Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1881-02-17

The Chicago Times makes public the
topics discussed by Jefferson Davis in
his history 1.-THE Rise and Fall of the
Confederate Government''-soon to be
issued. Mr.. Davis introduction is
short one, covering not quite two pages.
He dedicates the work to the widows and
orphans of the Confederate dead. He
conceives it to be his duty to his coun-
trymen to prepare this history of the
rise and failure of their cause. He finds
in the structure of thirteen independent
States, and their relation to each other,
primary principles and vested rights on
which he rests his vindication of the
Confederacy. He evidences the doc
trine of State sovereignty and COM
pact by which the States volun-
tarily gave their consent to federation,
with no design. expressed or implied,
ever to become fractional parts OF the
nation, and he believes that those who
resisted the violation of this original
compact were. in fact, the true friends
of constitutional union. The author. in
discussing principles and events in their
natural and logical order, first gives his
attention to African servitude and the
long and bitter sectional strife to which
it gave rise; he then takes up the ques-
ton of States rights, giving constitu-
tional and historical arguments on which
he rests the principle of State sover.
eighty, and quoting copiously from all
authorities on the subject of these ques-
tions, and full statement of the imme
date causes of the war, occupy one half
of the first volume. The remainder
of the work is given to a narrative
of the struggle, including the
fullest statement yet written from a
Southern standpoint of the fierce OLSEN
sions in the Confederate councils, and
of his defense of the proclamation of the
war after many of the ablest men in the
South were fully convinced that their
struggle was a hopeless one. In the
opening of the work he treats of the
early legislation on the subject of slavery;
he acquits the South of all responsibility
for the existence in its midst of that
peculiar institution, and calls attention
to the fact that Virginia was the first
DtdGC W pIUHluit thV 1AAPoA eoelOh AhVO 1tS
territory of blacks brought to this coun
try and reduced to slavery, and
that Georgia was the first State
to incorporate in its constitution
prohibition of the African slave
trade. All through the work he treats
of slavery, not as the cause of the war,
but only as an incident of the secession
movement. The only question, he de-
clares, was equality in the Territories,
and of the inability of the South to
maintain its equal rights in the Terrific
ries and new made States of the Union.
He traces the conflict, which intensified
until it burst into open war. While
upon this subject, he speaks in condem-
natory terms of the Missouri compro
mise, which he regards as surrender of
rights which belonged to the South,
and which it should have maintained,
but after it was adopted he believed
it should have been adhered to.
and he arraigns the North and Federal
Government for the failure of the COM
promise. which was practically repealed
by the bills organizing the Territories OF
Kansas and Nebraska in 1859. 1t will
be observed that Mr.. Davis takes occa-
sion to declare in many places through
out the work his devotion to a cOnstitu-
tlonal Union; he instances speeches
which he made in 1851, during his can
didacy for Governor of Mississippi in
opposition to Henry S. Foote. These
speeches contained repeated declarations
of his adherence and devotion to the
Union, and he afirms that his public
deeds were at all times actuated by this
spirit before the General Government
began its violent encroachments on the
rights of the States. 1t was during the
Pierce administration that the struggle
in Kansas, between the free soil and pro-
slavery parties, eliminated. In the bit
terness of this struggle, Mr.. Davis finds
the beginning of the immediate causes
of the war He devotes considerable
space to description of what he calls
the usurpations of the Federal authori-
ties. Congress, it will be remembered,
refused to recognize delegate chosen
from Kansas, on the ground that his
election by the proslavery party had
been procured by fraud. He regards
the repeal of the Missouri compromise
as reopening of the question of slavery
in the Territories, and as precipitating
conflict between the opposing parties,
which was encouraged by the
abolitionists of the North, and
which finally compelled the South,
in self-defense, to take a decided
stand. He holds the violent abolition
lists largely responsible for the final
breach of peace. Bringing his history
down to the election of Lincoln, he finds
the Federal Government in the hands of
a party under which the Southern States
could not live. Lincoln was elected up
on a platform of resistance to slavery
extension. A party antagonistic to the
South and believing in the Capitalization
of power in the Federal Government
controlled the Executive Department
Having devoted half of the first volume
to an exposition of the causes which led
the South to desire separation from
the Federal Government, Mr.. Davis pro-
ceeds in several chapters to defend the
right of secession. In justification of
this right he quotes largely from
Webster, Calhoun, Douglas, Gree
lev Seward, Benton and Clay. In
maintaining that the compact between
the States was in the nature of confed-
Grafton, he draws largely for the basis of
his argument upon the debates in the
Constitutional Convention of ITO, and
fortifies himself with extracts from Sto-
rev on the Constitution, Elliott's Debates
and Bancrofts History. He refers to the
memorable debate on the purchase of
Louisiana, when Josiah Quincy, of Mas
sachusetts, asserted in the House of Re-
representatives., that that act virtually dis
solved the Union, so that the States were
freed from the obligations, and should
prepare for peaceable or forcible sepa-
ration. He gives history of the adoption
of the tenth amendment to the COnStitu-
ton, by which it was provided that 'pow-
ers not granted to the United States by the
Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the
States, are reserved to the States re-
spectively, or to the people" lie vim
dicates the right of secession as perfect
" compatible with the Constitution, and
claims that the General Government has
no rightful power to prevent it. The
question, he maintains, rests with the
people, from whom all power is derived.
Arriving, in the latter part of the first
volume, at the period when hostilities
commenced, the narrative makes rapid
progress. The author refers to the
Northern protests against coercion, In
which connection the name of Greeley
figures prominently. He maintains the
South did everything in its power to 60
out of the Union peaceably and quietly;