THE SECTIONAL EQUALITY PARTY. 43 loan were not paid in, and the financier was | waited in vain. Though Gen. Scott plead to compelled to see his department brought to be permitted to throw a strong defensive embarrassment. Matters were not changed force in Fort Moultrie, as in 1832--though he until, by Mr. Cobb's resignation, (December labored earnestly to dissuade Mr. Buchanan 10th,) John A. Dix, of New York, was called from the dangerous apathy which governed to the Secretaryship. His integrity and busi- his actions-it was in vain: the President ness ability won the confidence of Wall street, not only would authorize no steps looking to and, ere ten days of administration, the the complete protection of Government prothreatened bankruptcy was not only averted, perty, but committed the more heinous misbut the Treasury began to show signs of ac- take of assuring the determined Southern cumulation quite gratifying in view of the leaders that no reinforcements should be contingencies likely to arise. made. North. With such want of decision in the Administration, it followed that the people were greatly divided in sentiment. One party, looking at the question of difference between the North and the South, assumed the unequivocal position that the South should be rendered The Sectional Equali politically equal in the Confederacy, no matter what her minority might be in population and wealth. The New York Herald, as organ of this class of thinkers, said, in its issue of November 28th: ty Party. ern slaveholders to their slave property, wherever it may be found within the limits of the Union. That point conceded by each of the Northern States, even Massachusetts will be ready for the next proposition, which is that the Southern States, in behalf of their institution of Slavery, are entitled to such additional checks and balances in the General Government as may be necessary to render them hereafter secure The state of feeling at The Feeling at the the North, during the month, was extremely unsettled. The selection of Mr. Lincoln's cabinet would, in a great degree, determine the line of conduct to be adopted by the administration; therefore men of all parties canvassed the subject freely and with some feeling. The attitude of the Southern States inspired apprehensions of disaster, which it was very difficult to dissipate by any course consistent with the integrity of the Union. Mr. Buchanan's policy, it was feared, would lack "The first thing demanded is the absolute suspenin firmness and integrity to the Constitution, sion of Mr. Seward's 'irrepressible conflict,' and the since, unlike his predecessor, Andrew Jack-recognition by the North of the rights of our Southson, he had expressed no determination to enforce nis abrogated authority. On the 15th of November it was announced that Fortress Munroe, in Virginia, was garrisoned by but eight companies of artillery-the valuable arsenal at Fayetteville, North Carolina, by one company-Fort Moultrie, in Charleston harbor, by two companies (eighty men)—Key against Northern Anti-Slavery parties and Popular West fortifications by one company-Barran- Majorities. This proposition will, of course, comprecas barracks, Pensacola, by one company-hend a reconstruction of the organic law of the the richly stored arsenal at Baton Rouge, Union, and a new Constitutional Convention of all Louisiana, by one company; while the New the States to do this important work. It is probable, Orleans Mint, the valuable Custom Houses in too, that this very proposition may emanate from New Orleans, Charleston, Mobile, Savannah, this approaching Congressional Conference, and it &c., &c., were totally without guard. Nor- may be suggested in the President's Annual Mesfolk Navy Yard and the Pensacola Navy sage," Yard, both having millions of property in their keeping, were only garrisoned by 120 marines. As soon as the movements for secession became well developed, the South demanded of the President that no reinforcements of Southern fortresses, &c., should be made. The North anxiously awaited the President's action in the matter. It Mr. Buchanan's Inaction. This, it was understood, represented the views of the Breckenridge wing of the Democracy, although it was certain that many of the Pro-Slavery men of the party did not favor so undemocratic a measure as a "protection against popular majorities." Another class, representing the Douglas wing of the Democratic party, favored liberal concessions to the South in the shape of a right in the territories; of a repeal of the Per- | martial terms, such as defeat' and' victory' obtain sonal Liberty bills in the Northern States; in our system of elections. The parties engaged in of a strict execution of the Fugitive Slave law, &c., &c. This class of men were devoted to the Union, and most of them favored a firm defence of the Government property, and the enforcement of the laws. Position of the Repub. lican Party. The Republicans were, also, strong in their Union sentiments, and apparently favored the idea of such compromises as were consistent with their ineradicable opposition to the extension of Slavery. They could but deplore the want of firmness in the President, and looked hopefully forward to Congress, which would come together December 3rd. Senator Seward—who, it was well understood, would be Secretary of State under the new administration-in a speech made to the “Wide-Awakes” of Auburn, on the evening of November 20th, advised conciliation in these terms: "What is our present duty? It is simply that of magnanimity. an election are not, never can be, never must be, enemies, or even adversaries. We are all fellowcitizens, Americans, brethren. It is a trial of issues by the force only of reason; and the contest is car ried to its conclusion with the use only of suffrage. An appeal lies from the people this year, to the people themselves next year to be argued and determined in the same way, and so on forever. This is, indeed, a long way to the attainment of rights and the establishment of interests. It is our way, however, now, as it has been heretofore. Let it be our way hereafter. If there be among us, or in the country, those who think that marshaling of armies or pulling down the pillars of the Republic is a better, because a shorter way, let us not doubt that if we commend our way by our patience, our gentleness, our affection towards them, they too will, before they shall have gone too far, find out that our way, the old way, their old way as well as our old way, is not only the shortest but the best." This reflected the feelings of the great majority of Republicans. There was no comWe have learned, heretofore, the mittal, on the part of the leaders of the party, practice of patience under political defeat. It now to any definitive line of conduct in the crisis remains to show the greater virtue of moderation in-they appeared willing to await the issue of triumph. That we may do this, let us remember events, leaving all responsibility with the that it is only as figures of speech that the use of President and Congress. CHAPTER VI. PROGRESS OF THE REBELLION IN SOUTH CAROLINA. * THE action of the South Carolina Legisla- that Free Governments should exist in slaveholding ture in ordering a Convention, and in provid- countries. The republics of Rome and Greece --still ing for the "military defence" of the State, gave almost unanimous satisfaction to the people of the State. If a Union sentiment was existent it did not appear. Although the Convention was not to assemble until December 17th, the feeling prevailed, early in November, that the State was virtually out of the Union. November 12th, Barnwell Rhett, one of the leading men of the State, said, in a public address: the light and glory of ancient times-were built on * RESIGNATION OF MILITARY tice and liberty, the world has ever seen. With such a Constitution and our institutions, we can establish a Confederacy which shall endure for ages; and our Confederacy will be as powerful as it will be great. * The Union is dissolved, and henceforth there is deliverance and peace and liberty for the South. We leave it, not in a time of public danger and trouble, but in a time of established security; not in a time of war, with a foreign enemy thundering on our coasts, but in a time of profound peace with all the world. We leave it victorious in three wars, led on by Southern generals; and with a vast domain of territory, stretching from sea to sea, greater than all civilized Europe contains-the glorious fruits of Southern statesmanship. We leave it, as our fathers left their union with Great Britain, after a patience of endurance, which they would have scorned; and armed like them, with the mighty consciousness of right, more powerful than armies with banners. The long weary night of our humiliation, oppression, and danger is passing away, and the glorious dawn of a Southern Confederacy breaks on our view. With the blessing of God, we will soon be a great people-happy, prosperous and free." This speech was significent not only of the state of sentiment in the State, but demonstrated, incontestably, that the work of rebellion had been progressing long enough before the Presidential election to render secession a fixed fact in event of Lincoln's success. On Thursday evening a great meeting was held in Charleston, to welcome the returning delegates to the Legislature, to secure the passage of the Convention bill. Mayor Macbeth presided. From the speeches made we see Reception of Delegates. that the mere act of calling a Convention was regarded as equivalent to secession, although the Convention would not assemble until December 17th. One speaker, Mr. Porter, responding for the delegates, said: "This great Government, the wonder of the world -this mighty Federal Union, the centre of so many hopes and aspirations-is now sliding from under our feet, and those great sovereign communities that breathed into it the breath of life; that called it Into being, but which has been most perfidiously abused and betrayed, are about to recall the powers with which they clothed it, and to assume their orig inal positions among the people of the earth as a sovereign and independent nation. But, fellow-citizens, what is most remarkable of all is, that it is not a legislative, but a popular revolution. The people started the ball of revolution, and they will carry it forward to the consummation and the end they have in view. Solitary and alone, it is my fixed belief that the State of South Carolina, whatever may betide her, whoever refuse to stand by her-that South Carolina, solitary and alone if need be, will launch her gallant little bark of independence upon an untried political sea; abiding in the justice of her cause, and relying upon the gallant arms and the stout hearts of her people, will peril all in the contest with our enemy." Another speaker from the delegation said: "The wicked and nefarious plot which forty years ago was conceived to seize the reins of this Government for the purpose of plundering the South and uprooting her institutions has, day by day, matured, until the hour of its accomplishment has come. The knell of this Union has been sounded, and it must go down, if it has to go down in a stream of blood and in a multitude of human suffering. Of what value, my friends, is this Union to you now? Three thousand millions of property is involved in this question, and if you say at the ballot-box that South Carolina shall not secede, you put into the sacrifice three thousand millions of your property. Aye, my friends, that Union of which so many speak in terms of laudation-its virtues, its spirit, its splendor has forever fled. It is now a dead carcass, stinking in the nostrils of the South. * * Aye, my friends, a few weeks more and you will see floating from the fortifications the ensign that now bears the Palmetto, the emblem of a Southern Confederacy. A thousand hearts will rally to its support, and a thousand swords will leap from their scabbards, resolved to make it their winding-sheet ere it shall trail in dishonor in the dust." Upon the adjournment of the Court of Chancery, on the afternoon of Friday, November 16th, the Chancellor, in his parting address, "expressed the earnest hope that when they again met, it would be as the Court of an independent State, and that State a member of a Southern Confederacy." About this time a demand was made by the Mercury, of "all the Army and Navy officers of the State of South Carolina, now in the service of the General Government," to throw up their commissions and join in the revolutionary movement. The call read : Navy and Army off cers to resign. "In behalf of the people of the State of South Carolina, we would this day call upon each and all of her sons who are now engaged in the military ser vice of the Government of the United States, to renounce at once the sword and the rations of the vulgar oppressor, and to hasten at once to the homes that gave them birth, for the protection of their native soil, the preservation of the institutions of their State, and the maintenance of the liberty of freemen, bequeathed them by their fathers. "South Carolina wants her soldier citizens around her now. The mother looks to her sons to protect her from outrage. Shall she look in vain? She wants, now, military skill and science, to direct the courage and energies of her people. She looks to her Army and Navy officers to supply that want. Let them return home at once, without any hesitation whatever. They need have no more doubt of South Carolina's going out of the Union, than of the world's turning round. Every man that goes to the Convention will be a pledged man-pledged for immediate separate State secession, in any event what ever. Once out of the Union, nothing but conquest will bring her back. She is resolved, sick of the Union, disgusted with it upon any terms that are within the range of the widest possibility. "Her sons, however, will be taken care of, whatever the result of her secession-for that is a fixed fact. Let them not hesitate; but rather let their promptitude bespeak the amount of their devotion to their native State." Greit Popular Demon. stration. Saturday morning, Nov. 17th, the people of Charleston inaugurated a gala-day by erecting a pine pole, ninety feet in height, from which was flung the Palmetto flag. It consisted of a white ground with a palmetto tree in the centre, under which was inscribed -"Animas assibusque parati." The State flag also flew from all the public buildings and leading houses in the city. It is estimated that twenty thousand persons took part in the festivities of the day "to inaugurate the revolution." As the flag ran up the "liberty pole," the Washington artillery fired a salute of one hundred guns, while a band discoursed the "Marseilles Hymn"-adding the "Miserere" from Il Trovatore, as a requiem for the departed Union. blessed our fathers being imperiled, we ask Thy fa vor and aid. Inspire us with courage, with a spirit of self-sacrifice, with a love of law and order, and with dependence upon Thee. Bless our State, and her sister States, in this great crisis. May they act as becometh a moral and religious people. Consecrate with Thy favor the banner of liberty this day hung in the heavens. May the city over which it floats be in Thy gracious keeping. Shield our commerce on the seas, and protect our homes and firesides. May agriculture bring her stores to our mart, and order and quiet abide in our streets, if it be Thy will. Avert from our land the horrors of war; but whatever we may be called upon to endure, be Thou our fortress and defence. O God! our fathers have declared unto us the noble works which Thou didst in their days. Continue Thy goodness to us their children, and make us that happy people whose good is the Lord, through Jesus Christ, our Redeemer. Amen." This was succeeded by speeches, chiefly from business men, since it was a business men's, or people's celebration. The crowd was addressed as "Citizens of the Southern Republic." Processions came pouring into the public square from all sections of the city, bearing banners and mottoes expressive of the sentiments of the hour, viz. :-"Now of Never," "Stand to your Arms," "South Carolina Goes it Alone," "God, Liberty, and the State," "No Stripes for South Carolina,” “Let us bury the Union's Dead Carcass," &c., &c. Secession badges were worn by men, women and children. A reporter present said:"All classes are arming for the contingency of coercion. Revolvers and patent fire-arms are selling like hot cakes." rity said: The same autho "Not a ship in the harbor has the Federal flag flying, but, far down in the Bay, it can still be discerned flying over Fort Moultrie." In the evening of the same day another vast concourse of people assembled in the square to hear speeches, all of the most radical disunion character. One thought, feeling and devotion to the secession sentiment prevailed. Merchants from Northern cities, it is said, took part in the proceedings-giving the people strong assurances that New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore, would sustain South Carolina in her course. From the speech of Mr. Theodore G. Barker we must re-produce a paragraph to show VIGILANCE ASSOCIATIONS. 47 The True Cause Cropping Out. that a strong feeling prevailed against the Union for its majority rule. Mr. B. said :— I am not one of those who can bear to scoff at the lost grandeur of this dying Republic. It has indeed been a glorious triumph of free institutions. The diseases which have undermined it are common to all known human systems. Its death should be no discouragement to our continuing the grand experiment of self-government for our selves. The great lessons of its short but brilliant history will not be lost to us or mankind. But remember, also, its warnings. Beware of the tendencies of a majority government-Remember the teachings of the great State-Rights Champion of Carolina, your own Calhoun. See to the protection of the minority; beware of the abuses of universal suffrage; beware of Democratic Absolutism! But be not discouraged. The torch of liberty, which was kindled by the great men of 1776 in the fires of the American Revolution, is already passing into the hands of the leaders of the Southern Revolution of 1860. The experience of near a century will teach them how to keep it bright forever." A Congressman's with the men of the western part of the State. They would come up to the Convention with hearts resolved to do or die. The people of South Carolina had determined, right or wrong, to be free. The die was cast. All these expressions, taken in connection with the resolves of the Legislature, leave no reason to doubt that the people were prepared for any contingency which might arise, either in separate secession, in a peaceful negotiation of terms of settlement with the authorities at Washington, or in a conflict with the Federal Government. It was, apparently, a matter of indifference what turn events might take-all appeared to feel that their mere act of secession was equivalent to the full accomplishment of the States independence. Vigilance Associa As a further feature of the attitude of the people throughout the State, we may mention the formation of "Vigilance Associations," whose objects will be inferred from the following resolutions adopted November 24th, by citizens of Lexington On the evening of November 21st, Hon. John McQueen and others addressed the people of Columbia. Mr. Mc- District :Queen said, among other things: "In three short weeks, according to his humble judgment, the sovereignty of South Carolina will be again established. The people are determined to live free or die. In a journey of three thousand miles that the speaker had made through many Southern States, he had not met one man who was not ready to strike the blow at once. They say you are ready, and if you strike we will soon follow you. Had they not heard it said by the other Southern States that if South Carolina goes now, whether we unite with you or not, yet upon the shedding of the first drop of blood we will be with you in such numbers that there will not be soil enough in South Carolina to hold us?" tions. Resolved, That the officers shall be elected every four months by the members of the Association, and they are required to meet monthly, and transact all business that may be referred to them, having full power to decide all cases that may be brought before them, and their decisions shall be final and conclusive. Resolved, That the President appoint as many captains of patrol as he may think necessary to carry out the object of the Association, each company of patrol to consist of not less than five men. Resolved, That the patrol companies have the power to arrest all suspicious white persons, and bring them before the Executive Committee for trial. Resolved, That each captain of patrol be required to call out his company for duty once a week, or as often as he may think necessary. Resolved, That we pledge ourselves to put down all negro preachings, prayer-meetings, and all congregations of negroes that may be considered unlawful by the patrol companies. Resolved. That the patrol companies have the power to correct and punish all slaves, free negroes, mulattoes, and mestizoes, as they may deem proper, as nothing herein justifies any patrol company to injure any person's property. Resolved, That we pledge ourselves to give no general passes-each pass to specify where to go and when to return. |