purposes, or that it works out of slaughter and desolation and brave men's lives and widows' tears and the orphan's destitution great and beneficent ends. Human anger, self-interest, popular violence, ambition, greed of power, greed of gain, love of country, love of honor, philanthropy, real or pretendeda thousand vices and ten thousand virtues-may all be wrought into the multitudinous means by which the Almighty governs the world. But notwithstanding all this, the statesman who does not labor to avert the calamity of civil war by every means within his reach that may be consistent with the dictates of an enlightened conscience, fails to fulfil a duty that is just as divinely appointed as the duty of the soldier can be said to be after the clash of arms has begun and the battle is raging. This was true when Buchanan was subjected to his great trial, and it will remain true of all other men in like situations to the end of time. Is it said that he strove to save his party and to save slavery, because he tried to save the Union by compromise and conciliation? Well, what is this but to judge him by an utterly uncharitable judgment? Do you imagine that posterity is going to judge him in this way? We can so judge him to-day, if we will; in the near to-morrow of another age he will be judged by another tribunal, and even now it may behoove us to take care how we permit the rising generation to be misled concerning the man who propounded and asserted the constitutional doctrine that saved us of the North from having a conquered Ireland or a subjugated Poland on our hands. THE AUTHOR'S LIFETIME VIEWS OF COERCION. Let me conclude, Mr. Editor, by saying that the distinction between coercing a State and enforcing the laws of the United States upon individuals is no new one with me, nor has it been adopted for the purpose of defending President Buchanan; nor did I derive it from him, much as I respect and honor him for the clear and forcible manner in which he stated it. It was in substance set forth in an oration which I delivered on the 4th of July, 1862, before the municipal authorities of the city of Boston, and which was published in pamphlet by the city government at the time, and was twice printed at length in the New York Journal of Commerce. If any one cares anything about the consistency of my opinions or attaches any importance to them, he can compare what I said in 1862 with what I have said in the recent "Life of Buchanan; or he can go back to an earlier period and consult Chapter XII. of Volume II. of my history of the Constitution, first published in 1854; or he can come down to a period since the Civil War and consult a published lecture which I delivered in New York in 1875, long before I ever knew Mr. Buchanan's executors or a single member of his family. In fact, from the years of my earliest manhood to this day I never had but one set of opinions upon the mode in which the Government of the United States is to maintain its rightful supremacy, and those opinions have been expressed by me quite as freely and frequently as could become a citizen who never held or sought an official position. Very respectfully, your obedient servant, GEORGE TICKNOR CURTIS. MY DEAR SIR/ TO MR. PHILLIPS.1 WASHINGTON 5 Dec: 1860. Many thanks for your favorable opinion of the Message! I prize it highly, I assure you. It will at first be condemned at the North & the South. I must rely upon the sober second thought for justice. I understand the Republican Journals of Philadelphia condemn it in the severest terms. Surely that is a doomed City. Whilst all parts of the Country will suffer dreadfully from Disunion, the manufactures of Philadelphia must in a great degree be prostrated. They say there is a contradiction between my opinion that States cannot constitutionally secede & a denial of the power to compel them to remain in the Union. Not in the least! The laws must be executed by the President until this is impossible with the means in his power. Then when the question arises whether Congress shall prosecute a civil war against a State to conquer her, comes the question of power. In haste, I remain always Very respectfully your friend HON: HENRY M. PHILLIPS. JAMES BUCHANAN. MESSAGE ON A CONVENTION WITH COSTA RICA.2 TO THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES: I transmit, for the consideration of the Senate with a view to ratification, a convention for the adjustment of claims of citizens of the United States against the Government of the Republic of Costa Rica, signed by the plenipotentiaries of the contracting parties at San José, on the second day of July last. JAMES BUCHANAN. WASHINGTON, 5 December, 1860. 'Dreer Collection, Historical Society of Pennsylvania. 2 Senate Executive Journal, XI. 239. MESSAGE ON THE AFRICAN SLAVE TRADE. 1 TO THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES: In answer to the resolution of the House of Representatives of the 9th of April last, requesting information concerning the African slave trade, I transmit a report from the Secretary of State, and the documents by which it was accompanied. WASHINGTON, December 5, 1860. JAMES BUCHANAN. MEMORANDUM.2 [December 10, 1860.] Monday morning, 10th December, 1860, the within paper was presented to me by Messrs. McQueen, Miles, and Bonham. I objected to the word "provided," as this might be construed 'H. Ex. Doc. 7, 36 Cong. 2 Sess. "This memorandum, which is printed in Curtis's Buchanan, II. 377, with appropriate explanations, is endorsed, in President Buchanan's handwriting, on the following letter: TO HIS EXCELLENCY JAMES BUCHANAN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: In compliance with our statement to you yesterday, we now express to you our strong convictions that neither the constituted authorities nor any body of the people of the State of South Carolina will either attack or molest the United States forts in the harbor of Charleston previously to the action of the convention, and, we hope and believe, not until an offer has been made through an accredited representative to negotiate for an amicable arrangement of all matters between the State and the Federal Government, provided that no reinforcements shall be sent into those forts, and their relative military status remain as at present. WASHINGTON, December 9, 1860. JOHN MCQUEEN, WM. PORCHER MILES, M. L. BONHAM, into an agreement on my part which I never would make. They said nothing was further from their intention. They did not so understand it, and I should not so consider it. Afterwards Messrs. McQueen and Bonham called, in behalf of the delegation, and gave me the most positive assurance that the forts and public property would not be molested until after commissioners had been appointed to treat with the Federal Government in relation to the public property, and until the decision was known. I informed them that what would be done was a question for Congress and not for the Executive. That if they [the forts] were assailed, this would put them completely in the wrong, and making them the authors of the civil war. They gave the same assurances to Messrs. Floyd, Thompson, and others. MEMORANDUM.1 [December 11, 1860.] Tuesday, 11th December, 1860, General Cass announced to me his purpose to resign. SIR: FROM GENERAL CASS.2 DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Dec. 12, 1860. The present alarming crisis in our National affairs has engaged your serious consideration, and in your recent message you have expressed to Congress, and through Congress to the Country, the views you have formed 2 1 Buchanan Papers, Historical Society of Pennsylvania. 'Buchanan Papers, Historical Society of Pennsylvania; S. Ex. Doc. 7, 41 Cong. I Sess. 1-2; Curtis's Buchanan, II. 397. Among the Buchanan Papers in the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, there is a letter from Mr. Slidell to Mr. Buchanan, dated Feb. 19, 1857, relating to the offer of the Secretaryship of State to General Cass, and reading as follows: "I have yours of 17 inst. I have seen Genl. Cass this morning in company with Bright. I read him all that part of yours relating to himself, respecting the questions, fraught with the most momentous consequences, which are now presented to the American people for solution. With the general principles laid down in that message I fully concur, and I appreciate with warm sympathy its patriotic appeals and suggestions. What measures it is competent and proper for the Executive to adopt under existing circumstances is a subject which has received your most careful attention, and with the anxious hope, as I well know, from having participated in the deliberations, that tranquillity and good feeling may be speedily restored to this agitated and divided Confederacy. In some points which I deem of vital importance, it has been my misfortune to differ from you. It has been my decided opinion, which for some time past I have urged at various meetings of the Cabinet, that additional troops should be sent to reinforce the forts in the harbor of Charleston, with a view to their better defence should they be attacked, and that an armed vessel should likewise be ordered there, to aid, if necessary, in the defence, and also, should it be required, in the collection of the revenue; and it is yet my opinion that these measures should be adopted without the least delay. I have likewise urged the expediency of immediately removing the Custom House at Charleston to one of the forts in the port, and of making arrangements for the collection of the duties there by having a Collector and other officers ready to act when necessary, so that when the office may become vacant, the proper authority may be there to collect the duties on the part of the United States. I continue to think that these arrangements should be immediately made. While the right and the responsibility of deciding belong to you, it is very desirable that at this perilous juncture there should be, as far as possible, unanimity in your Councils, with a view to safe and efficient action. I have therefore felt it my duty to tender you my resignation of the office of Secretary of State, and to ask your permission to retire from that official association with yourself and the members of your Cabinet which I have enjoyed during almost four years without the occurrence of a single incident to interrupt the personal intercourse which has so happily existed. I cannot close this letter without bearing my testimony to the zealous and earnest devotion to the best interests of the Country with which during a term of unexampled trials and troubles you have sought to discharge the duties of your high station. Thanking you for the kindness and confidence you have not ceased to manifest towards me, and with the expression of my warmest regard both for yourself and the gentlemen of your Cabinet, I am, sir, with great respect, Your obedient servant, LEWIS CASS. excepting the two or three lines in which you speak of the special objections to his son. He assents without reserve or qualification to all your suggestions. As to the Assistant Secretaryship, he remarked that you could probably suggest a better choice than he, & that he would prefer leaving that matter in your hands. I am sure that although you may occasionally be compelled to take the laboring oar out of the ordinary course of duty, you can get along with the General better than with any other person." |