y% ^ A 1 ~\ vi;. Ai J\ ■17 -"^ ~h) "^ ^ Gass ^(^(a-C COPYRIOHT DFPOSIT '^1 JUSTICE LAMAR. LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAK: HIS LIFE, TIMES. AND SPEECHES. 1525—1595. BY EDWARD MAYES, LL.D., EX-CHANCELLOR OF THE UNIVERSITY OP MISSISSIPPI. "It is, tlierefore, as the inspired pacifieator that Lamar will stand out unique, al- most incomprehensible to other times."— T/ie lUuslraled Amerimn. - ."^tVO- -^ Nashville, Tenn. : Publishing House op the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. Barbee & Smith, Agents. lS9fi. e: COPYRUmTED, 18S13, BY EDWARD MAYES. ELeCTHOTVPED AND PRtNTEO BY BARBEE & SMITH, AGENTS, NASHVILLE, TENN. 3 >-^' PREFACE. The writing of Mr. Lamar's biograph}' was not, with me, a pelf-assiimed task. When he died the members of his more immcdiatf family requested nie to undertake the work. Notwithstanding the grave objections that I possessed no adequate Uterary preparation, either of study or experience, and wiis much pressed by the imperative demands of an active law practice, there were certain other considerations which compelled my consent. Of these the principal was a belief that my long-continued and intimate association with jMr. Lamar, which began in 1869 and ended only with his life, qualified me especially to collect the facts of his history and tii understand and interpret much of his thoughts and designs which to any other who could be in- duced to assume the labor woidd be obscure or even incomprehensible. Bound to him by many ties of gratitude and tender memories, I could not decline to render the service desired. It is not the purpose of this memoir to rake over the ashes of old quarrels or to stir up the embers of dying anim.isities. Nor is its object either to vindicate the [leople of the South or to convict those of the North. Nor is it an apology for, or a glorification of, the career of Jlr. Lamar. The-aim is to give the story of his life as it was; to show, so far as is possible, what he did and why he did it, conceiving that the story will be not only a merited tribute to a brave and patriotic man who dared much and sufiered greatly for the good of his people, and in the end was greatly rewarded, but also a useful illustration of the unprecedented times in which he lived and of the novel events among which he moved. Those events extended over forty years of most exciting and fruitful struggles in all departments of our government. They included the subjects of slavery, secession, civil war, reconstruction, constitutional amend- ments, reconciliation, in all of which Mr. Lamar was actively and prominently con- cerned. In order, therefore, that his biography may be read with full comprehen- sion and sympathy, it has been necessary to venture upon the delicate and dangerous task of presenting occasional brief expositions of some of those great controversies, as appropriate and helpful settintr for the man and his work. I have earnestly tried to do this in a nonsectional spirit. Unless that lias been done, I have not only fallen short of my duty as a man and patriot; but also I have departed from the way of the great-hearted subject of the work, and have been untrue to his teaching. The principal labor and end of Mr. Lamar's later and greater life, that indeed to which all other efibrts were but a means, was the molding of a public sentiment— a sentiment in each section of our unhappily divided Union for a broad and lasting na- tional love. What success was his, and how much of that success was his work, this volume may help to indicate. It was manifestly impossible to tell that story without recalling and unfolding the conditions of then existing sentiment, both North and 4 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR. South, with which he and his colaborers had to deal. Let the reader be assured that in discussing those topics the statement of them is designed to be historical only, and not polemic. The new South holds the old in highest lionor. The South of to-day thrills with filial love for the South that was; and in her innermost heart sits enshrined an un- wavering faith in the purity, the nobility, and the patriotism of the former genera- tion. But aspirations and hopes change with the lapse of time and the drift of events, and the Southern dreams of the present are not those of the past. Our people, throughout all the republic, are by the South believed to be now united as never be- fore. Prejudices of section and the passions of war and the humiliation of conquest have alike and all failed to rend us asunder; and the voice of the sower of dissension is felt to be the voice of a criminal. Edward Mavbs. .Jackson, Miss., November 5, IbQS. CONTENTS. I'AUE Preface 3 CHAPTKK I. The Family of Lamar — Thomas, the Immigrant — Thomas, His Son — John I^amar — Mirabeau B. Lamar— Lucius Q. C. Lamar, the Elder — Micajah Williamson and Sarah Gilliam, His Wife— Dr. Thompson Bird and Susan Williamson, His Wife— :Mrs. Sarah ( Bird) Lamar 13 CHAPTER n. The Old Lamar Homestead— The Old Georgia-Conference Manual-Labor School — Lucius' Character and Habits as a Child — Anecdote — Removal to Oxford, Ga. — Emory College — Graduation — College Influence upon His Character and Views 27 CHAPTER in. Legal Education and Admission to tlie Bar— ^larriage- Judge Longstreet— Mrs. Longstreet — Mrs. Lamar and Mrs. Branliam — " Influence of Women " 37 CHAPTER IV. Removal to Oxford, Miss.— Admitted to the Mississippi Bar— Elected to an Ad- junct Professorship in the University of Mississii)pi— Dt'^^ui as a Political Speaker— The Compromise Measures of 1850— Debate with Foote over the Compromise '^5 CHAPTER V. Religious Impressions— Hon. Jacob Thompson— Prof. Albert T. Bledsoe— Return to Covington, Ga.— In the Georgia Legislature — Moves to Macon, Ga.— Candi- date for Congress from Third District— Returns to Mississippi— " Solitude "— Practices Law— C. H. Mott— James L. Autrey— Congressman or Professor? 56 CHAPTER VI. The Kansas-Nebraska Bill— The Struggle for Kansas— The Nicarasrua Affair- Elected to Congress from the First District— Correspondence on Questions of the Day— First Speech in Congress— Rozell Letter— The Keitt-(4row Fight— The Vallandigham-Campbell Contest— A Professorship Contemi)lated—Dr. Bar- . nard's Letter— Speech at Jackson on Douglas— Eulogy on Harris— Speech on the Tarifl" ^^ CHAPTER VII. Thirty-sixth Congress; Reelected— Speech at Jackson— Speech on Election of Speaker— Letter to Barnard- Speech on Southern Slaven,'— Charleston Conven- tion—Letter to :\Iott— Baltimore Convention— Accepts Professorship in Uni- versity — Speech at Columbus ^" CHAPTER VIII. Election of Lincoln— Conference of Congressmen— Speech at Brandon— Legisla- ture of 1860— Resigns Seat in Congress— Liddell Letter— Member of Secession Convention— Passage of Ordinance— Lamar's Views on Secession— Blaine on Lamar and Secession 8(> (5) 6 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR. CHAPTER IX. PAGE. Appointed to Confederate Congress^Lieutenaiit Colonel of tlie Nineteenth Mis- sissippi Regiment— Speech in Riclimond— Military Service— Battle of Wil- liamsburg— Honorable Mention— Official Report— Illness- Resignation— Death of Jefferson M. Lamar 9'i CHAPTER X. Envoy to Russia— Special Letter of Instructions— Trip to England— Official Dis- patches—Mission Terminated— Anecdote of Thaclieray— Anecdote of Disraeli- Speech in England— Return to the Confederacy— Speech at Atlanta— Death of Thompson B. Lamar— Judge Advocate of Third Corps— Speech in Lines— Sur- render 103 CHAPTER XL Southern Sacrifices and Condition— Cien. Walthall— Settles at Coffeeville— Condi- tion of Law Praitice— Abstains from Politics— B. N. Harrison— C. C. Clay- Southern Sufferings- Correspondence — Accepts Professorship of Metaphysics- Made Law Professor— Character and Methods as Professor- Resigns Profess- • orship— Address at University— Death of Judge Longstreet— Address at Emory College— Agricultural Address— Lee Letter— Letters to Reemelin— U. S. Marshal Pierce— Debate with Alcorn at Holly Springs 117 CHAPTER XII. Reconstruction: President Lincoln's Plan— Southern States: In or Out?— Presi- dent Johnson's Plan— Provisional Governments— Southern Constitutional Con- ventions—Temper of Southern People— Temper of Congress— Howe and Ste- vens—Gloomier Days— Reconstruction Legislation— Military Rule— Demorali- zation— Carpetbaggers— Reconstruction Constitutions— Three Delayed States- Radical Rule— Freedman's Bureau— The Negro Problem— Southern Sentiment 137 CHAPTER XIII. Reconstruction in Missiscippi— Ejection of Gov. Clarke— Constitutional Conven- tion of 1865— Gov. Humphreys— Col. Lamar on the Situation in 1866— Leg- islation of 1865 and 1867 about Freedmen— Rejection of Fourteenth Amend- ment—The Fourth Reconstruction District— Participation or No?— Constitu- tion of 1868-69— Removal of Gov. Humphreys— Adelbert Ames, Military Ctov- ernor— Louis Dent and Election of 1869— Gov. Alcorn— The Kuklux Prnsecu- tions— Col. Lamar in Retirement— The New Outlook 156 CHAPTER XIY. The Liberal Republican Movement- -Lamar's Letter on Greeley and Brown— La- mar for Congress in 1872- Nomination, Canvass, and Election— Letters— Re- moval of Political Disabilities— Illness— Deliberations, 1873— Democratic Party Disbanded — Supports Alcorn against Ames— Illustrative Letters of November, 1873— Enters Forty-third Congress— I>etters to Judge Wharton on Grant— First Speeches : West Virginia Contested Election 169 CHAPTER XV. The Eulogy on Sumner: Pieparation— Letter to Reemelin— Mr. Sumner's Flag Resolution — Memorial Services in the Senate — In the House— I^amar's Ora- tion—Its Delivery— Its Reception— Letter to Wife— Comments of the Press: Extracts— Anecdote— Criticisms— ;\Ir. Blaine on the Eulogy— Effects 181 COS TEXTS. 7 CHAin'ERXVI. I'AUE. Speech on Misrule in the Soiitheni SkiU's— Radical Rule in Louisiana- McEnery and Kellogt!— Judge Duiell's Kxtraonlinary Order— Kellogg Installed— Mr. Lamar's Speech— Its Reception— Incorrect Newsiiaper I'ersonals— Further Events in Louisiana— Contlict of September 14, 1874- Ivellogg Again Installed by United States Troops— Mr. Lamar's Canvass of 1S74 The "Landslide"— Critical Era in the South— Coiu-se of Events in Louisiana— DeTrobriand Purges the Legislature— Gen. 1\ H. Sheridan's "Banditti" Dispatch- Excitement in the North— Debates in Congress— CorrespondiMuc on Southern Policy— La- mar's Remarks on Civil Rights Bill— The Force Bill— Filibustering— Letter to New York Herald on Afiairs in the South— Its Reception— Canvass and Speech in New Hampshire— Press Comments— Interviewed by Henry Grady— Corre- spondence ^"^ CHAPTER XVII. The Question of Reelection— Rescue of the State from Radicalism— Mississippi and Louisiana— Gov. Ames's Administration- The Taxpayer's Convention of 187,5— The Vicksburg Riot— Congressional Investigation— Ames's Message- Address of the Legislators— Invidious Police Laws— The Color Line— Lamar's Growing Fame— Renominated— Reorganization of the Democratic Party of the State— County Mass ]Meetings— Siwech at Falkner's Station— The Color Line Again— The State Democratic Convention of 187.5- Lamar's Speech— Demo- cratic Platform— The Press on Lamar's Renomination and Speech— Address of the Sfcite Democratic E.xecutive Committee— Campaign of 187.5— George's Let- ter on the Black Code— Riots at Clinton and Yazoo City— Gov. Ames Calls for Federal Troops— Democrats Triumph and the State is Rescued— Impeachment of Ames, Davis, and Cardozo 228 CHAPTER XVIIL Forty-fourth Congress Convenes— Mr. Lamar Chosen Chairman of Caucus— The Caucus Address— Press Comments— Senator Alcorn's Term Expiring— :Mr. La- mar Discussed as His Successor— Calls from outside the State— Nominated by Acclamation— Speech before the Legislature— Election and Comments on It— The Centennial Year— Debate on the Amnesty Bill— Lamar's Centennial Speech— The Scene Described— Press Comments— The Belknap Case— Lamar's Speech on Parliamentary Privilege— Press Conmients— The Hamburg Massa- cre— Speech and Its Reception— Charged with Inconsistency, and His Vindica- tion-Speech on the Policy of the Republican Party and the Political Situation in the South CHAPTER XIX. The Presidential Election of 1876— The Result Contested— Storms Threatening— The Electoral Commission— Mr. Lamar Speaks in Favor of the Bill— Sijeech— Additional Reasons for Supporting the Bill- Popular S|)eech— The Electoral Count— Democrats Disappointed— Filibustering- Feeling in Mississippi-Un- founded Rumors of Collusion— Press Discussions and Correspondence— The Gain Found in Defeat— President Hayes' Inaugural on Southern Pacification- Republican Chagrin-Mr. Blaine's Tilt with Thurman-Mr. Lamar's Letter to the President— Withdrawal of the Troops-The South Relieved-Mr. Lamar's Speech of 1879 on Hayes' Administration CHAPTER XX. Doubts About Admission to Senate— Causes Thereof-Elections of 187o-Tbe Boutwell Committee of Investigation-Correspondence— Reports of the Bout- well Committee -The Presidential Contest Intervenes-The Complication 265 290 8 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAE. PAGE. with Kellogg's Case — Mr. Blaine's Unexpected Turn — Seated — The Democratic State Convention of 1877 — Independentism in Mississippi — Gen. George's Ad- dress to the Convention — Mr. Lamar a ;\Ienil)er— Spealis — Silver— Platform of 1877 — Called Session of the Forty-fifth Congress — Speech on the Seating of Sen- ator Butler, of South Carolina 311 CHAPTER XXI. The Silver Speech — Summary of the Question — President Hayes' Message — The Bland Bill — The Matthews Resolutions — Debate on the Resolutions — Mr. La- mar's Speech — Newspaper Comments — The Legislative Instructions — Corre- spondence — Refusal to Obey Instructions — Speech — Public and Private Com- ments — The Double Question of Statesmanship Involved — Uarper's Weekly — "A Heart Almost Mated to Despair " — Campaign Speech of 1879 — Defense of Vote on the Resolutions — The Texas Pacific Railroad — Report and Speech on the Same 323 CHAPTER XXII. Returns Home — His Reception — The Epidemic of 1878 — The Congressional Elec- tions of 1878 and the Solid South — The Cincinnati Interview — The Presi- dent's Message — Mr. Blaine's Investigation Resolution — The Debate^Mr. Lamar's Speech — Press Sketclies — The Debate Resumed — Anecdote — Jefferaon Davis' Open Letter on the Right of Legislative Instruction — The Bill to Pension the Soldiers of 1812 — Senator Hoar's Amendment Excluding Jefferson Davis — Angry Debate — Mr. Lamar's Speech — Mr. Chandler's Sjjeech — Correspondence with Davis — Symitosium in Norlli American Reviewou the Negro Question — Pen Sketches and Anecdotes of Senator Lamar 352 CHAPTER XXIII. Struggle in Congress over the Army Appropriations — Troops Must Not Be Used at the Polls — The Debate of 1879 — Mississippi Opinion — Senator Conkling-- The Mississippi River Commission Bill — The Army Bill — Republicans Filibus- tering — Senator Conkling's Speech — Mr. Lamar's Reply — Exciting Personal Col- lision — Current Comment — ^Ir. Lamar's Letter to Gen. Walthall — Press Com- ments on the Incident — Effect in Mississijipi — Mr. Lamar's Views on Dueling. 377 CHAPTER XXIV. Mississippi Politics in 1879 — Democratic Party Threatened with Disru|ition — Mr. Lamar's Position before the People — Letter to Wright — The F.pidemicof 1879 — Canvass of 1879 — The Right of Lej^'islativelnstruction Again — Question Kept in Agitation — Mr Lamar's Argument and Discussion of It — His Power as a Stump Speaker — Reception of His Speeches — Death of Mrs. Troutman — The Succession to Senator Bruce — Judge George Elected Senator — Mr. Lamar's Illness 394 CHAPTER XXV. Returns to Washington — Interview with Blaine — The Exodus — Mr. Lamar's Views — The "^''oorhees Investigation Resolution — The Debate on the Commit- tee's Report — Mr. Lamar's Speech — Speech at the Democratic National Con- vention of ISSO — Lafayette Sjirings Speech — Letter to Hon. J. W. C. Watson — Mrs. Lamar's Failing Health — Holly Springs Speecli, and Fall Canvass — The " Grant Bill "—The Executive Session of March, 1881- Political Complexion of the Senate — Virginia Readjusters — Senator Mahone— Struggle in the Senate over the Committees — Struggle over the Election of Officers — The Debate — Mr. Lamar's Speech — Its Reception 41-1 CaV7AVV7*. 9 CHAPTER XXVI. lAUE. Candidiite for Reflection — Opposition and Complications — Cioss Currents — Voice of tlie Press — Address at tlie A. and M. College — Progress of the Senatorial Question — The State Convention— A Selliack or Xo? — Mr. Lamar's Great Can- vass of ISSl— The DeKalb Speech— The Canton Speech— The Yazoo City Speech — Letter to Mcintosh — The Forest Speech — The Hazlehurst Speech — In- terest outside the State — Reelection and Vindication 431 CHAPTER XXVII. Mrs. Lamar's Failing Health — The Taritl' Speech of 1883 — Press Comments — Speech on National Aid to Education — Presidential Camijaign of 1884 — The Holly Springs Speech— The Aberdeen Speech— The Xews of Cleveland's Elec- tion — Death of Mrs. Lamar — Senator Edmunds' Condolences — Letter to a Friend — The Shemian-Davis Imbroglio — Senator Hawley's Resolution— The Debate — Mr. Lamar's Speech, and His Last— Letter to West on Davis and Se- cession 44!i CHAPTER XXVIII. JVIr. Lamar Discussed as a Possible Member of the Cabinet — Cleveland's Inaugu- ration—The Cabinet Named and Confirmed- Comments and Congratulations — Calls for Resignations of Heads of Departments— Mr. Lamar's Methods— Sale of the Government Carriages— The Land Office— The " Backbone " Patents— The Death of Jacob Thompson— The Throng of Office Seekers— Views on Office- holding in Washington— Limitations in the Bestowal of Offices— Civil Service Reform— Watchfulness over Character of Subordinates— Freedom from Ne- potism—First Annual Report— Management of the Indian Bureau— The Re- port on the Indians— The Report on the Public Lands— The Report on the Railroads— The Report on the Pensions— Minor Subjects— Education— The Second Annual Report— The Third Annual Report— Third Report on Public Lands— Adjustment of the Railroad Land Grants— Thir SrPPLE:\IENTARY CHAPTER. 1. Tribute of Hon. Blanche K. Bruce, ex-Senator o!13 2. Tribute of Senator George F. Hoar, of Massachusetts o!l4 3. Tribute of Rev. Charles B. Galloway, Bishop of the Methodist Church, South.. 594 4. Extract from Address of Hon. John L. T. Sneed, at tlie Meeting of the Mem- phis Bar 5''<5 5. Tribute of ex-Chief Justice James M. Arnold 598 (i. Study V)y Harry Pratt Judson, Head Dean of the Chicago University 000 7. Resolutions of the Legislature of North Dakota ''O- 8. Collection of Newspaper Comments ''03 APPENDIX. 1. Speech on Kansas and Nicaraguan Afi'airs: House, January 13, 18.'58 609 2. Speech before the Legislature at Jackson, Miss., November 3, 1858 (il8 3. Speech on the Election of Speaker: House, l>ecember 7, 1859 ()21 4. Speech on Southern Slavery anil Slaveholders: House, February 21, ISOO 624 5. Letter to P. F. Liddell, December 10, 1860, on Formation of a Confederacy. . . 033 6. Credentials to Russia, November, 1802 ''39 7. Speech on the State of the Countiy (Confederacy) : April 14, 1864 639 8. Letter on the Cliaracter of Robert E. Lee, December 5, 1870 650 9. Speech on Misrale in the Southern States: House, June 8, 1874 659 10. Letter of H. C. Carter on Carpetbag Misgovernment, April 25, 1874 069 11. Speech on the Centennial Celebration: House, January 25, 1870 070 12. Speech on Parliamentary Privilege (Belknap Case): House, March 7, 1870. . . 074 13. Speech on the Southern Policy of the Republican Party, etc.: House, August 2, 1876 6S2 14. Speech on the Electoral Commission : House, January 25, 1877 69S 15. Speech (Undelivered) on the Electoral Count: House, February, 1877 699 10. Speech on the Payment of Government Bonds in Silver: Senate, January 24, -1878 " 701 17. .Vrticle on the Enfranchisement of tlie J\egn)— North Amcrinin Rei-ieir, March, 1879 "1^ IS. Speech on the Exodus of Negroes from Southern States: Senate, June 14, 1880 723 19. Speech on Placing Gen. Grant on tlie Retired Army List: Senate, .January 25, 1881 "'^8 20. Speech on the Election of Othcera in the Senate: Senate, April 1, 1881 739 21. Speech on the TarifT: Senate, Feliruary 7, 1883 "-18 22. Speedi on National Aid to Education: Senate, March 28, 1884 "74 23. Oration on Life and Services of John C. Calhoun: Charleston, April 26, 1887. 779 24. Speech at Emory College, June 24, 1890 SOI ILLUSTRATIONS. TAOE. 1. Justice Lajiiar Frontispiece. 2. Mirabeau B. Lamar '. 16 3. Judge Lucius Q. C. Lamar, of Georgia 20 4. Rev. Augustus B. Longstreet 38 5. Mississippi Senators and Congressmen at the Time of Secession (Group) 86 6. Gen. Edward C. Walthall 1 18 7. Liberal Republican Leaders, 1870-75 (Group) ,, 108 8. Charles Sumner 182 !). Senator L. Q. C. Lamar . . . ^^'O 10. Some Democratic Senators (Group) S-'iS 11. Some Republican Senators (Group) 378 12. Mr. Lamar's Children (Group) -120 13. President Cleveland and His Cabinet (( iroup) -186 14. The Funeral of the Bloody Shirt 536 15. The Supreme Court of 1891 (Group) 546 16. Campus Views at Emory College 5o2 (11) LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR: HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. CHAPTER I. The Family of Lamar— Thomas, the Immigrant— Thomas, His Son— John Lamar— :Mirabeau B. Lamar— Lucius Q. C. Lamar, the Elder— Micajali Williamson ami Sa- rah Gilliam, His Wife -Dr. Thompson Bird and Susan Williamson, His Wife— Mrs. Sarah (Bird) Lamar. THERE is a tradition amongst tlie Lamars of Georgia that their family was of Huguenot origin, and was planted in Maryland Uy four brothers who fled from France in the celebrated exodus consequent upon the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. In part this report is probably correct; but there are public records still extant in Mary- land which show that the Georgia tradition is incomplete and, in de- tails, erroneous. In the early days of Maryland all of the papers which found their way into the records, and so have been preserved, were prepared by petty officials and lawyers who seem to have had very limited educa- tional advantages. The spelling of names varied almost with the num- ber of the documents in which they appeared; for example, Brown was spelled Broun, Brown, Browne, and Broune, all in instruments intended to convey property to the same individual. It seems also to have been customary for one person, in making deeds, to spell his own name in different ways, in order to conform exactly to the various spellings by which he had received conveyances of the properties alienated. It is not strange, therefore, that a Frenchman in an English colony should have his name spelled phonetically, and differently by different parties. It is more than probable that the first Lamars came to Maryland prior to the year 1663. There is a Maryland tradition that there were three brothers. Huguenots. If their religion formed any part of the motives which led them to seek the New World, the immediate cause certainly could not have been the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, but probably was only the general disfavor and oppression of Protestants under the administration of Cardinal Richelieu following upon the destruction of Rochelle in 1628. Maryland being an English colony, the English laws obtained, anil no immigrants could hold lan.ls in fee except sucli as were of British na- ^ (13) 14 lAVirS Q. C. LAMAR: tioiiality. lu lG-49 Lord Baltimore issued a circular to the people of France, Germany, and other countries, offering inducements to immi- grants to join his Maryland colony, and assuring to them the same priv- ileges as immigrants of English birth. On November 17, 1663, he granted a certificate of nationality — or "denuozacou," as it was called — wherein it was recited that Whereas Thomas and Peter Lamore, late of' ]'irginia, and subjects of the crown of France, having transported themselves into this province here to abide, have besought us to grant them, tlie said Thomas and Peter Lamore, leave to here Inhabit as free denizens, and freedom land to them and their heirs to purchase. Know ye, that we, willing to give encouragement to the subjects of that crown, do hereby declare them, the said Thomas and Peter Lamore, to be free denizens of this our province of Mary- land, etc. Various record entries and documents, extending from 1663 to 1684, give the names tif these men, and of a John of the same name, as La- mer, Lamare, Lamair, Lamaire, De Le Maire, Lemaire, Lemarre, Le- mar, Le Marr, and Lamar. Not infrequently the name was spelled va- riously in the same document. The records of this period are so per- fect that it would seem impossible to confound these men and their fam- ilies with other persons. There are no names similar to these three. John Lamaire was naturalized about ten years after Thomas and Pe- ter, from which it is inferable that he came over at a later date. His naturalization papers sliowed that he, at least, was born in Anjou. Peter and Thomas " Lamore " located in what was then Calvert County, on the Patuxent River, and engaged in ijlanting; while John, who was a doctor, as the records show by numerous administrator's accounts, settled in the more populous community of Port Tobacco, the county seat of Charles County. However, all of this is more or less speculative. What is certain is that Peter Lamer's will is of record, dated in 1693; while that of Thom- as Lamar, dated October 4, 1712, is also recorded, and shows that he was then living in Prince George's County. By that instrument he left what seems to have been quite a considerable estate, both in Maryland and in England, to his wife, Ann, and to his two sons, Thomas and John. The second Thomas also left a will. It is dated May 11, 1747. He distributed a large estate between his six sons and two sons-in-law, by name. In the year 1755 three of those sons (Robert, Thomas, and John) and one of the sons-in-law ( Clementius Davis) on the same day sold their lands to the Rev. John Urqi;hart, " Minister of Al-Faith Parish in Saint Mai-y's County," their mother's brother, and moved down into South Carolina and Georgia, settling at Beach Island and on the Geor- gia side of the Savannah River. This settlement in these Southern col- onies may have given rise m later years to the Georgia tradition that four brothers came to America. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 15 John Lamar, son of John, was graiidsou of tlie Joliu who moved to Georgia. He was born in the year 1769, aud married his cousiii-germnn, Rebecca Lamar. That union produced nine children who attained ma- turity. Four were sons (Lucius Quintus Ciucinnatus, Thomas Ran- doli:)h, Mirabeau Buonaparte, aud Jett'ersou Jaciison) and tive were daughters ( Mrs. Evalina Harvey, Mrs. Mary A. iloreland, Mrs. Aurelia liandle, Mrs. Louisa McGehee, and Mrs. Loretto H. Chappell 1. This John Lamar, the grandfather of Justice Lamar, was a planter, and a thrifty one. His residence was for a time in Warren County; but later iu Putnam, eight or ten miles south of Eatonton. Here, about the year 1810, he established what is still locally known as the "olil La- mar homestead," now the property of Mr. Mai-k Johnson. The house still stands in good condition: a tine, old-fashioned, two-story, frame building, constructed after the strong and enduring models (>f that period. Little River winds near by, aud cultivated fields offer a wide prospect. Here for many years, iu great happiness and moderate pros- perity, lived the old couple. With them lived a bachelor brother, Zachariah— a ;^elf-t;iuglit uuin — who, like many of the men iu old plantation times, gave himself up to the ideal world of literature aud history, without any further purpose than the enjoyments of that fairyland. These honest, happy— some might consider them useless — members of society belong to an extinct fauna, but they were loved and revered and humored in their day and little circles. This Lamar was one of this sort, perhaps its most striking e;iample. Over all his immediate surroundings was cast the glamour of that realm of letters in which he lived. When he le.l in family prayer, good Methodists that they were, he did not think it inapt to thank God for the heroic examples of Roman or English or American history, for the march of science, or for exemption from the crimes and mis- eries of less favored lands into which Ids geographical studies had last led him. So when son after sou was born to the head of the house this bookish enthusiast claimed the privilege of naming his infant nephews after his fevorite of tlie moment, and the amiable and doubtless amused parents consented. Thus Lucius Quintus Ciucinnatus, Mirabeau Buonaparte, Jefferson Jackson, Thomas Randolph, and J>avoisier Legrand (a grandchild ) indicate how his interest shifted from history to politics, and from politics to chemistry.* At this old homestead, buried in a quiet garden, by the side of his daughter Evalina, lies John. His grave is kept in excellent order, and over him is a slab bearing the following inscription, written by his son Mirabeau: In memory of John Lamar, who died August ,S, 1S33, aged sixty-four years. He was a man of unblemished honor, of pure aud exalte.l benevolence, whose conduct through life was uniformly i-egulated by the strictest principles of iirobity, truth, and justice; thus leaving behineen the first to declare publicly for inde- pendence. He was not less ardent as a soldier than as a speaker; and, in the cavalry skirmish on the day before the battle of San Jacinto, saved the life of Gen. Rusk by a free exposure of his own. He was conspicuous for gallantry at San Jacinto, and, hav- ing first served as Attorney General, was soon after appointed Secretary of W.ar by President Burnet, and was elected Vice President in 1836. His impetuous valor, en- thusiastii' temper, and unselfish aspirations for the honor and welfare of his country, made liim tlie fit choice of Texas as her President. Lamar was a man of high, un- bending honor; his native gifts were fine: lari.'eness and brilliancy of conception, fancy, eloquence, readiness, and courage. Though ardent, impulsive, and open tci pres- ent impressions, sometimes, es|iecial!y in seasons of ill health, he gave way to the re- action that dis'iJays itself in waywardness, dejection, and lassitude. But lie was biave, aifectionate, open as the day, lofty, and magnanimous. . ' . . To the eloquent appeals of Lamar are due the foundations of the educational sys- tem of Texas, and tlie consecration of nolile grants of public lands to the school and university funds. By him, too, a great tide of corruption and public (ilunder was s\iddenly stopjied.* After the annexation of Texas Mirabeau Lamar served efficiently in the Mexican -War. In 1857 he was appointed United States Minister to the Argentine Republic, and in 1858 to Costa Eica and Nicaragua. He died in the year 1859. Between him and Justice Lamar existed the deepest attachment and mutual admiration. His rare combination of qualities, his fiery and chivalric nature, his enthusiasm, his patriotism * Willi.-iiu Prest.in .I.>lin..t(>i.. in •• I.ilr' of Gen. A. S. .lolin-t ii." ]>v- ii3. M. HIS LIFE, TUfES, AND SPEECHES. 17 and fervid partisanship— all strongly drew and deeply iutluenced the nascent character of his observant and thoughtful yonng nephew. As a specimen of the literary style of Mirabeau Lamar the following lyric, which does not appear in the " Verse Memorials," is given. The poem is the last he wrote, and was inspired by a rarely beautiful wom- an whom he saw in Central America. THE DAUGHTER OF MENDOZA. O lend to me, sweet nightintrale, Your music by the fountains! And lend to me your cadent'es, O river of the mountains! That I may sing my gay brunette A diamond sparli in coral set, Geui for a prince's coronet — Tlie daugliter of Mendoza. How brilliant is the morning star! The evening star, how tender! Tlie light of botli is in her eye, Their softness and their sjilendor. But for the lash that sliades their light, They were too dazzling for the figlit; And when she shuts them all is night — The daughter of IMendoza. O! ever bright and beauteous one, Bewildering and beguiling. The lute is in thy silvery tones. The rainbow in thy smiling. And thine is, too, o'er hill and dell. The bounding of the young gazelle. The arrow's flight and ocean's swell- Sweet daughter of Mendoza! What though, perchance, we meet no more? Wliat though too soon we sever? Thy form will float like emerald light, Before my vision ever. For who can see and then forget The glories of my gay brunette? Thou art too bright a star to set — Sweet daughter of Mendoza! Lucius Q. C. Lamar, the father of the late Justice, was John La- mar's oldest son. Born in Warren County, on the 15th of July, 1797, he passed the most of his early youth in Putnam, to which county his father had removed. Much of his time was spent behind the counter as a salesman; bitt in 1816 he began the study of law in the office of Hon. Joel Crawford, at Milledgeville. Reading with great ddigence, lie acquired, amongst other things, accuracy in pleading. After twelve months or more he repaired to the celebrated law school of Judges 2 18 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR: Eeeve and Gould, at LituLtield, Conn. About the year 1818, having been admitted to practice in the courts of law and equity in Georgia, he opened an office in ^Lilledgeville. There, on tlie 10th of March, 1819, he married Sarah W. Bird, daughter of Dr. Thompson Bird, au eminent physician of that city. Though few young lawyers have brought to the bar higlier quahfications, he lacked some, ami for a few years liis prospects were anything but bright. While others, with not a tithe of his genius or learning, were seen to be reaping rich har- vests of fees and crowded with clients, he remained poor and almost briefless. How and why did this happen? Courage, truth, and honor were among the most con- spicuous elements of his character, and he seemed to have the esteem and confidence of every one. But he could not court clients nor solicit patronage; his characteristic independence and legitimate self-esteem would not tolerate even the semblance of unworthy conilescension. He doubtless wanted what is commonly called addrrss: he liad no turn for frivoliius chat, story-telling, anecdotes, etc. In short, he lacked those qualifications on which humbler natures rely for conciliating ijopular favor. When quite young in his profession Mr. Lamar was chosen by the Legislature to compile the laws of Georgia from 1810 to 1820. He arranged the several acts under their apjiropriate divisions, and made such references and explanations in notes as were necessary to show what had been repealed or modified. The result of his la- bors was reported to Gov. Clark in 1821, and by him was accepted after a careful examination at the hands of a committee. It was then published in a quarto vol- ume of thirteen hundred pages, constituting Volume III. of the "Georgia Statutes." Mr. Lamar also revised Clayton's "Georgia Justice" (now rarely found ) about 1819. In the summer of 1821 Judge Crawford, who had retired from the practice some four or tive years before, resumed it, and Lamar be- came his partner. This copartnership by its terms was limited to three years, and before the expira- tion of that time Lamar had so many oijportunities of exhibiting proofs of his great legal ability that he never afterwards wanted clients or fees. Mr. Lamar doubtless had ambition — a legitimate ambition — to acquire by merito- rious actions that fame and fortune which may at all times be justly awarded to use- ful and brilliant achievements; but he had an insuperable aversion to catching oflice as a mere fortuitous windfall, or getting it by surrendering himself to the arbitrary management of a jiolitical party. Under the influence of snch generous self-denial, he more than once refiLsed his name as a candidate when success was little less than certain. His conduct when Thomas W. Cobb (about the fall of 1828) became a candi- date for the bench of the Ocmulgee circuit will serve to exemplify some of the lofty traits which belonged to his character. Mr. Cobb was an experienced and confessedly an able lawyer; had been for many years a respectable member of Congress, desired to continue in the public serv- ice, but, in the decline of life, preferred a station nearer home. The popularity, however, which had carried him three terms to the House of Representatives, and afterwards to the Senate of the United States, now forsook him. He was beaten on joint vote of the General Assembly by a large majority; but, for some cause best known to himself, his successful opponent within a few days resigned the commis- sion of judge, and the vacancy had again to be filled. Cobb's friends again jiresent- ed his name, and Lamar was importuned to offer as a rival candidate. Had he con- sented, his election was morally certain ; but he had a becoming respect for Mr. Ills LIFE, TIMES, ASD SPEECHES. 19 Cobb's seniority and past services, was no stranger to tho uiiwiuthy motives of tliose who were most intent on a second defeat, nor to the plasticity of tliat ill-organized college of electors, the General Assembly. His refusal was jienMnptory, and Mr. Cobb was permitted to take the office he so much coveted. Before the term for which Mr. ("obb had Ijeen elected expired, his death made a vacancy which Mr. Lamar could honorably consent to fill. He came then, on the 4th of November, ISliO, while only in his thirty-fourtli year, into oliice on such con- ditions as met bis approbation, and continiicd until the day of his own lamented death to discharge its duties with signal ability, and witli jiuMic applause which few injudicial stations have had the good fortune to receive. He presided with great dignity, and was most elfective in the dispatch of busi- ness. No one who knew the man ever ventured on an act of rudeness or disrespect to his court; yet every person whose deportment was worthy of it had unfailing as- surances of his kindness. His lectui-es of instruction to the grand juries, at the opening of a term, were delivered in aduiiralile style; and his charges to special and petit juries in the trial of dilhcult and nmch-Utigated cases might well serve as mod- els to any bench. As specimens of Judge Lamar's style and reasoning on legal topics, reference may be made to two cases in Dudley's "Keports:" Brensfer vs. Hanlcinan and Kendrirk vs. the Central Baid; the latter sustaining notes when the statute required bonds. They are both fine instances. A remarkable case was one which was brought from Jasper b(>fore the convention of Judges. It was well argued, was thoroughly discussed, and the authorities examined by the Convention, Judge Lamar leading the convention to adopt his view. Au opinion was rendered unaitiiiwHsli/. During the succeeding interval before the next conven- tion he met with a case which gave him a new view. He pursued the examination closely during several weeks. When the next convention assembled, he stated what had occurred, and that his opinion had un- dergone an entire change. The authorities were reviewed, criticised, and applied by the convention, and it iiiianhnonsli/ reversed its former decision. Judge Lamar leading both times the argument, and writing out the final decision of the judges. This remarkable episode furnishes a high proof of his mental powers and intellectual and moral integrity; more especially when it is remembered that William H. Crawford, Judge Law, Judge Dougherty, and perhaps Judge Warner, were mem- bers of the convention. Of this decision, and of that of Brewster vs. Hanlciiiiin, Hon. Joseph Henry Lumpkin says, that they "may be placed on a level with the best productions of the American or Eng- lish bench." Nothing delighted him more than for his brethren of the bar to mingle literary anecdote or classical allusion in their arguments. He was a great admirer of Hugh S Legare, of South Carolina, as presenting the finest model of the profound lawyer and accomplished scholar; and such, since Legare's death, was the judgment of Mr. Justice Story. ■ ~. ^ i From boyhood Judge Lamar was a lover of books, readmg with good effect al- most everything that came within his reach, but had a decided partiality for poetry 20 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR: and other works of imagination. In after life he was distinguished for his attain- ment ill belles-lettres, for tlie classic purity of his compositions, and for his forensic eloquence. He was fond of poUtics, and wrote many articles of that nature for jjub- lication. His active genius, lofty virtues, and profound erudition would have given eclat to any name. There is no instance in England or America where a judge so rapidly gained public favor. In less than four years from his accession to the bench he was commonly known as "the great Judge Lamar," and was its brightest luminary. He could not have been displaced; there was no desire felt by his political opponents to give his otKce to another; and it was his singular merit, his crowning glory, that both Union and State rights men would equally have renewed his commission. And, to complete his blessings, he was happy in his domestic circle. Wife and chil- dren, relatives and friends, everybody loved him, and he loved all. Yet amid all this innocence and honor and felicity a withering bolt fell; and Judge Lamar's sudden death occurred on the 4th of July, 1834, when he was thirty-seveii years of age. A lengthy and beautiful " Tribute of Respect " was adopted by the bar of the Baldwin Superior Court, from which the following extract is taken : At the bar he was an ingenious and able advocate and excellent jurist. Possessing a mind far above the ordinary grade, distinguished alike for acuteness and discrimi- nation, it could grapple with the giant difficulties of the science and master its abstruse theories. On the bench he exhibited a soundness of judgment and depth of learning beyond his years. His candor, ingenuousness, and modesty were no less conspicuous than his amenity and kindness to all in any way connected with the administration of justice. His expositions of the law, his charges and instructions to juries, were uni- formly marked by piecision, beauty, and eloquence, imjiarting interest to the suliject and instruction to the hearer. Devoting himsi-lf to the arduous duties of his station, he seldom erred in judgment; but, ever anxious that his judicial opinions should be correct, he sought occasion for their revision, and, with the noble impulse of an up- right mind, rejoiced in the opportunity for their revision. Always guided by human- ity, he truly administered justice in mercy. To the youthful aspirant for professional distinction he was indeed a friend, exciting his ardor, aiding his exertions, commend- ing his efforts, alluring him onward, and extending a fostering hand for his support when difficulties surrounded him. In all the relations of private life he was blameless, ever kind, ardent, and affec- tionate. Of unblemished integrity and pure morals, no whisper injurious to either ever rested on his name. He was beloved for his amiable disi^osition, his bland de- portment, his noble frankness, and his generous sentiments.* Judge Lamar had eight children, five of whom attained maturity. The sons were Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus, Thompson Bird, and Jeffer- son Mirabeau. The daughters were Mrs. Susan E. Wiggins and Mary Ann, who first married James C. Longstreet, Esq., and afterwards John B. Ross, of Macon, Ga. The maternal ancestors of Justice Lamar are historic in Georgia. They shotild be briefly noticed, not only because they are noteworthy in " These quotations are trom tlic " Ilench ami Jiar of Georgia; " title, " L. Q. C. Lamar." JUCGE L. Q. C. LAMAR. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 21 themselves, but also because both by inheritance and by education they materially contributed to the production in him of those (jualities of mind and soul with which he was endowed, as well as the sentimeuts by which his life was greatly influenced. The women especially were at once lovely and heroic. Sarah Gilliam, Susan Williamson, and Sarah Bird were all of such sort as was the Roman Cornelia. The first is believed to have been a niece of the Eev. Devereux Jarratt, the celebrated Episcopalian divine of Tirginia. A native of Henrico County, Va., and descended from a Huguenot stock, she married Mica- jah Williamson, of Bedford County, whose grandfather was from the North of Ireland, and who was himself a man of quite considerable wealth. The two, in the year 1768, moved to Georgia and settled in Wilkes County, where Mr. Williamson purchased a valuable plantation from Col. Alston, giving him sixty negroes in exchange therefor. Wilkes County was then on the frontier, and subject to great afflictions from Indian aggressions. Here and then, and in the later stormy days of the great Revolution, the Williamsons were conspicuous from both their services and their sufferings. The country was almost a wilderness. The houses of settlers were built as near together as possible, for union and for capacity of fortify- ing against hostile attacks. In the Indian wars Williamson became prominent. He was brave but prudent, and inspired such confidence as made him by common consent a leader. He soon became intimate with Elijah Clarke, even then the most prominent man of that region, and later a colonel in the continental army. Their intimacy continued through the Revolution. In that struggle they were associated in the army of the South, which was assigned to protect the western frontier of Georgia. Williamson was Clarke's lieutenant colonel and was his chief dependence. In all hazardous enterprises requiring skill, caution, and perseverance he was selected to command. This, of course, im- mensely increased his risks, and he was more frequently wounded than any other officer in the command. The scene of this war was in the im- mediate neigliborhood of his home, and his wonderful wife was not only a witness of many of the conflicts, but also often a participant in them. Hers was a character as marked as was that of her husband. While he was in the field fighting she was in the fields at home supervising the management of the farm, and contriving to support a large family of sons and daughters. In one of the inroads of the English, Tories, and Indians, during the absence of Col Williamson with his command, their liouse and outbuildings were burned, with all their mova])les. A son, a youth of twelve years, was hung in the presence of his mother. Following this a proclamation was issued, offering a large reward for the head of Col. Williamson. The wife and cliildren were forced to flee to the mountains of N(n-th Carolina for safety. This was near the end of 22 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: the war. It was only on the cessation of hostilities that the suffering family returned to their desolated fields. Then Williamson went to work to i'e2:)air his shattered fortunes. A few slaves were left; and, uniting with theirs the labor of himself and his sous, the farm was cul- tivated actively and successfully. He also kept an inn in the town of Wa.shingtou. In a few years he was again comparatively independent, and directed as best he could the education of his family. In this his wife, who was well educated for the times, assisted. But the fatigues, the wounds, and the anxieties of the troubled life he had, added to the severe labors of the reclamation, broke down the old soldier's constitu- tion. He dietl in 1795, aged about sixty years. Col. Williamson left five sons and six daughters. The sons were Charles, Peter, Micajah, William, and Thomas Jeffenson. The daugh- ters were Mrs. Nancy Clarke, Mrs. 8arali Griffin, Mrs. Susan Bird, Mrs. Martha Fitch, Mrs. Elizabeth Thweat, and Mrs. Mary Campbell. It was a most remarkable family of women. Thej' were celebrated for their beauty antl intellects. Any one of them would have made a home distinguished, and no sisters ever took a wider hold iiijon a State. Mrs. Clarke was the wife of Gen. John Clarke, afterwards Governor of the State. Mrs. Griffin was twice married; both husbands were judges, and "the second, Hon. Charles Tail, served two terms in the United States Senate. The husbands of Mrs. Bird, Mrs. Fitch, and Mrs. Thweat were all men of high standing and influence. Mrs. Campbell was the wife of Hon. Duncan G. Campbell, a lawyer of prominence, who was one of the two commissioners of the United States who negotiated the treaty whereby the Creeks surrendered their lands in Georgia and Alabama; and she became the mother of the Hon. John A. Campbell, late Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. It is believed that the William- son family occupy the unique position that it was the first in the United States to give two of its members to that great tribunal, since the com- mission of Judge Campbell antedated that of Justice Field, while Jus- tice Lamar was appointed before Justice Brewer. Dr. Thompson Bird, the husband of Mrs. Susan (Williamson) Bird, and tlie grandfather of Justice Lamar, was a son of Empsou Bird, of Cecil County, Md., who died there in 1787. Thompson graduated at William and Mary, and afterwards at the celebrated medical college in Philadelphia. His older half-sister, Mrs. Mary Montgomery, and her husband (from whom are descended a fine family of that name), having found their way to Georgia, induced Thompson to follow them. He settled first in Milledgeville, and later at Macon, at which place he died July 8, 1828. He was one of the most eminent, successful, and popular physicians in the State. His nature was frank and generous; quick to resent an injury, he was yet easily conciliated. He was dis- HIS LIFE, TIMES, A\D SPEECHES. 23 tinguisbed for hospitality; and his cheerfulness and vivacity gave liiui great prestige in society. For example, in 1823 he was selected to pre- side over the festal board at the first banquet ever given in the then newly organized C(junty of Bibb in conimetnoration of the Declaration of Independence. His superior skill and many jjersoual virtues secured for him a high place in popular esteem. However, the chief interest along this branch of the family history gathers about Mrs. Bird. The personal and mental graces, the intel- lectual and spiritual glory of a perfect woman — who shall paint them? And who shall sound the mysterious ways in which God moves to per- form his wonders? or guess why it is that a star whose brightness and serenity seem worthy of a cloudless heaven shall yet go down in dark cloiids and in storm? This magnificent woman died, under the most tragical and dramatic circumstances, of a broken heart. Her sister, Mrs. Fitch, with her husband and children, lived at St. Angnstine. Attracted by them, thither also had gone Mrs. Bird's only son then living, just entering upon manhood, a most amiable and gifted young man, who when only twenty-one years of age had been appointed United States Attorney for the Territory. To him his uncle and aunt were very kind. On one fatal occasion in the fall of 18'21, while trav- eling off the coast, Mr. Fitch found floating on the o'cean a mattress which seemed to be good. He had it taken aboard, dried it, and slept upon it. The result was yellow fever. This dread disease spread. When it became epidemic Mrs. Bird wrote to her son, praying him to come away; but in the meantime every member of his aunt's family had been taken ill, and she, rising from her bed of sickness, threw her arms about her nephew and implored him not to leave her in her de- spair. He knew that to stay was death; but he wrote his mother that he must meet his fate; and stay he did, and died November 15, with his uncle, his aunt, and both of his cousins. From this blow his mother never recovered. Her grief was supposed to have in- duced organic disease of the heart. On the 22d of March, 1822, Mrs. Bird's niece, Nancy Clarke, the daughter of the Governor, was married to John W. Campbell, the ycmuger brother of Hon. Duncan G. Campbell. Mrs. Bird laid aside her mourning, if not her sorrow, and assisted in the prepai'ation for the wedding. When the ceremony was over, she approached the hap- py and blushing bride, kissed her, wiped from her eyes the gathering tears, and said, "Dear Nancy, if your happiness shall be equal to my wishes, you will never know misery. Excuse me now, I am fatigued and must go home." She kissed her niece again, and left the draw- ing-room. The elite of the young people of the State were present. Everybody knew Nan- cy Clarke, and everybody loved her, and was responding in mirth to her happiness. 24 LUCIUS Q. C. LA MA II: The clock struck twelve, the dancers were upon the floor, when that stern old man, Gov. Clarke, with his military stride, entered the room, and authoritatively said: "Stop this!" All were startled, and an instantaneous silence ensued. There was a pause of a moment, when the Governor said: "Mrs. Bird is dead. "* Aye; the wrung heart had ceased, from its labors, aud the stricken mother had fallen on sleep, slain through the noble conduct of her ilu- tiful aud loving son. Again was illustrated the singular and terrible fact that acts of the highest virtue and those of the lowest depravity often lead to the same bitter result; tiiat in the strange complexity of this mysterious life many of the jjurest altars bear the burden of that tremendous offering, the broken heart. The mother of Justice Lamar, Sarah Williamson Bird, was born in Milledgeville on the 2-ith of Februar}-, 1802. She was married when only seventeen years of age. Left a widow by the cruel stroke already narrated, at thirty-two, with five young children to rear, she was not overwhelmed by so great a calamity, but bravely gathered her men- tal and moral forces to meet the duties cast upon her. In her widow- hood she was not altogether aloue, for she had many warm and devoted friends, both of her husband and of her own. She was spared the sharp bitterness of poverty. Her husband left her a comfortable loroperty, which was considerably increased by the skillful management of his brother, Mr. Jeflerson Lamar. Her daughters were educated at good boarding schools; her oldest son, Lucius, at Emory College; her second sou, Thompson B., at the same institution, aud afterwards at the Jef- ferson Medical College, in Philadelphia; and her youngest son, Jeffer- son M., at the University of Mississippi. In July, 1851, after remaining a v\'idow for seventeen years, she was married to Col. Hiram B. Troutmau, of Yineville, near Macon, Ga., and removed to his home, where she lived until her death. She had much in this world — beauty, intellect, education, social po- sition, a competency, admirati/?w( as a Tolitical Speaker— The Comi:>romise Measures of 1,S.")0— Debate with Footc over tlie Compromise. WHEN Judge Longstreet went to Mississippi, in September, 1849, to take charge of the State University, he addressed to Mr. La- mar, then living in Covington, Ga., a letter which induced him also to remove to Oxford, Miss., for the purpose of practicing law. Tliat village was the county site of a large and prosperous -county in the northern part of the State, in a region, embracing about two-fifths of the State's entire area, which had been ceded by the Indians to the whites only about fifteen to eighteen years before; and it, therefore, was a new country. There was a great and rapid immigration. Mr. La- mar's trip was made overland in a rockaway and two wagons, carrying his wife, infant daughter, and servants. The travelers reached Oxford about the middle of November, the Branhams following in the next year. Under date of May 14, 1850, Mr. Lamar wrote as follows to Mr. Chap- pell: Dear Sir : I received a few weeks since your letter accompanying the commission from the Governor of Georgia, wliich you were Ivind enouKli to obtain for me. 1 post- poned my reply until I could get qualified. Inclosed you have the certificate of the judse, which you will oblige me by sending to the Governor. I thank you, my dear sir, for the sentiments of friendship and regard which you express for me; my heart responds to it all. The knowletlge that I possess your esteem will always incite me to deserve it; and should I live to realize your flattering liopes of me, my chief pleas- ure will be in the belief that it gratifies such friends as you and my aunt, at the bare- mention of wliose name my heart beats with a sacred impulse. And I hope I shall be pardoned for repeating licre what upon every fit occasion I delight to say to your- selves and others, that after my own immediate family there is no being on earth for whom I entertain an afi'ection so devoted and abiding as that which I chensli for no- Aunt Loretto. The year I lived with you was fraught with benefits to my character of incalculable value, and from you in particular I have received impressions which I shall carrv with me to my grave. I can never reciprocate these kindnesses, but should the thne unfortunatelv ever come when your children may need a friend (and what may not happen in this whirligig world?), they will have one in me, firm and true. , , , fi N- i This is a magnificent countrv for planters. There are men here who left Newton County poor and in debt eight and ten years ago, who now have a good plantation and fifteen to twenty hands, and are buying more every year. ... There will be, a month or two hence, an election of two additional tutors for this university; and as the duties of one of them will not be so onerous as to draw my attention from mv profession, I shall apply for it. My motive for tliis step is to pro- vide myself with" read V monev until I get a practice, but more particularly to extri- cate my mother from some pecuniary embarrassments in which she baa become in- ^ (45) 46 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR: volved, rather by untoward circumstances than by her own mismanagement. ... It is my duty, and it will be my pleasure, to avail myself of this opportunity to relieve a mother whose whole widowhood has been a history of self-sacrifices for her chil- dren. On the 1st of June, 1850, Mr. Lamar was licensed, on examination, by the Hon. Hugh E. Miller, to practice "as an attorney and counselor at law and solicitor in chancery in all the courts of law and equity" in the State. In July of the same year he was elected adjimct professor of mathematics in the university, the princiiial jirofessorship being held by Dr. Albert T. Bledsoe, later distinguished as an author and as the editor of the Southern Revieir. Mr. Lamar at once endeavored to qualify himself to manage his department most advantageously, and, amongst otlie*' preparations, corresponded with the teacher of mathe- matics at Emory College in respect to his methods and experiences. In the latter p&vt of this year, also, he began to make political speeches, and they were favorably received. Indeed, they seem to have made him a local reputation somewhat unusual for a neophyte. It was in the autumn of 1851, however, that he was first pitted against a formi- dable foe, and won his spurs. In order that this incident may be under- stood, it will be necessary to make a brief historical digression. In the year 1851 there was intense excitement and profound agitation in the slaveholding States of this Union. Nowhere was that excite- ment more intense or the agitation more profound than in Mississippi. The direct cause of it was certain legislation which had been indulged in by the preceding Congress, which bore upon the question of slavery, but especially the admission of the State of California with an anti- slavery constitution and, it was claimed, in a grossly irregular manner. From the formation of the Federal Union there existed between the North and the South a jealousy of political power, which was pregnant with immense issues and dire resitlts. That jealousy was the life of the subsequent great struggle over slavery as a domestic institution. Ex- cept as a xjolitical force, it is more than doubtful whether that particular struggle would ever have been. The possession of slaves was not only a unifying agency for the South, but it was also understood to be a source of political power to each State, iuasmiich as under the constitution the representation of each State in Congress was fixed at the sum of its white citizens and of three-fifths of all its slaves; and that j^rovision was gen- erally, although erroneously, understood to have been adoj^jted as a repre- sentation of property. In the North, therefore, the political and the moral questions conspired to produce an intense opposition to any in- crease of the slave States; while in the South the political question, and the anxiety to secure a vested property interest, conspired to produce a desire equally intense to make such an increase. The first great contest over this issue was on the admission of Mis- HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 47 souri. lu that region were already many slaves, and in 1819 the terri- tory applied for admission under a constitution which recognized slav- ery. The application failed by a disagreement between the two houses of Congress; the House refusing assent unless a clause abolishing slav- ery should be inserted in the constitution, while the Senate held that such a requirement would be violative of the Constitution of the United States. In 1820 the application of Missouri was renewed. After a pro- tracted and bitter controversy a compromise, known to history as the " Missouri Compromise," was agreed on, the substance of which was that the State should be admitted with a proslavery constitution, but with a prohibition in the act of admission against slavery in all of the territo- ry north and west of Missouri, down to the parallel of thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes. Then came, in time, the annexation of Texas, the Mexican "War, and the acquisition from Mexico of vast territories reaching to the Pacific Ocean. This straightway opened a new question. The autislavery party began to declare that, notwithstanding the Missouri Compromise, slavery should not be introduced into any newly acquired territory — not even below the line of thirty-six thirty— that the compromise was limited to such territory as was embraced in the old province of Louis- iana. In August, 1846, when the President requested an appropriation to enable him to negotiate a treaty of peace with Mexico, based on a ces- sion of territory, a Democratic member from Pennsylvania offered a proviso to the appropriation bill, called after him the " Wilmot Provi- so," to the effect that as an express and indispensable condition to the acquisition, slavery should never be allowed therein. This proviso was passed by the House, but was rejected by the Senate. The territory subsecjuently ceded by Mexico was acquired free from its operation. But its introduction, its advocacy, and its almost success, were regarded by the State rights party as a practical repudiation of the Missouri Compromise, and accordingly were deeply resented and bitterly de- nounced. In February, 1847, Mr. Calhoun presented in the Senate a set of res- olutions to the effect that, inasmuch as the territories were the common property of all the States, Congress had no constitutional power what- ever to exclude from them slaves, the legal property of so many of the citizens of the States of the Union; and in the South the opinion rapid- ly crystallized that the only just or constitutional course for Congress to adopt was one of absolute nonintervention. The Soutii demanded "simply not to be denied equal rights iu settling and colonizing the common public domain;" and that when territories should be formed into States their people " might be permitted to act as they pleased upon the subject of the status of the negro race amongst them, as upon all other subjects of internal policy, when they came to form their constitutions." 48 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR: lu April, lS-i9, Gen. Bennett Kiley was, by the United States Govern- ment, appointed military governor of the newly acquired province of California; and in June, by the initiative of President Taylor, who had been elected by the Whig party, he called a convention to meet at Mon- terey for the purpose of forming a State constitution. This convention adopted such a constitution, antislavery in character, on the 13th of October, which was ratified by a vote of the people. In December a Governor was elected under this constitution, and application was made to Congress for admission. A proposition was made to continue the line of the Missouri Compromise through the newly acquired territories to the Pacific. This measure was defeated in the Senate by a vote of thirty-two nays to twenty-four yeas. All of the affirmative votes were cast by Southern Senators; and all of the negative votes, except two from Missouri and Kentucky, by Northern Senators, Delaware being then counted as a Northern State. The pacification effected by the Missouri Compromise, and which had endured for thirty years, was now ended. There was a furious struggle between the two sections. It was, in fact, a struggle for the control of Congress. The North had con- trolled the House from the foundation of the government, at first by the exclusion of two-fifths of the negro population in the count for ap- portionment of representation, and later by its superiority in popula- tion; but the attitude of the Senate was different. There a system of admitting States practically in pairs, a Northern and a Southern State together, had long been established; so that when the question of the admission of California arose the North and the South were equal in strength in the Senate, and the admission of California with an anti- slavery constitution meant that the North should control both Houses. The opposition urged that the organization of California into a State without any enabling act of Congress was illegal and revolutionary; that the refusal to extend the compromise line to the Pacific, whereby two States might in time be formed, one of each class, as theretofore, pro- ceeded from a purpose to admit California as a State, rightly or wrong- ly, with an antislavery constitution, in denial of the constitutional and equitable rights of the South tc3 have equal practical benefit with the North in the territories acquiied by their common expenditure of treas- ure, suffering, heroism, and blood. They did not deny the abstract proposition that each new State should determine for itself what form of constitution it would adopt; but they charged that the requisite pop- ulation did not yet exist in California, such as it had being mainly com- posed of Mexicans, South Americans, and adventurers, drawn thither temporarily by the " gold fever," and that the pretended vote on which the constitution was based was cast by persons not enfranchised by any competent authority, while the region itself was largely under the con- trol of military organizations from New York, sent thither during the HIS LIFE, TIMES, AXD SI'EECHES. 49 Mexican War, aud disbanded in California on tho restoration of peace; that tlie powers of the Federal Government were in fact unfairly aud nnconstitntionally nsed to trammel and defeat the popular will if it was favorable to slavery, and they denied that the proposed new State was practically allowed to determine the matter for itself. This conflict led to the adoption of the celebrated "Compromise Measures of 1850," which, in effect, were as follows: California was ad- mitted with her free constitution; the remainder of the Mexican cession was organized into territories without any provisions as to slavery, thus leaving its establishment therein, or exclusion therefrom, to the choice of the settlers; certain territory claimed by Texas was purchased from her and annexed to New Mexico; the domestic slave trade in the Dis- trict of Columbia was abolished, but a pledge giveu not to interfere else- where with slavery or the internal slave trade; and the South was con- ceded a fugitive slave law more efficient than the one passed in 1793. The last item of the compromise was advanced as the real compensation to the South for the other unacceptable measures. Under the act of 1793 it was the duty of the Federal Government to return fugitive slaves to their owners whenever they had escaped into States other than those in which they were held. The Legislatures of thirteen of the nonslave- holding States, however, had passed statutes which forbade the State of- ficials to cooperate in such cases (such cooperation being a part of the scheme of the act of 1793), and in many instances riots and bloodshed had followed upon attempts of slaveowners to recover their property. The act of 1850, therefore, provided for a prompter and more effective execution by the Federal Government of its obligation in this respect. Most of the Southern people, however, believed not in the efficacy of the act of 1850. They regarded it as a snare. They had no faith that in the communities whose sentiment was such as to produce the results in- dicated above the Federal officers would carry out, or would be per- mitted to carry out, the new act of Congress any more than had been done under the previous act of Congress. They felt that they were of- fered the shadow for the substance. However, notwithstanding these objections and recalcitrations, the act admitting California aud the Fugitive Slave Law were passed, Califor- nia being admitted in September, 1850. It will readily be conceived that pending these controversies the South was not dormant. In October, 1849, a convention was h(>ld in Jackson by which resolutions were adopted asserting the equal right of the Soiith in and to the free use and enjoyment of the new territories, and by which also a convention of delegates from the Southern States was called to meet at Nashville in Jane, 1850, for the purpose of concerting measures for the securing of those rights, and others similar in nature. On the 21st of January, 1850, Senators Davis and Foote, and the four 4 50 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: Eepreseutatives from Mississippi, addressed a letter to Gov. Quitman, in which they notified him, and through him their common constituents, that California would be admitted; that their individual opinions had undergone no change; that they regarded such action, tinder all the cir- cumstances of her application, as an attempt to pass the AVilmot Provi- so in another form. They said, further, that they desired, through the Governor, to submit to the people and the Legislature the single fact that California would most likely be admitted with an antislavery constitu- tion, and that they should be greatly pleased to have such expression of opinion by the Legislature, the Governor, and, if practicable, by the peo- ple, as should clearly indicate the course which Mississippi would deem it her duty to pursue "in this new emergency." This letter was by the Governor submitted to the Legislature, and that body on the 5th of March adopted a series of resolutions upon the subject, setting forth its view of the situation and particularly that the policy theretofore pursued by the government in refusing to provide a territorial government for California had been and was eminently cal- culated to promote, and was about to effect indirectly, the cherished ob- ject of the abolitionists, which could not be accomplished by direct legislation without a palpalile violation of the Constitution; that the admission of California under the circumstances would be an act of fraud and oppression on the rights of the slaveholding States, and that it was the sense of the Legislature that the Senators and Representa- tives should to the extent of their ability resist it by all honorable and constitutional means. Notwithstanding these resolutions, based on the letter calling for them, Mr. Foote finally voted for the admission of California, being in- duced to do so by the compromise measures detailed above. There- upon, at an extra session of the Legislature convened in November, a resolution was adopted which set forth the above letter and the above resolutions and indorsed the action of Mr. Davis and of the Eepresent- atives, but disapproved the action of Senator Foote and declared that "this Legislature does not consider the interests of the State of Missis- sippi committed to his charge safe in his keeping." The same Legislature passed an act providing for a convention of the people, to be held in Jackson in November, 1851, to express their will upon the legislation in Congress of the session under consideration and especially "to devise and carry into effect the best means of redress for the ijast and obtain certain security for the future, and to adopt such measures for vimlicating the sovereignty of the State and the protec- tion of its institutions as shall appear to them to be demanded." Of course these stirring events ci-eated a great commotion in the State. There was much difference of opinion upon the efficiency and propriety of the compromise measures, but that difference did not pro- HIS LIFE, TIMES, A .\D SPEECHES. 51 ceed upon the old pai-ty lines. The old parties were disrupted and new combiuations were formed. Senator Foote did not resign, but showed fight. His supporters, calling themselves the "Union party," were com- jjosed in large measure of the old AVhigs, reenforced by ;i considerable coutiugeut of Democrats, and they placed him in nomination for Gov- ernor. He was opposed by e.\-Gov. Quitman as the standard bearer of the State Rights jjarty. Each party had its candidates for delegates to the convention and for members of the Legislature. The canvass was very bitter and exciting. The election for delegates came off in September, and the Union party was triumphant by a majority of about seven thousand. This disastrous result caused Gov. Quitman to relin- quish his candidacy, and his party then called upon Mr. Davis to as- sume his place as candidate for Governor. This Mr. Davis consented to do, resigning his seat in the Senate for that jjurpose. The condition of his health was such, however, as to prevent his participating in the canvass to a great extent, and he was defeated at the November electi(m by a majority of less than one thousand. The convention met in November, and after being in session a week or ten days adjourned sine die, after declaring its unalterable fealty to the Union. It was in this canvass that Prof. Lamar encountered Mr. Foote. The Senator, Hushed with the triumph of the September election, was ap- pointed to speak at Oxford. The State Eights party were without a champion. They appealed to Lamar to represent them. Notwithstand- ing the fact that the call was unexpected and on only a few hours' no- tice, he consented. It was a great compliment to him, a young man of only twenty-six, but it was also a fierce ordeal. He had had no practice in polemical discussions, and was without experience in practical poli- tics. His antagonist was an exijerienced and trained politician of the highest official position, who had been driven to bay and was now ex- ulting in victory, whose adroitness and pugnacity were unmatched in the State, whose hot temper and personal courage were proverbial, and whose tongue was untiring and vitriolic. Of Prof. Lamar's speech on that occasion nothing now remains, ap- parently, except a few pages of his own manuscript, containing a num- ber of hurried and fragmentary notes. So far as they go, his line of argument was as follows: He felt keenly his own incompetency to encounter one wlio was so greatly his own superior in age, position, abilities, and experience; one who was practiced as a de- bater on every field from the hu.stings to the Senate chamber; one who, Iiear of him where you will at home, is speaking; and who, hear of him when you will, is demol- ishing every one who meets him on the stump; and who is said to have spoken on a single clause of a bill seventeen times from seventeen different seats, showing him- self as expert on the wing as at rest. The gentleman came not only equipped with his own great abilities, native and acquired, but also panoplied in the armor furnished 52 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR: to liim by his Northern alhes in the battle again&t the South recently fought at the capital and now renewed belore his constituents. Even so, however, the discussion would not be so unequal as it is if only the gentleman drew his facts from sources ac- cessible to both ; but he will tell you of his expectations, founded uj)on reports picked up during his pilgrimages to the North or gathered from his nuineious correspond- ents, of whom the speaker never heard and of whom you know he has many, whose disclosures he publishes or keeps to himself, as shall best serve his purposes. But the speaker did not conr^ider himself at liberty to consult his own reputation or interests. The State was entitled to all that he was, be it little or much ; and have it she should, whether her summons is to the lecture room, the hustings, the field, or the gibbet, if it be treason to obey her call against the Senator's particular friends. Clay, Cass, and Webster — par nohile fralrum. The gentleman appears before you in a singular attitude. He presents himself as the ijrosecutor of his constituents. He has discovered many egregious sins in the late action of the Legislature of his State, and has visited upon them a punishment which, in his estimation, doubtless is equal to their transgression: the weight of his senatorial condemnation. The S[ieaker did think that the case of the State vs. Foote stood upon the docket before that of Foole vs. the Slate. There were grave charges against the gentleman which he must clear up before he could animadvert upon his constituency. We protest against his discussing any other questions until he shall have ]ilaced liimself rectus in curi:'i, until he shall have answered the charges against himself. He is charged, and the speaker pledges himself to prove those charges to be true, with knowingly and willfully misrepresenting the sentiments of the people of his State as made known to him through her only constitutional organ of communi- cation; with doing wliat he knew that his State Legislature did not wish him to do — nay, with doing what it positively forbade him to do — nay, with doing what he re- quested it to instruct him not to do — and at the same time with abandoning the cher- ished principles and friemls of the South, leaguing with her enemies on matters vital to the South's prosjierity and honor, exerting his acknowledged abilities against the recognition of her most earnest and righteous demands, committing in the meantime every variety of gross inconsistency. The gentleman's motives are not impugned. He says that they were good, and says, furthermore, that his etforts have been beneficial to his section. He has cer- tainly been performing before the country some very remarkable evolutions, begin- ning with his displays at the opening of the last Congress. His political friends and foes alike have been dazzled and confounded by his gyrations. He began the session by indulging in fiery ultraism, which shocked his conservative free-soil friends at the North and caused them to hold up their pious bands in holy horror at Ins savage talk. But he finished by assisting to fasten ujjon us the very wrongs which he de- nounced, and declaring that there is no aggression upon the South and that she has nothing to complain of. It has been said that when the English were in China one of the stratagems to which they resorted to frighten the poor Celestials out of their wits was to tie skyrockets to their heels at niglit and turn somersaults in full view of the enemy's camp. The result is said to have been amazingly successful, and it may be that the gentleman has attempted to steal their thunder. At all events he has ex- hibited some very remarkable specimens of ground and lofty tundjling at Washing- ton. But alas! instead of frightening the enemy, he ha« turned a somersault into their camp, and now attempts to speak Ids old friends into the delusion that he has taken the whole force prisoners of war. The Soutli, says he, gets everything; the North, those wily old politicians, Cass, Webster, Fillmore, have all been hoodwinked. We have met the enemy, and they are ours! So much for his first fight. Having whipped the North, he now begins to whip the South. The speaker, for one, will not HIS LIFE, TIMES, AXD SPEECHES. 53 decline the fight, hoping from his heart tluvt tlie Si>ii;itor will gain over him just such a victory as he gained over the North. Witli his usual anil characteristic positiveness the Senator asserts that the only is- sue before you is union or disunion. We are prepared to meet that issue when it comes from the proper authority, and at the proper time; hut it is not before you on this occasion, nor has the gentleman the right to force it belbre you. He promised at Washington to present to the people a very diS'erent issue, and the only one he is competent to discuiss before them— viz., do they, or do they not, approve of the mis- called compromise measures. Listen to his own language in the .Senate chamber (reading from Mr. Foote's speech). These words were hardly cold before he received from his constituents, in terms of direct censure, their reprobation of these measures and of his agency in the adoption of them, through the resolutions of the Legislature, for the passage of which he is responsible. Instead of resigning his jilace upon this intimation, with no precedent for his conduct but that set by Tijomas H. Benton (whom he has himself denounced), he holds on to his post, and appeals to the peo- ple of his State to sustain him in liis course. Now what do the people say? Let us see what the organ of the Union party (the gentleman's own organ) says (reading): . . . Now has the gentleman redeemed his pledge to resign if all he has said be not approved? No; but he appears before you, and in order to divert your minds from the grave offenses with wliicli he is charged he proclaims, with an authority which seems to admit of no denial, that the only issue is union or disunion. Whatever dilferences may exist among the people with regard to the remedies for the injuries of which we complain, whether they shall deem it best to correct these evils by means of the ballot box, or by means of disunion, one thing is certain, or else the speaker has mistaken the high-hearted freemen of Mississippi — they will never again listen to the counsels of one who assisted their enemies in fastening such meas- ures upon them ; they will brook no dictation from such a quarter. Even the Union men of this State shall be convinced that Mr. Foote is not the man whose leadership even they should acknowledge; and that, for the plain reason that his being a LTnion man to-day is no guaranty that he will not be a fire eater tomorrow, what he advises and promises to-day he will repudiate to-morrow, what he espouses to-day he will de- nounce to-morrow, whom he hails as friends to-day he will count as enemies to-mor- row, whom he attacks as enemies to-day he will colleague with to-mori-ow. That this is true the speaker now proceeds to prove. A few things must be premised. It is unnecessary to point out the clauses of the Constitution which protect slavery. It needs not to tell you that but for those clauses the Southern States would never have come into tlie Confederacy. All this you know. The Northern States ratified that instrument with a full knowledge of its terms, and thereby incurred the most solemn obligation that can be imposed upon a nation hon- estly and faithiully to maintain it in all its stipulations. How has that obligation been fulfilled? Hear Mr. Foote's answer to that question, given in company with many Southern men whom he has since deserted: "It has been fulfilled by hostile acts on the part of the Northern States intended to render it of noneffect, and with so much success," etc. (See address of the Soutliern Congressmen.) So spoke the gen- tleman in tlie days of his Southernism. What has changed his tone? "Why at that time the fugitive slave bill was not passed." But a slave bill had then been passed under which a hundred negroes have been reclaimed for one that has been reclaimed under the late bill. What have we gained by this bill? The gentleman's complaint was of hostile enactments. Have they lieen repealed? The complaint was that those enactments rendered the Constitution inoperative; can a statute disarm them of a power which overcame the Constitution? Those infamous enactments all stand unre- pealed ; and nine hundred ami forty abolition clubs are still working out, with a more terrific enginery, their infernal schemes. Every one knows tluit a Southern man 54 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: cannot go into the North fur the purpose of recovering his slave without encounter- ing resistance, from hostile legislation, from otticers of the law, and from mobs of both colors. The efficacy of the late bill has been tried in a few cases, and those who went, under its panoply, to recover their property, were insulted, prosecuted, imiiris- oned, and subjected to every kind of pecuniary loss. You hear of no claims made un- der it in these days, and I doubt whether you will ever hear of another in Massachu- setts, (ir ten mure in all the free States put together. The old law, according to Mr. Webster, was less favorable to the fugitive tlian the present one. Under its operation we did save a few slaves, and it was never resisted by an armed mob in open court. Claims under both have ceased as worthless. The gentleman, who was so rampant at the disrespect shown to the first, is so well satisfied witli the last that he is willing to be kicked out of California, abandon 36: 30, and carve out of Texas a very resi>ectable State for the free-soilers, simply for the pure gratification which it afibids him. Un- der its comforting securities, he visits the North, partakes of her festivities, speaks of course— and what did he say? Did lie brand them to their fiices as recivants, lost to honor until tliey should blot out from their statute books their unconstitutional laws? No; but he glorified the Union. But let us look seriously at the gentleman's explanation. It is this : that all of these objections were to the admission of Calilbrnia as a sepaniie measure, and that he was always willing that she should come in under a general scheme of compromise. Now, fellow-citizens, he said that that admission of California was the Wilmot Proviso in another form— nay, worse than the Wilmot Proviso. I put the question to you, and I wish you to think well upon it, could any scheme of compromise justify your Sena- tor in fastening the Wilmot Proviso upon you? How, then, can such a scheme justi- fy him in fastening upon you a measure worse than that proviso? Unfortunately for tlie gentleman, the only time that he spoke of the admission of Califciniia as part of a compromise scheme he specified what that compromise sliould be. Here is his language: "If all other questions connected with the subject of slav- ery can be satisfactorily adjusted, I see no objection to admitting all California above the line of 30:30 into the Union, provided another new slave State can be laid off within the present limits of Texas, so as to keep up the present equiponderance be- tween the slave and the free States of the Union ; and provided, further, that all this is done by way of compromise, and in order to save the Union— as dear to me as to any man living." Here the gentleman lays down that general scheme of compromise which alone would reconcile him to the admission of California— namely, that her southern boundary should be 36: 30, and that another slave State should be admitted with 36: 30 as her boundary, and tliis to be considered only as an extreme concession, made in order to save the Union. In passing it will not be improper to show what different and opposite reasons the gentleman gives for his conduct at different times. While he acted with the Southern party he gave as a reason for not offering this scheme of compromise that the aggres- sive spirit of the North determined him to offer no more compromises. But when he left his old Southern associates, so anxious is he to throw odium upon them that he relieves the North of all the blame of his withholding the plan just mentioned, and throws it upon Mr. Calhoun and the Southern Senators. Here the notes stop abruptly. It is to be regretted that they are so meager, and deal almost exclusively with the more personal portions of the speech; for this debate with Mr. Foote is understood to have been the foundation of Mr. Lamar's subsequent political advancement. It was the flood which led on to fame, albeit not to fortune. His success HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SI'EECUKS. 55 was considered phenomenal. The college students, especially, were wild witli excitement and pride, and bore liim away from the hustings upon their shoulders. Judge C. P. Smith, then upon the bench of the High Court of Errors and Appeals, was present, and he enthusiastically re- lated in Jackson, to auditors somewhat incredulous, the powers of the young orator who had appeared in Lafayette County. It is a striking and curious thing to find Mr. Lamar in tliis debate pressing Mr. Foote about his disregard of the legislative instructions. The latter was then in the zejiithof his fame and power in Mississippi; the former, at his dawning. It is believed to be the only time they ever met in joint discussion. It was at the crisis of Mr. Foote's career. Thirty years later the same question, as shall be seen, confronted Mr. Lamar in the very crisis of his fate and in the fullness of his political career— of which, however, in its proper place. CHAPTER V. Religious Impressions — Hon. Jacob Thompson — Prof. Albert T. Bledsoe^Retm-n to Covington, Ga.— In the Georgia Legislature — Moves to Macon, Ga. — Candidate for Congress from Third District— Returns to Mississippi — "Solitude" — Practices Law — C. H. Jlott — James L. Autrey — Congrefsman or Professor? ALTHOUGH Mr. Lamar was busy about the duties of his professor- ship and his law practice, and although he made occasional excur- sions into the field of polities, those toijics did not engross his attention. At this period his thoughts hovered much over the subject of religion. The impressions on that subject received at Emory College continued. His correspondence with his sister, Mrs. AViggins, dealt with them; and in it he expressed the most orthodox views, declaring himself to be " a firm and unwavering believer in the truths of the Bible." She, how- ever, admonished him that to be such a believer his opinions must in- fluence his conduct and govern his life. Dr. John N. Waddel, then a professor in the university (afterwards Chancellor), in his "Academic Memorials," says: I remember a casual conversation I held with him during his first years in Oxford, in which, as we spoke of his future, he remarked that he would not be surprised if he should end his life work in the ministry of the Methodist Church. My reply was: "No, sir; you will surely pass your life in the world of polities." My own impression is that Mr. Lamar had from his earlier manhood kept steadily in view the career of statesmanship. He had not united himself with any church, bait had it in serious contemplation. This life continued for two years. In the summer of 1852 he re- signed his connection with the university and returned to Covington, Ga., in order to engage in the practice of law in partnership with Mr. Eobert G. Harpei-, the man of whom he said in the address at Emory College in 1870, quoted in a previous chapter: "To whom my own soul was knit as was David to Jonathan." Mr. Harper had been corre- sponding with Prof. Lamar with a view to this partnership for more than a year; and his letters bear the strongest evidence of intense per- sonal devotion to Mr. Lamar, of high aspirations in his j^rofession, and of an inflexible determination to achieve its best possibilities. Two things which have not yet been touched on shoidd be noted in connection with Mr. Lamar's stay at the University of Mississipi^i. It was there and then that he met the Hon. Jacob Thompson, for whom he entertained always the highest regard, and whose kindness to him- self and encouraging attentions he ever held in grateful remembrance. (56) LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 57 Mr. Thompson was then a member of Congress, and also a tiustee of the university. Years afterwards, on the occasion of Mr. Thompson's death, Mr. Lamar wrote to a niece a letter of sympathy, saying, among other things: He was one of the few men whose presence in this world invested my own life with much of its own interest. I first met him in 1849. I was tlien a youtli only twenty-four years of age, while he was near the zenith of his high honors and intel- lectual jiowers. I huJ then, as I am now anare, many faults of high temper and im- patient aspirations; but he was on all occasions kind, considerate, and sympathetic to me, when on some he might well have been austere and reserved. My first nomina- tion to Congress was due largely to llr. Thompson's influence, openly exertetl in my behalf against very distinguished ami powerful men in the district. From that time to the day of his death our friendship, jicri^onal and political, has been unbroken. The second fact to be observed, as remarked above, was the effect of Mr. Lamar's association for two years with Dr. Albert T. Bledsoe, his professor in chief. The relations between the two men were most cor- dial. The Doctor was gifted with a massive and vigorous intellect, trained to the most acute and logical processes of reasoning. He was not a mathematician merely, but a philosopher also, and was deeply learned in both political and theological science. In after years he was fond of saying that he "taught Lucius how to think." It is remem- bered that on one occasion after Mr. Lamar went into the Senate this remark was repeated to him. He smiled a little, pondered awhile, and then remarked: " Well, there is a good deal in it." His bearing and comment were such as to indicate that while he thought the Doctor's claim rather too sweeping, yet he acknowledged a debt to him for great service in mental training. He certaiidy held the Doctor in the highest esteem during the remainder of his life. Mr. Lamar prospered in Covington. In the autumn of 18-53, notwith- standing the facts that he was a Democrat and that in Newton County the Whigs were in an immense majority, he was elected to the Legisla- ture. He had not been in the House more than a mouth before he came to the front as a leader. During the session there were so many motions to suspend the rules to take up business out of its order that a resolution was adopted requiring a two-thirds vote to suspend the rules. In a day or two thereafter a resolution was ofl'ered to suspend the rules to bring on some important election, probably that of a Senator, and fixing a day for it. The Democrats, havinsr a majority, would be able to elect their candidate. The Whig3 opposed the motion to suspend the rules, and Mr. Thomas Hardeman, the member from Bibb, led in the opposition. He made a speech against it, and on a vote being taken, the Democrats, only having some twelve or fifteen majority, fiiiled to carry it by a two-thirds vote, upon which there was consternation on the Democratic side aiid rejoicim: on the Whig side. The Democrats felt that they were caught in the trap, and many were the anxious faces on the part of the majority. The next day, on a motion to reconsider, Mr. Lamar made his first speech. He was then 58 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR: young, not more than twenty-seven, with a handsome face, a full head of dark hair, brilliant eyes, in figure ratlier below the medium height, handsomely dressed, with fine, musical voice. He at once attracted the attention of the House. In a short speech of not more than thirty miimtes he captured the whole assembly. I remem- ber how he scathed the motives of those who would thus seek to defeat an election that under the law and constitution had been devolved upon the General Assembly. Such an excitement as was produced by his speech I never saw in that body. "When he finished no one sought to reply. A vote was taken, and a laige majority reconsidered the action of the House of the preceding day, and the resolution passed with almost a unanimous vote. His speech was a remarkable exhibition of the power of the orator and logician, and his appeal to his opponents to step manfnlly and patriotically forward to dis- charge their duty was so overwhelming that all party spirit was subdued, even in the breast of the most bitter partisan, and none even ventured a reply.* lu the summer of 1854, the health of Mr. Harper having failed, and de- siring a larger field, Mr. Lamar moved to the town of Macon, offering there for ;islature, to discharge the duties of local magistracy or to take his place in the national councils. The solution of the enigma of the so-called slave power may be sought here. Its basis lay in that cool, vigorous judgment and unerring sense applicable to the onli- nary affeirs and intercourse of men which the Southern mode of life engendered and fostered. The habits of industry, firmness of purpose, fidelity to dependents, self- reliance, and the sentiment of justice in all the various relations of life which were necessary to the management of a well-ordered plantation fitted men to guide Legis- latures and command armies. But the duties of the plantation did not cliiefly engage Mr. Lamar's attention or enlist his interest. Those eighteen months were mainly devoted to study. There was a small oiEce, remote from the house and withdrawn from the noises and little daily excitements of the family, in which he passed most of his time at work with his books of law, poli- tics, and philosophy — in the summer, under a mosquito bar spread like a tent in the middle of tlie room. He used to say that the hardest and most profitable study of his life was done at "Solitude." It was at this time, also, and while he lived at "Solitude," that he formed a partnership for the practice of law with Christopher H. Mott and James L. Autrey. The firm of Lamar, Mott & Autrey kept their of- fice in Holly Springs, and it endured until dissolved by the Civil War, albeit each member of the firm was occasionally absent for long periods on other piirsuits. Here we must pause to consider the lives and characters of tlie two gentlemen with whom Mr. Lamar came into so intimate a relation. Of the two, his favorite and more intimate friend was Mr. Mott — a man to whose memory he was devoted during the whole of his after life. We have seen that he declared that his attachment in his earlier manhood, and in Georgia, to Hon. Eobert G. Harper was that of David to Jona- than. In Mr. Mott we find the friend of a later period for whom his love was of equal strength and from whose admiration and support he derived as great benefit and drew as much of encouragement in his mo. ments of despondency. Christopher Haynes Mott was born in Livingston County, Ky., on the '22d of June, 1826. At a very early age he was brouglit by his i)ar- ents to Mississipxii, where they settled in the beautiful and polished lit- tle city of Holly Springs. His early education was received at St. Thomas' Hall, a school founded by the celebrated Episcopalian divine, Dr. Francis L. Hawkes; and he completed his studies at the Ti-ansyl- vania University, in Lexington, Ky. He studied law under the gifted Roger Barton. Hardly had he been called to the bar when the Mexican war broke out. Burning with tlie martial ardor of a born soldier, he entered service as a lieutenant in the Marshall Guards, a company of 62 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: the celebrated First Mississippi Regiment, then commanded by CoL Jeflfersou Davis. At the battles of Monterey and Buena Vista he won distinction for general good conduct and for gallantry. The war over, he returned to the practice of law; was sent by the county to the State Legislature; later was elevated to the position of Probate Judge. While occui>ying tliis position he was appointed by the United States Govern- ment oil a special xuission to California to inquire into certain alleged abuses in the service in that region, which duty he discharged in the most thorough, intelligent, and satisfactory maimer. When the Civil War began he was among the earliest in the Held. The Secession Convention made him a brigadier general of the army of the State, but he resigned that post in order to accept employment in the regular army, when he was made Colonel of the Nineteenth Mississippi Eegi- ment, raised by his own exertions, and the first Mississippi regiment organized for service during the whole period of the war. Col. Mott was a man after Mr. Lamar's own heart; a faithful and dil- igent lawyer, an upright and sympathetic judge, a gallant and intrepid soldier, a chivalric and generous gentleman; mc)dest but hrm, charita- ble, tender of heart yet quick to perceive a slight and prumpt to punish an injury, a friend to love and a foe to fear; through all his eventful and sparkling life there yet ran a vein of sadness, the result of a tem- perament somewhat melancholy acting upon a l)ody not wholly strong. Besides the attraction of their mutual sympathies there was another tie between the two men: that of friendship and love existing between their wives, inherited from a former generation of Longstreets and Govans. James L. Autrey was born in 1830, it is thought in Jackson, Tenn. His father was one of the immortal band of heroes who ofi'ered their lives at the Alamo in the cause of Texan independence. His widowed mother removed to Holly Springs, and there he was educated at St. Thomas' Hall. In early youth he gave promise of superior talents, unusual readiness in repartee, and a sparkling wit, wliieli made him a most interesting child. He soon manifested both taste and capacity for politics. At the age of twenty-two he was sent to the State Legis- lature, and served in that body continuously for a number of terms. In the session of 1858-59 he was elected Speaker of the House, and was notable as the youngest man ever honored with that laosition. He was a Democrat of the strictest and a politician of the best type. He was ambitious, but generous and true — in every respect a noble man. Upon the outbreak of the war he also was among the first to throw himself into the front, and was soon elevated to the rank of lieutenant colonel. Mott and Autrey both sealed with their blood their devotion to the cause which they espoused. The former fell at Williamsburg, the lat- ter at Murfreesboro; and the sign of Lamar, Mott & Autrey, torn from HIS LIFE, TIMES, AXD SPEECHES. 63 its fastenings in the peaceful interior village by invading hosts, was afterwards picked up in the Mississippi River, a derelict on its way to the gulf. But this is both a digression and an anticipation. We shall retura to Mr. Lamar at " Solitude." Judge Lougstreet, who, it may be remembered, had resigned the presidency of the State University in 1856, was living in the village of Abbeville, only two miles away. This agreeable life was ended in the latter part of the year 1857 by the election of the Judge to the presi- dency of the South Carolina College, and by the election of Mr. Lamar to Congress. Lafayette County was in the First Congressional District, which at that time embraced the northern tiftii of the State. On the 3d of March, 1857, the term of the Hon. Uauie) B. Wright, the representa- tive in Congress for that district, expired, and of course it became nec- essary to elect his successor. On the lOth of that month a communi- cation appeared in the Mcntphis Appeal, then the most i)opular and influential newspaper taken in that section of the country, proposing Mr. Lamar as the Democratic candidatt- for Congress. He himself Jiad in some way obtained information that such a communication had been sent to the paper, and wrote to the editor to withhold it from publica- tion, since it might place him in an uniileasant attitude toward other aspirants. To that letter the editor, Mr. B. F. Dill, replied that he was one day too late; that the communication could do him no harm, and that Mr. Lamar could command his services. Throughout the whole of his public career this paper was Mr. Lamar's stanch and unfalter- ing friend. Another movement was in progress at the same time in respect to Mr. Lamar. In May he was approached through William F. Stearns, Esq., the Professor of Law, anent his acceptance of the chair of Metaphysics in the university. Prof. Stearns wrote, presenting strongly the desira- ble features of the proposed arrangement, its offering a comfortable support, its adaptation to his own cast of mind and habit of thought, the anxiety of the Faculty to include him amongst their number, and urging that he, "without question, would be happier here than at the bar." This proposition was seriously entertained, and would doubtless have been finally accepted but for the action of the congressional nom- inating convention. CHAPTER VI. The Kansas-Nebraska Bill— Tlie Straggle for Kansas— The Nicaragua Affair- Elected to Congress from First District— Corre>^pon(lence on Questions of the Day — First Speech in Congress — Eozell Letter — Tlie Keitt-Grow Fight— The Vallandigham- Campbell Contest — A Professorship Contemplated — Dr. Barnard's Letter — Speech at Jackson on Douglas — Eulogy on Harris — Speech on the Tariff. WE have now reached that period in the life of Mr. Lamar when he entered the arena of national politics as an actor in its conflicts, its defeats, aud its victories. The stage of jsreparatiou is past; that of vigorous work begins. He commenced his public career at a most in- teresting and dramatic era — when the struggle over slavery was drawing to its crisis; when the rising of a new political supremacy was kindling the horizon into a lurid dawn which foreboded a terrible tempest. The intense opposition of Mr. Lamar and of those with whom he was in sympathy to the comj^romise measures of 1850 has been narrated in a previous chapter; but the appeals to the people by the elections of 1851 showed that a majority of the Southern jjeople favored those meas- ures, and settled that question. Acquiescence in the compromise, and in its fulfillment, became the settled political jjolicy. So entirely was this true that, in their national conventions of 1852, both the Whigs and the Democrats expressly indorsed the compromise and pledged them- selves to maintain it. Notwithstanding this, however, great opposition was manifested North to the practical enforcement of the new fugitive slave law, which was one of its featui'es; and the Southern people com- plained bitterly that its oiJeratiou was defeated, aud the law itself in effect nullified. At the session of Congress of 1843^4 a bill was introduced for the organization of Nebraska Territory. The Committee on Territories, of which Mr. Douglas, of Illinois, was chairman, reported favorably. The bill provided that " the said Territory, or any portion of the same, shall be received into the Union -with or withoiit slavery, as their constitution may prescribe at the time of their admission," which terms were cojjied literally from the Utah and New Mexican liills of 1850. The commit- tee's report referred to the compromise measures of 1850, and justified that provision by those measures. It said that In the judgment of your committee those measures were intended to have a far more comprehensive and enduring effect than the mere adjustment of tlie difficulties arising out of the recent acquisition of Mexican territory. They were designed to es- tablish certain great principles which would not only furnish adequate remedies for existifig evils, hut, in all time to come, avoid the perils of a similar agitation by with- (64) LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 65 drawiiigthequestionof slavery from the halls of Congress and the political arena, and committing it to the arbitrament of those who were immediately interested in it, and alone responsible for its consequences. Here again arose a great, ami bitter controversy. The opponents of the bill declared that the compromise of 1850 had no relation to any territory except that acquired from Mexico, and that the effort to extend it to the Louisiana purchase was a violation of the Missouri Compro- mise, and was a broach of faith on the part of the proslavery party; while the supporters of the measure declared that the compromise of 1850 was intended to cover all controversies, merged all previous disputes, and had itself already repealed the restrictive provisions of the jMissouri Compromise by necessary implication. The bill passed. The test vote in the Senate showed, by States, twenty-one for it, seven against it, and three divided. Amongst those States voting yea were New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Iowa, Delaware, and Califor- nia. The divided votes were those of Connecticut, Tennessee, and Tex- as. But passed as the bill was, and although not on a sectional vote, it aroused an immense opposition; and again hot blood and hot words be- came the order of the day. Before the bill was passed it was so amended as to provide for the or- ganization of Kansas Territory also, thereby becoming designated as the "Kansas-Nebraska bill." So soon as it became a law a strenuous struggle began between some of the advocates of slavery extension and some of its opponents for the possession of the Territory, whereby its status as a free or a slave Territory should be determined according to the provisions of the organizing act. There was a rush across the border from Missouri of proslavery settlers, and a few weeks later, under the auspices of emigrant aid societies in Massachusetts, of antislavery set- tlers from New England. Then ensued a great turmoil, which was finally pushed to the extreme of midnight butchery and civil war. Each side charged the other with beginning the career of violence; each charged the other with fraudulent voting at the first general election. A census taken in February, 1855, showed 1,070 registered voters from Southern States, 1,018 from the North, and 217 from other countries; but at the election in March over six thousand votes were cast, the ex- cessive poll being caused, to a considerable extent at least, by a large fraudulent vote from Missouri. The proslavery party carried the day and organized the first territorial government, the Legislature consist- ing of twenty-eight proslavery and eleven antislavery members. This Legislature was recognized by the Federal Government, and entered upon its work. It adopted a strong slavery code. The antislavery peo- ple in Kansas, however, repudiated the territorial government, and carried their opposition to it to the very verge of war against it as such. They denounced it as an illegal, usurping, and bogus concern; they im- 5 66 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: ported supplies of Sharpe's rifles and organized companies, avowing their determination, if need be, to put down the lawful government by force; they held conveutions, by one of which a general couveutiou was called to meet at Topeka in October, 1855, for the purpose of forming a State constitution and applying for admission into the Union. The delegates to this general convention received in the aggregate 2,710 votes, but the supporters of the territorial government looked upon the whole proceed- ing as a farce, and did not vote. The Topeka convention, so called, adopt- ed an antislavery constitution, with a feature excluding negroes from the State; and this constitution was ratified by a vote of 1,731 to -16 — the sup- Ijorters of the territorial government again refusing to take any part. A State government was elected, consisting of a Governor and other officers, and members of the Legislature; but this government, while approaching the very extreme of a revolutionary one, stopped short of actual interference with the territorial government recognized by the Federal administration. The Topeka Constitution was presented to Congress, where it formed the subject of heated discussions, but neither it nor the government formed under it was recognized. The j)roslavery government, formed as it was according to law, maintained the control. Civil war raged. Large companies of armed men were introduced into the Territory by both sides, by far the larger part coming from the North. A reign of terror was established. The presidential election of 1856, resulting in the choice of Mr. Buchanan, led to a change of Federal policy in regard to Kausan affairs. In May, 1857, Piobert J. Walker, a prominent statesman from Missis- sippi (a Pennsylvanian by birth), was appointed Governor of the Terri- tory, and it seems was authorized to make some concessidus to the anti- slavery party. Meanwhile the territorial Legislature had, in turn, called a constitutional convention; and a census, preliminary to the election therefor, was taken. It was a very defective census, for which fact the antislavery party, as is now admitted even by its ajaologists, was partly responsible. The election passed off quietly, less than one-fourth of the registered voters taking ])art in it. The antislavery party permitted it to go by default, not appearing at the polls. Meanwhile Gov. Walker made certain speeches, in which be spoke of the climate of Kansas and its want of adaptation to slave labor; also he declared that if the coming constitutional convention should decline to submit the proposed new constitution to the people for ratification he would oppose its acceptance by Congress, and expressed confidence that the President would do likewise. These speeches were deeply resented in the South: first, and mainly, because they were regarded as a viola- tion of the principle of nonintervention by the Federal Government ; and secondly, and more particularly in Mississippi, because they came from Mr. Walker, whose politi<'al lionors had been derived from that State, II IS LIFE, TIMES, AXIJ SPEECHES. 67 the political interests and rights of which — iu commou with those of her sister Houtheru States — he was charged with thereby betraying. The constitutional convention met at Lecompton; and iu Movember, 1857, adopted a constitution which provided for the establishment of slavery. The convention determined not to submit it to a popular vote for ratification as a whole, but to submit only the article on slavery — ballots might be cast for "constitution with slavery," or "coustitution without slavery." This submission was made on the 21st of December, resulting in an almost unanimous vote for the "constitution with slav- ery " — the antislavery people again staying away from the polls. Meanwhile, in the elections of October, the antislavery party had cap- tured the Legislature; aud this Legislature, assembling at Lecompton on December 7, ordered a further and unreserved submission of the constitution to the people on the 4th of January, 1858, providing for a ballot " against the constitution formed at Lecompton." At this election over ten thousand adverse votes were cast, with less than two hundred favorable. On the 8th of December, 1857, the President submitted by liis an- nual message the Kansas affairs to the attention of Congress; and on the 2d of February following, by a special message, he transmitted the Lecompton constitution to that body, recommending that Kansas be speedily admitted to the Union, although the instrument had not Ijeen fully submitted to the people, aud declaring the antislavery party to be iu rebellion against the government. The debate upon these messages was. immensely protracted (it fills more than nine hundred pages of the Congressional Globe), and resulted in a reference of the constitution back to the people, where it was ultimately rejected. It is not uncom- mon for writers on these excitiug subjects to denounce the eftbrt to pass the Lecompton constitution as a monstrous fraud, or in similar terms; but there are certain considerations which may cause a dispassionate reader to take a more moderate view. Prof. Spring, whose sympathies are all against the instrument, yet makes this admission: For tlic constitution tliere was a single tenable line of defense : that it was the work of a legitimate convention which had observed all indispensable formalities. The constitution dates back to the lirst territorial Legislature which submitted to the people the question of calling a constitutional convention. Fifteen months afterwards —an ample period for mature consideration— they respond favorably at the iiolls. After a lapse of three months the question reaches the second territorial Legislature, which "bows to the will of the people and provides for the election of delegates." Then between the legislative sanction and the election of delegates four months inter- vene. Before the delegates meet and enter upon their duties a further delay of three months occurs. Thev submit a single but vital article of the constitution to the peo- ple for acceptance or rejection December 21, and they ratify it almost unanimoasly. * Nor is that all. What opposition there w as to the coustitution was *Kans,i,s (American Coniiiinnw eiimisl, p. 23». 68 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: not expressed at the polls, the only forum iu our system for the deter- mination of such questions. Persistently, systematically, and with arms in hands, the antislavery people had refused to recognize the legal gov- ernment, had set up an illegal organization in ox^positiou, bai-ely stop- ping short of revolution, and had refused to vote. Could such recusan- cy be wisely or lawfully taken to overweigh the will of the people as ex- pressed through the ballot cast? To ask the question is to answer it. Still again: the constitution was in fact submitted on the only point of serious controversy, which was the question of slavery; and had it not been submitted on any point whatever, the step would have been no novelty in American constitution making.* Finally, had the constitution as presented not in fact truly represented the wislies of the people, it could at any time have been altered by the people, and in very short order. Such a thing as a constitution unalter- able is unknown to our system. During this contest a serious breach occurred within the ranks of the Democratic party. The Kansas-Nebraska bill declared it to be the "true intent and meaning" of the act "not to legislate slavery into any Territory or State, nor to exclude it therefrom, but to leave the peojjle thereof perfectly free to form and regulate their domestic institutions in their own way, subject only to the Coustitution of the United States." This declaration that "the people thereof" should be "perfectly free to form and regulate their domestic institutions in their own way " con- tained an ambiguity which jjroved fatal to the iinity of the party. In *. Jameson, in his book " The Constitntiouai Couvention," enumerates one hundred and eigliteen conventions, and says : " Of these, seventy-eiglit have submitted the fruit of their labors to the peo- ple, and forty liave not." Jameson's work, however, is not reliable on this point. Amonsst the seventy-eight submissions enumerated by him are the following: Ohio, 1803; Missouri, 1820; Missis- sippi, 1S17; Mississippi, 1832; Tennessee, 1"%; Alabama, 1810; Arkansas, 1836; Illinois, 1818; Indiana, 1816; Kentucky, 1792; Louisiana, 1812. During the discussion of these questions, apropos of the Kan- sas constitution, newspapers of that day asserted that none of those constitutions had Ijeen referred to tlie people. It is quite certain that the following were not: Missouri. 1S20; Mississippi, 1817; Missis- sippi, 1832; Alabama, 1819; Keutuokr, 1792. And Poore, in the coniiiilation of "Constitutions and Chiirters " (a government publication), says that those of Oliio, 1S02, and Tennessee, 1791!, were not. On the other hand, Poore is not reliable on that point, eitlier; for he says that the Mlssissi]ipi con- stitutions of 1817 and 1832 were so referred, while it is certain that they were not. Poore and Jameson contradict e.ach other in sever.al jjiirticulars.— In denouncing the Southern constitutions of 1865 with a view to a justification of the reconstruction laws of Congress adopted in 1867 Mr. Blaine, in liis work " Twenty Tears of Congress" (Vol. II., p. 87), says: They diil not even stop to submit these ch;ingcs to the popular vote, but assumed tor their own assemblage of oligarclis tlie full power to motlify the organic laws of their States — an assumption irifhon/ precedcuf and icillioiU repetition in the Jiisfort/ of State co-nstititfioiif; in tliis ennntri/. antf utterly anbeersive of the fnnfla- mental idea of repuliliean tiovernment." In Ibis dogmatical statement Mr. P.laine .'■hows himself to be uninformed about the history of American constitutions. Not oidy had many of the States been admitted into the Union, prior to 1865, on constitutions not submitted, but also " the power to modify the oi-ganic laws " without reference to the people had been exercised in several instances —without considering the ten "secession " constitutions of 1861— in South C'arolin.a, 1777 and 1790: in Penn.sylvania, 1789; in Delaware, 1792 and IS31; in Georgia,1795 and 1798; in Kentucky, 1799: in New York, 18(11; in Mississippi, 1832— one of these instances being in Mr. Blaine's native State.^In Mis- sissijipi, in fact, there have been six constitutions and revisions; those of 1817, 1832, 1.861, 186.'.. 1.869, an'l ISito. Only one of them Avas ever sulnnirted to the people for ratification, which was tliatof 1869, the Reconstruction Constitution dictated by Congress, ami the submission of which was a mocUerv. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 69 connection with it Mr. Douglas, who was the loailer of the Northern Democrats, and whose course theretofore in connection with the shivery controversy had placed him high in the good graces of the Southern wing of that party, enunciated his doctrine of "squatter sovereignty," whicli was, in effect, that such persons as should live in a territory could, by their territorial Legislature, and before organization as a State, regulate the question of slavery ; and, if they saw proper, exclude it altogether. But this the Southern ])arty denied. They held that the right of any citizen to carry his slave property into the territories of the United States was secured to him by the Federal Constitution; that even Congress could not deny that right; that the territorial Legisla- tures were only instrumentalities or agents of Congress for the provi- sional government of the Territories; and that, since an agent's power cannot exceed that of the principal, tiie territorial Legislature might not do what Congress could not— in short, that not until the territory was clothed with the sovereignty of a State could any citizen's right to hold slave property within its limits be denied. This difference of view caused Mr. Douglas and tlK)se whom he led to refuse to cooperate with the remainder of the party in their effort to admit Kansas at once into the Union on the Lecompton Constitution; and because of that refusal, although the Democrats were in the majority in both Houses, that effort failed. By many of the Southern Democrats this course of Mr. Douglas was regarded as a betrayal of the party in the interest of his presidential aspirations, and he was denounced as worse than a " black Eepublican." It all led to the rupture of 18G0 in the party, and the consequent election of Mr. Lincoln. Another, and a different, episode needs attenticm here. In the year 1855, one William Walker, a Tennesseean, recently resident in California, left that State at the head of a band of adventurers for Nicaragua, which he entered in the character of ally to one of the factions habitu- ally disputing the mastery of that country. So long as he acted under color of the authority of the chiefs of the faction which he supported he was generally successful. He captured the city of Grenada, which was deemed the stronghold of the adverse faction, and then assumed the title of General. Later he took upon himself the title of President of Nicaragua (or was chosen to that office, as he claimed), and pro- mulgated a decree reestablishing slavery in that country. He aroused the jealousy of the natives and weakened himself by various impru- dences. Yet he maintained an unequal contest for about two years, suc- cumbing at last to a coalition of the Central American States, and sur- rendering at Rivas. He returned to this country (or, as he claimed, was broiTght thither against his will), and immediately commenced at New Orleans the fitting out of a new military expedition to Nicaragua. 70 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: He was arrested and compelled to give bond to desist from unlawful enterprises; but he very soon left New Orleans ou a steamboat freighted with armed men and military stores, ostensibly for Mobile, but in fact for Nicaragua, where he and his followers lauded at Puuta Arenas on November 25, 1857. Here Commodore Paulding, of our navy, com- Ijelled him to surrender with some of his followers, bringing him to New York as a prisoner. The President, by a special message to Con- gress, January 7, 1858, condemned Walker's expedition, but also con- demned the Commodore for violating the sovereignty of a foreign coun- try in assuming to make any arrests within it, and declined to hold Walker as a prisoner.* This message produced a discussion in Con- gress, this expedition and others like it being viewed with great dislike in the North as of proslavery tendency. We are now prepared to resume the consideration of the attitude of Mr. Lamar toward these stirring questions. Of course his candidacy for Congress was not free from opposition within the party. The objection most strongly urged against him was his connection by marriage with Hon. Howell Cobb, a memlier of Mr. Buchanan's cabinet, who was known to have great influence with the President. It was remembered that this gentleman, as Speaker of the House, had advocated and had materially assisted in the adoption of the comjjromise measures of 1850; and that, when assailed at home because of his course, he had afterwards canvassed the State of Georgia as a candidate for Governor on the Union ticket, and had been trium- phantly elected. Resenting the course of Gov. Walker in Kansas, as the State Plights party did, and understanding that the President was committed to support him in that course, there was an attitude of growing hostility to the administration, albeit a Democratic administra- tion. It was thought, or at all events urged, that the kinship of Mr. Lamar to Secretary Cobb, and their long friendship, would bring the former under the influence of the latter to such an extent as to impair bis efi'ectiveness as the champion of tlie party. But this objection, and all others, failed to defeat the movement in Mr. Lamar's favor. In the month of June, 1857, there was a meeting in Oxford of Democratic citizens of Lafayette County, at which Mr. Lamar was present. He submitted resolutions condemnatory of Gov. Walker's course, and made a strong speech in their support. The res- olutions were adopted, and Mr. Lamar was nominated for the Lower House of the State Legislature. The Democratic congressional nominating convention met in Holly Springs early in July. Before that body were placed the names of Mr. * The "American Conflict; " Greeley, V^ol. I., p. 270. Files of Weekly Mismsippian lor .Tannary, 1S58. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 71 Clapp, of Marshall; Mr. Cushman, of Lafayette; aiul Mr. Jackson, of Tippah. This brought about a deadlock. All candidates were filially dropped, and Mr. Wright, of Tijjpah, and Mr. Lamar were placed before the convention. After the sixtieth ballot of the meeting Mr. Lamar was nominated by acclamation. The fact that the convention met in Holly Springs was fortunate for him. Long afterwards (in 1879) he said in a speech made there: The first political speech I ever made which attracted general public attention in Mississippi I made here. Near twenty years ago I was nominated as a candidate for Congress by a convention assembled here, and I attribute that result largely to the manifestation of local attachment by the peo|)le here. What I said upon that occa- sion has long finee passed from my memory, but the kindness and sui)]iort which I then received and have ever since received from you I nevei' can forjiet. I know that public professions are easily made and are counted cheap, but iis circumstances have prevented me from addressing you of late years you must permit me to depart froui my usual reserve and to say tliat there is no community in Mississippi or in the country to vvliich I am more attached than to this. I not only esteem and respect it for the intelligence, refinement, and puljlic spirit of its citizens; for the enteiprise of its business men; for the devoted piety and eloquence of its ministers of the gospel-; for the ability and honor of its bar, which I consider second to none in the State — but I also love this community for many personal reasons. Your city is in my affec- tions consecrated by thron^'iuir memories, in which joys and sorrows are strangely interminijled. Some of the best and most cherished friendshijis of my mature man- hood were formed here. I have in some way conceived the idea that I am better un- derstood and more generously regarded here tlian anywhere else. I hope it is not vanity in me to feel and say this, for it has been and will ever be a consolation to me in many a dark hour of depression and gloom. Upon Mr. Lamar's nomination he immediately made arrangements for a thorough canvass of the district. It was announced that Col. James L. Alcorn, of Coahoma County, would enter the lists as the can- didate of the opposition, composed of AVhigs and Know-nothings, and arrangements were made for a joint canvass. This canvass excited very general interest throughout the State. Mr. Thomas Walton, writing from Jackson under date of September 25, said to him: Xow that I have got at it I must write you what I have heard at Jackson. I only heard what convinced me that you have much to do to sustain your reputation. Every man was asking about you, every man remarking that Mr. Alcorn, it was ^aid, would be most egregiously disapi5oint( d if he expected an easy passage through this campaign, for that you were going to prove a more unmanageable character than any other he could have found in the State. However, they do not set you against Mr. Alcorn. They all talk of what you are going to do for the credit of the State when you reach Washington. I tell you what, my friend, you have, in plantation parlance, a hard mw to weed. As German Le«ter said to me last evening, you have more rep- utation than any other man in the State, considering that you have never been here and that it is all built on hearsay. The following extract is from a letter written to Mr. Lamar by his brother Tliompson, of date August 17, and will help to illustrate the temper and views of the Southern people at this time: 72 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR: I am afraid that if you are elected this time you will not be able to hold your seat — that is, if Jell' writes that which is correct. He says that you will probably assuuje an attitude of hostility to the administration on account of Gov. Walker's position. I shall be sorry if it proves to be the ease. Opposition to tlie administiation will nec- essarily drive you into a sectional party. The Northern Demociats will sustain it and will act with those at the Soiitli who do. You will be defeated whenever you have a national Democrat for a competitor. Although I disapprove of INIr. Walker's threats, I must say that I think the convention ought, under the circumstances, to submit the constitution it may foi'm to a vote of ratification. Whom tlie administra- tion tliinks should be entitled to vote on the adoption of the constitution will apjiear from the inclosed slip, cut from the Wusiiington Union. No fair man, I think, should object to the views there set forth. It is idle to say that IMr. Walker can eifect any- thing either for or against the establishment of slavery in Kansas. That question was settled against us long before Mr. Walker went to that Territory — not by the action of any government official, but by the immense influx of Northern immi- grants. All reliable accounts agree in stating that the jiroslavery jiarty aie vastly in the minority in Kansas. I would prefer that her people .should at once adopt a free- .state constitution, rather than that the free-soilers should stand aloof and perndt a constitution recognizing slavery to be formed and then in a few years almlish it. I consider it a foregone conclusion that a vast majority in Kansas are against us, and can settle the matter when they choose to act in conformitj' to law. !My confidence in the Northern Democracy and Mr. Buchanan continues unaliated. The entire unanimity with which the former have approved and defended the decision of the Sui>reme Court in the Dred Scott case, with their avowals of willingness to admit other slave States into the Union, seems to me sufficient to satisfy the most exacting. There is one view of tiie case which alone would prevent me from denouncing IMr. Buchanan for not removing Walker. Tlie latter proposed that all the inhabitants of Kansas should vote upon the adoption of the constitution under which they are to be governed. I myself think the convention should provide for that, since not more than a third of the voters are represented by delegates. But Walker goes farther: he threatens a rejection by Congress of the application for admission as a State, and his own individual opposition if his views are not adopted. The latter I consider his offense. Not the course he dictates, but the dictation. Now, if he were removed from office, it would be almost impossil>le to get the Northern mind to perceive the distinction. Tiie opponents of Democracy would urge, with a good deal of plausibil- ity, that Mr. Walker was removed for advocating the claims of each and all of tlie citizens of Kansas to take part in forming the government under whicli they were to live, for endeavoring to carry out in good faith the jirinciple of the Kansas-Nebraska bill. Their denunciation of the South for a breach of faith in this case would liave a far greater effect than when hurled at her for violating the Missouri Compromise. My convictions are fixed and unwavering that if Mr. Walker be removed and Kansas be admitted as a slave State, without submitting the constitution to a vote of the people, in 1801 a black Republican President and Congress will be installed in office. For the foregoing reasons I can see cause why the President can retain Walker in office without being a " traitor to the South." But enough of politics. Mr. Lamar was elected, and rejiaired to Washington about the 1st of December, 1857, to take liis seat iu the Thirty-fifth Congress. On his arrival he found, of course, that the Nicaragnan expedition and the Kansas question were creating great excitement and discussion. Hav- ing been admitted to his seat, he made his first sjieech in Congress ou HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 73 the 13tli of January, 1858. la it lie dealt with both of the questious of the day, aud the speech is yiveii iu full in the "Appeudix" as No. 1. It will be observed that he touched but lightly ou the Nicaraguau ques- tion. Iu his opinion it seems to have been of small importance. Mr. Lamar's speech was most enthusiastically received, both in the Congress and at tlie South. It gave him at once prominence in the House, and secured even from those opposed to him a recognition for eloquence, " impetuous, scholarly, aud defiant." It gave him great pres- tige in Mississippi. About this time Mr. B. S. Eozell, a jirominent citizen of his district, addressed to Mr. Lamar a letter in which, amongst other things, he urged the necessity for taking immediate action for the protection of Southern interests in case the Congress should refuse to accept the Le- compton constitution. The following is Mr. Lamar's reply: Washington, D. C, March 8, 1858. My Dear Sir: Your letter of the 20th ult. came duly to haiul. It sets forth in an exceedingly able manner views which every trne Southern man should be jiroud to entertain. With regard to my own course I can readily make it clear to you, as I would have done to all the voters of your locality could I have had an opportunity of addressing them last autumn. I have never been one of those who run ahead of the issue, who create evils in or- der that they may destroy them. I have preferred always a peaceable s^ettlement of political questions. But I hold to the old motto: " In peace prepare for war." I can see too plainly the clouds that are hanging over us. I can hear and interpret too well the niutterings of an approaching storm. I have measured the extent of that danger which we must, sooner or later, look resistently in the face. I l)elieve with you, and with w^hat I trust will soon be the unanimous South, that the refusal of Congress to admit any Territory into this Union merely because tliat Territory should present a proslavery constitution would be at once and forever an ab- rogation of political equality. Should that time come, I may deprecate, but would not prevent, the fearful consequences. Dissolution cannot take place quietly ; the vast and complicated machinery of this government cannot be divided without general tumult and, it inav be, ruin. When the sun of the Union sets it will go down in blood. Should we not, tlien, have our camp prepared, our leaders chosen, our ranks marshaled, and our sentinels at their posts ? If I act with caution in this matter, it is because I am in earnest. If I am slow in deliberation, it is because I shall be rapid in action. I believe and hope, however, that we will pass the Lecompton constitution. The administration is acting in good faith; and, unless the Southern Know-nothings in Congress should take the responsibility of deserting their section, we may be able to avert the threatened evil for the i)resent. To tlie ambition of New England we may trace the rise of this whole abolition move- ment. She was the great manufacturing agent of the country ; she saw in the South the great producing agent. She sought to reverse the law of nature, and make produce the slave of manufactures. In the " alien and sedition laws," and the spirit of the Hartford Convention, we see the first declaration of inequality between jiersons and classes. From this position the step was easy to an ineciuality between communities and States. 74 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: Should the Soutli ever submit to one invasion of her rights, the white line might be distinctly drawn iironnd her, and a servile government constituted to rule, not protect, her. Such was the dream of Puritanism — New England the nation, the other States her colonies. What has she left undone in pursuance of this scheme? She has scattered gold like %vater. Her abolitionists have gone into the churches, creating feuds and schisms in the hearts of pious men, and upon the altar of the most high God they have poured forth their blasphemies against the South. They have laid their filthy hands upon poetry and romance, and their literature comes to us teenung with insult and infec- tion. Is it not time to whip into submission these wolves that have banded together for the destruction of nobler things? The Keitt-Grow fight, which caused a great deal of comment and some ill feeling, occurred at this session, on the uight of February 5-6, about one o'clock. The House of Eepresentatives was in a furious struggle as to whether the President's message on the Lecompton constitution should be re- ferred to the Democratic Committee on Territories or to a select commit- tee of fifteen. It was an all-night session. Congressmen lay asleep on sofas while a few prolonged the debate. Sometime before two o'clock in the morning Mr. Grow, a Rei)ublican member from Pennsylvania, whom Mr. Cox characterizes as "saucy in bravado toward his oppo- nents" * had gone over to the desk of Mr. Cox, on tlie Democratic side. While there, Mr. Quitman, of Mississippi, requested permission nf the House to make some explanation. Mr. Grow objected. This angered Mr. Keitt, of South Carolina, whom also Mr. Cox describes as addicted to " swaggering bravado," and he asked Mr. Grow why he didn't go over to his own side of the house if he wanted to object. Of what fol- lowed a cofrespoudent of the New Orleans Fkaijune gave this rather amusing account: Mr. (irow replied that it was a free hall, and that he would object from any point in it which he pleased. The parties exchanged angry words— Keitt calling Grow a black Republican puppy, and the latter retorting that he would not allow any nigger driver to crack whips around his ears. This is the substance of the phrases as related by parlies who were near. Mr. Keitt caught Grow by the throat, Init they were separated by Mr. Reuben Davis, of Jlississippi, who had followed Keitt for the purpose of restraining him and keeping the peace. Immediately afterwards, however, he broke loose and again seized Mr. Grow, when the latter (as he himself says) struck him a severe blow, which felled him to the floor. Mr. Keitt denied tliat he fell from the effects of a blow, but asserts that he stumbled. By this time quite a number ot gentlemen (among whom were Barks- dale of Mississippi, Craig of North Carolina, and others) rushed forward, some probably for the purpose of getting a better sight of " the ring," and others to sejiarate the contestants. This all occurred on the Democratic side of the chamber; but when the Republicans saw so many rushing toward Cirow they thought he was to be badly hanilled, ami quick as thought starteil en masse for the scene of conflict. Potter, of Wisconsin, a stout fellow with a fist like an ox, was foremost, and bounded into the * " Three Decades of Federal Legislation," S. S. Cox, pp. Ti-76. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 75 fray like a maddened tiger. Just then Barksdale had hold of Grow, with a view of leading liim out of the vicUe. Potter, mistaking his purpose, planted a " sockdola- ger " between Barksdale's eyes, which only had the ell'ect of rousing hiH grit. Looking around, the first man he saw was Elihu Washburne, of Illinois. .Supposing it was he who struck him, Barksdale si'rani; gallantly at him, and tliey exchangi'd a handsome little match in less than no time. Potter meantime was striking right and left at Barksdale or anybody else. Cadwalader Washburn al.so aime to the rescue of his brother and attacked Barksdale, who defended himself with coolness, vigor, and skilly saving his face from bruise or scratch. It was a jolly row, and no bones broken. The Speaker cried in vain for order. The Sergeantat Arms made arrests, but the fight was over, and the choler exploded in a broad guffaw in a very short time as soon as the ludicrous jioints in the affair presented themselves. It was evident that noltody, unless Keitt, intended to fight in the begin- ning ; but even Lamar, of Mississippi, and Parson Owen Lovejoy had a little set-to in the course of the passing gust. [" They probably fought for ten minutes," says another cor- respondent, " neither gaining any particular advantage, and both getting pretty well pounded."] Bocock, of Virginia, was threatened with a knockdown by Montgomery, of Pennsylvania, whom he proposed to restrain from tixking part in the row. .John Covode seized a gigantic spittoon of stoneware with which to brain somebody, but fortunately happened to see no one at the instant who seemed to deserve braining, and so a homicide was doubtless avoided. McQueen, of South Carolina, was some- where in the ring, for he looked not a little troubled when the affair was over; and Barksdale — than whom no man had a bigger or better share of the fun — came out right side up, but with his wig wrong side front. It was ]ileasant to witness the good nature of all parties after the fight was over. Nobody was hurt much, and they liail nothing to do but apologize. Gentlemen who got acquainted for the first time in the midst of the "sliindy " shook hands over the mutual assurance that they went into the fight only to prevent a fight, and in half an hour the house was quieter than ever. Mr. Cox, however, seems to have regarded this " shindy " with a more serious eye than did the correspondent of the Picayune. He says of it: The passions of the time are incarnate in that Congress and at that hour. See the fierce clutch and glaring eye, and the struggle between those heady champions ! Now, after nearly thiee decades, the author sees trooping down the aisle of memory, as then there came trooping down the aisle of the house, the belligerent members, with Wash- burne, of Illinois, and Potter, of Wisconsin, leading the one extreme, and Barksdale and Lamar, of Mississippi, leading the other; then comes the tni'Ue—ihn struggle, the pale face of the Speaker calling to order, the Sergeant at Arms rushing into the area before the clerk's desk, with the mace as his symbol of authority. Its silver eagle moves up and down on the wave of passion and conflict. Then fheie is a dead hush of tlie hot heart, an.l the glare of defiance across tlie hall ! As this scene is revivified, looking at it through the red storm of the war, there is epitomized all that has made that war bloody and desperate. The reader who shall remember thnt this scene is an almost exact re- production of a similar occurrence in the British House of Commons only two or three years ago may comfort himself with the hope that, after all, the passions which brought it about were not so violent or im- placable as they seemed to Mr. Cox, and that the P/c« //««('' .^designation of it as a " shindy " was nearer to the truth. It must not be imagined that because Mr. Lamar took part in this combat he was one of the bullies of the House, or was so regarded. 76 LVCIVS Q. a LAMAR: It may be noted that the correspondent says "even Lamar" had a set-to. The suggestion of that expression is carried out by a notice iu the North. Aiiicricaii, of Philadelphia, of date January 25, 1893, in which Mr. Lamar's humor and bearing as a member of Congress at that period were described: As a member of the House prior to the Civil War lie won considerable notice as a conservative Southern man, eloquent in debate, and a power when fully aroused. But his indolence gave him the appearance of sluggishness to a casual looker-on. He was not sluggish, however. He was always on the alert and fully cognizant of the stirring scenes almost daily enacted in the House. Much of the wrangling disgusted him as puerile and without object. He was a peacemaker oftener than a peacebreaker. As jealous of the rights and claims of the South as other and more boisterous members, his methods were free from much that rendered the more fiery representatives of the oligarchy ofiensive both as respected manners and language. Mr. Lamar took a prominent part in the Vallandigham-Campbell con- test over the seat in the House as member from the Third District of Ohio. The question turned mainly upon the recejition of negro votes. Mr. Vallandigham unseated Mr. Campbell after a long contest. Mr. La- mar was a member of the Committee on Elections, and strongly ad- vocated the claim of the contestant. His speech, made May 22, was a very effective one; but being upon questions local and now wholly ob- solete and almost pirrely legal in character, it is not given. He wrote to his wife that " the papers from Ohio come loaded with complimen- tary notices of my speech." Mr. Lamar was not particularly pleased with life in Washington. Under date of May 4, he writes his mother-in-law, Mrs. Longstreet: Washington is now a most beautiful place, and the Capitol Hill is the most splen- did and picturesque scene my eye ever rested upon. But I am ready and willing to leave the city forever. The center of all my enjoyments is the home wherein are my wife and children, and I have no wish to wander out from that home in pursuit of any pleasures that the world picsents. To his wife, at the same time, he wi-ote: I have not yet made up my wind what to do aliout running a second time. Your pa's views will have great weight with me, but he is mistaken about the importance of men of talent here from the South. They can do liut little good for their section in Congress. So deeply was he impressed with the ideas expressed in those ex- tracts that he was in active correspondence with the authorities of the University of Mississippi for appointment to the chair of Mental and Moral Philosophy. He had obtained indorsements from Mr. Cos, Hon. Jacob Thompson, Senator A. G. Brown, and others, all of which were of the most flattering nature. The movement, however, was energetically protested against by many influential friends, on the ground that his i/W LIFE, TIMES, AXD SPEECHES. 77 work was more importaul iu the tiold of politics. The followiug extract from a letter from Dr. ¥. A. P. Baruanl, theu Chaucellor of the uni- versity, shows the liue of argument used ou this point, as well as other matter of interest: Univebsity of MississU'pi, March 25, 1858. My Dear Friend: Your letter of the 15th, received yesterday, atl'orded ine iin- mingled gratification. I had been led, by outgivings of your friends, to lielieve that you would not persevere in your clioice to leave the more conspicuous position in winch j'ou are placed for our dull oljscurity ; and while I felt that the change of your jirevi- ously understood purpose would be, to myself personally, a severe misfortune, and to the University of Mississippi no slight calamity, yet I could not find it in my con- science to disapprove the determination to which, as I understood the matter, you were likely to come. I have said to you before, and I say to you again, that I believe the country has need of such men as you in precisely such positions as that which you hold, and those to which, in the course of time, I should expect to see you ad- vanced. In saying this I do not mean to allude to any sectional questions between the North aneaceably. A circular had been issued, recommending the book; and that circular had been signed by sixty-five members of the Congress, amongst others by Mr. Slierman. His nomination for the speakership was, therefore, a firebrand thrown into the House. On the 6th of December Mr. Sliermnn made a speech to the effect that, although liis name was signed to the circular, he did not remember (80)' LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 81 tliat he had signed it; that bo certainly iiad never read the hook; that be did not iuteud to come in coullict with auy rights of JSoutberu citi- zens, etc. Many speeches were made; amongst them one by Mr. Lamar, on the 7th, which was delivered on the impulse of the moment and without any preparation, but also " with electrical effect." * Especial attention is called to that portion of his speech in which he speaks of his attitude toward the ([uestion of secession, saying: "for one, I am no disunionist per se. I am devoted to the constitution of this Union, and as long as this republic is a great tolerant rejiublic, throwing its loving arms around both sections of the country, I, for one, will bestow every talent which God has given me for its promotion and its glory." It was at this time, too, that he wrote to Dr. Barnard thus: The sectional war rages with unabated violence. No one started out with more of honest indignation than I felt. But I begin to hope that there exists a mutual misunder- standing between the two sections, brought about by ultra party leaders and deluded fanatics. I think I can see, through all the rancor and madness of this struggle, the slow evolution of right principles. What is now the greatest need is some one man, one true man, who will present tlie whole controversy in its true light — who, rising above the passions and prejudices of the times, will speak to lioth sections in a spirit at once tolerant, just, generous, humane, and national. No one has sliown himself to be that man yet. I think 1 know one (a friend of yours and mine) who might do it. I think he has clear perceptions of his duty, high and noble sentiment, and a heart big with pure and holy afl'ection for his whole country; but his love for repose, shrinking from the uproar and confusion of party strife, will, I fear, cause him to be, what he has always been, wanting in the energy and courage to execute what his reason designs, his conscience approves, or his duty dictates. On the 21st of February, 1860, the House being in committee of the whole on the state of the Union, and having under consideration the President's annual message, Mr. Lamar delivered his reply to Mr. Fer- ry, of Connecticut, who had spoken on the never-ending subject of Southern slavery.f Mr. Lamar's speech treated slavery per se, in its divine and sociological aspects; Southern slavery specifically, from the legal, social, and humanitarian points of view; and the Southern planter and Southern nonslaveholders as men and as classes. It was warmly received at the South, and greatly added to his reputation and popular- ity in that region; nor did it go without a flattering and apparently ap- preciative recognition in the North. Under date of March 1.5 he writes to Judge Longstreet, then Presi- dent of South Carolina College, thus: My jiosition here is a far higher one tlian I ever expected to attain. The praises which I receive are so extravagant that 1 sometimes fear it is flattery. The President has sent for me two or three times to consult with me upon his message which he contemplates sending in. He told me not to mention it, as there are men who would resent his not consulting with them. *See Appenilix, Xo. 3. t^i'c Apiniilix. No. 4. 82 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR. I do assure you, though, that iiour opinion of my speech, and your gratification at nay success, is the ricliest and dearest reward of my public life. You never have known how dceijly your approval of anything I do sinks into my heart and sweetens my life. 1 have hardly a hope or a fear that does not connect itself with you. No son ever loved a father more, and no one (except your wife) ever lo\ed, honored, and tried to obey you more faithfully. We have uow reached that fateful ijeriod when the passions which had been gathering and intensifying for so long a time disrupted all previous affiliations — when, especially, the Democratic jjarty, which fur sixty years had borne on the nation to a height of prosperity and gloi-y not dreamed of by its founders, was rent in twain, and, through its ruin, the nation was hurled into the incarnadine sea of a civil war. Tlie Democratic convention assembled in Charleston, S. C, on the 23d of April, 1860, for the purpose of nominating the party candidates for the Presidency and Vice Presidency. It was the first occasion on which the Northern and the Southern wings of the party had met in con- vention since the celebrated "defection" of Mr. Douglas on the Kansas controversy. No great political sagacity was needed to see that the convention, notwithstanding that many Southern Democrats still be- lieved in Mr. Douglas as a stanch party man, would be divided into two great f Motions: those who favored the presidential candidacy of Mr. Douglas, and those who opposed it. Accordingly, upon the oi'ganization of that body a resolution was introduced for the purpose of declaring the most important item, or " plank," of the proposed platform, relating to slavery in the Territories. It was as follows: That the government of a Territory organized by an act of Congress is provisional and temporary ; and during its existence all citizens of the United States have an equal right to settle w-ith all their property in the Territory without their rights, either of person or property, being destroyed or impaired by Congressional or territo- rial le(jis!alio'ii. The only particular in which this resolution substantially diifered from the platfom of 18-56 consisted in the introduction of the conclud- ing words, "or territorial legislation." The object of this addition was manifestly to exclude the " squatter sovereignty " doctrine of Mr. Doug- las, and to conform the platform expressly to the views of those who held that only sovereign States could prohibit the introduction of slaves within their limits. Of course an eager and rancorous contest followed. The resolution was rejected; whereupon quite a number of the dele- gates withdrew from the convention, and, after organizing themselves into a separate body, called another convention to meet at Richmond, Va., on the second Monday of June. The remaining delegates of the Charleston Convention then, withoirt transacting any further business, adjourned to meet again on the 18th of June, in the city of Baltimore, requesting the several States to supply the vacancies caused by the withdrawal of their delegates. ins LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 83 It may readily be imagined that these proceedings caused a great ex- citement in all the Htates. Throughout those States, ijarticularly, whose delegates iiad withdrawn, in whole or in part, tliere was agitation for meetings of the " National Old Line Democrats," favorable to the contin- uance of the "Union Democracy," in order to send delegates to the Baltimore Convention. In Mississippi, immediately after the ru^jture, Mr. Davis (who was regarded as a Presidential possibility) and others issued an Address to the Public, advising that the bolting delegates return to the Baltimore Convention. Mr. Lamar was a member of the Charleston Convention, and made a speech there, which was commonly pronounced one of the ])est of the occasion. Although more conservative in his views than the extremists, he still withdrew with them. The following letter, written to C. H. Mott, Esq. (his partner), under the date of May 29, 1860, will cast a light upon his own motives and position, and on the general situation as he then regarded it : You will have seen ere this that I signed with Jeff Davis the address which advises the return of the dele-ates to Baltimori'. Davis had signed it, and 1 was determined that his name should not go unsupported by any of the delegation. It was in obedi- ence to his wish that I went to Charleston. He wrote to Barry,* telling him that I was fully possessed of his views. He did not wish the Southern delegates to secede on the platform, because he knew that we could achieve a more solid and enduring triumph by remaining in and delealing Douglas. I urged his views to the delegates, and insisted that if they could get a living, i)ractical representative of our principle it would be better than to go out upon a mere verbal symbol. But there was no hold- ing back such men as Gen. Clark, Thompson, Mathews, and .Judge Gholson. They forced Alab:una to stand to their instructions, and then stood by her. Their position (whatever may have been the policy of it) is certainly based upon high grounds, and was prompted by the purest devotion to the rights of the South. It deserves the indorsement and approval of the people of IMississiijpi. I have hnked my future with it, for weal or for woe. I do not know that their course was not even the best jjolicy. To divide the South is a most deplorable result just at this time, but the Northern men give us no other alternative. That Northern wing is rife with the elements of bitter sectionalism ; and if we yield to their mandate, all is lost. If the South would only unite, she could secure all her rights; but there is so little of unity— so much of discord, jealousies, and distrust- between the most patriotic of our men, that I am opiiressed with emotions of the profoundest and most hopeless sadness. I endured, in beholding it,s exhibition at Charleston (and that, too, in the face of a compact and hostile sectional organization), a mental torture that allowed me no relief exceiit the thought that it could not be otherwise. O, will the nolile spirits of the South become ever a band of brothers, before the chain of the oppressors unites them? Mr. Lamar, notwithstanding the tone of his letter to Mott, was not, apparently, without serious misgivings as to the policy of the action of the Southern delegates at the Charleston Convention. The following *Hon WilUani S. Barry, a member of tlie convention, formerly a memlier of Congress and Spealjevof the House in the Mississippi Legi-slature, afterwards President of the Secession Con- vention, etc. 84 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: extract is fi'om a letter of Mr. Justice John A. Campbell, of date June 12, iu reply to a letter of Mr. Lamar's ou this subject : I received your penitential letter of the 7th inst. yesterday. If I had the powers of a Turkish cadi, I should condemn all the Southern actors in that scene to wear veils for four years. Their faces should not be seen among Democrats. I am not sure but what my sentence would comprise certain bastinadoes for all those fi-om whom some- thing better should have come. In that case, you and your friends. Cable and Jack- son, would have cariied sore feet for a Ions time. The convention which had been called to meet in Richmond was post- poned, and appointed to meet iu Baltimore at the same time with the retjular organization. Ujjon the assembling of the two conventions, an- other withdrawal took place from the regular organization, led by Mr. Caleb Gushing and Mr. Benjamin F. Butler, of Massachusetts ; and these members joined the new organization. The rupture of the party was complete. Each convention made its noiniuatious-^one declaring for Mr. Douglas, and the other for John C. Breckinridge, of Kentucky. It would seem a singular coincidence that the candidate of the new con- vention should be taken from the great State whose motto was: " United we stand, divided we fall." Did any think of it, and read in it a warning? While all this was going on Mr. Lamar was preparing to abandon practical politics altogether. It has been shown that he had always a longing for the quiet of a domestic life, and that he deemed the times unfavorable for any good results to the South by continuing in Congress. So it was that when the trustees of the LTniversity of Mississippi, in the latter part of June, offered him the chair of Ethics and Metaphysics, he accepted it. The election was announced in the Oxford lutelUijcncer in these terms : Hon. L. Q. C. Lamar, of this county, who takes the chair of Ethics and Metaphys- ics, is too well and widely and favorably known, abroad as well as at home, to ju-tify us in pronouncing upon him the eulogium he deserves. It is agreed on all hands that he possesses a peculiar fitness for his chair. . . . Prof. Lamar will serve out Ids full term as a member of Congress, but this will involve his absence from the university only for the period of three months during the next session. The Vickshurcj Whig, the leading opposition paper in the State, said editorially : We see it stated that Col. Lamar intends resigning his seat in Congress, to accept a position in the University of Mississipiii. We sincerely trust that this report is not true. ... In our judgment Mr. Lamar is the ablest man in either branch of Congress from this State, and far ahead of the generality of Congressmen from the Southwest. There is hardly a question of governmental policy on which we do not ditt'er materially with liim ; but, if his side is to have the Congressmen, we at least feel a sort of state pride that such a man as Tj. Q. C. Lamar is made the recipient of tlie honors of his party. But, although "Prof." Lamar had decided to retire to the academic shades, it was not his intention to abandon the ship during the gale. He took an active part in the Presidential campaign, speaking with great eifect at numerous places. Col. Young, of Waverly, one of the HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 85 typical Southern gentlemen of the old school, who embodied all of their charms without any of the blemishes sometimes found in them, wrote to Judge Longstreet October 26 : We luive just had the largest mass meeting in Columbus ever known in this State. Davis spoke in the forenoon. Pettus was to follow in the afternoon, but the country- people were so importunate for Lamar that he was forced up immediately after din- ner. . . . The universal opinion wa.s that it was the most statesmanlike speech which had been heard. Pettus spoke at night; then Barksdale, of Jackson. And yet, when so late, the cry burst forth for Lamar; and for one hour and thirty minutes he transported his audi- ence, and covered himself all over with glory. The Bell men followed and serenaded him. His appeal to them subdued all hearts, and made patriots of partisans. . . . Saturday we take him to Aberdeen, to speak there. They sent up for him to go to Mobile. . . . Lamar is carried away with Columbus, where he was feasted and lionized not a little. CHAPTER VIII. Election of Lincoln— Conference of Congressmen— Speech at Brandon— Legislature of 1800— Resigns Seat in Congress— Liddell Letter — Member of Secession Con- vention—Passage of Ordinance — Lamar's Views on Secession — Blaine on Lamar and Secession. THE election of Mr. Lincoln brought the South face to face with a most tremeutlous question. For the first time in the history of the nation the executive and the legislative branches of the government (with the consequent ijower to organize the judiciary) had both fallen into the hands of a party established on a sectional issue, sustained by a purely sectional vote, and inflexibly bent on the enforcement of a sec- tionally hostile policy. What was to be done about it— submission and union, or resistance and disunion? That was the question. The world knows the fateful decision. Tliat decision, however, was by no means unanimous. When the sound of marching squadrons came from the North all sprang to arms with a unanimity and ardor never surpassed, and rarely equaled, and proved themselves "confederate" to the heart's core; but in the ante- cedent deliberations there were many minds. Some were for immediate and unconditional secession, others for secession upon conditions, oth- ers for union still ; and yet others were lost in a wilderness of doubts and fears. On the 13th of November, 1860, Mr. Lamar wrote to Judge Long- street : The election of Lincoln has diffused a general feeling of dissatisfaction throughout the State. Some are anxious and dejectei.l ( myself among them), others confident and hopeful of resistance, a large mass for awaiting the overt act, a few bad men rejoiced at the overthrow of tlie Democracy by any means, and ready to hang and quai-ter the secessionists. If South Carolina will only have the courage to go out, all will be well. AVe will have a Southern Republic, or an amended Federal Constitution that will place our in- stitutions beyond all attack in the future. Immediately upon the ascertainment of the result of the election, Gov. Pettus, by proclamation, called upon the Legislature to meet at Jackson, on tiie 26th of November, to consider what steps should be taken to meet the emergency; and on the 12th he issued an invitation to the members of Congress from this State, including the Senators, to convene at the same place, on the 22d, in order to take counsel among themselves and with the State Government on the same subject, and es- pecially with regard to the matter of his message to the Legislature. This meeting was held accordingly, all being present except Mr. McKae. (8(5) MISSISSIPPI SENATORS AND CONGRESSMEN AT THE TIME OF SECESSION LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 87 There was an auimated and protracted discussion over the questions, iu substance: Sliould Mississippi, "as soon as her convention can meet, pass an ordinance o£ secession, tlius placing herself by the side of South Carolina, regardless of the action of other States? or shall she endeavor to hold South Carolina in check, and delay action herself, until other States can get ready, through their conventions, to unite with them ; and then, on a given day, and at a given hour, by concert of action, all the States willing to do so secede in a body? " Upon one side it was argued that South Carolina could not be induced to delay ac- tion a single moment beyond the meeting of her convention, and that our fate should be hers, and to delay action would be to have lier crushed by tlie Federal Government; whereas by the earliest action possible we might be able to avert this calamity. On the other side it was contended that delay might bring tlie Federal Government to consider the emergency of the case, and perhaps a compromise could be effected; but if not, then the proposed concert of action would at least give dignity to tlie move- ment, and present an undivided Southern front.* These questions weve raised by a resolution offered by Congressman Keuben Davis, to the effect that " the Governor insert in his message to the Legislature a recommendation that they call a convention for the purpose of seceding the State of Mississippi by separate State action." A vote was taken upon the resolution under consideration, Singleton, Barlcsdale, and R., Davis voting for, and Jefl' Davis, Brown, and Lamar against it. Gov. Pettus gave the casting vote in favor of tlie resolution, and it was adojjted, the vote being made unanimous. I thought then, as I believe now, that the only point of difference was one of expediency, not of principle. I am sure that so far as principles were concerned we were all fully united. . . . After the adoption of the resolution above referred to, Gov. Pettus read to the committee a telegram which lie liad received the day before from the Governor of South Carolina, asking his advice whether the South Carolina ordinance of secession should be made to take eft'ect instantly, or ujion the 4th of March. A resolution was then introduced Viy R. Davis, to the effect that Gov. Pettus should advise the Governor of South Carolina to cause the ordinance to take eSect from and after its passage. This resolution was oppoi^ed by Jelf Davis, Brown, and Lamar, and supported by Singleton, Barksiiale, and R. Davis, Gov. Pettus again giving the casting vote in favor of the resolution ; in accordance with which a reply was next day sent to the Governor of South Carolina.f On the next day after this meeting Mr. Lamar delivered a public ad- dress, in the town of Brandon, which is thus reported in the newspapers of the day : • His speech was an earnest, dispassionate appeal to the people of the South to arouse from their lethargy, and arm for resisting Black Republican domination. He jiictured in vivid colors the aggressions of the North upon the South since the enactraentof the Compromise measures of 18.50. Those measures were adopted by both sections as a final settlement of the slavery question, each agreeing that they would be carried out in good faith. Yet we to-day see upon the statute books of fourteen Northern States enactments nullifying the Futritive Slave Law, which law was the only advantage or concession that the South gained in the Compromise measures. *0. K. SinRletoa, in Davis' " Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government," Vol. t., p. 58. + Reuben Davis, in the Weekly Clarion^ June 5, 1878. 88 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: He was unwilling to enter into any more comi^romises, or accept guaranties from a i)eople who had so flagrantly violated former agreements of that kind. After giving at length the design of the Black Republican party, through Mr. Lin- coln, upon the institution of slavery, he declared that secession was the only remedy now left for the Southern jieople to save tliemselves from a doom similar to that of the former white people of San Domingo. He submitted a plan by which the people of the Southern States, or so many of them as maj' choose to do so, might secede from the Union in a few days' time, and resume all the functions of government. The plan was, in sul>tance, for the people of the South to meet together in convention, at their several State capitals, and appnint commissioners to another convention of all these States ; that convention to pass ordi- nances, declaring the State absolved from all further allegiance to the Government of the United States of North America; adojit the old constitution, without the crossing of a i or the dotting of an i; adopt the present Federal laws; elect new Electors, to choose a President and Vice President ; and, in short, to readopt fc )r the United States South all the laws, rules, and regulations now prevailing for the United States. This could all be done in a very few days, and there would be no anarchy, no bloodshed, or anything extraordinary to disturb the peace and quiet of the people. The Legislature assembled on the 2Gth, as called ; and to that body Gov. Pettus addressed au annual message, from which the following extract is taken : Can the lives, liberty, and property of the people of Mississippi be safely intrusted to the keeping of that sectional majority which must hereafter administer the Federal Government? I think tliey cannot, for the following reasons: They iiave exhibited a low selfishness in seizing all the Territories, which are the common property of all the States. They have deliberately attempted to, and have succeeded in educating a generaticjn to hate the South. They have sworn to support the Federal constitution, and deliberately passed laws with the palpable intent to vi- olate one of the plainest provisions of that comi:iact. They have sent large sums of money to Congress, for the purpose of bribing the members of that body to pass laws to advance their private interests. They have attempted to degrade us in the estima- tion of other nations, by denouncing us as barbarians, pirates, and robbers— unfit as- sociates for Christian or civilized men. They have excited our slaves to insurrection, advised them to liurn our property and murder our people, and have furnished them with arms and ammunition to aid them in their bloody work. They have nnirdered Southern men in the lawful pursuit of their fugitive slaves, and failed to punish their citizens for these flagrant violations of the laws of God and man. They have furnished money and arms for the invasion of a slaveholding State, and when the punishment awarded to treason and murder by all civilized nations overtook the invaders, they threatened the dastardly revenge of midnight incendiaries, tolled bells in honor of traitors and murderers, and rewarded the family of the chief traitor as never was re- warded that of any soldier who fell in defense of the country, and held him up as an example of heroic devotion to a just and glorious cause. Their press, pulpit, lecture room, and forum teem daily and nightly with exhortations to their people to jiress forward this war on our institutions, even to the drenching of Southern fields with the blood of her citizens. In view of all this long catalogue of insults and injuries, in view of the fact that this hostile section must continue to increase in power, I feel that I am warranted in saying that the Northern jieople have forfeited the confidence of the people of Mississippi; and that the lives, liberty, and property of ourselves — and our children after us — ought not to be intrusted to rulers elected by such a people. ms LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 89 To this message the LegisLiture responded by calling a convention, to meet on the 7th of January following, and by a resolution " that seces- sion by the aggrieved States, for their grievances, is the remedy." When the Thirty-sixth Congress convened in its second session, on the 3d of December, Mr. Lamar was present, as were all of the members from Mississippi, including the Senators. Early in the session meas- ures were proposed, looking to a compromise and settlement of the dif- ferences between the parties; but they were delayed, and it became manifest to the Southern members that nothing would come of them. Mr. Lamar resigned his seat, and left Washington on the 12th of De- cember, for the purpose of canvassing the State for the coming Seces- sion Convention. On the day preceding he wrote to Judge Longstreet: We are living in eventful times, and the only pleasure I have among the tremen- dous responsibilities upon me is tlie thouiiht of those I love. ... I send you a letter of mine by to-day's mail. You will doubtless deem it too subdued in tone. What I know will happen in the next yeai- has taken all the " highfaluting" out of me. God bless you, my darling old father. The letter alluded to in the foregoing epistle was that of date Decem- ber 10, addressed to Hon. P. F. Liddell, of Carrollton, Miss.* This let- ter will be found to give a full exposition of Mr. Lamar's views as to the proper steps needed most certainly and most easily to form the South- ern Eepublic. Of it the Vickshnrg Whhj, the leading paper of that par- ty in the State, said: " Mr. Lamar advances a plan for the formation of a Southern Confederacy. It is the first which has yet been promulgated having the least spark of ]H-acticability about it." Before leaving Washington he witnessed a scene in the Senate cham- ber which made the profoundest impression upon him. In after years he often described it in his speeches before the people. It seemed to recur in various and frequent connections, like the haunting of a vivid dream. It is given below, in his own words, as depicted in his speech of Jan- ury 24, 1878, in the United States Senate: I remember hearing on this floor the then distinguished Senator from New York (Mr. Seward) declare that the power had departed from the South ; that the scepter was now taken from her hand; and that henceforth the great North, stronger in pop- ulation and in the roll of sovereign States, would grasp the power of government and become responsible for its administration. I am aware that I listened to him with impatience, and, perhaps, with prejudice. For it seemed to me that he spoke in a spirit of exultation that scarcely realized the magnitude of the task about to devolve upon him and his associates. It struck me that he spoke in a spirit far removed from that sadness and solemnity which I think always weighs upon the mind and heart of a trulv great man in the presence of a grave crisis of national life. I rememljer the answer that was made to him by a South Carolina Senator, Gov. Hammond. . . . He was surrounded by a circle of Southern statesmen whom no fu- ture generation will see surpassed in ability or purity, be the glory of our growth, as I "See Appendix, No. 5. 90 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: triis^t it will be, unrivaled in the history of nations. There was James M. Mason, the square and ma-ssive simplicity of whose character and purity stands monumental in our annals. There was his accomplished colleague, Robert M. T. Hunter, whose clear and broad statesmanship found fitting expression in a scholarly eloquence that drew friends and opponents into the same circle of admiring affection. There was Slidell, with his shrewd and practical wisdom ; and near him J. P. Benjamin, whose astute- ness anerrait me, I will here repeat: " Sir, wdiat the Senatorsays is true. The power has passed from our hands into yours; but do not forget it, it cannot be forgotten, it ia written upon the brightest page of history, that we, the slaveholders of the South, took our country in her infancy, and, after ruling her for near si.xty out of the seventy years of her existence, we return her to you without a spot upon her honor, matchless in her splendor, incalculable in her power, the pride and admiration of the world. Time will show what you will do with her, but no time can dim our glory or diminish your responsibility.'' Mr. Lamar, on his return to Mississippi, was elected as oue of the two delegates from Lafayettf County to the convention. Before that body convened it was well known that the efforts making at Washing- ton in the way of a compromise and adjustment of the differences be- tween the sections were futile. On the 17th of December, Mr. Keuben Davis, one of ilr. Lamar's colleagues in the House, who had been placed as the representative of Mississippi upon the House Committee of Thirty-three, on grievances and the state of the country, wrote to Mr. Lamar: I withdrew to-day from the Committee of Thirty-three. The Northern members, with H. Winter Davis, by vote forced upon us the consideration of a modification of the fugitive slave law, with the statement that they would hereafter let us know whether they woidd grant any concessions. All the members from the North, pretty much, have said in speeches that they had fought the recent battle upon the principle that property could not exist in a slave — nonexteiision of slavery, no admission of, another slave State, etc. — and tliat they would not surrender the principle. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 91 Ou the 31st of December tbe Senate Committee of Thirteen, ou the same matters, reported, that they could arrive at no satisfactory conclu- sion. The Mississippi Convention met at Jackson ou the 7tii uf Jauuarj', 1861, in accordance with the act of tbe Legislature. It was composed of two parties: the unconditional secessionists, who numbered two- thirds of the V)ody; and the coOperatiouists, or those who favored seces- sion only upon condition that the Southern border States should coop- erate in the movement. Hon. William S. Barry, of Lowndes County, was elected Pre.sident. Immediately after the organization Mr. Lamar offered a resolution, which was passed, that a committee of fifteen be appointed by the Presi- dent to prepare and report, as speedily as possible, an ordinance for the withdrawal of the State from the Federal Union, with a view to the es- tablishment of a new Confederacy, to be composed of the seceding States. The committee was accordingly appointed, and consisted of the mover as Chairman, and fourteen others. On the 9th Mi\ Lamar, for the committee, reported the ordinance, which had been drafted by himself, and was as follows: An ordinance to dissolve tlie union between the State of Mississippi and other States united witli Iier under the compact entitled "The Constitution of the United States of America." The jieople of Mississippi, in convention assembled, do ordain and declare, and it is hereby ordained and declared, as fellows, to wit: Sectiiin 1. That all the law's and ordinances by which the said State of Mississippi became a member of the Federal Union of the United States of America be, and the same are hereby, lepealed, and that all obligations on the part of said State, or the people thereof, be withdrawn, and that the said State doth hereby resume all the rights, functions, and powers which, by any of said laws and ordinances, were con- veyed to tlie Government of the said United States, and is absolved from all the obli- gations, restraints, and duties incnrred to the said Federal Union, and shall hence- forth be a free, sovereign, and imlependent State. Sec. 2. That so much of the first section of the Seventh Article of the Constitntion of this State as requires members of the Legislature and all officers, both legislative and judicial, to take an oath to sujiport the Constitution of the United States be, and the same is hereby abrogated and annulled. Sect. 3. That all rights accjuired and vested under the Constitution of the United States, or under any act of Congress pa-ssed in pursuance thereof, or under any law of this State, and not incompatible with this ordinance, shall remain in force and have the same efl'ect as if the ordinance liad not been passed. Sec. 4. That the people nf the State of Mississippi hereby consent to form a Federal Union with such of the States as have seceded or may secede from the Union of the United States of America, upon the ba'^is of the present Constitution of the United States, exce]>t such parts tliereof as etnbra'-e other portions than such seceding States. On the 9th, also, in the afternoon, the ordinance was called up on the question of its final passage. The galleries and the floor of the Hall were crowded with spectators of the solemn scene. The yeas and nays were ordered. The Secretary called the roll slowly. As each member 92 LVCIVS Q. a LAMAR: responded iu tones vibrant with intense feeling suppressed, the murmur of conversation and the rustle of movement ceased, and a stillness as of death held the great assembly. As the roll call made it manifest that the result would be largely in favor of the adoption of the ordi- nance, tears gathered into the eyes of nearly every actor and spectator. When the call was completed, and the President, rising, announced the result — ayes, eighty-four; noes, fifteen — a profound silence for some time prevailed. Then a silent wave of the President's hand, and the Rev. Whitfield Harrington stood by bis side. Members and spectators arose, and with bowed heads united iu the prayer of the eloquent divine for God's blessing on- the momentous steii just taken. All, by a subtle communiim of thought, felt that they were leaving the old home which they had long loved well; that they were turning their backs upon the house every stone of which was baptized by the blood of their fathers and by their mothers' tears; that the old flag which their fathers and themselves had borne from glory to glory was from henceforth to be alien and possibly hostile. For these people loved the Union. They, however, believed in their principles and their methods. If they were mistaken iu the one and wrong in the other (questions not necessary to discuss here), none the less did they feel compelled to go; but even amongst those who so felt tiiere were very few who went without many a longing and lingering backward look. Tiien there was a booming of cannon and a ringing of rejoicing bells, unwittingly ringing out the institution which had kept the nation in a turmoil for thirty years, and presaging the method of its destruction — the dread decision of battle. A fire bell, from an engine house in the caiiitol yard, first announced the tidings. Within three years the t(U-ches of Grant's and Sherman's armies had so laid the city in aslies that it be- came known, partly iu derision and partly in wrath, as " Chimney ville." Mr. Lamar's views upon the political philosophy of secession — its character as a general movement of the Southern people— are fully set forth in a letter written by him to Mr. West, in 1883, introduced in an- other connection." As he said therein, it was not a conspiracy of indi- viduals. " On the contrary, it was the culmination of a great dynastieal struggle, an 'irrepressible conflict' between two antagonistic societies, a culmination which had been foreseen and predicted by the wisest statesmen of the nation. . . . This culmination was a result of the opera- tion of political forces which it was not witliin the power of any individ- ual man or set of men to prevent or postpone." As to Mr. Lamar's per- sonal sentiments upon the matter, it is well to say a few words. Mr. Blaine has seen proper, in his work, "Twenty Years in Congress," to say of him that See Chap. XXVIII. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 93 I[is reason, his faitli, his hope, all led liim to believe in the necessity of preserving the union of the States; but he persuaded himself that tidelitj' to a constituency which had honored him, personal ties with friends from whom lie could not part, the main- tenance of an institution which he was pledged to defend, called upon him to stand with the secession leadere in the revolt of 1S61. He was thus ensnared in the toils of his own reasoning. His very strength became his weakness. He could not escape from his self-imposed thralldom, and he ended by following a cause whose success could bring no peace, instead of maintaining a cause whose righteousness was the as- surance of victory. This passage is purely imaginative. There is no warrant for it in fact. Mr. Lamar was never in any such condition of thralldom to sentiment as opposed to his reason and faith ; nor was he dragged reluctantly along by his sense of fidelity to his constituency. He was possessed, in a high degree, of the sentiments attributed to him. No man felt them more deeply, or more seriously esteemed their demands. But they were not his captors in that great emergency. He also entertained a great ven- eration for the Union, and love of it. When secession seemed to him necessary, it was a necessity most painful. Could any securities have been obtained which would fairly have promised to obviate that neces- sity, he would have welcomed them most joyfully. In this he was by no means alone; it was the prevailing feeling. But, also, Mr. Lamar most firml_v believed that, in the condition into which affairs had fallen, it was impossible any longer to preserve the dignity, sovereignty, and institu- tional self-governnieut which the States had sedulously reserved in the formation of the Union, and the reservation of which all Southern and many Northern statesmen believed to have been indisputably a conditio sine qua non to the acceptance of that bond. He, therefore, logically believed, also, th;it there were but two courses open. One was to sub- mit ignominiously to a denial, within the Union, of the rights guar- anteed by the constitution (rights regarded as sacred, and as the very consideration for the formation of the federative compact ) ; tamely to continue within a Union whose constitittion should be, as Dr. Barnard expressed it in his letter, a constitution only if the North so pleased. The other was to preserve the rights and dignity of the Southern States by a peaceable withdrawal from a broken compact. The conclusion of his mind was a reluctant one, but it was the conclusion of his own rea- son and of his political faith. Nor did he regard the South as respon- sible for the existence of the momentous dilemma. Mr. Blaine, himself, does Mr. Lamar better justice when he says, in that other paragraph of his work, that He stood flruily by his State, in accordance with the political creed in which he had been reared; but looked back with tender regret to the Union whose destiny he had wished to share, and under the protection of whose broader nationality he had hoped to live and die. CHAPTER IX. Appointed to Confederate Congress — Lieutenant Colonel of Nineteenth Mississippi Regiment— Speecli in Richmond — Military Service — Battleof Williamsburg — Hon- orable Mention — Ollicial Report — Illness — Resignation — Death of Jefl'erson M. Lamar. ON the 26th of Januai'y the Secession Couveution passed resolutions providiog for the representation of the State in the Congress of a Southern Confederacy. Senators Davis and Browu were appointed to the Senate; and Messrs. Eeuben Davis, Lamar, Singleton, Barksdale, and McRae to the Lower House — thus returning the representation which had existed in the Congress of the United States. But this plan was never eJBfectuated. On February 4 a conveniion of States met at Montgomery, to which the Mississippi Convention had appointed seven delegates; and this convention, after electing Mr. Davis as Provisional President, and adopting a constitution, resolved itself into a Provisional Congress. It was this body which first legislated for the Confederacy. The Secession Convention also took measures to organize the army of the State, in case it should be needed. Mr. Davis was made major general, and four brigadiers were appointed: Earl VauDorn, Charles Clark, J. L. Alcorn, and C. H. Mott. It soon became appai-ent, however, that there was to be an army of the Confederate States. Gen. Mott then resigned his State command, and undertook, by a special authority from the Confederate Govern- ment, to raise a regiment for service "during the war." Mr. Lamar, who had been considering the question of taking a staff appointment, abandoned that idea, and cooperated witli Gen. Mott in this work. Of- fers of companies poured in from all quarters; and the regiment, so far as its roster was concerned, was completed by the middle of May, al- though not sufficiently supplied with either tents or arms. Mott was elected colonel, and Lamar lieutenant colonel. Lieut. Col. Lamar then resigned his i)rofessorship in the university, and was on the 14th of May in Montgomery, offering his regiment to the Confederate "War Depart- ment. This regiment was the first from its State raised for service "during the war," and it was numbered the Nineteenth of Mississippi. From Montgomery Mr. Lamar seems not to have returned to Missis- sippi, but to have gone on with his regiment to Eichmoud. To that city the Provisional Confederate Congress, by its resolution of May 21, had removed tlie seat of government. Col. Lamar was with Mr. Davis, in Eichmond, on the 1st of June, at the Spottswood Hotel. Mr. Davis was there serenaded by the citizens of the citv, and made an address (94) LIFE, TLVES, AXD SPEECHES. 95 from the balcony of the hotel. Gov. Wise, of Virginia, was then called oil, and spoke; aud then Mr. Lamar was called out, aud made the clos- ing address of the occasion, from which the following extracts are taken: Gentlemen: It aifords me pleasure to respond to your CiiU. But I feel ronsoious of my inability to address you in a strain worthy of the interest inspired Ijy tlie great events now so rapidly hurrying to their consummation. Indeed, it would be almost impossible to give adequate expression to the feelings with which all patriotic minds are now agitsited. Fortunately, however, the time has come when tlie people need the aid neither of argument nor of exciting appeal. The time has arrived when they are satisfied that the deliverence of this fair State depends not upon argument, not upon eloquence, not upon statesmanship ; but upon the fighting manhood of the people of this country [cheers], upon the courage which dares to sti'ike a braver blow for the right than the enemy dare strike for the wrong. The [leople of these Confederate Stiites have, by a solemn appeal to tlir ballot box, after exhausting every eflbrt to live at peace with their neighl)ors, jiroclaimed thcirde- termination to take their place and maintain it among the nationalities of the earth; and the charter of their new nationality, which was written with the pen of our rev- olutionary fathers, and adopted at Montgomery, shall, if a sacrament be needed, be subscribed with the blood of patriotism. Fellow-citizens, if this continent is to be the theater of internecine strife, history will acquit these Confederate States of all responsibility for its calamities. The very first act of the Confederate Government was to send cummissioneis to Washington to make terms of peace, and to estiiblish relations of amity betw'een the two sections. . . . If that people had not been blinded by passion, maddened l)y fanaticism, and excited liy the loss of power; had they consented to a peaceful separation of these two sections into two repulilics, each pursuing its destiny in accordance with its own choice, it would have afforded the strongest evidence of the capacity of man for self- government ever presented to the world. But they did not do it. They proclaimed war and subjugation. They have called upon you to abandon your right of self-gov- ernment, to surrender your civil liberty. Right here Virginia steps forward, and, among all the rich materials she has hith- erto contributed to the history of the country, there are none so rich as those contrib- uted in this ontest; for, in the moujent the Federal Government raised an arm against her Southern sisters Virginia sprang forward to catch the blow. Grand, glo- rious old commonwealth! Proud, free empress! Mother of States, themselves free, standing here in robes of steel, raising a majestic arm to press back the foe that dare attempt to force her daughters into an unnatural and unwilling union! And now war is denounced against her! an infuriate mob is upon her borders! But the senti- ment of Virginia is the sentiment of the South. Eather let the pillars of the new re- public crumble to their foundations; rather let its lofty liattlements he overwhelmed with the last hope of liberty than that its people should quail in this hour of trial, or refuse to tread with her the bloodiest path that may be mai'ked out for her to follow. The sentiment of the entire South is with her; men from every rank and class of so- ciety are rushing to arms, begging the government to put any kind of weapons into their hands, and to allow them to march to the battlefields of Virginia. I tell you, in our State, the little State of Mississippi, the number of men who are ready to fight, I fully believe, is above our voting population. Even the walls of onr universities stand to-day mute and deserted, while our young students have marched upon the soil of Virginia, to mingle the dash of patriotic youth with the courage of disciplined man- hood, and teach the vainglorious foe the invincibility of Southern arms and the invi- olability of Virginia soil. Fellow-citizens, I shall not detain you longer. [Cries of " Go on."] 96 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAU: We may not know what will be the nature or result of this contest. It may be that much sutliering is before us. It may 1)6 that our towns and cities will be sacked. It may be that our fields will be desolated. It may be — f(jr it is well to look at the worst attitude of affairs — that our South shall yet emerge from the contest exlinusted, pallid, her garments dripping with blood [loud cries of" No! No!"]; but for all that, she will survive, and her glorious constitution, fresh witli vigor, will be instinct with imuiortal life. This very night I look forward to the day when this beloved country of ours — for, tliank God! we have a country at last — will be a country to live for, to pray for, to fight for, and if necessary, to die for. [A voice: " Yes, I am willing to die for it a hun- dred times over."] Cheers, amid which the wimlows were closed, and the crowd slowly dispersed. From Richmond Col. Lamar went immediately into camp with his regiment. Soldiering was not congenial to him. The camjj life, with its isolation from intellectual circles, with its daily drill, its hourly de- mand of small details of police, equipment, and organization, was ex- ceedingly irksome. Removed at once from all those i)ursuits which had tilled his life, transplanted into a condition wholly strange, the compen- sations which partly consoled many others whose lives were equally rev- olutionized did not appeal to him. Whether he would have succeeded as a military officer cannot now be told. His great personal courage, his invincible coolness in times of danger, his fixed resolution to achieve his objects if achievement were possible, his urbanity coupled with an inflexible firmness, were all on his side; while his inaV)ility to under- stand tactics, which he declared to be "the puzzle of his life," was against him. The course of events growing out of failing health, as will be seen, prevented the supreme and final test. Before the regiment left Richmond Col. Lamar had the first attack of a physical infirmity, which pursued him during thewhole of his afterlife, which hung over him always, a veritable sword of Damocles. It was a violent vertigo, something like an apoplexj', accompanied by unconscious- ness more or less prolonged, and followed by more or less of paralysis of one side. Sometimes even his si^eech w^as afl'ected. This attack, which was about the 1st of July, prevented his going to the front with the regiment, although not so severe as some others of later date. It caused his friends great alarm, and his wife was tele- graphed for from Mississippi. On the 11th of July Col. Mott, who seems not then to have understood fully the serious nature of his illness, wrote to him from the front: Our regiment seems to be ready and eager for the conflict, but I trust it will not be forced upon us till we can have your assistance. We may need that soi-t of tim and projxlling power which you possess in a greater degree than any man I ever saw, and which the Major and I are very deficient in. Improving somewhat, tlie Colonel was sent home to Oxford, Miss., about the middle of July. There he remained, hoping for recovery. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 97 longiug to rejoin his command and participate in their dangers and glo- rious exploits, cousiimiug his heart with rebellion and impatience, raging against the enemy who waged "a war so cruel and iniquitous." Frequent " slight rushes of blood to the head " continued, and caused the physician to abound in serious warning. About the 1st of November he returned to E-ichmond, dragging a lame left leg, but unable to resist the impulse to get again to work. On the 9th Col. Mott writes to him from the camp near Centerville: Inquire at the clothing department in Richmond with a view to procuring over- coats for the men. It is almost indispensable that tliey sliould be supplied with overcoats for the winter. . . . Our tents are made of such jioor material that the winds and weather will soon render them worthless, and we must begin to look after the health and comfort of the men before the winter is upon us. In my anxiety to preserve your tent, I have not had it used for a long time, sending it to Manassas with our extra baggage; and now it is said to be entirely rotted. My tent still holds to- gether, and is large enough for both of us. Our regiment has sufl'ered severely from sickness; had improved greatly until out on picket in bad weather without tents or fires, the nundjer of sick increased again. There have been three deaths within the last thirty-si.K hours. On the 22d of November he wrote his wife, from Richmond: I shall probably start next Monday for General Johnston's headquarters, and will keep you pretty well posted about army matters. There is some ill feeling between the Potomac generals and the President. I fear that cousin James Longstreet is taking sides against the administration. He will certainly commit a grave error if he does. I hope to be able to disabuse his mind, as well as that of Gen. Johnston, of some wrong impressions. ... I hope I am nearly cured of my sickness. I can manage to get along with a stick, though my leg is quite weak and uncertain in its move- ments. My vertigo comes upon me very rarely, and then in a very modified form. . . . The President seems more attached to me than ever. Everybody says that it is well known that he loves me. If we ever have peace, I expect I shall be sent as Minis- ter to Spain or Sardinia. ... If I were well enough ofl', I should give up public life and devote myself to social duties; but as it is not possible to do that yet, I will do all I can to improve the condition of my family. I have now no other earthly object in life. During this winter, whilst the army was in winter quarters around Centerville, Gen. Johnston offered to Lieut. Col. Lamar to recommend him for promotion to the rank of brigadier general. The Colonel thanked him, but said immediately: "Gen. Johnston, I shall never con- sent to receive promotion over the head of my friend. Col. Mott. He deserves it, and I request that you recommend him instead." This was done, and Col. Mott would have been commissioned but for his untimely death. From this period forth Col. Lamar was with his regiment at the front. In April they were in the lines near Yorktown, confronting McClellau and awaiting his attack. Here there was a continuous firing, with shells and balls Hying, numerous "skirmishes of little importance and signifi- cant of nothing," as he wrote; and here he cheered his men occasionally 7 98 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: by inakiug tliem a speech. He suffered much from the exposure; and as the spring opened, serious symjjtoms of vertigo again appeared. On the 5th of May the battle of Williamsburg occurred. In this hotly contested field he took a distinguished part, being complimented by three brigadiers, including his own, and by Gen. Longstreet, in their reports. But he had the great grief to lose his friend, Col. Mott, who fell gallantly leading his men. This battle was the first serious engagement of the great Peninsular Campaign. On the night of the 3d of May the Confederates abandoned their position at Yorktown and began a retrograde movement toward Kichmond. The Federal army pursued closely, and Gen. Longstreet determined to repel that pursuit. A line of fortifications had been thrown up about two miles east of Williamsburg, and it was occupied by a portion of Longstreet's Corps. Thus he fronted eastwardly toward the pursuing Federals, with his right flank toward James Eiver; and on the right, a dense forest. Orders were given to Gen. Anderson to organize columns of attack upon the Federal position and batteries, using the brigades of Wilcox (in which was Col. Lamar's regiment) and of A. P. Hill, supported by that of Pickett. The attacking columns were well arranged, and were gallantly led by Gen. Anderson. Leaving the fortifications behind them, the Confederate line pressed eagerly forward, and drove back that portion of Hooker's Division which confronted them. As the forces ad- vanced the battle broadened, and the brigades of Pryor, Jenkins, Early, and Colston, successively, became engaged. On the right flank of the Confederates they were successful in holding their gained ground; but on the left flank, on which Gen. Hancock had appeared late in the afternoon with a heavy assailing force, they were not so fortunate, and they failed to drive him back. The battle lasted during the day, and was inconclusive, each side claiming the advantage. The brigade of Wilcox, which was first in the field, was ordered to occupy the forest. The Nineteenth Mississippi was the center regi- ment of the brigade, the Ninth Alabama being to its left, and the Tenth Alabama to its right. The wood was entered. It was so dense that a colonel could not see his whole regiment when in line of battle. When the skirmish line had penetrated the wood something under two hun- dred yards, it encountered a brisk fire from the Federal skirmishers. The Federal line of battle was then developed about two hundred yards to the front, almost parallel with that of the Confederates, protected partly by a rail fence, partly by felled trees, and partly by low and boggy ground. Its left flank extended beyond the Confederate right. Gen. Pryor then came up with about seven hundred men of his bri- gade, and was placed on the right of Wilcox. Tiie order to forward was now given. The line advanced boldly, and almost instantly became en- HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 99 gaged in a close musketry fight. A heavy fire was concentrated on the Tenth Alabama, both in front and from its right flank; it was thrown into some confusion and gave way, but quickly reformed and returned to the attack with cheers. At this time Gen. A. P. Hill came up with his brigade. It was or- dered into action, covering Pryor's troops and the Tenth Alabama. A small regiment (the First Virginia) was placed in position to the rear of the Ninth Alabama, with orders to follow and support that regiment; and another regiment of this brigade (the Twenty-eighth Virginia) was directed to support the Nineteenth Mississippi. Pickett's Brigade soon arrived, and was posted to the right of Hill. The musketry was now in- cessant and heavy, and extended along the whole front, continuing from this time (11 a.m.), with but little intermission, until near dark. The Nineteenth Mississippi had met the enemj', compactly formed, under cover, and in rear of a fence and piled-up logs. Led by the gal- lant Mott, after a few minutes of close musketry, at a distance of less than thirty yards, it charged, and a stubborn fight ensued. The Feder- als were forced to yield, leaving the ground thickly strewn with the dead and the wounded. Driven from that position, the Federal line at- tempted to form to the rear; but it was again forced back, and sought refuge in tiie fallen timber. It was directly in fi-out of the fence that Col. Mott fell, shot through the breast with a minie ball. The Nineteenth Mississippi (says Gen. Wilcox in his rei>ort), after the fall of its highly esteemed and brave colonel, was commanded during the remainder of the day by its lieutenant colonel, L. Q. C. Lamar. This officer, suddenly called to the com- mand of his regiment, acquitted himself creditably throughout this long and stubborn- ly contested musketry fight, proving himself in all respects a competent, daring, and skillful officer. Col. Lamar's personal adventures, and those of his regiment, are more fully told in a report of the battle, made by himself to his brigade head- quarters, from which the following extracts are taken: Headquarters Nineteenth Kegiment Mississippi Volunteeks, ) Near Long Bridge, Va., May l.>, lS(i2. \ Sir: I have the honor to submit the following report of the operations of my com- mand during the action of the 5th inst.: At about 8..30 a.m. Col. C. H. Mott, then commanding our regiment, was ordered by Gen. Wilcox to make a sortie fi-om the second redoubt, on the right of Fort Magruder, through a field into the forest supposed to be occupied by the enemy in large force. . . . In consequence of the dense umlergrowth and uneven ground Col. ^Mott had placed the right wing of the regiment under my command, and directed me to operate with it according to my own discretion. At the command of our colonel the men advanced with great spirit and steadiness. A destructive fire was at once opened upon us b.\' the enemy. In the first volley, as I was afterwards informed. Col. Mott fell, shot through the body while cheering on his men. The fight became at once general along our whole line. The men under my command ])ressed on to the attack with the utmost eagerness, and yet with pei feet coolness, keeping our line as unbroken as the nature 100 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: of the ground would allow, and firing with deliberation and telling effect. The ene- my, partially protected by the fence l>ehind which they were posted, contested the ground most stubbornly. The opposing lines could not have been more than thirty yards apart, and for a time I expected a hand to hand conflict with the bayonet; Ijut at last, wavering before the iniiietuosity and undaunted resoluti(jn of our men, the enemy began to yield ttiC ground, continuing to tire as they retired. Just as we reached the fence above alluded to, the [First] Virginia Regiment came upon our right companies, having been sent as reenforcements. They continued with us, two companies fighting in line with my regiment, the others in the rear acting as a support. Passing the fence, where, in evidence of the precision of our fu-e, the ene- my lay slain in large numljers, my men continued to drive the enemy before them un- til they reached an open place of felled timber, which furmed an abatis for the ene- my. Being on open ground, I deemed it proi>er to halt my command in order to con- nect it with the left wing, so that the unity and organization of the regiment could be preserved, and the whole put under the command of its colonel. The operations of the left wing of the regiment up to this time I cannot report from personal observation; but from Maj. John MuUins and other reliable sources I learn that the companies of which it was composed moved with the most perfect order, in line with the right wing, until the first position of the enemy was carried ; that here, coming upon the abatis of felled trees, the progress of the extreme left companies was impeded; that, owing to a severe fire from their left, supposed by them to have come from our own troops through mistake, they were tlirown into some confusion, which was increased by an order to fall liack and reform; but that, though to some extent scattered, they fought on eagerly, and the list of their killed and wounded shows them to have l)een in the thickest of the fight. Unaljle to find my left wing, and discovering that troops of other l.irigades were on both flanks of my command, I ordered it to advance. Our reenforcements had pressed on, and now occupied the front, and were most liotly engaged. I drew up my men within supporting distance, ready to advance and take the front at a moment's notice. For an hour we were exposed to a galling fire, which was borne with the same firm- ness that marked the conduct of the men in their flr.st successful attack. While in this position I was joined by Cajit. W. G. Martin, of Company B, and learned from him for the (irst time of the fate of Col. Mott, and the position of our left companies. . . . The [First] Regiment, which was on my left and somewhat in front, had now expended its ammunition, and moved from its position by filing to the rear by the right. I threw my regiment forward to the position thus vacated, and ap- plied in person to Brig. Gen. A. P. Hill, commanding (with his brigade) that portion of our line, for permission to hold it with my regiment as a part of his brigade, and re- ceived his consent. At tliis juncture the fire slackened on my new position, but, growing exceedingly severe to my right, I was ordered by Gen. Hill to throw my leg- iment in that direction, to supjiort the troo)is thus hotly engageil. In the execution of this order I encountered Brig. Gen. Pryor, with one of his regiments, very closely engaged with the enemy. Gen. Pryor at once ordered me to throw two of my compa- nies to the ri^ht, to arrest an apjirehended flank movement of the enemy. The re- maining portion of the regiment was held in reserve. Tlie enemy here ceased his at- tack, and in this position I remained until near 8 p.m., when, pursuant to orders, I moved my regiment from the field. From the time the order to advance was given until the conflict terminated this regiment was under fire, and through it all both offi- cers and men bore themselves with an intrepidity which merits the highest commen- dation. I append herewith a list of the casualties in this regiment, from which it ajipears that om- loss amounts to 100 killed and wounded. In consequence of heavy details and sickness among our recruits, we carried into the field only 501 men. mn LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 101 . Not ouly did Col. Lamar's haudliug of his regiineut in this battle re- ceive the complimeutary uotice from Geu. Wilcox quoted above; but, also, Geu. A. P. Hill, iu his report, mentioned him iu these terms: Lieut. Col. Lamar, of the Nineteenth Mississippi, volunteered to serve under my orders, having becomi; separated from his brigade, and was eager to bear liis part in the day's fray, nobly seconded by the right wing of his regiment. He rendered me most efficient service. Geu. Pryor, also, said of him this: At this moment Lieut. Col. Lamar, of tlie Nineteenth Mississippi, just issuing from a severe but successful struggle, came up with his regunent, and reported that he had been sent to my assistani'e. Two of his companies I threw to my right, to arrest a re- ported flank movement of the enemy ; the balance I held in reserve. Aud Gen. Lougstreet said: Col. Kemper . . . and Lieut. Col. Lamar (favorably mentioned by three of the brigadier generals ) discharged their difficult duties with marked skill and fearlessness.* To the regiment itself, because of its gallantry, Gen. Johnston granted the honor of the right to inscribe " Williamsburg " on its standard. Although Col. Lamar's bearing at Williams! )urg met such ample and flattering recognition, he never plumed himself on his military career. He had no conceit of his own capacity as a military leader. Albeit no one had a greater admiration for and love of a gallant soldier, his own ambitious lay entirely apart from that career. In later years he was wont, at home and in the lobbies of the Senate chamber, in coteries of his friends (which embraced many of the most distinguished officers of both sides), to make his adventures at AVilliamsburg the subject of bur- lesque narratives, and the text of humorous dissertations on the cheai> uess of military glory, whereby he would seek, in jest, to lessen the pride of the "generals." Well was it for him that his ambition lay in other directions; for about the 15th of May, as he was reviewing his regiment, his vertigo re- turned suddenly, and in a most violent form. He fell as if he had been shot. The soldiers raised him upon a litter, covered him with the regi- mental flag, and carried him to his tent. From thence an ambulance conveyed him to friends iu Richmond. His connection with the line was over. Again for months there was the same slow and uncertain recovery. In June he went home, and from thence, in July, with his family, to Ma- con, Ga., where he enjoyed the solace of the society of his mother and sister. In September of this year he had the great misfortune to lose his younger brother, Jefferson M., to whom he was most tenderly attached. Jefl'erson was the lieutenant colonel of Cobb's (Georgia) Legion, and fell while leading a charge at Cramptou's Gap, in the Blue Ridge, in • ■' War of tlie Rebellion." Sei-ies I., Vol. XI., Piivt I., pp. 567, 579, 588, 589, 597. 102 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR. Maryland. In that desperate and bloody fight he was ordered to pro- tect a small gap to the right of the field. Upon reaching the spot, he ordered a charge over a stone fence. He scaled it himself, in his sad- dle; but his horse was immediately shot, and fell under him. He promptly raised his cap, and, waving it, cheered on his men, calling upon them to follow him; but he was immediately pierced by a number of bullets from the enemy, who were in great force in front and on both sides. He still kept the field, refusing to be removed. Stretched out upon the ground, with his hand supi^ortiug his head, while his elbow rested upon the earth, he could still watch and encourage his men. When any faltering was apparent in their thinned ranks he would check it by simply saying to those in front, " If you fall back, you will tread on my body; " and to those in the rear, "If you retreat, you will leave me here." Hours passed away in an unequal contest. All that remained of Cobb's Legion were taken prisoners, clustering aboiit their dying colonel's form. He survived only a few days. His loss was a terrible blow to the fam- ily, for he was their Benjamin and their Joseph in one. He had been married less than a year before to a lovely cousin, a niece of Mrs. Howell Cobb's. The family had dreamed of a great future for " Jeffey," regarding him as the most highly gifted of the three brothers. Twenty- three years later Col. Lamar wrote of this lost brother : " I never knew a more perfect being, from the time of his childhood up to the day of his death. I never heard a word fall from his lips that could not have been uttered in the presence of his mother and sisters. His success was of ex- ceptional brilliancy, and his death was an irreparable loss to Georgia." Col. John B. Lamar, a cousin, was also mortally wounded in the same engagement, dying on the next day. In October, Col. Lamar, owing to continued bad health, resigned his colonelcy of the regiment, in order to accept other employment. When the regiment received intelligence of his resignation, a meeting of ofii- cers and men was called, and resolutions were adopted expressing regret for his resignation, and requesting him to recall it and to resume com- mand after his health should have been restored. To this he replied that his absence would necessarily be a prolonged one, and, while greatly appreciating the comiilinient paid to himself, and regretting to sever his connection with the regiment, he felt that it would be a grave injustice to the other officers who must command in the field and who deserved promotion, if he should consent to adopt that course. Col. N. H. Harris (afterwards brigadier general), who succeeded to tlie colo- nelcy thus vacated, is authority for the statement that the soldiers of the regiment regarded him as a heroic leader and felt deep sorrow at his resignation; that great and lasting mutual affection existed between the men and himself. CHAPTEK X. Envoy to Russia — Special Letter of Instructions — Trip to England — Official Dispatch- es — Mission Terminated — Anecdote of Thackeray — Anecdote of Disraeli — Speech in England — Return to the Confederacy — Speech at Atlanta — Death of Thompson B. Lamar — Judge Advocate of Third Corps — Speech in Lines — Surrender. ATEANSITION from the dullness, the monotony, and the priva- tions of army life in the beleaguei-ed Confederacy to the vivacities, the multiform interests, and the luxuries of the largest and gayest cap- itals of Europe was a great one; but just this is what came next to Col. Lamar. On the 19th of November, 1862, he was appointed Special Commis- sioner of the Confederate States to the Empire of Russia. In addition to his commission and his special passport he was furnished with a letter from President Davis to the Czar, a letter from the Secretary of State to the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, letters of instruction from the Secretary of State, and copies of the letters of instruction theretofore given to Messrs. Mason and Slidell.* Of these papers the following is set forth in the text, as showing most clearly the views and policy of the administration in respect to this mission: Confederate States of America, Department op State, "I Richmond, November 19, 1862. J Lucius Q. C. Lamar, Esq., Commissioner to Russia, Sir: When several of the independent States wliich had formerly been members of the confederation known as the "United States of America" determined to with- draw from the Union and to associate themselves in a new confederation under tlie name of the "Confederate States of America," it was natural and proper that they should communicate this fact to the other nations of the earth. Tlie usages of inter- national intercourse require official communication of all organic changes in the con- stitutions of States, and tliere was obvious propriety in giving prompt assurance of our desire to continue the most amicable relations with all mankind. Actuated by these considerations, one of the first cares of the government was to send to Europe commissioners charged with the duty of visiting the capitals of the different powers and making preliminary arrangements for the opening of more formal diplomatic intercourse. Prior, however, to the arrival of the commissioners the United States had declared war against the Confederacy, and had in its communications to the different cabinets of Europe assumed the attitude of being sovereign over the Con- federacy, alleging that tliese independent States were in rehellion against other States with which they liad theretofore been acknowledged confederates on a footing of perfect equality. To the extreme surprise of this government, this absurd pretension was considered by the cabinets of f4reat Britain and France as affording a valid reason for declinins to entertain relations with the Confederate States, or even to recognize the See Appendix, No. ti. (103) 104 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: contiimtHl fxistence of these States as indepeiulent sovereignties. It soon beeanie ap- parent tliat, ill consequence of tlie delegation of power formerly granted by these States to the Federal Government to represent tliem in foreign intercourse, the nations of Europe had been led into the grave error of supposing that the sei)anite sovereignty and independence of these States had been merged into one common sovereignty, and had thus ceased to exist. All attempts to dispel so grave an error by argument and appeal to historic facts were found unavailing, and the cabinets of Versailles and St. James intimated their deternunation to confine themselves to recognizing the self-evident fact of the existence of a war; to treat us as belligerents; and to postjione any decision of the question of rigid until that of viiglit was made clear. This result of our offers to enter into amicable relations with the two great powers of Europe who-e proximity caused them to be first visited by our commissioners nat- urally created some hesitancy in approaching his Imperial Majesty, Alexander II. Dcie self-respect forliade our a.ssuming an attitude which could possibly be construed into a supplication for favor as inferiors, instead of a tender of friendly intercourhe as equals. Nor is it improper to add that a communication to which extensive publicity was given, addressed by the cabinet of St. Petersburg to that of Washington, justified the inference of the existence in that city of the same views as those which were avowed at London and at Paris. Under these circumstances this government abstained from further obtruding on European powers any propositions for conmiercial or other amicable relations, and ac- cepted, with stern determination, the arbitrament to which all civilized nations seemed to invite it. The result has become matter of history, and 1 have only made these jjrefatory remarks that you may understand, and be able to explain, the causes which prevented this government from making, eighteen months ago, tlie same ad- vances to his Imperial Majesty which were made to two of the other great European powers. The time has now arrived when, in the judgment of the President, he may, without hazard of nusconstruction, temler to the Emperor of Kussia the assurances of the sin- cere desire of this |)eopleto entertain with him the most coi'dial relations of friendship anil commercial intercourse, and the President has chosen you to represent this gov- ernment in conveying such assurances. In opening your communications on tliis suliject with the cabinet of St. Petersburg, it is not deemed nei'essary that you resort to argument to maintain the right of these States to secede from the United States any further than may be embraced in the statement above given of the reasons which have caused delay in approaching that government on the subject. You will, of course, not refuse any explanations on this point which may seem to be invited, but we now place our demand for recognition and admission into the family of nations on the result of the test to which Europe, by common understanding, submitted our rights. We have conquered our position by the sword. We are ready and able to maintain it against the utmost efforts of our enemies in the future, as we have already done in the past. We weie independent States before secession; we have been independent ever since, in spite of an invasion by armaments far exceeding in magnitude that immense host which, to Russia's im- mortal honor, she overwhelmed with disaster by the voluntary sacrifice of her capi- tal. Nearly a million of armed men, aided by numerous fleets possessing unques- tioned control over the waters of our coasts, have, in a war now far advanced into the second year, utterly failed to make any ]ii'ogi-ess in the insane effort to subjugate this Confederacy, whose territory covers nearly half a continent, and whose population exceeds ten millions of inhabifcints. According to the Code of International Law, a nation which, with such elements of grandeur, also presents itself with an organized government and an obedient peo- ple, with institutions created in past generations by the free will of the citizens, and BIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 105 still cherished; a nation defentled by numerous armies, that crush all attempts of a most jxjwerful foe to subjugate it ; a nation which is aiming at no conquest, seeking no advantages, and using its sword for the sole purpose of defending its inherent right of self-government— such a nation may well insist on its claim to recognition Irom those who may expect hereafter to maintain with it relations of mutual advantage in the exchange of good ollices and the freedom of commercial intercourse. It is not deemed necessary to dwell on the many considerations wliich plainly indi- cate the benefits that must result to both nations from the establii^hment of Iriendly relations and unrestritted commerce. No rival interests exist to impede the creation or disturb the continuance of sucli relations; but the people of each country haxe everything to gain from a free interchange of the commodities which the other pro- duces in excess of its own wants. Each, ])ursuing its own career in the development of its own resources, would be regarded by the other as supplying new aliment for an intercourse mutually advantageous, and additional motives for cheiishing the most cordial amity. On the subject of the recognition of the Confederacy you will not fail to represent to the government of his Imjierial Majesty that, while the «ar which now ravages this continent and afiiicts mankind was due, in some measure, to the determination of Europe to leave the decision of the questions which have arisen between the Northern and the Southern States of North America to the arbitrament of war, rather than by friendly intervention to promote their amicable adjustment; the adherence of those governments at the present time to a line of policy purely (jassive is the sole cause of the continuance of hostilities. Desperate as the United States now know the attempt to be, they can scarcely be expected lo al.iandon their avowed purpose of sub- jugating the South in the absence of some expi-ession on the part of the great powers of Europe justifying such abandonment. Tlie people of the North, knowing that the right of the Confederacy to recognition is dependent solely \ipon its ability to defend itself against conquest by its enemies, cannot interpret the failure of Europe to accord that recognition on any other ground than the conviction that the North is able to subjugate the South. The unprecedented silence of European cabinets, after the abundant evidence afforded by the events of the past eighteen months of the power of the Confederacy to defend itself, is scarcely less effective in stimulating the United States to continue its present atrocious warfare than language of direct encouragement. The Presiperation with the views of the French Emperor. There is no party in Russia absolutely hostile to the South. The avidity with which the Confederate loan has been taken up, both here and on the Continent, has caused great rejoicing among our friends; and it is claimed by them to be a financial recognition of the Confederacy. I am your obedient servant, L. Q. C. Lamar. Twenty-four years later (iu 1SS7) Mr. Lamar was interviewed by Col. D.jnu Piatt in respect to liis knowledge of the views of the French Court at this important juncture, and said: I know very well that Louis Napoleon was not only in favor of interfering in our behalf, but warmly so. He received me kindly, and spoke with the utmost frankness upon the subject. There were two oljstacles in his way. One was the fact of our slaveholJing, that would make intervention in our behalf unpopular among the mass- es of the French people. The other was the need of a naval power like England or Russia to join in the movement. The Count de Morney, the emperor's confidential adviser, opened his mind to me yet more freely, and gave assurances that made us hope with reason for the intervention of the Imperial (Government of France. On one oc- casion I was shown a note from the emperor, in which he gave a positive order that, ins TJFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 109 had it not been revoked, would have brought on the intervention which we so ear- nestly souglit As the struggle went on in its first stage, when the Confederate cause had so many great victories to its credit, the emperor was induced to believe that we could win without outside assistance. When the tide began to turn through the exhaustion of our resources, tlie emperor became deeply interested, so that there was more ilanger to the Federal Government when we were losing than when we were successful. At any time before the cause grew utterly desperate the way was open to an alliance with France. So, had Hood defeated Thomas, and won his way to the Ohio, it would have had an appreciative influence in bringing about intervention. The motive for this course on the part of the emperor was not altogether a senti- ment. In the blockade of the Southern ports France suffered as England su3"ered, only in a less degree, from a cotton famine. Perhaps the French Government felt it more deeply than the Englisli, because in France the laboring classes had been taught and trained to look to the government for subsistence. When this failed the government was imperiled. Now, President Lincoln's navy had not only established a blockade, but his friends in Congress had enacted a high protective tariff' that was a threat of an irritating sort at the very time when Mr. Seward was courting favors from European governments; and when the news spread abroad that the Government of the North, failing to perfect its blockade, was sinking ships loaded with stone in the channels, so as to destroy our harbors, the indignation of the European press was very great. lu Jiily Mr. Lamar received from the Secretary of State a dispatch, iuformiug him that the Confederate Senate had refused to confirm his appointment as Commissioner, and giving the reasons therefor, to which he replied as follows: London, July 22, 1863. Hon. J. P. Benjamin, Secretary of State, Confederate States of America, Sir : I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your dispatch No. 2, advising me that, the Senate having fiiiled to ratify my nomination as Commissioner to Rus- sia, the President de.«ires that I consider the official information of the fact as termi- nating my mission. I have to thank you for the regret you express, on the part of the President and yourself, at this decision of the Senate; but, while I cannot free my- self altogether from a feeling of rotection, and allowed him as much personal liberty as he is capable of enjoying in his present in- tellectual and moral condition. They all awarded the penalty of deatli for the mur- der of a slave, and imprisonment in the penitentiary was the punishment for maim- ing. [" Hear! "] Eeturning at last to the Confederacy, Mr. Lamar pursited a difPereut route from that liy wliicli he went. He sailed first from Liverpool to Halifax, by the "Asia." From Halifax he went to Hamilton, on the island of Bermuda; and thence he took the "Ceres," to run the block- ade into Wilmington, N. C. In these voyages he was accompanied by Mr. Walker Fearn, his former Secretary, and by Mr. Charles A. L. La- mar, his cousin. As the " Ceres " was nearing the Carolina coast she was sighted and pursued by a Federal ship, and in her flight was stranded. The vessel had to be abandoned, and recourse had to boats. Mr. Lamar was enabled to save but little of his luggage, losing nearly all the effects he was endeavoring to bring to his family; and what he saved was drenched with sea water. However, he got in safely. From the 9th to the 31st of January, 1864, he was in Eichmond, hav- ing his accoitnts audited. On the 15th of March he made at Milledgeville his great speech on " The State of the Corintry." Before the people was not only the ques- tion of the foreign relations of the Confederacy, but also a question of the gravest moment in regard to its internal affairs. The government had, as a war measure, suspended the use of the writ of Iialmis corpus. Gov. Brown, of Georgia, in a message to the State Legislature, had in- veighed in the severest terms against this step. Mr. Lamar's Milledge- ville speech, therefore, dealt with the diplomatic question, and then passed to a defense of the action of the government on the habeas corpus. A contemporary Milledgeville newspaper said of it that There was something peculiarly impressive in the circumstances under which this distinguished son of Georgia appeared, to address these burning words of counsel to our people. He was near the spot of his birth, and stood in the very spot where his honored iiither had received the highest judicial functions known to our laws. These influences seemed to give inspiration to his powers, and he held his large auditory spellbound for nearly two hours. Substantially the same speech Mr. Lamar made again at Columbus, Ga., aliout the" 20th of March. Afterwards, a speech by Vice President 114 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: Stephens, taking the same position as Gov. Brown, and defending his message, having appeared, Mr. Lamar repeated his Milledgeville ad- dress at Atlanta on the 14th of April, with such altei-ations as were nec- essary to answer Mr. Stejjheus, as well as Gov. Brown. It is the Atlanta speech which is given in the Appendix.* The address was received with the greatest enthusiasm. The news- papers circulated it widely, and commented upon it freely. The Culiun- bns EiKjiiirer, of the 25th of March, said: It has long been the fashion of our pubhc speakers in this country to devote them- selves in tlieir liarangues as mueli to the aiuuseinent of fools as to the edification of men of sense. The first oilice is that of a demagogue ; the last, that of the statesman ; and the Hon. L. Q. C. Lamar is certainly no demagogue. His observations in Europe seem to have been very general, or, perhaps more properly to speak, generally miimte ; and the result, as related in the flowing sentences of his own eloquent style, was well calculated todisaljuse the Southern mind of much of the bitter jirejudice that has been rankling in it for two years past against Great Britain. The address was well calcu- lated to send his hearers home happy. It was better calculated still to give moral stamina to the confidence which is springing up anew in the hearts of our people at home in our capacity to ultimately triumph; and, best of all, it was calculated to send along the line of battle arrayed under the Confederate flag at the front a thrill of ex- ulting joy, the exhibition of which must redoidjle the strength of our own invincible hosts, and rapidly enhance the demoralization of the foe. We predict [said the Atlanta paper] that new luster has been added to the his- toric name of Lamar by the grand effort spoken of. The speech was one of the ablest and most effective we have ever heard, and never have we seen an audience carried so irresistibly with every conclusion of the speaker, as was the case on this occasion. Mr. Lamar [said the IMilledgeville paper] addressed himself to the task of under- mining the ingenious defense of Gov. Brown's position contained in that speech (of Mr. Stephens'). That he performs the work undertaken with thorough and perfect success, the reader shall see in a day or two. He does it, too, in such a manner that we are left in doubt whether most to admire the massive power of his argument or the excellent temper in which it is set forth. Numerous other papers eulogized, in similar strain. During the year 1864, owing to his infirm health, Mr. Lamar was not in the military service; and he passed his time in Georgia, between the towns of O.xford and Macon. At this period he was called to mourn the death of his elder, and only siirviving, brother — Thompson B., colonel of the Fifth Florida, who was killed in battle near Petersburg. And this brother was one whom to mourn was to mourn indeed. A braver man or nobler gentleman, it was universally said, did not live. He was modest by nature, a lover of justice, impartial, a shrewd observer, highly cultvated in mind, liberal and kind in feeling, and possessed of the greatest probity of character; * Appendix, No. 7. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 115 he would have adorned auy station. He commanded a company in the First Florida, at Peusacola; was made lieutenant colonel of the Fifth, and went with it to Virginia; was wounded at Sharpsburg (Antietam) while gallantly rescuing with his own hands the standard of his regi- ment; served as adjutant to Gen. Joseph E. Johnston; and was made colonel of the Fifth, in which station be fell, universally lamented. On the 1st of December Mr. Lamar had returned to Richmond. He was at once appointed Jvidge Advocate of the military court in the Third Army Corps (A. P. Hill's), with the rank of Colonel of Cavalry. The work of this office was ardiious, and was, as he wrote, " the most unpleasant duty I ever had to perform in my life." In the discharge of its functions he manifested " a kind heart, which would yield to noth- ing save a sense of duty." It was about the 20th of January, 1865, that, at their special invita- tion, he made a speech in the lines to Harris' Brigade, which included his old regiment. "Never," writes Gen. Harris, "shall I forget that scene: the earnest faces and torn and tattered uniforms of officers and men as shown by the flickering torchlights, the rattle of the musketry on the skirmish line, the heavy detonation of the enemy's constant ar- tillery fire, the eloquent and burning words of the speaker, and the wild cheers of the auditors, stirred to the innermost depths of their hearts by his patriotic words." He stood on a real stump, with the ragged veter- ans of Lee huddled close about him. Attracted by the cheering, the Federals shot at the noise. Col. Lamar went on with his speech, duck- ing his head to the right or the left as the bullets whizzed close by him. Finally the firing became so heavy, continuous, and accurate, making the splinters fly from the stump he was on, that he concluded his speech with this remark: " Those Yankees must have owl's eyes." However, hopes fail. The speeches, the cheers, and the fighting came alike to naught; and soon the dramatic interview at Appomattox ended all. On the morning of the evacuation of Petersburg (April 3), a time when few men were unselfish enough to think of others. Col. Lamar went with his purse to a brother officer, and forced him to share it. When the surrender had taken place a knot of officers were bidding each other farewell. One of them spoke of leaving the country, and asked Col. Lamar what he proposed to do. With trembling voice and. tears unrestrained (for it was a day when strong men wept without shame), he said: "I shall stay with my people, and share their fate. I feel it to be my duty to devote my life to the alleviation, so far as in my power lies, of the sufferings this day's disaster will entail upon them." The following letter tells its own story : Appomattox C. H., Va., April 11, 1865. Dear Brother: I send this letter to you by Col. Lamar, of Mississippi, with whom we served in Congress. I found him here in I^e's army, and he was included in the sur- render. He is about starting home via Memphis, and will want to get out from that 116 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR. point. I hope j'ou will afford him every proper facility. We know him well enough to know he tli.at will abuse no privilege extended to him. I only left home a week ago last night. I stayed with Gen. Grant last night, about seventeen miles from here, and arrived here about noon. The formal laying down of arms will take place this p.m. I shall start on my return for City Point to-morrow morning. All well at home when I left. Very truly yours, etc. E. B. Washburne. Maj. Gen. C. C. WASUBrKSE, Memphis, Tenn. Col. Lamar did not avail himself of Gen. Washburne's letter, how- ever, but remained in Kichmond several weeks before setting out upon his return to Mississippi. CHAPTEE XL Southern Sacrifices and Condition— Gen. Walthall— Settles at Cofieeville— Conditions of Law Practice— Abstains from Politics— B. N. Harrison— C. C. Clay— Southern Sufferings— Correspondence— Accepts Professorship of INIetaphysics — Made Law Professor — Character and Methods as a Professor — Resigns Professorship— Address at University— Death of Jud^e Longstreet- Address at Emory College — Agricul- tural Address— Lee Letter — Letters to Keemelin— U. S. Marshal Pierce — Debate with Alcorn at Holly Springs. THE surrender of Gen. Lee at Appomattox on the 9th o£ April was followed by that of Gen. Johnston to Gen. Sherman on the 2(5th at Raleigh, and by that of Gen. Dick Taylor to Canby at Citronelle, Ala., on tiie dtli of May; so that when Col. Lamar started home from Richmond, as he did about the 20th of May, the war was ended. After the lapse of three decades the hopes and fears of that exciting pei-iod are now but fading 'memories. The fierce passions and hot ha- treds engendered by the long struggle for political supremacy, and by the sterner issues of the battlefield, have passed away; and we may now contemplate this eventful ejiisode in our national history with a philo- sophical and dispassionate calmness, which was not possible then. Regarded in its broadest and most far-reaching results, the late Civil War can hardly be considered as a national, or even a sectional disas- ter. Hard as it bore upon the South especially, and much as it cost the whole nation in treasure, in passion, in tears, in blood, it would still seem that, as the world's history goes, the losses and sitft'erings endured were not an extravagant price to pay for the results achieved; for the assurance of an indestructible Union which promises untold national glory and human happiness for the future, and incidentally for the ex- tirpati(m of the deplorable cancer of slavery. The great calamity was farther back. It consisted in the existence of those conditions which rendered possible the war and the controversies otit of which it grew; in the failure of the constitution to fix more clearly the status of the slave population, the relations of the States to the Union, those of the States to the Territories; and especially in the existence of those mutual jealousies at the time of the formation of the constitution, which made indefiniteness in that instrument apparently expedient, and " compro- mises" imperative. But however we may now regard these matters, then, and to the South- ern people who had staked all and lost all, appeared no solace. From the Potomac to the Rio Grande the universal and despairing thought was: "Vce virfis!" To them the memory of their happy and glorious past in (117) lis LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: the Uiiiou bad become a fountain of Mara. The present was a horror, and the future held little hope. Conquest is not conversion; and still, in their view, those principles which waited tipou the formation of the Federal compact, and but for the recognition of which tiiat compact would never have been made, had been betrayed; and the treachery had been crowned by the infamies of invasion in the name of liberty, and of subjugation in the names of equality and fraternity. During the long and bitter 'struggle for the principles which they cherished, a struggle in which they believed themselves to have acted always on the defensive, they had suffered so bravely and so much. The very women and children at home had gone hungry and ill-clad; all domestic happi- ness had been surrendered for years; all the able-bodied men from six- teen to sixty had been sent away to the hardships and dangers of the battlefields; all profitable industries had been renounced; jjrivate for- tunes had been poured into the army chest; the very fields, for want of markets for their products, had been abandoned and desolated; the ter- rors of invading hosts had been endured; the homes and the cities had been given up to pillage and the torch; the names of a thousand bloody fields had been written upon their stricken hearts with indelible tears; in every household for years had been borne the daily torturing dread — a dread to be displaced only by the crowning sorrow of the fact — of the loss of the bravest and best beloved; the throne of the om- nipotent God had been hourly besieged with groans and prayers— and all to what end? To this: that not only the humiliation 'of conquest awaited them, the loss of fortune and of honorable estate in the coun- cils of nations, but also that their honor was challenged; and while the decision of the sword, which so sternly settles facts, never yet in truth settled a question of right and wrong, either political or moral, they experienced the injustice that their failure to maintain their cause by the sword 'brought them under the imputation that they were "reb- els" and "traitors." Perhai)s no conquered peopile ever suffered so much; because no other people ever were conquered who had such lofty conceptions of personal and national liberty. In England a thousand years of sturd}' contests had developed the highest ideals of ijolitical rights which the world had ever known. These ideals, denied to us in practical application by the British Crown, had produced our glorious revolution of '70. They had been embodied in the Federal Constitution, and our national life for ninety years had infused them in their largest and highest develop- ment into the lifeblood of every thoughtful American. In the march of American political progress Southern statesmen had l)cen always in the van. It was a peculiar phase of Southern intellectual life that all ambitions and all higher culture led to statesmanship and to the polit- ical career. The very women were skilled in statecraft. And thus it GEN. EDWARD C. WALTHALL. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 119 was that when the South fell, and its theories of the political structure of the government and of the rights of the citizens of the several States were denied without appeal and by the armed hand, the Southern peo- ple felt that they had been stricken in the very citadel of their intel- lectual and political lives — as if the flower of their own labors, and of those of their fathers for centuries, had been trampled into the dust. The country, moreover, was utterly impoverished. Not only were the slaves freed, but also laud values were enormously reduced. The rail- roads had been torn up to a great extent, and were without rolling stock. Many of the cities were in ruins, and a large proportion of the dwellings both in town and country were destroyed; no cotton ci'ops had been made for three years; all movables had been consumed by the war — farming utensils, wagons, and live stock. At one sweep the eleven Southern States, with a free population of five millions, had lost over two thousand millions of value; and of this immense loss nineteen hun- dred millions had fallen upon the six States of South Carolina, Geor- gia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas. Out of this wreck were to be met the debts incurred during the period of great prosperity, with five years' accumulation of interest. It was ruin, apparently irre- trievable and hopeless. Everything was to buy. Clothing was scarce, and so was food. Even the floors of the dwelling houses had been stripped, the carpets having been used in lieu of blankets; and many families of refinement and for- mer wealth were without the commonest articles of household and table furniture. The grim specter of poverty sat at their firesides, and con- fronted them at table. When Mr. Lamar left Richmond on his return home he had recovered to some extent from tlie shock of the downfall of the Confederacy, and was in a frame of mind not at all morbid. He expressed himself as being hopeful of early pacification and a happy future for the South. On his trip he traveled over part of the route with Gen. E. C. Wal- thall; and this meeting laid the foundation for a friendship which en- dured through his life, and was of a character so firm and true as to be- come almost proverbial in Mississippi. The relation between these men was so intimate, so cordial, so generous, and so helijful to each as to make indispensable here a notice of this friend. Gen. Walthall was born in Eichmond, Va., April 4, 18/U. He was brought to Mississippi while still young, and was educated at the same celebrated high school attended by Mott and by Autrey — St. Thomas' Hall, in Holly Springs. Admitted to the bar, he settled in CofFeeville, and tliere off'ered for practice. He was early elected District Attorney (in 1856), and discharged the duties of that oflice with great success and credit. He was reelected, but resigned and entered the Confeder- 120 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR. ate army as a lieutenant of the Fifteeuth Mississippi Eegiment, in 1861. His gallantry and military skill were so conspicuous that lie was rapidly promoted. Made lieutenant colonel of his regiment in July, 1861, he commanded it at Fishing Creek. In the spring of 1862 he was made colonel of the Twenty-ninth, and in December of the same year brigadier general. In this capacity he achieved a brilliant reputation, and was made a major general in the Army of the West in 1861. At the battle of Missionary Ilidge he served with great distinction. After the terrible defeat at Franklin he and Gen. Forrest " added greatly to their laurels. Forming the rear guard of the army, they protected it against the attack of the victors until a secure position was reached." Gen. J. E. Johnston said of him that, "if the Confederate War had lasted two years longer, Gen. Walthall would have risen to the com- mand of all the Confederate armies." He served after the war four times as a delegate to the Democratic National Convention. He re- moved to Grenada in 1871. In 1885 he was appointed to succeed Mr. Lamar in the Senate, and was elected to that oiiice by the Legislature in 1886; was reelected in 1888 without a dissenting vote, and again in 1892 without being a candidate for the office. As a Senator his course has been marked by great iirmness, wisdom, and conservatism. His unbending integrity, purity of morals and of life, high sense of honor and chivalric nature, accessibility, courtesy, vivacity, and personal mag- netism have all united to make him a favorite of the people of Missis- sippi. Mr. Lamar admired and loved him exceedingly, and throughout all of his life, from this time forth, found in him an unfailing support for both mind and soul. In a letter of 1868 he wrote to Gen. Walthall: "Do you know that but for you I could not keep up? I would have given up long ago, and never made an effort." Mr. Lamar passed a few months at Oxford with the Longstreets. About the 1st of September, 186.5, after some yearnings for a wider and more attractive field in the city of Memphis, he concluded a part- nership with Gen. Walthall for a practice in Coffeeville, and by the last of the month he had established himself and his family in that village. Here he led an uneventful life for a year, laboring at his profession. At this period, and for some years after. Col. Lamar's belief was that bis political career was over. Not only was he disfranchised and pro- scribed, but also the fate of the Confederacy and the outcome of the movement for secession weighed heavily upou him. By nature dis- trustful of liis own powers— a fact which attracted freipient observation when he was a younger man — he now considered himself discredited as a public leader. In the latter part of 1870, anticipating that he would be forced to enter upon a political discussion, he sketched the outline of a speech, from which the following extract is taken: /^ NTS LIFE, TIMES, AXD SPEECHES. 121 It is needless for me, my fellow-eitizens, to assure you of the reluctance with which I enter upon a discussion of this character. You too well know the care with which I have for now mauy years abslained from any participation in political uiatters; and this abstinence has Ijeen the ellVct not of any disgust for such a career, but of a con- viction of duty. When a nation has just emerged from the throes of a great civil warfare, where section was arrayed against section, class against class, two things are to be done : First, the work of reconstruction is to be effected ; Secondly, a willingness for the proper acceptance of the issue's decision is to be created. The former is the labor of the victor, and of the victor alone; it is to be accomplished by the prescience of wisdom and the magnanimity of justice, by wise legislation leading to strong con- stitutional guarantees. The latter is the work of the vanciuished, and can be effected only by a zealous advocacy of compromise measures. To none of these things can one who has been an ardent secessionist lay his hands actively. Wherever he might take his stand suspicion and distrust would spring up around him and choke him. Feared by all, any party with which he might seek to array himself would exclaim, " Save us from our friend ! " and sach an afflliation as would alone enable him to ac- complish his purpose would be impossible. Hence it is that for five or six years past I have, deemed every duty to which man is subject— duty to himself, duty to his family, duty to his country— to dictate to such men silence ; and by this I mean not to censure those whose convictions and acts are different from mine. I have thought, and still think, that all such a one can do, or should do, is not to uphold or approve, but quietly to acquiesce in, the result of the wager of battle. This have I sought to do, and liappy am I if my example has in- spired in a single other breast the desire which animates mine: the wish to be in the country one peaceable, law-abiding citizen. Still, as an observer of political affairs. Col. Lamar was neither mo- rose nor indifferent. Especially did lie feel just then a keen interest in the fate and welfare of Mr. Davis and those intimately associated with him. On the 21st of November, 1865, he writes to Dr. Waddell, the Chancellor of the university, in respect to Mr. Burton N. Harrison, Mr. Davis' private secretary, who also had been imprisoned, as follows: I shall write, this mail, to Sharkey. I have more liope, however, from Alcorn's energy than from Sharkey's influence. I will also write to Pinson and Reynolds, of the House, and West. The incarceration of young Harrison has weighed upon my spirits like a nightmare, and it gives me some relief to make an effort for his release. His continued imprisonment indicates a purpose on the part of the govermnent which I am almost afraid will not yield to mere influence. It has some connection with the designs in reference to the President of the late Confederacy. Until those designs are accomplished or thwarteil. there seems to me but little prospect for poor young Har- rison's release from his confinement. But you may be assured that I will leave noth- ing untried, within the range of my influence, to effect his release. I feel his posi- tion the more, that I was the means of getting him the post which has resulted so dis- astrously to him. The imprisonment of Hon. C. C. Clay also distressed him greatly. It was another of the closely personal matters, which, in conjunction with the hastening developments of public affairs, as administered by the Congress, pressed deeply upon him the sense of implacability in the Eepublican party. Mr. Clay had been a Senator from Alabama. He was a man of elegant and dignitied manners, not robust, suave but co- 122 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR: gent ill elocution, firm and daring in policy. He had served also in the Confederate Senate. Toward the end of the war he had been sent on a confidential inissiou to Canada by the Confederate Government, in- trusted with secret service money for the purpose of enlisting aid. When the Confederacy fell he voluntarily surrendered to the United States, although he was charged with complicity in the murder of Pres- ident Lincoln. He was imijrisoned at Fortress Monroe, but was re- leased on parole, and w^as finally fully acquitted. He wrote to Mr. La- mar the following account of his experiences: HuNTsviLLE, Ala., March 15, 1866. -J/i/ Drar icimar.- Your fraternal letter only reached me on yesterday. . . , las- sure you it gave me great pleasure to hear from you and to read the generous senti- ments of love and sympathy you felt. If my means were adequate to my will, I would fly to yon, my dear friend, ere a month passed over us. But there are insuper- able difficulties in my way. My parole confines me to this State unless my personal business absolutely requires me to leave it. My father is tottering to his grave under the accumulated weight of nearly fourscore years and many cares and sorrows. Since my mother's death, caused by giief for me, he has never left the lot; and, indeed, rarely gets out of the house. . . . Had I foreseen what I should suffer at the hands of those among whom I sought a sanctuary of justice to vindicate my character and that of my friends and the South from an atrocious calumny, I should not have sur- rendered, but have made my escape, as I might easily have done. I was treated as the vilest felon; crucified in body and soul; subjected to indignities and outrages more disgraceful to the United States Government than humiliating to me ; and would have been murdered by the slow tortures, conceived in devilish malignity and Yankee ingenuity, but for the grace of God. It is too long and painful a tale of horroi's to write to you. If we live, you will hear it or see it in print some day, I think. I have turned very gray, but look and feel as well as I have for many years. I shall prob- ably continue to live in Alabama while it pleases God to let me live. I confess to you that my interest and my inclination both incline me to go elsewhere; but as I feel in some measure responsible for the suflerings of the people of this State, and as I have been honored by them beyond my deserts, I am persuaded that it is my duty to share their fate. I could be happier, I think, almost anywhere than here, the scene of so many departed joys, never to return, of so many sorrows never to be forgotten, of so many wrongs so hard to forgive. That command of Christ, " Love your enemies," so like a good God, and so unlike a wicked man, is kept constantly in memory here, to wound and i-eproach. The Tories are so much more despicable tlian the bloodiest Yankees. I left our friend and chief in delicate, not bad, health. His beard is snowy white, his step not as firm and elastic as formerly, and his voice is stridulous. Guarded and goaded as he is, he cannot long survive. I trust that the guard will be removed from his prison before long; it is kept there, not for his security, but, I fear, to torture him. There is scarcely an officer in the Fortress besides the commandant (a Massachusetts Radical and proh'gi- of AVilson's), who does not regard his treatment as cruel and un- magnanimous and mean. This letter is a sigh from the depths of suffering. It is an epitome of the sorrows of the Smith. Here are some other extracts from old letters, showing a different ])hase of trouble and anxiety. They are from J. W. M. Harris and N. H. Harris, of Vicksburg, the latter o£ HJS LIFE, TIMES, ASD SPEECHES. 123 whom was the brigadier general of the brigade to which Mr. Lamar's old regimeut belouged. We are hard at it now. Wlien our senior retnrneil he found his home shattered in pieces. . . . Our olliee furniture consisted of one desk, two chiiirs, and one book: the Code of 1857. This was our start. We have now a neatly furnislied office, some two or three hundred books, and are little more than paying expenses. ... If any man twelve months ago had told either of us this when, despondent and gloomy, the one borrowed fifty dollars in gold from a little Jew friend, a fellow-Mason, to come from Eufoula on; the other had returned from the army with seven iloUars in greenbacks (the remnants of the sale of a dearly loved old warhorse) and one suit of clothes, then I say we would have thought that man crazy. Our eyes were gazing out on the wide world for some other home, Colonel. But God helped us. 'Twas he that aided us. From his mother, Mrs. Troutman, to Mr. Lamar, under date March 23d, 1SG6, from Macon, Ga.: Our people here are very despondent. Gen. Cobb and others say that we have not yet seen the " bottom of our trouble." One of our papers, the Telegraph, says that there will be revolution before Christmas. The Federals are seizing all the cotton they can get hold of, upon the plea of its being subscribed to the Confederate Government. Geor- gia is anxious to lie at peace. The people are yielding, and submit as well as they may to compulsion. Everything is quiet and still. The people earnestly desire to do right, and are well pleased with President Johnson. There is great destitution among many of our people: those who have been accustomed to even the luxuries of life. In Calhoun, where I went with your sister two weeks ago, there were such striking evidences of poverty as to make it painful to imagine. Mrs. J , a granddaughter of Mrs. C (relatives), does her own washing, cooking, and all her other work, as- sisted by a girl ten years old. The village is in a ruinous condition. Many of the houses burned, and no repairs going on. I was told that persons who had been rich have now barely the necessaries of life. It was a sad thing to witness. Your sister could not collect a cent of money. . . . Are you heavily taxed in Mississippi? Every silver spoon, fork— indeed, everything that we are not compelled to have— is taxed by the United States. We are old, and it will not take much for us the lialance of our lives. . . . Write soon, dear son, and tell me you have courage to meet all the trials of life with cheerfulness, and that you are contented to commence life again with renewed hope and confidence in your final success. May God aid you in all your efforts. From the same to the same, September 4, 1866: People here are hard run, and considerable talk of repudiating all debts by a con- vention of the people of the State, if the Legislature does not act to meet the wishes of the people. It is earnestly to lie hoped that it may not be carried out. Some of the wealthiest men in Jasper and Jones are reduced to the bare necessaries of life. I firmly believe that it is all right and best for us all. God cannot err. Good when he gives, supremely good; noi- less when he denies. E'en crosses, from his sovereign hand, are blessings in disguise. Why should we doubt a Father's love, so constant and so kind? If we could truly realize this, how many of the sorrows and afflictions of life would lose their poignancy, and a sweet feeling of implicit trust and love would fill our hearts with happiness. I trust, dearest Lucitis, that, in some degree, you feel this blessed assurance, and can trust your God for the future. Be encouraged. God opens your way before you, and when an avenue of usefulness is closed he leads you gently on, 124 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR: his redeemed ohild, into ways you have not known. And thus he will ever do; only put your unfaltering trust in him. Mrs. Lamar, from Coffeeville, Februarj- 16, 1866, to her motlier, Mrs. Loiigstreet: Perhaps it will all turn out right in the end. I try to take this view of everything whicli happens, and be thankful for the portion of this world's goods which is left to us. True, tlie times are very much changed, but they might be worse. We keep no man servant now about the lot. Lucius lias been working about the fences and gates and locks to his outhouses all the morning. He feeds his cows and helps cut the wood and does a great deal of work. If he can only have good health, I feel as if we woulil Ije hajipy under almost any circumstances. • From Col. Lamar to Mrs. Lougstreet, July 26, 1866: I feel sometimes pretty blue about the future. How I am to get along I can't see now; but I hope to get some law practice in addition to ray salary. Col. Lamar was burdeued not only by the general expenses of his family and the depression of the times, but also by debts which he had incurred before the war. They were not great when made, compared with his ability to pay at the time; but they were very onerous after the impoverishment described. Nevertheless, he labored courageously and faithfully to discharge them; and this he finally did, after years of self-denial, out of his earnings, meeting principal and interest, declining to admit of any rebates, or even reductions in interest. At the period now under consideration he was using even his jewelry to pay such debts as those articles would meet. In June of this year Col. Lamar was again elected to the chair of Eth- ics and Metaphysics in tiie university, and accepted the position. He moved to Oxford, in order to enter upon the duties of his new work, in September. It was his intention, as it was his privilege, not to abandon the practice of law, but to accept such cases as should come to him while teaching. He had always a fancy for metaphysical study and investi- gation. It will be remembered that he bad held the same chair for a short time in 1860-61. During his first year at the university — that is, during the session of 1866-67 — Prof. Lamar discharged, ad interim, the duties of Law Profess- or, the chair of Law not having been supplied. Consequently, although be was relieved of part of his own proper work for that time, his labors were very onerous. He conducted the classes in Psychology, in Logic, and in Law, besides composing written lectures. In January, 1867, however, he was relieved of this pressure to some extent. He was unan- imously elected to fill the Law chair, which was thenceforward his ex- clusive work. There was but one voice from those who came in contact with him, in regard to Prof. Lamar's efficiency. He was an enthusiast in his calling, whatever that might be; and that enthusiasm he carried into his professorial work. As a member of the faculty he was always wise HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 125 and prompt in counsel, temperate and considerate, altliousli firm where occasion arose. To his pupils he was always accessible and kind, com- panionable, inspiring them all with commingled sentiments of profound respect and personal regard. He was devoted to their interests. He felt that, for the time, he was the representative of the true principles of the science which he taught, and that he was individually responsible for the results of his teaching. He possessed in a wonderful degree the faculty of infusing his own spirit into all who sat under his instruc- tion. It was his lot to fill three of the least attractive chairs in the uni- versity — Mathematics, Metaphysics, and Law. Yet to each of them he gave a charm in the eyes of his pupils, alike unusual and beneficial. Many of those pupils treasured up his instructions, and bore away with them rich fruits of their association with him; and in the professional eminence which they attained proved themselves successful channels for the communication of the same benefits to others. To a knowledge of the law coextensive with its range, he united a power of analysis, generalization, and elucidation which nearly divested it of all obscurity. His lectures upon the most intricate and obscure branches, such as conditions and limitations in deeds, executory devises, contingent remainders, and the exact boundaries between the law and equity, presented those troublesome subjects in entirely new lights, and gave to them a symmetry, consistency, and persi)icuity equally admira- ble and unexpected. For his pupils he set daily lessons, upon which each pupil was siibjected to a searching examination. The lesson end- ed, he took up the subject, and in a lecture which, it is said, never flagged in interest or tired in delivery, unfolded it in all its amplitude and modifications, anticipating and removing, so far as was ])ossible, all the doubts and difficulties which might arise in the minds of the stu- dents. Tn the exercises of the law classes, a member of each class was now appointed, whose duty it became at the next meeting to deliver a lecture on what was taught at the preceding recitation. This he did under the criticism of the whole class, any member of which was privi- leged to object to the lecture that it omitted something important or contained something incorrect. This exercise was deemed valuable in several respects. It constrained the sustained attention of the class to the recitation and the professor's lecture. It trained the lecturing student in the habit and art of appropriate style and manner of stating and unfolding legal propositions in a court of justice. If the lecturer were criticised, he was expected to defend his lecture if he thought fit, and thus debates among the students often arose on the scope and mean- ing of their recitations; all conducted orderly, under the supervision of the professor. Moot courts were also held every week, upon the plan of a complete court of justice. Records were provided and neatly kept, with a clerk. 126 LIVIUS Q. C. LAMAR: sheriff, bailiff, and juries. Cases for trial were devised by the professor, whicli were brought and defended by students appointed for the jjurpose, with all of the formalities and details. The records were kept with ex- actness. Each student was expected to serve in various capacities in his turn, and thus he received trainijig in the special duties of the offi- cials of the court. Many years later — indeed, after Mr. Lamar's death — Hon. C. E. Hook- er, in a memorial address spoke of this portion of Mr. Lamar's life as follows: The love and affection nhich he aroused in the hearts of young men wa.'i wonder- ful. I know of no criticism to which a professor can be subjected more to be dreaded than that of young men assembled from all portions of the State in the classes of a university. You will not find a graduate ijf that institution who was educated there during the period that J\Ir. Lamar acted as professor that does not feel for him anil lias not borne for him in all the changing stages of life that perfect affection and profound admiration that he inspired in the hearts of all young men who came in contact with him. In the month of November, 1868, the family with which Mr. Lamar was so thoroughly identified were deeply afflicted by the loss of the ac- complished and angelic Mrs. Longstreet. A recurrence to his own trib- ute to her in a previous chapter will suggest the distress which this event caused to him as well as to the others of her loved and loving circle. The year 1869 was distinguished by nothing of note in Mr. Lamar's history except the marriage, in May, of his oldest child— a daughter. In the fall of that year also he purchased a body of laud, about thirty acres, in the northern part of the town of Oxford; and on this premises began the erection of a residence, which was completed in the following April. This home, the first of his own since he had left " Solitude " in 1857, was the slowly earned fruit of hard labor at his profession; for at this time his practice had so increased that he, with his moderate ideas in that particular, descriVied it as " very large." For a year or two past he had associated with himself a junior partner, of whom he had become very fond — a Mr. Edward D. Clarke, who later married a niece of Gen. Walthall's. In the fall of 1869 occurred' the election, under the authority of the United States Government (as will be more fully narrated in the fol- lowing chapter), by which the State was reconstructed and "radical- ized," as the phrase then was, and which led to his retirement from the faculty of the university. The new constitution was ratified. In 1870 the State was released from military rule, and turned over to the civil authorities of the new rff/inie. All of the State officials and a large ma- jority of the Legislature were Kejiublicans of types most obnoxious to HIS LIFE, TIMES, AXD SPEECHES. 127 the people of the State. The incoming party laid its hands on the board of trustees of the university, and infused into it a large element of their own kind. As the papers of the day put it, perhaps a little too strong- ly, the board was also " radicalized." There was general apprehension that the university would be assailed, that it would be made a training school for " radical " i^olitics, and even that it would be converted into a mixed institution, for blacks as well as whites — a condition wholly re- pugnant to the feelings of the Soutliern people. The Governor of tlie State was ex officio President of the board, and his election Mr. Lamar had opposed strongly. Altogether he expected but little consideration from the new administi'atiou, and felt that his own self-respect demand- ed his resignation. This he transmitted to the June meeting, and thus severed finally his connection with the university. While leaving the institution, however, he left it gracefully. At the Commencement, on June 27, 1870, he delivered the address to the literary societies. It was one of his ablest and most eloquent efforts. For one hour he held bis vast au- dience asdeli,i;hted listeners. The young men of our country who were not privileo;ed to hear it should have its wholesome, timely counsels before them. His word paint- ing of two events in the life of England's leading statesman (Disraeli) was equal to the grandest effort of even his distinguished subject, and was rich in encouragement for the young men who were about to step forth on the theater of life. . . . Col. Lamar was followed by Mr. Joseph A. Brown, the first honor man of the fourteen graduates of the law class, and valedictorian on this occasion. . . . His tribute to his law instructor (Col. Lamar) was beautiful and just, mingled with regret to many by the announcement that Col. Lamar had resigned his chair in the university. . . . On Mr. Brown's taking his seat, Col. Lamar arose, and with evident emotion thanked the young orator who had addressed him; and, turning to the law graduates, he said: "And now, young gentlemen, as you go home I pray that you may have prosperity and happiness through life, with just enough of sorrow to remind you that this earth is not your liome."* This was the closing scene. ■^o At the same time, however. Col. Lamar did not wholly abandon the idea, just yet, of continuing to teach law. He opened a negotiation with the law firm of Nisbets & Jackson, of Macon, Ga., looking to an associ- ation with them; all of which will appear from the following extract from a letter, dated May 30, to Judge James Jackson: The arrangement of the courts in this State by the recent legislation renders it al- most impossible for a lawyer to leave home. I have just received from Gen. Walthall, the leading lawyer in North :Mississippi, and second to none in the State, a letter turn- ing all his business in the Federal court over to me, on account of liis being unable to come to Oxford. . . . This will give you some idea of how our profession is disturbed in this State. The lawyers here, consisting mainly of old Wliigs, whose ex- elusion from political honors made them more attentive to their profession, are a body of talented, high-toned men, who are deeyjly discontented with the shock which Alcorn and his Legislature have given to their interests, and many of the leading men *CorresponiIence of the Weekly Clarion. 128 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: have fjone to New Orleans and Memphis. The wound is an incurable one, and tlie state of things is permanent. The negroes have a huge and increasing majority. I must take my property and family from the State. JetF Davis approves my purpose, and says he sees nothing but sorrow and wrongs for Mississippians in the future. I shall most probably move to Macon. I would like much to practice witli you. I pre- fer you to any living man. The fact that I would be also associated with the Nisbets is an additional attraction. If, however, that arrangement is made, I would so nuicli like to move my law school to Macon, and have you all in it, the Judge to be the Chancellor. He would be delighted with it. Tlie {vuAi young manhood of Georgia coming in contact with him, their bright hopes and budding aspirations, their rever- ential attachment to him as their preceptor, and the interest that they would take in his lectures, would enliven and illumine the evening of his life as nothing else of an earthly nature can. He would not find it difficult or irksome. I could take ofl' his hands all the details. I have been very successful as a law professor. The Judge can take a second growth in this career. However, these castles iu Spaiu crumbled away. The Federal court was not removed from Oxford, as be expected it would be; aud the es- tablished practice aud the local attachments jiroved too strong to leave. The foregoing letter, to one who can read between the lines, will give some disclosure of the pleasures which Mr. Lamar derived from his pro- fessorship, and the reluctance with which he gave it up. In Jidy of this year the honored Judge Longstreet ^jassed away, in his eightieth year. He died surrounded by the members of his family circle, Mr. Lamar and his wife being present. "The death scene was almost a demonstration of immortality. His mind was clear and his soul was calm, in the assurance of Christian hope. Placing his finger upon his wrist, he marked the beating of his failing pulse. Growing weaker, his hand dropped away, and the finger lost its i^lace. Motion- ing that it should be replaced, it was done, and he resumed the count of his last heart beats, growing fainter and fainter." — "Look, Jennie, look! " exclaimed Mr. Lamar to his wife, as amongst the awe-struck by- standers, "he beheld a sudden illumination overspread the pale face of the dying man, with a look of wonder and joy in his eyes, and every feature expressing unearthly rapture. That was the end." * Mr. Lamar was not a man given to fancies, religious or other; but this scene of Judge Longstreet's death made upon him a most profound impression. If not exactly convinced of it, he was yet strongly per- suaded that those dying eyes had, in very truth, beheld something of the glories of tlie other world. In his address made at the Commencement of Emory College, but a few days later, he spoke with great emphasis and impressiveness about what he had witnessed. He said, also, that the loss of Judge Longstreet had filled his heart with unutterable sad- ness. This address at Emory College, in July, was the one from which quo- ' Juil;,'!' Lon.ssli-eet," Bishop O. P. Fitzgerald, p. V.rl. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 129 tatiou was made iu the first chapter of this work. Here ho was received with great cordiality. He was tendered the professorship i>i Belles Let- tres and History, but declined it, having determined to remain in Mis- sissippi. In the autumn of this year Mr. Lamar delivered an address before tlie Agricultural and Mechanical Association of Carroll and Choctaw Counties, \ipou tlie needed changes in our agricultural system, and the relation of government to agriculture. In brief outline his speech was to this effect: The emancipation of the slaves had revolutionized Southern farming. It had converted what before was capital into a never-failing and clam- orous claimant for profits. The x^lauter must therefore capitalize his own manhood and intelligence. This he could do in three principal ways: by diversification and rotation of crops, by the use of labor-sav- ing machinery, and by the higher culture of fewer acres. By diversi- fying crops a most appalling waste of values would be prevented. The crop of 1870 was estimated at four million bales of cotton. This great quantity depresses prices one-half. Two million bales at twenty-five cents per pound would bring as much money as four million at twelve and one-half cents. If this be true, or apijroximately so, we get abso- lutely nothing for the third and the fourth millions. We suffer a clear loss of the labor, outlay, and exhaustion of lands expended in making them. That expenditure would have produced one hundred million bushels of corn. What is true of the people as a whole is true of indi- viduals. Those who raise cotton exclusively grow poor; those who raise cotton, corn, meat, potatoes, etc., grow iu wealth, and work no harder. After dwelling for a time upon the next topics of machinery and in- tense culture, Mr. Lamar turned to the governmental relation to agri- cultui-e. Government can contribute to the aggregate wealth of its cit- izens no direct and positive increment. It does its good by a negative influence, by preventing injustice and crime, by secui'ing property from invasion, and thus by affording to its citizens an opportunity to enrich themselves. Government resembles the fences which surround our fields. They are a needful protection, but produce neither harvests nor fruits. A law cannot create capital. If it could, there would be an end to la- bor. If government makes a man or a section rich, it is by wronging other men or other sections. The speaker then considei'ed the evils of class legislation, of excessive and partial taxation, of lavish and disci'iminating expenditures, at length, including a discussion of the operation upon agricultural communities of the existing tariff. He showed how the North was prospering under the existing management, and the South suffering. This finished, the speaker continued: 9 130 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: We are told that we are uiuler a new n'gime, that the past of the South was marked by great intellectuality, that her leaders were great and pure; but that while they were engaged in tracing and enforcing the principles of constitutional government, the North with more practical wisdom was using the government as an instrument for its own enrichment. We are told that the South must imitate the North in this respect, that her people must give up their character for virtue, intellectual and moral dignity, and become treasury-eaters side by side with those Northerners who are will- ing upon such terms not only to grant us an act of amnesty, but also to permit us for a time to share their plunder. And all this to a certain extent is true. The speaker then discussed at some length the prond records of the South in standing by her political princiijles and her convictions of right without balancing them against calculations of profit, and con- cluded: Choose you then. Will you have hon(jr? Then adhere to the practices and prin- ciples of your fathers; stand for the rights of the people and for an honest govern- ment economically administered. AVill you have profit? Then cast in your lot with those who administer the government for profit, who oppress the poor and the la- borer; turn your backs on the faith of your fathers, and fall in with those whose prac- tices, whatever they may signify to them, can mean nothing but reproach to you. I want no response to these questions. I read it in your eyes. The pure spirit of patriotism illuminates your countenance. In vain will the harpies who prey upon our stricken land beckon to you to sell your birthright for a mess of pottage. It was at this period also that Mr. Lamar wrote his celebrated " Lee Letter." This epistle was elicited by a proposition, after the death of Gen. E. E. Lee, to celebrate his birthday in Vicksburg, and by an invi- tation extended to Col. Lamar to deliver the memorial address. It is a beautiful specimen of character analysis and of antithesis, besides pre- senting interestingly Mr. Lamar's conception of the characters of Lee and Washington, the two great Virginians.* On the 11th of September, 1870, Mr. Lamar wrote to Charles Keeme- lin, of Dent, O., a German gentleman whose writings in the Coiinnoner, of Cincinnati, had arrested his attention and excited his admiration, as follows: The country is in a deplorable state, and the people, with all their sacred convic- tions scixttered to the winds, are absorbed in the prosaic details of making a living. Our public men have become bewildered in the wreck of all that they considered per- manent and true, and know not what to do or advise. There is a perfect anarchy of opinion and purpose among us. If you will come down and see us, and show us some definite way of getting out of our present very indefimte condition, our gratitude will be unspeakable. We feel that the fate of our section is not in our hands; that nothing we can do or say will afiect the result. In another letter to the same correspondent, written in the year 1871, he said: I have nothing to do with politics. Some kind friend in Washington sends me the Globe occasionally, and I read the debat es with interest. It makes me realize the '■= .Appendix, No. 8. ins LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 131 great revolution which has been wrought, both in the political institutions of the country and in the thoughts and phraseology of those who direct its affairs. It is fortunate for most of our Southern leaders that they are excluded from their former positions in the govfrnraent. They could hardly sustain the high reputation acquired in the old arena. Toombs possibly might, he is so ardent in his temperament and so keenly alive to the influences of jjassing scenes and immediate events; but Mr. Davis, Hunter, and the others, would be at a great disadvantage in every encounter with the new men who, produced by the times, are up to its passions, its questions, its de- mands and resources. On the 22cl of June, 1871, occurred an incident which gave Col. La- mar a great deal of annoyance at intervals during the remainder of his life. The United States Government had instituted in the District Court at Oxford a number of prosecutions under the Kuklux law, and the town was filled with strangers: prisoners, witnesses, deputy marshals, and soldiers. It was a time of great bustle and no little excitement. Many of the persons attracted thither were desperate and reckless men, disreputable, and altogether dangerous, who were turbulent and aggres- sive, calculating on their "backing" by the United States authorities and the presence of the soldiery. One of these men was a witness for the government in one of the Kuklux cases— "Whistler by name— about thirty years of age, illiterate, apparently addicted to liquor, and ill- looking. Col. Lamar's law ofSce opened on the same stairway and passage as the Federal court room. As he approached it on this occasion he found a scene of excitement and turbulence. Whistler was beating a citizen of the town named Kelly, an old man, poor, under the influence of liq- uor, and unable to defend himself. So great was the commotion that the court, which was engaged in hearing a bankruptcy case, was dis- turbed, and the judge ordered a deputy marshal to arrest the parties and turn them over to the Mayor of the town, who had police powers. In the meantime Kelly had appealed to Col. Lamar for protection, to which Whistler replied by swearing at the Colonel. The latter applied to the Mayor, whose office was in the same passageway, to have the man arrested, and passed on; but the arrest was not made. When the deputy marshal reached the scene Whistler had his pistol out, and seemed to be trying to shoot Kelly. The deputy arrested both parties and carried them before the Mayor. He then started to return to the court room, where he was needed; but hearing the noise renewed, he saw Whistler violently struggling to draw his pistol again. The deputy then turned back toward the scene of violence, but Whist- ler's pistol was taken from him by a man named Eoberts, and he went off with a party of soldiers. The deputy then returned to the court room. In the afternoon the prosecution against some of the alleged Kuklux 132 LUCIUS Q. a LAM All: f)risouers was taken up. Col. Lamar was iu the court room, and. seeing tlie deputy, asked of him the name of the man whom he had arrested, and what had been done with him. He was told the name, also that "Whistler was there as a witness for the United States; that he had been delivered u^j to the Mayor, but that he had walked off before the Mayor's face with some soldiers. The Colonel then said that the dei:)nty shouLl have held him in custody, for he had himself seen him insulting and threatening peaceable citizens. The deputy answered that he would arrest him again, and give him up to the town marshal. The Colonel replied: "No; the town authorities seem powerless in presence of the soldiers. I will speak to Judge Hill about it." About this time Whistler came into the court room and took a seat on the steps leading up to the dais occupied by the jixdge, and conse- quently within the space reserved for the members of the bar, officers of the court, jury, etc. At this time Col. Lamar and Marshal Pierce were engaged in a whispered jocular conversation. There was a cessa- tion of proceedings before the court, and the Colonel, seeing Whistler, arose. He made a motion, ore le/nis, that the coxirt have Whistler ar- rested and placed under a peace bond. He proceeded to give his reasons, stating the facts in the case, and was saying that Whistler was evidently a violent, turbulent man, who should be placed under restraint, when Whistler arose. He approached the Colonel. He was armed with a large pistol, which was in a scabbard attached to a belt around the waist; and as he aj)proached he was trying to draw the weapon. The Colonel was not armed. He said to the judge: " I ask your Honor to make this man take his seat and keep it until I finish my statement." Then he seized a chair and raised it, saying: "If the Court won't make you, I will." Whistler jumped backward, and the Colonel put the chair down. The Court commanded order. Various officials scattered about the room shouted out, "Arrest Col. Lamar! arrest Col. Lamar!" and one of them said to some soldiers present as guards to the prisoners, "B}- virtue of the authority of the United States I order you to arrest that man " (pointing to the Colonel ) ; to which one of them replied, " We are not under your orders." The Colonel protested that he had done nothing to justify arrest. The deputy approached him for the purpose of quieting matters, and was about to place his hands upon him when the Colonel waved him aside without touching him, saying: "I am committing no disorder." Marshal Pierce then came running i;p, followed by other persons. He jumped in between the Colonel and Whistler, and seized both, turning his face toward Whistler. His iDurpose was pacific; but the Colonel neither recognized him nor knew of his purpose, and struck him with his fist a quick, severe blow upon the jaw, which dislocated the jaw, and sent him sprawling. Then there was a great excitement. The United States HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 133 Attorney demanded that the Ci)lonel be arrested. No one paid any at- tention, however, to Whistler. Mr. Emory, the foreman of the grand jury, rushed out and returned in a very short time on the double-quick with another squad of soldiers, with guns in hand, one of whom advanced within the bar. The judge continued calling upon the Colonel to ob- serve order, and threatening his arrest. When the soldiers came in the confusion became greatly intensified. Two gentlemen who were armed — E. O. Sykes, an attorney from Aberdeen, one of the Colonel's former law students, and Maj. Thomas Walton, a Kepublican, afterwards United States Attorney — sprang to his side, pistols in hand, to defend him or fall with him. Matters assumed a most dangerous appearance; the ominous click of the military rifles sounded through the room, and had the soldiei's not behaved with great discretion bloodshed might have followed. Meanwhile the Colonel had become greatly exasperated. He continued to address the Court, saying in substance that he had seen Whistler commit the assault, and that he would not sit quietly by and see an uuofi'ending citizen struck down without raising his voice. He denounced the parading ot soldiery in the courts in times of profound peace. When the Court threatened to have him arrested he said at first that he might be sent to jail, but that he regarded the jail now as a more suitable place for gentlemen than most others. After the soldiers M'ere brought in and their guns were cocked, becoming much incensed, stand- ing on his tiptoes with his clinched fists shaking over his head, and his face blazing with wrath, he declared that if they undertook to put him in jail the streets should "swim in blood." The citizens of the town, hav- ing gotten news of the occurrence, began to run in. Gen. Featherstone and Col. Manning, friends of the Colonel, here requested him to desist from speaking and to go with them into an adjoining room. This he did at once, catching himself short up as he often did in his passions. After a very short absence he returned, made some pacific remarks, and apologized to the Court for his part in the disturbance. When he had taken his seat Marshal Pierce came forward and said: "I ask the Court to place Col. Lamar under arrest for striking me in open court." The Colonel sprang to his feet and said: " I am sure the Court will not make that ordei'. I did not strike him until he tried to arrest me unlawfully." The marshal replied: "I did not approach you for the purpose of ar- resting you; I only wanted to give you friendly counsel." "Then," said the Colonel, " I regret very much that I struck you. I hope you are not hurt," stating, besides, that he did not know at the time that it was the marshal. The two men entered at once into an amicable expla- nation, and Col. Lamar repeated his apology to the Court. The soldiers afterwards discussed the matter with some of the citizens. Their ser- geant said: "We didn't want to hurt him; we never saw a better fight or heard a better s^jeech. He hadn't broken any law." 134 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: Col. Lamar's apologies were accepted by the judge, and the incident was supposed to be terminated; liut on the next day, without notice to him, the following order was entered ui)ou the minutes: Whereas a most unfortunate and much to be regretted difficulty occurred in tlie presence of tiie Court on yesterday, in which Col. L. Q. C. Lamar, a member of the bar of this court, was a party; and whereas soon tliereafter the said Lamar made an apology to the Court which was satisfactory to the judge of the court as an individual, yet, being the judicial representative of the LTnited States forthe time being, the judge of the court deems it necessary for the vindication of the court and the government that the name of said L. Q. C. Lamar be stricken from the roll of attorneys theieof, and that he be prohibited from practicing as an attorney and counselor therein. This action on the part of the Court excited great surprise and no little indignation amongst the members of the bar. The newsiDapers, which contained accounts of the fracas, made emphatic comments upon it; the Cbirion, for instance, saying that "It will detract nothing from his fame as a lawyer and as a high-toned, chivalric gentleman, in the highest sense of the term." The attorneys of the court bestirred them- selves to memorialize the Court for his reinstatement; but he forbade them to do so, maintaining that he had done nothing but what was his right in protecting himself in a very moderate manner from a murderous assault, in the first instance, and from an unlawful and oppressive arrest, as he deemed it, in the second. He declined to be placed in the atti- tude of a petitioner for pardon. After a few days of cooling time, how- ever, the district attorney of his own motion moved the rescission of the order, which motion was promptly granted, and amicable relations re- stored. The affair, however, was much distorted and misrepresented. The radical papers made much ado over it. The versions varied, but all de- picted a scene of great and unprovoked violence. The university students were asserted to have rushed into the bar, and to have joined in the row; the Kuklux prisoners were depicted as vaulting over the railing of the bar, with cheers, to take part, etc. — of all of which not a word was true. The matter was even exj^loited in the Kuklux report of Con- gress as in some surt a Kuklux performance, and as connecting the Colonel with the Klan in some undefined manner. During his later career this affair was occasionally made the text of assaults upon the Colonel by his political enemies. "When in the Sen- ate, he had reason to expect that Mr. Blaine would recur to it in one of their ccmtroversies, and ho prepared himself to meet the charge with evidences of such character that he regretted that the j)oint was not made. "When he was named for Secretary of the Interior the matter was revived; and again, in a general assault upon him by the Trihiiup, of New Y(n-k, when he was nominated for tlie Supreme Bench. On the latter occasion Col. I'ierce, the ex-marshal, gave him a written statement HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 135 of the whole afPair, from which the main features of the foregoing nar- rative were taken, and which closed with the following paragraphs: I was appointed Marshal of the United States for the Northern District of Missis- sippi during June, 1870 (reappointed June, 1874), and had my oflice at Oxford, the home of Col. Lamar, wliose acquaintance I soon liad the pleasure of making, and whom I afterwards knew well. Our relations, otlicially and personally, were always most pleasant, as also were his with the other otlicers of the court. I had known that it was mainly due to his eflbrts and personal influence that a riot was averted at Oxford, at an election held during November, 1869; and from in- tercourse with him I knew him to be conservative, law-abiding, and considerate of the views of other men. Knowing his great ability, his extensive knowledge of our institutions, and liis conservative tendencies, and lielieving that he could best repre- sent the people of that district, I favored liis election to Congress, and voted for him. This, be it remembered, when the ReiDiiblicaus had a candidate in the field. ■ On the same occasion Judge Hill, in a letter of July 5, 1887, said: I was shown, a day or two since, by a friend of you and myself, a copy of the Ti'ih- une, in which there is an allusion to a difficulty whicli occurred in the court at Ox- ford, regretted by no one more than yourself, the allusion to which is regretted by no one more than myself. I trust that it will not be alluded to again. If so, and it be- comes necessary, I will do all in my power to render it harmless to you, as well as to myself. It occurred under most extraordinary circumstances, its disposition was at the time satisfactory to all concerned, and it ought to be buried in the sea offorgetful- ness. In the autumn of this year (1871) the county officers and members of the State Legislature were to be elected. An active canvass was made by the Democratic-Conservative party, one of the features of which was a series of joint discussions between Gov. Alcorn and Hon. Robert Lowry. They met at Holly Springs on the 9th of October. Col. Lamar happened to be in the town on business connected with his profession. There was a discussion in the morning between the two canvassers, and a second bout was projected for the evening. Gen. Lowry, however, was taken sick; and Col. Lamar, who was in the audience, was called upon — mainly through the instrumentality of his former young partner, Mr. E. D. Clarke — to represent the Democratic champion in this emer- gency. " Imagine my consternation," writes the Colonel afterwards to a friend. " I had not made a political speech in ten years, and was almost ignorant of the current campaign politics. I had heard Alcorn's speech in the morning, but not with any view to controverting its positions. I had not a document to verify my statements, nor a note with which to refresh my memory. But my friends would hear to no refusal ; so I rose and opened the debate. I replied to Alcorn's morning speech, but my re- marks took a very different range from what had got to be called ' the issues of the canvass.' But I had good reason to flatter myself that, while I did not meet the nat- ural antici]iations of what the occasion required, my speech answered more to the hid- den thought and to the hearts of my audience than if I had followed the established 136 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR. lines. It certainly disconcerted Alcorn so much that he was unable to get along in his reply, though usually a most irrepressible ' slangwhanger.'" Certainly the sijeecli was a successful one. The newspapers of the day gave it very comijlimentary notices. Mr. Clarke writes him, under date of the 13th of October: With the general approbation that your speech has elicited, the complimentary things that Alcorn said of you, and the opportunity that you had of being a little mag- nanimous toward him, I tliink that it was altogether a field ivisioii and Ueiiiiiuu," AVilson, j).2Gr. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 147 But these acts? did not only establish martial law in time of profound peace, did not only suspend the writ of habeas corpus and sweep away every vestige of republican government in ten States, did not only enact a bill of attainder against nine millions of people at once;* they also invaded the recognized prerogative of the States, a prerogative recog- nized throughout the whole history of the Union, and recognized now, to determine upon whom the right of suflVage should be conferred; and while withdrawing that right from the great mass of the most intelli- gent and influential citizens contrary to the State laws and constitutions conferred it upon a million of ignorant and recently emancipated ne- groes, wholly unjjrepared by either traditions or education to act upon even the simplest political questions, and set those negroes to making constitutions which should not only dominate the fortunes and the lib- erties of the whites, but also establish themselves in power. The military commanders entei'ed at once upon the discharge of their duties. Their powers were dictatorial not only in political matters, but also in those appertaining to the ordinary business aiTairs of the commu- nity. They could abolish charters, extend franchises, stay the collec- tion of debts, prohibit the foreclosure of mortgages, levy taxes, impose fines, inflict penalties, authorize the issuance of bonds and the contract- ing of State debts, set aside the decision of the courts, remove all offi- cers, and fill all vacancies without the form of elections. They issued general orders, difl'ering in some respects, but generally to the efiect that the laws of the States would be enforced; that officers engaged in the discharge of their duties would be continued except in cases where the commander should see proper to remove them for cause; and that the courts should continue to discharge their functions, sub- ject, however, to the intervention of military commissions and inspect- ors at the discretion of the commander. The practical operation of these measures was catastrophic. Shoals of unscrupulous adventurers appeared, few knew from whence. Loud in their professions of loyalty, they assumed the leadership of the inex- perienced, credulous, and timid blacks, infusing into their minds the most extravagant ideas of private rights and public duties, inspiring them with dislike of their former owners, and organizing them into leagues of secret nature, but political use. An extraordinary carnival of crime and plunder was opened. Bribery, embezzlement, perjury, in all forms ruled the hour. In a few months negro majorities gained complete control of the State governments, and these majorities were implicitly obedient to their white manipulators, the "carpetbaggers." The ranks of these latter gentry were to some extent reenforced by na- tive whites, who were even more detested by the Southern people under the name of " scalawags." Taxes were piled up and enormoiis debts were *" Three Decades of Federal Legislation," Cox, p. S77. 148 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAR: accumulated, the proceeds of both of which went mainly into the pock- ets of these adventurers aud the prominent negroes, their confederates. Hajjpy indeed was that State whose credit was not good, for its disre- pute was its only salvation. No civilized country ever before had pre- sented such a scene. One of the most distinguished and honored gentlemen in Mississij)pi * said of these jDeople iu a public address delivered in 1875: The Government of the United States " proceeded to sponge out the constitutions of eleven great commonwealths, to overturn tlieir governments, to reverse tlieir social systems, and in eflect to prescribe new constitutions for them. Unfortunately the party which controlled it sought to exliibit it, and did exhibit it, only in its aspect of boundless authority. In their hands it seemed to have unlimited power to tear down and to wound, without the power to build up and to heal. Confronted by the most novel and formidable social and political problem ever presented to the statesmanship of any country, and which, God be praised, can never again be presented in this, they recklessly turned over the Southern States thus dislocated as so much food to the lowest grade of hungry partisans, leaving the adjustment of the grave difliculties in- volved in these great fundamental changes to the most ignorant, narrow-mindeil, and selfish class of men that ever bore sway in any country; men atflicted with what ap- pears like moral idiocy, and to whom the sense of public duty is as color to the blind. It is not to be wondered at that these men at once formed a partnership with the newly enfranchised slave — a most unequal partnersliip as it has turned out — to cap- ture and ' run' the State governments of the South. That which has followed might have been foreseen. ... I assure you that the fact has become known at last to the American people that the only oppression in the South is the oppression of the whites by colored majorities led by radicals. To my mind it has now become clear as the noonday sun that the only intimidation here is the intimidation by a few hundred radical adventurers of the whole population. AVith unparalleled au- 326. HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. 163 After the rightful occupant had been ejected Geu. Ames took posses- sion of the niansiou and of all the public buildings and archives." * This summary ejection of the Governor, it is needless to say, was much resented by the people of the State. It was considered as done in the interest of Eggleston's candidacy, at his instigation, and it was understood to mean that Congress would not only not tolerate any op- position to its methods, but also none to its instruments, noble or igno- ble. The appointment of Gen. Ames, who was an alien to the State, without part or lot in its fortunes or sympathy with its people, was regarded as no less worse than the removal of Humphreys. But the indignity of his appointment soon shrank into insignificance before the wrath kindled by his administration. No temperate terms will de- scribe the humor with which the people of the State regarded him. His rule was deemed to be stupid and blundering, oppressive, lawless, and self-seeking. The radicals did not acquiesce in the rejection of their constitution and the defeat of their ticket. On the contrary, encouraged by the election of Gen. Grant to the Presidency, and speculating on his sup- port, they appointed a committee of sixteen to endeavor to induce Congress to declare the constitution ratified and the Eggleston ticket, elected, by throwing out the returns from seven of the counties of the State, on the ground that the majorities returned therefrom were ob- tained by fraud and intimidation. To meet this movement ex-Senator A. G. Brown, Jiadge Simrall, and other gentlemen repaired to Wash- ington. They were aided by certain of the moderate Eepublicans of the State, led by Judge Jeffords, of the High Court of Errors and Ap- peals. Their efforts succeeded. The President recommended that the constitution should be submitted anew, with the privilege of a sepa- rate vote on the prescriptive features. This action was induced by as- surances that the people would accept the constitution without diffi- culty if such a course should be adopted. Accordingly, Congress so enacted, providing at the same time that full tickets of State officers and Congressmen should be voted for. In their i-esistance to the committee of sixteen, a certain part of the Ee- publican party of Mississippi had parted, or " bolted," from the radicals; and as the spring and summer of 1S69 passed it became manifest that there was an irreparable breach. Tlie more moderate Piepublicans ef- fected a separate organization, taking the name of the National Union Eepublicans. At their State convention this party declined to make any nominations, for the time lieing, for a State ticket; and the leaders of the Democratic, or conservative, party began to discuss the advisability of cooperating with it in the approaching elections. '•' History of Mississippi," Duval, 213. 164 LUCIUS Q. C. LAMAR: lu their resistance to the committee of sixteen also, ex-Senator Brown and his associates had received in Washington quite material aid and comfort from Hon. Louis Dent, a Mississippian by adoption and brother-in-law of the President. They remembered his labors in their behalf gratefully; and when the political forces began to gather, Senator Brown, in an open letter, suggested Judge Dent as a man available to defeat the radicals. It was supposed that his relationship to the President would be influential in his favor. The National Union Eepublicans later nominated Judge Dent as their candidate; and gave recognition to the Democrats, or conservatives, by offering Gen. Eobert Dowry as their candidate for Attorney-general, thus pre- senting a fusion ticket. This ticket received the support of the Dem- ocrats and conservatives. The radicals placed a full ticket in the field, led by James L. Alcorn, of Coahoma County, as candidate for Governor. Judge Dent made a canvass of the State, holding joint discussions with Gen. Alconi. The former in November paid a visit to Prof. Lamar in Oxford, and consulted him about his cuurse; but except to advise, Mr. Lamar took no part in the campaign. The expectation that the President would give moral support to the candidacy of Judge Dent was disappointed. Tlie movement in favor of liberal Republicanism, as a shield against radicalism, won no enthu- siasm. At the elections in December the constitution was ratified by an almost unanimous vote, and its proscriptive clauses were rejected in the same emphatic manner; but Alcorn was elected by a vote of 7(),- 186, against Dent's 38,097, while the radicals also elected all of the Congi-essmen and three-fourths of the State Legislature. The effect upon the State of the establishment in power by this election of the radicals, and the effect of the same misfortune upon Prof. Lamar's individual history, have been narrated in the preceding chapters. He resigned iu June, 1870; and the Iliad of the State's woes was continued and made even more tragic. Still a further trouble, and one deeply felt, indeed, grew out of the Kuklux prosecutions of 1S71 and the following years. The Kuklux Klan was an oath-bound, secret organization, first heard of iu Tennessee in 1868. The society soon spread into other Southern States. Its avowed object was to break up the Loyal Leagues, which were oath-bound, secret organizations of the negroes made by the "carpetbaggers " for the purpose of keeping up, at fever heat, the sen- timent of loyalty to the Republican party, and which were worked as political machines from the start. It was proposed in the begin- ning to effect this object by working on the superstitious fears of the negroes. Grotesque disguises were adopted, the most fantastic lit- erature was employed, with ghostly apparitions, etc.; but later, as HIS LIFE, TIMES, AND SPEECHES. ' 1G5 was inevitable, resort was had to violence. The victims of violence were either negroes or whites who made themselves obnoxious by acts of oppression, or acts considered to be injurious to the local welfare. There was no concerted sj-stem. The disturbances were limited to a few localities. Their work and misdeeds were disapproved by the great body of the Southern people. They were, however, the natural and certain offspring of the oppressions of the reconstruction laws, and of the dis- turbed social conditions arising from their enforcement. In April, 1871, Congress made these offenses punishahle in the Fed- eral courts, and authorized the President to suspend the writ of lidheas corpus when necessary to the i^reservation of order. Troops were to be emijloyed to enforce the law. Apart from the question of the cou- stitiitiouality of the law itself, had these measures been wisely and hu- manely employed to supress the evil, it would have been well enough; but the tremendous enginery put in operation was managed by the same reckless and unscrupulous class of aliens, " carpetbaggers and scalawags" already described. They perverted it from its just design. In many of the judicial districts, instead of using it for the maintenance of g(jod order, it was used to rivet still further the shackles upon the people by establishing the radicals in power. It was distorted into an instru- ment for the gratifying of private enmities and grudges. It was prosti- tuded into a money-making machine by hordes of ■ profligate deputy marshals, who spied out the land and worked up prosecutions yielding- enormous costs. Witnesses found out that the heavy j)er diem fees and the large mileage allowed realized pretty sums, and they were not lacking. It was not an unknown thing for witnesses to be summoned to the seat of a court from long distances under subpoenas which held them from term to term, even during the vacations; and so tliey were enabled to draw ^Jf>r dlfm compensation during the whole period, while at the same time hiring out for wages in the usual manner. The courts were thronged with poor people who had been dragged from their homes under groundless charges, with their women and children along as wit- nesses on expenses; and vacant lots in the court towns were frequently covered with the tents which sheltered them. What approval the good people of the State would have felt for a proper administration of the law was lost in a sense of outrage at beholding a widespread and re- lentless persecution, conducted to a great extent by men who were well known to be of the most desperate and lawless character, under pretense of loyalty to the government. It was commonly asserted, and was cer- tainly believed, that much f)f the lawbreaking which was charged to the Kuklux was in fact done for political eifect by the Loyal Leagues or their emissaries. No adequate description can now be given of the cli- ablerie which was carried on by the rulers. The "carpetbaggers and scalawags" were beginning to quarrel amongst themselves over the 166 LUCIUS Q. a LAMAk: spoils; aud their mutual crimiuations auJ recrimiuations, their vilifica- tions of each other, quite equaled or exceeded in bitterness aud magni- tude anything which the Uem