Address of Major-General J.H. Martin at the reunion of the Georgia Division, United Confederate Veterans at Columbus, Ga., October 19th, 1910

EESPONSE TO ADDEESS OF WELCOME BY BEIGADIEE GENEEAL J. H. MAETIN, COMMANDEE OF WESTEEN BEIGADE, GEOEGIA DIVISION.
Loyal Adherents to the Undying Cause for Which the Con federate States Fought:
When I contemplate the royal welcome extended to us as guests of this patriotic city, which contributed to that cause such heroes as Henry L. Benning, Paul J. Semmes, Charles J. Williams, James B. Moore, Peyton H. Colquitt, Wesley C. Hodges, James N. Eamsey, Boiling H. Holt, Frank G. WiUdns, John F. Iverson and a host of others equally as heroic, and the charming manner in which that welcome has been tendered by the gifted and eloquent speakers selected for the purpose, I fear our loved and gallant Division Commander was unfortunate in his selec tion of me to represent the old Confederate Veterans, as I awake to a realization of my inability to respond in a fit ting manner. I might as well attempt,
"To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, To throw a perfume upon the violet,
To smooth the ice, or add another hue Unto the rainbow, or with taper light
To seek the beauteous eye of Heaven to garnish."
We behold here presented a scene of surpassing loveli ness. It is like a dream of poetry, that may not be written or told, exceedingly beautiful, for here are assembled Hie beauty and chivalry of Muscogee's fair Metropolis extend ing soul stirring greet^in*g'-s--* -to*-* -tI'jh.-.e handsome women and brave men whom thep^n^e-bido^fc) come as their guests.

MAJOR-GEXERAL J. H. MARTIX
rnanimously elected Commander of the Georgia Division United Confederate Veterans at the reunion of the Division at Columbus, Ga., on October 20th, 3910.

BESPONSE TO ADDRESS OF WELCOME BY BRIG ADIER GENERAL J. H. MARTIN, COM MANDER OF WESTERN BRIG ADE, GEORGIA DIVISION.

Loyal Adherents to the Undying Cause for Which the Con federate States Fought i

When I contemplate the royal welcome extended to ns as guests of this patriotic city, which contributed to that cause such heroes as Henry L. Benning, Paul J. Senunes, Charles J. Williams, James B. Moore, Peyton H. Colquitt> Wesley C. Hodges, James N. Ramsey, Boiling H. Holt, Frank G. Wilkins, John F. Iverson and a host of others equally as heroic, and the charming manner in which that welcome has been tendered by the gifted and eloquent speakers selected for the purpose, I fear our loved and gallant Division Commander was unfortunate in his selec tion of me to represent the old Confederate Veterans, as I awake to a realization of my inability to respond in a fit ting manner. I might as well attempt,

"To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, To throw a perfume upon the violet,
To smooth the ice, or add another hue Unto the rainbow, or with taper light
To seek the beauteous eye of Heaven to garnish."

We behold here presented a scene of surpassing loveli

ness. It is like a dream of poetry, that may not be written

or told, exceedingly beautiful, for here are assembled the

beauty and chivalry of Muscogee's fair Metropolis extend

ing soul stirring greetings^to the handsome women and

^ *^ "*~ ""

"* " * -"*^k* ^W__

brave men whom the^Sive ?bidae8fcto come as their guests.

Their beaming faces radiate the cordial and heartfelt wel come which has completely captivated ns, while their cheery voices in sweet silvery cadences ring out to us the bewitch ing invocation,
"Come in the evening or come in the morning, Come when you're looked for, or come without warn
ing, Kisses and welcome you'll find here before you, And the oftener you come the more we'll adore you."
Under the inspiration of these enchanting surroundings, there is an enrapturing beauty that thrills us with delight and bids us drink deep of the waters of your generous and unmeasured hospitality and friendship, which gushes forth in sparkling streams of plenty and freshness from every nook and corner of your lovely city, as we stroll its spacious streets embellished as they are with elegant and stately edifices of stone and marble, indicative of great businessthrift, commercial activity, social, literary and religious advancement.
As hosts you have shown yourselves peerless, and we receive this grand ovation not only as a tribute to us as individuals, but as a merited recognition of the grand, in comparable and immortal principles for which the old Con federate Veterans are the matchless exponents.
In brief, the occasion, the delightful reception and princely courtesies, which we have enjoyed at your hands, have filled our hearts with dear remembrances that will ever be cherished and kept fresh and green.
"Long, long be our hearts with such memories filled, Like the vase in which roses have once been distilled, You may break, you may shatter the vase if you will, But the scent of the roses will hang round it still."
The scenes now witnessed vividly remind us that a little more than forty-five years ago, there closed a war which
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for deeds of noble daring, by the armies on both sides, stands without a parallel or even a rival in all the annals of history and the thrilling traditions of warfare. I use the words "by the armies on both sides" advisedly and de liberately, for those of us who wore the gray and met those who wore the bine in the conflict of battle, amidst the pon derous roar of cannon, the screaming of bursting shells, the whistling of grapeshot and canister, the deafening rattle of musketry, the deadly rain of leaden bullets, the agoniz ing and heart-rending shrieks and groans of the wounded and the dying, realized that we had met foemen worthy of our steel.
He who would deny courage to Federal soldiers and belittle their valor disparages the prowess and the most brilliant achievements of our Confederate soldiers and de tracts from their courage and their valor.
The arbitrament of arms, to which we appealed our cause, was decided against us, and as true and honorable people we of the South have, in good faith, abided the re sult, have loyally supported the Federal Constitution, and have always stood ready and willing to do our part in main taining and defending the dignity, the honor, and the in tegrity of the government of the United States. This was most forcibly illustrated in the prompt response made by the South to the call for soldiers to rally around the stars and stripes for duty in Cuba and the Philippine Islands, and it was the* soldiers from the South whose conspicuous gallantry and noble daring contributed most in carrying that flag to victory; while among the leaders, none displayed more consummate skill, chivalric dash and intrepidity, and covered themselves with such glory as grand, superb "Fighting Joe Wheeler" of Confederate fame.
If, however, loyalty to the United States government means or demands that we of the South are by our
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thoughts, words, acts, or deeds to consider and brand the glorious men who constituted the peerless armies of the Southern Confederacy as cut-throats, outlaws, or felons de serving to be swung from the gallows or incarcerated in dungeons, then I voice the sentiment of our beautiful and loved Southland when I declare with all the emphasis of my nature, that we never have and, God sustaining us, we never will subscribe to such loyalty as that; for sooner would the bright stars be swept from the blue dome of heaven than the revered recollections of the heroic achieve ments of our intrepid Confederate soldiers be obliterated from our minds and our hearts, or the principles hallowed with their blood be renounced by us. While hills and vales exist, while mountains and valleys survive, until the riv ers, seas, gulfs, and oceans go dry, and time itself ceases, so long will the principles for which the South fought be by us of the South maintained as right and the sweet re membrances and tender associations that cluster around that cause survive and be by us cherished as a priceless heritage and our dearest and most valued treasures.
"Still o'er those scenes my memory wakes And fondly broods with miser care,
Time but the impression stronger makes As streams their channels deeper wear."
We have no regrets to express except that we did nol succeed. We have no pardons to ask or beg and no apolo gies to make for having struggled and battled to establisl the Southern Confederacy. We knew we were right thei and we know it now, and feel a contempt for the craven hearted who are so lost to shame and honor, as to fe called upon to render excuses for the Confederate war an< who characterize our efforts as a criminal blunder.
It was the North that trampled under foot, nullified an destroyed the Constitution which guaranteed our rights an
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protected onr liberties. John O. Premont, the first Repub lican presidential nominee, was on June 17th, 1856, nomi nated on a secession platform and one which avowedly as sailed the Constitution, demanded its repudiation and pro claimed war against it and the people of the South. In March, 1857, under the leadership of Schuyler Golfax, af terwards thrice chosen Speaker of the House of Represen tatives and elected Vice-President of the United States, a proclamation was issued by prominent Republican leaders including sixty-eight members of Congress, declaring the "ineligibility of all slave owners for every office; no co-op eration with them in religion or society; no patronage to their manufactures or merchants; no pay or fees to their lawyers, physicians, preachers, teachers or editors." In a word, the South was outlawed and her people ex-commun icated from all things political, educational, social and re ligious and stigmatized as being unfit for State or Church.
At a large celebration at Framingham, Massachusetts, on July 4th, 1854, was witnessed a most shameful political tragedy, when William Lloyd Garrison, the orator of the day, deliberately struck a match and applied it to a copy of the Constitution which he characterized as a lie as he held it up in his hand, and as the burning particles were wafted into the air, amidst much pomp and ceremony and the enthusiastic applause of the assembled multitude he ex claimed: "So let the Constitution of the United States be destroyed; it is nothing but a covenant with death and an agreement with hell. Null and void before God from the first moment of its inception."
H. C. Wright, a prominent Northern politician, de nounced the Union as an unmitigated curse and its dissolu tion only a question of time.
Horace Greeley declared that the free and slave States ought to be separated and advocated the right of a State

to secede. On February 23rd, 1861, he said the South had the right to secede and that one section of the Republic should not be pinned to another by bayonets.
Samuel J. May favored the overthrow of the Constitu tion and the establishment of another government.
Joshua R. Giddings advised the insurrection of the slaves and the extermination by them cf their masters.
Charles Sumner strenuously warred against the Con stitution.
In 1848, Abraham Lincoln publicly asserted that "any people whatever have the right to abolish the existing gov ernment and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred right."
William H. Seward declared there was a higher law than the Constitution.
Wendell Phillips, an abolitionist leader, declared "The Republican Party is not national, it is sectional. It is the North arrayed against the South. All hail! then, disunion. The Republican Party is a party of the North pledged against the South." Referring to the Constitution he said "It is a mistake, let us tear it up and make another."
Anson Burlingame, another prominent abolitionist lead er, proclaimed to an approving constituency that, "The times demand an anti-slavery Constitution, an anti-slavery Bible and an anti-slavery God."
Ralph Waldo Emerson, the noted Northern writer, made the blasphemous declaration that "The gallows on which John Brown was executed is as glorious as the cross of Jesus Christ."
Such was the attitude of the North towards the Consti tution, our only safeguard. Such were the feelings of bit terness and hate entertained towards us of the South, that the assassination of our citizens by negroes was strenuously urged; the diabolical murderer John Brown who dragged
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innocent men and helpless children from their beds at night and brutally massacred them in his atrocious efforts to ex terminate those who entertained Southern sentiments was declared the equal of our pure and holy Saviour, and to satiate the enmity felt against us, they committed the soul killing crime of demanding that God Himself be changed to a South-hating God.
Waiving the causes enumerated, I place the secession of the South upon a higher plane and assert without the slight est fear of successful refutation that she had the Consti tutional right to secede. That secession was a Constitu tional right was recognized and publicly declared in con ventions and otherwise for over seventy years before the Civil War, not only by the Southern States, but by those of the North, East and West. In support of this asser tion, I cite the following facts: As early as 1793 Georgia, in the exercise of her powers as a free, sovereign and in dependent State, by the Legislature, passed an Act making it a felony for any Federal officer to levy or attempt to levy upon any part of her territory to prevent the enforcement of a judgment obtained by Chisholm against the State of Georgia in the United States Supreme Court. In 1825 George M. Troup, as Governor, defied the administration of John Quincy Adams and called out the State Militia to resist Federal interference with the treaty that the State had made with the Creek Indians. In 1798-9 the Legislatures of Virginia and Kentucky passed nullification resolutions; those of Kentucky were drafted by Thomas Jefferson, after wards twice elected President of the United States and those of Virginia by James Madison who was also thereafter twice elected President. In 1803, 1804, 1808 and in 1814 at the Hartford Convention the Eastern States clamored for se cession from the Union and the formation of a Northern. Confederacy, and their right to secede was not questioned,

nor were they charged with rebellion or treason. In 1809, the Governor of Pennsylvania ordered out the State Mili tia to prevent the service of process issued from the Su preme Court of the United States. Other instances of the assertion of State sovereignty were by Maine in 1831, South Carolina in 1832, Massachusetts from 1843 to 1845, and in fact hy a majority of all the States, for fourteen of the
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Northern States enacted laws to prevent the execution of the laws of Congress within their boundaries.
The first Article of the Confederation entered into by the several colonies, in 1778, expressly declared that each State retained its sovereignty, freedom and independence, and every power, jurisdiction and right which was not by the States expressly delegated to the Confederacy formed.
In the treaty of peace entered into between the Colonies and Great Britain in 1783 Great Britain mentioned the thirteen colonies by name and acknowledged them to be free sovereign and independent States.
In 1781, 1783 and 1784 the United States Congress rec ognized the sovereignty of the several States by asking of them the right and power to levy duties.
In 1787, when the States sent delegates to the Philadel phia Convention to revise the Federal Constitution, and form a more perfect union, each State, with the exception of South Carolina and Massachusetts, set out in the com missions to the delegates that they were issued in tha eleventh year of the Independence of the Free Sovereign and Independent State issuing the same without mention ing the year of Independence of the United States as the date of issuing the same.
That convention was a secession convention pure and simple. It was called for the express purpose of seceding from the Union established by the Articles of Confedera tion which declared that the Union should be perpetual.
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On the 17th day of September, 1787, the convention adopted the present Constitution other than the amendments there to, and a new Union was formed and a new Constitution framed which is absolutely silent as to the perpetuity of the Union formed and this omission was intentional for the perpetuity of the Union then being formed was discussed and considered by the Convention. If the several States could secede from a Union which they had entered into and declared should be perpetual, as was done at the Philadel phia Secession Convention in 1787, it irresistibly follows that at the Montgomery Secession Convention in 1861 the States of the South had the same indisputable legal right to secede from the Union whose Constitution makes no ref erence whatever as to its duration, thereby leaving to each State the right to withdraw from the Union whenever the State saw fit to exercise this right. The Constitutional Convention of 1787 was in itself a decisive declaration by all the States that notwithstanding the confederation entered into by them in 1778, each State had retained its sover eignty, freedom and independence, and its right to with draw froni the Confederation whenever it desired to do so.
The Constitutional right of the South to secede from the Union depends upon the construction of the Constitu tion framed by the convention in 1787. If the Constitution then adopted established a nation a national government the Constitutional right to secede did not exist; other wise it did exist. That the Constitution did not and never was intended to establish a national government was settled beyond controversy by the convention itself. The very first resolution that came up before the convention was "that a . national government ought to be established" when Oliver Ellsworth of Connecticut made a motion to expunge the word "national" and alter the language used so as to run "that the government of the United States ought to eon-
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sist," etc., he then and there stating that tills alteration would drop the word "national" and retain the proper title. This motion was seconded by Mr. Gorham and th3 motion was unanimously adopted by the Convention. The contention that a national government was established has no basis of fact to rest upon and is in direct !and irrecon cilable conflict with the real fact, the truth of the matter.
It has never been questioned that if the Southern States acceded to the Union they had the right to secede there from. It has never been questioned that if the Constitu tion was a compact, secession was a Constitutional right. It has never been questioned that if the framing of the Constitution and the formation of the Union was a compact between the States, each State had the right to withdraw therefrom at will.
The records of the Convention and the unequivocal dec larations of the members of the Convention establish be yond controversy that the States acceded to the Union. The following members of that Convention, while the Con stitution was being framed and the Union formed, ex pressly declared that the Union was an accession of the States: George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, James Madison, Wilson, Gerry, Randolph, Innes, King and Mor ris.
Eminent contemporary statesmen and writers asserted that the States acceded to the Union, to-wit: John C. Calhoun, Patrick Henry, Chief Justice Marshall, Grayson and a great many others.
Everyone must admit that "the same power which es tablished the Constitution may justly destroy it," and the Constitution having been established by the accession or consent of the several States each acting separately and independently it inevitably follows that the States had the
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right to dissolve the Union by seceding from it, whenever they deemed it advisable and to their interest to do so.
Was the Constitution a compact? Gouverneur Morris,
a member of the Convention, asserted "that he was there to form a compact for the good of America and was ready to do so with all the States, and hoped that all would enter into the compact." He further asserted that the compact was to be a voluntary one. Mr. Oerry, the representative of Massachusetts, spoke of it as a compact. Mr. Madison of Virginia, the father of the Constitution, calls it "a compact among the States in their highest sovereign capacity." In 1830, Daniel Webster in his speech on Foot's resolu tions said it was a compact. Chief Justice Jay of- the Su preme Court of the United States in the case of Christian vs. State of Georgia expressly declares that the Constitu tion of the United States is a compact. John Quincy Adams, the sixth President of the United States, said it was a compact. Edmund Pendleton, President of the rati fying Convention of Virginia in 1788, declared it was a gov ernment founded in "real compact." Judge Tucker in his excellent commentaries on Blackstone repeatedly calls the Constitution of the United States a compact between the States. Thomas Jefferson, father of the Declaration of Independence, says the States entered into a compact which is called the Constitution of the United States. The Massa chusetts Convention which ratified the Constitution speaks of it as an explicit and solemn compact. The Federalist, that great political periodical, in submitting the Constitu tion to the people for ratification sets it before them as "the compact." From the viewpoint that the Constitu tion was a compact the right of secession is unquestionably established.
Was the Constitution a compact between the States T To ascertain this we must look back to the manner in which it
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was formed and upon what foundation it rests. The Con stitution was the creation of the several States acting sep arately and independently and not jointly, was drawn up by the States, each acting for itself, every item therein was voted upon by each one of the States separately, each State having one vote, and then the entire instrument was adopted by the States acting as separate, independent and equal bodies. There was no joint approval of the Constitution, but each State acted for itself alone, "free and indepen dent, uncontrolled and uncontrollable by any power upon earth," thereby showing that it was a union of States effected by the several acts1 of each State in forming a Fed eral government, and not a national government. Provis ion was made by the Convention for the submission of the Constitution to be ratified by each of the several States acting for itself independently of the action of any other State.
Gouverneur Morris made a motion to have the Consti tution ratified by a general Convention chosen and author ized by the people to consider, amend and establish the same, which motion if carried would have had the effect to establish a national government but his motion failed to receive a second in the convention.
Mr. Madison moved that "a concurrence of a majority of both the States and the people should be required to ratify the Constitution," which motion also tended to the formation of a national government and was summarily voted down. The minutes of that convention and the dec larations of the members thereof will show that every sug gestion of a national government was promptly and un equivocally repudiated and that the convention rigidly ad hered to the determination of establishing a Federal and not a National Government by referring the adoption of the Constitution to "the accession of the several States each
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acting separately and independently for itself and bound only by its own voluntary act."
James Madison, though personally favoring a national government, in the ratifying Convention of Virginia in 1788, in his articles in The Federalist, and in his letters to Daniel Webster and Edward Everett asserted that the Con stitution was a compact to which the States are the parties as distinct and independent sovereigns.
Alexander Hamilton in the Federalist, "the great polit ical classic of America," referring to the adoption of the Constitution, said "It is to be the assent and ratification of the several States derived from the Supreme authority in each State the authority of the people themselves. The act, therefore, establishing the Constitution will not be a National, but a Federal act."
No historical fact is better established than that the Constitution of 1787 was a compact between the- several States, and while additional authorities establishing this fact can be cited in great numbers from among the mem bers of the Convention, contemporaneous statesmen and historians not one can be cited that will show that it is not a fact.
The rights of the several States were not derived from the Constitution but the rights, powers and authorities of the Constitution were derived solely from the several States. The Constitution is the creature and the several States the creator thereof and all rights not given by the States are by them retained. This is declared in the tenth amendment to the Constitution which says: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution nor prohibited by it to the States are reserved to the States or to the people." It can not be shown that any State ever ceded, relinquished, surrendered or gave away the right of sovereignty. It can not be shown in the Constitution that
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any State every waived, renounced, gave away, relinquished or surrendered its right to withdraw from the Union. It can not he shown in the Constitution of 1787 that any State ever surrendered or relinquished its sovereignty and inde pendence to a greater extent than it did in the Articles of Confederation, and the highest tribunal in the land, the United States Supreme Court, in the case of McElvaine vs. Coxe in 1805, and again in the case of Gibbons vs. Ogden in 1824 decided that each State was sovereign and indepen dent under the Articles of Confederation.
i
The universally recognized doctrine that each State re tained its independence and sovereignty gave rise to the Nullification Acts of the States and the various Conven tions held and in which secession was advocated, such as the Abolitionist Convention held in Syracuse New York in May, 1851, in which it was asserted that any State had the right to secede from the Union, and a resolution was adopted declaring that it was "a doctrine vital to liberty and the only safeguard of the several sovereignties from the tyranny of a grasping centralization."
No National Union ever existed before the avaricious and damnable invasion and conquest of the South in 1861-5 by the burning and plundering hordes of the North aided by mercenary hirelings.
Jefferson Davis, Bobert E. Lee, Joseph E. Johnston and Albert Sidney Johnson were taught at the Great Mili tary School conducted by the United States at West Point that each State was free, sovereign and independent and had the Constitutional right to secede at will. The Stand ard text book on Constitutional law at "West Point was "View of the Constitution of the United States" by Wil liam Bawle, an eminent lawyer of Philadelphia to whom Washington more than once tendered the position of Attor ney-General. In this book he asserts "It depends on the
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State itself to retain or abolish the principle of representa tion because it depends on itself whether it will continue a member of the Union. To deny the right would be incon sistent with the principles on which our political systems are founded. The secession of a State from the Union de pends on the will of the people of such State."
The realization by the United States Government offi cials that secession was a Constitutional right was the key that unlocked the prison cell in which was confined that im mortal man, in whom true nobolity of soul and unalloyed patriotism were personified, the South's Great Chieftain and martyr, Jefferson Davis, President of the Sonthern Confederacy. The cruel, heartless and cowardly United States Government officials kept him incarcerated in a dun geon from the 22nd of May, 1865, to the 13th of May, 1867, when his counsel forced a hearing by suing out a writ of habeas corpus and he was released from imprisonment un der a $100.000 bond. These officials committed the brutal and unpardonable crime of putting fetters npon his feet although he was confined in the strongest and most impreg nable fortress on the American continent with two armed guards stationed continuously day and night at his door and he was at the time in a weak and enfeebled condition, all of which rendered his escape utterly impossible. He was a State prisoner, yet they treated him as if he were the vilest and most degraded felon. They dared not give him a trial on the indictment for treason although he earn estly sought and demanded one. They well knew that a trial would result in his honorable acquittal and the judicial establishment of the fact, that secession was a Constitu tional right and that neither Mr. Davis nor the South had violated any law, but were acting strictly under their Con stitutional rights in withdrawing from the Union. These officials well knew that the Federal compact entered into
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by the several States did not and was never intended to establish a nation and destroy the sovereign power of each State and its right to withdraw from the Union at will, and rather than have this right judicially determined and es tablished they, on the 15th day of February, 1869, dis missed the joint indictment pending against Mr. Davis and a number of other Confederates for treason and abandoned all future proceedings against them, thereby admitting that the trumped up charges against them were without merit, and without even the shadow of right, justice or law but was a highhanded assumption of power by brute force.
The uttermost depths of infamy and villainy were reached by the persecutors of Mr. Davis when they at tempted to bribe the incorruptible Henry Wirz with his life as the reward to testify falsely against Mr. Davis so that they could criminally take action against him. The heroic Wirz spurned the offer and in his execution which followed was committed as diabolical a murder as. ever blackened the historic page. All honor and praise to the grand and cour ageous Southern women for erecting a monument to his memory.
In face of the fact that the Eepublican leaders of the North, East and "West had most strenuously advocated the Constitutional right of secession and threatened the seces sion of their respective States, yet in 1861, when the South in the exercise of this right withdrew from the Union they branded her withdrawal as rank treason, declared war against her. and invaded her territory with vast armies for the purpose of subjugating her people. The secession of the South militated against the financial interests of the North, East and West and was therefore condemned by them as a crime, but when Panama seceded from Columbia and these Republicans thought that the seceding would add to their coffers there was a complete change of front and
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these erstwhile blatant anti-secessionists again became ram pant advocates of secession and landed it as a right and a patriotic virtue to exercise that right. The North and East were never influenced by their patriotism or love for the Union for they never possessed either, but by their love for the Almighty Dollar. Their money loving, shifting policies afford a striking illustration of the moral inculcated in Rabelais' couplet,
"The Devil was sick, the devil a monk would be; The Devil was well, the Devil a monk was he."
The South, however, resorted to every honorable means of averting war and in the Congress of 1860, that grand' and noble man whose fame and patriotism will endure while time lasts, Jefferson Davis, with all the power of his great nature, pleaded for the Union and urged the adoption of the Crittenden compromise, which was a measure much more favorable to the North than the South, and which was conceived in the interest of peace and intended to prevent a rupture between the two sections of the government, but which did not receive in Congress a single Republican vote. In the Charleston Convention the South and the Democratic Party in the platform then adopted stood for the Union and the Constitution, while Abraham Lincoln was nominated and elected on a platform avowedly inimical to the Consti tution and the South and which repudiated the United States Supreme Court and had for its purpose the subjection of the South to the rule of the North. Northern rebellion against the Constitution and the undisguised determination to rob the South of her inalienable rights and hold her a vassal to Northern greed and despotism caused the South to withdraw from the Union.
It was the North that declared and forced war on us of the South, for the North sought revenue and empire and on our part we simply fought for defense and existence.
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The result was against us and the absolutely null and void 14th and 15th amendments to the Constitution of the United States were without any authority of law or right ruth lessly foisted upon us for the infamous purpose of African izing the South and to rivet the fetters in which we were bound by war's iron hand and which was only averted by that grand, invincible and invisible army that, Phoenix-like,, rose from the remnants of the Confederate armies and un der the mystic name of the Ku Khix 'Klan saved the South from negro domination and spoliation and established white control and supremacy, in spite of the seenungly insupera ble obstacles thrown around us and the dangers which con fronted us.
Dr. Albert Taylor Bledsoe, in his masterly work "Is Davis a Traitor," and from which I obtained much data and whose ideas and language I have made liberal use of in discussing the Constitutional right of secession so ad mirably presents the causes of secession that I approve,, adopt and present them as follows:
"First, the destruction of the balance of power, which was originally established between the North and the South ; and which was deemed by the authors of the Constitution to be essential to the freedom, safety and happiness of those sections of the Union.

Secondly, the sectional legislation by which the original poverty of the North was exchanged for the wealth of the South; contrary to the great design of the Constitution,, which was to establish the welfare of all sections alike, and not the welfare of one section at the expense of another.
Thirdly, the formation -of a faction, or "the party of the North pledged against the South;'* in direct and open violation of the whole spirit and design of the new Union; involving a failure of the great ends for which the Eepublic was ordained.
is

Fourthly, the utter subversion and contemptuous disre gard of all the checks of the Constitution, instituted and designed by its authors for the protection of the minority against the majority; and the lawless reign of the North ern Demos.
Fifthly, the unjust treatment of the slavery question, by which the compacts of the Constitution made by the North in favor of the South, were grossly violated by her; while, at the same time, she insisted on the observance of all the compacts made by the South in her own favor.
Sixthly, the sophistry and hypocrisy of the North, by which she attempted to justify her injustice and oppression of the South.
Seventhly, the horrible abuse and slander, heaped on the South, by the writers of the North; in consequence of which she became the most despised people on the face of the globe; whose presence her proud ally felt to be a con tamination and a disgrace.
Eighthly, the contemptuous denial of the right of seces sion; the false statements, and the false logic by which that right was concealed from the people of the North; and the threats of extermination in case the South should dare to exercise that right.
These are the principal causes by which the last hope of freedom for the South in the Union was extinguished; and consequently, she determined to withdraw from the Union. Bravely and boldly did she strike for Liberty.'*
We are no cringing sycophants, no hypocritical penitents hovering around the altar of a mock and sham patriotism who
"Crook the pregnant hinges of the knee, liVhere thrift may follow fawning;" but "Unawed by power and unbribed by gain/'
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we always have and ever will proclaim our undying devo tion and unwavering fealty to the principles for which we fought for four long and bloody years.
In the brilliant period beginning in the year 1861 and ending in 1865, the South gave to the world new examples1 of patriotism, to the orator new topics of eloquence, to the statesman new subjects of thought, to the poet new themes of song, to the soldier new models for imitation, to her sons and her daughters a matchless and imperishable roll of heroes and heroines, and to her soil the blood of the very flower of her chivalry that consecrated it and forever ren dered it sacred.
! if there be on this earthly sphere
A boon, an offering Heaven holds dear,
'Tis the last libation Liberty draws
From the heart that bleeds and breaks in her cause."
"No country ever had truer sons, no cause nobler cham pions, no people braver defenders, no age more valiant knights, no principle purer victims" than our immortal Confederate dead, whose lifeblood encrimsoned the trenches around Petersburg and Vicksburg, the hills and valleys around Bichmond and Franklin, the wooded knobs and dells around Atlanta, the shadowy forests of Chickamauga and Chancellorsville, the dark ravines of Shiloh and the Wil derness, and the rock-ribbed heights of Sharpsburg and Gettysburg.
While in the armies of every other nation and country there are now and have always been marked and well de fined differences and distinctions in the social relations and stations in life between officers and men in the ranks, no such differences or distinctions found recognition in the armies of the Southern Confederacy, where officers and pri vates met and stood on the same high plane of social equal-
20

iiy on the tented field, that characterized their cordial, in timate association and warm genial companionship at their hospitable homes &re war's rude shock was felt. No lines of demarcation were drawn between officers and privates, for they were all of the same noble lineage and true nobil ity of soul and mingled together with brotherly love and affection, entertaining for each other the highest respect and esteem, each one being that highest type of genuine manhood a Southern gentleman.
The men in the ranks were not mere automatons, help lessly dependent upon their officers for guidance, direction and instruction.
In every private were born and bred that intelligence and those grand and distinguishing traits and qualities of mind and heart that render him self-reliant and prepared to meet any emergency that might arise and which fitted and qualified him for the highest leadership. Indeed, it was the intelligent skill and daring of the private soldiers that wrought and moulded the imperishable fame of our loved Confederate leaders and entwined around their brows chaplets of unfading beauty and grandeur the undying laurels of chivalric renown.
Such a love and admiration do I possess for the Con federate soldier, that I can truthfully assert and I believe I voice the sentiment of every true Southerner when I say it, that I would rather have coursing through my veins the blood of the humblest private who, in ragged clothing, with bare feet bleeding at every step, but with a heart as brave as Richard Cceur de Lion or Julius Csesai and as true and patriotic as that of George Washington himself, marched and fought in defense of Southern rights and principles, with a bravery and a patriotic devotion before unknown to the world, than to have combined in me the blood of all the
21

emperors, kings and royal potentates that ever sat upon the thrones of all the nations of the world.
The unquestioned heroes of the war were the Confeder ate private soldiers the men behind the guns. They gave to our arms undying renown; to our flag eternal glory; to Joseph E. Johnston, John B. Gordon and Stephen D. Lee everlasting fame; and to Eobert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson and Bedford Forrest immortality.
Only remnants of those peerless armies now survive and no recruits can be added to their decimated rolls. Neither royal titles nor abounding riches can purchase a place in their ranks or put one additional name upon the imperish able rosters of those armies, the most magnificent that ever were marshaled beneath the sun or fought for any cause. Multiplied thousands would rejoice to take the places of those who have answered their last roll call and now rest in the life eternal, but the enlistment has forever closed and not another name can be entered upon that immortal scroll of exalted honor, incomparable patriotism, sublime courage and matchless bravery, that has inscribed upon it in letters of living light the names of those heroic souls who with un wavering and chivalric devotion fought for the honor and independence of their beautiful and loved Southland and for a cause that "Bose without shame and fell without dishonor."
Ah! it is indeed sad to realize that the muffled drum has beat their last tattoo and that we shall never again meet them on life's parade.
"On fame's eternal camping ground, Their silent tents are spread,
And Glory guards with solemn round, The bivouac of the dead."
22
I: _

. . "How sleep the brave who sink to rest

,

By all their country's wishes blessed!

When Spring, with dewy fingers cold,

Returns to deck their hallowed mold,

She then shall dress a sweeter sod

Than Fancy's feet have ever trod.

*
By fairy hands their knell is rung; By forms unseen their dirge is sung; There Honor comes, a pilgrim gray, To bless the turf that wraps their clay; And Freedom shall awhile repair, To dwell a weeping hermit there."

The canse for which they fought and fell, failed. The hopes they so dearly cherished were crushed. The Confed erate battle flag which they loved so well was furled with no stain or soil of dishonor thereon, but around it was wreathed the glory of hundreds of victorious battlefields, while its shell and shot torn rents and remnants ware un dying emblems of the heroic deeds of the brave men who fought beneath its folds and whose achievements
"Shall deathless be Upon the scroll of history And on the lips of poesy."
I have briefly alluded to the men of the South and the part played by them in war's bloody tragedy; but what shall I say of the role enacted by the noble, Christian, God like women of the South amidst the perils and dangers which confronted and environed them during that war! "Not once did they falter in their patriotic enthusiasm but encouraged fighting to the bitter end and to carry it on
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gave their jewels and the tireless labor of their hands to feed and clothe the men who wore the gray."
Words fail me; for as the full-orbed light of the meri dian sun exceeds in splendor and brilliancy the mellow, sil very beams of the midnight moon, so did the part per formed by our Southern women during the Confederate war surpass in self-sacrificing glory that of the men. From the moment the tocsin of war sounded the appeal to arms and the sunlight of Confederate victory burst forth and streamed over the plains of Manassas and continued through alternate epochs of shadows and sunshine to the gloomy night which settled over fated Appomattox, the women of the South, with a devotion, a heroism, and a patriotism un exampled and unparalleled in sublimity, stood by the altars of the Confederate States and kept the fires of patriotism aglow in the hearts of the men of the South. Indeed, "poetry would exhaust its inspiration and philosophy its eloquence" in futile efforts to wreathe adequate garlands of praise around their fair brows, for in all that is good> true, pure, noble, grand, magnificent, and sublime they stand unapproached and unapproachable.
Daughters of the Confederacy: With love, reverence and admiration we salute you as most worthy descendants of those grand women of the South. In you and your noble, beneficent deeds we behold the preservers of the faith and loyalty of your sainted mothers. You are still standing by the altars of your loved Dixie land keeping the fires of patriotism bright and blazing. Following in the footsteps of those angelic mothers you are "unchanged and unchangeable, loving and loyal, unfeigned and unfearing, unawed and unrepentant, and thanks be to God unre constructed forever."
We old soldiers, who are now in the twilight of life, with feelings of pride and exultation have witnessed your
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untiring constancy and loyal devotion in keeping fresh and fragrant the memories of those heroes who wore the gray.
When the last gnn of the Southern Confederacy had been fired on the battlefields and her armies, without food or clothing or the munitions of war, with ranks thinned to almost annihilation in battle's gory drama, were forced to yield to overwhelming numbers, who were supplied with all the comforts and equipped with every appliance and appointment of warfare, when our brave soldiers with eyes bedimmed with tears of regret, with their dearest hopes crushed, with hearts bleeding because success had not crowned their heroic and superhuman efforts to enable the South to erect her triumphal arches and sing thereunder her paeans of victory and success and celebrate the jubilee of the Southern Confederacy, returned to their desolated homes in a ruined and devastated country, with nothing left except honor and the sweet memories and hallowed asso ciations that clustered around the glorious cause for which they fought, then it was that the brave women of the South land with glowing patriotism and a heaven-born inspiration resolved that the cause consecrated with their blood should not die, that the memories of the patriotic dead should be forever cherished and preserved and their honor and fame forever guarded and kept pure and unsullied.
This noble impulse was first given practical form and beauty by Georgia Daughters of the Confederacy, and of this patriotic City of Columbus in the persons of Mrs. Charles J. Williams and Mrs. Eoswell Ellis (who was at that time Miss Lizzie Rutherford) in whose loyal and lov ing hearts originated the thought which was afterwards crystallized and ushered into existence as memorial day.
Here in your Linwood cemetery on the 26th day of April, 1866, were inaugurated the initial ceremonies of what has now become a universal custom both North and
25

South of annually decorating the graves of the heroic dead with "the whole smiling wardrohe of the Spring.*' Im poverished by the desolation of war, the South could not afford monuments, but she had her flowers upon every velvet carpeted hillside and in every verdant valley which she could "lay upon the hallowed shrines of her sleeping heroes."
The North was elated with her triumphs. The South was left with only the lustre of her untarnished honor and her sweet memories. Then it was that these Georgia daugh ters, with the heart of Ruth, bethought themselves that there were "laurels for the living and for-get-me-nots for the dead," and the sweet devoted "Marys of the South land" joined with them in "shedding tears and bearing incense sought the sepulchers in which lay buried the Temp lar knights of the Southern Cross" the soldier boys of Dixie. "It was love's unspeakable tribute of devotion," and thus it was that "in the genial lap of the Southland," and in the warm patriotic hearts of these brave Georgia daughters "the beautiful thought of memorial day was born."
Your love and adoration for the cause which you so zealously espoused have kept pace with the tide of pros perity that has blessed our sunny land. To annual vernal decorations you have added handsome monuments that rise up in balmy Spring, parching Summer, chilly Autumn and icy Winter in silent eloquence to sound your praises and eternize in granite and marble the objects of your loyal devotion. God bless and preserve you.
Sons of Confederate Veterans: I have hurriedly re verted to the matchless deeds of the illustrious sires from whom you can proudly claim your lineage and the just and righteous cause for which they gave their blood and their lives. I adjure you by all that is true, sacred and holy
26

never to prove disloyal to the patriotic principles for which your sires fought. Advocate them with all the zeal and power with which God has endowed yon, for they are eternal in their imperishable justness and undying gran deur and sublime purity. Never fail to revere the memo ries of those noble men who fell in defense of, or to respect and honor the battle-scarred veterans who fought so galgantly for those principles, for in honoring and revering such heroes and the cause they espoused, you will honor yourselves. "Whenever you find a Southern man so lost to honor and shame as to disown the principles for which the South fought, or who entertains such ignominious feelings and dastardly impulses as to prompt the utterance of words derogatory to the South for going to war and the grand and imperishable Cause for which she fought, or who would consign to forgetfulness and relegate to the rear the patriots, who illustrated that Cause on the battle field, you will find that he is a degenerate and one to whom true and unalloyed Southern manhood and honor are un known. You will find that he is one incapable of drawing the distinction between bravery and cowardice, manhood and poltroonery, virtue and vice, honor and disgrace, right and wrong and is a traitor streaked and striped with yellow to such an extent that he never would have responded to the call of his country, but would have ingloriously taken himself to the swamps and jungles in a frantic effort to place his unworthy carcass beyond the reach of Yankee bullets and danger, and is simply a miserable thing to be despised, spurned and condemned by all brave, high-toned
men. Young men, love the flag that your fathers rallied
around and transmit to posterity a love for it and the Cause it represented that shall not die
"Till the sun grows cold And the stars are old And the leaves of the judgment book unfold.'9

"That flag was never lowered in disgrace. It went down in sorrow but not in shame. No breeze ever wafted, no sunlight ever kissed a flag that represented a better, nobler or holier Canse." The flag of the stars and stripes will be respected and defended by us, bnt the flag dearest to our hearts is the battle cross of Dixie. We loved it from Sumter to Bentonville. "Living we love it. Dying we will love it. We will love it when we reach the other shore."
Confederate Veterans: We owe it to our dead com rades, to ourselves, to the noble women of the South who are so zealously at work erecting monuments to the living and the dead Confederate Veterans, and to the undying principles for which we fought, to keep our camp-fires brightly burning, and if we fail to do so then we are aiding in obliterating and consigning to forgetfulness the past and proving recreant to our most sacred duties and obligations. It is a burning shame that there is not a Confederate camp in every county and every old Veteran in a camp.
Not only were the Confederate armies the most patri otic, brave and chivalric ever marshaled beneath the sun or who ever fought for any cause, but they stand solitary, conspicuous and pre-eminent on the historic page as the only unsuccessful armies in the world's history that for more than forty-five years after the close of war's bloody reign kept up their organization to commemorate and per petuate the memories of their sublime heroism and patriot ism, their matchless achievements, the loved Cause and exalted principles for which they fought.
Let us keep our colors flying and our camp-fires burning as long as one of us survives. Let us indelibly impress upon our posterity that, when we have passed from the stage of life, it is their sacred duty to take our places in perpetuating a love for the Cause for which we fought and
28

the memory of the record made by the armies of the South. You can with pride point them to the colossal memorial inscribed upon the records of the United States, which requires an annual appropriation of millions of dollars running in 1894 to the enormous sum of $180,681,075, and which looms up as the most striking and stupendous monu ment to Confederate valor, the Federal pension roll, which forty years after the war contained nearly twice as many names of wounded Federal Veterans as the Southern Con federacy had soldiers in the field during the entire four years of the war, maintained by the South against fearful , odds in men, money, ships, guns, and munitions for war fare. The total number of pensioners of all classes on the roll June 30th, 1909, was 946,194 and the amount appropri ated for pensions for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1910, was $160,000,000.00. The South had few arms or ships while the Federals were abundantly supplied with arms and had two thousand ships afloat, of which eighty-nine were ironsides. The enlistment of the South was 600,000, that of the Federals 2,859,164, and of which in round num bers 720,000 were foreigners and 255,000 negroes. In short, she had the whole world to fight without regard to race or color.
Comrades, our ranks are being rapidly thinned by the grim Reaper Death! We are all going down the Western or sunset decline of life. Some have passed and others are approehing man's allotted time of life, three score and ten years. It is highly improbable that all of us who are assembled here today will ever meet again, with ranks un broken. There will be some missing faces, some vacant seats. Let us strengthen the ties which unite us a band of brothers, pledge anew our love and friendship for each other, and ever walk uprightly before man and before God. Let us keep fresh and green, nurtured with love and
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affection, the dear memories of our loved comrades who

have crossed over the river of Life and now respose in the

life immortal. May your joys be many, and may no sor

rows disturb your days nor griefs distract your nights!

May the gates of plenty, peace, honor and happiness be

ever open to you and yours. It is my heartfelt prayer to

our merciful Heavenly Father that when life's battle is

ended each one of you may be borne in the arms of Heaven*s

angels to Paradise. I sincerely desire that when your

epitaph is engraved upon the marble slab that will mark

your last earthly resting place there shall be inscribed

thereon the grandly suggestive and impressive words, than

which none import more exalted honor:

"He was a Confederate soldier."

NOTE. To the excellent work "Life of Alexander H.

Stephens," by Louis Pendleton, I am indebted for valuable

information and assistance.

J. H. MABTIN.