Extract from a Speech by Alexander H. Stephens, Vice-President of the Confederate States, Delivered in the Secession Convention of Georgia
Author: Unknown
Date: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

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Title:Extract from a speech by Alexander H. Stephens, vice-president of the Confederate States, delivered in the secession convention of Georgia, January 1861.

Author:Stephens, Alexander Hamilton, 1812-1883.

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Print Source:Extract from a speech by Alexander H. Stephens, vice-president of the Confederate States, delivered in the secession convention of Georgia, January 1861.

Stephens, Alexander Hamilton, 1812-1883.

4 p. 19 cm.

[n.p.,

1861?]

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EXT’RACT FROM A SPEECH ALEXANDEPR H. STEPIHENS, VICE-PRESIDENT OF THIE

CONFEDERATE STATES, Delivered in the Secession Convention of Georgia, January, 1861. This st(ep, [tlhe secession of Georgia,] once taken, can never be reclled and all the baleful and withlering consequences that must follow, (as you will see,) will rest on the Convention for all coming time. When we and our posterity sltall see our lovely South desolated by the demion of war which this act of yours will inevitably invite and call forth; when our green fields of waving harvests shall be trodden down by tile murderous soldiery and fiery car of war sweeping over our land; our tenmples of justice laid in ashes; all the horrors and desolations of war upon us-who but this Convention will be held responsible for it? anid who but him who shall have given his vote for this unwise and ill-timed measure (as I honestly think and believe) shall be held to strict account for this suicidal act, by tile present generation, and probably cursedi and ex eerated by posteritv for all coming tinie, for the wide and desolating ruin that will inevitably follow this act you now propose to perpe trate ” Pause, I entreat you, and consider for a momenet what reasons you can give that will even satistv yourselves in calmer moments-what reasons you can give to your fellow-sufferers in the calamity that it will bring upon,us? Wlhat reason can you give to the nations of the earth to justify it? They will be tlhe calin and deliberate judges in the case; and to what cause or one overt act can you nanie or point, on which to rest the plea of justification? What right has the North assailed 2 WThat interest of the South has been invaded t What justice has been denied? and what claimi founded in justice and right has beenii withheld?

Can either of you to-day name one governmental act of wrong, deliberately and purposely done by tlhe government of Washington, of which the South has a right to coniplain? I challenge the answer! While, on the other hand, lef me show the facts, (anld believe me, gentlemen, I ant not here the advocate of the North; hut I am here the friend, the firm friend and .. ,iJ~ r_, t f le cl, I ., r, - - BY I

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2 lover of the South and her institutions, and for this reason I speak thus plainly and faithfully, for yours, mine, and every other mnan’s interest, the words of truth and soberness,) of which I Wish you to judge, and I will only state facts which are clear and undeniable, and which now stand as records authentic in the history of our country. When we of the South demanded the slave trade, or the importation of Africans for the cultivation of our lands, did they not yield the right for twenty years?

When we asked a tliree-fifths representation in Congress for our slaves, was it not granted? When we asked and demanded the return of any fugitive from justice, or the recovery of those persons owing labor or allegiance, was it not intcorporated in the Constitutioti? and again ratified and strengthened in the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850? But do you reply, that in many instances they have violated this compact, and have not been faithful to their engagements? As individuals and local communities they may have done so; but not by the sanction of government; for that has always been true to Southern interests. Again, gentlemen, look at another fact: when we have asked that more territory should be added, that we might spread the institution of slavery, have they not yielded to our demands in giving us Louisiana, Florida and Texas, out of which four States have been carved, and ample territory for four more to be added in due time, if you by this unwise and impolitic act do not destroy this hope, and, perhaps, by it lose all, and have your last slave wrenched from you by stern military rule, as South America and Mexico were; or by the vindictive decree of a universal emnancipation, which may reasonably be expected to follow? But, again, gentlenmen, what have we to gain by this proposed change of our relation to the general government? We have always had the control of it, and can yet, if we remain in it, and are as united as we have been. We have had a majority of the Presidents chosen from the South; as well as the control and malnagement of most of those chosen from the North. We have had sixty years of Southern Presidents to their twenty-four, thus controlling the Executive department. So of the judges of the Supreme Court, we have had eighteen from the South, and but eleven from the North; although nearly four-fifths of the judicial business has arisen in the Free States, yet a majority of the Court has always ireen from the South. This we have required so as to guard against any interpre.

tation of the Constitution unfavorable to us. In like manner we have been equally watchful to guard our interests in the Legislative branch of government. In choosing the presiding Presidents (pro tern.) of the Senate, we have had twenty-four to their eleven. Speakers of the House, we have had twenty-three, and they twelve. While the majority of the Representatives, from their greater pop)ulation, have always been from the North, yet we have so generally secured the Speaker, because he, to a great extent, shapes and controls the legislation of the country. Nor have we had less control in every other department of the general government.

Attorneys, Generals we have had fourteen, while the North have had but five. Foreign ministers we have had eighty-six, and they but fifty-four.

P% .4

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3 While three-fourths of the business wiwhich) denlands diplomatic agents abroad is clearly from the Free States, from their greater comnmercial interests, yet we have lhad the principal embassies, so as to secure the world markets for our cotton, tobacco and sugar on the best possible terms. We have had a vast majority of the higher offi ces of both army and navy, while a larger proportion of the soldiers and sailors were drawn from the North. Equally so of Clerks, Au ditors and Comptrollers filling the Executive department; thle re cords show for the last fifty years, that of the three thousand thus employed, we have had more than two-tl)irds of the samne, while we have but one-third of the white population of the Republic.’ Again, look at another item, and one, be assured, in which we have a great and vital interest; it is that of revenue, or means of supporting government. From official documents, we learn that a fraction over thlree-fourths of the revenue collected for the support of government has uniformly been raised from the North. Pause, now, while you can, gentlemen, and contemplate carefully and candidly these important items. Look at another necessary branch of government, and learn from stern statistical facts how matters stand in that department. I mean the mail and post-office privileges that we now enjoy under the general government, as it has been for years past. The expense for the transportation of the mail in the Free States was, by the report of the Postmaster General for the year 186S0, a little over.$13,000,004, while the income was $19,000,000. But in the Slave States, the transportation of the mail was .$14,716,000, while the revenue from the same was.8,001,026, leaving a deficit of $6,115,73o5, to be supplied by the North for our accommodation, and without it we must have been entirely cut off from this most essential branch of government. Leaving out of view, for the present, the countless millions of dollars you must expend in a war with the North; with tens of thousands of your sons and brothers slain in battle, and offered up as sacrifices upon the altar of your ambition,-and for what, we ask again? Is it for the overthrow of the American government, established by our conmmon ancestry, cemented and built up by their sweat and bloodl, and founded on the broad principles of Riqht,,.ustice, and Humanity? And, as such, I must declare here, as I have often done before, and which has been repeated by the greatest and wisest of statesmen and patriots in this and other lands, that it is the best and freest gqovernment-the most equal in its riqhts-the most just in its dcecisions-the most lenient in its measuires, and the most insp)iring in its p)rinciples to elev(tte the race of men, thlat the sun of heaven ever shone upon. Now, for you to attempt to overthrow such a government as this, under which we have lived for more than three quarters of a century -in which we have gained our wealth, our standing as a nation, our domestic safety while the elements of peril are around us, with peace and tranquillity accompanied with unbounded prosperity and rights unassailed-is the height of madness, folly and wickedness, to which I can neither lend my sanction nor myv vote. I I i I

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