The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1884-07-03
Blaine on v1rginia's Separation.
AN INTERESTING CHAPTER FROM HIS
HISTORY.

| twenty years IN Congress. In order
that our readers may have the benefit OF
the entire paper, the ablest ever given to
the public on the subject, we lay before
them this morning the full chapter, thus
reproducing in part what has already been
published. Mr.. Blaine says:
The great Importance attached by Mr..
Lincoln to the preservation of loyalty in
the line of slave states which bordered
upon the free states was everywhere re-
cognized. AS Delaware, Maryland, Ken
lucky. and Missouri had been promptly
placed under the control of governments
friendly to the union, there remained of
the states in rebellion only Virginia with
territory adjacent to the loyal states. Vir-
ginia bordered on the Ohio river for $50
miles she was adjacent to Pennsylvania
for distance of 100 miles, half on the
southern. half on the western, line of that
state. Her extreme point stretched to the
northward of Pittsburg. and was within
twenty-five miles of the parallel of lati-
tude that marks the southern boundary of
New England. The continued exercise of
even nominal jurisdiction so far north,
by the state which contained the capital of
the rebel confederacy, would be serious
impeachment of the power of the national
|
respect at home and its prestige abroad.
But the national government was of itself
capable only of enforcing military occupa-
ti0n and proclaiming the jurisdiction of
the sword. What the president desired
was the establishment of civil government
by u loyal people, with the reign of law
and order everywhere recognized. Hap
PLY the disposition of the inhabitants was
in harmony with the wishes of the admin
istration and the necessities Of the union.
After the adoption of the secession ordi-
nance by the Virginia convention Of the
seventeenth of April. the loyal people of
the western section of the state were
prompt to act. AS early as the thirteenth
| of May. fortnight before the day ap-
pointed for the popular vote on the Sc
cession ordinance in Virginia, five hun
dred Staunch union men came together in
a convention at Wheeling, denounced the
ordinance of secession and pledged their
loyalty to the national government and
their obedience to it's laws. IF the ordi-
nance should be approved by the popular
vote of Virginia, this preliminary confer
ence requested the people in all the cOun-
ties represented to appoint delegates on
the 4th day of June to a general conven-
| tion to assemble in Wheeling on the 18th
of the same month. These union loving
men were energetic and jealous. They
realized that with the secession of Vir-
ginia, completed and proclaimed, they
must do one of two things-either proceed
at once to organize a state government
which would be faithful to the national
constitution, or drift helplessly into an
archy, and thus contribute to the success
OF the rebellion. Their prompt and intel
| ligent action is a remarkable Illustration
of the trained and disciplined ability of
| Americans for the duties Of Self-gOvern-
ment.
| The members of the convention which
was organized on the 18th of June were
even more determined than those who had
assembled the preceding month. Without
delay, they declared the state offices of
| Virginia vacant because of the treason and
disloyalty of those who had been elected
to hold them, and they proceeded to fill
them and to form regular state organiza-
! ton, of which Francis II. PierpOnt was
appointed the executive head. They did
not assume to represent a mere section of
the state, but in the belief that the loyal
people were entitled to speak for the
whole state they declared that their gov
eminent was the government of Vir-
ginia. This western movement was sub
sequently strengthened by the accession of
delegates from Alexandria and Fairfax
counties, in middle Virginia, and from
|
the Eastern Shore. Thus organized, the
government of the state was acknowledged
by congress as the government of Virginia
and her senators and representatives were
admitted to seats.
| Notwithstanding the compliance with
all the outward forms and requirements,
notwithstanding the recognition by con-
| gresS of the new government, it was seen
to be essentially and really the government
OF West Virginia. 1t was only nominally
and by construction the government of the
state of Virginia. 1t did not represent
the political power or the majority OF the
people of the entire state. That power
was welded in aid of the rebellion. The
senators and representatives Of Virginia
were in the Confederate congress. The
| strength of her people was in the confed-
crate army, of which a distinguished Vir-
| ginian was the commander. The Situa-
ton was anomalous, though the friends of
the union justified the irregularity of re-
cognizing the framework of government
in the hands Of loyal men as the actual adj
ministration of the state of Virginia.
The people of the western section of
Virginia realized that the position was
unnatural, one which they could not sus-.
tain by popular power within the limits of
the state they assumed to govern, except
for the protection afforded by the military
power of the national government. Be-
tween the two sections of the state there
had long been serious antagOniSm. Indeed
from the very origin of the settlement of
| West Virginia, which had made but little
progress when the federal constitution was
adopted, its citizens were in large degree
alienated from the eastern and older sec
tion of the state. The most of the men
were hardy fr0ntiersmen, majority OF
| ~ tIo Init md
immediate descendants. without estates,
with little but the honorable record of
patriotic service and their own strong
arms, for their fortunes. They had few
slaves. They had their land patents, which
were certificates of patriotic service in
the revolutionary war and they depended
4 upon their own labor for new home in
the wilderness. A population thus origi-
mating, a community thus founded, were
naturally uncongenial to the aristocratic
element of the Old Dominion. They had
no trade relations, no social intercourse,
with the tide-water section of the state.
Formidable mountain ranges separated
the two sections, and the inhabitants saw
little of each other. The business inter-
ests Of the western region led the people
to the valley of the Ohio and not to the
shores of the Chesapeake. The waters of
the Monongahela connected them with
Pennsylvania and carried them to Pitts
burg. All the rivers of the western slope
flowed into the Ohio and gave to the people
the markets of Cincinnati and Louisville.
Their commercial intercourse depended
on the navigation of western waters, and
a far larger number had visited st. Louis
and New Orleans than had ever seen Rich
mond or Norfolk. The West Virginians
were aware of the splendid resources of
their section and were constantly irritated
by the neglect of the parent state to aid
| in their development. They enjoyed a
climate as genial as that of the Italians
who dwell on the slopes of the Apprentices ;
! they had forests more valuable than those
that skirt the upper Rhine; they had min
eral wealth as great as that which has
given England her precedence in the man.
ufacturing progress of the world. They
were anxious for self-government. Their
1 trustworthy senator, Waitman T. Wiley,
declared that the people west of the ALLIE
ghany range had for sixty years desired
separation" The two sections, he said,
had been time and again on the eve of an
outbreak, and the western people could
with difficulty be held back from insur-
rection. EXAMINATIONS and recriminations
had haan aychanOnd of ayarV session of the