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they would be more likely to fight the Confederates than the Nationals.
Davis was averse to a general arming of the negroes, but recommended the employment of forty thousand of them as pioneer and engineer laborers in the army, and not as soldiers, excepting in the last extremity.
“But,” he said, “should the alternative ever be presented of a subjugation, or of the employment of the slave as a soldier, there seems to be no reason to doubt what should then be our decision.”
But they never ventured upon the arming of the negroes.
And it was a significant indication of Davis's consciousness of the weakness of the hold of the Confederates upon them, either legally as slaves, or morally as men, that he suggested the propriety of holding out to the negro, as an inducement for him to give faithful service, even as a laborer in the army, a promise of his emancipation at the end of the war.1 It was tried in Richmond, and failed, for the negroes would not trust the Confederates.
Davis's proposition disturbed the slave-holders, and made all but Unionists uneasy, for it indicated an opinion on the part of the “Government” that the cause was reduced to the alternative of liberating the slaves, and relying upon them to secure the independence of the Confederacy, or of absolute subjugation.
The people had also observed, for some time, with gloomy forebodings, the usurpation of power on the part of Davis, and a tendency to the absolutism which precedes positive despotism.
At about the time we are considering, that feeling was intensified by a decision of George Davis, the Confederate “Attorney-General,” in a certain case, that the “Cabinet Ministers” must “see that all laws be faithfully executed,” even should they be clearly and expressly unconstitutional.2 This decision struck down the Constitution, the supposed bulwark of the liberties of the people.
There was wide-spread discontent; and when the news came that Mr. Lincoln was re-elected by an unprecedented majority, they lost hope and yearned for peace, rather than for an independence that proved to be less desirable than that which they had enjoyed under the Government they had rebelled against.
But Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee would not permit it, and the desolating war went on.
1 “This,” says a Rebel War Clerk's Diary (II. 326), “is supposed to be an idea of Mr. Benjamin, for foreign effect.” It is added, “the press is mostly opposed to the President's project of employing 40,000 slaves in the army, under promise of emancipation.”
2 See A Rebel War Clerk's Diary, II. 322. “It makes the President absolute,” wrote the Diarist. “I fear this Government, in future times, will be denounced as a cabal of bandits and outlaws, making and executing the most despotic decrees. This decision will look bad in history, and will do no good at present.” At page 334, the Diarist says: “Both Houses of Congress sit most of the time in secret session, no doubt concocting strong measures under the influence of the existing crisis. Good news, only, can throw open the doors, and restore the hilarity of the members. When not in session, they usually denounce the President; in session, they are wholly subservient to him.”
The Diarist further recorded, as follows, under date of January 7, 1865:--“How insignificant a legislative body becomes when it is not independent. The Confederate States Congress will not live in history, for it never really existed at all, but has always been merely a body of subservient men, registering the decrees of the Executive. Even Mr. Miles, of South Carolina, before introducing a bill, sends it to this department for approval or rejection.” --Volume II., page 379.
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