Robert Toombs to E. B. Pullin and Others.[i]
Washington, Ga. Dec. 13, 1860.
Gentlemen: Your letter of the 10th. inst., inviting me on behalf of the citizens of Danburg and its vicinity to address you at an early day, was received yesterday. I regret very much that my public duties deprive me of the pleasure of accepting your kind invitation. But I shall be compelled to leave for Washington city day after tomorrow, and unless the state of the public business will allow me to return during the Christmas holidays I shall have no day at my command before your election; if I should return, I will take great pleasure in meeting you in council on the state of the country. The legislature of Georgia have unanimously declared that the present crisis demands resistance, and have unanimously voted to call a convention of the people to determine the mode and measures of redress. This is plain language—it is easily understood. It proposes to resist wrongs at the time and in the manner best calculated to obtain redress. The Legislature also unanimously voted a million of dollars to arm the people of Georgia, in order that they may repel by force whatever force may be brought to resist the measures of redress the people may adopt.
Then, upon the question that we have wrongs and that we intend to redress them by and through the sovereignty of Georgia, the state is unanimous. What then is likely to divide us? It cannot be the mode of redress, for it seems all look to secession, separation from the wrong doers, as the ultimate remedy. The time when this remedy ought to be applied seems to be the most important, if not the only point of difference between us; we ought not to divide upon this point. Many persons think the remedy ought to be applied immediately, others at a day not to extend beyond the 4th of March next, others again supposing that too short a time for the convenient action of the abolition states would extend it only to what might be fairly deemed a reasonable and convenient time within which our wrongs might be redressed by the wrong doers. I would strongly advise that there be no division among those who hold either of those opinions. While I personally favor the position of those who are opposed [to] delaying longer than the 4th of March next, I certainly would yield that point to earnest and honest men who were with me in principle but who are more hopeful of redress from the aggressors than I am, especially if any such active measures should be taken by the wrong doers as promised to give us redress in the Union. But to go beyond the 4th of March we should require such preliminary measures to be taken before as would with reasonable certainty lead to adequate redress, and in the mean time we should take care that the delay gives no advantages to the adversary and takes none from ourselves.
But let us not deceive ourselves as to what is redress and how we can secure it in the Union. The open and avowed object of Mr. Lincoln and the great majority of the active men of his party is ultimately to abolish slavery in the States. This he himself expressly avows, and there is not a single public man of his party in the United States within my knowledge who does not avow his hostility to the relation of master and servant as it exists among us. The means by which they seek to accomplish this result are many, but all consistent and all efficient to produce that result. The first is that we shall be driven out of the Territories by law. Upon this Mr. Lincoln and his party are unanimously agreed; and it is the corner stone of the entire Abolition party in the United States, and is planted in the Chicago platform. This they propose to do in violation of the Constitution of the United States as generally construed from the beginning of the Government and in express violation of that instrument as expounded by the Supreme Court of the United States.
2. They propose to exterminate slavery by abrogating by State laws, that portion of the Constitution which provides for the return of fugitive slaves to their owners.
3. To weaken and destroy it by protecting those who steal slaves and murder the inhabitants of the slave-holding States in pursuit of revolutionary schemes for its abolition, in direct violation of that clause of the Constitution which requires such criminals to be given up.
4. To destroy it by exciting revolt and insurrection among the slaves; this the pulpit, the press, the political orators, and indeed we may say the great body of the abolition party in Congress, in the State Legislatures, and everywhere else, are daily endeavoring to accomplish.
How is it possible to remedy these enormous evils in the Union? There is but one mode, one only; all others are delusions and snares, intended to lull the people into false security, to steal away their rights, and with them the power of redress. This mode is by amendments to the Constitution of the United States. In the Union the States cannot make contracts with each other; all departments of the government would disregard them. To repeal laws hitherto passed by the Abolition States would not redress; they would reenact them next year. The amendment of the Constitution should be such as could neither be evaded or resisted by the Abolition States, and should not rest for their efficiency upon the oaths of Abolitionists—no oaths can bind them.
The Constitution provides two modes for its own amendment. Article 5th is as follows on the point before us: “The Congress, whenever two-thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, which shall be valid, to all intents and purposes as part of this Constitution when ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the States or by conventions in three-fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress,” etc.
Thus, you perceive, the road is plain, it is easily tested; you can here find a test which ought to satisfy every honest resistance man in Georgia. Do this: offer in Congress such amendments of the Constitution as will give you full and ample security for your rights; then if the Black Republican party will vote for the amendments, or even a majority of them in good faith, they can be easily carried through Congress; then I think it would be reasonable and fair to postpone final action until the legislatures of the northern States could be conveniently called together for definite action on the amendments. If they intend to stop this war on your rights and your property, they will adopt such amendments at once in Congress; if they will not do this, you ought not to delay an hour after the fourth of March to secede from the Union. This is a constitutional and effectual ultimatum, means something, can be tested—can be tested at once. This will be putting planks where they are good for something if they are the right kind of planks; but putting planks in your Georgia platform is putting them where our experience teaches us they are powerless for good, and only subject us to the jibes and jeers of our enemies. A cart load of new planks in the Georgia platform, will not redress one wrong, nor protect one right of the people of Georgia. Demand additional constitutional securities from your confederates, and if they are refused, confederate with such of them as are willing to grant them, or defend them yourselves.
[i] From the Southern Recorder, Milledgeville, Ga., Dec. 25, 1860. Pullin was the chairman of a committee of citizens of Danburg, a village near Washington, Ga.
From Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1911.
Robert Augustus Toombs was an American lawyer, planter, and politician from Georgia who became one of the organizers of the Confederacy and served as its first Secretary of State. He served in the Georgia House of Representatives, the US House of Representatives, and the US Senate. In the Confederacy, he served in Jefferson Davis’ cabinet as well as in the Confederate States Army, but later became one of Davis’ critics.