Senator Douglas went from Springfield to Chicago, where he delivered another eloquent address, along the same lines as the one delivered at Springfield, to tens of thousands of people. Very soon thereafter he was taken ill with pneumonia and passed away.
He was a man of extraordinary intellect. He did his full part, at one of the most critical periods of our history, in saving the Nation. His speeches in and out of Congress are among the most able and eloquent delivered by any American statesman.
CHAPTER VI SPEAKER OF THE ILLINOIS LEGISLATURE AND A MEMBER OF CONGRESS 1860 to 1865
The election of Mr. Lincoln was made the pretext for secession. It has always seemed to me that the South was determined to secede no matter at what cost; and it has also seemed to me that this determination was not due to the great body of the people of the South, than whom there were no better, but to the jealous politicians of that section, who saw the gradual growth in wealth and power of the Northern States threaten their domination of the National Government, which they had firmly held since the days of Washington. They saw that domination slipping away, and they determined to form a nation of their own—in which slavery, indeed, would be paramount; but it was not so much slavery as it was their own desire for control that influenced them.
As soon, therefore, as Mr. Lincoln was elected President they began the organization of a Government of their own. President Buchanan declared in his message that the Southern States had no right to secede—"unless they wanted to," as some one aptly expressed it; in other words, that he had no right under the Constitution to keep them forcibly in the Union, and thus the constitutional opinions of the President harmonized effectively with the purposes of the secessionists. Fortunate it was that Mr. Buchanan had so short a term remaining after the election of Mr. Lincoln. Had a year or two elapsed, the Confederacy would have been firmly and irrevocably established.
It has never been quite clear to my mind whether Mr. Buchanan cared to preserve the Union or not. In the heat and passion of that day, we all thought he was a traitor. As I look back now and think of it, remembering his long and distinguished service to the country in almost every capacity—as a legislator, as a diplomat, as Secretary of State, as President, I think now he was only weak. His term was about expiring, and he saw and feared the awful consequences of a civil war.
One State after another seceded; the United States' arms and arsenals were seized; on January 9, the Star of the West, carrying supplies to Fort Sumter, was fired upon and driven off. South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas went out. The Confederate States of America were organized in the capital of Alabama on the fourth of February, and Jefferson Davis was elected President.
We watched with great interest the famous Peace Conference which met in Washington and over which John Tyler, ex-President of the United States, presided. It sat during the month of February, preceding Mr. Lincoln's inauguration, and recommended the adoption of seven additional articles to the Constitution, which were afterwards rejected by the Senate of the United States.
But the fourth of March finally came, and new life was infused into the national councils.
Mr. Lincoln's speeches on his way East were a disappointment, in that they failed in the least to abate the rising Southern storm; the calmly firm tone of his inaugural address impressed the North, but his appeals to the South were in vain. Said he: