
shall die.
And where do we stand now ? Let us touch a few
points in the history of the last three years, and read
the answer. While, as a mere philosophical disquisi
tion, such a review might not be of special interest, it
will, if I mistake not, be found not only instructive in
its exhibition of the progress of public thought, but
highly practical, and eminently cheering to the friends
of freedom, because demonstrating that the national
mind has finally emancipated itself from every retard
ing and repressing influence, and is prepared for a
forward move along the whole line, against Slavery and
for universal freedom.
First, recall the celebrated Crittenden Compromise
resolutions, which at one time commanded, apparently,
so large a measure of public acquiescence, if not
approbation. That they were brought forward by

The Union's Safety. 419
their distinguished author, in the spirit of patriotism,
and under the conviction that they would, if concur
red in, probably avert the calamity of civil war, no
man, I suppose, will question. But that no greater
mistake has been made by any loyal statesman, than
that which Kentucky's venerable Senator committed,
in the framing of that plan of pacification, misnamed
Compromise, few men who are more loyal to their
country than to Slavery will deny. What were its
terms ? It proposed amendments to the Constitution
as follows:
1st. In all the territory of the United States, then
held or thereafter acquired, situated south of the lat
itude of 36 degrees and 30 minutes, " Slavery of the
African race" should be recognized as existing, whe
ther there in fact or not, and should not be interfered
with by Congress, but be protected as property by all
the departments of the Territorial Government 'during
its continuance : which was no more or less than a
Constitutional dedication of all such territory to Slave
ry forever.
2d. Congress should have no power to abolish Slave
ry in places under its exclusive jurisdiction, situated
within the limits of States permitting the holding of
slaves. 3d. Congress should have no power to abolish Slave
ry within the District of Columbia, so long as it existed
either in Maryland or Virginia, nor without the con
sent of the inhabitants of the District, nor without
just compensation to the non-consenting owners.
4th. Congress should not at any time, whether

420 Slavery's Destruction,
Slavery were abolished in that District or not, prohibit
officers of the Federal Government, or members of
Congress, whose duties required them to be there, from
bringing with them their slaves, and holding them as
such during the time their duties might require them
to remain there, and afterwards taking them hence.
5th. Congress should have no power to prohibit or
hinder the transportation of slaves from one State to
another, or to a Territory in which slaves were per
mitted by law to be held.
6th. No further amendment of 'the Constitution
should affect the preceding articles ; nor should any
amendment be made to the Constitution authorizing or
giving Congress any power to abolish or interfere with
Slavery in any of the States by whose laws it should
be allowed or permitted.
Such, in brief, were the leading features of Mr. Crit
tenden's celebrated proposition of compromise. Had
it been submitted to the people, as he proposed it
should be, it is not improbable, that, in the then dis
tracted state of the public mind, it would have been
ratified, if the seceding States had voted for it, and
become a part of the supreme law of the land. Had
that terrible calamity befallen this Nation, binding it,
as it would, for all after time, a voluntary slave to,
and propagator and defender of, the institution of
Slavery, eternity would hardly have been too long for
repentance, for such an infinite sin against Humanity,
Christianity, and Liberty. But were the country
required to act now upon this plan, who here doubts
that Henry Wilson, of Massachusetts, spoke truly,

The Union's Safety. 421
when, within a fortnight of this hour, he said in the
Senate of the United States, that an overwhelming
and uncounted majority of the people to-day would
reject it with unutterable scorn ?
Next, recall the proposition which, in March, 1861,
was passed by two-thirds of both Houses of Congress,
to amend the Constitution, so that it should declare
that " no amendment shall be made to the Constitution
which shall authorize or give to Congress the power to
abolish or interfere within any State with the domestic
institutions thereof, including that of persons held to
labor or service by the laws of such State." This
was another chain to bind the Nation to Slavery ; but
we can glory to-day in the knowledge that its links
will never be completed. Not a single State Legisla
ture has voted to ratify it, and not one ever will. But,
on the contrary, let our hearts beat high with hope
and joy at the movement already progressing in the
halls of Congress, so to amend the great Charter of our
liberties that it shall abolish and prohibit Slavery,
instantly and forever, throughout the United States of
America ! That, friends of Freedom, is the true solu
tion of the Slavery question on this continent. It is
better than proclamations, military orders, enlistment
of negroes, or aught else that depends upon the power
of the sword or the accidents of events ; for it leaves
no questions to be asked or answered after the sword
is sheathed — no decision of the Supreme Court to be
waited for after the record of the war is closed.
Being the sovereign act of the Nation, done in
conformity with the terms of the Constitution,

422 Slavery's Destruction,
it will overleap at a single bound all squabbles and
quibbles about State rights, strict construction, Vir
ginia resolutions of '98, Kentucky resolutions of '98
and '99, and such like breastworks of Slavery, and
will be the People's irreversible edict of Slavery's
extinction. Do any doubt that such an amendment
can be now adopted? Let every such doubt be ban
ished. The auspicious day has come for this grand
movement of the disenthralled Nation. The people
are ready for it ; the heart of the nation demands it ;
three-fourths of the States will ratify it ; the world will
hold jubilee over it; and the regenerated Republic,
founded at last on the rock of universal freedom, will
move down the pathway of the ages, luminous as the
sun, firm as the solid earth, and enduring as time
itself. Again, remember the resolution adopted by Con.
gress, in April, 1862, upon the direct and formal
proposition of the President, declaring " that the
United States ought to co-operate with any Slate which
may adopt gradual abolishment of Slavery, giving to
such State pecuniary aid, to be used by such State, in
its discretion, to compensate for the inconveniences, public
and private, produced by such a change of system.'
That it was proposed by him with as earnest a purpose
of good as probably ever actuated a Chief Magistrate,
and was adopted by Congress with as sincere a hope
of good as probably ever influenced patriot's, I do not
doubt ; but it has quietly passed to its endless sleep,
and will be heard of no more. Already the Natio n
has renounced the idea of ransoming the black race

The Union's Safety. 423
out of bondage, and with giant strides has passed far
beyond the " sleepy hollow" of gradual emancipa
tion, into the broad and blooming plain of instant
freedom. Again, recall the annual message of President Lin
coln, in December, 1862, in which, with intense earnest
ness, he urged upon Congress the adoption of a
Constitutional amendment, binding the Nation to pay
to every State, which should abolish Slavery at any
time before the first day of January, 1900, a specified
sum of money, in the bonds of the Government, for
every slave shown by the national census of 1860, to
have then been in l such State. Listen to his urgent
appeal to Congress in behalf of this plan :
" Is it doubted, then, that the plan I propose, if
adopted, would shorten the war, 'and thus lessen its
expenditure of money and blood ? Is it doubted that
it would restore the national authority and national
prosperity, and perpetuate both indefinitely ? Is it
doubted that we here — Congress and Executive — can
secure its adoption ? Will not the good people
respond to a united and earnest appeal from us ? Can
we, can they, by any other means, so certainly or so
speedily assure these vital objects ? We can succeed
only by concert. It is not ' can any of us imagine
better ? ' but ' can we all do better ? ' Object whatso
ever is possible, still the question recurs, ' can we do
better ? ' The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate
to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high
with difficulties, and we must rise with the occasion.
As our case is new, so we must think anew. We
must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save
our country."
Who doubts that Abraham Lincoln's whole honest

424 Slavery's Destruction,
soul was in those words ? But who doubts also that
the plan he so carefully and conscientiously devised,
was, like " the dogmas of the quiet past, inadequate to
the stormy present ? " It did not so much as ripple
the surface of the public mind, already at that time
far in advance of such an expedient as that. Slavery
was fighting for its own dominion and perpetuity, not
for payment for the freedom of its slaves ; and the
Nation was fighting for its own life and for Liberty,
not for the privilege of buying Slavery out; and this
plan of emancipation fell still-born from the Presi
dent's pen. The ferocious and implacable South gave
no signs of heeding it ; and to the question " can we
all do better ? " the loyal States thundered back :
" Yes, a thousand times better; fight it out, fight it out,
till rebellion and Slavery are ground into dust together!"
And the loyal States went on fighting, and will keep
on fighting, till in that dust shall be written by the
finger of time the warning legend to all the future,
" Extinct forever ! "
One more reference to history will finish the contrast
between the beginning and the ending of the three
years of war, whose last weeks are now passing away.-
No authoritative expression in regard to the object
of the United States in prosecuting this war, has
attracted more general attention, and been more widely
and frequently quoted, or more eagerly repeated and
displayed by certain classes of men, than the resolution
offered by John J. Crittenden, in the House of Repre
sentatives, in July, 1861, and adopted there, with
only two dissenting voices, and four days afterward,

The Union's Safety. 425
somewhat modified, offered by Andrew Johnson in the
Senate, and adopted there with only five dissenting
votes. As presented by Mr. Crittenden, it was in the
following words :
" Resolved, by the House of Representatives of the
Congress of the United States, That the present
deplorable civil war has been forced upon the country
by the disunionists of the Southern States, now in
revolt against the Constitutional Government, and in
arms around the Capital ; that in this national emer
gency, Congress, banishing all feelings of passion or
resentment, will recollect only its duty to the whole
country ; that this war is not waged on their part in
any spirit of oppression, or for any purpose of con
quest or subjugation, or purpose of overthrowing or
interfering with the rights or established institutions
of those States, but to defend and maintain the supre
macy of the Constitution, and to preserve the Union,
with all the dignity, equality, and rights of the several
States unimpaired ; and tfyat as soon as these objects
are accomplished the war ought to cease."
To the mind now fully aroused, as that of the Nation
is, to the true character of the war, and justly impres
sed with the nature and scope of its demands, this
resolution is equally remarkable for what it contains
and what it omits. It affirms that the war is deplor
able ; but ventures not to pronounce it treasonable,
atrocious, and infamous on the part of the rebels. It
declares that the war was forced upon the country by
the disunionists of the South; but omits any reference
to the object aimed at by them, the establishment of a
piratical Empire of Slavery ; for which they were ready
and willing to sacrifice the country of their birth, and

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428 Slavery's Destruction,
never again will be waged by the loyal people of the
Nation to maintain the Constitution and preserve the
Union, without conquest, or subjugation, or interference
with established institutions of the Rebel States; but
it is henceforth »to be, distinctly and avowedly, a war
for the conquest of the ravished domain of the Union —
a war for the absolute, unconditional, and permanent
subjugation, aye, and if need be, the complete extermi
nation of the rebels in arms — and above and beyond
these, a war for the utter overthrow and final extirpa
tion" of Southern Slavery : all to the great end of
maintaining the Nation's integrity, vindicating its
supreme dominion over every foot of its soil, and
sacredly preserving its Union and Constitution ; without
which Independence is a myth, Freedom a mockery,
the past a failure, the present a disgrace, and the
future a hopeless blank. If we can not face this mighty
truth, are we not unfit for the tempestuous times in which
our lot is cast ? If we shun to declare it in every
place and presence, are we not false to the precious
trust committed to us ? And if the Nation fails to act
upon it, might it not as well cease to act at all, and
send Fernando Wood to Richmond, to sue for peace
on any terms ?
I trust, my friends, that this brief review of the
Nation's progress in patriotic sentiment and purpose,
will have accomplished its object in carrying to your
minds the cheering assurance, that, whatever head
winds and tides we may have to contend with, we need
have no fears hereafter of our loyal brethren in the
Border States, or in the North. In the face of many

The Union's Safety. 429
discouragements and distracting influences, they have
at last risen to the full height of the emergency, and
profoundly moved by the great but slowly learned
truth which I have just expressed, are ready to press
forward with us over every obstacle, to the final over
throw of the rebellion and Slavery together, and the
perfect establishment of the Republic on the imperish
able principles of Universal Freedom.
It is the intense and irresistable belief in, and undy
ing purpose to avow and act upon, that truth, which,
in Missouri, distinguishes Radicalism from Conserva
tism, and has supported the Radicals of that wronged
and outraged State through a severe and unequal con
flict, for more than a twelvemonth past. The nature
and incidents of that conflict are known to the world,
and need not be recounted here. Suffice it to say,
that it sprung from the inherent and irreconcilable
antagonism between Freedom and Slavery, and conse
quently between Loyalty and Disloyalty. It has been
bravely and steadfastly met by the Radicals there, in
the unhesitating conviction of right, against such odds
as no loyal party in any loyal State has ever before
encountered, and in the face of such combinations of
official and personal power and influence, as would
have borne down any but a righteous cause. And it
will again be encountered by them, patiently and faith
fully through the fiery scenes which the present year
will display, to the glorious and lasting triumph which
awaits them.
Friends of Freedom ! is it possible to confine that
conflict within the borders of Missouri? Are there

430 Slavery's Destruction,
no Radicals in the nation, but those that have sprung
from her sufferings and wrongs ? Look abroad over
the country — look around you here in Kentucky, and
see that the conflict does exist elsewhere than in Mis
souri; and sound the depths of your hearts, and learn
that there are Radicals besides those of Missouri.
The issue, upon one side or the other of which every
man in the nation must be ranged, is fully made up,
between that Radicalism which will venture all, do all,
and brave all for the Union and Freedom, and. that
Conservatism which, assuming loyalty, hangs back
from the advanced positions of patriotism; professes
enmity to Slavery, and yet cringes to it; avows hos
tility to treason, and yet ¦ courts traitors for partisan
ends; ever finds something strong and resolute which
it were wise not to venture ; something prompt and
effective, that had better not be done; something dar
ing and aggressive, which it is discretion not to brave ;
and is content to stake less than all for country, that
it may more cheaply win all for itself. - When between
two such forces the country's safety hangs, it is time
that the banner of Radicalism should be unfurled
beyond the narrow limits of Missouri. The Nation
should behold it. Why not raise it here ? and why not
on this birthday of Washington ? Is there any better
place or day ? We have come to fling it to the breeze,
and to plant it in the front rank, and we will do it.
It is no paltry ensign of sectionalism, no drabbled
banner of party, but the grand old standard of the
Republic, with every broad stripe still firm and
unstained; and look! with one more star in its azure

The Union's Safety. 431
field, than when treason struck at the beaming constel
lation; and that one riven, by her own blood-stained
hand, from once brilliant, now poor, dismembered, fallen
" Old Virginia ! " And see ! its spreading folds reveal
an inscription, inwoven in letters of gold, flashing in
the orient sunlight ! What are the words ? Read
them, ye downcast and oppressed, for they speak hope
and cheer to you ; read them, friends of Freedom, for
they tell you of a brighter day ; read them, champions
of Slavery, for they proclaim your discomfiture ; read
them traitors, for they thunder anathemas to you, as
they say — " The Union without a slave ; the Con
stitution, AMENDED, TO FORBID SLAVERY FOREVER;
and the arms of the nation to uphold that
Union and that Constitution to the latest gen
eration I "

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