The Great Conspiracy, Volume 3 - John Alexander Logan

[In Dawson's Life of Logan, pp. 348-353, this matter is thus alluded to:

"In an early part of this work the base charge that Logan was not loyal before the War has been briefly touched on. It may be well here to touch on it more fully. As was then remarked, the only man that ever dared insinuate to Logan's face that he was a Secession sympathizer before the War, was Senator Ben Hill of Georgia, in the United States Senate Chamber, March 30, 1881; and Logan instantly retorted: 'Any man who insinuates that I sympathized with it at that time insinuates what is false,' and Senator Hill at once retracted the insinuation."

"Subsequently, April 19, 1881, Senator Logan, in a speech, fortified with indisputable record and documentary evidence, forever set at rest the atrocious calumny. From that record it appears that on the 17th December, 1860, while still a Douglas Democrat, immediately after Lincoln's election, and long before his inauguration, and before even the first gun of the war was fired, Mr. Logan, then a Representative in the House, voted affirmatively on a resolution, offered by Morris of Illinois, which declared an 'immovable attachment' to 'our National Union,' and 'that it is our patriotic duty to stand by it as our hope in peace and our defense in war;' that on the 7th January, 1861, Mr. Adrian having offered the following 'Resolved, That we fully approve of the bold and patriotic act of Major Anderson in withdrawing from Fort Moultrie to Fort Sumter, and of the determination of the President to maintain that fearless officer in his present position; and that we will support the President in all constitutional measures to enforce the laws and preserve the Union'—Mr. Logan, in casting his vote, said: 'As the resolution receives my unqualified approval, I vote Aye;' and that further on the 5th of February, 1861, before the inauguration of President Lincoln, in a speech made by Logan in the House in favor of the Crittenden Compromise measures, he used the following language touching Secession:

"'Sir, I have always denied, and do yet deny, the right of Secession. There is no warrant for it in the Constitution. It is wrong, it is unlawful, unconstitutional, and should be called by the right name—revolution. No good, sir, can result from it, but much mischief may. It is no remedy for any grievances. I hold that all grievances can be much easier redressed inside the Union than out of it.'

"In that same speech he also * * * said:

"'I have been taught that the preservation of this glorious Union, with its broad flag waving over us as the shield for our protection on land and on sea, is paramount to all the parties and platforms that ever have existed or ever can exist. I would, to day, if I had the power, sink my own party and every other one, with all their platforms, into the vortex of ruin, without heaving a sigh or shedding a tear, to save the Union, or even stop the revolution where it is.'

"In this most complete speech of vindication—which Senator Logan said he put upon record, 'First, that my children, after me, may not have these slanders thrown in their faces without the power of dispelling or refuting them; and second, that they may endure in this Senate Chamber, so that it may be a notice to Senators of all parties and all creeds that hereafter, while I am here in the Senate, no insinuation of that kind will be submitted to by me'—the proofs of the falsity of the charge were piled mountain-high, and among them the following voluntary statements from two Democratic Senators, who were with him before the War, in the House of Representatives:

"'United States Senate Chamber, WASHINGTON, April 14, 1881.

"'DEAR SIR: In a discussion in the Senate a few weeks since you referred to the fact that a Southern Senator, who had served with you in Congress before the War, could testify that during your term of service there you gave no encouragement to the Secession of the Southern States, adding, however, that you did not ask such testimony. I was not sure at the time that your reference was to me, as Senator Pugh of Alabama, was also a member of that Congress.

"'Since then, having learned that your reference was to me, I propose on the floor of the Senate, should suitable occasion offer, to state what I know of your position and views at the time referred to. But, as I may be absent from the Senate for some time, I deem it best to give you this written statement, with full authority to use it in any way that seems proper to you.

"'When you first came to Congress in——, you were a very ardent and impetuous Democrat. In the division which took place between Mr. Douglas and his friends, on the one hand, and the Southern Democrats, on the other, you were a warm and uncompromising supporter of Mr. Douglas; and in the course of that convention you became somewhat estranged from your party associates in the South. In our frequent discussions upon the subjects of difference, I never heard a word of sympathy from your lips with Secession in either theory or practice. On the contrary, you were vehement in your opposition to it.'

"'I remember well a conversation I had with you just before leaving Washington to become a candidate for the Secession convention. You expressed the deep regret you felt at my proposed action, and deplored the contemplated movement in terms as strong as any I heard from any Republican.' Yours truly, "'L. Q. C. LAMAR

"'Hon. JOHN A. LOGAN. "United States Senate, Washington, D. C.'

"Senate Chamber, April 14, 1881.

"'Having read the above statement of Senator Lamar, I fully concur with him in my recollection of your expressions and action in opposition to Secession. Truly yours, J. L. PUGH.'

"At the conclusion of Senator Logan's speech of refutation, Senator Brown of Georgia (Democrat) said:

"'Our newspapers may have misrepresented his position. I am now satisfied they did. I have heard the Senator's statement with great interest, and I take pleasure in saying—for I had some idea before that there was some shadow of truth in this report—that I think his vindication' is full, complete, and conclusive.'

"'I recollect very well during the war, when I was Governor of my State and the Federal army was invading it, to have had a large force of militia aiding the Confederate army, and that Gen. Logan was considered by us as one of the ablest, most gallant, and skillful leaders of the Federal army. We had occasion to feel his power, and we learned to respect him.'

"Senator Beck, of Kentucky (Democrat), referring to the fact that he was kept out of the House at one time, and a great many suggestions had been made to him as to General Logan, continued:

"'As I said the other day, I never proposed to go into such things, and never have done so; but at that time General Frank Blair was here, and I submitted many of the papers I received to him,—I never thought of using any of them,—and I remember the remark that he made to me: Beck, John Logan was one of the hardest fighters of the war; and when many men who were seeking to whistle him down the wind because of his politics when the war began, were snugly fixed in safe places, he was taking his life in his hand wherever the danger was greatest—and I tore up every paper I got, and burnt it in the fire before his eyes.'

"Senator Dawes of Massachusetts (Republican), also took occasion to say:

"Mr. President, I do not know that anything which can be said on this side would be of any consequence to the Senator from Illinois in this matter. But I came into the House of Representatives at the same session that the Senator did.

"'He was at that time one of the most intense of Democrats, and I was there with him when the Rebellion first took root and manifested itself in open and flagrant war; and I wish to say as a Republican of that day, when the Senator from Illinois was a Democrat, that at the earliest possible moment when the Republican Party was in anxiety as to the position of the Northern Democracy on the question of forcible assault on the Union, nothing did they hail with more delight than the early stand which the Senator from Illinois, from the Democratic side of the House, took upon the question of resistance to the Government of the United States.

"I feel that it is right that I should state that he was among the first, if not the very first, of the Northern Democrats who came out openly and declared, whatever may have been their opinion about the doctrines of the Republican Party, that when it came to a question of forcible resistance, they should be counted on the side of the Government, and in co-operation with the Republican Party in the attempt to maintain its authority.'

"'I am very glad, whether it be of any service or not, to bear this testimony to the early stand the Senator from Illinois took while he was still a Democrat, and the large influence he exerted upon the Northern Democracy, which kept it from being involved in the condition and in the work of the Southern Democracy at that time.'">[

So far from this being the case, the fact is—and it is here mentioned in part to bring out the interesting point that, had he lived, Douglas would have been no idle spectator of the great War that was about to be waged—that when Douglas visited Springfield, Illinois, to make that great speech in the latter part of April, 1861, the writer went there also, to see and talk over with him the grave situation of affairs, not only in the Nation generally, but particularly in Illinois. And on that occasion Mr. Douglas said to him, substantially: "The time has now arrived when a man must be either for or against his Country. Indeed so strongly do I feel this, and that further dalliance with this question is useless, that I shall myself take steps to join the Array, and fight for the maintenance of the Union."

To this the writer replied that he was "equally well convinced that each and every man must take his stand," and that he also "purposed at an early day to raise a Regiment and draw the sword in that Union's defense."

This was after Sumter, and only seventy days before Congress was to meet in Called Session. When that session met, Douglas had, weeks before, gone down to the grave amid the tears of a distracted Nation, with the solemn injunction upon his dying lips: "Obey the Laws and Defend the Constitution"—and the writer had returned to Washington, to take his seat in Congress, with that determination still alive in his heart.

In fact there had been all along, substantial accord between Mr. Douglas and the writer. There really was no "difference between Douglas and Logan" as to "preparations for War," or in "exhausting all Peaceable means before a resort to Arms," and both were in full accord with President Lincoln on these points.

Let us see if this is not of record: Take the writer's speech in the House of Representatives, February 5, 1861, and it will be seen that he said: "I will go as far as any man in the performance of a Constitutional duty to put down Rebellion, to suppress Insurrection, and to enforce the Laws." Again, he said, "If all the evils and calamities that have ever happened since the World began, could be gathered in one Great Catastrophe, its horrors could not eclipse, in their frightful proportions, the Drama that impends over us."

From these extracts it is plain enough that even at this very early day the writer fully understood the "frightful proportions" of the impending struggle, and would "go as far as"—not only Mr. Douglas, but—"any man, to put down Rebellion"—which necessarily involved War, and "preparations for War." But none the less, but rather the more, because of the horrors which he foresaw must be inseparable from so terrible a War, was he anxious by timely mutual Concessions—"by any sacrifice," as he termed it—if possible, to avert it.

He was ready to sink Party, self, and to accept any of the Propositions to that end—Mr. Douglas's among them.