The commercial. (Union City, Tenn.) 190?-193?, 1903-09-04
POSITION OF THE SOUTH.
Gen. Geo. Still Believes States Had
Right TO Secede.

Gen George " Gordon , Gem
mander Of The Tennessee Division
United Confederate Veterans, wa'
here Saturday from Memphis 70
til purpose of comforting witt
Prank Ghheaattii;ai;iff EEivor;a frel;i i =
to raising funds to meet debt o
the association. This amounts t.
$4,000 and Tennessee's part II
$500.
After the conference with Capt
John p. Hickman, Gen. Gordon
was invited to address the bivouaC
Saturday night. He acceeded to
the request and delivered a stir
ring and eloquent address, defend
ing the position taken by the South
in the civil war. Gen. Gordon is
writing history Of the secession
and gave in an interesting way a
synopsis Of the contents OF the
book.
"In my remarks here tonight,
said Gen. Gordon, sit is not my
desire to inspire in anyone a spirit
of hatred or hostility to the peo-
pie of the North nor to review
political animosities or sectional
antipathies, but if my words
should have that effect, so be 1T.
I would not allude to the causes
and questions that plunged the
country into a bloody and blasting
war forty years ago, if it were not
for the fact that the Northern
people during that period have per-
petually and persistently charged,
iterated, and to-day are reiteratlng
that the Southern people were re-
sponsible for that war with all its
crimes and carnage. They are
still telling the world, and trying
to convince it, that you and | and
every other soldier and patriot OF
the South were rebels and traitors
and that we causelessly, wickedly
and aggressiVely sought to over
throw great and equitable
government.
such charges are not only UNI
Just and calumnious, but the peo-
pie of the North were the real
aggressors and consequently re-
ponsible for the untold woes and
calamities of that deplorable
conflict.
Gen. Gordon referred to the two
statesmen of Massachusetts who in
1904 and 1911 advocated a dissolu-
ton of the Union, or in other
words, secession, saying that at
that time no statesmen, North or
South, had ever denied the right OF
State to withdraw from the
Union. He showed where Mas
sachusetts again threatened such
action in 1914, claiming the right
to secede.
"And thus we see," he said,
that Massachusetts,, that nation
al fountain of vanity and venality,
of officiousness and intolerance,
twice threatened to do just what
South Carolina and ten other
Southern States proposed peace
ably to do, and did so by solemn
ordinance of secession in 1860 and
1861, but were invaded, despoiled
and finally overpowered by the
weight of numbers an stress OF
circumstances, and compelled after
submitting to the most Illuminating
conditions, to resume their places
in the Federal Union
And so, we say the South did
not inaugurate the war, Re con-
tinued, "as charged, nor was she
primarily responsible for one drop
of the blood that flowed, one pang
of the untold woes that were
suffered, or one dollar of the billions
of treasure that was spent. The
North was aggressive, the South
defended. The North invaded to
Stay and despoil, the South re-
sisted to protect and preserve.
The North fought Extensively for
commerce, power and empire, the
South fought defensively for home,
freedom and Independent e.'-Mon-
days Nashville Banner,
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