Again, look at another fact, and one, be assured, in which we have a great and vital interest; it is that of revenue or means of supporting government. From official documents we learn that more than three-fourths of the revenue collected has been raised from the North. Pause now while you have the opportunity to contemplate carefully and candidly these important things. Look at another necessary branch of government, and learn from stern statistical facts how matters stand in that department, I mean the mail and post-office privileges that we now enjoy under the General Government, as it has been for years past. The expense for the transportation of the mail in the free States was by the report of the postmaster-general for 1860, a little over $13,000,000 while the income was $19,000,000. But in the Slave States the transportation of the mail was $14,716,000, and the revenue from the mail only $8,000,265, leaving a deficit of $6,715,735 to be supplied by the North for our accommodation, and without which we must have been cut off from this most essential branch of the government.
Leaving out of view for the present the countless millions of dollars you must expend in a war with the North, with tens of thousands of your brothers slain in battle, and offered up as sacrifices on the altar of your ambition—for what, I ask again? Is it for the overthrow of the American Government, established by our common ancestry, cemented and built up by their sweat and blood, and founded on the broad principles of right, justice and humanity? I must declare to you here, as I have often done before, and it has also been declared by the greatest and wisest statesmen and patriots of this and other lands, that the American Government is the best and freest of all governments, the most equal in its rights, the most just in its decisions, the most lenient in its measures, and the most inspiring in its principles to elevate the race of men that the sun of heaven ever shone upon.
Now for you to attempt to overthrow such a government as this under which we have lived for more than three-quarters of a century, in which we have gained our wealth, our standing as a nation, our domestic safety while the elements of peril are around us with peace and tranquility accompanied with unbounded prosperity and rights unassailed is the height of madness, folly and wickedness to which I will neither lend my sanction nor my vote.
This is one of the most eloquent appeals recorded on the pages of history, and had Mr. Stephens carried out his first intention as expressed, "I will neither lend my sanction nor my vote," in his subsequent career during that war he had so eloquently and prophetically depicted, he would to-day not only be recognized as one of the ablest and most brilliant of orators as he is known, but would have stamped his life as a consistent and constant legislator which is so laudable in any man. But only a month later, after delivering the great speech at Milledgeville in defense of the Union he accepted one of the chief offices in the Confederacy, and began to perpetrate the very wrongs he had so vehemently deplored, seeking by speeches innumerable to overthrow that government he had so eloquently eulogized.
At Savannah he spoke something as follows: "The new constitution has put to rest forever all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institutions—African slavery as it exists among us—the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and the present revolution. Jefferson in his forecast had anticipated this as the rock upon which the old Union would split. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old constitution, were that the enslavement of the African was in violation to the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle socially, morally and politically."
"Our new government is founded on exactly the opposite ideas. Its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man. That in slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first in the history of the world based upon this great physical, philosophical and moral truth. It is the first government ever instituted upon principles in strict conformity to nature and the ordination of Providence in furnishing the materials of human society. Many governments have been founded upon the principle of enslaving certain classes, but the classes thus enslaved were of the same race and enslaved in violation to the laws of nature."
"Our system commits no such violation of the laws of nature. The negro, by nature or by the curse against Canaan is fitted for that condition which he occupies in our system. The architect in the construction of buildings lays the foundation with the proper material, the granite; then comes the brick or marble. The substratum of our society is made of the material fitted by nature for it, and by experience we know that it is best not only for the superior, but the inferior race that it should be so. It is, indeed, in conformity with the Creator. It is not for us to inquire into the wisdom of his ordinances, or to question them. For his own purposes he has made one race to differ from another, as he has made one star to differ from another in glory. The great objects of humanity are best attained when conformed to his laws and decrees in the formation of governments as well as in all things else. Our confederacy is founded upon principles in strict conformity with these laws. This stone which was rejected by the first builders 'is become the chief stone of the corner' in our new edifice."
By both of these speeches he was of great service to the national government. The first was used to justify the suppression of secession, and the second to excite the animosity of the world against secession. After the war Mr. Stephens was once more a member of the National Congress and Governor of his native State. On the 3rd day of March, 1883, he died at his home in Crawfordville. We have thus spoken of Mr. Stephens as a legislator; personally, he was a very pleasant man to meet, loved in society, was kind-hearted, and we believe sincere. His eloquence was at times wonderful, and was augmented rather than diminished by his physical infirmity. Those who have heard him will never forget the squeaking voice and haggard look.
According to Webster, the three cardinal points essential to true oratory are clearness, force and sincerity. In all of these Stephens was proficient. His descriptive powers were remarkable, and he could blend pathos with argument in a manner unusual. He was a warm friend of Mr. Lincoln, and one of the most characteristic stories ever told of Mr. Lincoln is in connection with Governor Stephens' diminutive appearance and great care for his shattered health. On one occasion before the war he took off three overcoats, one after the other, in the presence of Mr. Lincoln, who rose, and walking around him, said, "I was afraid of Stephens, for I thought he might keep on taking off clothes until he would be nothing but a ghost left," and speaking to a friend standing by, remarked further, "Stephens and his overcoats remind me of the biggest shuck off the smallest ear of corn that I have ever seen in my life." One by one the eminent men of State pass away. Their deaths make vacancies which the ambitious and active hasten to occupy whether they are able to fill them or not.