Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1881-08-08

right of secession, but in the right OF the
seeding States to appropriate the property
Of the United States. There was not and
could not be any doubt as to the ownership
of the forts in Charleston harbor. They
had been built and paid for with the
money of the United States, and South
Carolina could have no claim upon them,
even supposing secession recognized. But
General Scott, according to Black, seems
to have thought that they ought to be sur
rendered to South Carolina the moment
they were demanded, and he could not
bring himself to the point of offending his
Southern friends by reinforcing Major An
derson. Indeed when the latter moved
from Fort Moultrie into Fort Sumter,
Scott wanted to have him reproyed sharply,
and but for the firm stand taken by Black
this would have been done. Buchanan, he
says, after much vacillation,- at length
Welded to his (Black's) urgent representa-.
TONS and issued the order for the REIN
forcement of Major Anderson. Bat Scott
took it upon himself to keep the order in
his pocket for two months, and at last,
when he could no longer delay the execu-
| ton of it, he persisted in sending the
troops to Charleston in the defenseless
merchant steamer Star of the West, in
stead of the frigate Brooklyn, which had
been got ready for the work, and which
could not have been fred upon with i'm
punity by the rebels.
This is very extraordinary story, but
it is necessary to point out that even if all
that Black says of Scott is true, his I'M
! faithfulness to the Union cause cannot be
regarded as relieving Buchanan of respon-
sibility fer the failure to reinforce the
Charleston forts. 1t seems, according to
Judge Black, that Buchanan allowed Scott
to disobey his positive orders allowed him
to pocket those orders, and ignore them for
| two months and to the last permitted the
General to thwart and weaken the purposes
of the Government. Now if all this is
true, it only serves to show, what was very
well understood before, that President
Buchanan was very weak. minded man;
but it assuredly does not make his part in
the crisis any the less reprehensible. 1t
was his plain duty to see that his orders
were promptly and unhesitatingly obeyed,
and if General Scott undertook to defeat
his policy he should have suspended him
at once, and transferred the command of
the Federal forces to an officer in whose fl.
deity and obedience he could rely. In fact
if Buchanan really was convinced that
it was mis- duty to reinforce the Charleston
forts, and nevertheless permitted Scott to
prevent him from performing his duty, the
fact places him in more odious and con.
temptible light than ever. For Judge
Black now describes him as man so
utterly infirm of purpose that even when
his convictions harmonized with what he
clearly perceived to be bis duty, he was
yet too weak to resist the usurpation of
his prerogative by subordinate whose
purposes he well knew to be disloyal and
sinister. In short We do not see that
Judge Black has succeeded at all in reha-
bilitating the character of Buchanan by
impeaching the character of Scott He
may have made an addition to the list of
secessionists, buthe certainly has not effect
ed the substitution at which he seems to
have aimed.