Mitch:
I meant to get to this yesterday. It is highly suspect that the North had less of a respect for the Constitution than the South. In fact the reverse could be more correct. The quote from Alexander Stephens was written long after the war, and it stands in direct contradiction to his “Cornerstone Speech” in which he condemned the Founding and claimed the Confederacy was founded on truer, more just, principles. In other words, as Vice-president of the Confederacy, Stephens believed the Union was faulty or flawed, and fatally so. He thought the Confederacy was founded on truer principles than we find in the Declaration or the Constitution. This is no defense of the Constitution over the “North.”
A lengthy snip from said speech:
The new
constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions
relating to our peculiar institution?African slavery as it exists
amongst us?the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization.
This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present
revolution. Jefferson in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the
“rock upon which the old Union would split.” He was right. What was
conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully
comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may
be doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the
leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old constitution,
were that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws
of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally, and
politically. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal with, but
the general opinion of the men of that day was that, somehow or other
in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and
pass away. This idea, though not incorporated in the constitution, was
the prevailing idea at that time. The constitution, it is true, secured
every essential guarantee to the institution while it should last, and
hence no argument can be justly urged against the constitutional
guarantees thus secured, because of the common sentiment of the day.
Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the
assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy
foundation, and the government built upon it fell when the “storm came
and the wind blew.”
Our
new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its
foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth
that the negro is not equal to the white man; that
slavery?subordination to the superior race?is his natural and normal
condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of
the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral
truth. This truth has been slow in the process of its development, like
all other truths in the various departments of science. It has been so
even amongst us. Many who hear me, perhaps, can recollect well, that
this truth was not generally admitted, even within their day. The
errors of the past generation still clung to many as late as twenty
years ago. Those at the North, who still cling to these errors, with a
zeal above knowledge, we justly denominate fanatics. All fanaticism
springs from an aberration of the mind?from a defect in reasoning. It
is a species of insanity. One of the most striking characteristics of
insanity, in many instances, is forming correct conclusions from
fancied or erroneous premises; so with the anti-slavery fanatics.
Their conclusions are right if their premises were. They assume that
the negro is equal, and hence conclude that he is entitled to equal
privileges and rights with the white man. If their premises were
correct, their conclusions would be logical and just?but their premise
being wrong, their whole argument fails. I recollect once of having
heard a gentleman from one of the northern States, of great power and
ability, announce in the House of Representatives, with imposing
effect, that we of the South would be compelled, ultimately, to yield
upon this subject of slavery, that it was as impossible to war
successfully against a principle in politics, as it was in physics or
mechanics. That the principle would ultimately prevail. That we, in
maintaining slavery as it exists with us, were warring against a
principle, a principle founded in nature, the principle of the equality
of men. The reply I made to him was, that upon his own grounds, we
should, ultimately, succeed, and that he and his associates, in this
crusade against our institutions, would ultimately fail. The truth
announced, that it was as impossible to war successfully against a
principle in politics as it was in physics and mechanics, I admitted;
but told him that it was he, and those acting with him, who were
warring against a principle. They were attempting to make things equal
which the Creator had made unequal.
There is much controversy over the cause for the Civil War. To suggest that slavery was not somehow central to it, is to ignore the succession articles presented in the states that secceded.
