While during the month of October (1860) President Buchanan was anxiously watching the course of public events, he was surprised by receiving from General Scott, the General-in-chief of the Army, a very extraordinary paper. It was written on the 29th of October, from New York, where the General had his headquarters, and was mailed to the President on the same day. On the 30th the General sent a corrected copy to the Secretary of War, with a supplement. These papers became known as General Scott’s “views.” He lent copies of them to some of his friends, to be read; and although they did not immediately reach the public press, their contents became pretty well known in the South through private channels. From them the following facts were apparent:
First.—That before the Presidential election, General Scott anticipated that there would be a secession of one or more of the Southern States, in the event of Mr. Lincoln’s election; and that from the general rashness of the Southern character, there was danger of a “preliminary” seizure of certain Southern forts, which he named.
Second.—That the secession which General Scott deprecated was one that would produce what he called a “gap in the Union;” that he contemplated, as a choice of evils to be embraced instead of a civil war, the allowance of a division of the Union into four separate confederacies, having contiguous territory; and that he confined the use of force, or a resort to force, on the part of the Federal Government, to the possible case of the secession of some “interior” States, to reestablish the continuity of the Federal territory. This he considered might be regarded as a “correlative right,” balancing the right of secession, which he said might be conceded “in order to save time.”
Third.—That his provisional remedy, or preliminary caution, viz: The immediate garrisoning of the Southern forts sufficiently to prevent a surprise or coup de main, was confined to the possible or probable case of a secession that would make a “gap” in the Union, or break the continuity of the Federal territory. He excluded from the scope of his “provisional remedies” the secession of Texas, or of all the Atlantic States south of the Potomac, as neither would produce a “gap” in the Union.
Fourth.—That for the application of his “provisional remedies,” he had at his command but five companies of regular troops, to prevent surprises of the nine Southern forts which he named; and that as to “regular approaches,” nothing could be said or done without calling for volunteers.
Fifth.—That in the meantime the Federal Government should collect its revenue outside of the Southern cities, in forts or on board ships of war: and that after any State had seceded, there should be no invasion of it, unless it should happen to be an “interior” State.
Sixth.—That the aim of his plan was to gain eight or ten months to await measures of conciliation on the part of the North, and the subsidence of angry feelings in the South.
If these “views,” palpably impracticable and dangerous, had remained unknown in the hands of the President, there would have been no necessity for commenting on them in this work, especially as subsequent events rendered them of no importance. But they did not remain unknown. They became the foundation, at a later period, of a charge that President Buchanan had been warned by General Scott, before the election of Mr. Lincoln, of the danger of leaving the Southern forts without sufficient garrisons to prevent surprises, and that he had neglected this warning. Moreover, in these “views,” the General-in-chief of the Army, addressing the President, had mingled the strangest political suggestions with military movements, on the eve of a Presidential election which was about to result in a sectional political division. It is therefore necessary for me to bestow upon these “views” a degree of attention which would otherwise be unnecessary.
These papers were addressed by the General-in-chief of the Army of the United States to a President who utterly repudiated the alleged right of secession, by any State whatever, whether lying between other States remaining loyal, or on the extreme boundary of the Union. Becoming known to the Southern leaders who might be disposed to carry their States out of the Union in the event of Mr. Lincoln’s election, they would justify the inference that in one case at least, that of a secession which did not make a “gap” in the Union, the General-in-chief of the Federal Army would not draw his sword to compel the inhabitants of the seceded region to submit to the laws of the United States. In regard to the “provisional remedies” which the general advised, let it be observed that if the President had had at his disposal the whole army of the United States, the introduction into the Southern forts of a larger or a smaller force, at such a moment, however officially explained, could have been regarded in the South only as a proof that President Buchanan expected secession to be attempted, and that he was preparing for a civil war, to be waged by him or his successor. The right of the Federal Government to place its own troops in its own forts, without giving offence to any one, was perfectly apparent; but it was equally apparent that on the eve of this election, or during the election, or at any time before any State had adopted an ordinance of secession, such a step could not have been taken as anything but an indication that the Federal Government was preparing to prevent by force the people of any State from assembling to consider and act upon their relations to the Government of the United States. Now a very great part of the popular misapprehension of President Buchanan’s policy, purposes and acts, which has prevailed to the present day, has arisen from the total want of discrimination between what the Federal Government could and what it could not rightfully do, in anticipation of the secession of a State or States. It has been a thousand times inconsiderately asked, why Mr. Buchanan did not nip secession in the bud.
In the first place, the Federal Government, however great might be the physical force at its command, could at no time have done anything more than enforce the execution of its own laws and maintain the possession of its own property. To prevent the people of a State, by any menace of arms, from assembling in convention to consider anything whatever, would have been to act on the assumption that she was about to adopt an ordinance of secession, and on the farther assumption that such an act must be forestalled, lest it might have some kind of validity. The Executive of the United States was not bound, and was not at liberty, to act upon such assumptions. There were many ways in which a State convention could peacefully take into consideration the relations of its people to the Federal Union. They might lawfully appeal to the sobriety and good feeling of their sister States to redress any grievances of which they complained. There might be, we know that in point of fact there was, a strong Union party in most of the Southern States, and the President of the United States, in the month of October, 1860, would have been utterly inexcusable, if he had proclaimed to the country that he expected this party to be overborne, and had helped to diminish its members and weaken its power, by extraordinary garrisons placed in the Southern forts, in anticipation of their seizure by lawless individuals, when such an exhibition must inevitably lead the whole people of the South to believe that there was to be no solution of the sectional differences but by a trial of strength in a sectional civil war. Mr. Buchanan was far too wise and circumspect a statesman to put into the hands of the secessionists such a means of “firing the Southern heart,” before it was known what the result of the Presidential election would be. It was his plain and imperative duty not to assume, by any official act, at such a time, that there was to be a secession of any State or States.