legal government was concerned, was conducted in good order, and every impediment to order which the Robinson government, or the Republican party, in and out of Congress, could invent, was intruded. A general election was ordered, by the Constitutional government, for the first Monday in January. The election could be valid, only as it included the objects for which it was ordered the choice of a member of Congress, a State Legislature, and certain other State officers. The revolutionists, however, who had refused to vote in December, on the ratification of the Constitution, and had then wilfully, by neglect, submitted to the ratification, by more than six thousand majority, now entered the contest, and prepared for the general election, of January, with tickets headed, "Against the LeCompton Constitution." The ballots so headed had attached the names of individuals for the various offices, which the election had been ordered to fill. Of these ballots 10,226 were certified by "Secretary and Acting Governor, J. W. Denver," an officer unknown to the law, and were sent forward by him with the "Topeka Constitution," to the chairman of the Senate Committee on Territories, Mr. Douglas. The President of the LeCompton Convention, Mr. Calhoun, forwarded to the President of the United States, the LeCompton Constitution, with the request that it be transmitted to Congress. It was now understood that Mr. Douglas had boldly taken sides with the revolutionists. After considerable delay, the President sent the LeCompton Constitution to Congress, on February 2, 1858, with a recommendation that the State, now in full organization, be admitted to the Union. Great excitement had prevailed throughout the country, in the period of the President's indecision as to what he would do with the LeCompton Constitution, and now that the message and the document were referred to Mr. Douglas' committee, excitement ran higher. Debate in both houses on the subject, in some aspect, continued in extreme bitterness three months, in course of which Mr. Douglas made the report of his committee, to which was attached the "Topeka Constitution." May 4, an act was passed to admit Kansas with the LeCompton Constitution, on "a fundamental condition precedent," that, by vote of the people, the new State would consent to certain dispositions of the public lands within its borders.

There was nothing in the LeCompton Constitution imposing upon Congress such a "condition precedent" to the admission of the State of Kansas. The LeCompton Convention had passed a simple Ordinance, claiming from Congress an unusually large area of public lands, for the benefit of the new State. California, when presenting her Constitution, had presented, also, an Ordinance, relating to the public lands, not acceptable to Congress, but the State was admitted regardless of the land ordinance, and the claim for lands was properly left open for future negotiation. The pretext now was sufficient. The friends of submission of the land proposition to the popular vote were foes to the admission of the State under its Constitution; those who desired to have a new Constitution, demanded this excuse to have one made. The State was excluded from the Union not because of any impediment in its organism, but merely because the sectional majority in Congress had found an opportunity to enforce, as in the original example of Missouri, the "great national policy" of enlarging the Union, by political communities created by itself, rather than by "States" admitted. The Legislature of Kansas, now in full possession of the revolutionists, called a Convention to meet at Wyandotte, in July, 1859, to frame another Constitution.

Upon the test vote in the Senate on the party question of accepting the LeCompton Constitution, and, impliedly, thus the Dred Scott decree, Messrs. Douglas, Stuart, from Michigan, and Broderick, from California, alone of Democrats, took sides with the Republicans. Accordingly, Mr. Douglas, so long in trying times identified with reform legislation, as chairman of the Senate Committee on Territories, was deposed from that position. His courage deserted him not for a moment. With ceaseless energy he held up to the country his resolve to unite the West and the South, to defeat the Republican party. The free States were never served, if in vain, by a more far seeing statesman than he. No statesman ever undertook a more conscientious or more impossible task.

CHAPTER 18.

The People Consider.

1858-1859.

Mr. Yancey's public life now became very active and important. The campaign of 1856 bore rich fruit in Alabama. The general elections of August, 1857, were carried by the State Rights party by increased majorities. Andrew B. Moore, a South Carolinian by birth and in political faith, was chosen Governor. Houston and Cobb, national Democrats, were, as usual, elected in the upper Districts, but in the remaining five Districts pronounced State Rights Democrats were chosen-Stallworth, from the First, Shorter, from the Second, Dowdell, from the Third, Sydenham Moore, from the Fourth, and J. L. M. Curry, from the Fifth. The delegation to the House was not only ardent in its Southern sympathies, but very capable in point of intellect. In the Montgomery District the contest was extremely close between Mr. Dowdell and Mr. Judge, one of the ablest of State Rights Whigs. Mr. Yancey assisted Dowdell, but Judge came within less than twenty votes of election. The resumption by Mr. Yancey of the leadership of the masses of his party, while apparently acquiesced in by them, in the progress of the campaigns of 1856 and 1857, was not received by some strong men as a final condition. There was a determined effort, set on foot in 1858, and continued, to overcome his control. Mr. John Forsyth, a gentleman of rare accomplishments and high ability, was the leader of the opposition. In the last year of the Pierce

Administration Mr. F. S. Lyon, of Demopolis, sat next the President at dinner at the Executive Mansion. The President remarked to Mr. Lyon that it would please him to appoint an Alabamian to the Mexican mission and requested to have the suggestion of a name from Mr. Lyon. The name of Mr. Forsyth, then the young editor of the Mobile Register and one of the most devoted of Yancey's followers, of 1851 and 1856, was given. Mr. Forsyth remained at the Mexican mission a year after Mr. Buchanan came into office. He resigned and returned in ill humor toward the Administration at the time the Kansas question separated Mr. Douglas from it. Forsyth and Douglas, congenial spirits, at once became fast friends. A perfect confidence, beautiful to witness, prevailed between the men. Both men turned against Yancey with a single purpose. A strong man, a leading Secessionist of 1851, joined them, Colonel John J. Seibles. Seibles put up, or had established for his control, a daily newspaper, at Montgomery, the Confederation, which, tho' less polished in its satire than the Register, was not less active and vehement in its opposition.

In the season of suspense in the public mind, relating to the course the President might pursue, in withholding or recommending the LeCompton Constitution, the hopes of the Southern people were revived in the promise of an outlet for their enterprise in the countries to the southward. The just and reasonable ground of their expectation will be discovered in the various opinions of the officers of the federal government, officially presented from an early time until now. The first annual message of President Fillmore, in 1850, said:

"The company of citizens of the United States who have acquired from the State of Nicaragua the privilege of constructing a ship canal between the two oceans, through the territory of that State, have made progress in their preliminary arrangements. The treaty between the United States and Great Britain, of the 19th of April last, above referred to, being now in operation, it is to be hoped that the guarantees which it offers will be sufficient to secure the completion of the work with all practicable expedition. * Citizens of the United States have undertaken the connection of the two oceans by means of a railroad across the Isthmus of Tehauntepec, under grants of the Mexican government to a citizen of that Republic. * Negotiations are pend

*

ing for the accomplishment of that object, and the hope is confidently entertained," etc.

General William Walker, a citizen of the United States, friendly to Southern institutions, was President of Nicaragua when Captain Hiram Paulding, of the navy of the United States, stationed in the waters of the Gulf, sent an armed force on Nicaragua soil, captured Walker, after some fighting, destroyed his stores and camp equipage, and took him aboard the American man-of-war, where some officers of the British navy were already assembled approving the act. The prisoner was carried by sea to New York. The United States had no case against him, and the President, not offering to bring him to trial, and not even seeing him, ordered his discharge; but without any apology or reparation for Paulding's illegal act. The free States applauded Paulding; the slave States received Walker with open arms in his tour, explaining to the people his conduct in Nicaragua as he proceeded. The middle of January, 1858, he arrived at Montgomery. The Legislature took a recess to receive him and offered the use of the Hall of the House for the purpose. Walker spoke, followed by Elmore, Yancey and others. Passing on to Mobile, the distinguished soldier was received there with extraordinary honors. Resolutions passed a public meeting to employ counsel to prefer charges and specifications against Captain Paulding, to supply the neglected duty of the President. The morning after the Walker meeting at the Capitol the Confederation published a sarcastic criticism upon the tone of the speeches of some of the local orators, attacking Yancey's in pointed terms. "There is a plan to induce the Southern people to join the Free Soilers in breaking down the Administration," the editor proclaimed; tho' the course of the Admin-. istration on the vital issue of the day was then unknown. A few days later it declared: "Several of the speakers at the Walker meeting the other night joined the Know Nothings in denouncing the Administration." These editorial premonitions were followed by a circular issued from the Confederation office, carried about the Capitol and through the city, calling a public meeting "to sustain the Administration." The call for the indignation meeting, at the Capitol, was signed by some. Democrats and refused by many. It was not offered for Mr. Yancey's endorsement, and when the names of the speakers were announced, in the newspapers, Yancey's was omitted, but