Plan of Secession.
The
Columbus (Ga.) Sun suggests the following plan of settling the Secession question:
‘
- 1.
The eight cotton States--South Carolina' Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, and Arkansas--shall consult together, and their destiny in this crisis shall be the same; all shall act together; all shall either remain together in the Union, or all together shall go out of the Union.
- 2. It shall be understood that a majority of the people in these States shall control the matter for them all — and in order to carry out this programme--
- 3.
Let a Convention of the people be called in each State, and let it be understood when
the vote is taken in each of those States for delegates, that the first question is, shall those eight States remain in the
Union, or shall they together go out?
4. Let there be a Convention or Congress of these eight States; let each appoint a delegation equal to its present representation in Congress--
Georgia being entitled to ten delegates.
5. Let the
Convention in each State delegate to its representatives to this Southern Congress all the powers that the
Convention itself has, which will be sovereign and supreme over this question.
6. When this Southern Congress meets, it will have full power to settle this question for those eight States; and let a majority of the delegates in this Congress have power to bind all by their action.
7. Let the first question before this Congress be, shall those eight States remain in the
Union, or shall they go out together and form a Southern Confederacy?
8. In the event they go out of the
Union, this Congress will have power to organize at least a temporary Confederation; and in the event they determine to remain in the
Union, then I propose that--
9. They (this Congress) shall agree upon some efficient plan of retaliatory legislation, to be recommended to the several Legislatures of those States; and that such retaliatory legislation should be the most stringent and efficient that can be devised.
’
