THE CONFEDERACY ESTABLISHED AND IN OPERATION—CALMNESS AND MODERATION OF THE SOUTH—THE MONTGOMERY CONSTITUTION—THE IMPROVEMENTS UPON THE FEDERAL INSTRUMENT—POPULAR DELIGHT AT THE SELECTION OF MR. DAVIS AS PRESIDENT—MOTIVES OF HIS ACCEPTANCE—HIS PREFERENCE FOR THE ARMY—DAVIS THE SYMBOL OF SOUTHERN CHARACTER AND HOPES—ON HIS WAY TO MONTGOMERY—A CONTRAST—INAUGURATION AND INAUGURAL ADDRESS—THE CONFEDERATE CABINET—TOOMBS—WALKER—MEMMINGER—BENJAMIN—MALLORY—REAGAN—HISTORICAL POSITION OF PRESIDENT DAVIS—THE TWO POWERS—EXTREME DEMOCRACY OF THE NORTH—NOBLE IDEAL OF REPUBLICANISM CHERISHED BY THE SOUTH—DAVIS’ REPRESENTATIVE QUALITIES AND DISTINGUISHED SERVICES—THE HISTORIC REPRESENTATIVE OF THE CONFEDERATE CAUSE—EARLY HISTORY OF THE GOVERNMENT AT MONTGOMERY—CONFIDENCE IN PRESIDENT DAVIS UNLIMITED—PRESIDENT DAVIS’ ADMINISTRATIVE CAPACITY—HIS MILITARY ADMINISTRATION—THE CONFEDERATE ARMY—WEST POINT—NEGOTIATIONS FOR SURRENDER OF FORTS SUMTER AND PICKENS—MR. BUCHANAN’S PITIABLE POLICY—THE ISSUE OF PEACE OR WAR—PERFIDIOUS COURSE OF THE LINCOLN ADMINISTRATION—MR. SEWARD’S DALLIANCE WITH THE CONFEDERATE COMMISSIONERS—HIS DECEPTIONS—THE EXPEDITION TO PROVISION THE GARRISON OF SUMTER—REDUCTION OF THE FORT—WAR—GUILT OF THE NORTH—ITS RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE WAR.

Thus, without the disorder of anarchy, and without the violence of armed conflict, a new and imposing structure of state was speedily erected from the separated fragments. The event was indeed unparalleled, and, to the mind of the world, unused to the novel spectacle of the dismemberment of an empire, except as the consummation of years of bloodshed, its philosophy was difficult of comprehension.The sixth of November, 1860, was the ominous day upon which the revolution, so long threatened, and so often deferred by Southern concession and sacrifice, was inaugurated. Upon that day, with the election of Abraham Lincoln, was opened a new volume in American history. Upon that day, the American Union, “formed to establish justice,” resting upon the principle of equality as its foundation-stone, passed under the control of an arrogant majority, pledged to its perversion, to the oppression of nearly one-half its members. From the profession of fraternity, and the outward pretense of comity, it passed under the domination of principles whose origin was discord and whose logical result was dissolution.

The answer of those who were threatened most seriously by this subversion of the Government of their fathers, though well considered, neither debated with passion, nor concluded with rashness, was worthy of men—the descendants of the authors of American Independence, and educated in that political school which teaches the assertion of the rights of the few against the power of the many. A manly resistance, such as only threatened degradation inspires in the bosoms of freemen, which the insolence of faction had long defied and a conscious physical superiority had haughtily derided, was, at length, thoroughly aroused. Within a few months, the revolutionary movement, begun in November, and pressed, by its authors, to its inevitable consequences, had reached the important result of a withdrawal of nearly one-fourth of the States constituting the American Union.

The new government, in the incidents attending its construction and setting in operation, fully vindicated the earnest and conscientious convictions of the people who had called it into existence. The absence of tumult and of all passionate display, at Montgomery, was in marked contrast with the indecent exultation witnessed at Washington from the adherents of the incoming administration. The calmness, moderation, and evident earnestness of purpose which prevailed at the South, and was thus manifested by those who were intrusted with the framing of the new government, impressed the world to an extent that prepared it to entertain a sympathy for the Southern cause not to have been expected from the prevalent, though erroneous, impressions of foreigners respecting the merits of the sectional quarrel in America.

That secession was not a revolutionary movement, but merely the necessary defense of a people threatened with material ruin and political degradation, by a revolution which had already been consummated, was amply demonstrated by its immediate consequences. The Confederate leaders, at Montgomery, exhibited an almost religious veneration for the spirit, forms, and associations of the government which they had abandoned. The strict adherence of the Montgomery Constitution to the features of the Federal instrument, indicates the absurdity of the impression that it was a proclamation of revolution; and the circumstances of its adoption are totally inconsistent with a correct conception of the conduct of an insurgent body.

It was a signal improvement upon the original American Constitution, and the few alterations made were commended by enlightened and conservative intellects every-where, as necessary changes in the perfection of the American polity. The object sought, and successfully consummated, was to embody every valuable principle of the old Constitution with certain remedial provisions for the correction of obvious evils, which experience had fully indicated. Among these changes, which were universally recognized as of the utmost value, were provisions making the Presidential term six years, instead of four, as under the old system, and precluding reËlection; permitting cabinet ministers to participate in the debates of Congress, and the virtual abolition of the pernicious system of removing all officials, of whatever degree, upon each advent of a new administration. The Confederate Constitution positively prohibited the African slave-trade, which the Federal Constitution had failed to do. A striking provision, and one never before avowed in any similar instrument, was the prohibition of duties for the purpose of protection. There was, indeed, nothing whatever in the Montgomery instrument which a candid and enlightened public sentiment, even at the North, might not have fully approved, excepting the ample and avowed protection to property in slaves. This, it was claimed, was not an alteration of the old Constitution, but merely a formal interpretation of its obvious purpose.

In no respect was the action of the new Confederacy deemed more fortunate than in the selection of its leader. That, in the choice of Mr. Davis as President, the Congress only responded to the preconceived choice of the Southern people, was attested by the spontaneous acclamation with which the announcement was received. Even those who had been in doubt as to the proper personage to endow with the powers and responsibilities of a position, at once the most onerous, and, looking to the contingencies of the early future, a long and sanguinary war, with the chances of a disastrous termination, the most precarious of modern times, yielded hearty recognition of the wise selection of the Congress.

The responsibilities and difficulties of the trust, did not suggest to Mr. Davis hesitation as to its acceptance. If this, the highest distinction which public appreciation had yet tendered him should prove a forlorn hope, his sense of duty would no more permit hesitation than in the assumption of more cheaply-earned honors. Entertaining no purpose of inglorious ease, amid the trials and perils, which, with a prevision, rare, indeed, at that period, he already anticipated, his own preference was for a different station of public service. Months subsequently he indicated the post of danger as the post of duty to which he had aspired in that gigantic struggle through which his country must pass to the assurance of independence. “I then imagined,” said he, “that it might be my fortune again to lead Mississippians in the field, and to be with them where danger was to be braved and glory won. I thought to find that place which I believed to be suited to my capacity—that of an officer in the service of the State of Mississippi.”[21]

Of the public conviction as to his preËminent fitness, there could not be a question. His character, his abilities, his military education and experience, had long been recognized throughout the Union, and his exalted reputation was a source of just pride to the South. No Southern statesman presented so admirable a combination of purity, dignity, firmness, devotion, and skill—qualities for which there is an inexorable demand in revolutionary periods. William Tell, with his cross-bow and apple, to the rustic simplicity of the Swiss, was the very embodiment of the genius of liberty. Far beyond any influence of fiction was the magic potency of the red shirt and felt hat of Garibaldi to imaginative Italy; and Washington, as Lamartine said, with his sword and the law, was the symbol standing erect at the cradle of American liberty. Equally with the greatest of these prototypes was Jefferson Davis, the symbol of the noble aspirations of the proud, impulsive, chivalrous race which confided to him the conduct of its destinies through the wilderness of revolution to the goal of independence and nationality beyond. He did not seek the position; had not been conspicuous in flaming exhortations to popular assemblies; had not employed any of the arts of the demagogue—of flattery or cajolery of the masses into a false and extravagant estimate of his qualities; but before the world were his character, fame, and services, in unadorned simplicity, painted only in the severe colors of truth. It was the tribute to virtue, most to be valued when unsought; the award of honor, only appropriate when merited and becomingly worn.

Mr. Davis’ assumption of his trust was characterized by a dignity, absence of ostentation, and profound appreciation of its delicate nature, in the highest degree imposing. From it was augured such a worthy administration of public affairs as would secure for the Confederacy, if permitted the blessings of peace, an enviable position among the nations of the earth. But his first announcement of its policy indicated his appreciation of the danger of war, in which its utmost exertions would be required to vindicate the independence which the States had declared. To the heroic maintenance of that position he committed himself by the most emphatic avowals; and in whatever contingency, whether of peace or war, his purpose was one of deathless resistence to any denial of the right of self-government, which his fellow-citizens had exercised.

Informed of his election, Mr. Davis immediately left his home for the seat of government. Along the route to Montgomery he was greeted, by the people, with every possible demonstration of patriotic enthusiasm and personal regard. In response to these demonstrations, he at several points addressed the people in terms of characteristic eloquence, dignity and moderation.

Proud, indeed, must ever be, to the Southern people, the contrast of the noble bearing of their chosen ruler with the display of vulgarity attending the journey of Mr. Lincoln from Springfield to Washington. These two men—the one with the calm dignity of the statesman and the polished bearing of the gentleman; the other with coarse jests and buffoonery, upon the eve of the most important event in their individual history, and pregnant with significance to millions—were no bad indices of the civilization of their respective sections.

Arriving in Montgomery, Mr. Davis was inaugurated on the 18th February, with a simplicity of ceremony, an absence of personal inflation, and a degree of popular enthusiasm, which well befitted the formal assertion of true republican liberty, equally protected against the license of mobs and the usurpations of tyrants. The ceremonies of inauguration were little more than the taking of the oath of office and the delivery of the inaugural address. The inaugural of President Davis is unquestionably of the highest order of state papers. As a model of composition, it is rarely equaled; and its statement of the position of the South, the grievances which had led to the assumption of that position, her hopes, aspirations, and purposes, has never been surpassed in power and perspicuity, by any similar document.

Working in great harmony between its executive and legislative departments, the new government, within a very few weeks, presented an extraordinary spectacle of compact organization, though in all its parts it was yet purely provisional. The Cabinet announced by the President, embraced, for the most part, names well known to the country in connection with important public trusts. It may not be inappropriate to speak briefly here of those who sustained to President Davis the close relations of constitutional advisers.

Mr. Robert Toombs, the Secretary of State, was indebted for his appointment not less to the position of his State, the first in rank in the Confederacy, than to the public appreciation of his abilities. For several years he had represented Georgia in the United States Senate, and in that body his reputation was very high as a debater and orator. His oratory, however, was a good index of his mind and disposition, strong and impassioned, but desultory, vehement and blustering. Mr. Toombs had contributed largely to prepare the people of Georgia for secession, and his fierce and persistent eloquence had greatly accelerated the movement. His capacity for agitation and destruction was indeed immeasurably superior to any qualification that he may have had for reconstructing the broken and scattered fragments of the governmental column. Restless, arrogant, and intolerant—a born destructive and inveterate agitator—Mr. Toombs speedily demonstrated his deficiency in statesmanship. His connection with the Confederate Cabinet was of brief duration, and his subsequent military service undistinguished. The War Department—the second post of distinction in the Cabinet—was given to Alabama, the second State of the Confederacy, in the person of Mr. Leroy P. Walker. His connection with the Government, like that of Mr. Toombs, was brief, and wholly unmarked by evidence of fitness. Mr. Memminger, of South Carolina, the Secretary of the Treasury, made an exceedingly unpopular officer, and, as the sequel demonstrated, was incompetent to the delicate task of financial management. The Attorney-General, Mr. Benjamin, of Louisiana, an eminent lawyer and a prominent Senator, was, beyond all question, the ablest of Mr. Davis’ Cabinet. He was a man of marvelous intellectual resources, an orator, a lawyer, and gifted, to an unexampled degree, in the varied attributes, entering into the savior faire of politics and diplomacy. Mr. Benjamin continued the trusted counselor of President Davis during the whole period of his authority. Mr. Mallory, of Florida, was the Secretary of the Navy—a gentleman of excellent sense, unpretending manners, who probably conducted his department as successfully as was possible, with the limited naval resources of the South. The Post-office Department was given to Mr. Reagan, of Texas, noted for his fidelity, industry, and good sense.

The Cabinet of President Davis was destined to many changes in the progress of subsequent events. Of those originally appointed, Messrs. Benjamin, Mallory, and Reagan continued their connection with the Confederate Government during the entire period of its existence. The brief experiment of Confederate independence was fruitful in illustrations of the important truth that political distinction achieved in the ordinary struggles of parties, in times of profound peace, is not the sure guarantee of the possession of those especial and peculiar qualifications which befit the circumstances of revolution. That President Davis, in the selection of some of his advisers, was at fault, is to be ascribed rather to the novelty and necessities of the public situation than to errors of his judgment. Not only must public sentiment respecting men be to some extent consulted, but the test of experience must, necessarily, after all, determine the question of fitness, where all were untried.

Jefferson Davis now occupied a position in the highest sense historical. It was plain that his name was destined to be indelibly associated with a series of incidents forming a most thrilling and instructive episode in political history. As the exponent of a theory of constitutional principles never asserted, and unknown save through the inspiration of the genius of American Liberty, and as the head of a Government whose birth and destiny must enter conspicuously into all future questions of popular government, he stood, in a double sense, the central figure in a most striking phase of the drama of human progress. Splendid as had been American history until that day, it was now to contribute, still more generously, to the illumination of the great truths of political science.

The issue was again to be joined between constitutional freedom and the odious despotism of an enthroned mob. On the one side were asserted the principles of regulated liberty, without which free government can never be stable—order, allegiance, and reverence for law and authority. On the other, the wild passions of an infuriated populace, hurling down the restraints of law, shattering constitutions; and when its frenzied lust had been satiated by the destruction of every accessible image of virtue and order, transferring supreme power from its polluted grasp to the hands of demagogues—capable agents of the depraved will which invests them with authority.

Such was really a faithful contrast of the two powers which were now inaugurated in what had been the United States. It was still the old Greek question of the “few or the many,” the “King Numbers” of the North against the conservatism of the South. The old contest was to be revived, of Cleon and Nicias, in the Athenian Agora, and struggling on through the political battle-fields of free governments in all ages.

It is not an abuse of language to characterize the North as realizing the ultra theory of popular government. Its political fabric rests exclusively upon the Utopian conception of an intelligence and integrity in the masses which they have never been known to possess. Carrying out its pernicious construction of the doctrine of the Declaration of Independence, that “all men are born free and equal,” it professes to hold in light esteem the obvious distinctions of race, property, and color. Earnestly devoted to the successful illustration of the experiment of Democracy, it has sedulously directed its social and political development to the overthrow of caste, the obliteration of necessary social distinctions, and the practical assertion of the principle of absolute social, political, and personal equality among all men. The election of Lincoln was the grand, decisive triumph of these tendencies. He went into power as the avowed champion of the interests of the poor and laboring classes, which he declared to be in conflict with those of the slave-holding aristocrats of the South. Entirely undistinguished, with no political record, his popularity was based upon his vulgar antecedents—no slight recommendation to the populace, gratified at the prospective promotion of one of its own class.

A free society, politically, in which wealth and distinction were debarred to none, the aristocratic influences of slavery were the propitious inducements in the South, to the cultivation of that personal dignity which marks the refinement of rank, in contradistinction to the vulgar pretensions and affectation of a mere aristocracy of money. The patrician society of the South sought the noblest type of republicanism—regulated liberty—beyond the influence of ignorant and fanatical mobs, that perfect order which reposes securely upon virtue, intelligence, and interested attachment, which all human experience teaches are the only reliable safeguards of freedom.

The noblest achievement of constitutional liberty would have been the realization of the Southern ideal of republicanism. The success and beneficence of such a government would have been in perfect accord with the philosophy of history. Every nation to which has been guaranteed a free constitution is indebted for its liberal features to its educated, patrician classes, while all the decayed republics of history owed their downfall to the corruption and excesses of an “unbridled Democracy.”

Of such a government, Jefferson Davis was the appropriately chosen head. An ardent republican, in the truest and noblest sense of that abused term, a foe to absolutism and radicalism in every shape, he was the noblest product of a conservatism in which the elements of distinction were ability, intelligence, refinement, and social position. When, added to this representative quality, are considered his splendid career of public service, and his varied talents, exemplified on almost every field of exertion, it must be conceded that no ruler was ever more worthily invited to the head of a nation, and assuredly none ever was invited with such unanimity of popular acclaim.

We have said that Jefferson Davis must ever appear to the eye of mankind the historic representative of the Confederate cause. The North can not, assuredly, reject this decision, since it made him the vicarious sufferer for what it affected to consider the sins of a nation. Through him, it actually accomplished that from which the great abilities of Edmund Burke recoiled in confession of impotent endeavor, the indictment of an entire people. Those Southern men who have rashly and ungenerously assailed him as responsible for the failure of the South to win its independence, can not complain if the verdict of history shall be that the genius of its leader was worthy of a noble cause, whose fate the laws of nature, not the resources or the impotence of one man, determined. The star of Napoleon went down upon the disastrous field of Waterloo, and the millions that he had liberated passed again under the domination of tyrants whom they despised. But would the most stupid Bourbon partisan, therefore, call in question the mighty genius of Napoleon? It is a glorious memory to France, that her illustrious sovereign, aided by the valor of her children, defied for twenty years, the arms of combined Europe, but she has no blush that those energies were not equal to an indefinite resistance. That the South, struggling against mortal odds, with her comparatively feeble resources constantly diminishing with each prodigious effort, finally succumbed to an enemy inexhaustible in strength and reinforced by the world, is no testimony against either the valor or the skill with which her struggle was directed. Like Washington, Davis was embarrassed, in a hazardous cause, with defection, distrust, and discontent. But, unlike Washington, Davis did not receive the assistance of a powerful ally at the moment when aid could be most serviceably employed.

Recurring to the early history of the Confederacy, during the brief season when Montgomery was its seat of government, and especially to its unwritten details, there seems wanting no auspicious omen to presage for it future security and renown. The cause and its leader equally challenged the enthused sympathies of a patriotic people, and all that patriotism was ready to sacrifice for the one was cheerfully confided to the other. Hopefully, almost joyously, the young Confederacy began its short-lived career. Those were the halcyon days of that cheap patriotism and ferocious valor which delights to vaunt itself beyond the sound of “war’s rude alarms.” Every aspect of the situation appears tinged with the couleur de rose. In fancied security of certain independence, achieved without the harsh resort of arms, demagogues boasted that they courted a trial of strength with the North, as an opportunity for the display of Southern prowess. Men who subsequently were noted for unscrupulous assaults upon the Confederate administration, and, since the war, for their ready prostration before the Northern juggernaut, were then loud in “never surrender” proclamations of eternal separation from the North.

Such was not an appropriate season for expressing grave and painful doubts of the President’s fitness for his high trust. No whisper was then heard of his want of appreciation of his situation. There was no intimation then that he failed to discern the future, or refused to provide against the perils that menaced the Confederacy, and were so obvious to more sagacious minds. Sensational newspaper correspondents, professing to base their accounts upon reliable hints from the executive quarter, were profuse in their panegyrics upon his indefatigable industry, his vigilance, penetration, and marvelous intuition of Yankee designs. They vied with each other in telling the world, especially the North, of the stupendous preparations which the Government was making in anticipation of a possible attempt at coercion by the Lincoln government. It was evident, from the outgivings of every source of opinion, that the Confederates trusting much to the merits of their cause and their own valor, yet largely depended for the successful issue of their assertion of independence upon the soldier-statesman, who, charged with many public duties, had never proven either unwilling or incapable in any trust. The time for censure was not yet at hand. Incompetent generals and recreant politicians were not yet in want of a scape-goat upon which to throw their own delinquencies. Harsh and censorious criticism was reserved for a more opportune period, when the Confederacy, like a wearied gladiator, whose spirit was invincible, reeled under the exhaustion of a dozen successive combats, with as many fresh adversaries.

The high administrative capacity of Mr. Davis had received a most fortunate discipline in his brilliant conduct of the Federal War Department. That service was a valuable auxiliary to his efficiency as the executive head of a new government, whose safety was, from its incipiency, to depend upon the resources of that rarest phase of genius, the combined capacity for civil and military administration. The complex machinery of government, even when moving smoothly in the accustomed grooves, imposes not only severe labor, but is frequently a painful tax upon the faculties of those most familiar with its workings. When to the labor of comprehension is added the task of construction and organization from comparative chaos, such as prevailed at Montgomery, and as prevails every-where, as the result of political change, the difficulties are increased tenfold. Creation must then precede order. Organization is to be perfected before administration can be successfully attempted. It is this task of organization which has invoked some of the most splendid displays of genius, and interposed the obstacles which have occasioned its severest disappointments. Universal testimony awards to Napoleon, for his wonderful ingenuity in penetrating social necessities and meeting civil emergencies, a merit not inferior to his unrivaled genius for war. Frederick the Great, in times of peace, exhibited a vicious pragmatism which rendered his civil rule contemptible when contrasted with his military success.

The underlying secret of all successful administration is the union of the advantages flowing from unity of purpose, and those resulting from division of labor—so necessary to exact and intelligent execution. President Davis, throughout his administration, sought the attainment of this aim. Confiding the various departments to men of at least reputed talents and integrity, he yet exercised that constant supervision which was inseparable from his responsibilities, and exacted by public expectation, and this without arrogance or dictation. Disingenuous criticism has alleged that, by an assumption of autocracy, he united in himself all the powers and prerogatives of government, and thus professes to hold him alone responsible for the loss of his country’s liberties. A score of years, or even a decade hence, and he will be exalted as the all-informing mind which directed, vitalized, and inspired the noblest struggle of republicanism known to ancient or modern story.

At the organization of the Confederate Government, his individual taste, capacity and experience, were fortunately coincident with the necessities of the situation in urging upon President Davis a thorough and efficient military establishment upon a war footing. The necessity of thorough preparation for war with the United States was never lost sight of by him. Whatever his efforts to avert that calamity, its probabilities were too menacing not to challenge unremitting precautions. In the War Department and military legislation of the Confederacy was felt the infusion of his energy and system, and were realized the fruits of his labors. There can be no more splendid monument of his genius than that superb specimen of scientific mechanism, the army of the Confederate States. Its nucleus was prepared in those few weeks’ respite from actual war, passed by the Confederate Government, at Montgomery; and the framework then established was subsequently enlarged upon, until it was developed into a model of military anatomy—of complex, yet harmonious organism—seldom rivaled and never surpassed in the history of war. Whatever may be said of defective features exhibited in the Confederate military organization, in the numerous and varied campaigns of the war, those defects are not to be attributed to the original system. Whatever may be alleged against its lax discipline—that morbid influence which so fearfully enervated its efficiency, neutralized valor and strategy, and made the war a series of magnificent but valueless successes, the shadow without the substance of victory—the fault was in the execution, not in the original conception. However admirably tempered the blade, that must be a skillful hand which would efficiently wield it.

A graduate of West Point and a practical as well as theoretical soldier, President Davis naturally and, as the war demonstrated, wisely inclined in his military administration to those theories which regard war as a science difficult and laborious of mastery. His marked and judicious partiality for educated soldiers was often the ground of censorious comment during the war, but this will hardly be adjudged a fault now. “West Point” was amply vindicated by the experience of both armies, against the sneers of those who affected such extreme admiration for the “native genius” of citizen-soldiers. With a few notable exceptions in the Confederate army (and here is to be considered the peculiar genius for war of the South), and scarcely one worth mention in the armies of the North, the achievements of educated officers, and those of officers from civil life, are so utterly disproportionate as to forbid comparison.

The paramount object of all Confederate diplomacy was to secure a recognition of the new Government by the Government of the United States. If war with the United States could be averted, the Confederacy was, for all time, a fixed fact. At an early period President Davis instituted efforts to secure by negotiation possession of certain fortifications and other property of the Federal Government located within the limits of the seceded States. Arsenals, located in the interior, had, in many instances, been seized by the State troops previous to the formation of the Confederate Government. Happily, those in authority at these places, appreciating the folly of resistance in a situation utterly helpless, had avoided a needless shedding of blood, by a prompt compliance with the demands of the State authorities.

When the Confederate Government went into operation, there were but two fortifications within the limits of its jurisdiction in the possession of Federal garrisons: Fort Sumter, in Charleston Harbor, and Fort Pickens, off Pensacola, Florida. These two positions were of the utmost value to the Confederacy, viewed as to location, and their peaceable acquisition was of increased importance in consideration of the obstinate defense of which they were capable. The continued occupation of these positions by Federal forces was, in the highest degree, inconsistent with the dignity of the Confederacy after it had proclaimed a distinct and independent nationality. Moreover, in the present temper of the dominant party in the United States, a large majority of which favored coercion of the South back into the Union, Federal occupancy of these forts was a menace to the safety of the Confederacy.

It is easy to appreciate the delicate character of the diplomacy now required by the situation of the Confederacy. Without at all acquiescing in the Federal possession of Sumter and Pickens—on the contrary, asserting the right of the Confederacy to those places, and avowing its willingness to give adequate compensation whenever they should be surrendered—it was yet necessary to avoid affront to a respectable minority at the North, influenced, apparently, by pacific intentions. In short, it became the settled policy of the Confederate Government to postpone collision with the Federal Government until the latest possible moment—until obvious considerations of public safety should impel a resort to hostile measures.

President Buchanan, whose term of office expired March 4, 1861, after numerous badly disguised attempts at duplicity with the Confederate authorities, or more properly, with the authorities of some of the States constituting the Confederacy, and after a contemptibly weak and driveling policy of evasion, had left the negotiations between the two Governments in a most unsatisfactory and confused condition. A brief summary of Mr. Buchanan’s conduct affords a most singular exhibition of mingled imbecility, timidity, and disingenuousness. His course, until the meeting of Congress, in December, 1860, was understood to be in thorough accord with that of the States’ Rights party of the South. In that party were his most trusted advisers, both in and out of the Cabinet, and it had given to his administration a consistent and cordial support. Like them, he was pledged to the preservation of a constitutional Union, and also to a full recognition of the perils which menaced the South, resulting from the late sectional triumph. In his opening message he condemned the exercise of secession as unauthorized and illegal, but denied emphatically the right of coercion. Yet, in the sequel, he proved, equally with the Republican party, an enemy to peaceable secession.

When South Carolina was preparing for secession, Mr. Buchanan entered into a solemn understanding with a delegation of several of her most prominent citizens, that, upon condition that the people and authorities of that State should refrain from hostile demonstrations, no reinforcements should be sent to the forts in Charleston harbor, and that “their relative military status should remain as at present.” Yet, when Major Anderson, in positive violation of this agreement, removed his forces from the weaker forts to Fort Sumter, Mr. Buchanan refused to order him back. Having broken one stipulation, he now determined to disregard the other, and, under the pretense of “provisioning a starving garrison,” Mr. Buchanan attempted to send troops to Sumter.[22]

But the conduct of Mr. Buchanan, weak, offensive, and disgusting, as it was to both North and South, becomes simply pitiable, when contrasted with the greater magnitude of the perfidy of the Lincoln government.

The two Presidents, Davis and Lincoln, were inaugurated within a fortnight of each other—the first on the 18th of February, the latter on the 4th of March. Between them the question of peace or war must, after all, depend—for, however pacific might have been Mr. Buchanan’s policy, it would fail, should Lincoln adopt a belligerent course. Considerable hope was, at times, indulged, that the negotiations with Mr. Lincoln and his Cabinet would at least be marked with a better display of candor than had commemorated the policy of his predecessor. These negotiations, as fruitless as those attempted in Congress during the preceding winter, for the prevention of secession, were to involve a question of even more moment. The direct issue of peace or war was now pending. It is confidently and successfully maintained by the South, that in the grave question of responsibility for actual bloodshed, her vindication is as clear and incontestable as must ever be her acquittal of the responsibility of disunion. War with the United States was deprecated by official declaration of the Confederate States as “a policy detrimental to the civilized world.” Most impressive is the declaration of President Davis’ inaugural: “Sustained by the consciousness that the transition from the former Union to the present Confederacy has not proceeded from a disregard, on our part, of just obligations, or any failure to perform any constitutional duty—moved by no interest or passion to invade the rights of others—anxious to cultivate peace and commerce with all nations, if we may not hope to avoid war, we may at least expect that posterity will acquit us of having needlessly engaged in it.”

President Davis was at all times most solicitous for peace, and adopted every expedient of negotiation that could promote that end. Heartily responding to the wishes of the Congress and people of the Confederacy, he appointed, in February, an embassy to the Government at Washington. The resolution of Congress, asking that the embassy should be sent, explains its object to be the “negotiating friendly relations between that Government and the Confederate States of America, and for the settlement of all questions of disagreement between the two governments upon principles of right, justice, equity, and good faith.”

Two of these commissioners, Messrs. Crawford and Forsyth, arrived in Washington on the 5th of March, the day succeeding Mr. Lincoln’s inauguration. Wishing to allow the President abundant opportunity for the discharge of the urgent official duties necessarily crowding upon him at such a season, the Confederate commissioners did not immediately press their mission upon his attention. At first giving merely an informal announcement of their arrival, they waited until the 12th of March before making an official presentation of their mission. On that day they addressed a formal communication to the Secretary of State, Mr. Seward, announcing their authority to settle with the Federal Government all claims of public property arising from the separation of the States from the Union, and to negotiate for the withdrawal of the Federal forces from Forts Sumter and Pickens.

Here begins a record of perfidy, the parallel of which is not to be found in the history of the world. Mr. Seward, while declining to recognize the Confederate commissioners officially, yet frequently held confidential communication with them, by which the faith of the two Governments was fully pledged to a line of policy, by what should certainly be the strongest form of assurance—the personal honor of their representatives. In verbal interviews, the commissioners were frequently assured of a pacific policy by the Federal Government, that Fort Sumter would be evacuated, that the status at Fort Pickens should not be changed, and that no departure from these pacific intentions would be made without due notice to the Confederate Government.

The commissioners, conformably to the spirit of their Government, to avoid, if possible, collision with the United States, made an important concession in these interviews in consenting to waive all questions of form. It was alleged that formal negotiations with them, in an official capacity, would seriously jeopardize the success of Mr. Lincoln’s manipulation of public sentiment at the North, which, it was further confidentially alleged, he was sedulously educating to concurrence with his own friendly purposes toward the Confederates. By this cunning device and the unscrupulous employment of deception and falsehood in his interviews with the commissioners, Mr. Seward accomplished the double purpose of successful imposition upon the credulity of the commissioners and evasion of official recognition of the Confederate embassy.

In the meantime, while these negotiations were pending, and in the midst of these friendly assurances, the Lincoln administration was secretly preparing hostile measures, and, as was clearly demonstrated by subsequent revelations, had never seriously entertained any of the propositions submitted by the Confederate Government. Resolved not to evacuate Fort Sumter, the Federal Government, while amusing the Confederate commissioners with cunning dalliance, had for weeks been meditating the feasibility of reËnforcing it. To pass the numerous batteries erected by the Confederates in Charleston harbor was clearly a task of the utmost difficulty, if, indeed, possible. So complete was the cordon of Confederate batteries which had been in course of preparation for many weeks, that the beleaguered fortress was evidently doomed whenever the Confederates were provoked to fire upon it. The evacuation of Fort Sumter was clearly a military necessity, so pronounced by the highest military authority in the United States, and so regarded by the intelligent public of the North. Never had a Government so auspicious an opportunity to save the needless effusion of blood, and to avert indefinitely, if not finally, the calamity of war.

Such a result was, however, farthest from the wishes of Mr. Lincoln and the majority of his Cabinet. Reinforcement of Fort Sumter being out of the question, it became the study of the Federal authorities to devise a convenient and effective pretext by which the North could be united in a war of subjugation against the South, and for the extermination of slavery. To this end an expedition was ordered to Charleston, for the purpose of supplying the garrison of Sumter with provisions, peaceably or forcibly, as events might decide. As it was well known that the Confederate authorities would not permit the execution of the object of this expedition, it was clearly a measure of hostility, prepared and conducted, too, under the most dishonorable circumstances of secrecy and falsehood as to its destination.

In the meantime the Federal authorities continued to practice the base policy of deception with the Confederate commissioners. Upon one occasion Mr. Seward declared that Fort Sumter would be evacuated before a letter, then ready to be mailed, could reach President Davis at Montgomery. Five days afterward, General Beauregard, commanding the Confederate forces in Charleston harbor, telegraphed the commissioners at Washington the ominous intelligence that the Federal commandant was actively strengthening Fort Sumter. The commissioners were again soothed with Mr. Seward’s renewed assurances of the positive intention of his government to evacuate the fort. As late as the 7th of April Mr. Seward gave the emphatic assurance: “Faith as to Sumter fully kept: wait and see.” This was the date of the sailing of the Federal fleet with a strong military force on board.[23] The just characterization, by President Davis, of these deceptions, was, that “the crooked paths of diplomacy can scarcely furnish an example so wanting in courtesy, in candor, and directness, as was the course of the United States Government toward our commissioners in Washington.”[24]

The expedition was some hours on its way,[25] when its purpose to provision the fort was announced to the Governor of South Carolina by an agent of the United States. This announcement was telegraphed to Montgomery by General Beauregard, who also asked for instructions. His government replied, that if the message was authentic, a demand should be made for the surrender of the fort to the Confederate forces; and in the event of refusal, its reduction should be undertaken. On the 11th of April the demand was made and refused.[26] In obedience to the orders of his government General Beauregard opened fire upon Fort Sumter early on the morning of the 12th April. On the 13th the fort surrendered.

The calculations of Mr. Lincoln and his cabinet, as to the result to be produced by the attack on Fort Sumter, provoked by their deliberate and dishonest design, were not disappointed. A furious and instantaneous rush to arms by the North followed the intelligence of the surrender of the fort, and revealed the ferocious lust with which it had awaited the signal to begin the crusade against the liberties and property of the South. As no possible trait of guilt had been wanting in the means employed to precipitate hostilities, so no conceivable feature of atrocity was to be wanting in the conduct of a war by the North, produced by its own avarice, perfidy, and lust of dominion.

The brief recapitulation which we have given sufficiently exposes the pretexts upon which the North began the war of coercion. Assuming that the national dignity had been insulted, and the national honor violated, by an attack upon the flag of the Union, under the impious profession of vindicating the law, the North drew its sword against the sovereignty of the States. It had procured the assault upon Sumter—that essential step to the desired frenzy of the masses. By a shallow device, the South had been provoked to initiate resistance—that long-sought pretext which should justify the most barbaric invasion of modern times. Yet, under this flimsy imposition, the North cloaks its crime, and exults in its anticipated immunity from those execrations which have been the reward of similar examples of turpitude. The spirit of inquiry is not to be thus deftly eluded, nor the avenging sentence of history so easily perverted. The question shall not be, who fired the first shot? but, who offered the first aggression? who first indicated the purpose of hostility? We are not required to await the bursting forth of the flames over our heads, when the fell intent of the incendiary is revealed to our sight. The menace of the murderer justifies his intended victim in eluding the blow while the steel is uplifted.

Jefferson Davis signed the order for the reduction of Fort Sumter, but he did not thereby invoke the calamities of war. That act was simply the patriot’s defiance to the menace of tyranny. It was the choice of the freeman between resistance and shame.