The Sun.
London, England, 1862-03-12 00:00:00

PRESIDENT DAVIS'S INAUGU.RAL
ADDRESS.

Flowthis the birthday of the
man 'most Citizens,—Onidentid ith the establishment of
American independence, and beneath the monument
hero
have
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ei c avs
ei re tmu
he sl
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d te
and
erected to commemorate hiswe
compatriots,te nee
the
permanent Government of
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the Confederate States. Through this instrumen-
tality, under the favour of Divine Providence, we
hope to perpetuate the principles of our revolu-
tionary fathers. The day, the memory, and the
purpose seem duly associated.
It is with mingled feelings of humility and pride
that I appear to take, in the presence of the people,
and before high Heaven, the oath prescribed as a
qualification for the exalted station to which the
unanimous voice of the people has called me.
Deeply sensible of all that is implied by this mani•
festation of the people's confidence, I am yet more
profoundly impressed by the vast responsibility of
the office, n
eu, r
and
for humbly
unworthiness.
In only offer as-
surances of the gratitude with which it is received,
ttheir
kindness feel
cann
and can but pledge a zealous devotion of every
faculty to the service of those who have chosen.me
as their Chief Magistrate.
When a long course of class legislation, directed
not to the general welfare, but to the aggrandise-
ment of the Northern section of the Union, culmi-
nated in a warfare on the domestic institutions of
the Southern States, when the dogmas of a sectional
party, substituted for the provisions of the consti-
tutional compact,threatened to destroythe sovereign
rights of the States, six of those States, withdraw-
ing from the Union, confederated together to exer-
cise the right and perform the duty of instituting a
government which would better secure the liberties
for the preservation of which the Union was
established.

Whatever of hope some may have entertained
that a returning sense of justice would remove the
dangers with which our rights were threatened,
and rende r it possible to preserve the union of the
Constitution, must have been dispelled by the ma-
lignity and barbarity of the Northern States in
the prosecution of the existing war. The confi-
dence of the most hopeful among us must have been
destroyed by the disregard they have recently ex-
hibited for all the time-honoured bulwarks of civil
and religious liberty. Bastiles filled with prison-
ers, arrested without civil process or indictment
duly found; the writ of habeas corpus suspended by
executive mandate : a State Legislature controlled
by the imprisonment of members whose avowed
principles suggested to the Federal Executive that
there might be another added to the list of seceded
States; elections held under threats of a military
power; civil officers, peaceful citizens, and gentle
women incarcerated for opinion's sake—proclaimed
the incapacity of our late associates to administer a
government as free, liberal, and humane as that es-
tablished for our common use.

For proof of the sincerity of our purpose to main-
tain our ancient institutions, we may point to the
constitution of the Confederacy and the laws en-
acted under it, as well as to the fact that through
all the necessities of an unequal struggle there has
been no act on our part to impair personal liberty,
or the freedom of speech, of thought, or of the
Press. The courts have been open, the judicial
functions fully executed, and every right of the
peaceful citizen maintained as securely as if a war
of invasion had not disturbed the land.
The people of the States now confederated be-
came convinced that the Government of the United
States had fallen into the hands of a sectional ma-
jority, who would pervert that most sacred of all
trusts to the destruction of the rights which it was
pledged to protect. They believed that to remain
longer in the Union would subject them to a conti-
nuance of a disparaging discrimination, submission
to which would be inconsistent with their welfare,
and intolerable to a proud people. They therefore
determined to sever its bonds and establish a new
confederacy for themselves.
The experiment instituted by our revolutionary
fathers, of a voluntary union of sovereign States for
purposes specified in a solemn compact, had been
perverted by those who, feeling power and forget-
ting right, were determined to respect no law but
their own will. The Government had ceased to
answer the ends for which it was ordained and
established. To save ourselves from a revolution
which, in its silent but rapid progress, was about
to place us under the despotism of numbers, and to
preserve in spirit, as well as in form, a system of
government we believed to be peculiarly fitted to
our condition and full of promise for mankind, we
determined to make a new association, composed of
States homogeneous in Merest, in policy, and in
feeling.
True to our traditions of peace and our love of
justice, we sent commissioners to the United States
to propose a fair and amicable settlement of all
questions of public debt or property which might
be in dispute. But the Government at Washington,
denying our right to self-government, refused even
to listen to any proposals for a peaceful separation.
Nothing was then left to us but to prepare for
war.

The first year in our history has been the most
eventful in the annals of this continent. A new
Government has been established, and its machinery
put in operation over an area exceeding 700,000
square miles. The great principles upon which we
have been willing to hazard everything that is dear
to man, have made conquests for us which could
never have been achieved by the sword. Our Con-
federacy has grown from 0 to 13 states ; and Mary-
land, already united to us by hallowed memories
and material interests, will, I believe, when able to
speak with unstilted VOlOO, connect her destiny
with the South. Our people here rallied with un-
exampled unanimity to the support of the great
principles of constitutional government, with firm
resolve to perpetuate by arms the rights which
they could not peaceably secure. A million of men,
it is estimated, are now standing in hostile array,
and waging war along a frontier of thousands of
miles. Battles have been fought, sieges have been
conducted, and although the contest is not ended,
and the tide for the moment is against us, the final
result in our favour is not doubtful.
The period is near at hand when our foes must
sink under the immense load of debt they have in-
curred—a debt which, in their effort to subjugate
us, has already attained such fearful dimensions as
will subject them to burthens which must continue
to oppress them for generations to come.
We, too, have had our trials and difficulties.
That we are to escape them in future is not to be
hoped. It was to bo expected
when we entered
upon this war that it would expose our people to
cost them much both of blood and
sacrifices, and
money, But we knew the value of the object for
which we struggled, and understood the nature of
the war in which we were engaged. Nothing could