intercourse of the separated States. Every step taken by the
Confederate Government was directed toward that end. The
separation of the States having been decided on, it was sought
to effect it in such manner as would be just to the parties con-
cerned, and preserve as far as possible, under separate govern-
ments, the fraternal and mutually beneficial relations which
had existed between the States when united, and which it was
the object of their compact of union to secure. To all the
proofs heretofore offered I confidently refer for the establish-
ment of the fact that whatever of bloodshed, of devastation, or
shock to republican government has resulted from the war, is
to be charged to the Northern States. The invasions of the
Southern States, for purposes of coercion, were in violation of
the written Constitution, and the attempt to subjugate sover-
eign States, under the pretext of "preserving the Union," was
alike offensive to law, to good morals, and the proper use of lan-
guage. The Union was the voluntary junction of free and
independent States; to subjugate any of them was to destroy
constituent parts, and necessarily, therefore, must be the de-
struction of the Union itself.

That the Southern States were satisfied with a Federal Gov-
ernment such as their fathers had formed, was shown by their
adoption of a Constitution so little differing from the instrument
of 1787. It was against the violations of that instrument, and
usurpations offensive to their pride and injurious to their inter-
ests, that they remonstrated, argued, and finally appealed to the
inherent, undelegated power of the States to judge of their
wrongs, and of the "mode and measure of redress."

After many years of fruitless effort to secure from their
Northern associates a faithful observance of the compact of
union; after its conditions had been deliberately and persist-
ently broken, and the signs of the times indicated further and
more ruthless violations of their rights as equals in the Union,
the Southern States, preferring a peaceful separation to continu-
ance in a hostile Union, decided to exercise their sovereign right
to withdraw from an association which had failed to answer the
ends for which it was formed. It has been shown how they
endeavored to effect the change with strict regard to the princi-

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