On The 18th Of April, 1860, Governor Hicks Issued A Proclamation To
The People Of Maryland, Begging Them To Be
Quiet, the chief object
of which, however, was that of promising that no troops should be
sent from their State,
Unless with the object of guarding the
neighboring City of Washington - a promise which he had no means of
fulfilling, seeing that the President of the United States is the
commander-in-chief of the army of the nation, and can summon the
militia of the several States. This proclamation by the Governor
to the State was immediately backed up by one from the Mayor of
Baltimore to the city, in which he congratulates the citizens on
the Governor's promise that none of their troops are to be sent to
another State; and then he tells them that they shall be preserved
from the horrors of civil war.
But on the very next day the horrors of civil war began in
Baltimore. By this time President Lincoln was collecting troops at
Washington for the protection of the capital; and that army of the
Potomac, which has ever since occupied the Virginian side of the
river, was in course of construction. To join this, certain troops
from Massachusetts were sent down by the usual route, via New York,
Philadelphia, and Baltimore; but on their reaching Baltimore by
railway, the mob of that town refused to allow them to pass
through, - and a fight began. Nine citizens were killed and two
soldiers, and as many more were wounded. This, I think, was the
first blood spilt in the civil war; and the attack was first made
by the mob of the first slave city reached by the Northern
soldiers. This goes far to show, not that the border States
desired secession, but that, when compelled to choose between
secession and Union, when not allowed by circumstances to remain
neutral, their sympathies were with their sister slave States
rather than with the North.
Then there was a great running about of official men between
Baltimore and Washington, and the President was besieged with
entreaties that no troops should be sent through Baltimore. Now
this was hard enough upon President Lincoln, seeing that he was
bound to defend his capital, that he could get no troops from the
South, and that Baltimore is on the high-road from Washington both
to the West and to the North; but, nevertheless, he gave way. Had
he not done so, all Baltimore would have been in a blaze of
rebellion, and the scene of the coming contest must have been
removed from Virginia to Maryland, and Congress and the government
must have traveled from Washington north to Philadelphia. "They
shall not come through Baltimore," said Mr. Lincoln. "But they
shall come through the State of Maryland. They shall be passed
over Chesapeake Bay by water to Annapolis, and shall come up by
rail from thence." This arrangement was as distasteful to the
State of Maryland as the other; but Annapolis is a small town
without a mob, and the Marylanders had no means of preventing the
passage of the troops. Attempts were made to refuse the use of the
Annapolis branch railway, but General Butler had the arranging of
that. General Butler was a lawyer from Boston, and by no means
inclined to indulge the scruples of the Marylanders who had so
roughly treated his fellow-citizens from Massachusetts. The troops
did therefore pass by Annapolis, much to the disgust of the State.
On the 27th of April, Governor Hicks, having now had a sufficiency
of individual responsibility, summoned the legislature of which he
had expressed so bad an opinion; but on this occasion he omitted to
repeat that opinion, and submitted his views in very proper terms
to the wisdom of the senators and representatives. He entertains,
as he says, an honest conviction that the safety of Maryland lies
in preserving a neutral position between the North and the South.
Certainly, Governor Hicks, if it were only possible! The
legislature again went to work to prevent, if it might be
prevented, the passage of troops through their State; but luckily
for them, they failed. The President was bound to defend
Washington, and the Marylanders were denied their wish of having
their own fields made the fighting ground of the civil war.
That which appears to me to be the most remarkable feature in all
this is the antagonism between United States law and individual
State feeling. Through the whole proceeding the Governor and the
State of Maryland seemed to have considered it quite reasonable to
oppose the constitutional power of the President and his
government. It is argued in all the speeches and written documents
that were produced in Maryland at the time, that Maryland was true
to the Union; and yet she put herself in opposition to the
constitutional military power of the President. Certain
Commissioners went from the State legislature to Washington in May,
and from their report it appears that the President had expressed
himself of opinion that Maryland might do this or that "as long as
she had not taken and was not about to take a hostile attitude to
the Federal government!" From which we are to gather that a denial
of that military power given to the President by the Constitution
was not considered as an attitude hostile to the Federal
government. At any rate, it was direct disobedience to Federal
law. I cannot but revert from this to the condition of the
Fugitive Slave Law. Federal law, and indeed the original
constitution, plainly declare that fugitive slaves shall be given
up by the free-soil States. Massachusetts proclaims herself to be
specially a Federal law-loving State. But every man in
Massachusetts knows that no judge, no sheriff, no magistrate, no
policeman in that State would at this time, or then, when that
civil war was beginning, have lent a hand in any way to the
rendition of a fugitive slave.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 138 of 141
Words from 139856 to 140857
of 143277
