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friends. This stupendous trust they cannot put from them, if they would. Emancipation, were it possible, would be rebellion against Providence, and destruction to the colored race in our land. We at the North We at the North rid ourselves of no responsibility by assuming an attitude of hostility to Slavery, and thus sundering the bonds of State fellowship; we only put it out of our power to do the good which both humanity and religion demand. Should we not rather recognize the Providence of God, in His placing such a vast multitude of the degraded and dependent sons of Africa in this favored land, and cheerfully coöperate, by all needful labors and sacrifices, with His benevolent design to save and not to destroy them? Under a Providential dispensation, lifting them up from the degradation and miseries of indolence and vice, and exacting of them due and needful labor, they can certainly be

trained and nurtured, as many have been for the services and joys of heaven; and, if the climate and institutions of the South are such that our fellow-citizens there can afford to take the onerous care of them, in return for their services, should we not gladly con

sent? They freely concede to us our conscientious convictions, our rights, and all our privileges: should we not as freely concede to them theirs? Why should we contend? Why paralyze business, turn thousands of the industrious and laborious poor out of employment, sunder the last ties of affection that can bind these States together, destroy our once prosperous and happy nation, and perhaps send multitudes to premature graves-and all for what? Is not such a course a struggle of arrogant assumption against the Providence of the Most High? and, if persisted in, will it not surely bring down His heavy and prolonged judgments upon us?"

Such were the means whereby many conservative and Christian men were intent on preserving our National unity, and reviving the sentiment of fraternity among our people, in March and the beginning of April, 1861.

XXVIII.

FORT SUMTER.

I

WHETHER the hesitation of the document, that he fully purposed, to Executive to reënforce Fort Sumter was real or only apparent, the reserve evinced with regard to his intentions was abundantly justified. The President, in his Inaugural Address, had kindly and explicitly set forth his conception of the duties and responsibilities assumed in taking his oath of office. No man of decent understanding who can read our language had any reason or right to doubt, after hearing or perusing that

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the extent of his ability, to maintain the authority and enforce the laws of the Union on every acre of the geographical area of our country. Hence, secessionists in Washington, as well as South of that city, uniformly denounced that manifesto as a declaration of war, or as rendering war inevitable. The naked dishonesty of professed Unionists inquiring —as even Senator Douglas,' for two weeks, persisted in doing—whether

to demonstrate that the Republicans ought to act, in accordance not with their own principles and convictions, but with his-and who talked and acted in this vein through most of the Sen

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FUTILITY OF THE 'PEACE' CLAMOR.

Mr. Lincoln intended peace or war, was a sore trial to human patience. A government which cannot uphold and vindicate its authority in the country which it professes to rule is to be pitied; but one which does not even attempt to enforce respect and obedience is a confessed imposture and sham, and deserves to be hooted off the face of the earth. Nay, more: it was impossible for ours to exist on the conditions prescribed by its domestic foes. No government can endure without revenue; and the Federal Constitution (Art. I. § 9) expressly prescribes that

"No preference shall be given, by any regulation of commerce or revenue, to the ports of one State over those of another; nor shall vessels bound to or from one State be obliged to enter, clear, or pay duties, in another."

But here were the ports of nearly half our Atlantic and Gulf coasts

ate's called Session, which followed-yet, when war actually grew out of the conflicting pretensions of the Union and the Confederacy, took nobly and heartily the side of his whole country. But, even before the close of the called Session, a decided change in his attitude, if not in his conceptions, was manifest. On the 25th of March, replying to a plea for 'Peace,' on the basis of 'No Coercion,' by Senator J. C. Breckinridge, of Kentucky, he thus thoroughly exposed the futility of the main pretext for Disunion:

"From the beginning of this Government down to 1859, Slavery was prohibited by Congress in some portion of the territories of the United States. But now, for the first time in the history of this Government, there is no foot of ground in America where Slavery is prohibited by act of Congress. You, of the other side of this chamber, by the unanimous vote of every Republican in this body, and of every Republican in the House of Representatives, have organized all the territories of the United States on the principle of non-intervention, by Congress, with the question of Slavery-leaving the people to do as they please, subject only to the limitations of the Constitution. Hence, I think the Senator from Kentucky fell into a gross error of fact as well as of law when he said, the other day, that you had not abated one jot of your creed-that you had not abandoned your aggressive policy in

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sealed against the commerce and navigation of the other half, save on payment of duties utterly unknown to our laws; while goods could be entered at those ports at quite other (and generally lower) rates of impost than those established by Congress. Hence, importers, with good reason, refused to pay the established duties at Northern ports until the same should be exacted at Southern as well; so that three months' acquiescence by the President in what was untruly commended as the "Peace policy," would have sunk the country into anarchy and whelmed the Government in hopeless ruin.

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Still, no one is required to achieve the impossible, though to attempt what to others will seem such may sometimes be accepted by the unselfish and intrepid as a duty; and this practical question confronted the

the territories, and that you were now pursuing the policy of excluding the Southern people from all the territories of the United States. *** There never has been a time since the Government was founded when the right of the slaveholders to emigrate to the territories, to carry with them their slaves, and to hold them on an equal footing with all other property, was as fully and distinctly recognized in all the territories as at this time, and that, too, by the unanimous vote of the Republican party in both Houses of Congress.

"The Senator from Kentucky [Mr. Breckinridge] has told you that the Southern States, still in the Union, will never be satisfied to remain in it unless they get terms that will give them either a right, in common with all the other States, to emigrate into the territories, or that will secure to them their rights in the territories on the principle of an equitable division. These are the only terms on which, as he says, those Southern States now in the Union will consent to remain. I wish to call the attention of that distinguished Senator to the fact that, under the law as it now stands, the South has all the rights which he claims. First, Southern men have the right to emigrate into all the territories, and to carry their Slave property with them, on an equality with the citizens of the other States. Secondly, they have an equitable partition of the territories assigned by law, viz.: allis Slave Territory up to the thirty-seventh degree, instead of up to the parallel of thirty-six degrees thirty minutes—a half degree more than they claim."

2

President on the threshold: 'What | ton on the 20th, and had a long means have I at command wherewith interview with Gov. Pickens and to compel obedience to the laws?' Gen. Beauregard, with reference, it Now, the War Department had, for was said, to the terms on which nearly eight years prior to the last | Fort Sumter should be evacuated, if few weeks, been directed successively evacuated at all, the 25th brought to by Jefferson Davis and John B. Charleston Col. Ward H. Lamon, a Floyd. The better portion of our confidential agent of the President, little army had been ordered by who, after an interview with the Floyd to Texas, and there put under Confederate authorities, was permitthe command of Gen. Twiggs, by ted to visit the fort, and hold unrewhom it had already been betrayed stricted intercourse with Major Aninto the hands of his fellow-traitors. derson, who apprised the GovernThe arms of the Union had been sed- ment through him that their scanty ulously transferred by Floyd from the stock of provisions would suffice his Northern to the Southern arsenals. little garrison only till the middle of The most effective portion of the April. Col. Lamon returned immeNavy had, in like manner, been dis- diately to Washington, and was said persed over distant seas. But, so to have reported there, that, in Major early as the 21st of March, at the Anderson's opinion as well as in his close of a long and exciting Cabinet own, the relief of the fortress was session, it appears to have been defi- impracticable. nitively settled that Fort Sumter was not to be surrendered without a struggle; and, though Col. G. W. Lay, an Aid of Gen. Scott, had visited Charles

2 The New York Herald of April 9th has a dispatch from its Washington correspondent, confirming one sent twenty-four hours earlier to announce the determination of the Executive to provision Fort Sumter, which thus explains the negotiations, and the seeming hesitation, if not vacillation, of March:

"The peace policy of the Administration has been taken advantage of by the South, while, at the same time, their representatives have been here begging the President to keep hands off. While he was holding back, in the hope that a forbearing disposition, on the part of the authorities of the seceded States, would be manifested, to his great surprise, he found that, instead of peace, they were investing every fort and navy yard with Rebel troops and fortifications, and actually preparing to make war upon the Federal Government. Not only this, but, while the Administration was yielding to the cry against coërcion, for the purpose, if possible, of averting the calamity of civil war, the very men who were loudest against coërcion were preparing for it; the Government was losing strength with the people; and the President and his Cabinet were charged with being imbecile and false to the high trust conferred upon them.

"At last, they have determined to enforce the

By this time, however, very decided activity began to be manifest in the Navy Yards still held by the Union. Such ships of war as were

laws, and to do it vigorously; but not in an aggressive spirit. When the Administration determined to order Major Anderson out of Fort Sumter, some days since, they also determined to do so on one condition: namely, that the fort and the property in it should not be molested, but allowed to remain as it is. The authorities of the Confederacy would not agree to this, but manifested a disposition to get possession of the fort and United States property therein. The Government would not submit to any such humiliation.

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'It was immediately determined to keep Major Anderson in Fort Sumter, and to supply him with provisions forthwith. ***There is no desire to put additional men into the fort, unless resistance is offered to the attempt to furnish Major Anderson with supplies. The fleet will not approach Charleston with hostile intent; but, in view of the great military preparations about Fort Sumter, the supply vessels will go prepared to reply promptly to any rosistance of a warlike character that may be offered to a peaceful approach to the fort. The responsibility of opening the war will be thrown upon the parties who set themselves in defiance to the Government. It is sincerely hoped, by the Federal authorities here, that the leaders of the secessionists will not open their batteries."

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