Bissell, and resolutions relating to Federal Relations, in which it was declared that, although the people of Illinois did not desire any change in the Federal Constitution, yet, as several of the sister States had deemed it necessary that some amendments should be made thereto, that if the application should be made to Congress by any of the States deeming themselves aggrieved, to call a convention in accordance with the constitutional provision to propose amendments to the Constitution of the United States, that the Legislature of Illinois would concur in making such application, but it was further declared, "that until the people of these United States shall otherwise direct, the present Federal Union must be preserved as it is, and the present Constitution and laws must be administered as they are; and, to this end, in conformity with that Constitution and the laws, the whole resources of the State of Illinois are hereby pledged to the Federal authorities."

SPECIAL SESSION.

The members of this General Assembly had hardly returned to their homes and become settled in their ordinary vocations of life, before they were convened in extraordinary session, to pass measures to aid the Nation in preserving its life. On the 14th of April, the rebels fired upon Fort Sumter, in Charleston harbor, and compelled its surrender, whereupon President Lincoln issued his proclamation calling for 75,000 soldiers to put down the insurrection, and repossess and preserve the property of the government. Gov. Yates convened the General Assembly on the 23d of April, for the purpose of passing such laws as might be deemed necessary to place the State in a condition to render effective assistance to the General Government in preserving the Union, enforcing the laws, and protecting the property and rights of the people. His message to the assembly was full of stirring

patriotism, and filled every loyal heart with gladness. The sword, said he, was drawn not in a spirit of revenge, but clearly and unmistakably in self-defense and for the preservation of the Union. Referring to the public sentiment of the people of the North prior to the assault upon Fort Sumter, and the consequences to follow, he said:

"Public sentiment was everywhere, in the free States, for peace and compromise. No better proof could be required, than the facts I have stated, that the conspiracy, which has now assumed such formidable dimensions, and which is threatening the destruction of the fairest fabric of human wisdom and human liberty, is of long standing, and is wholly independent of the election of a particular person to the Presidential office, than the manner in which the seceded States have acted toward their loyal brethren of the South and North since they have entered upon their criminal enterprise. We must do them, however, the justice to say, that all their public documents and all the speeches of their controlling leaders candidly admit that the Presidential election has not been the cause for their action, and that they were impelled by far different motives.

"So forbearing and pacific has been the policy of the Federal Government-anxiously hoping for a return to reason in the minds of our Southern brethren-that they were suffered to erect their batteries in the jaws of our guns at Sumter, finally losing to us that strong fortress, by the most unexampled forbearance and reluctance to the shedding the blood of our countrymen; and a simple attempt, on the part of our constitutional Government, to provision a starving garrison in one of our ports, of which the revolutionary authorities had received official notice from the Government, has been made the occasion for a destructive bombardment of that fort. Overpowered by numbers, our gallant men had to lower our glorious flag, and surrender on terms dictated by rebels.

"The spirit of a free and brave people is aroused at last. Upon the first call of the constitutional Government they are rushing to arms. Fully justified in the eyes of the world and in the light of history, they have resolved to save the Government of our fathers, to preserve the Union so dear to a thousand memories and promising so much of happiness to them and their children, and to bear aloft the flag which for eighty-five years had gladdened the

hearts of the struggling free on every continent, island and sea under the whole heavens. Our own noble State, as of yore, has responded in a voice of thunder. The entire mass is alive to the crisis. If, in Mexico, our Hardin, and Shields, and Bissell, and Baker, and their gallant comrades, were found closest to their colors, and in the thickest of the fight, and shed imperishable lustre upon the fame and glory of Illinois, now that the struggle is for our very nationality, and for the stars and stripes, her every son will be a soldier and bare his breast to the storm of battle.

"The attack upon Fort Sumter produced a most startling transformation on the Northern mind-awakened a sleeping giant, and served to show, as no other event in all the history of the past ever did, the deep-seated fervor and affection with which our whole people regard our glorious Union. Party distinctions vanished, as a mist, in a single night, as if by magic; and parties and party platforms were swept as a morning dream from the minds of men, and now men of all parties, by thousands, are begging for places in the ranks. The blood of twenty millions of freemen boils, with cauldron heat to replace our national flag upon the very walls whence it was insulted, and by traitor hands pulled down. Every village and hamlet resounds with beat of drum and clangor of arms. Three hundred thousand men wait the click of the wires for marching orders, and all the giant energies of the Northwest are at the command of the Government. Those who have supposed that the people of the free States will not fight for the integrity of the Union, and that they will suffer another government to be carved out of the boundaries of this Union, have hugged a fatal delusion to their bosoms, for our people will wade through seas of blood before they will see a single star or a solitary stripe erased from the glorious flag of our Union.

"The services already tendered me, in my efforts to organize troops, provide means, arms and provisions, by distinguished members of the party hitherto opposed to me in political sentiments, are beyond all praise, and are, by me, in behalf of the State, most cheerfully acknowledged. There are now more companies received than are needed under the Presidential call, and almost unlimited numbers have formed and are forming, awaiting further orders. A single inland county (LaSalle) tenders nine full companies, and our principal city (Chicago) has responded with contributions of men and money worthy of her fame

for public spirit and patriotic devotion. Nearly a million of money has been offered to the State, as a loan, by our patriotic capitalists and other private citizens, to pay the expenses connected with the raising of our State troops, and temporarily providing for them.

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Civil war, it must be confessed, is one of the greatest calamities which can befall a people. And such a war! It is said when Greek meets Greek then comes the tug of war.' When American shall meet American-when the fiery, impetuous valor of the South shall come in contact with the cool, determined bravery of the North, then blood will flow to the horses' bridles. Would that the calamity might be averted! But the destruction of our government is a far greater evil. A government which is the hope of the world-promising more of happiness to us and our children and the millions who are to come after us, and to the struggling free in every land, than any government ever invented by man, must not, shall not be destroyed.

"A government that submits to peaceable secession signs its own death warrant. What would be left of our Union? No matter how many States it might for the present still comprise-this would give us not a moment's guarantee against further dissolution, if the right to secede once were peaceably tolerated. Government is established for the protection of rights and property, and when built upon the principle of voluntary dissolution, it ceases to furnish that protection; it ceases to be a government under which national men can live.

"We draw the sword then, not in a spirit of indignation or revenge, but clearly and unmistakably in selfdefense, and in the protection of our rights, our liberty and security, for property-in a word, for the nearest and dearest interests of ourselves and our posterity. I have thus spoken, because an impression may still prevail in the minds of some, that this conflict was one of our own seeking, and one which might have been avoided without any imminent danger to the yet loyal parts of the country. This is not so. Secession has brought about its inevitable results, and we must crush it and treason, wherever they raise their unsightly heads, or perish ourselves.

"And now, as we love our common country, in all its parts, with all its blessings of climate and culture; its mountains, valleys and streams; as we cherish its history and the memory of the world's only Washington; as we love our free civilization, striking its roots deep down into

those principles of truth and justice eternal as God; as we love our government so free, our institutions so noble, our boundaries so broad; as we love our grand old flag, 'sign of the free heart's only home,' that is cheered and hailed in every sea and haven of the world, let us resolve that we will preserve that Union and those institutions, and that there shall be no peace till the traitorous and bloody palmetto shall be hurled from the battlements of Sumter, and the star-spangled banner in its stead wave defiantly in the face of traitors, with every star and every stripe flaming from all its ample folds.

"Gentlemen, I commend the destiny of our noble and gallant State, in this its hour of peril, to your wise and patriotic deliberations, and prudent and determinate action. May the God of our fathers, who guided our Washington throughout the trying scenes of the Revolution, and gave to our fathers strength to build up our sacred Union, and to frame a government which has been the center of our affections and the admiration of the world, be still with us, and preserve our country from destruction.

"In the firm belief that we are in the hands of a Supreme ruling power, whose will is wisdom, let us manfully maintain our rights, and our Constitution and Union, to the last extremity. Let us so act that our children and children's children, when we are laid in the dust, will hold us in grateful remembrance, and will bless our memories, as we do now bless the heroes and patriots who achieved our independence, and transmitted to us the priceless heritage of American liberty."

On the 25th of April, Senator Douglas, in response to a joint resolution, addressed the assembly in the hall of the House of Representatives on the issues of the hour. The hall was filled to overflowing, and the speech was the bravest and best of all the great efforts of that gifted and patriotic statesman, from which a liberal extract will be found in a subsequent chapter.

The two houses proceeded without circumlocution to transact the business for which they had been called together, and adjourned on the 3d of May, being in session only ten days; and returning home, many of the members volunteered in defense of their country's flag.