The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1868-10-13

hSfaAtlt. 81 ifAhs - 4tsgI6e To hIhb VtoW o.
il, We are suffering now terribly,
both North and South, from political
intemperance. You were guilty of it
when you did all in your po$$sr 90
rupture the Union by for ), because
yon would not trust the {, Iestion of
elaye.ss,S e The The people under the Con-
stitutionj and we are, guilty of it now
when we viii not restore the Union
under the Constitution, because we
distrust the people. What is needed,
in the first place, is moderation,
calmness and habit of patience in
politics, we orc inclined to be i'm
pulsive, headlong, desperate in our
devices. Waiting and watching,
relying upon slow but sure processes,
has never been very popular with
any people of our race, and is pecu-
liarly distasteful to us. But, my
fellow-citizens, this disagreeable dis
cipline is, in my Judgment, precisely
the training we are, all of us, most
in need of. and 1 think it essential to
your happy deliverance. Let us come
down to the actual facts of your case,
and try to look at them together,
calmly, dispassionately and without
prejudice. 1t is always foolish to
deceive ourselves, and in your case,
to mislead you knowingly, would be
n crime. I shall, therefore, speak
with perfect frankness and plainness.
You began the war down here at
Sumter, under claim of right to
defend yourselves as an independent
State, which had exercised reserved
right to secede from the Union; and
l take it that no one denies tha. the
cause of that action was the appre-
hended danger to slavery, from the
result of the election of 1866. You
fought for your side of the contro-
versy for four years, with desperate
determination and courage, until ut
last you were compelled by the fate
of battle to surrender. You had
allied yourselves with other seeded
States and formed Confederacy,
which claimed an equal rank among
the nations. You proclaimed slavery
its cornerstone. In the stress of
conflict, as war measure, justified
by the emergency, and as means of
distressing you, your slaves were
proclaimed free. The North insisted
that no State could secede under the
Constitution, and that the whole
proceeding, on the part of the State,
was an insurrectiou of portion of
the people of the seeding States. It
is far from my intention to revive
old controversies, or reopen settled
disputes. But I must state the facts,
to bring us to our present position.
You claimed to be sovereign
State, and OH your own showing
were, by the laws of war, subject to
any terms the victor might impose.
1t did not lie in your mouths, there
fore, to demand any rights in the
Union you had broken, or any i'm
munlty from the consequences of
your own acts under the Constitution
you had renounced. If we were to
accept your own theory of action,
you were alien enemies and your
land conquered territory, and so sub
lect to the naked laws of war alone.
But the North had always denied
every one of your positions; had in
sisted that you were never out of the
Union; that your resolutions of Sc
cesslon were simply void; that you
could not cease to be citizens of the
United States by any such process,
and that. of course, yon were liable,
when taken, to the pains and penal
ties of perjury. To be sure, this
theory was necessarily infringed
little in practice, rs in respect to the
exchange of prisoners and the OBJ
servance Of the same laws of warfare
that obtain between independent
States. Still, this was the accepted
faith. The war was to subdue an in
surrection, not to conquer nation.
You were defeated rebels, not van
quished alien enemies, and the Union
was re-established, not extended over
your territory. It was upon this
theory that the Government of the
United States proceeded at first to
renew what were called the practical
relations of the States to the Union,
and you gladly accepted this view of
the case, and did all in your power
to resume your vacant place.
Now it has always seemed to me
that you, by your acts, at that time,
gave all the proof in your power that
You abandoned the principle for
which you fought, accepted the de-
cision of your wager of battle, and
bowed to the supremacy of the Con-