Графични страници
PDF файл
ePub

The fact last stated excited the notice of President Lincoln, and in July, 1862, he sought an interview with the Border State Congressmen, the result of which is contained in McPherson's Political History of the Great Rebellion, as follows:

The President's Appeal to the Border

States.

The Representatives and Senators of the border slaveholding States, having, by special invitation of the President, been convened at the Executive Mansion, on Saturday morning last, (July 12,) Mr. Lincoln addressed them as follows from a written paper held in his hand :

"GENTLEMEN: After the adjournment of Congress, now near, I shall have no opportunity of seeing you for several months. Believing that you of the border States hold more power for good than any other equal number of members, I feel it a duty which I cannot justifiably waive, to make this appeal to you.

The

trying to accomplish it by war. incidents of the war cannot be avoided. If the war continues long, as it must, if the object be not sooner attained, the institution in your States will be extinguished by mere friction and abrasion -by the mere incidents of the war. It will be gone, and you will have nothing valuable in lieu of it. Much of its value is gone already. How much better for you and for your people to take the step which at once shortens the war and secures substantial compensation for that which is sure to be wholly lost in any other event! How much better to thus save the money which else we sink forever in the war! How much better to do it while we can, lest the war ere long render us pecuniarily unable to do it! How much better for you, as seller, and the nation, as buyer, to sell out and buy out that without which the war could never have been, than to sink both the thing to be sold and the price of it in cutting one another's throats!

"I do not speak of emancipation at once, but of a decision at once to emancipate gradually. Room in South America for colonization can be obtained cheaply and in abundance, and when numbers shall be large enough to be company and encouragement for one another, the freed people will not be so reluctant to go.

"I intend no reproach or complaint when I assure you that, in my opinion, if you all had voted for the resolution in the gradual emancipation message of last March, the war would now be substantially ended. And the plan therein proposed is yet one of the most potent and swift means of ending it. Let the States which are in "I am pressed with a difficulty not yet rebellion see definitely and certainly that mentioned, one which threatens division in no event will the States you represent among those who, united, are none too ever join their proposed Confederacy, and strong. An instance of it is known to they cannot much longer maintain the you. General Hunter is an honest man. contest. But you cannot divest them of He was, and I hope still is, my friend. I their hope to ultimately have you with valued him none the less for his agreeing them so long as you show a determination with me in the general wish that all men to perpetuate the institution within your everywhere could be freed. He proclaimed own States. Beat them at elections, as all men free within certain States, and I you have overwhelmingly done, and, noth-repudiated the proclamation. He expected ing daunted, they still claim you as their own. You and I know what the lever of their power is. Break that lever before their faces, and they can shake you no more forever.

"Most of you have treated me with kindness and consideration, and I trust you will not now think I improperly touch what is exclusively your own, when, for the sake of the whole country, I ask, 'Can you, for your States, do better than to take the course I urge?' Discarding punctilio and maxims adapted to more manageable times, and looking only to the unprecedentedly stern facts of our case, can you do better in any possible event? You prefer that the constitutional relations of the States to the nation shall be practically restored without disturbance of the institution; and, if this were done, my whole duty, in this respect, under the Constitution and my oath of office, would be performed. But it is not done, and we are

more good and less harm from the measure than I could believe would follow. Yet, in repudiating it, I gave dissatisfaction, if not offence, to many whose support the country cannot afford to lose. And this is not the end of it. The pressure in this direction is still upon me, and is increasing. By conceding what I now ask you can relieve me, and, much more, can relieve the country in this important point.

[ocr errors]

Upon these considerations I have again begged your attention to the message of March last. Before leaving the Capitol, consider and discuss it among yourselves. You are patriots and statesmen, and as such I pray you consider this proposition; and at the least commend it to the consideration of your States and people. As you would perpetuate popular government for the best people in the world, I beseech you that you do in no wise omit this. Our common country is in great peril, demanding the loftiest

views and boldest action to bring a speedy |ject of which it treats. We have given it relief. Once relieved, its form of govern- a most respectful consideration, and now ment is saved to the world, its beloved lay before you our response. We regret history and cherished memories are vin- that want of time has not permitted us to dicated, and its happy future fully assured make it more perfect. and rendered inconceivably grand. To you, more than to any others, the privilege is given to assure that happiness and swell that grandeur, and to link your own names therewith forever."

At the conclusion of these remarks some conversation was had between the President and several members of the delegations from the border States, in which it was represented that these States could not be expected to move in so great a matter as that brought to their notice in the foregoing address while as yet the Congress had taken no step beyond the passage of a resolution, expressive rather of a sentiment than presenting a substantial and reliable basis of action.

The President acknowledged the orce of this view, and admitted that the border States were entitled to expect a substantial pledge of pecuniary aid as the condition of taking into consideration a proposition so important in its relations to their social system.

It was further represented, in the conference, that the people of the border States were interested in knowing the great importance which the President attached to the policy in question, while it was equally due to the country, to the President, and to themselves, that the representatives of the border slave-holding States should publicly announce the motives under which they were called to act, and the considerations of public policy urged upon them and their constituents by the President.

With a view to such a statement of their position, the members thus addressed met in council to deliberate on the reply they should make to the President, and, as the result of a comparison of opinions among themselves, they determined upon the adoption of a majority and minority an

swer.

REPLY OF THE MAJORITY.

We have not been wanting, Mr. President, in respect to you, and in devotion to the Constitution and the Union. We have not been indifferent to the great difficulties surrounding you, compared with which all former national troubles have been but as the summer cloud; and we have freely given you our sympathy and support. Repudiating the dangerous heresies of the secessionists, we believed, with you, that the war on their part is aggressive and wicked, and the objects for which it was to be prosecuted on ours, defined by your message at the opening of the present Congress, to be such as all good men should approve. We have not hesitated to vote all supplies necessary to carry it on vigorously. We have voted all the men and money you have asked for, and even more; we have imposed onerous taxes on our people, and they are paying them with cheerfulness and alacrity; we have encouraged enlistments and sent to the field many of our best men; and some of our number have offered their persons to the enemy as pledges of their sincerity and devotion to the country.

We have done, all this under the most discouraging circumstances, and in the face of measures most distasteful to us and injurious to the interests we represent, and in the hearing of doctrines avowed by those who claim to be your friends, must be abhorrent to us and our constituents. But, for all this, we have never faltered, nor shall we as long as we have a Constitution to defend and a Government which protects us. And we are ready for renewed efforts, and even greater sacrifices, yea, any sacrifice, when we are satisfied it is required to preserve our admirable form of government and the priceless blessings of constitutional liberty.

A few of our number voted for the resolution recommended by your message of the 6th of March last, the greater portion of us did not, and we will briefly state the prominent reasons which in

The following paper was yesterday sent to the President, signed by the majority of the Representatives from the border slave-fluenced our action. holding States :—

WASHINGTON, July 14, 1862.

To the PRESIDENT:

The undersigned, Representatives of Kentucky, Virginia, Missouri, and Maryland, in the two Houses of Congress, have listened to your address with the profound sensibility naturally inspired by the high source from which it emanates, the earnestness which marked its delivery, and the overwhelming importance of the sub

In the first place, it proposed a radical change of our social system, and was hurried through both Houses with undue haste, without reasonable time for consideration and debate, and with no time at all for consultation with our constituents, whose interests it deeply involved. It seemed like an interference by this Government with a question which peculiarly and exclusively belonged to our respective States, on which they had not sought advice or solicited aid. Many of us doubted

the constitutional power of this Govern- Again, it seemed to us that this resolument to make appropriations of money for tion was but the annunciation of a sentithe object designated, and all of us thought ment which could not or was not likely to our finances were in no condition to bear be reduced to an actual tangible proposithe immense outlay which its adoption tion. No movement was then made to and faithful execution would impose upon provide and appropriate the funds required the national Treasury. If we pause but to carry it into effect; and we were not ena moment to think of the debt its accept-couraged to believe that funds would be ance would have entailed, we are appalled provided. And our belief has been fully by its magnitude. The proposition was justified by subsequent events. Not to addressed to all the States, and embraced mention other circumstances, it is quite the whole number of slaves.

sufficient for our purpose to bring to your notice the fact that, while this resolution was under consideration in the Senate, our colleague, the Senator from Kentucky, moved an amendment appropriating $500,

was voted down with great unanimity. What confidence, then, could we reasonably feel that if we committed ourselves to the policy it proposed, our constituents would reap the fruits of the promise held out; and on what ground could we, as fair men, approach them and challenge their support?

According to the census of 1860 there were then nearly four million slaves in the country; from natural increase they exceed that number now. At even the low average of $300, the price fixed by the emancipa-000 to the object therein designated, and it tion act for the slaves of this District, and greatly below their real worth, their value runs up to the enormous sum of $1,200,000,000; and if to that we add the cost of deportation and colonization, at $100 each, which is but a fraction more than is actually paid by the Maryland Colonization Society, we have $400,000,000 more. We were not willing to impose a tax on our The right to hold slaves is a right apperpeople sufficient to pay the interest on that taining to all the States of this Union. suni, in addition to the vast and daily in- They have the right to cherish or abolish creasing debt already fixed upon them by the institution, as their tastes or their inthe exigencies of the war, and if we had terests may prompt, and no one is authobeen willing, the country could not bear it. rized to question the right or limit the enStated in this form the proposition is noth-joyment. And no one has more clearly ing less than the deportation from the country of $1,600,000,000 worth of producing labor, and the substitution in its place of an interest-bearing debt of the same

amount.

affirmed that right than you have. Your inaugural address does you great honor in this respect, and inspired the country with confidence in your fairness and respect for the law. Our States are in the enjoyment of that right. We do not feel called on to defend the institution or to affirm it is one which ought to be cherished; perhaps, if we were to make the attempt, we might find that we differ even among ourselves. It is enough for our purpose to know that it is a right; and, so knowing, we did not Slaves. see why we should now be expected to .225,490 yield it. We had contributed our full 87,188 share to relieve the country at this terrible .490,887 crisis; we had done as much as had been

But, if we are told that it was expected that only the States we represent would accept the proposition, we respectfully submit that even then it involves a sum too great for the financial ability of this Government at this time. According to the census of 1860

[blocks in formation]

Delaware...

Missouri......

Tennessee...

1,798 required of others in like circumstances; .114,965 and we did not see why .sacrifices should .275,784 be expected of us from which others, no more loyal, were exempt. Nor could we

Making in the whole..............1,196,112 see what good the nation would derive At the same rate of valuation

[blocks in formation]

from it.

Such a sacrifice submitted to by us would not have strengthened the arm of this Government or weakened that of the enemy. It was not necessary as a pledge of our loyalty, for that had been manifested beyond a reasonable doubt, in every form, and at every place possible. There was not the remotest probability that the States we represent would join in the rebellion, nor is there now, or of their electing to go with the southern section in the event of a recognition of the independence of any part of the disaffected region. Our

States are fixed unalterably in their resolution to adhere to and support the Union. They see no safety for themselves, and no hope for constitutional liberty but by its preservation. They will, under no circumstances, consent to its dissolution; and we do them no more than justice when we assure you that, while the war is conducted to prevent that deplorable catastrophe, they will sustain it as long as they can muster a man or command a dollar. Nor will they ever consent, in any event, to unite with the Southern Confederacy. The bitter fruits of the peculiar doctrines of that region will forever prevent them from placing their security and happiness in the custody of an association which has incorporated in its organic law the seeds of its own destruction.

[blocks in formation]

Mr. President, we have stated with frankness and candor the reasons on which we forbore to vote for the resolution you have mentioned; but you have again presented this proposition, and appealed to us with an earnestness and eloquence which have not failed to impress us, to "consider it, and at the least to commend it to the consideration of our States and people." Thus appealed to by the Chief Magistrate of our beloved country, in the hour of its greatest peril, we cannot wholly decline. We are willing to trust every question relating to their interest and happiness to the consideration and ultimate judgment of our own people. While differing from you as to the necessity of emancipating the slaves of our States as a means of putting down the rebellion, and while protesting against the propriety of any extra-territorial interference to induce the people of our States to adopt any particular line of policy on a subject which peculiarly and exclusively belongs to them, yet, when you and our brethren of the loyal States sincerely believe that the retention of slavery by us is an obstacle to peace and national harmony, and are willing to contribute pecuniary aid to compensate our States and people for the inconveniences produced by such a change of system, we are not unwilling that our people shall consider the propriety of putting it aside.

ations will not be frustrated. We regard your plan as a proposition from the Nation to the States to exercise an admitted constitutional right in a particular manner and yield up a valuable interest. Before they ought to consider the proposition, it should be presented in such a tangible, practical, efficient shape as to command their confidence that its fruits are contingent only upon their acceptance. We cannot trust anything to the contingencies of future legislation.

If Congress, by proper and necessary legislation, shall provide sufficient funds and place them at your disposal, to be applied by you to the payment of any of our States or the citizens thereof who shall adopt the abolishment of slavery, either gradual or immediate, as they may determine, and the expense of deportation and colonization of the liberated slaves, then will our State and people take this proposition into careful consideration, for such decision as in their judgment is demanded by their interest, their honor, and their duty to the whole country. We have the honor to be, with great respect,

C. A. WICKLIFFE, Ch'n,
GARRETT DAVIS,
R. WILSON,
J. J. CRITTENDEN,
JOHN S. CARLILE,
J. W. CRISFIELD,
J. S. JACKSON,
H. GRIDER,
JOHN S. PHELPS,
FRANCIS THOMAS,
CHAS. B. CALVERT,
C. L. LEARY,
EDWIN H. WEBSTER
R. MALLORY,
AARON HARDING,
JAMES S. ROLLINS,
J. W. MENZIES,
THOMAS L. PRICE,
G. W. DUNLAP,
WM. A. HALL.

Others of the minority, among them Senator Henderson and Horace Maynard, forwarded separate replies, but all rejecting the idea of compensated emancipation. Still Lincoln adhered to and advocated it in his recent annual message sent to Congress, Dec. 1, 1862, from which we take the following paragraphs, which are in themselves at once curious and interesting:

But we have already saiu that we regarded this resolution as the utterance of a sentiment, and we had no confidence that it would assume the shape of a tangible, practical proposition, which would "We have two million nine hundred and yield the fruits of the sacrifice it required. sixty-three thousand square miles. Europe Our people are influenced by the same has three million and eight hundred thouwant of confidence, and will not consider sand, with a population averaging seventythe proposition in its present impalpable three and one-third persons to the square form. The interest they are asked to give mile. Why may not our country, at some up is to them of much importance, and time, average as many? Is it less fertile? they ought not to be expected even to en- Has it more waste surface, by mountains, tertain the proposal until they are assured rivers, lakes, deserts, or other causes? Is that when they accept it their just expect-it inferior to Europe in any natural ad

vantage? If, then, we are at some time to be as populous as Europe, how soon? As to when this may be, we can judge by the past and the present; as to when it will be, if ever, depends much on whether we maintain the Union. Several of our States are already above the average of Europe -seventy-three and a third to the square mile. Massachusetts has 157; Rhode Island, 133; Connecticut, 99; New York and New Jersey, each, 80. Also two other great states, Pennsylvania and Ohio, are not far below, the former having 63 and the latter 59. The states already above the European average, except New York, have increased in as rapid a ratio, since passing that point, as ever before; while no one of them is equal to some other parts of our country in natural capacity for sustaining a dense population.

"Taking the nation in the aggregate, and we find its population and ratio of increase, for the several decennial periods, to be as follows:

1790......... 3,929,827 Ratio of increase. 35.02 per cent. 36.45

1800.... 1810..

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

5,305,937

7,239,814

1820....

9,638,131

33.13

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

1870....... 1880..

1890.

1900..

1910.

1920. 1930..

.............

42,323,341

no one can doubt that the extent of it would be very great and injurious.

The proposed emancipation would shorten the war, perpetuate peace, insure this increase of population, and proportionately the wealth of the country. With these, we should pay all the emancipation would cost, together with our other debt, easier than we should pay our other debt without it. If we had allowed our old national debt to run at six per cent. per annum, simple interest, from the end of our revolutionary struggle until to-day, without paying anything on either principal or interest, each man of us would owe less upon that debt now than each man owed upon it then; and this because our increase of men through the whole period has been greater than six per cent.; has run faster than the interest upon the debt. Thus, time alone relieves a debtor nation, so long as its population increases faster than unpaid interest accumulates on its debt.

"This fact would be no excuse for delaying payment of what is justly due; but it shows the great importance of time in this connection-the great advantage of a policy by which we shall not have to pay until we number a hundred millions, what, by a different policy, we would have to pay now, when we number but thirty-one millions. In a word, it shows that a dollar will be much harder to pay for the war than will be a dollar for emancipation on the proposed plan. And then the latter will cost no blood, no precious life. It will be a saving of both."

Various propositions and measures relating to compensated emancipation, were afterwards considered in both Houses, but it was in March, 1863, dropped after a refusal of the House to suspend the rules for the consideration of the subject.

Emancipation as a War Necessity.

56,967,216 Before the idea of compensated emanci76,677,872 103,208,415 pation had been dropped, and it was constantly discouraged by the Democrats and 138,918,526 Border Statesmen, President Lincoln had 186,984,335 determined upon a more radical policy, 251,680,914 and on the 224 of September, 1862, issued "These figures show that our country his celebrated proclamation declaring that may be as populous as Europe now is at he would emancipate "all persons held as some point between 1920 and 1930-say slaves within any State or designated part about 1925 our territory, at seventy-three of a State, the people whereof shall be in and a third persons to the square mile, be- rebellion against the United States"-by ing of capacity to contain 217,186,000. the first of January, 1863, if such sections were not "in good faith represented in Congress." He followed this by actual emancipation at the time stated.

And we will reach this, too, if we do not ourselves relinquish the chance by the folly and evils of disunion, or by long and exhausting war springing from the only great element of national discord among us. While it cannot be foreseen exactly how much one huge example of secession, breeding lesser ones indefinitely, would retard population, civilization, and prosperity

Proclamation of Sept. 22, 1862.
I, ABRAHAM LINCOLN, President of the
United States of America, and Commander-
in-Chief of the army and navy thereof, do

« ПредишнаНапред »