Browsing "Withdrawing from the Union"

Tariffs and the South

The Confederate Constitution eliminated protective tariffs for industry altogether. The Boston Transcript observed on March 18, 1861 that “the principal seceding States are now for commercial independence” from the North, and it warned its readers that if free trade were permitted to exist in the Southern States, then the Southern ports would take away most of the trade from Boston, New York and other Northern ports. There is no doubt that a free-trade South could not be tolerated by protectionist Northern merchants who supported Lincoln’s party.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.Circa1865.com

 

Tariffs and the South

“In a November 1860 speech before the Georgia legislature, US Senator Robert Toombs explained why Southerners were complaining of unconstitutional fiscal plunder by the federal government and why they believed it was about to get much, much worse with the election of Lincoln.

In recent years, Toombs explained, the Northern States had succeeded in having Congress give them a legal monopoly in the shipbuilding business, prohibiting the sale of foreign-made ships in the United State. This increased the cost of shipping to the trade-dependent South.

Other laws prohibited foreign shippers from offering lower prices than American shippers. Special taxes were assessed on the citizens of Southern coastal areas to pay for lighthouses and harbors that primarily benefited the Northern shipping industry. “Even the fishermen of Massachusetts and New England,” Toombs complained, “demand and receive from the public treasury about half a million dollars per annum as a pure bounty on their business of catching codfish.”

Northern manufacturers also enjoyed trade protection with tariffs and import quotas “for every trade, craft, and calling which they pursue,” with tariffs ranging “from fifteen to two hundred percent,” most of which end up being paid by Southerners. No wonder they cry out for glorious Union,” Toombs said sarcastically, for “by it they got their wealth.”

On the eve of the South’s secession, Toombs then railed against the proposed Morrill Tariff, which proposed raising the tariff rate by as much as 250 percent on some items. With this tariff bill, Northerners were “united in a joint raid against the South.”

Because of the federal government, largely under the influence of Northern politicians, had overridden its bounds of constitutionality with regard to public spending, the Treasury had become a “perpetual fertilizing stream to [Northern businesses and laborers] and a suction-pump to drain away our substance and parch up our lands.”

(The Real Lincoln, A New Look at Abraham Lincoln, His Agenda, and an Unnecessary War; Thomas J. DiLorenzo, Forum, 2002, excerpts pp. 126-127)

The Dimensions of Southern Identity

The fundamental reason for the 1860-1861 withdrawal of Southern States from the 1787 Union was to achieve political independence, and distance themselves from the changed and radicalizing Northern States which had become increasingly populated by immigrants fully unfamiliar with the United States Constitution. That North was seen as a threat to the safety and liberty of the Southern people and therefore a separation was inevitable. The following piece on “Southern Identity” is an excerpt from the Fall 2017 newsletter of the Abbeville Institute — the only pro-Southern “think-tank” and an invaluable online educational resource.

Please consider a generous contribution to this organization, which is tax-deductible and can be made through PayPal at the www.abbevilleinstitute.org website.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.Circa1865.com

 

The Dimensions of Southern Identity

“Southern identity is not a mere regional identity such as being a Midwesterner or a New Englander. The South was an independent country, and fought one of the bloodiest wars of the nineteenth century to maintain its independence. No group of Americans in any war have fought so hard and suffered so much for a cause.

That historic memory as well, as resistance to the unfounded charge of “treason,” is built into the Southern identity. The South seceded to continue enjoying the founding decentralized America that had dominated from 1776 to 1861. We may call it “Jeffersonian America” because it sprang from both the Declaration of Independence and Jefferson’s election which was called “the Revolution of 1800.”

This founding “Jeffersonian America” was largely created and sustained by Southern leadership. In the first 67 years only 16 saw the election of Northern presidents. In the first 72 years, five Southern presidents served two terms. No Northern president served two terms.

The Republican Party was a revolutionary “sectional party” determined to purge America of Southern leadership and transform America into a centralized regime under Northern control.

When Southerners seceded, they took the founding “Jeffersonian America” with them. The Confederate Constitution is merely the original U.S. instrument except for a few changes to block crony capitalism and prevent runaway centralization.

Part of Southern identity is its persistent loyalty to the image of decentralized Jeffersonian America. To be sure, libertarians and others outside the South have a theoretical commitment to decentralization, but none have the historical experience of suffering to preserve the founding Jeffersonian America.

But the deepest dimension of Southern identity is found in Flannery O’Conner’s statement that Southern identity in its full extent is a “mystery known only to God,” and is best approached through poetry and fiction. The humiliation of defeat and the rape of the region by its conquerors have given Southerners a clarity about the limits of political action, the reality of sin, and the need of God’s grace.”

(Abbeville: The Newsletter of the Abbeville Institute, Fall 2017, excerpts pp. 1-3)

Seward’s Hot Potato

Samuel Cutler Ward (1814-1884), known as the “King of the Lobby” due to his exemplary success at high-level political persuasion, was the brother of abolitionist Julia Ward, and served as an intermediary between William Seward and Confederate leaders before the war. Ward told Seward in 1862 that the Confederate leaders would not rejoin the Union as he saw in the South “a malignant hatred of the North which rendered” the destruction of the South necessary. Ward understood that “within two years they would have formed entangling free trade and free navigation treaties with Europe and a military power hostile to us.” Seward may have believed that peace might prevail, but Lincoln and his party’s extremists led the way to war.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.Circa1865.com

 

Seward’s Hot Potato

“Seward, who was to be Secretary of State, it had become definite, was in a quandary. As he saw the situation, he faced two necessities: one was to guide the inexperienced Lincoln in shaping the policies of the Administration; and the other was to convince his former associates in the Senate, who now headed the insurrectionary Confederacy in Montgomery, that Washington would initiate no hostilities against them, but would follow a policy of conciliation and friendship.

Seward wanted Jefferson Davis, Judah P. Benjamin, and the others to understand clearly that he would be the chief architect of Administration policy; and further, that they could rely on his assurance that this policy would be one of peace, not provocation. In this, of course, he spoke only for himself, but he was convinced that he would be able to shape Lincoln’s view of the situation; Lincoln, he reasoned, was unversed in statecraft, and would be grateful for expert leading by a thoroughly practiced Secretary of State.

Seward’s sincere conviction was that the problem of secession, like all other human disagreements, could be resolved by reasonable discussion among reasonable men. One wing of the Republican party was howling for the forcible suppression of “treason” in the South; this wing was led by Salmon P. Chase of Ohio, and to them Seward’s conciliatory views were themselves barely removed from Treason, — if removed at all. For him to communicate directly with the men in Montgomery might be construed as “communicating with the enemy.”

If he were to communicate with them at all, he would have to work through an intermediary whom both he and Southern leaders could trust . . . [poet, politician and gourmet] Sam Ward.

When Lincoln slunk into Washington in a distressing pusillanimous manner (or so it seemed), supposedly to foil an assassination plot, Sam was disgusted.

Seward was juggling a hot potato tossed to him by three commissioners whom the Confederacy had sent to Washington to treat for the peaceable surrender of United States forts in Southern territory, principally Fort Sumter at Charleston, and Fort Pickens near Pensacola, Florida. The commissioners . . . were well-known to Sam . . . If [they] go back unacknowledged as [commissioners], President Davis cannot hold back the people from attacking the forts.

[Seward] kept stalling the Southern commissioners with excuses – pressure of patronage demands, the delays attendant [to] departmental routine, and such pretexts. He could not receive the commissioners without recognizing the government behind them; yet he did not wish to send them back to Montgomery in anger.”

(Sam Ward, “King of the Lobby,” Lately Thomas, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1965, excerpts pp. 251-253)

The Cause of the Great Calamity

The following are excerpts from a letter sent to Lincoln’s Secretary of State William Seward by Associate Chief Justice John A. Campbell on April 13, 1861. Seward repeatedly led Campbell and the Confederate commissioners to believe his government would peacefully resolve the issue at Fort Sumter. One concludes from the letter that Lincoln deceived his own Secretary as to his intentions at Fort Sumter and setting the war in motion – as well as sending Ward Lamon to Charleston to ascertain South Carolina’s defenses. Many Southern Unionists pleaded with Lincoln’s to disarm the crisis by simply removing federal troops from Sumter, and letting time heal the breach.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.Circa1865.com

 

The Cause of the Great Calamity

“On the 15th of March [1861] I left with Judge Crawford, one of the [peace] commissioners of the Confederate States, a note in writing to the effect:

“I feel entire confidence that Fort Sumter will be evacuated in the next five days. This measure is felt as imposing great responsibility on the Administration. The substance of this statement I communicated to you the same evening by letter. Five days elapsed, and I called with a telegram from General [Pierre] Beauregard to the effect that Sumter was not evacuated, but that Major [Robert] Anderson was at work making repairs.

The 30th of March [1861] arrived, and at that time a telegram came from Governor [Francis] Pickens, inquiring concerning Colonel Lamon, whose visit to Charleston he supposed had a connection with the proposed evacuation of Fort Sumter . . .

On the first of April, I received from you the statement in writing: “I am satisfied the government will not undertake to supply For Sumter without giving notice to Governor Pickens.”

On April 7, I addressed to you a letter on the subject of alarm that the preparations by the government had created, and asked you if the assurances I had given were well-founded. In respect to Sumter your reply was: “Faith as to Sumter fully kept – wait and see.”

In this morning’s paper I read “an authorized messenger from President Lincoln informed Governor Pickens and General Beauregard that provisions will be sent to Fort Sumter peaceably, or otherwise by force.”

This was on [April 8th], at Charleston, the day following your last assurance, and this is the last evidence of the full faith I was to “wait for and see!” . . .

The commissioners who received those communications conclude they have been abused . . . I think no candid man who will read over what I have written, and consider for a moment what is going on at Fort Sumter, but will agree that the equivocating conduct of the administration . . . is the proximate cause of the great calamity.

On April 4, 1861, President [Jefferson] Davis authorized General Beauregard to take any action he deemed necessary about Fort Sumter. Beauregard opened negotiations for the surrender of the Fort, and Major Anderson promised to evacuate within a few days.

Under the pretense of relieving a starving garrison, [Lincoln] sent an expedition . . . “of eleven vessels, with two-hundred and eighty-five guns, and twenty-five hundred men. They were scheduled to arrive at Charleston on the ninth of April, but did not arrive until several days later. The reason Lincoln’s [war initiation] scheme did not work was a tempest, which delayed his fleet.”

Jefferson Davis did everything in his power to prevent civil strife, and the South cannot be blamed for the most terrible Civil War the world has ever witnessed. It is true they did fire the first shot, but the question is, which party first indicated the purpose of hostility? Which made the fatal menace; or which drew, rather than which delivered, the fire at Fort Sumter?

If Jefferson Davis signed the order for the reduction of the Fort, Abraham Lincoln had, before, signed the order to reinforce it.”

(Jefferson Davis, Patriot, a Biography, 1808-1865, Eric Langhein, Vantage Press, 1962, excerpts pp. 54-57)

“Who Then is Responsible for the War?”

At war’s end, Southern Unionists who looked in vain for Northern compromise to avert war rightly expected fair treatment at Washington. They were disappointed as Radical policy was treatment of the South as “conquered territory to be plundered and exploited.” General Robert E. Lee had been swept along with Virginia in 1861 and viewed the Old South as dear as what existed in 1865. He wrote that “Never, for a moment, have I regretted my course in joining the Confederacy . . . If it were to do over again, I would do just as I did before.”

Bernhard Thuersam, www.Circa1865.com

 

“Who Then is Responsible for the War?”

“Occasionally someone from the North would write and ask the General’s opinion about Southern affairs. [A former Illinois] Captain, having expressed feelings of kindness and friendship, asked General Lee to set forth the reasons which influenced him to take part with the Confederate States.

Lee replied that he had no other guide and no other object than the defense of those principles of American liberty upon which the constitutions of the several States were originally founded. “Unless they are strictly observed,” he added, “I fear there will be an end to republican government in this country.”

In this letter Lee showed a grasp of the situation. He felt he had no influence in national affairs and whatever was done must be accomplished by those who controlled the councils of the country. Only the Northern people themselves could exercise a beneficial influence.

[Lee did not view the right of secession as legitimate, and] admitted that the Southern people generally believed in the right, but, as for himself, he did not. [British historian Herbert C. Saunders wrote after interviewing Lee that] “This right he told me he always held a constitutional right . . . As to the policy of Secession on the part of the South, he was at first distinctly opposed to it and not until Lincoln issued a proclamation for 75,000 men to invade the South, which he deemed so clearly unconstitutional, that he had then no longer any doubt what course his loyalty to the Constitution and to his State required him to take.”

[A few months later], Lord Acton, wrote Lee and asked his opinion on the questions at issue. The General’s answer is comprehensive and abounds in historical references . . . It calls attention to the [secession] attitude of New England in 1814 and to the Harford Convention.

“The South has contended only for the supremacy of the Constitution,” the Acton letter reads, “and the just administration of the laws made in pursuance of it. Virginia, to the last, made great effort to save the Union, and urged harmony and compromise.” After quoting [Stephen A.] Douglas, to the effect that the Southern members would have accepted the Crittenden Compromise, in order to avert civil strife, but that the Republican party refused this offer, the letter asks, “Who then is responsible for the war?”

(Robert E. Lee, a Biography, Robert W. Winston, William Morrow & Company, 1934, excerpts pp. 390-394)

Ensuring Northern Political Hegemony

On May 29, 1865, President Andrew Johnson issued his North Carolina Proclamation which made no provision for the extension of the vote to freedmen, and only those who voted before May 20, 1861 and who had taken the amnesty oath to the US government could take part in the constitutional convention. This enraged Radical Republicans and their supporters who saw permanent political hegemony over the South through black voters herded to the polls with Republican ballots in hand. Political opportunists rather than statesmen reigned in the North – led by Thaddeus Stevens and Charles Sumner –all who had little if any understanding of the intent of the Framers and their Constitution, or the proper orbits of States and the federal agent of strictly limited powers they had created in 1789.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.Circa1865.com

 

Ensuring Northern Political Hegemony

“At the time when the North Carolina Proclamation was issued, only six States in the North and West had granted suffrage to Negroes. Even in New York colored voters were required to own $250 worth of property as a condition of being permitted to register [to vote]. Lincoln had recognized provisional governments in Arkansas and Louisiana from which Negroes had been excluded as voters.

Logically, therefore, Johnson’s position [of following Lincoln’s example] was sound, and in conformity with the principle of States’ Rights in which he so ardently believed. His great mistake was in omitting to take into consideration the temper of the people of the North, who feared with some reason that the Southern States would return to Congress the same type of men they had elected before the War.

Such men, and their allies, the Northern and Western Democrats, might form a coalition strong enough to undo what the War had accomplished [for the Republican Party]. The enfranchisement of the Negro, for which they showed little enthusiasm at first, might at least change the balance of power in the South, and enable good Union men to be returned to Congress.

The Constitution of the United States had made no provision for secession . . . Johnson . . . had come to the conclusion that the Union had never been dissolved [and that secession] had been unconstitutional and ineffective. Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania had repeatedly urged that the South be treated as a conquered nation. Charles Sumner [thought] the seceded States had “committed suicide” and no longer existed as legally organized governments. He had declared that it would be contrary to the Constitution to readmit these States on their prewar basis.

The right of the Negro to suffrage had in his opinion been won in the War, and to exclude them as voters in the South would be a betrayal of their cause and of the principles for which the war had been fought.”

(The Uncivil War: Washington During the Reconstruction, 1865-1878, James H. Whyte, Twayne Publishers, 1958, excerpts, pp. 45-47)

The Southern Confederacy’s Objective

If we are true to the English language and its usage, what is referred to as the American Revolution was in reality a civil war as opposing sides fought for control of the governance of the American Colonies.  The 1861-1865 war was not a civil war as several Southern States had withdrawn from their voluntary political compact with other States, and formed their own voluntary Union.  The South, then, had no interest in governing the North and truly fought in self-defense; the North, then, truly fought the war for conquest.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.Circa1865.com

 

Lincoln’s War

“Matthew Forney Steele in his 1951 American Campaigns points out that the American Civil War was unusual for a civil war in having a purely sectional bias. Allegiance in this civil war was decided by one’s geographic location rather than class, religion, political allegiance, ethnicity or other factors that usually set the battling factions in a civil war apart from each other.  This meant, in practical terms, that in the American Civil War the sides fought not among themselves but arrayed against each other.

The Southern Confederacy’s objective was simply to be left alone.  The Union’s determination was to deny them that forbearance.  Thus, an “invasion” of the Southern portion of the country, in Abraham Lincoln’s blandly legal phraseology, to “subdue combinations too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings,” became the war’s inevitable strategy.”

(Maps and Mapmakers of the Civil War, Earl B. McElfresh, H.N. Abrams Publishers, 1990, excerpt, pg. 20)

The Mine Laid at Washington

Lincoln chose to ignore the advice of the most prescient Cabinet members who could foresee where his aggressive and warlike actions would take him. The inexperienced new president had seen the result of Buchanan’s provocative Star of the West expedition to Sumter in early January 1861, but still rushed headlong into a collision and bloody war which followed. It should also be noted that Southern Unionists who opposed secession were looking to Lincoln for a peaceful settlement of the crisis, and pleaded with him to evacuate Sumter and let time cool the debate.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.Circa1865.com

 

The Mine Laid at Washington

On the 15th of March, 1861, President Lincoln submitted the following request in writing to each member of his Cabinet:

“My Dear Sir, Assuming it to be possible to now provision Fort Sumter, under all the circumstances is it wise to attempt it? Please give your opinion in writing on this question.”

Secretary Cameron wrote that he would advise such an attempt if he “did not believe the attempt to carry it into effect would initiate a bloody and protracted conflict.”

Secretary Welles wrote:

“By sending or attempting to send provisions into Fort Sumter, will not war be precipitated? It may well be impossible to escape it under any course of policy that may be pursued, but I am not prepared to advise a course that would provoke hostilities . . . I do not, therefore, under all the circumstances, think it wise to provision Fort Sumter.”

Secretary Smith wrote:

“The commencement of civil war would be a calamity greatly to be deplored and should be avoided if the just authority of the Government may be maintained without it. If such a conflict should become inevitable, it is much better that it should commence by the resistance of the authorities or people of South Carolina to the legal action of the Government in enforcing the laws of the United States . . . in my opinion it would not be wise, under all the circumstances, to attempt to provision Fort Sumter.”

Attorney General Bates wrote:

“I am unwilling, under all circumstances . . . to do any act which may have the semblance before the world of beginning a civil war, the terrible consequences of which would, I think, find no parallel in modern times . . . upon the whole I do not think it wise now to provision Fort Sumter.”

Postmaster-General Blair and Secretary Chase united in the opinion that it would be wise to make the effort to provision Fort Sumter.

[Secretary Salmon P. Chase] then proceeded to declare that, if such a step would produce civil war, he could not advise in its favor, but that, in his opinion, such a result was highly improbable, especially if accompanied by a proclamation from the President, reiterating the sentiments of his inaugural address. “I, therefore,” concluded Secretary Chase, “return an affirmative answer to the question submitted to me.”

It will be seen . . . that five of the seven members of the Cabinet concurred in the opinion that no attempt should be made to provision or reinforce Fort Sumter, and that such an attempt would in all probability precipitate civil war.

As Mr. Seward expressed it, “We will have inaugurated a civil war by our own act without an adequate object”; or, in the language of Secretary Welles, “By sending or attempting to send provisions into Fort Sumter, will not war be precipitated?” . . . I am not prepared to advise a course that would provoke hostilities.”

If such were the opinions of leading members of President Lincoln’s Cabinet, expressed in confidential communications to their chief, as to the character of the proposed action, can it be deemed unreasonable that the people of Virginia held similar views?

Fourteen days later, the President made a verbal request to his Cabinet for an additional expression of their views on the same subject. Seward and Smith adhered to their former opinions. Chase and Blair were joined by Welles. Bates was noncommittal, and no reply was made by Cameron, so far as records show.

In the light of the facts and arguments presented by the members of the President’s Cabinet, men, not a few, will conclude that, if the explosion occurred at Fort Sumter, the mine was laid at Washington.”

(Virginia’s Attitude Toward Secession, Beverley B. Munford, L.H. Jenkins, Richmond Virginia, 1909, excerpts, pp. 285-289)

 

 

“All the Land Belongs to the Yankees Now”

The South laid down their arms with the understanding that political union with the North would be restored, albeit against their will, but their rights in that political union would be as they were before hostilities commenced. This was not to be — punishment and retribution for seeking independence followed the shooting war – the second phase of the war would continue to 1877 and beyond.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.Circa1865.com

 

“All the Land Belongs to the Yankees Now”

“Gloom and depression gripped Richmond after the surrender. Thieves, murderers and pickpockets swarmed in the streets. The prevailing feeling of despair was intensified when suspicions were expressed in certain Northern quarters that Jefferson Davis and other Confederate leaders were somehow responsible for Lincoln’s death. This was, of course, absurd, but Northern radicals were looking for an excuse to punish the South to the limit.

Orders were accordingly issued forbidding as many as three former Confederates to stand on any Richmond street corner, lest they engage in further “conspiracies.” No Confederate insignia could be worn, with the result that a former soldier who had only his battered Confederate coat had to cut off the buttons or cover them with cloth. Many citizens talked of emigrating to Canada, Europe or Latin America.

Negroes were flooding into Richmond and other cities from the country districts. An estimated fifteen thousand came to the former Confederate capital, doubling its black population. Many of these newcomers believed vaguely that they would be cared for indefinitely by “Marse Linkum” or his agents.

As one of Emma Mordecai’s former slaves put it: “All de land belongs to de Yankees now, and dey gwine to divide it out ‘mong the colored people . . .” Another ex-slave was heard to say: “Dis what you call freedom! Can’t get no wuck, and got ter feed and clothe yo’sef.”

It was often easier for blacks to get work than whites. Ex-slaves were known to bring their impoverished former masters or mistresses Federal greenbacks and food from the US Commissary. It was clear that there were strong ties of affection between onetime slaves and their erstwhile owners.

Schoolteachers came down from the North to instruct blacks. Those in charge of these activities were idealistic in the extreme, but too frequently were lacking in understanding. Among those in dire need of help were the returning Confederate soldiers who had been confined in Northern prisons. These haggard, weak and often ill men, clad in hardly more than rags, staggered into town after somehow making their slow and tortuous way back to the South.

Fighting between Federal soldiers and Negroes occurred frequently in Richmond. Two soldiers shot a black through the head, leaving him for dead near the old Fair Grounds after robbing him of two watches and five dollars, according to the Dispatch.

The Virginia press was almost unanimous in opposition to Negro suffrage. The Richmond Times, said, for example: The former masters of the Negroes in Virginia have no feeling of unkindness toward them, and they will give them all the encouragement they deserve, but they will not permit them to exercise the right of suffrage, nor will they treat them as anything but “free Negroes.” They are laborers who are to be paid for their services . . . but vote they shall not.”

(Richmond: The Story of a City, Virginius Dabney, Doubleday & Company, 1976, excerpts, pp. 199-202)

 

Pale Corpse of Murdered Liberty

As Czar Alexander II ruthlessly crushed a rebellion against his oppression in Poland in 1863, French and English newspapers compared it to Lincoln’s war upon Americans in the South who sought independence from his government. In mid-1863 as war seemed imminent between Russia and the French and English allies, Lincoln welcomed two Russian fleets into New York and San Francisco harbors for eight months to forestall European intervention in his war.  Historical orthodoxy today claims European aversion to the Southern slavery they themselves introduced in America as the cause of non-recognition of the Confederacy, when Lincoln’s Russian intrigues were a far more likely reason.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.Circa1865.com

 

Pale Corpse of Murdered Liberty in America and Europe

“Russia, the most hated nation in Europe, was even more friendless than Lincoln’s government [and her] Polish policy was threatening to embroil her in another European war. She needed America’s support for nonintervention in the Polish insurrection, as much as Lincoln’s government needed Russian support for nonintervention in the rebellion of the Southern States.

US Minister [William L.] Dayton wrote from Paris on February 23, 1863:

“The Polish revolt, which has been smoldering since 1861, broke into a fierce flame, and has driven American affairs out of view for the moment. A disturbance on the continent . . . is so near at hand and touches so many of the crowned heads of these countries, that distant events fall out if sight until these more immediate troubles are settled.”

Russia was ruthless in crushing the insurrection. Thousands of Poles were slain or incarcerated or deported to Siberia. The estates of numerous nobles were confiscated [and the] last remnants of Polish autonomy were extinguished.

Europe was touched by Poland’s plight. France, England and Austria decided to have recourse to diplomatic intervention . . . But the Czar, emulating Lincoln’s stand in the American rebellion, declared that the Polish rebellion was a purely domestic affair and that foreign intervention was unacceptable.

Years before, as a private citizen back in Springfield, Lincoln had not hesitated to take a leading part in protesting against Russia, “the foreign despot,” who “in violation of the most sacred principles of the laws of nature and of nations” had, through unwarranted armed intervention, overwhelmed Hungary when she was striving to throw off the yoke of Austrian tyranny.

[Lincoln] had subscribed to the principle: “That it is the right of any people, sufficiently numerous for national independence, to throw off, to revolutionize, their existing form of government, and to establish such other in its stead as they may choose.”

Now . . . Lincoln declared [the South’s] claim to the right of secession as unconstitutional and sheer treason. Lincoln’s answer [to the South was]:

“The States have their status in the Union, and they have no other legal status. If they break from this, they can only do so against law and by revolution. By conquest or purchase, the Union gave each of them whatever of independence liberty it has . . . Not any of them ever had a State Constitution independent of the Union.”

[Lincoln’s answer in opposing intervention] expressed confidence that the Polish grievances would be righted by the liberalism, sagacity and magnanimity of Czar Alexander II.

America’s refusal to join Russian’s enemies caused the Missouri Republic to declare that “the pale corpse of Poland’s murdered liberty” would haunt Lincoln in the days to come. French journals likened the American Civil War to the Polish insurrection, and pictured Lincoln placing his hand in the bloody hand of Czar Alexander II.

One French editor asked: “Is it right that fifty million Muscovites should unite to retain ten or twelve million Poles under a detested yoke? Is it right that twenty million Northern Germans and Irishmen should unite to impose on eight million Southerners an association they spurn?”

(Lincoln and the Russians, Albert A. Woldman, World Publishing Company, 1952, excerpts, pp. 157-160)

Pages:«1...78910111213...20»