CHAPTER 16
. . . a buzz of excitement here today in anticipation of the session of the Peace Convention. Numerous arrivals of delegates and spectators took place yesterday, and still continue.
—ALBANY JOURNAL, FEBRUARY 5, 1861
All political circles at Washington seem to coincide in the conclusion that unless this conference effects something, the fifteen southern states will be out before the middle of March.
—NEW HAMPSHIRE SENTINEL, FEBRUARY 7, 1861
Fillmore ~ Buchanan ~ Tyler ~ Lincoln ~ Pierce
On February 1, 1861, Texas, which had entered the Union after so much struggle and turmoil, whose maintenance in that Union had come at such a high cost, decided to leave. The twenty-eighth state cited violations of the fugitive slave law, the threat of the abolition movement, and the success of the Republican Party.*
* The Texas declaration clauses read: “We hold as undeniable truths that the governments of the various States, and of the confederacy itself, were established exclusively by the white race, for themselves and their posterity; that the African race had no agency in their establishment; that they were rightfully held and regarded as an inferior and dependent race, and in that condition only could their existence in this country be rendered beneficial or tolerable.
“That in this free government all white men are and of right ought to be entitled to equal civil and political rights; that the servitude of the African race, as existing in these States, is mutually beneficial to both bond and free, and is abundantly authorized and justified by the experience of mankind, and the revealed will of the Almighty Creator, as recognized by all Christian nations; while the destruction of the existing relations between the two races, as advocated by our sectional enemies, would bring inevitable calamities upon both and desolation upon the fifteen slave-holding states.
“By the secession of six of the slave-holding States, and the certainty that others will speedily do likewise, Texas has no alternative but to remain in an isolated connection with the North, or unite her destinies with the South.”
The following day, Congressman Elbridge Spaulding wrote his most famous constituent, Millard Fillmore, to let him know that the petition signed by him and twenty-three thousand citizens in favor of the Crittenden Compromise had been introduced in the House. “Much depends on the vote of the people of Virginia on Monday next,” he wrote, referring to the elections for the Secession Convention. But in any event, Spaulding cautioned, “our people ought to prepare for the worst.”
That day Charles Sumner, recovered and returned to the Senate, visited the White House. “What, Mr. President, can Massachusetts do for the good of the country?”
“Much,” Buchanan said, “no state more.”
“What is that?”
“Adopt the Crittenden proposition.”
“Is that necessary?” Sumner asked.
“Yes.”
“Mr. President, Massachusetts has not yet spoken directly on these propositions. But I feel authorized to say—at least I give it as my opinion—that such are the unalterable convictions of the people, they would see their state sunk below the sea and become a sandbank before they would adopt these propositions.”
On February 3, John Tyler returned to Washington to attend the Peace Conference. The next day, he was elected to Virginia’s secession convention from the district covering James City County, Charles City County, and New Kent. Of 76 electors present, all but 11 gave Tyler one of their votes. Buchanan was encouraged by the results, noting that a very large majority of those elected to consider secession were “in favor of remaining in the Union.”
The New York Herald took note of these results, but pointed out that Unionists had won their votes upon the hope of compromise from the Peace Conference. The paper predicted that the first fact presented to the secession convention would be the failure of the Peace Conference, which could revolutionize Virginians in a single day.
To Washington Tyler brought with him Julia, his son Alex, age twelve, and his baby daughter Pearl, who had arrived two months after her father’s seventieth birthday. Visitors surrounded the old president and his young family. The most coveted dinner invitations arrived, but Tyler chose to rest instead, taking a dose of mercury and going to sleep. He was “quite tired out with the fatigues of the day,” Julia wrote, “but he is in stronger condition to bear up than for many a day, and looks well. They are all looking to him in the settlement of the vexed question. His superiority over everybody else is felt and admitted by all.”
The night they arrived, Julia wrote to her mother in Staten Island of her excitement “to be on hand at such a trying and exciting time to the President, and observe and listen to the doings of the convention, which has for me the most intense interest. Perhaps I am here during the last days of the Republic.” It was always “the President” to Julia, even when writing to her closest family member, never “John,” as if a reminder that in her youth, she had won over the most eligible man in the country. After their years in exile at Sherwood Forest, she reveled in their newfound status, as if she were once again the first lady. Julia wrote her mother of their impressive accommodations and private parlors. “The President’s center table is loaded with correspondence from every quarter. There seems to be a general looking to him by those anxious to save the Union. I wish it might be possible for him to succeed in overcoming all obstacles. They all say, if through him it cannot be accomplished, it could not be through any one else.” One former governor attending the conference told her of “the immortality he [Tyler] would achieve . . . if he could bring all the discordant elements together.” Daniel Barringer told her “President Tyler has had the great happiness accorded him of living to see himself fully appreciated. All party feelings have faded away, and his old enemies are among his warmest friends.”
The Peace Conference of 1861, upon which rested the best and final hope to avoid war, opened at the same time of another meeting in Montgomery, Alabama. Delegates from the seceded states gathered to form the Confederate States of America, and elect Jefferson Davis as president. Peace Conference delegates were badly divided, with those from the North and South required to use different entrances. But on their second day, in the hall of the Willard Hotel, the convention was unanimous in choosing a president. John Tyler assumed the chair to great fanfare and spoke to the delegates. He talked of the Founding Fathers and the difficult origins of the government under the Constitution. “You have before you, gentlemen, a task equally grand, equally sublime, quite as full of glory and immortality. You have to snatch from ruin a great and glorious Confederation, to preserve the government, and to renew and invigorate the Constitution. If you reach the height of this great occasion, your children’s children will rise up and call you blessed. I confess myself to be ambitious of sharing in the glory of accomplishing this grand and magnificent result. To have our names enrolled in the Capitol, to be repeated by future generations with grateful applause—this is an honor higher than the mountains, more enduring than the monumental alabaster.”
Tyler went through the roll of states, listing with each its contributions to the Union, along with the names of its great citizens. While heeding Tyler’s inspiring call to meet the demands of the occasion, the delegates knew their efforts would be vanity if they could not convince President-elect Lincoln, who would soon be joining them to learn of their findings.
Meanwhile, events outside the Willard were proceeding badly. Congressional attempts at compromise had failed. Senator William Latham of California wrote Franklin Pierce of his exasperation. “I cannot tell you how blind the Republican leaders are in this body. Secession seems to them ‘a grand joke.’” Latham continued, stating that he was “not without hope, and if the border states remain firm, and we can get the question before the people, I believe permanent guarantees will be conceded to the south, after which, a party will spring up in the states now gone, which I hope will eventually bring them back.”
Despite Latham’s hope, the negotiations over Fort Sumter were getting worse. The new secretary of war, Joseph Holt, answered South Carolina’s proposal to buy the fort from the United States. Holt explained the title “is complete and incontestable. If, with all the multiplied proofs which exist of the President’s anxiety for peace, and of the earnestness with which he has pursued it, the authorities of that state shall assault Fort Sumter, and peril the lives of the handful of brave and loyal men shut up within its walls, and thus plunge our common country into the horrors of civil war, then upon them and those they represent must rest the responsibility.”
At 3:00 p.m. on February 8, John and Julia Tyler called on the president. Tyler explained that Isaac Hayne, South Carolina’s attorney general, considered Holt’s letter insulting. Buchanan assumed this to be a pretext, for the letter itself contained nothing to give offense. Buchanan added that Hayne’s letter to him was “one of the most outrageous and insulting letters” ever addressed to any head of government. Tyler promised to ask him to withdraw the letter. Could he telegraph Governor Pickens to relay what Buchanan said about Holt’s letter to Hayne? He was at perfect liberty to do so, Buchanan said, believing the letter would speak for itself. Tyler had another request. Let him tell Governor Pickens that the president would not reinforce the garrison at Sumter if Pickens would promise not to attack it. This would be “impossible,” Buchanan said. “I could not agree to bind myself not to reinforce the garrison in case I deemed it necessary.” Tyler asked Buchanan to remove all but an orderly sergeant and a guard at Fort Sumter to continue peaceful negotiations. Buchanan said if he did he would be burnt in effigy throughout the North.
“What of that, Sir?” Tyler replied. “In times as trying as these, have I not been burnt in effigy all over the land; and have I not seen through this window these grounds illuminated by the fires? But the light of those fires enabled me only the more clearly to pursue the path of duty.”