from each State, to be selected by the States. These consisted of the whole of respective State delegations; and to pre- the New England States, except Rhode vent delay they were instructed to report Island, and of Illinois, Iowa, and New on or before the Friday following (the 8th), York, all being free States. "what they may deem right, necessary, The first amendment reported by Mr. and proper to restore harmony and pre-Seddon differed from that of the majority inasmuch as it embraced not only the serve the Union." present but all future Territories. This was rejected. His second amendment, which, however, was never voted upon by the Convention, went so far as distinctly to recognize the right of secession. This committee, instead of reporting on the day appointed, did not report until Friday, the 15th February. The amendments reported by a majority of the committee, through Mr. Guthrie, their chairman, were substantially the More than ten days were consumed in same with the Crittenden Compromise; discussion and in voting upon various probut on motion of Mr. Johnson, of Mary- positions offered by individual cominisland, the general terms of the first and by far sioners. The final vote was not reached the most important section were restricted until Tuesday, the 26th February, when to the present Territories of the United it was taken on the first vitally important States. On motion of Mr. Franklin, of section, as amended. Pennsylvania, this section was further This section, on which all the rest deamended, but not materially changed, by pended, was negatived by a vote of eight the adoption of the substitute offered by States to eleven. Those which voted in him. Nearly in this form it was afterwards its favor were Delaware, Kentucky, Maryadopted by the Convention. The follow-land, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, ing is a copy: "In all the present territory Rhode Island, and Tennessee. And those of the United States north of the parallel in the negative were Connecticut, Illinois, of thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes of Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Missouri, north latitude, involuntary servitude, ex- New York, North Carolina, New Hampcept in punishment of crime, is prohibited. shire, Vermont, and Virginia. It is but In all the present territory south of that justice to say that Messrs. Ruffin and Moreline, the status of persons held to involun-head, of North Carolina, and Messrs. Rives tary service or labor, as it now exists, shall and Summers, of Virginia, two of the five not be changed; nor shall any law be commissioners from each of these States, passed by Congress or the Territorial Le-declared their dissent from the vote of gislature to hinder or prevent the taking their respective States. So, also, did of such persons from any of the States of Messrs. Bronson, Corning, Dodge, Wool, this Union to said territory, nor to impair and Granger, five of the eleven New York the rights arising from said relation; but commissioners, dissent from the vote of the same shall be subject to judicial cogni- their State. On the other hand, Messrs. zance in the Federal courts, according to Meredith and Wilmot, two of the seven the course of the common law. When any commissioners from Pennsylvania, disTerritory north or south of said line, with-sented from the majority in voting in favor in such boundary as Congress may pre- of the section. Thus would the Convenscribe, shall contain a population equal to tion have terminated but for the interthat required for a member of Congress, it position of Illinois. Immediately after shall, if its form of government be repub- the section had been negatived, the comlican, be admitted into the Union on an missioners from that State made a motion equal footing with the original States, with to reconsider the vote, and this prevailed. or without involuntary servitude, as the The Convention afterwards adjourned unConstitution of such State may provide." til the next morning. When they reassemMr. Baldwin, of Connecticut, and Mr. bled (February 27,) the first section was Seddon, of Virginia, made minority re-adopted, but only by a majority of nine to ports, which they proposed to substitute eight States, nine being less than a mafor that of the majority. Mr. Baldwin's jority of the States represented. This report was a recommendation "to the change was effected by a change of the vote several States to unite with Kentucky in of Illinois from the negative to the affirmher application to Congress to call a Con-ative, by Missouri withholding her vote, vention for proposing amendments to the and by a tie in the New York commisConstitution of the United States, to be sioners, on account of the absence of one submitted to the Legislatures of the several of their number, rendering it impossible States, or to Conventions therein, for rati- for the State to vote. Still Virginia and fication, as the one or the other mode of North Carolina, and Connecticut, Maine, ratification may be proposed by Congress, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Verin accordance with the provisions in the mont, persisted in voting in the negative. fifth article of the Constitution." From the nature of this vote, it was manifestly impossible that two-thirds of both Houses of Congress should act favorably The proposition of Mr. Baldwin, received the votes of eight of the twenty-one on the amendment, even if the delay had not already rendered such action impracticable before the close of the session. treated with either derision or contempt. The vote was then taken in committee on the amendments to the Constitution, proposed by Hon. J. J. Crittenden of Kentucky, and each and all of them were voted against, unanimously, by the Black Re The remaining sections of the amendment were carried by small majorities. The Convention, on the same day, through Mr. Tyler, their President, communicated publican members of the committee. to the Senate and House of Representatives the amendment they had adopted, embracing all the sections, with a request that it might be submitted by Congress, under the Constitution, to the several State Legislatures. In the Senate this was immediately referred to a select committee, on motion of Mr. Crittenden. The committee, on the next day (28th Feb.), reported a joint resolution proposing it as an amendment to the Constitution, but he was never able to bring the Senate to a direct vote upon it. Failing in this, he made a motion to substitute the amendment of the Peace Convention for his own. Mr. Crittenden's reasons failed to convince the Senate, and his motion was rejected by a large majority (28 to 7). Then next in succession came the memorable vote on Mr. Crittenden's own resolution, and it was in its turn defeated, as we have already stated, by a majority of 20 against 19. In addition to these facts, a majority of the Black Republican members of the committee declared distinctly that they had no guarantees to offer, which was silently acquiesced in by the other members. The Black Republican members of this Committee of Thirteen are representative men of their party and section, and to the extent of my information, truly represent the Committee of Thirty-three in the House, which on Tuesday adjourned for a week without coming to any vote, after solemnly pledging themselves to vote on all propositions then before them on that date. That committee is controlled by Black Republicans, your enemies, who only seek to amuse you with delusive hope until your election, in order that you may defeat the friends of secession. If you are deceived by them, it shall not be my fault. I have put the test fairly and frankly. It is decisive against you; and now I tell you upon the faith of a true man that all further In the House of Representatives, the looking to the North for security for your amendment proposed by the Convention constitutional rights in the Union ought to was treated with still less consideration be instantly abandoned. It is fraught with than it had been by the Senate. The nothing but ruin to yourselves and your Speaker was refused leave even to present posterity. it. Every effort made for this purpose was successfully resisted by leading Republican members. The consequence is that a copy of it does not even appear in the Journal. The refusal to pass the Crittenden or any other Compromise heightened the excitement in the South, where many showed great reluctance to dividing the Union. Georgia, though one of the cotton States, under the influence of conservative men like Alex. H. Stephens, showed greater concern for the Union than any other, and it took all the influence of spirits like that of Robert Toombs to bring her to favor secession. She was the most powerful of the cotton States and the richest, as she is to-day. On the 22d of December, 1860, Robert Toombs sent the following exciting telegraphic manifesto from Washington: Fellow-Citizens of Georgia: I came here to secure your constitutional rights, or to demonstrate to you that you can get no guarantees for these rights from your Northern Confederates. The whole subject was referred to a committee of thirteen in the Senate yesterday. I was appointed on the committee and accepted the trust. I submitted propositions, which, so far from receiving decided support from a single member of the Republican party on the committee, were all Secession by the fourth of March next should, be thundered from the ballot-box by the unanimous voice of Georgia on the second day of January next. Such a voice will be your best guarantee for LIBERTY, SECURITY, TRANQUILLITY and GLORY, ROBERT TOOMBS. IMPORTANT TELEGRAPHIC CORRESPOND- Atlanta, Georgia, December 26th, 1860. den: Mr. Toombs's despatch of the 22d inst. unsettled conservatives here. Is there any hope for Southern rights in the Union? We are for the Union of our fathers, if Southern rights can be preserved in it. If not, we are for secession. Can we yet hope the Union will be preserved on this principle? You are looked to in this emer gency. Give us your views by despatch and oblige WILLIAM Ezzard. S. G. HOWELL. R. C. HONLESTER. Washington, December 29th, 1860. In reply to your inquiry, we have hopes that the rights of the South, and of every State and section, may be protected within the Union. Don't give up the ship. Don't despair of the Republic. J. J. CRITTENDEN. S. A. DOUGLAS. Congress, amid excitement which the above dispatches indicate, and which was general, remained for several weeks comparatively inactive. Buchanan sent messages, but his suggestions were distrusted by the Republicans, who stood firm in the conviction that when Lincoln took his seat, and the new Congress came in, they could pass measures calculated to restore the property of and protect the integrity of the Union. None of them believed in the right of secession; all had lost faith in compromises, and all of this party repudiated the theory that Congress had no right to coerce a State. The revival of these questions, revived also the logical thoughts of Webster in his great reply to Hayne, and the way in which he then expanded the constitution was now accepted as the proper doctrine of Republicanism on that question. No partisan sophistry could shake the convictions made by Webster, and so apt were his arguments in their application to every new development that they supplied every logical want in the Northern mind. Republican orators and newspapers quoted and endorsed, until nearly every reading mind was imbued with the same sentiments, until in fact the Northern Democrats, and at all times the Douglas Democrats, were ready to stand by the flag of the Union. George W. Curtis, in Harper's Weekly (a journal which at the time graphically illustrated the best Union thoughts and sentiments), in an issue as late as January 12th, 1872, well described the power of Webster's grand ability * over a crisis which he did not live to see, Mr. Curtis says : fectly what everybody thinks, upon this great occasion the orator was the poet. He spoke the profound but often obscured and dimly conceived conviction of a nation. IIe made the whole argument of the civil war a generation before the war occurred, and it has remained unanswered and unanswerable. Mr. Everett, in his discourse at the dedication of the statute of Webster, in the State-House grounds in Boston in 1859, described the orator at the delivery of this great speech. The evening before he seemed to be so careless that Mr. Everett feared that he might not be fully aware of the gravity of the occasion. But when the hour came, the man was there. As I saw him in the evening, if I may borrow an illustration from his favorite amusement,' said Mr. Everett, he was as unconcerned and as free of spirit as some here have often seen him while floating in his fishing-boat along a hazy shore, gently rocking on the tranquil tide, dropping his line here and there with the varying fortune of the sport. The next morning he was like some mighty admiral, dark and terrible, casting the long shadow of his frowning tiers far over the sea, that seemed to sink beneath him; his broad pennant streaming at the main, the Stars and Stripes at the fore, the mizzen, and the peak, and bearing down like a tempest upon his antagonist, with all his canvas strained to the wind, and all his thunders roaring from his broadsides.' This passage well suggests that indescribable impression of great oratory which Rufus Choate, in his eulogy of Webster at Dartmouth College, conveys by a felicitous citation of what Quintilian says of Hortensius, that there was some spell in the spoken word which the reader misses." As we have remarked, the Republicans were awaiting the coming of a near and greater power to themselves, and at the same time jealously watching the movements of the friends of the South in Congress and in the President's Cabinet. It "The war for the Union was a vindica- needed all their watchfulness to prevent tion of that theory of its nature which advantages which the secessionists thought Webster had maintained in a memorably they had a right to take. Thus Jefferson impregnable and conclusive manner. His Davis, on January 9th, 1860, introduced second speech on Foot's resolution-the to the senate a bill" to authorize the sale reply to Hayne-was the most famous of public arms to the several States and and effective speech ever delivered in this Territories," and as secession became more country. It stated clearly and fixed firmly in the American mind the theory of the government, which was not, indeed, original with Webster, but which is nowhere else presented with such complete and inexorable reason as in this speech. If the poet be the man who is so consummate a master of expression that he only says per The text of Webster's speech in reply to Hayne, now accepted as the greatest constitutional exposition ever made by any American orator, will be found in our book devoted to Great Speeches on Great Lasues. probable he sought to press its passage, but failed. Floyd, the Secretary of War, was far more successful, and his conduct was made the subject of the following historic and most remarkable report: Transfer of U. 8. Arms South in 1859-60. Report (Abstract of) made by Mr. B. Stanton, from the Committee on Military Affairs, in House of Representatives, Feb. 18th, 1861. To North Carolina Arsenal, To Baton Rouge Arsenal, The Committee on Military Affairs, to whom was referred the resolution of the House of Representatives of 31st of De-To cember last, instructing said committee to inquire and report to the House, how, to whom, and at what price, the public arms distributed since the first day of January, A. P. 1860, have been disposed of; and also into the condition of the forts, arsenal, dock-yards, etc., etc., submit the following report: That it appears from the papers herewith submitted, that Mr. Floyd, the late Secretary of War, by the authority or under color of the law of March 31, 1825, authorizing the Secretary of War to sell any arms, ammunition, or other military stores which should be found unsuitable for the public service, sold to sundry persons and States 31.610 flint-lock muskets, altered to percussion, at $2.50 each, between the 1st day of January, A. D. 1860, and the 1st day of January, A.D., 1861. It will be seen from the testimony of Colonel Craig and Captain Maynadier, that they differ as to whether the arms so sold had been found, "upon proper inspection, to be unsuitable for the public service." Whilst the Committtee do not deem it important to decide this question, they say, that in their judgment it would require a very liberal construction of the law to bring these sales within its provisions. It also appears that on the 21st day of November last, Mr. Belknap made application to the Secretary of War for the purchase of from one to two hundred and fifty thousand United States muskets, flint-locks and altered to percussion, at $2.15 each; but the Secretary alleges that the acceptance was made under a misapprehension of the was made under a misapprehension of the price e bid, he supposing it was $2.50 each. instead of $2.15. Mr. Belknap denies all knowledge of any mistake or misapprehension, and insists upon the performance of his contract. The present Secretary refuses to recognize the contract, and the muskets have nize the contract, and the muskets have not been delivered to Mr. Belknap. Mr. Belknap testifies that the muskets were intended for the Sardinian government. the North Carolina Arsenal,* have been All of these arms, except those sent to seized by the authorities of the several States of South Carolina, Alabama, Louisiana and Georgia, and are no longer in possession of the United States. It will appear by the testimony herewith presented, that on the 20th of October last the Secretary of War ordered forty columbiads and four thirty-two pounders to be sent from the Arsenal at Pittsburg to the fort on Ship Island, on the coast of Mississippi, then in an unfinished condition, and seventy columbiads and seven thirty-two pounders to be sent from the same Arsenal to the fort at Galveston, in Texas, the building of which had scarcely been com menced. This order was given to the Secretary of War, without any report from the Engineer department showing that said works were ready for their armament, or that the guns were needed at either of said points. tain Wright, of the Engineer department, The order of the late Secretary of War (Floyd) was countermanded by the present Secretary (Holt) before it had been fully executed by the shipment of said guns Pittsburg.f from the Ordnance office of the 21st of January 499,554 Percussion rifles, calibre 54.......... 42,011 Total....... These were afterwards seized. 541,565 + The attempted removal of these heavy guns from Al It will appear by the papers herewith submitted, that on the 29th of December, 1859, the Secretary of War ordered the transfer of 65,000 percussion muskets, 40000 muskets altered to percussion, and 10000 percussion rifles, from the Springfield legheny Arsenal, late in December, 1860, created intense excitement. A monster mass meeting assembled at the Armory and the Watertown and Water- call of the Mayor of the city, and citizens of all parties vliet Arsenals, to the Arsenals at Fayette-aided in the effort to prevent the shipment. Through ville, N. C., Charleston, S. C., Augusta, Ga., Mount Vernon, Ala., and Baton Rouge, La., and that these arms were distributed during the spring of 1860 as follows: the interposition of Hon. J. K. Moorhead, Hon. R. Mc Knight, Judge Shaler. Judge Wilkins. Judge Shannon, and others inquiry was instituted, and a revocation the order obtained. The Secessionists in Congress bitterly complained of the “mob law" which thus interfered with the routine of governmental affairs.-McPherson's History. Of these 60,878 were deposited in the arsenals of South Carolina, Alabama, and Louisiana, and are in the possession of the authorities of those States, reducing the number in possession of the United States to 480,687. OTHER ITEMS. Statement of Arms distributed by Sale since the first of To whom sold. James T. Ames du.... No. St. Louis. 1,000 80 400 80 Since the date of said communication, the following additional forts and military posts have been taken possession of by parties acting under the authority of the States in which they are respectively situ- State of Virginia......... 5,00)) ated, viz: Fort Moultrie, South Carolina. Fort Morgan, Alabama. Baton Rouge Barracks, Louisiana. And the department has been unofficially advised that the arsenal at Chattahoochee, Forts McRea and Barrancas, and Barracks, have been seized by the authorities of Florida. To what further extent the small arms in possession of the United States may have been reduced by these figures, your committee have not been advised. The whole number of the sea-board forts in the United States is fifty-seven; their appropriate garrison in war would require 26,420 men; their actual garrison at this time is 1,331 men, 1,308 of whom are in the forts at Governor's Island, New York; Fort McHenry, Maryland; Fort Monroe, Virginia, and at Alcatraz Island, California, in the harbor of San Francisco. ...1 000 .2,500 Νον. 14 do. Nov. 24 Watervlict. The Mobile Advertiser says: During the past year 135,430 muskets have been senal at Springfield alone, to those in the quietly transferred from the Northern ArSouthern States. We are much obliged to Secretary Floyd for the foresight he has thus displayed in disarming the North and There is no telling the quantity of arms equipping the South for this emergency. and munitions which were sent South from other Northern arsenals. There is no doubt but that every man in the South who can carry a gun can now be supplied from pricontribution alone would arm all the milivate or public sources. The Springfield tiamen of Alabama and Mississippi.” General Scott, in his letter of December 2d, 1862, on the early history of the Rebellion, states that "Rhode Island, Delaware and Texas had not drawn, at the end of 1860, their annual quotas of arms for that year, and Massachusetts, Tennessee, and Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Kentucky only in part; Virginia, South Louisiana, Mississippi and Kansas were, by order of the Secretary of War, supplied with their quotas for 1861 in advance, and Pennsylvania and Maryland in part." From the facts elicited, it is certain that the regular military force of the United States, is wholly inadequate to the protection of the forts, arsenals, dockyards, and other property of the United States in the present disturbed condition of the country. The regular army numbers only 18,000 men when recruited to its maximum strength, and the whole of this This advance of arms to eight Southern force is required for the protection of the States is in addition to the transfer, about border settlements against Indian depreda- the same time, of 115,000 muskets to Southtions. Unless it is the intention of Con-ern arsenals, as per Mr. Stanton's report. gress that the forts, arsenals, dock-yards and other public property, shall be exposed to capture and spoliation, the President must be armed with additional force for their protection. |