Daily Nashville patriot. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1860-1862, 1861-05-28
For the Daily Patriot.
To the People of TENNESSEE

Tennessee are then to be determined by you
votes. They are, first, whether you as on
of the sovereign States of this Confederacy
will dissolve your connection with the Fede
raj Union; and second, whether you will unit
with the Southern Confederacy, and adop
the Constitution for their Provisional Gov
eminent.
With regard to these questions can Their
be doubt of what the response of Tennessee
and her gallant sons will bef That she viii
speak in tones of thunder to the Tyrant ant
UsurUer Lincoln and his myrmidOns tina
Tennessee is free-that she will strike off tn,
yoke that binds her to the North, and unit,
her destiny, now and forever, with her sister,
of the South? To act otherwise, would be t.
prove that her sons are not the worthy de
scendants OF those men who fought the bat
ties of the revolution and for less cause over
threw the government of Grorge the Third
aud dissolved their connection with the Brit
in Crown-that you have forgotten youl
fathers, the Kings Mountain heroes-anG
that you are untrue to your ancient renown
upon every battlefield from New Orleans to
Monterey, where Tennesseans have ever been
the first to rush at the call of their country
and which has given Tennessee the proud
title of 1.-THE Volunteer State.''
That her true Interests and honor dem and
this course will be apparent frcm a few con.
siderations. Not to dwell upon that long
course of abuses by the General Government
which, through high Tariff, Fishing bounties
Internal Improvements, and unequal legisla-
ton, has built up all the great interests al
the North. commercial, manufacturing and
agricultural, and poured untold wealth into
their Golfers, at the expense of the planting
and cotton States, and which has made them
in fact tributary TO the Free States-this war
which has now been inaugurated by Lincoln
for hn a1rhI of ha rr,st !
universal concurrence of the free States,
leaves no alternative.
The Constitution as it was made by our
fathers is a compact between co-equal and
sovereign States. 1t is one of strictly dele
gated p,'wers, and such was the jealousy of
the States with regard to the exercise of pow
ers by their agent the General Government,
it was expressly provided that all powers not
granted, nor prohibited to the States. were re-
served to the States, respectively, or the peo-
pie. At the time of its formation that ''pe-
culiar institution" which is so vital to the
Southern States, and through the productions
of slave labor to the commerce and civIliz l.
ton of the world, existed in all the States
with one exception, and is expressly guarded
and protected in the Constitution.
In process of time this institution, through
the influence of climate and other causes,
ceased 10 be profitable to the people of the
North, and Is a matter of State policy, it
ceased to exist in those States, and most of
heir slaves found their way to the South, by
sale to the Southern people.
Under such circumstances Ii was hardly to
be expected that our Northern brethren, hav-
ing rid themselves OF the evil, if they so re-
garded il, but which is in fact blessing to
both races, would have attempted any inter
ference with it In the States where il existed.
more especially as it was a matter purely of
domestic policy with which they had noihing
to do, or that they would have attempted to
deprive the South of their equal rights in the
territories under the Constitution. But not
withstanding this, under the pretense of phi
lanthropy, but in truth mainly for political
reasons, for the purpose of checking the
growth and prosperity of the South, the
North, for more than forty years, has been
carrying on an unproVoked, aggressive and
cruel war upon the South and It's Institutions
which has no parallel in the history of the
world, when there was no actual collision of
arms.
We shall not dwell here upon these outra-
ges at length, nor is it necessary. 1t is suffi
cient 10 say, they finally resulted in the
election of a sectional President by the free
States, without a single vote from the South,
founded upon principle OF direct hostility to
Southern institutions /; the result of which
would inevitably be not only the exclusion of
slavery from the territories, which were ac-
CURED equally by the blood and treasure of
the South, as of the North, but the ultimate
xtinction of slavery" in the States them
selves. 1t changed the whole character of
the government from one in which the equal
ity of all the States was recognized, and their
rights equally protected under the Constitu-
ton, to that of one grand consolidated des
potism. where the will of this sectional ma
jority was the only law.
This series of Outrages by the North upon
the South, eliminating in the election of Lin
coin, was IL itself a revolution and SC bver-
sion of the Constitution, which fully justified
the slave States. each one for itself in throw
ing themselves upon their original sovereign
ty. declaring the government dissolved, and
new Confederacy.
5 ven Of the cotton states at once proceed
ed in this Course and established a new Con-
ftderacy; and they have acted throughout
with wisdom. an energy and a forbearance
not surpassed in our revolutionary annals.
Tennessee and Virginia and the other
States, although fully alive TO
their rights, and deeply sensible of their
wrongs, with the warmest sympathy for the
seeded States. but still clinging to the old
Union and hoping for such an adjustment as
would secure their rights and bring back
these States, endeavored TO obtain new guar
antees within the Union. They appealed to
their Northern brethren in every way con-
sistent with their honor for such guarantees
by the glories of the past, the gloom of the
future, their mutual interests-but all in vain
They would have been satisfied with the Crit
tenden propositions those of the Peace
Conference, inadequate as they were but the
Black Republican leaders, under the influence
of fanaticism and hatred of the Southern
States, would not even permit them to be
presented to the States, although if they had
been, it is now very certain they would not
have been adopted.
On the 4th of March the present Admins
trstion came into power. Lincoln and his
Cabinet, with peace upon their lips, but
treacheTy and falsebood in their hearts, and
q duplicity and meanness that could not have
been surpassed by the W ,rst of the Roman
Emperors, not even Tiberius Cesar himself,
initiated war. They proclaimed that Fort
Sumter should be abandoned. but at the same
time sent down their ships of war and at
tempted its reinforcement. South Carolina.
as one of the Confederate States by vir.
tue OF her sovereignty. was entitled to the
integrity of her soil. And although the first
gun was fired from Fort Moultrie, il does not
make these States the aggressors it is the
party that forcibly retained Fort Sumter and
osseuP'cu W ieluiot &c ~ W lutte, THAT is
the aggressor. A glorious. but happily a
bloodless victory, was achieved in the bonn
bardment and surrender of this fort.
Lincoln then calls in bis ships and troops
from every quarter, and summons IS, 900 vol
unteers into the q Id 10 suppress, as be terms
il, 4" combinations" in these States and SUBJ
sequently issues another proclamation, call
ing upon the STATES for additional troops,
making nearly 1906 men which be has
call,d into the field We see these calls eve
rywhere sustained by the free States i'm
mense bodies of armed men assembled with
all the arms and munitions of War. ready to
march into Virginia and the seeded States i;
and likewise at Carlo. at the mouth of the
Ohio, evidently for the purpose of overawing,
and il need be prosecuting war of invasion
upon the Southern and Southwestern States.
The ports of all the seeded States, too, are