The Great Conspiracy, Complete

ld be elected had become a certainty, and before the close of that day, the fact had been heralded

rally chagrined at the defeat of their great leader, were filled with gloomy forebodings touching the future of their Country; and the Southern Democracy, or at least a large portion of it, openly exulted that at las

of Lincoln, with bonfires and processions.

ulate each other on the glad tidings of Lincoln's election. * * * Men thronged the streets, talking, laughing, cheering, like mariners long becalmed on a

oduced in the South Carolina Legislature, sitting at Columbia, having in view Secession contingent up

he was, he had come here to join them in that lead;" and that "every day delayed, was a day lost to the Cause." He acknowledged that Virginia was "not as ready as South Carolina;" but declared that "The first drop of blood spilled on the soil of South Carolina would bring Virginia, and every Southern S

these Sovereign States;" and that United States District Judge Magrath had resigned his office, saying to the Grand Jury, as he did so: "In the political history of the United States, an event has happened of ominous import to fifteen Slave-holding States. The State of which we are citizens has

e forthcoming. On November 9th, a joint resolution calling an unconditional Secession Convention to meet at Columbia December 17th, was passed by the Senate, and o

nd the duty of other Southern States to sustain South Carolina in the step she was then taking," and declaring that he "would like to see Federal troops dare attempt the coercion of a seceding Southern State! For eve

he House of Representatives is largely in the majority against him. In the Senate he will also be powerless. There will be a majority of four against him." He also cogently said: "Many of us have sworn to support it (the Constitution). Can we, therefore, for the mere election

ibuted to aid the success of the contemplated Treason and Rebellion, by lulling many of the people there, into a false sense of security. Unfortunately, also, even the ablest of the Southern Union men were so tainted with the heretical doctrine of States-Rights, which taught the "paramount allegiance" of the citize

by further advising the calling of a Convention of the people to decide the matter; thus, in advance, as it were, binding himself hand and foot, despite his previous Union utterances, to do the fell bidding of the most rampant Disunionists. And thus, in due time, it befell, as we shall see, that this "saving clause" in his "Union speech," brought him at the end, not to th

cal platforms, as embodying the creed of Southern men; committed by those declarations to the most extreme action when, in their judgment, the necessity should arise; and worked up during the Presidential campaign by swarming Fe

on and whether their respective States should join South Carolina in seceding from the Union. Kentucky alone, of them all, seemed for a time to keep cool, and

y yet be avoided. There is still hope, faint though it be. Kentucky is a Border State, and has suffered more than all of you. * * * She has a right to claim that her voice, and the voice of reason, and moderation and patriotism shall be heard and heeded by you. If you secede, your representatives will go out of Congress and leave us at the mercy of a Black Republican Government. Mr. Lincoln will have no check. He can appoint his Cabinet, and have it confirmed. The Congress wil

owned in the clamor and tumult of impassioned harangues and addresses, and the drumming and tramp of the "minute men" of South Carolina, and other mili

irty years before, had stamped out Nullification

ion, decision of character, and nerve. He knew Secession was wrong, but allowed himself to be persuaded that he had no Constitutional power to prevent it. He had surrounded himself in the Cabinet with such unbending adherents and tools of the Slave-Power, as Howell Cobb of Georgia, his Secretary of the Treasury, John B.

nstrued the Constitution-to prevent Secession! Before writing his pitifully imbecile Message, President Buchanan had secured from his Attorney-General (Jeremiah S. Black of Pennsylvania) an opinion, in which the latter, after touching upon certain cases in which he believed the President would be justified in using force to sustain the Federal Laws, supposed the case of a State where all the Federal Officers had resigned and where there were neither Federal Courts to issue, nor officers to execute judicial process, and continued: "I

aid him in performing this service, having first, by Proclamation, commanded the insurgents to 'disperse and retire peaceably to their respective abodes, within a limited time'"-and thereupon held that "This duty cannot, by possibility, be performed in a State where no judicial authority exists to issue process, and where there is no Marshal to execute it; and where even if there were such an officer, the entire population would constitute one solid combination to resist him." And, not satisfied with attempting to show as clearly as he seemed to know how, his own inability under the laws to stamp out Treason, he proceeded to consider what he thought Congress also could not do under the Con

no power in the Union, by the exercise of force, to preserve itself from instant dissolution! How imbecile the reasoning, how impotent the conclusion, compared with that of President Jackson, thirty years before, in his Proclamation against Nullification and Secession, wherein tha

ing one member from each State, in which there was a very large preponderance of such as favored Conciliation without dishonor. But the debates in both Houses, in which the most violent language was indu

Iowa. Their labors were alike without practical result, owing to the irreconcilable attitude of the Southrons, who would accept nothing less than a total repudiation by the Republicans of the very principles upon which the recent Presidential contest had by them been fought and won. Nor would they even accept such a repudiation unless carried by vote of the majority of the Republicans. The dose that they

Capital showed itself in great Conciliation meetings, where speeches were applauded and resolutions adopted of the most abject character, in behalf of "Peace, at any price," regardless of the sacrifice of honor and principles and even decency. In fact the Commercial

ence came these excessive sensibilities that cannot bear a few slaves in a remote Territory until the white people establish a Constitution?" Another, Mr. Charles E. Lex (a Republican), speaking of the Southern People, said: "What, then, can we say to them? what more than we have expressed in the resolutions we have offered? If they are really aggrieved by any laws upon our Statute-books opposed to their rights-if upon examination any such are found to be in conflict with the Constitutio

at this evidence of what it chose to consider "a divided sentiment" in the North. While it weakened the North, it strengthened the Sou

be found unprofitable for the North and South, bringing their respective griefs, claims, and proposed reforms, to a common arbitrament, to meet, discuss, and determine upon a future"-before a final appeal to arms. So, too, Horace Greeley, in the New York Tribune,-[November 9, 1860.]-after weakly conceding, on his own part, the right of peaceable Secession, said: "But while we thus uphold the practical liberty, if not the abstr

were hanging from the trees of that country;" and Senator Iverson, of Georgia, said: "Gentlemen speak of Concession, of the repeal of the Personal Liberty bills. Repeal them all to-morrow, and you cannot stop this revolution." After declaring his belief that "Before the 4th of March, five States will have declared their independence" and that "three other States will follow as soon as the action of the people can be had;" he proceeded to allude to the refusal of Governor Houston of Texas to call together the Texas Legislature for action in accord with the Secession sentiment, and declared that "if he will not yield to that public sentiment, some Texan Brutus will arise to rid his country of this hoary-headed incubus that stands between the

vernment. I stand to that principle to-day. I have argued it to half a million of people, and they stand by it; they have commissioned me to stand by it; and, so help me God, I will! * * * On the other hand, our platform repudiates the idea that we have any right, or harbor any ultimate intention to invade or interfere with your institutions in your own States. * * * It is not, by your own confessions, that Mr. Lincoln is expected to commit any overt act by which you may be injured. You will not even wait for any, you say; but, by anticipating that the Government may do you an injury, you will put an end to it-which means, simply and squarely, that you intend to rule or ruin this G

he threatened danger, were offered and referred to the Select Committee of Thirty-three. On the following Monday, Dec

d that we earnestly recommend the repeal of all Statutes by the State Legislatures in conflict with,

5 yeas to no nays, a resolution offered b

reme law of the Land, and ready and faithful obedience to

d; and that we earnestly recommend the repeal of all Nullification laws; and that it is the dut

ns, whether "good and law abiding" or not, to yield obedience to the Constitution, as will b

myself, between this resolution and the one [Adrian's] just passed, except in regard to verbiage. I can find but one objection to the resolutio

t the amendment sugge

; but if it is allowed to remain all 'good and law abiding'

modified by the omis

4 nays, a resolution offered by M

ery attempt to alienate any portion of our Country from the rest, or enfeeble the sacred ties which now link together the various parts; that we regard it as a main pillar in the edifice of our real independence, the support of tranquillity at home, our peace abroad, our safety, our prosperity, and that very liberty which we so highly prize; that we have seen nothing in the past, nor do we see anything in the present, either in the election of Abraham Lincoln to the Presidency of the United States, or from any oth