Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-12-18
FIFTY YEARS AGO
IN THE STAR

XN XAA WIN
Several members Of President Buchan-
ans cabinet were in close sympathy
with the secession
Secretary Cobb movement. fifty years
p..;~ ago. and one Of the
6A"' questions Of keenest in
terest in Washington at that time relat-
ed to the possibility Of . general break
up Of the executive advisory council on
the disunion issue. The first change was
announced as follows in The Star De-
cember 10. 1860:
THE Hon. Howell Cobb has resigned
the secretaryship Of the Treasury, and.
We learn. proposes on Thursday next to
repair to Georgia, where it now appears
he is candidate for the state conven-
ton to assemble on the 7th proximo. He
did not attend either of the three last
cabinet councils. Well informed persons
here attribute the step he has taken to
recent information that the cause OF the
destruction Of the Union has been much
damaged in Georgia by the dictatorial In
temperance with which 1t has been sup
ported there. Long since he embarked
his political future with that cause and
IL it perchance goes down In Georgia
the political fortunes Of Mr.. Howell Cobb
Of course go under with it. Our sincere
hope is that even his eloQuence and
energy will not prove sufficient to re-
pair the damage to the cause which his
really oligarchic and anti-republican CO.
laborers for the destruction Of the gov
eminent have already effected. He leaves
y; ,c< hA~o to- condition
ever was in before, perhaps since the
very formation Of the government; its
sad state being quite as much the re-
suit Of the fact that the business COM
come to distrust his fidelity to the gov
eminent he swore to uphold when taking
executive office in this city.
cit has become known here says The
Star Of December II. 1850. that the dis
union leaders design refus-
To Secede ing to permit the people Of
their respective states to
W VAoeA' vote upon what they in
tend their respective state conventions
shall do. Their scheme certainly is to
rush secession through those conventions
and to decline submitting to the people
willing to leave the Union. The truth
is, they apprehend popular rejection OF
their purpose and aim to oreak up the
government by a coup de main. which
they fear will be as repugnant to a ma
jority of their own people as to the peo-
pie Of the other states.
The truth of what we write above will
be made manifest in less tnan a fortnight
by the action of the South Carolina con-
vention, which will assume to declare
that state out of the Union without SUBJ
hitting to the people the question whether
they are or are not willing to accept the
altered condition Of things they (the
convention) assumed to ordain for them.
We feel assured that an increasing ap-
prehension that the Georgia convention
may not dare to venture upon the ex-
pertinent of carrying out this program in
the face of the opposition to 1t which
the gallant Stephens and his co-patriots
may essay to 1t, more than aught else, in
duce the resignation of Secretary Cobb.
that he might be on hand to prevent the
wreck of the plans of the conspirators
by and through the triumph of the de-
termination of the unionists in the
Georgia convention that the people of
the state shall be permitted to record
their judgment upon the question Of &C
cepting the future which the ,disunion
oligarchists aim to carve out for them"
Indiscreet advocates of secession in
Washington talked SO freely at times
during the exciting months
Slave preceding the civil war that
some Of the plans Of the
AA"uo' southern leaders were seri-
ously menaced. In The Star Of Decem-
Der IL, 1850. is the following paragraph
of interest in this connections:
If there be men yet skeptical of the
purpose of the leaders of the secession
movement of the gulf states to crafty
the desire Of their negroless followers
for the reopening of the African slave
trade in case they succeed in breaking
up the Union. they have only to come
here and listen attentively for few days
to the conversation of the subordinate Sc
cessionists now in the federal metrop-
oils, who evidently regard the re-estab-
lishment of that trade as being as certain
to grow out of successful secession as
the night to follow the day. Indeed, one
Of the leading causes Of their disinclina-
ton to have the gulf states to go into
council WITH the border slave-holding
states is because they believe that the
latter may prove powerful enough to de-
feat that darling purpose. In their con-
verSattOn here they Dy no means follow
the willy advice recently given to them by
the Charleston Mercury not to breach the
subject Of reopening the African slave
trade, now.
Secession sentiment was openly ex-
pressed in Washington during the winter
of 186O-61, not merely on
Palmetto the part Of the political
DALAI representatives Of that
badge. movement, but by en-
ployes of the government. In The Star
of December Ii, 1850. is the following
paragraph:
"A day or two since one of the cabinet
officers, noticing on the coat Of subordi-
nate a singular looking badge, and sus-
pecting its character, requested the indi-
vidual to call at his room. He then in
CURED of the young man the meaning OF
this device. Sir responded he, in re-
ply. this is a Palmetto badge and sig
mites that I am for secession Then,
SIR replied the high of1cial, will In
form you that your services in this de-
partment are no longer required and your
successor will be appointed tonight
ANY APARTMENT HOUSE.