E 
 
 440 
 . 5 
 
 B76Z 
 
SPEECHES 
 
 i0ULI(JM0FLAlli.SI(irM0FN.y. 
 
 DKLIVF.KIU' 1 
 
 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, FEB. 5, 1861. 
 SECESSION OF LOUISIANA. 
 
 Mr. Tavlor havini; annouiieod llio secesdion of liOuisianii, und his own withrtrawal from the 
 House — 
 
 MA BOULIGNY obtained the floor : 
 
 Mr. Speaker : I take this occasion to express my regret ihat I am not able to 
 agree with the honorable Senators from my State, and wiHj my colleague who has 
 just taken his seat, [Mr. Taylou,] although I entertain the greatest regard foj? 
 their opinions. In the outset, permit me to tsay, that until a few moments ago, I 
 was iu the same condition with my coUeage, not having received ofBcial informa- 
 tion of tlie pas^sage of the ordinance of .'"ecession by the convention of my State. 
 Nor have I received from the Legislature of my State, now in session, any infor- 
 mation of the passage by that body of a resolution instructing her Senators, or 
 requesting her Representatives, to withdraw from Congttss. For one, although 
 I respect that body, I shall not obey its requen. I was not ctected by that body, 
 and I have nothing to do with it, or it with me. 
 
 In reference to the convention, I Avill say that I respect that body, as I d) the 
 Legislature of my State. Many of its members are my personal and intimate 
 friends ; but I think they have shown discourtesy to me when they have not even 
 thought proper to send me a copy of their or'.inance of seoes-ion ; cert:uuly I shall 
 pay it no attention until it is communicated to me. [Laughter.] 
 
 Mr. Speaker, there is another reason which compel-j me to differ with the Sen- 
 ators and Representatives of my State. I am the only member of Congress from 
 Louisiana who was elected as an American Union man. To. ttiose principles 1 
 shall stand forever. [Great applause in the galleries.] 
 
 Again : when I came here, I took the oatli to sustain the Constitution of the 
 United States. What does that mean? Does not the Constitution of the United 
 States mean the Union of the United States ? I so understand it ; and to that oath 
 I shall adhere firmly to the end. Whenever 1 am instructed by my immediate 
 constituents, and am requested by them to withdraw from Congress, I shall com- 
 ply with those instructions «8 soon as they are received. Then, and not until 
 then, I shall resign ; and after resigning my positi n here. I shall yet be a Union 
 man, and stand under the flag of the country which gave me birth. [Great ap- 
 plause in the galleries and on the floor. ) 
 
NEW PHASES OP THE REVOLUTION— HOW TO MEET^THiLM. 
 
 The House V/ving resumed the consideration of iMr. Ool?ax'3 biU suspending; the postal geiTice, ii 
 
 I'ertain cases / 
 
 Mr. SICKLES, of New Y'ork, obtained the floor : 
 
 Mr. Speaker : There is a legal necessity for the pa'ssage of a bill of this 
 character. There is no power in any of the seceding States to protect the mails- 1^- 
 of the United States. There is no power in any of the seceding States to punish J 
 any criminal oti'ence which may be perpetrated upon the mails. As there are 
 no courts there which would entertain jurisdiction of any offence charged to 
 liave been committed against the United States, therefore, ex necessitate re-i, the 
 Government of the United States must either subject the mails to the hazard ol 
 livery possible trespass and depredation, or else withhold them from the insurgent 
 States. 
 
 Mr HINDMAN. Will the gentleman yield to me for a moment? 
 
 Mr. SICKLES. With pleasure. 
 
 Mr. HINDMAN. While I shall vote for this bill, acknowledging as it does the 
 independence of the seceding States, yet, sir, my impression is, that in the seced- 
 ing States the laws of the United States not specially declared null and void are 
 expressly continued in force. 
 
 Mr. SICKLES. My alteutiou had not yet been called to that extraordinary 
 inconsistency. I have yet to hear of the principle upon which a sovereign State 
 asserts its independence, and siill allows the laws of a foreign jurisdiction to be 
 enforced within its boundaries ; and I presume that no State holding the dignified 
 attitude which these States claim as independent sovereignties, will occupy such 
 a position. ii 
 
 Mr. HINDMAN. I have no desire to interrupt the gentleman unnecessarily. 
 I do not understand it is the intention of the seceding States that the United 
 States shall enforce its laws within their limits ; but those laws having been 
 enacted, and they having previously submitted to their enforcement within theii 
 limits, they, of their own act, and by their own authority, provide for their futurt- 
 enforcement until such time as they shall deem fit to declare their repeal In thn- 
 I see nothing derogatory to their assumption of authority. 
 
 Mr. SICKLES. The gentleman from Arkansas is a good lawyer ; and 1 ain 
 quite confident, if he were intrusted with the defence of a person accused of a 
 crime upon the mails of the United States, and the indictment was drawn in the 
 State of Louisiana, charging that certain oifences had been committed by a citizen 
 of that State against the property and in violation of the laws of the United States, 
 he would very speedily find the way to put in a demurrer wiiich would effectually 
 screen the offender. I know, sir, that where we have recognized the independ- 
 ence of a State, we can, by treaty, provide for the security of our mails in the 
 jurisdiction of a foreign State. But that is not this case. 
 
 The independence of these States has not been recognized by this Government. 
 It has not yet been recognized anywhere or by any Government. At least, it will 
 be conceded that it is a question in abeyance. In that position the measure pro- 
 posed is the only one consistent with principle. Certainly it cannot be objected 
 to as a coercive proposition. Far from it. As sucli I couli not vote for it. It 
 simply amounts to thLs : that you propose to suspend the operation of laws, the 
 enforcement of which is impossible. We mean to withdraw our property from a 
 jurisdiction wherein there are formidable impediments to its protection. So far as 
 this is a question to be considered with reference to private inconvenience, the mer- 
 chants of New York will suffer, in a pecuniary poiat of view, one hundred fold 
 more than the merchants of the South. The seceding States are indebted millions 
 upon millions to the city of New York. A. large portion of this indebtedness i.« 
 wholly unavailable. Of the bills receivable, payable by the seceding State*, 
 which matured iu .January and February', not twenty per cent, has been paid. 
 And this is the very season of the year when the remittances, if honorably met. 
 are forwarded. They have uot been met, I regret to know. The balance of trade 
 \h entirely against the seceding States. Nor would it be safe, in the present rela- 
 iions between the United States and the seceding States, to forward remittance> 
 tiy mail between the seceding States and the remaining States of the Union. 
 
 For the purpose of illustration, select from the large number of otlencea pun- 
 ishable under the several acts defining crimes .against the posiiii seivir^p t],c seizure 
 
of mail bags, the uiamifactuic of postage stamps, the approprialiou of letters or 
 iheir contents, the violation of a seal covering the dispatches of the Goverument 
 or of private correspondence. The Constitution, Art. 3 and Art. <> of the Amend- 
 ments, requires the ottender to be tried in the State and district where the ott'ence 
 is committed. We liave no courts in the States to which this bill applies. Vou 
 say you have adopted certain laws of ('ongress, and hence your own courts would 
 'have jurisdiction. The United States would not go into your courts to prosecute 
 anybody. Vou say you are a foreign jurisdiction. Well, suppose we trust our 
 mails to your protciiiou, and to your pi-osecution of persons who commit depre- 
 dations. Would you ever (HMivict anybody for riHiug a mail bag of a Government 
 dispatch, or of mail matter going to a place upon which you wisiied to make re- 
 prisals? Never. We send our mails i« ^rttw.t/Yw from one foreign Slate to iin- 
 <»thcr, in time of peace, where by treaty we have secured their protection under 
 the laws of the country through which iliey are transmitted. But it would be 
 mere folly to send our mails to Florida, while her troops are encamped before 
 Fort Pickens And if a series of belligerent acts, vast military preparations, and 
 loud menaces of war, authorize us to anticipate that a. liosiile relation may exist 
 between any of the States and the Government of the Union, then, unless we are 
 restrained by a romantic magnanimity, it is certainly proper to authorize the 
 Postmaster General lo discontinue tlie service within their limits. The seizure ot 
 the proceeds of the revenue, as well from postages as from imposts, is alone a 
 sufficient reason for this measure. The funds belonging to the United States 
 are not available to it in Mobile, New Orleans. Charlestou, or Savannah When 
 the proceeds are not safe, the service must stop. Revenue cutters, arms, public 
 buildings, barracks, navy yards, bullion, have been appropriated already. The 
 mails may be overhauled next, if we do not withhold them. 
 
 It is contended that such a discrimination against localities is unconstiiutioual ; 
 but, surely, there is nothing in this objection. It is simply a question of adminis- 
 tration. If a state of things is created by a particular locality which makes it 
 inconvenient for us to suffer public or private property to go there, we must either 
 send with it a sufficient force to protect it. or else not send it at all. 1 prefer the 
 latter, because it is not coercive. Besides, a constitutional objection will not come 
 with much gravity in behalf of those who look with complacency, if not with com- 
 mendation, upon the wholesale usurpation of power by the Governors and Legisla- 
 tures of their own ^tates. Georgia and Louisiana seized our forts and arsenals 
 before their secession conventions met. Florida, with equal precipitation, sent an 
 armed expedition, with the Hi<l of troops from Alabama and Mississippi, against 
 the Navy Yard !iT Pensacola Mississippi statiotied troops on the river at Vioks- 
 burg, to intercept reinforcements going lo the forts in Louisiana The Governor 
 of Mississippi, in ^ recent message to his Legislature, solicits an act of indemnity 
 for his extraordinary measures.. Louisiana requires all duties on goods passing 
 up the Missis-si ppi river to he paid at Xew Orleans. There are twenty ports of 
 delivery iu the western and south-western States, to which dutiable merchandise 
 may be transported in bond from the poit of New Orleans. The amount of duties 
 collected at Ihe^e ports is over $500,000 per annum. This sum Louisiana propo.ses 
 to take for herself, or else seize the goods. Of course, all payments so mnde 
 must be lost to the import' rs. for the duties must be paid to the United States, and 
 we have no Colle'-.tor at New Orleans. The principal ports upon which this block- 
 ade has been esfsiblished are St. Louis. Cincinnati, Louisville, Memphis, and Nash- 
 ville. Ohio and Mi.ssouri. anil Kentucky and Tennessee, will not be long in applying 
 a vigorous remedy at th» mouth of the Mississippi, if this Government shall not 
 remove the blockade. Meanwhile, the commerce of New Orleans will be transferred 
 to New York — not soon to return. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, just so far as you can suspend the operation of your laws upon the 
 seceding States, you obviate the necessity of coercive measures to be initiated by 
 tiie Governtnent of the United States. In the present state of affairs, I would con- 
 tine the Government of the United States strictly — as far ae it is possible to do it 
 consistently with the acts of the seceding States themselves — to a defensive line of 
 policy, protecting the public property, the public vessels, which are indisputably 
 ours, and especially those fortified places where jurisdiction has been ceded to 
 us by the States themselves. Taking this position, I would defend it firmly ; 1 
 would defend it adequately, without yielding to menaces, or to violence from any 
 
quarter, whether proceeding from the revolutionized States themselves, or from the 
 allies they may seek elsewhere. [Applause] 
 
 But, with reference to affirmative mea-'urea to b^ adopted on the part of the 
 Government of the United States, I would pau<!e to draw a broad and clear line ot 
 dictinction between postal laws, which can only he enforced withm the territorial 
 iurisdiction of a State, aided by the majristracy, and revenue laws, which can be 
 executed br the President at places lying within the exclusive jurisdiction of the 
 United States. The mnchinery of the postal service penetrnt-s to every village in 
 a State, and covers all its territory. With respect to the revenue kws, they are 
 not fldrainistf^red hv internal machinery— at least, to any considerable extent. 
 They may be enforced as Congress authorized G^^neral .Jackson to enfore them— 
 by a ship of- war lying off the harbor, and not encroaching upon the territorial 
 iurisdiction of a seceding State. But the postal service cannot be so maintained 
 The postal service cannot be continued and sufficient protection given to the mails, 
 without placing within the territorial jurisdiction of a seceding State the armed 
 power of the United States. This results from the ab.st-nce of courts or other civil 
 authority yielding alle^ia^ice to the Government of the United v^tates, competent 
 to protect property and preserve the peace. • 
 
 The United States judges have resigned, and you csinnot expect that a court or 
 jury in any of these seceding States will convict a man of an offence against a 
 power with which they are at wu-. Wherever the flag of the United States cannot 
 go ; wherever the nuthority of the United States is contemned and repelled — there 
 I would not trust the property of the United States. If the money, if the bullion 
 in the mint at New Orleans is not safe from spoliation : if they are willing in Lou- 
 isiana to imitate the Mexican policy of depredation upon property, how, sir, could 
 you intrust vour mails, with the property of your citizens, with the dispatches of 
 your Government, within the same jurisdiction? You cannot do if. 
 
 Mr. HINDMAN. Will the gentleman, under the head of spoliation, be kind 
 enough to explain the recent proceeding in New York oitv. in which the property 
 of southern men was pillaged ? 
 
 Mr. SICKLES. I have yet to learn that the ar'ii- to wcifj i wie gtnitlemanalludef 
 belong to southern men. No claimant has appeared, and I am glad to know it. 
 These arms were not " pillaged." Upon information alleging that they were to he 
 used for an unlawful purpose, they are held by the police until a legal investiga' 
 tion shall confirm or remove this suspicion. It is the duty of the police to prevent 
 crimes. Mr. Toombs, I am reminded, sent a telegraphic dispatch of an extraordi- 
 nary character to the Mayor of New York, to which he sent a reply equally re- 
 markable. [Laughter.] If I had been the Mayor of New York* I would have sent 
 a different answer to the message of Mr. Toombs, and especially in view of the 
 menace which was at the end of it. He admonished the Mayor of New York that 
 it was important for New York that Georgians should know wheiher the act was 
 justified. The loyalty of New York to southern rights should havf exempted the 
 city from insult. The Mayor should have repelled it. If I had been Mayor of 
 New York, I would have sent this answer: "The Huthorities of New York had no 
 information whether or not those arms were to be used in an insurrection of the • 
 character which John Brown initiated, or of the character which Mr Toombs and 
 others began in the State of Georgia when, without any color of authority, and 
 before the secession convention met, Georgia seized upon the forts and the arms of 
 the United States ; but, in either event, the arms were to hf used, as we. believed, 
 for the purposes of insurrection, and, therefore, in the preservation of the public 
 peace, I seized thern. and will hold them against all comers, until I am required to 
 release them by the law of the land." [Applause in thi: galleries.] To the pro- 
 found regret and humiliation of our citizens. th<» Mavor of New York was so 
 unmindful of what was due to the city and to his own position, as to send 
 the craven answer to which he appended his nam--. Mr. .Jefferson, in 1807, crushed 
 the insurrection of Aaron Burr— whose mischievous genius first proj-^cted a South- 
 ern Confederacy— -by dispatching orders to every intersecting p^'"' on the Ohio 
 aud Mississippi, from Pittsburg to New Orleans, for the emplovment of such force, 
 either of the regulars or of the militia, and of such proceedings also -f the civil 
 uthonties as might enable them to seize on all the boats i.i. i store- pv.^v;,ip^ fnr 
 
the expedition, to arrest the persone concerned, and to euppreso effectually the 
 progress of the enterprise.* 
 
 Bu' to resarae the current of my argument at tlie point where 1 yielded to the 
 interruption of my friend from ArkauHas. Let us not, at a crisis like this, confonii") 
 ideas Let us not confuse our proceedings by a failure to discriminate carefully 
 befween what we may rightfully do in the discharge of our duty and what wouWbe 
 rash and unwise to do irr yielding to passions. To administer this Government, to 
 protect its property, to guard its mails, to hold the scales of justice even and true 
 S8 between thosn who are an<l thosK who hv'> not in havraonv, is not aggression, but 
 is the simple and honest discharge of oar sworn duty. To that extent I would go ; 
 no furtb^r The President of the United States has solemnly announced to th» 
 people of this country that he will not adopt the policy of coercion. It has not been 
 adopted. The Congress of the United States, in the presence of events which all 
 concede to l-e revolution, h.as abstained from force, retaliation, or punishment- 
 Remembering the defiant and offensive responses to thi-< policy, it only escapes the 
 disgrace of being pusillaniraoii?. because it is conceived in forbearance, in fraternal 
 affection, in the hope that peace may be restored ; for if we accept the declaration 
 that th^re must be an appeal to the sword, then, sir, none of us desire to be held 
 rcsponeible for toler sting a series of events which have reduced this Government — 
 as if it were powerless, indeed, to prevent them — to a condition as contemptible as 
 its position among the nations of the earth has been lofty. 
 
 Again, I say, there has been no coercion attempted. The most abundant proof 
 has been given of tie sincere desire of the Government for peace. The magnanimous 
 policy of the President has been followed by insults to our flag : by the expulsion 
 of the United States troops and -luthorities. from Naw-yards and forts and arsen^ils : 
 by measures to control the vast commerce of the Mississippi river und its tributa- 
 ries ; by the seizure of national ships; and by flagrant acts of snoilation upon the 
 public property. While we are here deliberating upon measures of honorable 
 and fraterna' compromi^^e. envoys ha'^e been sent abroad to request the Cabinets 
 of Europe to sit in oouncil, as they are sitting this moment, not upon the " sick 
 man " of Turkey, whom th-^j have had before them for them for years, but upon 
 the paralyzed and impotent United States of Ainerifa. They uve invited to deter- 
 mine what share they will appropriate to themselves of our dismembered Confed- 
 eracy: and how ff^r they will interfere to complr'te the anarchy produced by the 
 confessed and apparently demonstrnted inability of the Government of the United 
 States to make its auth' rity respect -d. 
 
 There cannot be a r.iember of th's House who would not shrink from his share 
 of responsibility for the degradaMon of the Government, unless he could find some 
 adequate palliation f f r it.= f.-ivH-^ rauce : we have believed that whi'e our inactivity 
 may subject us to mihappreh'msion elsewhere, whil<* it has exposed the authority of 
 the United States to contemptuous insubordination, and has offered impunity to 
 offences which bring piin to the heart ot every patriot in the land ; — yet thit looking 
 to the origin of the discontent and considering the relations between the States and 
 the Government of the Union, we have hoped that magnanimity and moderation 
 at the outset might lead in the end to reconciliation and peace. 
 
 Now, sir, witli reference to the suggestion of the distinguished gentleman from 
 North Carolina, deprecating the application of this measure to bis State, his loyal, 
 
 * Sppukitic of Burr and hi? fli«nnion moverneut. Jpfferson pays, in his meRsage of January 22, 1807 : 
 '• He found at once tbiit the attachment of the western country to the present TTniou wiw not to 
 be shaken : thiit itn dispfolntion conld not he effei-tci with the consent of the inhnhitants. and that his 
 resources were inaderinnte. as vet. to effect it hy force. He took his course tlien at once, determined 
 lo seize on New Orleans, plmi'lcr the hank there. posseRs himaelfnf the miUtary and naval sUjres. and 
 procted onhif expedUiim In j^fixim : »n>\ to thisohject all his nieiins and prepaiations were now directed. 
 He coUec'ed ffni all the quarters where hini'-elf or his agents po.isesscd inftneiice, aV the ardent, re^t- 
 Itss, desperate arid dUv fl'ected pnrxavx \i\\<> wire ready./br any enterprise analoijniix to their character!:. 
 He seduced good and well-nieaninpr citizet s. .<-iime by assurances Ih^t he /.o.woj.'.vrf the confidence of the 
 gwtrnment, atui was acting under it.i sex^rei patronage ; a pretence which ohtiiiued some credit from the 
 state of our differences with Spain ; and others by offers of land in Bastrop's claim on the Washita." 
 
6 • 
 
 his noble, his gaUaut State, or to H.uy other which yet remains within the Union, 
 where we have a magistracy, where we have the means of enforcing the lawb 
 legitimately and regularly: why, sir, I venture to say, that no man in this House 
 would be guilty of so gratuitous an impeachment of the loyalty of any State, as to 
 toierate such a proposition. In the application of this law it can only be extended, 
 in the nature of things, to States which have by their own solemn act repudiated our 
 jurisdiction, and deprived us of all possible means of protncting the service except 
 by force of arras. 
 
 Mr. BRANCH. I must have be«n singularly unfortunate if the geutlemnn from 
 New York understood me as saying th.it I apprehended this law would be executed 
 iji North Carolina by discontinuing the mail service. What T said whs this, and the 
 position which I took— and the one to which the gentleman from New York must 
 address himself, if he desires to reply to me— was, that when this la>v has been 
 executed in the State of .Mississippi, for instance, a citizen of N rtn Carolina, who 
 has property in Mississippi, or who has family cmnections in .Missis.sippi, or who. 
 from any other cause, has occasion to have communi -ation hy letter with the State 
 of Mississippi, cannot have his letter transmitted to its destination, b.-oanse, when 
 it comes to the border of Miss'ssippi, this Government refuses to c^^^ry it a.iy iur- 
 ther itself, and will mske no arrangement with Mississippi for carrying on each 
 letter, as the merchant of New York has arrangemei.t^ made fv.r. to cvrry his let- 
 ters into the interior of Canada. « 
 
 Mr. SICKLES. I am obliged to the gentleman from North Carolina f<.r calling 
 ray attention to the distinction which he has made. It escaped my nnrice. though 1 
 gave his remarks that attention which I always pay to whatever falls from his lips 
 The argument, then, of the gentleman from North Carolina is erne of mere personal 
 inconvenience; but that cannot apply to North Carolina in «ny degree to be com- 
 pared with its temporary bearing upon the business intercourse of my own constit- 
 uents with the Gulf States. We send thousands of letters to Louisiana, Georgia, 
 and Mississppi, where North Carolina sends one. T deprecate the obvious incon 
 venience to which allusion has been made, but it is unavoidable. By and by, 
 should there he no reconciliation, should the people of the different sections agree 
 to separate, having found it impossible to get along together— undoubtedly, when 
 that state of things arises, postal arrangements will be en'ered into, likp our postal 
 conventions with foreign nations ; like the postal organization which exists ameng 
 the States represented in the German Diet, or iike the po.sta! arrauaernent which 
 exists between this country and Canada, and to which the gentleman has rrferred 
 Whenever such a relation to these States becomes an established fact, it would be 
 folly to refuse to enter into convenient stipulations of the character usually adopted 
 to regulate the intercourse between the people of distinct and independent nations. 
 
 But this is not the question now. This Congress cannot recognize sny other 
 than the normal condition of these States ; the President cannot recognize them 
 as independent. In the meantime what will you do? Will you preserve and en- 
 force the respect due to our flag? Will you protect the places and property con- 
 ceded to be within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Government, or not? That is 
 the simple question. Certainly, sir, I am sure that the chivalrous men who are 
 Uading this movement in the Southern States, will scorn to receive the benefits of 
 our postal laws, while they repudiate the obligations of our revenue laws. Tl-.ey 
 must mean one thing or another. They cannot intend to remain, like Mohammed's 
 coffin, between heaven and earth, neither in or out of the Union, getting all the 
 benefits that they can secure, and subjecting us to all its burdens. What do they 
 
say ? They say they are willing to accept the postal service ; but that we shall not 
 <;oHect the revenues, which would go towards defraying the expenses. 
 
 Mr. BRANCH. I would ask the gentleman from New Vork to specify in what 
 State they have refuseil to allow the coHection of the revenue from postages? 
 Mr. SICKLES. Oh, sir; irom postages ? I do not know. 
 
 Mr. COLFAX. With the gentleman's permission, I will state that some oi' the 
 postmasters in Alabama, when drafts have been drawn upon them by the Sixth 
 Auditor of the Treasury for the Post Office Department, have answered that they 
 would wait until they could ascertain the action of their State before paying the 
 drafts. 
 
 Mr. BRANCH. Those are ca.'jes of individual postmasters ; but 1 would ask the 
 gentleman from Indiana, if he has any information that in any instance, in the 
 States that have attempted to secede, the public authorities have interfered with 
 the collection of the revenue from postages? I would ask him this additional 
 question, while I am up: whether the Postmaster General has not, under existing 
 laws, full power to discontinue the service in all such cases as he has alluded to, 
 by abolishing the oiiices, or even discontinuing the mail service entirely? 
 
 Mr. COLFAX. I will answer the gentloman, that there is evidence in the Post 
 Office Department that the mails are tampered with in the States that claim to 
 have seceded ; and there is no authority by which you can protect the letters 
 against being tampered with. A man may take letters that do not belong to him 
 from the mail, in the public strect>, and open them, and there is no tribunal before 
 which he can be brought for that ofi'ence. 1 will add that it is weli known that the 
 correspondence between this Government and Major Anderson, at Fort Sumter, 
 was stopped by the authority of the Governor of South Carolina, until the Governor 
 saw fit to allow it to continue ; and it is now continued only by his toleration. 
 
 Mr. SICKLES. I suppose, sir, that gentlemen holding public stations, as post- 
 masters, in those States, paj' over what they receive to the sub-Treasuries in their 
 vicinity; and then, as we have seen in Louisiana, the State authorities, after it 
 has been collected in one mass, appropriate it to the local government. In that 
 way, all the receipts from the postal service, and from imposts, and all the 
 deposits belonging to the United States in those sub-Treasuries, are diverted 
 10 the insurgent States. Generally, in the sub-Treasuries and mints there are 
 large amounts of money and bullion belonging to private individuals, which are 
 placed there upon deposit, or for coinage, or to be assayed, or to be stamped for 
 exportation. Whilst we cannot protect private or public property, for the same 
 reason that I would have suspended the mint at New Orleans a month ago, if a 
 proposition had been brought forward for iliat purpose — because I could not 
 provide for the security of the public and private property there — for that very 
 reason I will now, in view of these acts of spoliation, withdraw the mails from a 
 jurisdiction where they are not safe. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, we must not close our eyes to the new phases which events have 
 successively put upon the secession movement. It originated, sir, as a peaceful 
 remedy for grievances. As such, it had thousands and tens of thousands of friends 
 at the North who were disposed to meet it on middle ground, and say, " If you 
 cannot abide with us, bitter as the lesson may be, we will yield to the necessity 
 for a separation." That was the December phase of the secession movement. In 
 .Fanuary it assumed a new attitude. No longer peaceable ; no longer disposed to 
 await the consent of the Government or the deliberations of Congress, forcible 
 possession was taken of our forts and arsenals and arms and ships; our flag was 
 
8 
 
 hved upon, and the authority of the Government contemned ; and we are menaced, 
 as the penalty of resistance, with all the terrors of civil war. When this new 
 aspect of the secession movement was presented, the northern partisans of the 
 southern cause who, up to December, defended it manfully, became only the apol- 
 ogists of the indefensible acts of Iheir friends. In February, secession assumes 
 another and yet more questionable shape. I can only characterize it as the 
 Mexican method of revolution. When Kobles or Miramon or Santa Anna issue a 
 rexolniionnry jjronunciamento, and a government convoy of specie comes within 
 their reach, it is seized upon ; and they say, " We will count every dollar of the 
 coin, and when we settle our quarrel with you, why then the money will all be 
 safe, and we will pay it over.". Let us not forget that when the populace of Paris 
 drove Louis Philippe from the Tuilleries, although they startled the shade of Louis 
 XIV. with the shouts of " Libei'ty, Equality, and Fraternity," which resounded 
 through the palace of so many kings, they did not aoil their hands or sully their 
 cause by the appropriation of property which did not belong to them. [Applause.] 
 
 Mr. WINSLOW. I would ask the gentleman if he has any information that any 
 money whatever belonging to the Government of the United States has been 
 seized by the governments of tlie seceding States ? 
 
 Mr. SICKLES. Yes, sir ; I have it from the Treasury Department. 
 
 Mr. WINSLOW. I speak now with reference to the sub-treasuries. 
 
 Mr. SICKLES. I speak of the bullion belonging to the United States — about 
 nine tons of silver — seized the other day in New Orleans. 
 
 Mr. WINSLOW. Does the gentleman rely upon newspaper reports ? 
 
 Mr. SICKLES. No ; upon official information. 
 
 Mr. WINSLOW. The same as that pifblished in the newspapers ? 
 
 Mr. SICKLES. Substantially the same ; but worse, I am sorry to say. Therew 
 has been another mint seized in Georgia, which is to be held for our benefit at 
 3ome future day in the general settlement. Now, that may be very safe, but 1 am 
 not disposed to put the mails in the same process of liquidation ; the drafts and 
 warrants on the sub-treasuries, and accounts of the postmasters in the seceding 
 States, and all tlie machinery of the Government which relates to the public funds, 
 would not be in a good condition of administration under such circumstances. 
 
 But, sir, to resume at the point where 1 yielded to uiy esteemed friend from 
 North Carolina, [Mr. Winslow,] and to bring these remarks to a close, I wish to 
 call the attention of gentlemen again to the new phases whicli the southern cause 
 has assumed in those places where reason and patriotism are niade to yield to the 
 passions of the hour. In December, it was peaceable secession, if you could not 
 obtain guarantees tor security and justice. Tlien you had troops of noble friends 
 in New York. We could agree to that. I was for it. lu January, it was the 
 immediate and forcible expulsion of the United States authorities from even the 
 limits of their exclusive jurisdiction — from their custom houses, postoffices, treas- 
 uries, navy yards, ships, arsenals, and forts. Then your friends in the North 
 were transformed into timid apologists. In February, secession is spoliation and 
 war. What next? Let us not lift the veil. But I will say, in the presence of 
 this new and latest phase of the revolution, that it can have no friends in the 
 North: ii can have no apologists in the North; and, if these aggressive and preda- 
 tory enterprises are sanctioned by the authorities .and the public opinion of the 
 alienated States, it will soon be difficult to find a respectable exception to the gen- 
 eral denunciation which they must encounter from the loyal and patriotic citizens 
 of this country. 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
 011 895 843 3