The Continental Monthly, Vol 3 No 3, March 1863

Whatever had been the original design of the story, its instant effect, in the excited state of the public mind, was the formation of companies in every county and village throughout the South for military drill.

These organizations, of which there were frequently several in a single village, were equipped entirely at the expense of the individual members. As they were under constant drill during the winter and summer, they presented at the opening of the year 1861 the singular spectacle of a great army, organized and equipped at its own expense, ready at any moment to march at the command of the recognized government. This, it is unnecessary to say, was the grand basis of that army which was afterward placed upon the field; and thus it was that a secretary of war so palpably inefficient as Mr. Walker was able, with an empty treasury, for many months to surpass the North in the supply of troops, equipped, and at once prepared for duty.

It was in full appreciation of this great armed mass that lay at his hand in a condition to be easily formed into an organized and efficient army, that Mr. Davis, after much entreaty, and repeated postponement, reluctantly gave his assent to the first strong act of the executive department, and ordered the attack upon Fort Sumter.

Without anticipating what were to be the effects of this act in the North, which was, indeed, open to the conjecture of no man, Mr. Davis on this occasion simply exhibited a hesitancy in venturing on extreme measures, which will be found to be a characteristic feature of his administration.

For several days the city was filled with rumors concerning the anticipated attack, but early on Friday morning it was announced that the bombardment had already begun. In the general excitement, business was suspended. Crowds filled the streets. The war department was in constant receipt of telegraphic messages announcing the progress of the bombardment. But nothing came during the day to diminish the growing anxiety. It was found that the fleet of war vessels said to be outside the bar would take advantage of the night to come to the succor of the fort. Sleep was impossible. Men who had gone to bed arose again and joined the crowd which thronged the streets. At length, shortly after midnight, Mr. Walker came forth and announced the last and most favorable telegraphic report concerning the progress of the siege, uttering at the same time the famous boast which has linked his name with an indissoluble association of folly. Shortly past noon on Saturday, the message came which announced the surrender of the fort. The city was frantic with joy. For hours, no forms of manifestation seemed adequate to express the excitement which filled all classes of society. Standing on the housetop in the evening, a wild crowd could be seen flitting before bonfires, or ranging the streets, and shouting in the ecstasy of an excitement which none could control. Immediately on the arrival of the despatch, messengers had started into the country with the welcome tidings, and deep in the night the ear was startled by the dull roar of the cannon announcing the arrival in some distant village of the joyful intelligence.

'That will be the end of the war,' said a man of well known conservatism, who stood by at the announcement in Montgomery of the surrender of the fort. It was the last expression of that fatal fallacy which had lured so large a class quietly to acquiesce in the fact of secession in the hope of thus securing the peaceful recognition of the North. In a few days more, the whole deception had passed away. But the correction had come too late. The Union party was extinct. Twice, in the course of that great change, by the progress of which, a people, in majority loyal, was converted into one totally disloyal and revolutionary, it lay within the power of the Federal Executive, by firmness and a proper exhibition of its powers, to have sustained the Union party in the South and crushed the rebellion—before the election of Mr. Lincoln, and at the time of the strong Union reaction in the election of delegates to the State convention. At both these periods the Union feeling was strong and increasing, immediately after each; pressed upon by arguments which the course of the Executive had failed to answer, it slowly declined. But no great sentiment is destroyed at once. There is reason to believe that, if left to itself, the tide of Union feeling might again have flowed back, and the faint traces of a reconstruction party which appeared in the short interval of quiet that belonged to the rebel confederacy indicates, perhaps, the path along which it would have returned. But the time for these things had passed.

The fall of Sumter brought the doctrines of secession into instant popularity, and roused a spirit of military enthusiasm in the South scarcely less intense than that which the same event excited in the North. At once, in every direction, disappeared all those sober scruples which, during the hottest excitement of the preceding months, had quietly controlled the judgment of a small but influential class in every community. The change in north Alabama and central Tennessee, where the principles of secession had been steadily rejected by the people, was almost instantaneous. The excitement and pride of a sectional victory, and a false sympathy for the individuals who had ventured their lives in a cause in itself, perhaps, objectionable, effected what the most cunning fallacies of the leaders had been unable to accomplish. As this movement of the popular feeling had many points of resemblance with the revolution of feeling which took place just after the election of Mr. Lincoln, there were some who believed that it would be followed by a similar reaction. The excitement of the war into which the whole country was immediately precipitated, cut off, however, every chance of any such retrogressive movement. No reaction took place. The surrender of Fort Sumter completed the change of opinion which had been so long progressing in the South.

Those who look for an immediate restitution of Union feeling in the South, as a result of Federal victories, will be disappointed. It will be the result of a gradual movement—a movement resembling in every important particular that by which the secession sentiment was established in the interval between the election of Mr. Lincoln and the surrender of Fort Sumter. Operating particularly upon that class in society which is by nature passive rather than active, conservative rather than headlong, the movement, as in that case, will be at first slow and attended with many reactions, but the result will not be uncertain. Already the progress of the war has destroyed nearly all the motives by which the Union party of the South was formerly led to adopt the cause of secession. This great party, therefore, stretching through all parts of the South, forming an important element in the population of every village and county which threatened at one time with its passive resistance to overturn the whole scheme of the rebellion, stands now exposed to the full influence of the reactionary tide which has now begun to set back toward the Union. The change may not be at once, but the same motive which led the Union man of Tennessee to return to loyalty, will prove equally effective with his whole party, wherever distributed.

SHAKSPEARE FOR 1863

'O England!—model to thy inward greatness,Like little body with, a mighty heart,—What might'st thou do, that honor would thee do,Were all thy children kind and natural!But see thy fault! the South in thee finds outA nest of hollow bosoms, which it fillsWith treacherous crowns! they would o'erthrow our country,And by their hands the grace of Freedom die,If hell and treason hold their promises.' Henry V, Act II, Scene i.

THE UNION

V.

ILLINOIS AND MISSOURI COMPARED

My previous numbers, comparing the progress, in the aggregate, of all the Slave States, with all the Free States, of Massachusetts and New Jersey, with Maryland and South Carolina, and of New York with Virginia, demonstrate the fatal effect of slavery upon material advance, and moral and intellectual development. In further proof of the uniformity of this great law, I now institute a similar comparison between two great neighboring Western States, Missouri and Illinois. The comparison is just, for while Missouri has increased since 1810, in wealth and population, much more rapidly than any of the Slave States, there are several Free States whose relative advance has exceeded that of Illinois. The rapid growth of Missouri is owing to her immense area, her fertile soil, her mighty rivers (the Mississippi and Missouri), her central and commanding position, and to the fact, that she has so small a number of slaves to the square mile, as well as to the free population.

The population of Illinois, in 1810, was 12,282, and in 1860, 1,711,951; the ratio of increase from 1810 to 1860 being 13,838.70. (Table 1, Cens. 1860.) The population of Missouri in 1810, was 20,845, and in 1860, 1,182,012; the ratio of increase from 1810 to 1860 being 5,570.48. (Ib.) The rank of Missouri in 1810 was 22, and of Illinois 23. The rank of Missouri in 1860 was 8, and of Illinois, 4.

Area.—The area of Missouri is 67,380 square miles, being the 4th in rank, as to area, of all the States. The area of Illinois is 55,405 square miles, ranking the 10th. Missouri, then, has 11,975 more square miles than Illinois. This excess is greater by 749 square miles than the aggregate area of Massachusetts, Delaware, and Rhode Island, containing in 1860 a population of 1,517,902. The population of Missouri per square mile in 1810 exceeded that of Illinois .08; but, in 1860, the population of Missouri per square mile was 17.54, ranking the 22d, and that of Illinois, 30.90, ranking the 13th. Illinois, with her ratio to the square mile and the area of Missouri, would have had in 1860 a population of 2,082,042; and Missouri; with her ratio and the area of Illinois, would have had in 1860 a population of 971,803, making a difference in favor of Illinois of 1,110,239 instead of 529,939. The absolute increase of population of Illinois per square mile from 1850 to 1860 was 15.54, and of Missouri 7.43, Illinois ranking the 6th in this ratio and Missouri the 14th. These facts prove the vast advantages which Missouri possessed in her larger area as compared with Illinois.

But Missouri in 1810, we have seen, had nearly double the population of Illinois. Now, reversing their numbers in 1810, the ratio of increase of each remaining the same, the population of Illinois in 1860 would have been 2,005,014, and of Missouri, 696,983. If we bring the greater area of Missouri as an element into this calculation the population of Illinois in 1860 would have exceeded that of Missouri more than two millions and a half.

Mines.—By Census Tables 9, 10, 13 and 14, Missouri produced, in 1860, pig iron of the value of $575,000; Illinois, none. Bar and rolled iron—Missouri, $535,000; Illinois, none. Lead—Missouri, $356,660; Illinois, $72,953. Coal—Missouri, $8,200; Illinois, $964,-187. Copper—Missouri, $6,000; Illinois, none. As to mines, then, Missouri has a decided advantage over Illinois. Indeed, the iron mountains of Missouri are unsurpassed in the world. That Illinois approaches so near to Missouri in mineral products, is owing to her railroads and canals, and not to equal natural advantages. The number of miles of railroad in operation in 1860 was, 2,868 in Illinois, and 817 in Missouri; of canals, Illinois, 102 miles; Missouri, none. (Tables 38, 39.) But if Missouri had been a free State, she would have at least equalled Illinois in internal improvements, and the Pacific Railroad would have long since united San Francisco, St. Louis, and Chicago.

Illinois is increasing in a progressive ratio, as compared with Missouri. Thus, from 1840 to 1850 the increase of numbers in Illinois was 78.81, and from 1850 to 1860, 101.01 per cent., while the increase of Missouri from 1840 to 1850 was 77.75, and from 1850 to 1860, 73.30. Thus, the ratio is augmenting in Illinois, and decreasing in Missouri. If Illinois and Missouri should each increase from 1860 to 1870, in the same ratio as from 1850 to 1860, Illinois would then number 3,441,448, and Missouri, 2,048,426. (Table 1.) In 1850, Chicago numbered 29,963, and in 1860, 109,260. St. Louis, 77,860 in 1850, and 160,773 in 1860. (Table 40.) From 1840 to 1850 the ratio of increase of Chicago was 570.31, and from 1850 to 1860, 264.65, and of St. Louis, from 1840 to 1850, 372.26 per cent., and from 1850 to 1860, 106.49. If both increased in their respective ratios from 1860 to 1870 as from 1850 to 1860, Chicago would number 398,420 in 1870, and St. Louis, 331,879. It would be difficult to say which city has the greatest natural advantages, and yet when St. Louis was a city, Chicago was but the site of a fort.

Progress of Wealth.—By Census Table 36, the cash value of the farms of Illinois in 1860, was $432,531,072, and of Missouri, $230,632,126, making a difference in favor of Illinois, of $201,898,946, which is the loss which Missouri has sustained by slavery in the single item of the value of her farm lands. Abolish slavery there, and the value of the farm lands of Missouri would soon equal those of Illinois, and augment the wealth of the farmers of Missouri over two hundred millions of dollars. But these farm lands of Missouri embrace only 19,984,809 acres (Table 36), leaving unoccupied 23,138,391 acres. The difference between the value of the unoccupied lands of Missouri and Illinois, is six dollars per acre, at which rate the increased value of the unoccupied lands of Missouri, in the absence of slavery, would be $138,830,346. Thus, it appears, that the loss to Missouri in the value of her lands, caused by slavery, is $340,729,292. If we add to this the diminished value of town and city property in Missouri, from the same cause, the total loss in that State in the value of real estate, exceeds $400,000,000, which is nearly twenty times the value of her slaves. By Table 35, the increase in the value of the real and personal property of Illinois from 1850 to 1860, was $715,595,276, being 457.93 per cent., and of Missouri, $363,966,691, being 265.18 per cent. At the same rate of increase from 1860 to 1870, the total wealth of Illinois would then be $3,993,000,000, and of Missouri, $1,329,000,000, making the difference against Missouri, in 1870, caused by slavery, $2,664,000,000, which is much more than three times the whole debt of the nation, and more than twice the value of all the slaves in the Union. While, then, the $20,000,000 proposed to be appropriated to aid Missouri in emancipating her slaves, is erroneously denounced as increasing federal taxation, the effect is directly the reverse. The disappearance of slavery from Missouri would ensure the overthrow of the rebellion, and the perpetuity of the Union, and bring the war much sooner to a close, thus saving a monthly expenditure, far exceeding the whole appropriation. But this vast increase of the wealth of Missouri, caused by her becoming a free State, if far less than one billion of dollars, would, by increasing her contribution to the national revenue, in augmented payments of duties and internal taxes, diminish to that extent the rate of taxation to be paid by every State, Missouri included.

The total wealth of the Union in 1860 exceeded $16,000,000,000. If this were increased $1,000,000,000 in time, by the augmented wealth of Missouri, and our revenue from duties and taxes should be $220,000,000, as estimated by the Secretary of the Treasury, the increased income, being one-seventeenth of the whole, would exceed $12,000,000 per annum; or, if the increase of wealth should be only $200,000,000, then the augmented proportional annual revenue would be $2,750,000, or nearly one-eightieth part of the whole revenue, thus soon extinguishing the principal and interest of the debt of $20,000,000, and leaving a large surplus to decrease the percentage of taxation in every State, Missouri included. The bill then might be justly entitled, an act to restore the Union, to advance the public credit, to hasten the overthrow of the rebellion, to augment the national wealth, and DECREASE THE RATE OF TAXATION. By overthrowing the rebellion, the taxes to pay the national debt will be collected from all the States, instead of being confined to those that are loyal. The rebel confederate debt, never having had any existence in law or justice, but having been created only to support a wicked rebellion, will of course be expunged by the reëstablishment of the Union. Indeed, by a new mathematical and philosophical principle, far transcending the most sublime discoveries of Newton, Leibnitz, or La Place, the rebel debt is redeemable six months after the end of eternity, namely, six months after it is an independent nation, they shall have ratified a treaty of peace with us! All the rebel State debts incurred since the revolt, for the purpose of overthrowing the Government, will, of course, have no legal existence. Under the Federal Constitution, no State Legislature can have any lawful existence, except in conformity with its provisions, accompanied by a prior oath of every member to support the Constitution of the United States. These assemblages, then, since the revolt in the several States, calling themselves State Legislatures, never had any legal existence or authority, and were mere assemblages of traitors. Such is the clear provision of the Federal Constitution, and of the law of nations and of justice. It would be strange, indeed, if conventicles of traitors in revolted States, could legally or rightfully impose taxes on the people of such States, loyal or disloyal, to overthrow the Government. Indeed, if justice could have her full sway, the whole debt of this Government, incurred to suppress this rebellion, ought to be paid by the traitors alone.

With a restoration of the Union, the prosperity of all sections will be enormously increased. The South, with peace and with ports reopened, relieved from rebel taxes and conscription, will again have a profitable market for their cotton, rice, naval stores, sugar, and tobacco; the West for breadstuffs and provisions; the North for commerce, navigation and manufactures; and our revenue, from duties, would be vastly augmented, soon justifying a reduction of internal taxation. There is one item of almost fabulous value that must not be omitted. The cotton now in the Confederate States, of the unsold crops of 1860-'61, 1861-'62, and 1862-'63, exceeds 5,000,000 of bales. This cotton, sold at present prices, payable in federal paper, would be worth $1,800,000,000, or $1,134,000,000 in gold. If we diminish this one-half, as cotton might fall in price from time to time by the gradual reopening of our ports, this cotton would still be worth $900,000,000 in our paper, and $567,000,000 in gold. This cotton, while putting all our spindles and those of the world into full operation, would turn the balance of foreign trade at once immensely in our favor, and bring back streams of gold to our shores. We would at once commence the liquidation of the national debt, with a large sinking fund, as a sacred trust applicable to that important subject.

Next to maintaining our finances and the public credit, followed by decisive victories in the field, the speedy success of emancipation in Missouri is most important. Missouri is larger by more than 6,000 square miles than any State east of the Mississippi, and occupies a central position between the North and the South, the East and the West. She is larger by 16,458 square miles than England proper, containing a population of nineteen millions. She is larger by 1,098 square miles than New York, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Delaware. She is larger by 5,264 square miles than all the New England States. She has a greater white population than the aggregate numbers of North and South Carolina and Florida, or of South Carolina, Georgia and Florida, or of Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi, or of Florida, Arkansas, South Carolina and Mississippi, or Louisiana; and a larger white population than all Virginia, East and West. She had, if disloyal, by her position and large white population, more power to imperil the Union than any of the slaveholding States. She has been true—she has suffered much in our cause, her fields and towns have been laid waste, thousands of her brave sons now fill our armies, and thousands more have fallen in our cause, and we will be recreant to truth and justice, to the safety of the Union, and forfeit the nation's pledge, if we do not now aid her in becoming a Free State. The southern boundary of Missouri (lat. 36°) is several miles south of Nashville, Tennessee; but, if we take altitude also into consideration, then, according to well established meteorological principles, the southern boundary of Missouri is at least a degree south of Nashville, reaching the northern boundary of Alabama. There is then a very large area of Missouri well calculated for the production of cotton. To accomplish this, the levee system of the Mississippi must be extended from the southern boundary of Missouri to the first highlands in that State, above the mouth of the Ohio; and a proper system of drainage adopted. These lands would thus be entirely secured from overflow, and greatly improved in salubrity. With these improvements, Missouri would contain an area of rich alluvial lands, well adapted to the profitable culture of cotton, embracing an extent capable of producing at least one million of bales of the great staple. These lands, considering latitude and altitude, would possess a climate similar to that of Middle Tennessee and North Alabama, where cotton is already cultivated with great profit. If emancipation prevailed in Missouri, these lands would soon be cultivated in cotton by free labor, and its immense superiority over the servile system would soon be demonstrated. Such a proof of the superiority of free over slave labor, even in the culture of cotton, would soon have an immense effect in reconciling the South to the disappearance of a system so fatal to her own prosperity, and endangering so much the harmony and perpetuity of the Union. This Missouri cotton would be nearer the North and Northwest than that grown in any other part of the Southwest, and thus supplied at a cheaper rate to our manufacturers, while opening new and augmented markets for the provisions and breadstuffs of the Northwest. This cotton would, in part, pass up the Ohio to Cincinnati and Pittsburgh, and thence to New York, Philadelphia, and New England. It would also in part pass through Indiana and Ohio by their railroads and canals. The great central railroad of Illinois would carry large portions of it also from Cairo to Chicago; but perhaps the largest portion eventually would pass up the Mississippi and Illinois rivers and enlarged canals to Chicago, and thence eastward. With the proposed enlargement of the canal connecting the Illinois river with Lake Michigan, and the enlargement of the locks of the great Erie canal, extended by a similar enlargement of the Chenango branch, and down the Susquehanna to tide water, cotton steam propellers would carry the great staple by this route to the Hudson and New England, to Baltimore or Philadelphia, at a rate much lower than any other Southwestern cotton. The Mississippi would thus have a quintuple outlet, as well into the lakes and the Hudson, the St. Lawrence, the Delaware, and Chesapeake, as into the Gulf of Mexico, and Missouri would be united by new ties with the North, and Northwest, as well as with the Middle States. Cairo, St. Louis, Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Pittsburgh and Buffalo would become considerable cotton depots, and slave labor would cease to monopolize the cotton culture. But there are other considerations still more momentous. Missouri extends from the 36th parallel to 40½, and from the 89th meridian to the 96th, thus embracing four degrees and a half of latitude, and seven degrees of longitude. She fronts for many hundred miles upon the great Mississippi, and commands its western shore; she commands also the mouth of the Missouri river, and both its banks for several hundred miles, and all its tributaries. The Missouri river and its tributaries are nearly double the length of the Mississippi and its branches. Missouri by her position dominates the whole valley of her great river, and commands Kansas and Western Iowa, and Nebraska, and Colorado, Dacotah and New Mexico. If Missouri had joined the Southern confederacy, and its power had ever been established, she would have forced with her all the vast region to which we have referred, containing, including Missouri, an area equal to twenty States of the size of Ohio. To separate Missouri forever from the proposed Southern confederacy, is to render the permanent establishment of such a government impossible. It not only severs Missouri from them, but all the vast region identified with the destiny of that great State. Secure Missouri permanently and cordially to the Union, and the rebellion is doomed to certain overthrow. With the fall of slavery in Missouri by her consent, and her cordial coöperation and sympathy with the North and Northwest, the days of the rebellion are numbered. With Missouri as a Free State, Arkansas, adjacent, cannot retain the institution. Such a result, aided by victories, and the reëstablishment of our finances, would soon give full effect to the edict of emancipation in Arkansas, and Louisiana would soon follow. With Missouri as a Free State by her consent, and her cordial coöperation and sympathy, slavery would soon disappear from the whole region west of the Mississippi, and Louisiana cordially be reunited to the Republic. With such a result, holding New Orleans and the mouth of the Mississippi and all the region west of that great stream, how could Tennessee or Mississippi remain in the Southern confederacy? The truth is, Missouri is the pivot upon which the rebellion turns. Had she gone with the South, and given to its cause a cordial support, it would have been difficult to subdue the rebellion. That she has gone with the Union is a momentous fact, and demands for her our heartfelt gratitude. I have shown, it is true, how greatly it is the interest of Missouri to become a Free State; but it is still more the interest of the nation to secure this great result. Give her what is needed to render emancipation certain, and we shall have secured the perpetuity of the Union. Missouri had no participation in introducing African slaves into this continent. The slaves that cultivate her soil are the descendants of those who were forced here under the British flag, or by the ships of the North, then in a state of colonial dependence; and it is just, and the national honor demands, that she should receive full compensation. As the existence of slavery in any State is a great evil and reproach, and a source of much weakness to the whole country, so should the nation compensate for any loss that may be occasioned by the abandonment of the system in any loyal State. Not only is this just, but the faith of the nation is solemnly pledged by resolutions adopted by Congress at its last session to carry this policy into full effect with the consent of any State. Twenty millions of dollars to secure such a result should be regarded as of little moment. Gladly would the nation pay a much larger sum for a single victory. But the moral and geographical and strategical victory secured by emancipation in Missouri by her consent, will be far more important than any triumph yet achieved by our arms. It is a victory that relieves a great State now and forever from the curse of slavery. It is a victory that secures the whole valley of the mighty Missouri to the Union. It is a triumph that sweeps slavery from Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas, dissevers the Southern confederacy, and restores the whole Mississippi, from its mouth to its source, to the Union.