The year 1861 was ushered in with the manifestation of a general belief among the people of the planting States in the necessity of an early secession as the only possible alternative left them. This condition of public opinion was in no measure due, as has been sometimes charged, to the “influence of a few ambitious politicians.” With rare exceptions the officials were neither agitators nor leaders in the popular movement; the people everywhere were in advance of them; and the influence of the officials, as a rule, was employed to allay rather than to stimulate excitement, to restrain rather than to accelerate action. These statements apply especially to the Southern Senators and Representatives in Congress, to whose imaginary “cabals” and “conspiracies” in Washington the rapid growth of the secession movement has been attributed in certain histories of the war published in the North and in Europe. The truth is, that the movements that culminated in secession were inaugurated before the meeting of Congress, and were conducted with a dignity and formality that precluded the theory of conspiracy or of passion. These acts were the deliberate results of convictions slowly and reluctantly adopted, and due wholly to the belief that by no other policy could this relief be obtained. The acts of secession were not intended as war measures. The opinion generally prevailed that secession would be peacefully accomplished; an opinion from which I publicly dissented, with the result, as already stated, that I was regarded as “too slow,” and as being behind the public sentiment of my own State.
Another fallacy should be noted here. It has been often asserted that the troops of the United States army were so disposed, by a collusion between the Southern leaders and Mr. Floyd, the Secretary of War, that the seizure of forts, arsenals, and custom-houses in the South was rendered possible and easy. No such conspiracy existed. The military forts were in their usual condition. There were no fewer troops at the time of their seizure by the States than there had been for many years, nor than there is, generally, even to this day (1889).
Still another imputation on the honor of Southern Senators should be repelled here before entering on the narrative of the ensuing events. It was alleged — and the Comte de Paris has specially singled out my name in connection with this disgraceful charge — that we held our seats as a vantage-ground for plotting for the dismemberment of the Union. It is a charge which no accuser ever made in my presence, although I have in public debate more than once challenged its assertion and denounced its falsehood. It will suffice to say that I always held, and often avowed, the principle that a Senator in Congress occupied the position of an ambassador from the State he represented to the Federal Government, as well as being, also, in some sense a member of the Government; and that, in either capacity, it would be dishonorable to use his powers and privileges for the dismemberment of the Government to which he was accredited. Acting on this principle, as long as I held a seat in the Senate my best efforts were directed to the maintenance of the Constitution and the Union resulting from it, and to make the Government an effective agent of the States for its prescribed purposes. As soon as the paramount allegiance due to Mississippi forbade a continuance of these efforts I withdrew from the United States Senate. To say that, during this period, I did nothing secretly in conflict with what was done or proposed openly, would be merely to assert my own integrity, an assertion which would be worthless to those who doubt it, and superfluous to those who believe in it. What is here said on the subject for myself, I believe to be also true of my associates in Congress. Further explanation of my own position on these questions more properly belongs to biography than to history, and may therefore be passed over here.
Without at this time entering into a discussion of the legal questions involved, it is proper to add that the sites of forts, arsenals, navy-yards, and other public property of the Federal Government were ceded by the States within whose boundaries they were situated, subject to the condition that they should be used solely and exclusively for the purposes for which they were granted. By accepting such grants, under such conditions, sometimes expressed, always implied, the Federal Government assented to their propriety; and it follows that a State withdrawing from the Union would consequently resume the control over all public defences and other public property within its limits; providing, however, for adequate compensation to the other members of the partnership, or their common agent, for the value of the work or loss incurred. Such equitable settlement the seceding States were desirous to make and prompt to propose to the Federal authorities.