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ABRAHAM LINCOLN

CHAPTER I

SOUTH CAROLINA SECESSION

THE

CHAP. I.

1860.

HE delegates to the South Carolina Convention were elected on the 6th of December, and assembled and organized at Columbia, the capital of the State, on the 17th of the same month; on account of a local epidemic, however, both the convention and the Legislature adjourned to Charleston, where the former reassembled on the following day and the latter two days afterwards. Elected under the prevailing secession furor which tolerated no opposition, and embracing the leading conspirators in its membership, the convention was practically unanimous. "There is no honor," said the chairman on taking his seat, "I esteem more highly than to sign the ordinance of secession as a member of this body; but I will regard it as the greatest honor of my life to sign it as your presiding nal," p. 10. officer."

The Legislature of South Carolina had just elected a new governor, who was inaugurated on the same day on which the convention met. This VOL. III.-1

"Convention Jour

CHAP. I.

was F. W. Pickens, a revolutionist of a yet more radical and energetic type than his predecessor Gist, and who, as we have seen, had been in close consultation with the Cabinet cabal at Washington, more than a month before. He was, of course, anxious to signalize his advent; and to this end immediately dispatched to Washington a special messenger, bearing the following letter to President Buchanan :

(Strictly confidential.)

COLUMBIA, December 17, 1860.

MY DEAR SIR: With a sincere desire to prevent a collision of force, I have thought proper to address you directly and truthfully on points of deep and immediate interest.

I am authentically informed that the forts in Charleston harbor are now being thoroughly prepared to turn, with effect, their guns upon the interior and the city. Jurisdiction was ceded by this State expressly for the purpose of external defense from foreign invasion, and not with any view that they should be turned upon the State.

In an ordinary case of mob rebellion, perhaps it might be proper to prepare them for sudden outbreak. But when the people of the State, in sovereign convention assembled, determine to resume their original powers of separate and independent sovereignty, the whole question is changed, and it is no longer an act of rebellion. I, therefore, most respectfully urge that all work on the forts be put a stop to for the present, and that no more force may be ordered there.

The regular convention of the people of the State of South Carolina, legally and properly called, under our Constitution, is now in session, deliberating upon the gravest and most momentous questions, and the excitement of the great masses of the people is great, under a sense of deep wrongs, and a profound necessity of doing something to preserve the peace and safety of the State.

To spare the effusion of blood, which no human power may be able to prevent, I earnestly beg your immediate consideration of all the points I call your attention to. It is not improbable that, under orders from the Commandant, or perhaps from the Commander-in-Chief of the Army, the alteration and defenses of those posts are progressing without the knowledge of yourself or the Secretary of War.

The arsenal, in the city of Charleston, with the public arms, I am informed, was turned over very properly to the keeping and defense of a State force, at the urgent request of the Governor of South Carolina. I would most respectfully, and from a sincere devotion to the public peace, request that you would allow me to send a small force, not exceeding twenty-five men and an officer, to take possession of Fort Sumter, immediately, in order to give a feeling of safety to the community. There are no United States troops in that fort whatever, or perhaps only four or five, at present; besides some additional workmen or laborers, lately employed to put the guns in order. If Fort Sumter could be given to me, as Governor, under a permission similar to that by which the Governor was permitted to keep the arsenal with the United States arms in the city of Charleston, then I think the public mind would be quieted under a feeling of safety; and as the convention is now in full authority, it strikes me that could be done with perfect propriety. I need not go into particulars, for urgent reasons will force themselves readily upon your consideration.

If something of the kind be not done, I cannot answer for the consequences.

I send this by a private and confidential gentleman, who is authorized to confer with Mr. Trescott fully, and to receive through him any answer you may think proper to give to this.

I have the honor to be, most respectfully,

Yours truly,

To the President of the United States.

F. W. PICKENS.

Arrived in Washington, the special messenger who bore this document sought the active agent

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Buchanan,

Memorandum, CurLife of Buchan

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CHAP. I. of the central cabal,1 Mr. Trescott, Assistant Secretary of State, and was by him on Thursday morning, December 20, conducted to the White House and presented to Mr. Buchanan, to whom he personally delivered his communication. The President received the document and promised an answer to it on the following day. The temper and condition of his mind is plainly reflected in what he wrote. He seems to have realized no offense in this insult to the sovereignty and dignity of the United States whose Constitution he had sworn to

an." Vol.

II., pp. 383,

384.

66

preserve, protect, and defend"; no patriotic resentment against the South Carolina conspirators who, as he knew by the telegraph, were assembling that same day in convention to inaugurate local rebellion;- his whole answer breathed a tone of apology that his oath and duties would not permit him to oblige the South Carolina Governor; and he feebly groped for relief from his perplexities in the suggestion that Congress might perhaps somehow arrange the trouble. This was the answer prepared:

WASHINGTON, December 20, 1860.

MY DEAR SIR: I have received your favor of the 17th inst. by Mr. Hamilton. From it I deeply regret to observe that you seem entirely to have misapprehended my position, which I supposed had been clearly stated in my message. I have incurred, and shall incur, any reasonable risk within the clearly prescribed line of my executive duties to prevent a collision between the army 1 In his message of November distinguished citizen, appointed, 5, 1861, Governor Pickens, of as I have since been informed South Carolina, refers to William by my predecessor, to remain H. Trescott, Esq., who was in at Washington as confidential December, 1860, Assistant Sec- representative of the State." retary of State of the United -"South Carolina House JourStates, at Washington, as "a nal," 1861, p. 31.

and navy of the United States and the citizens of South Carolina in defense of the forts within the harbor of Charleston. Hence I have declined for the present to reënforce these forts, relying upon the honor of South Carolinians that they will not be assaulted whilst they remain in their present condition; but that commissioners will be sent by the convention to treat with Congress on the subject. I say with Congress because, as I state in my message, "Apart from the execution of the laws so far as this may be practicable, the Executive has no authority to decide what shall be the relations between the Federal Government and South Carolina. He has been invested with no such discretion. He possesses no power to change the relations heretofore existing between them, much less to acknowledge the independence of that State." This would be to invest a mere executive officer with the power of recognizing the dissolution of the confederacy among our thirty-three sovereign States. It bears no resemblance to the recognition of a foreign de facto government, involving no such responsibility. Any attempt to do this would, on my part, be a naked act of usurpation.

As an executive officer of the Government, I have no power to surrender, to any human authority, Fort Sumter or any of the other forts or public property in South Carolina. To do this would, on my part, as I have already said, be a naked act of usurpation. It is for Congress to decide this question, and for me to preserve the status of the public property as I found it at the commencement of the troubles.

If South Carolina should attack any of these forts, she will then become the assailant in a war against the United States. It will not then be a question of coercing a State to remain in the Union, to which I am utterly opposed, as my message proves, but it will be a question of voluntarily precipitating a conflict of arms on her part, without even consulting the only authority which possesses the power to act upon the subject. Between independent governments, if one possesses a fortress within the limits of another, and the latter should seize it without calling upon the appropriate authorities of the power in posses

CHAP. I.

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