December 1860. |
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| Signatures of the Committee on Address to the Slave-labor States. |
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States,” and noted the fact, that the gold and silver of the National Government was the legal tender in South Carolina.
And so the argument went on. Barnwell was for sacrificing postal conveniences rather than seem to have any connection with the United States. “There never was any thing purchased,” he said, “worth having, unless at the cost of sacrifice.”
Rhett said:--“This great revolution must go on with as little change as possible,” and thought the best plan was to use the United States officers then in place.
“By making the Federal agents ours,” he said, “the machinery will move on.”
This was finally the arrangement, substantially.
On the 21st,
the Convention appointed Robert W. Barnwell, James I. Adams, and James L. Orr, Commissioners to proceed to Washington, to treat for the possession of the National property within the limits of South Carolina.
On the same day, the Committee appointed to prepare an “Address of the people of South Carolina to the people of the Slaveholding States,” made a report.
It was drawn by the
chairman, R. B. Rhett, and bore in every sentence indications of the characteristics of that conspirator.
It was remarkable for a reckless disregard of truth in its assertions, and its deceptive and often puerile logic.
It did not, in a single paragraph, rise above the dignity of a partisan harangue.
It professed to review the alleged grievances suffered by South Carolina in the Union, but it actually stated not one that might be perceived by the eye of truth.
The fact that her politicians had twice placed her in an attitude of hostility to the National Government, to whose fostering care and protection she was indebted for her prosperity and respectability, was shamelessly and ostentatiously paraded; and it was asserted that the Government of the United States was no longer a “Government of Confederated Republics, but of a consolidated Democracy ;” that the Constitution was but an experiment, and as such had failed; that the relations of “the South to the North” were
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