BY ISAAC N. ARNOLD. 49 Minnesota Block, and the very room in which this declaration was made, became the 'Douglas Hospital.' "What justification for all this?' said Stewart. "I will go as far as the Constitution will permit to maintain their just rights. But,' said he, rising upon his feet and raising his arm, if the Southern States attempt to secede, I am in favor of their having just so many slaves, and just so much slave territory, as they can hold at the point of the bayonet, and no more.' WILL THE NORTH FIGHT? Many Southern leaders believed there would be no serious war, and labored industriously to impress this idea on the Southern people. Benjamin F. Butler, who, as a delegate from Massachusetts, to the Charlestown Convention, had voted many times for Breckenridge, the extreme Southern candidate for president, came to Washington, in the winter of 1860-1, to inquire of his old associates what they meant by their threats. a "We mean," replied they, "we mean separation Southern Confederacy. We will have our independence, a Southern government-with no discordant elements. "Are you prepared for war?" said Butler, coolly. “Oh, there will be no war; the North won't fight." "The North will fight," said Butler; "the North will send the last man and expend the last dollar to maintain the Government." "But," replied Butler's Southern friends, "the North can't fight, we have too many allies there." "You have friends," responded Butler, "in the North, who will stand by you so long as you fight your battles in the Union, but the moment you fire on the flag, the North will be a unit against you. And," Butler conif war comes, slav tinued, "you may be assured that ery ends." THE SPECIAL SESSION OF CONGRESS, JULY, 1861 On the brink of this civil war, the President summoned Congress to meet on the 4th of July, 1861, the anniversary of our independence. Seven States had already seceded, were in open revolt, and the chairs of their representatives, in both houses of Congress, were vacant. It needed but a glance at these so numerous vacant seats to realize the extent of the defection, the gravity of the situation, and the magnitude of the impending struggle. The old pro-slavery leaders were absent, some in the rebel government, set up at Richmond, and others marshalling troops in the field. Hostile armies were gathering, and from the dome of the Capitol, across the Potomac and on toward Fairfax, in Virginia, could be seen the Confederate flag. Breckenridge, late the Southern candidate for President, now Senator from Kentucky, and soon to lead a rebel army, still lingered in the Senate. Like Catiline among the Roman Senators, he was regarded with aversion and distrust. Gloomy and, perhaps, sorrowful, he said, "I can only look with sadness on the melancholy drama that is being enacted." Pardon the digression, while I relate an incident which occurred in the Senate, at this special session. BY ISAAC N. ARNOLD. 51 Senator Baker, of Oregon, was making a brilliant and impassioned reply to a speech of Breckenridge, in which he denounced the Kentucky Senator, for giving aid and encouragement to the enemy, by his speeches. At length he paused, and, turning toward Breckenridge, and fixing his eye upon him, asked, "What would have been thought if, after the battle of Cannæ, a Roman Senator had risen, amidst the Conscript Fathers, and denounced the war, and opposed all measures for its success." Baker paused, and every eye in the Senate, and in the crowded galleries, was fixed upon the almost solitary senator from Kentucky. Fessenden broke the painful silence, by exclaiming, in low deep tones, which gave expression to the thrill of indignation which ran through the hall, "He would have been hurled from the Tarpeian Rock." Congress manifested its sense of the gravity of the situation by authorizing a loan of two hundred and fifty millions of dollars, and enpowering the President to call into the field five hundred thousand men, and as many more as he might deem necessary. SURRENDER OF MASON AND SLIDELL. No act of the British Government, since the " stamp act" of the Revolution, has ever excited such intense feeling of hostility toward Great Britain, as her haughty demand for the surrender of Mason and Slidell. It required nerve, in the President, to stem the storm of popular feeling, and yield to that demand, and it was, for a time, the most unpopular act of his administra tion. But when the excitement of the day had passed, it was approved by the sober judgment of the nation. Prince Albert is kindly and gratefully remembered in America, where it is believed that his action, in modifying the terms of that demand, probably saved the United States and Great Britain from the horrors of war, LINCOLN AND THE ABOLITION OF SLAVERY. When in June, 1858, at his home in Springfield, Mr. Lincoln startled the people with the declaration, "This government cannot endure, permanently, half slave and half free," and when, at the close of his speech, to those who were laboring for the ultimate extinction of slavery, he exclaimed, with the voice of a prophet, "We shall not fail, if we stand firm, we shall not fail. Wise councils may accelerate, or mistakes delay, but sooner or later, the victory is sure to come;" he anticipated success, through years of discussion, and final triumph through peaceful and constitutional means by the ballot. He did not foresee, nor even dream (unless in those dim mysterious shadows, which sometimes startle by half revealing the future), his own elevation to the presidency. He did not then suspect that he had been appointed by God, and should be chosen by the people, to proclaim the emancipation of a race, and to save his country. He did not foresee that slavery was so soon to be destroyed, amidst the flames of war which itself kindled. HIS MODERATION. He entered upon his administration with the single BY ISAAC N. ARNOLD. 53 purpose of maintaining national unity, and many reproached and denounced him for the slowness of his anti-slavery measures. The first of the series was the abolition of slavery at the National Capitol. This act gave freedom to three thousand slaves, with compensation to their loyal masters. Contemporaneous with this was an act conferring freedom upon all colored soldiers who should serve in the Union armies and upon their families. The next was an act which I had the honor to introduce, prohibiting slavery in all the territories, and wherever the National Government had jurisdiction. But the great, the decisive act of his administration, was the "Emancipation Proclamation." EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION. The President had urged, with the utmost earnestness, on the loyal slave-holders of the Border States, gradual and compensated emancipation, but in vain. He clearly saw, all saw, that the slaves, as used by the Confederates, were a vast power, contributing immensely to their ability to carry on the war, and that, by declaring their freedom, he would convert millions of freedmen into active friends and allies of the Union. The people knew that he was deliberating upon the question of issuUnion men of the Border States made an appeal to him to withhold the edict, and suffer slavery to survive. They selected John J. Crittenden, a venerable and eloquent man, and their ablest statesman, to make, on the floor of Congress, a public appeal to the President, to withhold the proclamation. Mr. Crittenden had been |