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U. S. CIVIL WAR
PHOTOGRAPHS
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JEFFERSON DAVIS
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U.S. Capitol Building March 1861
(Lincoln's Inaugration)
JEFFERSON DAVIS' FAREWELL ADDRESS TO
THE U. S. SENATE - JANUARY 21, 1861
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By any standard, this scene has to rank as one of the most dramatic events ever
enacted in the chamber of the United States Senate. Would-be spectators arrived
at the Capitol before sunrise on a frigid January morning. Those who came after
9:00 a.m., finding all gallery seats taken, frantically attempted to enter the
already crowded cloakrooms and lobby adjacent to the chamber. Just days earlier,
the states of Mississippi, Florida, and Alabama had joined South Carolina in
deciding to secede from the Union. Rumors flew that Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas
would soon follow.
On January 21, 1861, a fearful capital city awaited the farewell addresses of
five senators. One observer sensed "blood in the air" as the chaplain delivered
his prayer at high noon. With every senator at his place, Vice President John
Breckinridge postponed a vote on admitting Kansas as a free state to recognize
senators from Florida and Alabama.
When the four senators completed their farewell addresses, all eyes turned to
Mississippi's Jefferson Davis-the acknowledged leader of the South in Congress.
Tall, slender, and gaunt at the age of 52, Davis had been confined to his bed
for more than a week. Suffering the nearly incapacitating pain of facial
neuralgia, he began his valedictory in a low voice. As he proceeded, his voice
gained volume and force.
"I rise, Mr. President, for the purpose of announcing to the Senate that I have
satisfactory evidence that the State of Mississippi, by a solemn ordinance of
her people, in convention assembled, has declared her separation from the
United States. Under these circumstances, of course, my functions are
terminated here. It has seemed to me proper, however, that I should appear in
the Senate to announce that fact to my associates, and I will say but very
little more. The occasion does not invite me to go into argument; and my
physical condition would not permit me to do so, if it were otherwise; and yet
it seems to become me to say something on the part of the State I here
represent on an occasion as solemn as this.
"It is known to Senators who have served with me here that I have for many
years advocated, as an essential attribute of State sovereignty, the right of
a State to secede from the Union. Therefore, if I had not believed there was
justifiable cause; if I had thought that Mississippi was acting without
sufficient provocation, or without an existing necessity, I should still, under
my theory of the Government, because of my allegiance to the State of which I
am a citizen, have been bound by her action. I, however, may be permitted to
say that I do think she has justifiable cause, and I approve of her act. I
conferred with her people before that act was taken, counseled them then that,
if the state of things which they apprehended should exist when their
Convention met, they should take the action which they have now adopted.
"I hope none who hear me will confound this expression of mine with the
advocacy of the right of a State to remain in the Union, and to disregard its
constitutional obligation by the nullification of the law. Such is not my
theory. Nullification and secession, so often confounded, are, indeed,
antagonistic principles. Nullification is a remedy which it is sought to apply
within the Union, against the agent of the States. It is only to be justified
when the agent has violated his constitutional obligations, and a State,
assuming to judge for itself, denies the right of the agent thus to act, and
appeals to the other states of the Union for a decision; but, when the States
themselves, and when the people of the States, have so acted as to convince us
that they will not regard our constitutional rights, then, and then for the
first time, arises the doctrine of secession in its practical application.
"A great man who now reposes with his fathers, and who has been often arraigned
for a want of fealty to the Union, advocated the doctrine of nullification
because it preserved the Union. It was because of his deep-seated attachment to
the Union, his determination to find some remedy for existing ills short of a
severance of the ties which bound South Carolina to the other States, that Mr.
Calhoun advocated the doctrine of nullification, which he proclaimed to be
peaceful, to be within the limits of State power, not to disturb the Union, but
only to be a means of bringing the agent before the tribunal of the States for
their judgement.
"Secession belongs to a different class of remedies. It is to be justified upon
the basis that the states are sovereign. There was a time when none denied it.
I hope the time may come again when a better comprehension of the theory of our
Government, and the inalienable rights of the people of the States, will
prevent any one from denying that each State is a sovereign, and thus may
reclaim the grants which it has made to any agent whomsoever.
"I therefore say I concur in the action of the people of Mississippi, believing
it to be necessary and proper, and should have been bound by their action if my
belief had been otherwise; and this brings me to the important point which I
wish on this last occasion to present to the Senate. It is by this confounding
of nullification and secession that the name of a great man, whose ashes now
mingle with his mother earth, has been invoked to justify coercion against a
seceded State. The phrase, "to execute the laws," was an expression which
General Jackson applied to the case of a State refusing to obey the laws while
yet a member of the Union. That is not the case which is now presented. The
laws are to be executed over the United States, and upon the people of the
United States. They have no relation to any foreign country. It is a perversion
of terms, at least it is a great misapprehension of the case, which cites that
expression for application to a State which has withdrawn from the Union. You
may make war on a foreign state. If it be the purpose of gentlemen, they may
make war against a State which has withdrawn from the Union; but there are no
laws of the United States to be executed within the limits of a seceded State.
A State, finding herself in the condition in which Mississippi has judged she
is, in which her safety requires that she should provide for the maintenance of
her rights out of the Union, surrenders all the benefits, (and they are known
to be many,) deprives herself of the advantages, (and they are known to be
great), severs all the ties of affection, (and they are close and enduring,)
which have bound her to the Union; and thus divesting herself of every benefit,
taking upon herself every burden, she claims to be exempt from any power to
execute the laws of the United States within her limits.
"I well remember an occasion when Massachusetts was arraigned before the bar of
the Senate, and when then the doctrine of coercion was rife and to be applied
against her because of the rescue of a fugitive slave in Boston. My opinion
then was the same that it is now. Not in a spirit of egotism, but to show that
I am not influenced in my opinion because the case is my own, I refer to that
time and that occasion as containing the opinion which I then entertained, and
on which my present conduct is based. I then said, if Massachusetts, following
her through a stated line of conduct, chooses to take the last step which
separates her from the Union, it is her right to go, and I will neither vote
one dollar nor one man to coerce her back; but will say to her, God speed, in
memory of the kind associations which once existed between her and the other
States.
"It has been a conviction of pressing necessity, it has been a belief that we
are to be deprived in the Union of the rights which our fathers bequeathed to
us, which has brought Mississippi into her present decision. She has heard
proclaimed the theory that all men are created free and equal, and this made
the basis of an attack upon her social institutions; and the sacred Declaration
of Independence has been invoked to maintain the position of the equality of
the races. That Declaration is to be construed by the circumstances and
purposes for which it was made. The communities were declaring their
independence; the people of those communities were asserting that no man was
born---to use the language of Mr. Jefferson---booted and spurred to ride over
the rest of mankind; that men were created equal---meaning the men of the
political community; that there was no divine right to rule; that no man
inherited the right to govern; that there were no classes by which power and
place descended to families; but that all stations were equally within the
grasp of each member of the body politic. These were the great principles they
announced; these were the purposes for which they made their declaration; these
were the ends to which their enunciation was directed. They have no reference
to the slave; else, how happened it that among the items of arraignment against
George III was that he endeavored to do just what the North has been
endeavoring of late to do---to stir up insurrection among our slaves? Had the
Declaration announced that the negroes were free and equal, how was the prince
to be arraigned for stirring up insurrection among them? And how was this to be
enumerated among the high crimes which caused the colonies to sever their
connection with the mother country? When our Constitution was formed, the same
idea was rendered more palpable, for there we find provision made for that very
class of persons as property; they were not put upon the footing of equality
with white men---not even upon that of paupers and convicts; but, so far as
representation was concerned, were discriminated against as a lower caste, only
to be represented in the numerical proportion of three fifths.
"Then, Senators, we recur to the compact which binds us together; we recur to
the principles upon which our Government was founded; and when you deny them,
and when you deny to us the right to withdraw from a Government which thus
perverted threatens to be destructive of our rights, we but tread in the path
of our fathers when we proclaim our independence, and take the hazard. This is
done not in hostility to others, not to injure any section of the country, not
even for our own pecuniary benefit; but from the high and solemn motive of
defending and protecting the rights we inherited, and which it is our sacred
duty to transmit unshorn to our children.
"I find in myself, perhaps, a type of the general feeling of my constituents
towards yours. I am sure I feel no hostility to you, Senators from the North. I
am sure there is not one of you, whatever sharp discussion there may have been
between us, to whom I cannot now say, in the presence of my God, I wish you
well; and such, I am sure, is the feeling of the people whom I represent
towards those whom you represent. I therefore feel that I but express their
desire when I say I hope, and they hope, for peaceable relations with you,
though we must part. They may be mutually beneficial to us in the future, as
they have been in the past, if you so will it. The reverse may bring disaster
on every portion of the country; and if you will have it thus, we will invoke
the God of our fathers, who delivered them from the power of the lion, to
protect us from the ravages of the bear; and thus, putting our trust in God,
and in our firm hearts and strong arms, we will vindicate the right as best we
may.
"In the course of my service here, associated at different times with a great
variety of Senators, I see now around me some with whom I have served long;
there have been points of collision; but whatever of offense there has been to
me, I leave here; I carry with me no hostile remembrance. Whatever offense I
have given which has not been redressed, or for which satisfaction has not been
demanded, I have, Senators, in this hour of our parting, to offer you my
apology for any pain which, in the heat of discussion, I have inflicted. I go
hence unencumbered by the remembrance of any injury received, and having
discharged the duty of making the only reparation in my power for any injury
offered.
"Mr. President and Senators, having made the announcement which the occasion
seemed to me to require, it only remains for me to bid you a final adieu."
(Source Library of Congress - Congressional Globe)
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Absolute silence met the conclusion of his six-minute address. Then a burst of
applause and the sounds of open weeping swept the chamber. The vice president
immediately rose to his feet, followed by the 58 senators and the mass of
spectators as Davis and his four colleagues solemnly walked up the center aisle
and out the swinging doors.
Later, describing the "unutterable grief" of that occasion, Davis said that his
words had been "not my utterances but rather leaves torn from the book of fate."
(Source: www.senate.gov)
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JEFFERSON DAVIS - PAGE 3
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Notes
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