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THE CONVENTION'S ADDRESS TO THE PEOPLE.

al Federal regiments, whose retention, though | on the 3d Monday in De-
it weakened Lyon, was deemed of vital neces-cember. Before adjourn-
sity for the safety of the Government.
July 30th, the Conven-
The Resolutions of tion adopted its report,
covering the entire ground
of a loyal reorganization and an anti-secession
procedure. The features of the several reso-
lutions adopted, were:

State Reorganization.

"1. Declares the offices of Governor, LieutenantGovernor, Secretary of State, and members of the Legislature, as heretofore recognized, vacant.

“2. That a Governor, Lieutenant-Governor and Secretary of State shall be appointed by the Convention to hold these offices until the first Monday

in November next.

293

Address to the People.

ment an address to the people was prepared, giving an exposition of affairs and defending its action in legislating for the loyal Government of the State. It was a document of much importance as well as of interest, and served greatly to strengthen the Union sentiment among the people. After recurring to the sad change in the peace of the State, since the adjournment in March, the address proceeded to show what had brought about the state of war then existing within their borders. Governor Jackson was found to be

deeply implicated in the conspiracy, as the documents cited by the Address fully proved. As showing how the treacherous and unprincipled few dominated over the many, particuthe Legislature shall be chosen, and the precise larly in the States of Virginia, North Carolina,

3. That on that day a Governor, LieutenantGovernor and Secretary of State and members of

manner of election is set forth.

"4. That certain laws passed at the last session of the Legislature, referring to the organization of the militia; to raising money to arm the State to repel invasion, and to protect the lives and property of the people of the State; to suspend the apportionment of the school fund, and other less important laws, are repealed, and declared to have no validity whatever. That all commissions under any of such laws are repealed and annulled, and all soldiers and other persons are disbanded and discharged. That certain other laws for the organiza

tion of the volunteers are revived and declared to be in force, and under this law (December 31, 1850) volunteer forces may be enrolled-such act being declared to have full force and effect.

"5. That at the election for Governor, and other officers, on the first Monday of November next, polls shall be opened, and the people shall vote for the action of the Convention, or against the action of the Convention; and if a majority of the legal voters shall vote in favor of the amendment of the Constitution, then the officers before referred to shall hold their offices as provided in this ordinance; but if a majority be against such amendments, then the election of State officers shall be null and void, and they shall not take their seats."

These resolutions were adopted by a vote of 56 to 25-the first, only, varying, viz.: 52

to 28.

On the 31st July the Convention elected Judge Hamilton R. Gamble, Governor; Willard P. Hall, Lieutenant-Governor; Mordecai Oliver, Secretary of State. The inauguration took place during the afternoon, after which the Convention adjourned to convene again

Tennessee and Arkansas, we may quote, from the Convention's statement, the revelations regarding the conspiracy concocted to carry Several Missouri over to the Confederacy. letters were cited from Governor Jacksonone dated April 19th, to the President of the Arkansas Convention, and another, dated April 28th, to the editor of a secession paper in St. Louis-in both of which he declared for secession, notwithstanding the action of the Convention in March [see pages 29-31]. The Conventionists then say:

"Here we have the fixed mind and purpose of the Governor, that Missouri shall leave the Union. He wants time-a little time to arm the State. He thinks secrecy should be preserved by the parties with whom he acts in keeping their counsels. He suggests that nothing should be said about the time or the manner in which Missouri should go out; manifestly implying that the time and manner of going out, which he and those with whom he acted proposed to adopt, was some other time and manner than such as was to be fixed by the people through

their Convention. It was no doubt to be a time and manner to be fixed by the Governor and General As sembly, or by the Governor and a military body to be provided with arms during the little time needed by the Governor for that purpose.

"There have been no specific disclosures mad to

the public of the details of this plan, but the Governor expresses his strong conviction that at the proper time the State will go out.

66

This correspondence of the Governor occurred at a time when there was no interference by soldiers of the United States with any of the citizens, or with

organization of a military
Address to the People.
force, which was to be sus-
tained by extraordinary taxation, and to be abso-
lutely subject to the orders of the Governor, to act
against all opposers, including the United States.
By these acts schools are closed, and the demands
of humanity for the support of lunatics are denied,
that the money raised for the purpose of education
and benevolence may swell the fund to be expended
in war.

the peace of the State. The Address to the People. event which produced exasperation through the State, the capture of camp Jackson, did not take place until the 10th of May. Yet the evidence is conclusive that there was at the time of this correspondence a secret plan for taking Missouri out of the Union without any assent of the people through their Convention. An address to the people of Missouri was issued by Thomas C. Reynolds, the Lieutenant Governor, in which he declares that in Arkansas, Tennessee and Virginia his efforts "Without referring more particularly to the prohave been directed unceasingly, to the best of his visions of these several acts, which are most extraor limited ability, to the promotion of our interests, in- dinary and extremely dangerous as precedents, it is dissolubly connected with the vindication of our lib-sufficient to say that they display the same purpose erties and our speedy union with the Confederate to engage in a conflict with the General GovStates. Here is the second executive officer of Mis- ernment and to break the connection of Missouri souri avowedly engaged in travelling through States with the United States, which had before been mani. which he must regard, while Missouri continues in fested by Governor Jackson. The conduct of these the Union, as foreign States, and those States en- officers of the Legislative and Executive Departdeavoring, as he says, to promote the interest of ments has produced evil and dangers of vast magour State. nitude, and your delegates in Convention have addressed themselves to the important and delicate duty of attempting to free the State from these evils.

"The mode of promoting our interests is disclosed in another passage of the address, in which he gives the people assurance that the people of the Confederate States, though engaged in a war with a powerful foe, would not hesitate still further to tax their energies and resources at the proper time and on a proper occasion in aid of Missouri. The mode of promoting our interests, then, was by obtaining military aid, and this while Missouri continued in the Union. The result of the joint action of the first and second executive officers of the State has been that a body of the military forces of Arkansas has actually invaded Missouri, to carry out the schemes of our own officer, who ought to have conformed to your will, as you had made it known at elections, and had expressed it by your delegates in Convention.

"Still further to execute the purpose of severing the connection of Missouri with the United States, the General Assembly was called, and when assem

bled sat in secret session and enacted laws which had for their object the placing in the hands of the Governor large sums of money, to be expended in his discretion for military purposes, and a law for the

"The high executive officers have fled from the State, leaving us without the officers to discharge the ordinary necessary executive functions. But, more than this, they are actually engaged in carrying on a war within the State, supported by troops from States in the Southern Confederacy, so that the State, while earnestly desirous to keep out of the war, has become the scene of conflict without any action of the people assuming such hostility. Any remedy for our present evil, to be adequate, must be one which shall vacate the offices held by the officers who have thus brought our troubles upon us."

This is a dark record for the honesty and good faith of those in authority, during April and May; but is it not in perfect keeping with the dishonor and treachery successfully practiced upon the people of Virginia, Tennessee, North Carolina, Texas, and Arkansas by a few base spirits?

CHAPTER V.

THE LAST STRUGGLE IN THE SOUTH AGAINST SECESSION.

NESSEE'S VOTE, JUNE 8TH. THE GREENVILLE

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TEN

CONVENTION.

THE ADDRESS, PRO

RESOLUTIONS. THEIR FUTILITY.

The Vote of June 8th.

TENNESSEE, though press-a Union sentiment; in

The vote of June 8th.

ed into the Southern Con- Middle Tennessee it subfederacy by the hand of treason and the bay-jected the person to such persecutions as onets of the insurrectionists, still struggled few cared to challenge; in East Tennessee for a hearing. The vote of June 8th, as pro- the loyal sentiment was so immensely in the claimed by Governor Harris in his proclama- ascendant, through the labors of such men as tion of June 24th, was: Andrew Johnson, Judge Nelson, Parson Separation. No Separation. Brownlow, Emerson Etheridge, Horace Maynard, and their fellow-laborers, that the vote polled on the 8th, was over eighteen thousand majority against separation.*

East Tennessee,
Middle

14,780

32,923

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58,265

8,198

West

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29,127

6,117

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Finding themselves powerless before the tyranny

Giving a majority for "separation" of fifty- inaugurated, the Unionists

The Union Convention at Greenville.

of East Tennessee resolved, as a last resort, to hold a Convention at Greenville, to consult as to the best course to pursue. This Convention met June 17th. The attendance was very large-thirty-one counties having delegates present on the first day. Judge Nelson presided. After a four days' session it adopted a Declaration of Grievances and Resolutions which, emanating from a body composed of enlightened and substantial Southern men, deserve particular consideration. Occupying a position in the physical centre

seven thousand six hundred and seventy-five. How this vote was obtained we are well informed. The election in February had resulted in a majority of about sixty thousand [see page 24] against calling a Convention to consider an ordinance of secession-showing the Union sentiment to overwhelmingly predominate. Without any further action whatever, with no indication from the people of a change of sentiment, the loyal voters of the State were astounded, on the morning of May 8th, to learn that, on the 6th, their Commonwealth had been transferred to the keeping of the guns of Davis, but that they (the voters) were to be permitted the unusual privilege of voting upon the Ordinance of Secession-which was proclaimed on the morning of said May 8th [see pages 152, 153]. That vote having been ordered for June 8th, time and No Representation, East Tennessee gave thirtywas thus allowed for the State to pass under three thousand straight-out Union votes, with at Confederate military rule. When that day least five thousand quiet citizens deterred from comcame it was equivalent to immediate military ing out by threats of violence and by the presence arrest in West Tennessee for a man to express of drunken troops at the polls to insult them."

*Brownlow, in his " Experiences among the "For Separation and RepresentaRebels," says: tion at Richmond, East Tennessee gave fourteen thousand and seven hundred votes. One half of that number were rebel troops, having no authority under the Constitution to vote at any election. For No Separation

of the Union's area; originally settled almost exclusively by citizens of the Slave States adjoining, (Virginia and North Carolina); allied to the Southern States by sympathy with "Southern Institutions" as well as by commercial relations; intelligent, law-abiding and conservative, East Tennessee, it may be presumed, represented the voice of an arbiter, whose decision and views history will sustain. We quote from the Declaration such sentences and sentiments as seem to demand repetition :

Declaration of Griev

ances.

"We, the people of East Tennessee, again assembled in a Convention of our delegates, make the following declaration in addition to that heretofore promulgated by us at Knoxville, on the 30th and 31st days of May last: So far as we can learn, the election held in this State on the 8th day of the present month was free, with but few exceptions, in no part of the State, other than in East Tennessee. In the larger parts of Middle and West Tennessee no speeches or discussions in favor of the Union were permitted. Union papers were not allowed to circulate. Measures were taken in some

parts of West Tennessee, in defiance of the Constitution and laws, which allow folded tickets, to have

the ballot numbered in such manner as to mark and expose the Union votes. A disunion paper, the Nashville Gazette, in urging the people to vote an open ticket, declared that a thief takes a pocketbook or effects an entrance into forbidden places by stealthy means--a tory, in voting, usually adopts pretty much the same course of procedure.' Dis

unionists, in many places, had charge of the polls, and Union men, when voting, were denounced as Lincolnites and Abolitionists. The unanimity of the votes in many large counties, where, but a few weeks ago, the Union sentiment was so strong, proves beyond doubt that Union men were overawed by the tyranny of the military power and the still greater tyranny of a corrupt and subsidized press. Volunteers were allowed to vote in and out of the State, in flagrant violation of the Constitution. From the moment the election was over, and before any detailed statement of the vote

* * **

Declaration of Griev

ances.

provision is made by law for an examination of the vote by disinterested persons, or even for contesting the election. For these and other causes, we do not regard the result of the election as expressive of the will of a majority of the freemen of Tennessee. * *The Union men of East Tennessee,

anxious to be neutral in the contest, were content

to enjoy their own opinions and to allow the utmost latitude of opinion and action to those who differed from them. Had the same toleration prevailed in other parts of the State, we have no doubt that a majority of our people would have voted to remain in the Union. But, if this view is erroneous, we have the same-and, as we think, a much betterright to remain in the Government of the United States than the other divisions of Tennessee have to secede from it."

Thus far in regard to the character of that "election"-the second instance, in all the Seceded States, in which an Ordinance of Secession was submitted to the people for their acceptance or rejection! The Declaration then proceeds

to give the Convention's views of National obligations and relations, and to express its We may opinion of the secession movement. quote:

"We prefer to remain attached to the Govern ment of our fathers. The Constitution of the United States has done us no wrong. The Congress of the United States has passed no law to oppress us. The President of the United States has made no threat

against the law-abiding people of Tennessee. Under the Government of the United States we have enjoy.

ed, as a nation, more of civil and religious freedom

than any other people under the whole heaven. We believe there is no cause for rebellion or secession on the part of the people of Tennessee. None was assigned by the Legislature in their miscalled Declar ation of Independence. No adequate cause can be assigned. The Select Committee of that body asserted a gross and inexcusable falsehood in their address to the people of Tennessee when they de clared that the Government of the United States has made war upon them.

"The secession cause has thus far been sustained

in the different counties had been published, and by deception and falsehood: by falsehood as to the action of Congress; by false dispatches as to battles

before it was possible to ascertain the result, it was exultingly proclaimed that separation had been carried by from fifty to seventy thousand votes. This was to prepare the public mind to enable the Secessionists to hold possession of the State though they should be in a minority.' The final result is to be announced by a disunion Governor, whose existence depends upon the success of secession, and no

* The Virginia vote of May 23d, 1861, was taken under like circumstances; the hordes of the Confederacy being everywhere in Eastern Virginia, to prick with the bayonet any man presumptuous enough to entertain Union sentiments. We do not name the vote allowed in Texas: it was a mockery too base to be called a vote.

DECLARATION OF

that were never fought and victories that were never won by false accounts as to the purposes of the President; by false representations as to the views of Union men, and by false pretenses as to the facility with which the secession troops would take possession of the Capital and capture the highest officers of the Government. The cause of secession or rebellion has no charms for us, and its progress has been marked by the most alarming and dangerous attacks upon the public liberty. In other States, as well as our own, its whole course threatens to annihilate the last vestige of freedom. While peace and prosperity have blessed us in the Government of the United States, the following may be enumerated as some of the fruits of secession :

Declaration of
Grievances.

"It was urged forward by members of Congress who were sworn to support the Constitution of the United States, and were themselves supported by the Government.

"It was effected without consultation with all the States interested in the slavery question, and without exhausting peaceable remedies.

"It has plunged the country into civil war, paralyzed our commerce, interfered with the whole trade and business of our country, lessened the value of our property, destroyed many of the pursuits of life, and bids fair to involve the whole nation in irretrievable bankruptcy and ruin.

"It has changed the entire relations of States, and adopted Constitutions without submitting them to a vote of the people, and where such a vote has been authorized, it has been upon the condition prescribed by Senator Mason, of Virginia, that those who voted the Union ticket must leave the State.' "It has advocated a constitutional monarchy, a king and a dictator, and is, through the Richmond press, at this moment recommending to the Convention in Virginia a restriction of the right of suffrage, and in severing connection with the Yankees, to abolish every vestige of resemblance to the institutions of that detested race.'

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Declaration of Griev

ances.

"It has called upon the people in the State of Georgia, and may soon require the people of Tennessee, to contribute all their surplus cotton, wheat, corn, bacon, beef, &c., to the support of pretended governments alike destitute of money and credit.

"It has attempted to destroy the accountability of public servants to the people by secret legisla tion, and set the obligation of an oath at defiance.

"It has passed laws declaring it treason to say or do anything in favor of the Government of the United States, or against the Confederate States, and such a law is now before, and we apprehend will soon be passed by, the Legislature of Tennessee. It has attempted to destroy, and we fear will soon utterly prostrate the freedom of speech and of the press.

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It has involved the Southern States in a war whose success is hopeless, and which must ultimately lead to the ruin of the people.

"Its bigoted, overbearing and intolerant spirit has already subjected the people of East Tennessee to many petty grievances: our people have been insulted; our flags have been fired upon and torn down; our houses have been rudely entered; our families subjected to insult; our peaceable meetings interrupted; our women and children shot at by a merciless soldiery; our towns pillaged; our citizens robbed, and some of them assassinated and

murdered.

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No effort has been spared to deter the Union men of East Tennessee from the expression of their free thoughts. The penalties of treason have been threatened against them, and murder and assassination have been openly encouraged by leading secession journals.

"As secession has been thus overbearing and intolerant while in the minority in East Tennessee, nothing better can be expected of the pretended majority than wild, unconstitutional and oppressive legislation; an utter contempt and disregard of law; a determination to force every Union man in the State to swear to the support of a Constitution he abhors; to yield his money and property to aid a cause he detests, and to become the object of scorn and derision as well as the victim of intolera

"It has formed military leagues, passed military bills, and opened the door for oppressive taxation, without consulting the people; and then, in mockery of a free election, has required them by their votes to sanction its usurpations, under the penalties of moral proscription or at the point of the bayonet.ble and relentless oppression.” "It has offered a premium for crime in directing the discharge of volunteers from criminal prosecutions, and in recommending the Judges not to hold

their courts.

"It has stained our statute book with the repudiation of Northern debts, and has greatly violated the Constitution by attempting, through its unlawful extension, to destroy the right of suffrage.

In view of these considerations, and of the fact that the people of East Tennessee had declared their fidelity to the Union by a majority of nearly twenty thousand votes, the Convention resolved and declared their wishes and purposes as follows:

"1. That we do earnestly desire the restoration of peace to our whole country, and most especially

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