History of the United States, v.3, by James Ford Rhodes, 1910 [c1892].

Chapter 13, Part 2: Lincoln’s Course through Ordinance of Secession

Lincoln's influence on the march of events must now be taken into account. A letter tendering Seward the position of Secretary of State was delivered to him December 13. In it the President-elect said that this had been his "purpose from the day of the nomination at Chicago," and he had "the belief that your position in the public eye, your integrity, ability, learning, and great experience all combine to render it an appointment pre-eminently fit to be made."2 Seward did not immediately accept the offer. In a polite and considerate letter he replied that he should like time for reflection and to consult his friends;3 of all persons, he desired most the counsel of his wife and of Thurlow Weed.4 Leaving Washington December 14, he arrived at Albany the next day, and remained there long enough to have a full consultation with Weed, in which we may be sure that his probable colleagues in the cabinet, as well as the affairs of the country, were discussed. Much as he wished to, he had not deemed it prudent to visit Lincoln,5 but while at Albany he either suggested or fell in with the idea that Weed should go to Springfield on his behalf. He and Weed conferred together December 15 and 16. December 17, the Albany Evening
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2 Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 349. The letter was dated December 8. 3 Ibid., p. 350. The letter was dated December 13.
4 Life of Seward, vol. ii. p. 481.
5 See his letter of December 13

Journal had a carefully studied editorial, in which, asserting that the " question must have a violent or peaceful solution," it urged the Republicans to accept as a settlement of the dispute regarding the territories what was substantially the Crittenden proposition.1 Weed then went to Springfield; Seward went to his home at Auburn, there to await the return of his friend. Weed's consultation with Lincoln took place December 20. His article in the Evening Journal having reached there at about the same time, served as a fitting text for a discussion of the critical state of affairs, and, before the conference ended,. the news that South Carolina had passed the ordinance of secession furnished important material for it.2

Lincoln's mind was made up. Naturally, no man in the
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1 Cited in the New York Tribune, December 19. The Tribune in the same issue remarked in an editorial: "The Atlas and Argus [the celebrated Albany Democratic newspaper] warmly praises the last new compromise of the Albany Evening Journal. Praise from such a quarter is at least suspicious. The Atlas and Argus also intimates that Mr. Seward was consulted in devising the new compromise. This we judge to be malicious and untrue."
   The Albany Evening Journal of December 19 had the following article: "'It is susceptible of proof that Senator Seward aided in preparing the leader of last evening's Journal.2—Albany Evening Standard. There is not the shadow of foundation for this statement. The following paragraph was originally appended to the article referred to, but, to avoid seeming ostentation, was omitted: 'To avoid possible misconstruction, it may be proper to say that the senior editor of the Journal, consulting his own sense of duty and right, speaks for himself only.' Telegraph reports having assumed Mr. Seward's acquiescence in the article, the Auburn Advertiser of Tuesday evening [December 18] publishes the following paragraph: 'Mr. Seward, in conversation, fully repudiates the telegraph and newspaper assumptions of his authority for or concurrence in the Albany Journal's article of yesterday. He says he wonders how long it will take newspapers to learn that, when he desires to be heard, he is in the habit of speaking in his proper place for himself.'"—Cited in the New York World of December 20.
2 Life of Thurlow Weed, vol. i. p. 604 et seq. Weed gives a much fuller report of the discussion in regard to the cabinet than of that on the state of the Union. The question of the New York patronage was hardly touched upon, and then was brought up by Lincoln (see p. 612). For the date of the consultation, which is not given by Weed, see Springfield despatch to the New York Tribune of December 20.

country had watched with greater anxiety than he the course of events in South Carolina, or had studied more carefully the trend of Northern sentiment and the disposition to compromise. His first belief, " that this government possesses both the authority and the power to maintain its own integrity," was confirmed by his mature thought; but, in holding to this legitimate conviction, he did not lose sight of an equally important fact. "The ugly point," he said, in private conversation, "is the necessity of keeping the government together by force, as ours should be a government of fraternity." 1 A statesman at such a crisis would naturally cast about for a policy that might peacefully preserve the Union; and a statesman such as was the President-elect, who had been devoted to peaceful pursuits, would have deemed it wicked to conjure up visions of military power and glory, and would shrink from beginning his administration with a civil war on his hands. There is no doubt that, if the Crittenden compromise had been put forward as an ordinary congressional enactment instead of a constitutional amendment, Lincoln would have accepted every article of it except the one that proposed the settlement of the territorial question.2 Touching the cardinal principle of the Republican party, the principle that explained the reason of the party's existence, he was firm. "Entertain no proposition for a compromise in regard to the extension of slavery," he wrote, December 11, to Kellogg, the Illinois member of the House committee of thirty-three on the crisis. "The instant you do, they have us under again: all our labor is lost, and sooner or later must be done over. . . . The tug has to come, and better now than later. You know I think the Fugitive Slave clause of
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1 Conversations of November 15 and December 13, Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. pp. 247-48.
2 I think that this is clear from the whole tenor of his correspondence, and especially from his letter of December 15 to John A. Gilmer of North Carolina, to whom he afterwards offered a cabinet appointment. Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 284.

the Constitution ought to be enforced — to put it in its mildest form, ought not to be resisted." 1 Two days later, in a letter to E. B. "Washburne, also a member of Congress from Illinois, he repeats the same idea and objects to the scheme for dividing the territory between slavery and freedom by the Missouri line. "Let that be done," he writes, "and immediately filibustering and extending slavery recommences. On that point hold firm as a chain of steel."' Lincoln's letter to John A. Gilmer of North Carolina, written December 15, shows not only judicious constancy, but a largeness of political comprehension that is admirable. "On the territorial question I am inflexible," he said. "On that there is a difference between you and us; and it is the only substantial difference. You think slavery is right and ought to be extended; we think it is wrong and ought to be restricted. For this, neither has any just occasion to be angry with the other." a In his communication to Thurlow Weed of December 17, he is less positive than in the preceding letters referred to; he intimates where before he had asserted; he thinks it probable where before he had been absolutely sure: but this indicates no wavering of opinion; he undoubtedly wrote in a less confident tone out of respect to Weed, who had earnestly advocated a policy to which he himself was opposed.4

On leaving Springfield, after a free and full interchange of views with Lincoln, Weed brought away for the consideration of the Republican members of Congress a written proposition from Lincoln, which embodied his views essentially
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1 Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 259.
2 Reminiscences of A. Lincoln, North American Publishing Company, p. 30; Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 259. While Crittenden did not introduce his plan into the Senate until December 18, a compromise involving the division of territory on the Missouri line began to be discussed soon after the opening of Congress, and the essential part of his own plan was foreshadowed at least one week before he offered it to the Senate. See Washington correspondence New York Tribune, December 7, and editorial in New York Tribune, December 12.
3 Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 285.
4 Life of Weed, vol. ii. p. 310; Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 253.

as they have been here indicated.1 There was now urgent need for Seward's presence at Washington, and, on his journey thither, travelling December 22 with Weed from Syracuse to Albany, he learned Lincoln's emphatic position in regard to slavery in the territories. Arriving late that evening at the Astor House, New York, he found in progress the annual dinner of the New England Society, celebrating Forefathers' Day. The distinguished and influential men gathered around that banquet board shared the common desire of the whole country to hear from Seward some expression of opinion on the existing crisis, some outline of policy to be pursued. He was the leader of the Republican party in Congress. Though it had not yet transpired that a position in the cabinet had been offered him, yet common report ran that he would be the Secretary of State of the incoming administration. This meant to most of those New York gentlemen that he would practically be the President. It was known that Weed had been at Springfield, and that Seward had seen him since his return. Since the election, the New York senator had not opened his mouth in public. When, therefore, he consented to speak to the banqueters, we may easily imagine with what intense, even anxious, interest these eminent representatives of literature, of the bar, and of the business of the metropolis hung upon his words. Since the disunion movement began, they had been distracted by the disturbed condition of financial affairs,2
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1 This appears from Seward's letter to Lincoln of December 26, Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 262. The proposition itself is not printed by Nicolay and Hay, and does not appear in the Life of Weed or the Life of Seward. My friend Colonel Hay writes me that it is fair to presume it has been destroyed.
2 "The country is at this moment convulsed with excitement, and its commercial affairs disarranged and sacrificed."—New York Tribune, November 23. "We are suffering from a panic, and no man can see the end thereof." —Ibid., December 8. ''Three months ago the material condition of the country was healthy and prosperous. Careful trading and close economy had relieved it from the pressure which, during the four previous years, had weighed upon its energies and had restricted its resources. The magnificent crops of the Northwestern States, when taken in connection with the steadily-increasing demand for the cotton of the South, warranted the belief that our commercial and industrial interests were about to enter upon a career of activity almost without parallel in the history of the republic. These well-grounded expectations have been scattered to the winds. Banks have suspended; commerce languishes; trade is paralyzed; the Federal government has been brought to the verge of bankruptcy, and the prospect in the future is gloomier still. The depreciation in values is general and all-pervading." — Baltimore Daily Exchange, December 8, see also editorial of December 11. "The panic which is toppling down great business interests in the centres of trade and prostrating them in the dust."—New York World, December 19.

but just now, despite South Carolina's ordinance, they were feeling cheered by a gleam of light reflected in an advance of stocks, and in the brightening up of the commercial skies.1 Such was the estimate in New York City of Seward's greatness that it is likely every one present expected to hear this pale, slight man utter words of national salvation.

It does not ordinarily come within the province of an historian to criticise after-dinner oratory, but I can have no hesitation in saying that this speech of Seward's, full as it was of levity and unseemly jest, was unworthy of the man, of his position, and of the critical juncture of affairs.2 Yet, touching the serious part of the discourse, it must be admitted that he probably did as well as any man under the existing circumstances could have done. There had been reason for thinking that Seward might support the Crittenden compromise; it was a fair inference from this speech that he would not do it. Strong in his advocacy of the Union, he urged that the question at issue be considered in a conciliatory temper, and he ended in the optimistic vein so frequently characteristic of his thought.
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1 Life of Seward, vol. ii. p. 483; money article of New York Tribune for Saturday, December 22.
2 I refer to the speech as reported in the New York Tribune of December 24, in the New York Evening Post of the same date, and as published in Moore's Rebellion Record, vol. i, Docs., p. 4. In the speech as printed in Seward's Works, vol. iv. p. 644,the jocose and familiar expressions are omitted.

On Monday, December 24, Seward was at Washington, in attendance upon the committee of thirteen. It must be called to mind that, on the Saturday previous, the committee voted on the Crittenden compromise, and that Seward's name is recorded in the negative on all the articles of the proposed amendment to the Constitution.1 But he was not present at the meeting of that day; as we have seen, he was on the way from Auburn to New York City. On account of his absence, the Republicans were unwilling to have a vote taken; but, since they could give no assurance as to when he would return, the other senators refused to defer action.2 Monday, the committee permitted Seward to record his vote on the several propositions that had been considered at the previous meeting.3

It is a fair historic probability that Seward would have favored in committee a compromise on the basis of the Crittenden plan, had he not already in a measure submitted himself to the leadership of Lincoln by entertaining the offer of the State department. It is certain that if Lincoln, in the interview with Weed, had given his adhesion to the Albany Journal proposition, Seward would have championed it in committee and in Congress; and it seems almost certain that, with such support, the Crittenden compromise in essence would have been reported by the committee and adopted by Congress. It has been seen that Lincoln's influence was exerted against the proposal for the division of territory on the Missouri line. While, in spite of earnest requests from many quarters,4 he had refused to make a public declaration of his views, the letters to Kellogg and to Washburne 5 were obviously written with the design of having their contents made known to Republican members of Congress on whom rested any responsibility. Following these letters came an important avowal. Greeley, who had been
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1 See p. 154.
2 Associated Press despatch, December 22.
3 Journal of committee of thirteen, p. 8.
4 See Nicolay and Hay, vol. Hi. chap. xviii.
5 See pp. 160-61.

corresponding with Lincoln,1 made, on December 22, at the head of his editorial columns, in leaded type, this declaration: "We are enabled to state, in the most positive terms, that Mr. Lincoln is utterly opposed to any concession or compromise that shall yield one iota of the position occupied by the Republican party on the subject of slavery in the territories, and that he stands now, as he stood in May last, when he accepted the nomination for the presidency, square upon the Chicago platform."

What would have been the effect on the Republican members of the committee of thirteen if the weight of Lincoln's influence had been put in the other scale, if it had been exerted for instead of against the division of territory on the Missouri line? Collamer would likely have gone with Seward. At the beginning of the session he had said, in conversation with Clingman: "You must let us know your terms, for we do not want to part with you."2 Wade, we may be sure, would have agreed to no compromise acceptable to the cotton States. He had declared in the Senate, "So far as I am concerned, I will yield to no compromise."3 This remark was made in his speech of December 17—a speech which advanced him to the leadership of the radical Republicans, and which undoubtedly at that time had the approval of a majority of his party.4 Greeley had ceased
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1 See Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 258.
2 Speeches and Writings, Clingman, p. 523.
3 Congressional Globe, p. 103.
4 An editorial of December 19, in the New York World, then an independent journal, reflects so well in the main Republican sentiment in the middle of December, that I give a long extract from it: "Wade is the Republican senator from the agricultural State of Ohio, and his speech is probably a very exact reflex, not merely of the Republican sentiment of bis State, but of all the great agricultural communities of the North. The strength of the Republican party lies in the rural districts. In rural communities the moral element has more influence in politics than it has in towns, where the quick succession of events and ideas keeps the mind more alert, and does not allow that immobility of mental attitude which is favorable to a persistent contemplation of fixed principles. The slower perceptions of the agricultural mind do not enable it readily to keep up with the rapid pace of movements in revolutionary times. It seems incredible to those who are not in the thick of events that the great changes which we witness should have taken place in the six weeks since the presidential election. The panic, which is toppling down great business interests in the centres of trade and prostrating them in the dust, is unfelt and unappreciated in the homes of our farmers. The sudden blight which has fallen on all other interests has hardly yet come near to them. As to the cry of disunion, they have heard that raised so often, when it meant nothing, that they are now skeptical when disunion is close upon us. It is the old story of crying ' wolf,' till the cry has lost its effect when the danger is real.
   "Wade's speech derives its significance from the circumstance that it may be taken as a pretty accurate index of the sentiment of the great mass of the Republicans in respect to the crisis. The tone of their press for the last ten days accords with the anti-compromise tone of this speech. The current, indeed, seems setting more and more strongly in that direction. The ground on which a majority of the Republican party stands to-day is earnest opposition to any further compromises, combined with entire willingness to accord to the South every right guaranteed to it by the Constitution. . . .
   "Mr. Weed's quickness of perception and intimate personal relations with prominent business men in New York and other cities give him a full appreciation of the destruction to business interests that attends on the panic, and of the disasters and ruin that would accompany a dissolution of the Union. He occupies a different position from the great body of his party because, as his supporters will say, his mind takes a quicker grasp of the condition of affairs. He advocates compromise because he is convinced that the emergency can only be met by compromise or civil war."

the advocacy of his own policy of letting the Southern States go in peace, partly for the reason that it met no hearty response from Northern sentiment, and partly out of deference to Lincoln.1 The Tribune now came to the support of the policy laid down by Wade as "the only true, the only honest, the only safe doctrine."2 This doctrine could be summed up in the two words, "no compromise."

What would have been the course of Grimes and of Doolittle in this supposable case is not so clear. That they sincerely objected to the Crittenden compromise as presented to the committee is undoubted;3 but if the plan had been
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1 Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 258.
2 December 19.
3 See Grimes's letters of December 16, 1860, and of January 28, 1861, Life of James W. Grimes, Salter, pp. 132, 133; see letter of Doolittle, November 16, Globe, p. 9, speech of December 27, ibid., p. 195.

modified, and if the altered proposition had been urged by Lincoln and championed by Seward, it is a fair presumption that neither Grimes nor Doolittle would have taken the responsibility of defeating such a compromise. It is unquestionable, as I have previously shown, that in December the Republicans defeated the Crittenden proposition;1 and it seems to me likewise clear that, of all the influences tending to this result, the influence of Lincoln was the most potent. While it is true that a considerable majority of the Republican members of Congress were opposed to this scheme, it is also true that a public sentiment in its favor was rising and steadily growing at the North, and that if this opinion had been given direction and form by Republican leaders holding the positions of Seward and of Lincoln, it would have shaped the legislation of the existing Congress.2

Upon what grounds may the Republicans and Lincoln be justified for refusing their assent to this compromise? Every article of Crittenden's amendment to the Constitution mentioned "slavery" or "slaves." What the fathers with ingenious circumlocution had avoided 3 was here obtrusively asserted. To introduce that phraseology into the organic instrument of the land was to take a step backward, to run counter to the spirit of the age. True, it might be urged, as Taney had maintained in the Dred Scott decision, that "the right of property in a slave is distinctly and expressly affirmed in the Constitution,"4 and that the Crittenden amendment asserted no more; but to Republicans who venerated the Constitution it had been a consoling circumstance that the word "slavery" or "slaves" did not occur
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1 See p. 154.
2 "The reported recent declaration of the President-elect, that he will strictly adhere to the Chicago platform, has confirmed the wavering Republicans to that policy, and increased the intensity of Southern feeling." —Associated Press despatch, December 23.
3 See vol. i. p. 17, 3 See vol. ii. p. 257.

in it. Lincoln, in his debates with Douglas, had given utterance to this feeling in impressive words,1 and he was now undoubtedly conscious of its full force. "The main point at issue between the two sections of our Confederacy," said Brown of Mississippi in the Senate, is, that "we claim that there is property in slaves and they [the Northern senators] deny it." 2 Coming after the Dred Scott decision and the different constructions of it, the Crittenden amendment, had it been made part of the Constitution, would have settled the question whether that instrument distinctly recognized slaves as property. This was undoubtedly the reason why the Southern senators were strenuous to have the Crittenden compromise in the form of a constitutional amendment ;3 but, on the other hand, this was necessary in order to prohibit slavery in the territories, as the Supreme Court had denied to Congress that power.

Another objection to the Crittenden compromise, more serious and perhaps insurmountable, lay in the fact that, except on the understanding that the protection to slavery south of the Missouri line should apply to all future acquisitions of territory, it would not be acceptable to the senators from the cotton States. The phraseology of the article was misleading. In territory "now held or hereafter acquired" north of latitude 36° 30', slavery should be prohibited,
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1 See vol. ii. p. 335.
2 Speech of December 27, Globe, p. 201.
3 J. S. Pike wrote the New York Tribune under date of December 22: "I think the case turns upon the question of whether an agreement can be made to a partition of territory between the slave and free States. This is the nub of the controversy when winnowed from its chaff. All the other points, I fancy, can be managed. But the concession on the main one, of a partition of territory after the plan of the Missouri Compromise, is the sticking place. The revolutionists in the Gulf States don't want to be satisfied with this, but the other slave States, or those in them who are opposed to dissolving the Union, consider that the concession would force the secessionists to desist. The partition is demanded under the form of a constitutional guaranty. No ordinary legislation will satisfy the slaveholders. As Mr. Toombs says, it must take the shape of positive constitutional guaranty, or he would not give a fig for it, for the abolitionists are treacherous, and would repeal the settlement to-morrow if they had a chance."

while the protection to slavery apparently applied only to actual territory. Crittenden himself admitted that the article was ambiguous.1 The speech of Toombs, however, in the Senate, January 7, 1861,2 shows that he and Davis understood that, as regards that provision, the South and the North were on a par; and it is probable that, before accepting the compromise for their States, they would have demanded that their understanding of it should be expressly stated, as was afterwards done in the Powell amendment.3 With this implication a part of the scheme, and with the annexation of Texas, the Mexican War, the attempts to get Cuba, and the filibustering in Central America fresh in the minds of the Republicans, it is easy to see why they objected to the first article of the Crittenden compromise. True, as Thurlow Weed might have argued, such things cannot take place under a Republican administration; against them we are insured for the next four years, and the spirit of the age is working constantly and powerfully for us. But Lincoln did not take this view. "Filibustering for all south of us and making slave States of it would follow in spite of us," he wrote Thurlow Weed.4 "A year will not pass," he declared, "till we shall have to take Cuba as a condition upon which they will stay in the Union."5

After weighing with care the considerations on each side, it will appear that the Republicans and Lincoln may be justified in having refused to accept the Crittenden compromise.
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1 See letter of Crittenden, February 4, 1861, to a gentleman in Trenton, N. J., New York Times, February 21,1861.
2 Globe, p. 270.
3 Powell's amendment was offered January 9, 1861, and accepted by Crittenden. It was adopted by the Senate January 16. In reply to a question of Pugh, Powell said: "1 will say to the senator that I do think it material, and that was the intention of my colleague in presenting the resolutions. I put this amendment in to make it clear and distinct. I understand my colleague to accept it, as it carries out his original design."— Globe, p. 403.
4 Letter of December 17, Life of Weed, vol. ii. p. 311.
5 Letter to J. T. Hale, January 11,1861, Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 288.

A similar proposition was defeated by the Northern Whigs and Democrats in 1848.1 Clay and Webster in 1850 refused to entertain such a plan proffered by Jefferson Davis and the Nashville convention.2 Yet in coming to the conclusion that the project of Crittenden ought not at this time to have been agreed to by the Republicans, I must express that judgment with diffidence. An important fact in opposition to such a view is that public sentiment in favor of this compromise was now beginning to arise at the North. The manifestations of this opinion are clear after the 1st of January, 1861, and will be mentioned in the proper chronological order. For the present it is desirable to refer to the expressions of certain men as indicative of the growing sentiment of the community. "I would most cheerfully accept your proposition," was the word Crittenden received from John A. Dix, a Breckinridge Democrat, but more of a patriot than a partisan. "I feel a strong confidence that we could carry three fourths of the States in favor of it as an amendment to the Constitution."3 "I saw with great satisfaction your patriotic movement," wrote Edward Everett, "and I wish from the bottom of my heart that it may succeed." 4 Elisha Whittlesey, a Republican living in northern Ohio, hoped that Crittenden's efforts would succeed in preventing
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1 See vol. i. p. 96.
2 Ibid., pp. 168,174.
3 Letter of December 22, Life of Crittenden, Coleman, vol. ii. p. 237. 4 Letter of December 23, ibid., p. 237. He added: "There is nothing in your resolutions for which I would not cheerfully vote, if their adoption as amendments of the Constitution would save us from disunion, and, what I consider its necessary consequences, civil war, anarchy, desolation at home, the loss of all respectability and influence abroad, and, finally, military despotism. ... I could wish that our Southern brethren would be contented without inserting the word slave in the Constitution, it having been studiously omitted by the framers, and also that the right of holding slaves south of the 36° 30' had been left to inference, as it was in the Missouri Compromise, and not expressly asserted. Both these points will be stumbling-blocks with many conservative members of the Republican party. . . . Cannot our Southern friends be persuaded to proceed more deliberately ?”

disunion.1 Robert C. Winthrop, an old Whig, thought some features of the plan ought to be modified, but he wrote Crittenden: "I should try hard to sustain you in such measures as were essential to rescue us from disunion and civil war."2 August Belmont, representing the commercial interests of New York City, gave assurance of the anxiety that prevailed regarding the success of what was regarded as so fair a settlement of the difficulty.3

Before Crittenden had formally introduced his plan into the Senate, there were many indications that Northern sentiment was ripe for a compromise that should accord generous terms to the South. This sentiment was fostered by the gloomy state of trade. Since the secession movement began, the New York stock market had been in a feverish condition, resulting twice in panic. The Charleston, Washington, Baltimore, and Philadelphia banks had suspended
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1 He wrote, December 24: "My conservative neighbors express their high gratification in your able and patriotic effort to arrest the mad designs of those who wish the dissolution of the Union. . . . We bless you as a peacemaker."—Life of Crittenden, Coleman, vol. ii. p. 238.
2 Letter of December 24. He added: "And yet one hardly knows how to hope for anything good while there is so much passionate and precipitate action at the South."—Ibid., p. 239.
3 He wrote Crittenden, December 26: "I have yet to meet the first conservative Union-loving man, in or out of politics, who does not approve of your compromise propositions, and consider them a most efficacious, if not the only, remedy which can save this great country from ruin and destruction. ... I am afraid that no human power can stay the evil, since the Republican leaders by their vote in the committee of thirteen, have proved that they are determined to remain deaf to the dictates of justice and patriotism. Will the American people permit their country to be dragged to ruin by a handful of puritanical fanatics and selfish politicians?"—Letters of Belmont, privately printed, p. 24. Belmont wrote Herschel V. Johnson of Georgia, December 30: "Though the Republican leaders in Congress have thus far disappointed my expectations, I have strong hopes that they will be compelled to yield under the pressure of public opinion. In our own city and State some of the most prominent men are ready to follow the lead of Weed, and active agencies are at work to bring about a compromise. ... In regard to the territories, the restoration of the Missouri line, extended to the Pacific, finds favor with most of the conservative Republicans, and their number is increasing daily."—Ibid., pp. 26, 27.

specie payments; the New York banks had been forced to issue clearing-house certificates. The apprehended repudiation of debts due the North by Southern merchants was an important factor in the situation.1 Financial distress seemed to be staring the country in the face. Municipal elections, taking place early in December in Boston and other New England cities, and at Hudson, New York, showed a marked falling-off in Republican strength since the presidential vote.2 Among the Northern people there existed a widespread belief that the abolitionists were largely answerable for the present troubles, and this belief now began to show itself in public demonstrations. An anti-slavery convention held December 3 at Tremont Temple, Boston, to commemorate the anniversary of John Brown's execution, was broken up by a mob largely composed, it is said, of Beacon Street aristocrats. A number of business men took possession of the meeting, elected a chairman, and passed resolutions condemning John Brown, expressing their sense of the value of the Union, and declaring the assemblies of certain "irresponsible persons and political demagogues" of Boston "a public nuisance which, in self-defence, we are determined shall henceforward be summarily abated." 3 Thirteen days
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1 See money articles, New York Tribune, November 19, 21, 22, December 6, 7; New York Independent, November 15, cited by Von Hoist, vol. vii. p. 250; New York Tribune, cited on p. 269.
2 See Greeley's American Conflict, vol. i. p. 362.
3 New York Tribune, December 4. The anniversary of John Brown's execution coming on Sunday, this meeting was held Monday, December 3. Richard Grant White, writer in 1862 of the first number of Harper's Pictorial History of the Great Rebellion, thus spoke of this attempted meeting of the abolitionists: ''The organizers of so flagrant an affront to public decency were doomed to disappointment." The breaking up of the meeting is characterized as "proceedings somewhat irregular, but, under the circumstances, not quite unjustifiable."—Part i. p. 21. Per contra, see the indignant remarks of Carl Schurz in his address on " Free Speech " in Tremont Temple, Boston, December 11,1860, Speeches, p. 222. For the sentiment largely prevailing in the commercial circles of Boston, see letter of Nathan Appleton of December 15, 1860, printed in the National Intelligencer, January 1,1861. He wrote: "It is sad to see this powerful, glorious nation, in the midst of unparalleled prosperity, shattering itself into fragments, and all out of an impracticable idea, a nonentity, connected with the institution of slavery. . . . The South is in a state of great excitement, a feeling of extreme indignation towards the North. . . . The more extreme of our politicians "do not'' represent the feelings of the masses in the North, even in New England."

later, on a Sunday morning, Wendell Phillips spoke at Music Hall, bitterly condemning the disturbers of the Tremont Temple convention. The audience being largely made up of his friends, he delivered his speech without formidable interruption, but, at the close of the meeting, it was necessary for a hundred policemen to escort him home, to protect him from a hooting mob of a thousand.1 George William Curtis had engaged to deliver a lecture before the People's Literary Institute of Philadelphia on "The Policy of Honesty," but, owing to his connection with the antislavery movement, the mayor of the city thought it would be unwise for him to appear, and regretted the lack of lawful power to prevent such an orator from speaking in the present state of public feeling. The owner of Concert Hall, having been officially informed that, should the lecture be given, there would be danger of a riot, cancelled the engagement he had made to let the hall for that occasion.2 A great union meeting called by Mayor Henry, a supporter of Lincoln, was held in Independence Square, December 13, the date on which Curtis had expected to lecture. The speeches and the resolutions showed that, if the Crittenden compromise had then been before the public, it would have received the hearty approval of this assembly.3 The same may be said of the Pine Street meeting in New York City, a private gathering of one to two hundred gentlemen of
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1 New York Tribune, December 17; see article of George W. Smalley, Harper's Magazine, June, 1894.
2 Greeley's American Conflict, vol. i. p. 867; New York Tribune, December 13. Trouble had occurred the previous spring when Curtis had spoken in Philadelphia.
3 For the speeches and resolutions, see Greeley's American Conflict, vol. i. p. 362 et seq.

high position and great influence, who had in the presidential canvass supported Douglas, Bell, or Breckinridge.1

Seward did not appreciate the danger in which the country lay. "Sedition," he wrote Lincoln, "will be growing weaker and loyalty stronger every day from the acts of secession as they occur." 2 Nor did Lincoln comprehend the peril which menaced the nation should a settlement not be reached, as did Everett, Winthrop, and August Belmont. Lincoln knew plainly enough the worst that might happen if the demands of the South were submitted to, but he did not look upon the darkest side of the future in case of a failure to make a compromise.3 But there were representative men among the Republicans who predicted what would come, and yet opposed the Crittenden plan. "War of a most bitter and sanguinary character will be sure to follow in a short time," wrote Grimes to his wife.4 "The heavens are indeed black," said Dawes, in a letter to an anxious constituent, "and an awful storm is gathering. ... I see no way that either North or South can escape its fury.... I
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1 This meeting was held December 15, Memoirs of J. A. Dix, Morgan Dix, vol. i. p. 347 et seq.; New York Tribune, December 17,18; New York Times, December 17; New York World, December 17. Among the signers of the call for the meeting were: W. B. Astor, John J. Cisco, W. G. Hunt, James W. Beekman, John A. Dix. The chairman was Charles O'Conner. Ex-President Fillmore sympathized with the object of the meeting. On the committee of resolutions were: John A. Dix, James T. Soutter, E. Pierrepont, Samuel J. Tilden, William H. Aspinwall, Edward Cooper, Richard Lathers.
2 Letter of December 26, Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 264.
3 See Herndon's Life of Lincoln, edition of Belford, Clarke & Co., p. 473; Don Piatt's Memories of the Men who Saved the Union, p. 30. Many Republicans took the same view as Seward and Lincoln. J. S. Pike, whom I have had occasion to quote many times, who was always sincere, and who really was a representative man, asks, in a vehement argument written December 18 to the New York Tribune: "Wherefore, then, this idle gabble, this monstrous gassing about revolution and civil war?" Three days before he had written: "The talk of civil war is idle and childish."
4 Letter of December 16, Life of Grimes, Salter, p. 132. He added: "This is certainly deplorable, but there is no help for it. No reasonable concession will satisfy the rebels."

am wellnigh appalled at its awful and inevitable consequences." 1

The Republicans, however, did not merely object; they proposed a compromise of their own. Seward, with the unanimous consent of the Republican members, offered in the committee, December 24, three propositions:

"1. That the Constitution should never be altered so as to authorize Congress to abolish or interfere with slavery in the States. (This to be enacted as a constitutional amendment.)

"2. That the Fugitive Slave law should be amended by granting a jury trial to the fugitive.

"3. That Congress recommend the repeal by the States of their Personal Liberty acts which contravene the Constitution or the laws."2

Only the first of these articles was determined in the affirmative.3 December 26, Seward offered a resolution that " Congress should pass an efficient law for the punishment of all persons engaged in the armed invasion of any State from another."4 On that evening the Republican
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1 Printed in the New York Tribune, December 24. He added: "And now that the yawning jaws of destruction have been opened, I am called upon to betray both the Constitution and the Union. . . . Discomfiture, disgrace, destruction wait on timidity, vacillation, and concession. While safety, if it come at all, comes only through moderation, calmness, and firmness."
2 See letter of Seward to Lincoln, December 26, Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 262; Journal of Committee of Thirteen, p. 10. The Washington correspondent of the New York Tribune said that this proposition was drawn up by Collamer and Grimes. This is probable, as Seward did not arrive at Washington until the morning of the 24th.—Life of Seward, vol. ii. p. 483. As the Southern Democrats, in committee, voted against the third article on the ground that it would affect their laws imprisoning colored seamen (Washington cor. New York Tribune, December 24; New York World, December 26), I give it entire: "The legislatures of the several States shall be respectfully requested to review all their legislation affecting the right of persons recently resident in other States, and to repeal or modify all such acts as may contravene the provisions of the Constitution of the United States, or any laws made in pursuance thereof."
3 For the amendments and the several votes, see Journal of the Committee, p. 11; Seward's letter of December 26.
4 Journal of the Committee, p. 13. This resolution was amended by the Democrats in a way unacceptable to the Republicans, and then lost by the Republican votes.

members of the committee met at Seward's house, with Trumbull and Fessenden, to consider the written suggestion Lincoln had given Thurlow Weed. The President-elect was obviously willing to state the duty of enforcing the Fugitive Slave law in stronger terms than had been employed in the proposition of the Republicans, but, as they thought the ground had been already covered, they offered nothing further on this point.1 It appears, however, from a letter of Grimes to Governor Kirkwood, that the Iowa senator assented to another proposition, viz.: "To admit Kansas into the Union under the Wyandotte Constitution,' and then to admit the remaining territory belonging to the United States as two States, one north and one south of the parallel of 36° 30', with the provision that these States might be subdivided and new ones erected therefrom whenever there shall be sufficient population for one representative in Congress upon sixty thousand square miles."3 The adoption of this would have given the Southerners a slave State, for political purposes, in New Mexico.4 While the machinations of man had not overcome " an ordinance of nature" and "the will of God"—for there were now but twenty-two slaves in the territory 5—New Mexico would have remained for a while a pro-slavery pocket borough, as was Oregon on her admission.6 Although the Journal of the Committee of Thirteen does not disclose the fact, it is apparent from the context of Grimes's letter that the Republicans were ready to agree to this proposal.

These propositions, then, were the Republican offer of
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1 See Seward's letter of December 26. While Seward heard from Weed, on the 22d, the substance of Lincoln's suggestion, he did not receive it in written form until the morning of the 26th.
2 See vol. ii. p. 475.
3 Life of Grimes, Salter, p. 137.
4 New Mexico comprised what is now New Mexico and Arizona.
5 " Of these only twelve are domiciled ; the remainder are but transient residents."—C. F. Adams, Speech, January 31, 1861.
6 See vol. ii. p. 417.

compromise. Considering that the slavery question had been submitted to the people at the presidential election, and that the anti-slavery party had won, was it not a fair offer? Did not the Republicans meet the cotton States half-way? Should not Davis, Toombs, and Hunter have agreed to the proposition? Could they not have done so without dishonor? As players in the political game, fault cannot be found with the Southerners for making extreme demands, but when they had ascertained the furthest concession the Republicans were willing to make, ought they not to have accepted it rather than run the risk of involving the country in civil war? For, while it was a prevalent idea at the South that the North would not fight, Jefferson Davis did not share that illusion, and was alive to the actual peril.

Jefferson Davis had taken, or had been forced into, a position that must now have embarrassed him if he made a sincere attempt to reach a settlement. In the House of Representatives, on December 6, a select committee of thirty-three on the crisis had been appointed. December 13, the committee adopted, by a vote of 22 to 8, a pacific resolution of Dunn, a Republican of Indiana, which had been offered as a substitute for one proposed by Rust, a Democrat of Arkansas, and which had been accepted by Rust.1 Strangely enough, the next day after the adoption of this resolution—and, according to Reuben Davis of Mississippi, one of the committee of thirty-three, because of it—a number of Southern members of Congress met at
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1This was the resolution: "Resolved, That, in the opinion of this committee, the existing discontents among the Southern people, and the growing hostility among them to the federal government, are greatly to be regretted; and, whether such discontents and hostility are without just cause or not, any reasonable, proper, and constitutional remedies, and additional and more specific and effectual guarantees of their peculiar rights and interests as recognized by the Constitution, necessary to preserve the peace of the country and the perpetuation of the Union, should be promptly and cheerfully granted."—Journal of the Committee of Thirty-three, p. 7. The votes against this resolution were all Republican. Reuben Davis did not vote. 

his rooms and prepared an address to their constituents which asserted: "The argument is exhausted. ... In our judgment the Republicans are resolute in the purpose to grant nothing that will or ought to satisfy the South. We are satisfied the honor, safety, and independence of the Southern people require the organization of a Southern Confederacy—a result to be obtained only by separate State secession."1 This manifesto was untimely and unjust. Even from the Southern point of view, it was at that time premature to assert that the Republicans would refuse a satisfactory compromise. Jefferson Davis, in signing the address, committed a grave indiscretion. It is charitable to suppose that he was induced to give it his sanction by the zealous persuasion of his more precipitate associates; and it is also due to him to say that, when first asked to serve on the Senate committee of thirteen, he declined, on the score of propriety, and that it was only at the request of Southern senators, holding views similar to his own, that he consented to do so.2

The committee of thirteen considered several other propositions besides those of Crittenden and the Republicans, but could come to no agreement. December 28, they adopted a resolution that they "had not been able to agree upon any general plan of adjustment, and report that fact to the Senate." 3 It was evident that the cotton States would
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1 Washington Constitution, December 15, cited by Nicolay and Hay, vol. ii. p. 436. See Recollections of Mississippi, Reuben Davis, p. 398. Davis says the action was taken on account of the resolution of Rust, but he does not state the resolution of Rust correctly. The signers of this address were: Five representatives of Alabama; five representatives of Georgia; Iverson, senator from Georgia; the representative from Florida; one representative from Arkansas; Jefferson Davis and Brown, senators from Mississippi; three representatives from Mississippi; two representatives from North Carolina; Slidell and Benjamin, senators from Louisiana; one representative from Louisiana; Wigfall and Hemphill, senators from Texas; one representative from Texas; four representatives from South Carolina.
2 Congressional Globe, pp. 158,182.
3 Journal of Committee of Thirteen, p. 18.

accept nothing less than the Crittenden compromise; it was not so clear that the Republicans would do no more than they had offered. Yet it is a fact, which I hope to make clear as the story goes on, that, when the committee of thirteen failed to agree on a report, almost the last, if not the very last, chance of a compromise that could retain the cotton States was gone, although this was not generally appreciated, except by the cotton States themselves. If it had been fully comprehended, the pressure from the North on Congress and on the committee would probably have been so great as to lead to the adoption of the Crittenden compromise pure and simple.

While the leaders of parties and of factions in Congress were trying to effect a composition, Lincoln, in a quiet way and on other lines, endeavored to do something to retard the tide of secession. The Union speech which Alexander H. Stephens delivered November 14 before the members of the Georgia legislature1 attracted Lincoln's attention, and led to a correspondence which began by his request for a revised copy of the speech.2 This letter did not reach Stephens for two weeks; when it came, he immediately replied, ending with: "The country is certainly in great peril, and no man ever had heavier or greater responsibilities resting upon him than you have in the present momentous crisis." Lincoln's answer was an honest attempt to allay Southern apprehensions. He wrote: "I fully appreciate the present peril the country is in, and the weight of responsibility on me. Do the people of the South really entertain fears that a Republican administration would directly or indirectly interfere with their slaves or with them about their slaves? If they do, I wish to assure you . . . that there is no cause for such fears. The South would be in no more danger in this respect than it was in
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1 The War between the States, Stephens, vol. ii. p. 278.
2 Letter of Lincoln to Stephens, November 30, Letters and Speeches, Cleveland, p. 150.

the days of Washington. I suppose, however, this does not meet the case. You think slavery is right and ought to be extended, while we think it is wrong and ought to be restricted. That I suppose is the rub. It certainly is the only substantial difference between us." 1 Nevertheless, Lincoln was clear that he could not give the faintest expression of approval to the Crittenden compromise. Duff Green— a Georgian, a prominent politician and editor, born before the Constitution was adopted and loath to die with his eyes resting on a dissevered Union—believing that deliverance lay in the Crittenden project, went at President Buchanan's request to Springfield, in the hope of winning Lincoln's support to this plan. Green and Lincoln had a long conversation on the Crittenden compromise. The President-elect read the proposition over several times, but neither in the conversation nor in the formal letter he afterwards prepared for Green did he depart from the conviction he had arrived at and had several times before expressed.2

Leading Republican senators and representatives, some of whom held radical opinions, pressed Lincoln to call to his cabinet Southern men of position and character who had been adverse to his election. Thurlow Weed, on the occasion of his visit to Springfield, had urged this with pertinacity. Lincoln was willing to do this provided it could be done without sacrifice of principle, and with this end in view he wrote an editorial, which appeared in the Springfield Journal on the morning of December 13, in which the question was asked whether there were two or three Southern gentlemen, opposed to him politically, who would accept a place in the cabinet; and, if so, whether this could be accomplished without the surrender of principle on either side
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1 Letter of December 22. These three letters mentioned are given in fac-simile in Cleveland, p. 150; Nicolay and Hay print Lincoln's letter of December 22 in full, vol. iii. p. 271.
2 See letter of Green to Buchanan, Springfield, December 28, Life of Buchanan, Curtis, vol. ii. p. 426; Letter of Lincoln to Green, December 28, and to Trumbull, same day, Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. pp. 286-87.

and with due regard to the public service.1 While it was not known that Lincoln had actually written the article, it was well understood that he had inspired it.2 It was, in fact, a tentative inquiry on the part of the President-elect whether there existed common ground on which he and Southern supporters of Bell or Douglas could meet. Afterwards an indirect offer was made to one such man,3 and others were sounded with the purpose of carrying out this policy, but nothing came from any of these attempts.4

While Buchanan would have been glad to see the Crittenden compromise adopted,5 he became, through his wavering course, unwittingly a bar to a settlement. Firmness in the execution of the laws and conciliation in the way of the removal of grievances should have been the key to his policy. Firmness makes compromise possible; willingness to conciliate justifies resoluteness. The President was ready to yield more to the South than the Crittenden plan,6 but he shrank from the smallest assertion of the power of the government. The constitutional essay which he sent to Congress as his message led to nothing; it had not the slightest effect towards disentangling affairs in South Carolina. The people of Charleston, misled by their prejudices on slavery and State-rights, sincerely thought that they had begun another glorious revolution. Major Anderson, believing that
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1 Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 348; Springfield despatch of December 13 to New York Tribune.
2 After stating that the editorial "appeared at the head of this morning's Journal, Lincoln's organ," the Springfield despatch of December 13 to the New York Tribune went on to say: "It is known to have emanated directly from the President."
3 To John A. Gilmer, Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. pp. 283, 363. Gilmer was a representative from North Carolina, classed by the Tribune Almanac as a South American, presumably a supporter of Bell.
4 See Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 361 et seq.; Herndon, pp. 473, 477. 5 See letter to James G. Bennett, December 20, and special message of January 8, 1861, Curtis, vol. ii. pp. 431, 435.
6 See his annual message.

the South was at least half right in the controversy,1 but having an eye single to his duty as a soldier, had implored his government to adopt some definite line of policy, and, if it were decided to hold the forts in Charleston harbor, he urged that troops or vessels of war be instantly sent. "I shall go steadily on," he wrote, "preparing for the worst, trusting hopefully in the God of battles to guard and guide me in my course." 2 General Wool, who had served with distinction in the War of 1812 and in the Mexican War, and who now commanded the military department which included South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi, was eager to bear an active part. This veteran, now seventy-two years old, wrote, December 6, a private letter to his old friend, Secretary Cass. "If I can aid the President," he said, "to preserve the Union, I hope he will command my services. It will never do for you or him to leave Washington without every star in this Union is in its place. ... It seems to me that troops should be sent to Charleston to man the forts in that harbor. You have eight companies at Fort Monroe, Va. Three or four of these companies should be sent, without a moment's delay, to Fort Moultrie."3

December 8, the very day on which General Wool's letter should have reached Washington, several of the South Carolina members of Congress who had not, in accordance with the example set by their senators, resigned their seats called to see the President. Knowing that the subject of the reinforcement of the Charleston forts was frequently and earnestly discussed in the cabinet, and that the rumor
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1 See Life of Buchanan, Curtis, vol. ii. p. 371; private letter of December 11 to R. N. Gourdin, of Charleston, The Genesis of the Civil War, Crawford, p. 69.
2 Anderson to Adjutant-General Cooper, December 1, Official Records, vol. i. p. 82. Captain Foster, of the Engineers, sent through the proper channel a similar recommendation. See his letter of December 4, ibid., p. 84.
3 Troy Times, December 31, cited in Moore's Rebellion Record, vol. i., Documents, p. 11.

ran that General Cass and Holt1 were strenuous for such a policy,2 these men sought information, and, should the occasion demand it, were ready to enter their protest. The President came from a cabinet council to see them in the ante-room. When they opened the matter, he was seemingly "much disturbed and moved," and spoke of a conversation he had had with the wife of Major Anderson, who had come from New York for the purpose of making known to him her alarm at the situation of her husband, whom she considered "in momentary danger of an attack from an
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1 Joseph Holt, of Kentucky, postmaster-general, appointed in 1859 in the place of Brown, deceased.
2 Assistant Secretary of State Trescot, of South Carolina, says: "General Cass and Judge Black were urgent that the forts should be reinforced." A short while before the President sent his message to Congress, continues Trescot, "Governor Floyd called upon me, evidently much excited. He said that just after dinner the President had sent for him (at the room in the State department, which he occupied while preparing his message); that when he reached him he found General Cass and Judge Black, who retired immediately upon his entrance. The President then informed him that he had determined to reinforce the garrisons in Charleston harbor, upon which a very animated discussion arose. The President finally consented to suspend his decision until General Scott could reach Washington, and he had been telegraphed to come on immediately." Trescot thereupon wrote Governor Gist of South Carolina, November 26, asking him to assure the President that the forts would not be taken unless they were reinforced. Governor Gist replied, November 29, that they probably would not be attacked, and added: "If President Buchanan . . . sends on a reinforcement, the responsibility will rest on him of lighting the torch of discord, which will only be quenched in blood." Trescot saw the President December 2, two days before he sent his message to Congress, and communicated to him the tenor of this letter of Governor Gist. See Trescot's narrative, in Crawford's Genesis of the Civil War, pp. 26, 28, 30, 31, 34. I should have included part of this note in my narrative which led up to the President's message had not Floyd's statement that Buchanan had, in the latter part of November, determined to reinforce the forts seemed inconsistent with the other evidence. Trescot's narrative was written, says Crawford, in February, 1861 (see p. 21). In April, 1893, Mr. Trescot kindly showed me the original MS. from which Crawford has so largely cited. It is a straightforward and truthful story, and in conversation Mr. Trescot assured me that he had no doubt that Floyd represented faithfully the President's determination. If Floyd was exact, it is simply added proof of Buchanan's vacillation.

excited and lawless mob." The President stated that he ought to take all measures possible to protect the lives of Major Anderson and his command. The South Carolina congressmen assured him that the State opposed any decided step before the convention met,1 and that, unless reinforcements were sent or the existing status in Charleston harbor was in some way altered, there was no danger of an attack on the fort. If either of these things were done, they told the President emphatically, a collision could not, on account of "the excited state of feeling at home," be prevented. "The impression made upon us," relate Miles and Keitt, two of the delegation, " was that the President was wavering, and had not decided what course he would pursue." Pleased, however, that they had called, he desired that the substance of their statement be reduced to writing. Two days later 2 McQueen, Miles, and Bonham called, and gave him a memorandum, signed by themselves and two of their colleagues, which expressed their strong conviction that no attack would be made on the forts, provided the military status should "remain as at present." "I objected to the word 'provided,'" says Buchanan, "as this might be construed into an agreement on my part which I never would make." "We do not so understand it," replied the South Carolinians, and then they repeated what they had said at the first interview. "When we rose to go," relate Miles and Keitt," the President said in substance: 'After all, this is a matter of honor among gentlemen. I do not know that any paper or writing is necessary. We understand each other.'” Later, McQueen and Bonham went to the White House in behalf of the delegation, and assured the President that, even after the ordinance of secession should be adopted, the forts would not be molested unless the negotiations between the federal government and commissioners appointed to treat for the public property should fail.
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1 December 17 was the day appointed for the meeting of the convention.
2 December 10.

"I informed them," says Buchanan, "that what would be done was a question for Congress, and not for the executive. That, if the forts were assailed, this would put them completely in the wrong, and making them the authors of the civil war."1

At last Major Anderson's entreaties received some attention from the War department. Don Carlos Buell, assistant adjutant-general, was sent to Charleston to give him verbal instructions. "The great anxiety of the Secretary of War" to avoid "a collision of the troops with the people" of South Carolina was impressed upon Anderson. On account of his concern to steer clear of a course that would increase the irritation of the public mind, he had not sent reinforcements. Nevertheless, he felt confident that South Carolina would make no violent attempt "to obtain possession of the public works." "But," Buell continued, "as the counsel and acts of rash and impulsive persons may possibly disappoint those expectations of the government, the Secretary of War deems it proper that you should be prepared with instructions to meet so unhappy a contingency

"You are carefully to avoid every act which would needlessly tend to provoke aggression; and for that reason you are not, without evident and imminent necessity, to take up any position which could be construed into the assumption of a hostile attitude. But you are to hold possession of the forts in this harbor, and, if attacked, you are to defend yourself to the last extremity. The smallness of your force will not permit you, perhaps, to occupy more than one of the three forts, but an attack on or attempt to take
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1 My authorities for these interviews are the Statement of Miles and Keitt to the South Carolina convention, Official Records, vol. i. p. 125; the correspondence, late in December and January 1, 1861, between the President and the South Carolina commissioners, ibid., pp. 109, 115, 120; the memorandum of Buchanan endorsed on the letter of the South Carolina congressmen, the endorsement being made soon after the last interview, Life of Buchanan, Curtis, vol. ii. p. 377.

possession of any one of them will be regarded as an act of hostility, and you may then put your command into either of them which you may deem most proper to increase its power of resistance. You are also authorized to take similar steps whenever you have tangible evidence of a design to proceed to a hostile act."1

These instructions were not seen by the President until ten days later,2 nor were they known as late as December 28 to General Scott ;3 they were given on the sole authority of Floyd, the Secretary of War. Yet, so long as the government would neither strengthen the garrison nor withdraw the troops, it is difficult to see how the instructions could be improved upon.4

Trouble in the cabinet now testified to the difficulty an executive must labor under while endeavoring in a crisis of affairs to pursue a middle and negative course. December 8, Cobb, the Secretary of the Treasury, in some respects the ablest man in the cabinet, but one whose ability did not run in the direction of finance,5 formally resigned his
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1 Fort Moultrie, S. C, December 11, 1860. Memorandum of verbal instructions to Major Anderson, First Artillery, commanding at Fort Moultrie, 8. C, D. C. Buell, assistant adjutant-general. Official Records, vol. i. p. 89.
2 See his letter of December 31, Official Records, vol. i. p. 117.
3 Letter of Lay to Twiggs, ibid., p. 580.
4 I cannot agree with the criticism which Nicolay and Hay, vol. ii. p. 888, make of these instructions, but their view and the authorities cited are worthy of careful consideration. As confirming the statement in the text, see Official Records, vol. i. pp. 103, 182.
5 " The other night, in high glee, Toombs told Cobb in company that he had done more for secession than any other man. He had deprived the enemy of the sinews of war, and left them without a dollar in the treasury. He did not even leave old 'Buck' two quarters to put on his eyes when he died. This is a sore point with Cobb."—Letter of Alexander H. Stephens to his brother, February 17,1861, Johnston and Browne, p. 386.
   Cobb had the Treasury department at an unfortunate time. The panic of 1857 burst upon the country soon after he began its administration, and the political troubles checked the natural recovery which began in 1860. (Seep. 56.) Cobb, however, had a high idea of pecuniary honor. He was a good lawyer and a man of property; he owned 1000 slaves. See Memorial of Howell Cobb, Boykin, pp. 47, 98, 221.

position. "A sense of duty to the State of Georgia," he wrote,1 makes it improper for me to remain longer in your cabinet. Hard upon the resignation of Cobb followed that of Secretary of State Cass. Apprising the President of his determination on December 11, he sent four days later a formal letter confirming his purpose and giving his reasons: which were that the President had refused to reinforce the Charleston forts; to send an armed vessel to aid in defence and in the collection of revenue; and because he had declined to remove the custom-house at Charleston to one of the forts in the harbor, and to make arrangements to compel the payment of duties when the present collector should give up his commission.2 On account of the long and honorable public career of Cass, his evident friendliness to the South, and his disposition to mediate whenever the sectional quarrel arose, this resignation caused, as the reasons for it became understood, a profound sensation. The way it was received at the North would have made plain to President Buchanan, had he been in the mood to comprehend it, how ready were the Republicans in this crisis to take up with a Democratic leader who would stand as a champion for the Union and for the enforcement of the laws.3 General Scott
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1 See correspondence between Cobb and Buchanan, Washington Constitution, December 12.
2 For the correspondence between Secretary Cass and the President, see Curtis, vol. ii. p. 397. The Buchanan comment on the resignation is interesting, see p. 399; also Essays and Speeches of J. S. Black, p. 11. In this connection the remarks of McLaughlin should be read, Life of Cass, p. 337 et seq. Trescot relates: "Not recognizing any right in a State to secede except as a revolutionary measure, General Cass would have resisted the attempt at the commencement, and, as the sworn officer of the United States, he would have done his utmost to preserve its integrity. 'I speak to Cobb,' he would say, 'and he tells me he is a Georgian; to Floyd, and he tells me he is a Virginian; to you, and you tell me you are a Carolinian. I am not a Michigander: I am a citizen of the United States. The laws of the United States bind you, as they bind me, individually; if you, the citizens of Georgia or Virginia or Carolina, refuse obedience to them, it is my sworn duty to enforce them.'"—The Genesis of the Civil War, Crawford, p. 23.
3 Washington correspondence New York Tribune, December 14; Tribune editorial, December 15; J. S. Pike to New York Tribune, December 19; McLaughlin's Cass, p. 338.

had been ill most of the time since October 29, when he urged his views upon the President, but now, tortured by anxiety, he rose from his sick-bed in New York and came to Washington to relieve his mind of its burden, even if an old soldier's counsel should be set at naught. December 13 he saw the Secretary of War and earnestly requested that the garrisons in the southern forts be strengthened, pointing out the organized companies and recruits available for that purpose. Floyd opposed such a policy, but, at the request of the general, procured for him an interview with the President. This took place two days later. Scott argued strenuously for the reinforcement of Fort Moultrie and the sending of troops to Sumter, but Buchanan refused to do either.1 On this same December 15 he had a chance partially to repair his former mistakes. Cass, Generals Scott and Wool, Attorney-General Black, and Joseph Holt, advised a Jacksonian policy. General Scott, moreover, took especial pains to relate for the behoof of the President how Jackson had met a similar crisis, giving with circumstantial detail the steps that he had taken, and the reasons therefor.' This clearly indicated a plan for
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1 Scott's Autobiography, p. 615; Life of Buchanan, Curtis, vol. ii. p. 365; Buchanan's Defence, p. 175; Scott's letter of March 30,1861, published in the National Intelligencer, October 21, 1862. Floyd in a speech, January 11,1861, at a complimentary banquet tendered him at Richmond after his resignation, refers to a time when the President was strongly inclined to send troops to Charleston, and says that he, Davis, Mason, and Hunter by their persuasions caused the project to be abandoned. Floyd is apparently so oblivious of dates and the sequence of events that I cannot with any satisfaction use this speech as evidence, but the conversation he reports between the President and himself is interesting. He does not give the date of it, but we may infer that it took place between the interview with the South Carolina congressmen and the visit of General Scott. For the speech, see New York Herald, January 17,1861, and for a report of most of this conversation, see Nicolay and Hay, vol. ii. p. 894.
2 This letter of General Scott's is so important that I give it entire: '' Lieutenant-General Scott begs the President to pardon him for supplying, in this note, what he omitted to say this morning, at the interview with which he was honored by the President. 1. Long prior to the Force bill (March 2, 1833), prior to the issue of his proclamation, and, in part, prior to the passage of the ordinance of nullification, President Jackson—under the act of March 3, 1807, 'authorizing the employment of the land and naval forces'—caused reinforcements to be sent to Fort Moultrie, and a sloop-of-war (the Natchez), with two revenue cutters, to be sent to Charleston Harbor (all under Scott), in order to prevent the seizure of that fort by the nullifiers, and, 2, to insure the execution of the revenue laws. General Scott himself arrived at Charleston the day after the passage of the ordinance of nullification, and many of the additional companies were then en route for the same destination.
   "President Jackson familiarly said at the time: 'That, by the assemblage of those forces, for lawful purposes, he was not making war upon South Carolina; but that if South Carolina attacked them, it would be South Carolina that made war upon the United States.'
   "General Scott, who received his first instructions (oral) from the President (Jackson) in the temporary absence of the Secretary of War (General Cass), remembers those expressions well.
   "Saturday night, December 15, 1860."
   Buchanan and Curtis speak of this letter (Defence, p. 179; Curtis, vol. ii. p. 376), and dismiss the wise and prudent advice of Scott by affirming that the times were different.

Buchanan so full of wisdom, so strictly in conformity to law, so well adapted to win the approval of Europe, that, fortified as he was by the opinion of prudent and trustworthy counsellors, and backed as he would have been by public opinion at the North, the wonder must ever remain that he did not nerve himself for one great effort and make that policy his own. But, with the curious obstinacy which vacillating men occasionally exhibit, no amount of persuasion was at this time sufficient to impel him to the performance of his bounden executive duty. "It is well known," he wrote, December 31, "that it was my determination, and this I freely expressed, not to reinforce the forts in Charleston harbor, and thus produce a collision, until they had been actually attacked, or until I had certain evidence that they were about to be attacked."1 This feeling induced him on December 21 to modify the instructions which the
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1 Official Records, vol. i. p. 117.

Secretary of War had ten days earlier given Anderson.1 Just what were the Southern influences, if any, which now dominated the mind of Buchanan I have not been able to ascertain.2 I feel quite sure that they did not emanate from his cabinet. Cobb, whose sway had been potent, 3 had not only resigned, but had left Washington to persuade his State of Georgia that secession was the remedy she ought to employ.4 Thompson, the Secretary of the Interior, not only
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1 The President having observed that Major Buell, in reducing to writing at Fort Moultrie the instructions he had verbally received, required Major Anderson, in case of attack, to defend himself to the last extremity, immediately caused the Secretary of War to modify this instruction."—Buchanan's Defence, p. 166.
   The new order ran thus: "In the verbal instructions communicated to you by Major Buell, you are directed to hold possession of the forts in the harbor of Charleston, and, if attacked, to defend yourself to the last extremity. Under these instructions, you might infer that you are required to make a vain and useless sacrifice of your own life and the lives of the men under your command, upon a mere point of honor. This is far from the President's intentions. You are to exercise a sound military discretion on this subject.
   "It is neither expected nor desired that you should expose your own life or that of your men in a hopeless conflict in defence of these forts. If they are invested or attacked by a force so superior that resistance would, in your judgment, be a useless waste of life, it will be your duty to yield to necessity, and make the best terms in your power... . —John B. Floyd." —Official Records, vol. i. p. 103.
2 If I felt warranted in following Floyd, I should say that Davis, Mason, and Hunter still had influence at the White House, see note p. 188; see also Davis's Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, vol. i. p. 214. Blaine states that, up to about the last of December, Davis, Toombs, Benjamin, and Slidell were "Buchanan's intimate and confidential advisers," Twenty Years of Congress, vol. i. p. 233. Owing to the former personal and political friendship (see vol. ii. pp. 170, 171), I should be ready to believe this was correct, at any rate as far as Slidell is concerned, were it not for Buchanan's distinct statement that the intercourse " between the revolutionary senators and the President . . . had been of the coldest character ever since the President's anti-secession message at the commencement of the session of Congress."—Buchanan's letter in the National Intelligencer, November 1, 1862.
3 See vol. ii. p. 280.
4 Washington despatch to New York Tribune, December 13; Memorial of Howell Cobb, p. 30.

favored the secession of his own State, Mississippi,1 but he openly went on a mission to win over North Carolina to the cause of disunion;2 and, while Buchanan shirked from demanding his resignation, we may safely presume that after the middle of December, Thompson's opinion had no such weight with the President as had that of Jeremiah Black. Of all the cabinet officers Floyd's influence was the least.3 It is more than probable that, as Buchanan had served the South since he lent himself to the scheme of making a slave State out of Kansas,4 he could not now, owing to his sluggish nature, throw off at once the well-worn habit of that domination, and nothing less than a shock to his dignity by a question of his honor, coming from an accredited Southern source,5 would enable him to shake himself loose and take the stand demanded by his Northern birth and breeding.

The gloom at the North on account of the President's course was deepened by rumors about his mental condition and moral courage. "The President is pale with fear," said Cass.6 "Buchanan, it is said," wrote Grimes to his wife, "about equally divides his time between praying and crying. Such a perfect imbecile never held office before."7
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1 "Jacob Thompson openly avows that he regards the call of Mississippi as more imperative than his duty to the Union."—Leaded editorial, New York Tribune, December 17.
2 Journal of State Convention of Mississippi, p. 186; Clingman's Speeches and Writings, p. 526; Associated Press despatch from Washington of December 17; letter of Secretary Thompson to Governor Ellis of North Carolina, dated Raleigh, N. C, December 20, New York World, December 27.
3 "Certain it is that, during the last six months previous to the 29th December, 1860, the day on which Floyd resigned his office, after my request, he exercised less influence on the administration than any other member of the cabinet."—Buchanan's letter of October 28,1862, in the National Intelligencer, November 1, 1862.
4 See vol. ii. p. 280.
5 To anticipate: this was furnished by the communication of the South Carolina Commissioners, dated January 1, 1861, Official Records, vol. i. p. 120.
6 To B. J. Lossing, December 20, Pictorial History of the Civil War, cited in McLaughlin's Cass, p. 339.
7 Letter of December 16, Life of Grimes, Salter, p. 132.

A report got about that he was insane.1 Such expressions were natural, and bear witness to the impatience and concern with which the Northern people followed from day to day the course of a policy that seemed an abandonment of a legitimate national authority. But a confidential letter from Buchanan furnishes a denial to all of these statements. "I have never enjoyed better health or a more tranquil spirit than during the past year," he wrote, December 20. "All our troubles have not cost me an hour's sleep or a single meal, though I trust I have a just sense of my high responsibility. I weigh well and prayerfully what course I ought to adopt, and adhere to it steadily, leaving the result to Providence."2

December 17, Pickens, the newly elected governor of South Carolina, wrote to the President a request that he should be permitted to take possession of Fort Sumter with a small body of men.3 This letter was delivered to Buchanan December 20, the same day on which Caleb Cushing, whom he had sent to South Carolina to delay if possible her adoption of an ordinance of secession, reached Charleston. Cushing's errand proved bootless; but his conversation with the governor undoubtedly added weight to the telegram sent to Pickens by two of the South Carolina congressmen and Trescot, suggesting that the demand for Fort Sumter be withdrawn. This was accordingly done.4

In that part of the story which centres on the events taking place in Charleston, I had proceeded as far as December
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1 See a double-leaded editorial in the New York Tribune, December 17.
2 Curtis, vol. ii. p. 355. "Occasional" (probably J. W. Forney) wrote the Philadelphia Press: "Those who pretend to know Buchanan's condition insist that his health was never better, and that during all the troubles he has been instrumental in creating he affects a gay and lightsome deportment."—Cited by the New York Evening Post, December 20.
3 South Carolina House Journal, cited by Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 2.
4 Curtis, vol. ii. pp. 368, 383; The Genesis of the Civil War, Crawford, p. 83; Nicolay and Hay, vol. iii. p. 4

6, the day on which delegates to the South Carolina Convention were chosen. The President's message had been received and weighed.1 From its positions, declared the Charleston Mercury," we infer that the military power of the United States will not be used by Mr. Buchanan to coerce South Carolina after she goes out of the Union. This bugbear is therefore at an end."2 The revolution marched on. Interest and expectation were aroused, not as to what the convention would do, for its action was certain, but as to the manner in which it would sever the bonds between the sovereign State and the Federal Union. A lull in public demonstrations might be noted, but there was no turning back. While an ardent desire for peace prevailed, preparation was making for war. Two thousand soldiers were drilling in Charleston; it was thought South Carolina could put into the field, on short notice, ten thousand.3 A fear of negro risings increased the tension.4 Business grew worse. Plantation slaves could be sold for only half what they would have brought before the election of Lincoln.5 In Charleston the value of all kinds of property except
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1 It was published in full in the Charleston Mercury of December 5.
2 Charleston Mercury, December 6. As I have had frequent occasion to cite this journal as an index of opinion, and as the notion widely prevailed that it only represented the views of certain extremists (this is well stated by the Montgomery correspondent of the Mobile Register, cited in the National Intelligencer of February 26, 1861; see also Trent's Simms), it is proper perhaps that 1 should say, while it had long been in advance of South Carolina sentiment, that sentiment, by 1860, had caught up with it. November 9 it spoke of its rapidly increasing subscription list; January 1, 1861, it asserted it had the largest circulation of any newspaper at the South ; February 18, 1861, it said the circulation had kept gaining until it was impossible to supply the demand. "We have bought a new Hoe press. We print more dailies than any newspaper in this part of the South." The National Intelligencer of February 26,1861, speaks of the Mercury as "the traditional organ of that public sentiment which has recently triumphed in South Carolina."
3 Charleston correspondence of the New York Tribune, December 8, 15.
4 J. W. De Forest, Atlantic Monthly, April, 1861, p. 495; Charleston correspondence New York Tribune, December 22; letter of a wife of a South Carolina planter to a relative in New York, New York Tribune, December 10.
5 Ibid. 

cotton had fallen fifty per cent.; it was said that the railroads were not paying their running expenses; the hotels were not, as usual, full of strangers from the North, seeking a genial climate or looking after their business interests. Northern merchants could not make collections, and were disinclined to open new accounts.1 The luxury-loving people of Charleston began making sacrifices of their taste for adornment and their love for display. Economy became the fashion. The patrician ladies bought no new gowns; superb silks were no longer seen. The scions of their rich houses laid aside their dandified suits for soldiers' uniforms, and were proud to carry a musket at the beginning of this war of independence. There were no concerts, no balls, and no weddings.2 The priests of the Episcopal Church, in the prayer for all in civil authority, omitted the usual supplication for the President of the United States. On the first Sunday that Petigru noted this, he rose from his seat and left the church. The stars and stripes floated over Fort Moultrie, but were nowhere else to be seen; palmetto flags had taken the place of the national ensign.3

A new governor of South Carolina was to be elected. The legislature, on whom this duty devolved, began balloting December 11, but did not reach a choice until the seventh ballot, three days later, when Francis W. Pickens received a bare majority of the votes cast.4 Pickens, a grandson of the general of Revolutionary fame, was a man of distinguished family, a wealthy planter, a classical scholar, and a lawyer of wide culture. Now fifty-five years old, he had, before attaining to the age of forty, served his State ten years in Congress; declining the mission to France offered him by Tyler, and the mission to England tendered him by Polk, he had, under Buchanan, represented his country

1 Charleston correspondence New York Tribune, December 7.
2 Atlantic Monthly, April, 1861, pp. 490, 496, 502.
3 Charleston correspondence New York Tribune, December 8,13, 14, 16.
4 Pickens, 83 ; B. J. Johnson, 64 ; scattering, 16. See Charleston Mercury, December 11 to December 15.

for two years at the court of St. Petersburg, but now, feeling that his talents and his life were due to his State, he had recently returned home to devote himself to her cause. A disciple of Calhoun, a nullifier of 1832, a delegate to the Nashville Convention of 1850, he had nevertheless inclined, upon his return from Russia, to oppose precipitate action on the part of South Carolina; but, carried along with the tide, he had, in a speech at Columbia before the election for governor, set himself in line with the sentiment of his State. The moderates supported him, but this was rather on account of a former feeling and because the extremists voted for Rhett, the owner of the Charleston Mercury 1 than from any existing difference of opinion. For every one was agreed upon immediate secession and on war, should the forts be reinforced. No man could have been chosen who represented better than Pickens the actual sentiment, aim, and genius of South Carolina; and no one of her sons who came to the front in these parlous times showed greater aptitude for the direction of affairs.2

Pickens was inaugurated December 17, and in his address he averred that "the great overt act of the people of the Northern States" was the election of a chief magistrate "upon issues of malignant hostility and uncompromising war to be waged upon the rights, the interests, and the peace of half the States of this Union. . . . We have now no alternative left but to interpose our sovereign power as an independent State to protect the rights and ancient privileges of the people of South Carolina." Then, after asserting the Calhoun doctrine, and that their interests would impel them
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1 This was R. B. Rhett, Sr. He received on the fourth ballot 41 votes, while Pickens received 58, and Johnson 55. His son was then the editor of the Charleston Mercury.
2 See The Genesis of the Civil War, Crawford, p. 79; Charleston "Fire-eating correspondent" of the New York Evening Post, December 18, Charleston correspondence New York Tribune, December 14; editorial in Charleston Mercury, December 15; Diary of Floyd, Life of R. E. Lee, p. 794; editorial in New York World, December 20.

to adopt the policy of free trade, he went on: "South Carolina is resolved to assert her separate independence, and, as she acceded separately to the compact of union, so she will most assuredly secede separately and alone, be the consequences what they may; and I think it right to say with no unkind feeling whatever, that on this point there can be no compromise, let it be offered from where it may. ... It is our sincere desire to separate from the States of the North in peace, and leave them to develop their own civilization according to their own sense of duty and interest. But if, under the guidance of ambition and fanaticism, they decide otherwise, then be it so. We are prepared for any event, and, in humble reliance upon that Providence who presides over the destiny of men and of nations, we will endeavor to do our duty faithfully, bravely, and honestly."1 In his letter of the same day to the President, asking the possession of Fort Sumter,2 Governor Pickens showed his comprehension of the feeling in his State. "The excitement of the great masses of the people," he declared, "is great under a sense of deep wrongs."3

On the same day that the governor was inaugurated the
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1 Charleston Mercury, December 18. There can be no doubt about the sentiment of the State on the reinforcement of the forts. "Just so soon as more troops are sent to the forts in Charleston, that moment will the sword be drawn; South Carolinians will consider the movement a casus belli."— Charleston Courier, cited in Charleston correspondence New York Tribune, December 8. "The reinforcement of the forts at this time and under the present circumstances means coercion—war."—Charleston Mercury, December 19. In regard to the fear of an attack on the forts by a mob (ante, p. 183; see Captain Foster's letters of December 18, Official Records, vol. i. pp. 96, 97), the Mercury said, December 19 : "As to the bugaboo of mobbing the forts and slaying the officers and troops, our amiable friends need not excite their philanthropic sensibilities or roll up their eyes. We are not a mobocracy here, and believe in law, order, and obedience to authority, civil and military. No mob will attack the forts. In South Carolina we do not act by mobs."
2 See p. 192.
3 Letter of December 17, cited in The Genesis of the Civil War, Crawford, p. 82.

convention met in the new Baptist church at Columbia. Every member of it was present. A small-pox epidemic raged in the capital city. Such has been the progress in sanitary science since that time, that only men whose memories of 1860 are vivid will estimate aright the apprehension of the delegates as they heard that morning of fourteen new cases of the virulent and loathsome disease. On account of the epidemic the convention adjourned, to meet the next day in Charleston. There in secret session it deliberated. It was a body worthy of the momentous action about to be taken. The predominance of white-haired men attracted the attention of all observers, and nearly all of the delegates had passed life's prime. Among them were many who had represented South Carolina with ability in the national Senate and House; five had been governors of the commonwealth; many members of that dignified judiciary whose title came from legislative election, and whose places, bearing ample compensation, were of life tenure, had come forward to lend their guiding hands to their State when she was on the point of taking a step fraught with far-reaching consequence. Magrath, who had resigned his position of United States judge the day after the election of Lincoln,' was a delegate looked to for wise and energetic counsel; the leading lawyers of the State were present, while prominent Methodist and Baptist ministers, railroad presidents, men of business, and influential planters completed the roll of this convention.2

Yet the important office of the convention was but to register the will of the people. Hardly a difference of opinion existed among South Carolina's citizens; none manifested itself among their representatives. Only such
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1 See p. 116. The resignation of Judge Magrath, said Judge Black to Crawford, "caused more anxiety to Mr. Buchanan than any other event that occurred, except Anderson's movement from Moultrie to Sumter."— The Genesis of the Civil War, p. 16.
2 For the personnel of the convention more in detail, see Crawford, p. 46.

delay obtained as was necessary to accomplish this organic act decently and in order. The convention met the fourth day of its session at twelve o'clock in St. Andrew's Hall. Chancellor Inglis, Judge of Chancery, a silver-haired gentleman, a large planter and slave-holder, and a man of parts, reported the ordinance of secession. Explaining that the committee had used the utmost brevity, he read with flashing eyes the burning declaration, "We, the people of the State of South Carolina, in convention assembled, do declare and ordain . . . that the union now subsisting between South Carolina and other States under the name of' The United States of America' is hereby dissolved."1 December 20, at a quarter-past one, this ordinance was unanimously passed.2 It was known in the city that on this day the convention would take decisive action, and an excited throng had gathered about the hall eager for the first announcement of what its representatives, sitting in solemn and secret conclave, had done. Immediately on the declaration of the vote the door-keeper was apprised. He gave the word to the policeman nearest him. It was passed from mouth to mouth until it reached the sentinel at the tall iron gate at the entrance, and by him was proclaimed to the impatient crowd. Cheer after cheer rent the air. In less than fifteen minutes the Charleston Mercury had issued an extra giving the text of the ordinance, and the news that it had been unanimously adopted;3 six thousand of these were soon sold, and the whole city knew that South
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1 The act was entitled "An Ordinance to dissolve the Union between the State of South Carolina and other States united with her under the compact entitled 'The Constitution of the United States of America.'" The part of it elided in the text is, "and it is hereby declared and ordained that the ordinance adopted by us in convention on May 23, 1788, whereby the Constitution of the United States of America was ratified, and also all acts and parts of acts of the General Assembly of this State ratifying amendments of the said Constitution are hereby repealed."
2 Yeas 169, nays none.
3 A fac-simile of this may be found in Nicolay and Hay, vol, iii. p. 14

Carolina had, as she would wish it expressed, resumed her sovereign powers. The chimes of St. Michael's pealed an exultant note; the bells of all the other churches were loudly rung. The gun by the post-office, christened "Old Secession," and on which a copy of the ordinance had been pasted, belched forth the thunder of celebration; the cannon in the citadel echoed the glad tidings. Houses and shops were emptied; the streets were full of people. The cares of business and of family were forgotten; all faces wore smiles; all as they walked seemed to tread in air; joy was unconfined. Old men ran shouting down the streets. When friend met friend there was the hearty grasp of the hand as one said, "Thank God, they have put her out at last!" and as the other replied, "I breathe free now." Then they congratulated one another on the change of weather. For three days the sky had frowned and poured down rain. On this December 20 the sun had risen full and clear, and it pleased these men to say that Heaven smiled on their action. Volunteers donned their uniforms and hastened to their armories. New palmetto flags everywhere appeared. Every one wore a blue cockade in his hat. Great enthusiasm was shown at the unfurling of a banner on which blocks of stone in an arch typified the fifteen Southern States; these were surmounted by the statue of Calhoun with the Constitution in his hand, and the figures of Faith and Hope; at the base of the arch were blocks broken in fragments representing the Northern States. A scroll interpreted the allegory: a "Southern republic" was "built from the ruins" of the other half of the country. The sentiment of the community was shared by the boys firing noisy crackers, and, as it grew dark, Roman-candles — a spontaneous testimony to the general joy. That day the patricians of Charleston drank champagne with their dinners.

It was decided to make the signing of the ordinance an impressive public ceremony. The governor and the legislature, who had followed the convention to Charleston, were invited to assist in the proceedings that evening. At half-past six the members of the convention came together at the place of their deliberations, and, forming in files of two with locked arms, they marched silently, lighted by the flare of bonfires, to Institute Hall, which had been selected because it was the largest assembly-room in the city. At the foot of the staircase they were joined by the State senators and representatives. The hall was packed with spectators. The galleries were filled with ladies, dressed with what elegance the last year's wardrobe afforded. But dearer now to the Southern heart than trappings and show were the bright eyes and interested, encouraging looks of those women, who little recked that they were then beginning a course of devotion and heroism which has justly won the admiration of the world. On the floor the brilliant uniforms of the officers of the new-born army made a picturesque and suggestive contrast to the conventional broadcloth of the Carolina gentlemen.

The audience had not long to wait. The cry, "The convention is coming 1" drew every one's regard. Its president, leaning on the arm of the clerk, entered by a door in the rear of the hall and took his place upon the rostrum. Following him came the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House clad in their robes of office, with the clerks of both bodies in their black silken gowns. The delegates, the senators, and the representatives made their entrance by another door and took the reserved places in the body of the hall. A clergyman with bowed form and hair as white as snow advanced to the front of the platform with upraised hands, the whole assembly rising to their feet in reverent attitude while he invoked the blessing and favor of Almighty God on this great act of his people about to be consummated. The president of the convention, holding in his hand the parchment with the great seal of the State, read slowly and solemnly therefrom the Ordinance of Secession. As the last word "dissolved" left his lips the audience broke forth into cheers and shouts and roars that lasted until physical exhaustion made silence a necessity. The delegates sat grave and silent. They were now asked by the president to step forward and sign the ordinance. This ceremony took two hours, but the audience remained to witness it. When R. B. Rhett, who had been a disunionist since 1832, advanced to the rostrum, there were thunders of applause; cheers greeted Delegate Spratt, whose vehement advocacy of the reopening of the African slave-trade singled him out for notice; and ex-Governor Gist, who had been the official mouth-piece of the beginning of this secession movement, also inspired demonstrations of popular favor. To many of the people looking on there must have come the thought of that other signing of a Declaration of Independence, of that new era ushered in July 4,1776; and their feeling grew stronger that now was beginning a second glorious revolution, which, if successful, would, on account of a securer basis, be more lasting.1

Those who knew that Caleb Cushing, now regarded as the envoy of a foreign power, had been solicited by a committee of the legislature to attend this ceremony,2 might have imagined a likeness between this invitation and the request for assistance which another representative body— the French National Assembly of 1789—had preferred to Jefferson; and prophetic souls, to whom came the picture of the greatest of revolutions, must have seen beyond this present pledging of faiths an era of blood. It cannot but have occurred to all that in this very hall, eight months before, had been played the first act of the drama of secession, when the delegates from the cotton States withdrew from the national Democratic convention.3
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1 Struck with the resemblance, it was said that a committee of the convention endeavored to borrow for this occasion, from a lady of Charleston, the table on which the immortal paper, drawn by Jefferson, had been signed; but the lady told these gentlemen that rather than have it used for the Ordinance of Secession she would burn the table to ashes.
2 Of course, Cushing declined the invitation.
3 See vol. ii. p. 451,

When all the signatures had been affixed to the instrument 1
the president said, " I proclaim the State of South Carolina an independent commonwealth." And then the enthusiasm and the joy knew no bounds. Such cries of exultation, such shouts of gladness had never before been heard in Charleston. The scene in the streets was impressive, the avenues to the hall being filled with an ardent throng. Military companies marched and countermarched to the strains of martial music. The hurrahs above were taken up by the crowd below. Before the response to the cheers over the final declaration of the president had died away, the clerk of the convention mounted a chair in the streets and, holding aloft the parchment, besought silence. When he had finished reading the ordinance to the people wild gladness reigned. Bonfires were lighted; pistols and fireworks were shot off. The liberty-pole at the head of Hayne Street was brilliantly illuminated. Patricians and
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1 In the Athenaeum in Boston is a fac-simile of the Ordinance of Secession, signed; also an illuminated broadside published at the time, headed:

DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE
Of the State of South Carolina
IN CONVENTION, AT THE CITY OF CHARLESTON, DECEMBER 20, 1860

AN ORDINANCE
To dissolve the Union between the State of South Carolina and
other States united with her under the compact entitled the "Constitution of the United States of America."

We, the People of the State of South Carolina, in Convention assembled,
do declare and ordain, and it is hereby declared and ordained
(Here follows the Ordinance of Secession, with signatures.)

plebeians, planters and poor whites of the country, rich merchants and laborers of the city mingled in a common throng and blended their voices in hailing the new era of independence. With truth could an organ of public opinion two days later say, "The most impressive feature in the action of South Carolina is the concentrated unanimity of her people."1
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1 Charleston Mercury. My authorities for this description are : Journal of the South Carolina Convention, Charleston, 1861; Columbia and Charleston correspondence New York World; Charleston Mercury; "Fire-eating correspondent" New York Evening Post from Charleston; Crawford's The Genesis of the Civil War.


Source: Rhodes, James Ford. History of the United States; from the compromise of 1850 to the final restoration of home rule at the south in 1877, v.3. New York: Macmillan, 1910 [c1892].