The Alleghanian. [volume] (Ebensburg, Pa.) 1859-1865, 1864-10-06
Who is Responsible for the
war!

The following remarks were made by
Alexander Ii. Stevens, now Vice Presi-
dent of the Southern Confederacy, at the
Georgia Convention which met at Mil
ledgeville, in November, 1860, to consider
the question of seeding from the Union.
His arguments against secession are valu-
able as matter of history:
When we and posterity shall see our
lovely South desolated by the demons of
war which this act of yours will inevita-
bly, invite and call forth when our green
fields Of waving harvests shall be trod-
den down by the murderous soldiery and
fiery car CT war sweeping over our land /;
our temples of justice laid in ashes all
the horrors and desolations of war upon
US, who but this convention will be held
responsible for it and who but him who
shall have given his vote for this unwise
strict account for this suicidal act by the
present generation, and probably cursed
and execrated by posterity tor all coming
time, for the wide and desolating ruin that
will inevitably follow this act you now
propose to perpetrate ?
Pause, l entreat you, and consider for
a momen6 what reasons you can give that
will even satisfy yourselves in calmer mo-
ments-what reasons can you give to your
fellow-sufferers in the calamity that it will
bring upon US ? What reasons can you
give to the nations of the earth to justify
it? They will be the calm and deliberate
judges in the case and to what cause or
one overt act can we point, on which to
rest the plea of justification What right
has the North assailed What interest
Of the South has been invaded What
justice has been denied and what claim
founded in justice, what right has been
| withheld Can either of you to-day name
one governmental act of wrong deliberate
y and purposely done by the government
| at Washington, of which the South has a
right to complain? [ challenge the an
swer While on the other hand, let me
show the fact (and believe me, gentlemen,
am not here the advocate of the North
but am here the friend, the firm friend
and lover ofthe South and herinstitutiens,
and for this reason L speak thus plainly
and faithful to yours, mine, and every 9TH
ef man interest, the words OF truth dno
soberness,) of which [ wish you to Judge
and [ will only state facts which. are clear
and undcniable, and which now stand as
records authentic in the history of oul
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 for twenty years When we
| asked threc-fitth representation in Con
gress for our slaves, was it not granted
When we asked and demanded the return
of any fugitive from justice, or the recov-
cry of those persons owing labor or allegi
ance, was it not Incorporated in the con
stitution And again ratified and
strengthened in the Fugitive Slave law ol
1850?
Do you reply that in many instances
they have violated this compact, and have
not been faithful to their engagement ?
As individuals and local communities they
may have done SO but not by the sane
| tion Of government, for that has always
teen true to Southern interests. Again
gentlemen, look at another fact: when We
have asked that more territory should be