The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1904-12-28

Ntth'I! ~ "o'h. ~ altTlUUtc Gl Sti
crcignty wa IachirY. A nation AaL
been born in day.' The South
crncrs claimed to be aliens. They
were terribly in earnest.
President Liucoln's Official oath re-
quircd him to perform what circum-
stances now rendered both an impos
albility and an apparent violation Of
wha. he had affirmed to be "a most
valuable, a most sacred right" What
to do with the now Republic was tie
problem. ".ill we ask said prcsi-
dent Davis, "is to be let alone But
the whole North demanded action.
What policy shall our headed,
tender hearted Lincoln adopt? Con-
ssten,ly with his fayoritc doctrine,
he may advise to recognize the new
power, and to enter into diplomatic
relations with it in the hope of even
tlally winning it back or he may
undertake to onnihilatc its govern
mcnt by force, conquer its people and
rcanncx its territory.
Conscicntiously be chose the latter
course. Immediately the shooting
began and four other States joined
the Confcdcracy.
Mr.. Lincoln denied, .and most peo-
pie at the North always denied, that
the eleven seeded States constituted
a nation. But show US a detiuition
that shall not include under that ap-
pcllation the Confederate States. "Tho
State, says Prof. Bluntschli, "is the
politically organized people (Volk-
person) of a peculiar land" "a ma
ton, says President Woolsey Qntrod
to Study Of International Law "is an
organized community within certain
territory" Says the Standard Die
tionary, "a nation is an organized po-
litical community considered with ref
renee to the persons composing it. :"
Webster International Dictionary
defines it as "the body of the
Inhabitants OF country, united un-
der aa independent government Of
their own" The Century Dictionary
makes it IAN Organized crmnnnity
'nhatitlDG certain extent Of &C. ri
| tory, within which it's sovereignty is
exercised The Oldest, ablcst and
most impartial Of living historians,
Prof. Goodwin Smith, always a strong
champion of the North in its conflict
with the South, explicitly and re-
peatedly insists that the Confederacy
was bona fled nation, and that the
war was really international, not
civil"
What, then, was the duty of the
Washington Government2
Guided by it's fundam utal priuci
pies, bearing in mind it's own origin,
recalling it's uniform action in similar
cases, and acting in the spirit of Him
who is the "Author of Peace and the
Lover of Concord" should it not at
least have recognized the Richmond
Government, received its comm ..ssion
ers and listened to its overtures
Was It not as true then as when our
lamented Mckinley uttered it in 1898
that "forcible annexation is criminal
aggression?" Was it any the less so
because tho Southern people had al
ways been our associates, friends,
kinsfolk? Some nations may seem TO
have repudiated that doctrine now,
but who will say that forey-two years
ago every honorable expedient should
not have been tried, every fair and
kindly concession have been made, all
possible patience exhausted, before
recourse was had to violence against
our brothers2
Instead of that ne shut our eyes
and clenohed oar fists. We denied
that tdey were a nation either de
facto or do jure. A remark wittier
than wise. made by our quartermas
ter, Bromley, during the war to a
Southern lady who was eloquently ex,
tolling the Confederacy as an ideal
nation in contrast with the North, ex-
pressed the persistent nominal atti-
tudc of the Union authorities-"Per.
nit me TO suggest, madam, that me
Southern nation, which you 80 beauti-
fully describe, is mere imaginationr'
None of US, at the time, openly ad-
mittcd the genuineness of that ma
tionality; few of us frankly ooncede it
today; perhaps some of us never will;
but from the first all the South claim
ed 10; most of them claim it today;
probably many of them always will.
Because of our reverence for the
laws and the Constitution, all of
which we felt that the South had
most wautOuly violated and os INV