There are two or three other resolutions, which it is not necessary for me to trouble you with the reading of. You will bear in mind that there were no two sovereignties over these United Colonies at that time. They had no sovereignty or independence whatever; they were mere Provinces of the British Crown; the Governors derived their appointment from the Crown itself, or from the proprietors of the Colonies; and these wise and good men, on the 23d March, 1776, claimed that the King of Great Britain had usurped powers which did not belong to him under the Constitution of Great Britain, and that they had the right to resist his encroachments; and they authorized letters of marque to cruise against the ships and property of their fellow subjects of Great Britain, because of the state of things which arose from a collision between them and the Crown. They were enemies, and although they regretted that they had to injure in their property men who were their friends, they trusted they would excuse them, owing to the inevitable necessity that existed and the impossibility of discriminating between friends and foes in the case of inhabitants of Great Britain.
And now, gentlemen, to trouble you with one more brief reference, let me show you what took place before that Act of the Provincial Congress was passed in the Province of Massachusetts. They had already passed a Provincial Act of the General Assembly, couched in similar language, authorizing cruisers and privateers against the enemies of that Province; and you will see what occurred. I read again from Cooper's Naval History, 1st Vol., p. 42. He is speaking of the year 1775:
"The first nautical enterprise that succeeded the battle of Lexington was one purely of private adventure. The intelligence of this conflict was brought to Machias, in Maine, on Saturday, the 9th of May, 1775. An armed schooner, in the service of the Crown, called the Margaretta, was lying in port, with two sloops under her convoy, that were loading with lumber on behalf of the King's Government.
"The bearers of the news were enjoined to be silent,—a plan to capture the Margaretta having been immediately projected among some of the more spirited of the inhabitants. The next day being Sunday, it was hoped that the officers of the schooner might be seized while in church; but the scheme failed, in consequence of the precipitation of some engaged. Captain Moore, who commanded the Margaretta, saw the assailants, and, with his officers, escaped through the windows of the church to the shore, where they were protected by the guns of their vessel. The alarm was now taken; springs were got on the Margaretta's cables, and a few harmless shot were fired over the town by way of intimidation. After a little delay, however, the schooner dropped down below the town to a distance exceeding a league. Here she was followed, summoned to surrender, and fired on from a high bank, which her own shot could not reach. The Margaretta again weighed, and running into the bay, at the confluence of the two rivers, anchored. The following morning, which was Monday, the 11th of May, four young men took possession of one of the lumber sloops, and, bringing her alongside of a wharf, they gave three cheers as a signal for volunteers. On explaining that their intentions were to make an attack on the Margaretta, a party of about thirty-five athletic men was soon collected. Arming themselves with firearms, pitchforks, and axes, and throwing a small stock of provisions into the sloop, these spirited freemen made sail on their craft, with a light breeze at northwest. When the Margaretta observed the approach of the sloop, she weighed and crowded sail to avoid a conflict that was every way undesirable,—her commander not yet being apprised of all the facts that had occurred near Boston. In jibing, the schooner carried away her main-boom, but, continuing to stand on, she ran into Holmes' Bay, and took a spar out of a vessel that was lying there. While these repairs were making, the sloop hove in sight again, and the Margaretta stood out to sea, in the hope of avoiding her. The breeze freshened, and, with the wind on the quarter, the sloop proved to be the better sailer. So anxious was the Margaretta to avoid a collision, that Captain Moore now cut away his boats; but, finding this ineffectual, and that his assailants were fast closing with him, he opened a fire—the schooner having an armament of four light guns and fourteen swivels. A man was killed on board the sloop, which immediately returned the fire with a wall-piece. This discharge killed the man at the Margaretta's helm, and cleared her quarter-deck. The schooner broached to, when the sloop gave a general discharge. Almost at the same instant the two vessels came foul of each other. A short conflict now took place with musketry,—Captain Moore throwing hand-grenades, with considerable effect, in person. This officer was immediately afterwards shot down, however, when the people of the sloop boarded and took possession of their prize. The loss of life in this affair was not very great, though twenty men, on both sides, are said to have been killed and wounded. The force of the Margaretta, even in men, was much the most considerable; though the crew of no regular cruiser can ever equal, in spirit and energy, a body of volunteers assembled on an occasion like this. There was, originally, no commander in the sloop; but, previously to engaging the schooner, Jeremiah O'Brien was selected for that station. This affair was the Lexington of the sea,—for, like that celebrated land conflict, it was a rising of the people against a regular force; was characterized by a long chase, a bloody struggle, and a triumph. It was also the first blow struck on the water, after the war of the American Revolution had actually commenced."
And that is the act, gentlemen, which, instead of being the act of desperadoes, pirates, and enemies of the human race, is recorded in history as an act of spirited freemen. You will remember that the act was done without any commission; it was done while these Provinces were Colonies of the British Crown; it was done long before the Declaration of Independence. The Act of the Provincial Congress, so far as that could have any validity, authorizing letters of marque, was not passed until afterwards, on the 23d of March. The Declaration of Independence was passed on the 4th July, 1776. According to the theory on the other side, call this lawful secession—call it revolution—call it what you please,—these Confederate States, as they are called, are not independent. They have not any Government—they cannot do any thing until their independence is acknowledged by the United States. Therefore, according to the theory of the other side, no act of the Provincial Congress, no act of any of the United Colonies, had any validity in it until the treaty of peace between them and Great Britain was signed, in 1783. But, I need not tell you, gentlemen, that in this country, in all public documents, in all public proceedings, in the decisions of our Courts, the actual establishment of the independence of the United States is dated as having been accomplished on the 4th July, 1776. All the state papers that run in the name and by the authority of the United States of America, run in their name, and by their authority, as of such a year of their independence, dating from the 4th July, 1776. Let me, therefore, show you what was done by the Colonies, in 1776, before and after the date of the Declaration of Independence; and let me show how many piracies our hardy seamen of those days must have committed, on the theory of the prosecution in this case. I read again from Cooper's Naval History:
"Some of the English accounts of this period state that near a hundred privateers had been fitted out of New England alone, in the two first years of the war; and the number of seamen in the service of the Crown, employed against the new States of America, was computed at 26,000.
"The Colonies obtained many important supplies, colonial as well as military, and even manufactured articles of ordinary use, by means of their captures,—scarce a day passing that vessels of greater or less value did not arrive in some one of the ports of their extensive coast. By a list published in the 'Remembrancer,' an English work of credit, it appears that 342 sail of English vessels had been taken by American cruisers, in 1776; of which number 44 were recaptured, 18 released, and 4 burned."
Well, gentlemen, with these facts staring you in the face, I ask you if it is not flying in the face of history—if it is not rejecting and trampling in the dust the glorious traditions of our own country—to be asked seriously to sit in that jury box and try these men for their lives, as pirates and enemies of the human race, on the state of things existing here? Gentlemen, my mind may be under a strong hallucination on the subject; but I cannot conceive the theory on which the prosecution can come into Court, on the state of things existing, and ask for a conviction. Remember that, in saying that, I am speaking as a Northern man,—for I am a Northern man; I am speaking as a subject and adherent to the Government of the Union; I am speaking as one who loves the flag of this country—as one who was born under it—as one who hopes to be permitted to die under it; and I am speaking with tears in my eyes, because I do not want to see that flag tarnished by a judicial murder, and by an act cowardly and dastardly, as I say it would be, if we are to treat these men as pirates, while we are engaged in a hand-to-hand conflict with them with arms in the field, and while they are asserting and maintaining the rights which we claimed for ourselves in former ages. In God's name, gentlemen, let us, if necessary, fight them; if we must have civil war, let us convince them, by the argument of arms, and by other arguments that we can bring to bear, that they are in the wrong; let us bring them back into the Union, and show them, when they get back, that they have made a great mistake; but do not let us tarnish the escutcheon of our country, and disgrace ourselves in the eyes of the civilized world, by treating this mighty subject, when States are meeting in mortal shock and conflict, with the ax and the halter. In God's name, let us have none of that!
I have but one word more to say, gentlemen, before I close. I have already said that we claim that this commission is an adequate protection, considering that this is an inter-state war. It has been so considered, and is now so considered by the Government of the United States itself, because, after the conflict had commenced and had gone on for some time, it being treated by the Government at Washington as a mere rebellion or insurrection by insurgent and rebellious citizens in some of the Southern States, it was found that it had assumed too mighty proportions to be treated in that way, and therefore, in the month of July last, the Congress then in session passed an Act, one of the recitals of which was that this state of things had broken out and still existed, and that the war was claimed to be waged under the authority of the governments of the States, and that the governments of the States did not repudiate the existence of that authority. Congress then proceeded to legislate upon the assumption of the fact that the war was carried on under the authority of the governments of the States. There is a distinct recognition by your own Government of the fact that this is an inter-state war, and that the enemies whom our brave troops are encountering in the field are led on under authority emanating from those who are rightfully and lawfully administering the Government of the States.
You will recollect, gentlemen, that in most of those States the State governments are the same as they were before this condition of things broke out. There has been no change in the State constitutions. In a great many of them there has been no change in the personnel of those administering the government. They are the recognized legitimate Governors of the States, whatever may be said of those claiming to administer the Government of the Confederate States.