Last Best Hope of Earth

Tag: Secession

  • The Civil War: Jefferson Davis: Message to the Confederate Congress

    April 29, 1861

    With only a few weeks at the helm of the Confederate government, president Jefferson Davis and the Confederate Congress had cause for concern—but also cause for inspiration. The whole of the South (and the whole of the North) was animated: men and women were mobilizing; making their preparations to contribute to the cause they dearly held. For his message to Congress, Davis—as ever—explained why the Confederate cause was just and good; why legally and historically it was correct and noble; and why it must continue its fight for independence.

    (more…)
  • The Civil War: John B. Jones: Diary, April 15-22, 1861

    The Civil War: John B. Jones: Diary, April 15-22, 1861

    John B. Jones was a rare man in Philadelphia. In the spring of 1861, he thought he may be arrested for being a Confederate sympathizer. After all, he had been the editor of that city’s weekly newspaper, the Southern Monitor, which was supportive of the South. In April 1861, he left his home—arriving in Richmond, Virginia three days later. His diary from those days in Richmond reflected some of the conventional wisdom of the time—much of which has been long forgotten—about how the Confederacy may have taken shape not as a group of states but as an empire. He also wrote about some unconventional wisdom of the time: how the North was not just preparing for an immediate war; it was preparing for a complete and ruthless victory.

    (more…)
  • The Civil War: Robert E. Lee to George Washington Custis Lee

    The Civil War: Robert E. Lee to George Washington Custis Lee

    January 23, 1861

    While Robert E. Lee was serving as the acting commander of the Department of Texas at Fort Mason, in Texas, he wrote to his son George Washington Custis Lee of the events unfolding in the east—southern states beginning to secede amid antagonism from the north.

    (more…)

  • The Civil War: Henry Adams to Charles Francis Adams Jr.

    January 8, 1861

    A few weeks after Henry Adams wrote to his brother Charles Francis Adams Jr. about the scenes playing out post-election in Washington, D.C., he wrote again—this time about the potential for warfare to soon begin.

    (more…)

  • The Civil War: Jefferson Davis: Farewell Address in the U.S. Senate

    January 21, 1861

    United States Senator Jefferson Davis, of Mississippi, rose on the floor of that august chamber the morning of January 21, 1861 to make an announcement. It would not be one pertaining to some Senate bill, or a resolution, but instead an announcement that he was leaving the Senate.

    (more…)

  • The Civil War: Catherine Edmondston: Diary, December 27, 1860

    December 27, 1860

    Catherine Edmondston lived with her husband in North Carolina, and they operated a plantation there. During a visit to Aiken, South Carolina, to see her parents, she became a witness to the action surrounding South Carolina’s secession from the Union.

    (more…)

  • The Civil War: South Carolina Declaration of the Causes of Secession

    December 24, 1860

    On Christmas Eve, 1860, South Carolina announced that it would, indeed, be seceding from the Union and declared the many causes for taking this drastic step. On its face, this declaration would appear to articulate the reasons for secession and presumably would serve as part of the historical record—as an explanation of the secessionist’s cause. But, given the importance of the moment, perhaps this declaration would simply be a cloak—covering darker ambitions to continue to subjugate all other races to the white race with a veneer of nobly preserving states’ rights.

    (more…)

  • The Civil War: Memorandum Regarding Abraham Lincoln

    December 22, 1860

    Two days prior, South Carolina had decided to secede from the Union with a 169-0 vote. The day after that vote, the New York Times reported that President James Buchanan had ordered Major Robert Anderson to surrender Fort Moultrie in Charleston harbor, if attacked. The report was not entirely correct, however: Buchanan’s Secretary of War, John Floyd, had instructed Anderson to “exercise a sound military discretion” if attacked and to avoid “a vain and useless sacrifice” of life “upon a mere point of honor.”

    (more…)
  • The Civil War: Benjamin F. Wade: Remarks in the U.S. Senate

    The Civil War: Benjamin F. Wade: Remarks in the U.S. Senate

    December 17, 1860

    Benjamin Wade, a Republican Senator from Ohio, rose to speak in the Senate. There were murmurs abound of averting the crisis—of stopping states from seceding from the Union. Some talked of forming a committee to explore the potential for a compromise between northern and southern states, even though no one knew what contours such a compromise could take. After all, for decades, Congress had been encapsulating compromises into bills, presidents had been signing those bills into law, and none of the laws resolved the tensions between the states.

    (more…)

  • The Civil War: New-York Daily Tribune: The Right of Secession

    December 17, 1860

    Thurlow Weed, the editor of the Albany Evening Journal and one of the leaders of the Republican Party in New York, had criticized another newspaper editor, Horace Greeley of the New-York Daily Tribune. Weed’s criticism was on the issue of secession and Greeley’s apparent support for it.

    (more…)