The Secession and reconstruction of Tennessee. A dissertation, etc

Front matter

TTbe "Clntverstts of Chicago FOUNDED BY JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER THE SECESSION AND RECONSTRUCTION OF TENNESSEE A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTIES OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOLS OF ARTS, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE, IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY BY JAMES WALTER FERTIG, A. M. CHICAGO abe TUntversttg os Chicago prees CONTENTS. Bibliography, ------- Pages 7 Introduction, 9 Chapter I. Secession, ------- 15 Chapter II. Military Government, - 34 Chapter III. The Brownlow Government, ... 61 Chapter IV. Federal Reconstruction, ... BIBLIOGRAPHY. The following books and papers have been consulted and of use in the preparation of this dissertation: found sources. Acts of the General Assembly of Tennessee 1861. Acts of the General Assembly of Tennessee 1865. Acts of the General Assembly of Tennessee 1865-6.

Acts of the General Assembly of Tennessee 1866. House and Senate Journals for the same sessions. Congressional Globe of 37th, 38th, and 39th Congresses. Reports of Supreme Court of U. S. Reports of Supreme Court of Tennessee. Report of the Reconstruction Committee of 1866. Report of the Frazier Impeachment Trial. Report of the Memphis Riots of May, 1866. Papers of the Southern Historical Society. Papers of the Tennessee Historical Society. Reports of Contested Elections in Congress of 1863. Rebellion Records. Vols. I to XVI. Files of the Nashville Dailies: Daily Banner. 1860-1862, 1864-1866. Daily Union. 1862-1865. Patriot. 1 864- 1 866. Dispatch. 1862-1866. Union and American. 1865-1866. The Rebellion Record.— Frank Moore. Vols. I to XII. Political History during the Civil War. — McPherson.

Annual Register for 1861-6. Am. Ann. Cyclopedia. 1860- 1866. Reports on the Conduct of the War. AUTHORITIES. Blaine — 20 Years in Congress. Birkimer — Military Government and Martial Law. BIBLIOGRAPHY. Brownlow — Parson Brownlow's Book. Caldwell — Constitutional History of Tennessee. Chittenden — Report of the Secret Session of Peace 1861. Committee Cox, S. S. — Three Decades of Federal Legislation. Draper — American Civil War. Herbert — Noted Men of the South. Hume's Loyal Mountaineers. Houghton — History of American Politics. Lindsley— Military Annals of Tennessee. Loring — Reconstruction. Lossing — Civil War. Miller's Manual of Tennessee. Nicholay and Hay, Life of Lincoln. Phelan — History of Tennessee. Scott — Reconstruction during Civil War. Taylor — Destruction and Reconstruction. Victor — History of Southern Rebellion.

Introduction

. The triumph of the federal arms in the American Civil War only placed upon the federal government a greater task. The sword could conquer but could not convince, could overthrow the Con federacy but could not reestablish the Union, which then became a political necessity and a constitutional obligation of the government no less to the North than to the South. The North was com pelled for its own sake to make the South equal with it in every sense, for to have held the South as a conquered province would have soon wrought the destruction of the Northern states as states. The Constitution could not long have stood the strain of two sorts of governments among states nominally and constitutionally equal. The re-admission of the seceded states to all their original rights under the Constitution was a problem which demanded immediate solution, but its complexity required time.

The re-admission of the states was not the only question involved in reconstruction. The admission of four millions of people, morally low, poverty-stricken and ignorant, as constituent members of the bodies-politic, and their transformation in a day into a people cap able of performing the duties of citizenship in a highly civilized, self-governng society, was a question more difficult to solve. In fact, upon the question of the freedmen the whole subject of the re-admission of the states turned. Almost every act, either of Con gress, of the President, or of the states themselves, was viewed in the light of its effect upon the negroes. It would perhaps have been just as well for all concerned if the Federal Government had left this matter entirely to the states, as it was done in the border states, but this was not in harmony with the policy of the party in power.

The Federal Government had in the end to give the question over to the states. The question of the freedmen, how ever, although so intimately connected 'with the restoration of the states, must, in the present treatise, for obvious reasons, be left for the most part untouched. Another important factor in the problem of reconstruction was

INTRODUCTION.

. the fact that it must be solved by the leaders of the party in power, whose preceding history rendered them least fit for such a task. The Civil War had greatly excited their passions, and, almost every day, they had stepped beyond the usual limitations of the Con stitution, until it had become a habit with them to decide all questions according to their feelings rather than according to law. Dur ing the war, they had looked upon the Federal Government as pos sessing both the authority of a constitutional sovereign and all the rights of war accorded to a belligerent by the law of nations.1 As the constitutional rights were limited, they came more and more to rely upon the more vague and undefined powers confirmed by the laws of war. And, when the war was over, they applied to the questions of reconstruction the same absolutism which they had employed during the war.

They were evidently wholly unfit for the settlement of so important a matter, but as they were the party in power, they alone could solve it. This necessity, how ever, made the solution of the problem the more difficult. How to solve the problem the men in power could not agree. The difficulties in the way were almost insurmountable. The questions of law would not harmonize with the facts. There was, indeed, only one solution and that was found, not in the states manship of the Federal Government, nor in the virtues of the freed men, nor in the good temper and good policy of the South, but in the good common-sense of the whole American people. The sense of fairness in the people led to the revival of the principle that the people must be trusted — the fundamental principle of the Con stitution.

The Republic of the Constitution could only be saved by the application of this principle to the whole country. To this principle of the Constitution the politicians had at last to yield and to leave the question of the social status and business relations of the freedman to be solved by himself and his former owner. The judiciary was the first to make this change from the way of the politician. In the case of Texas v. White, the Supreme Court reasserted the principle that our country is "an indestructible Union of indestructible states."2 The people recognized this as a principle long cherished, and began to retrace their steps and to I. McPherson's History of Rebellion, 326. 2. 7 Wall, 700.

INTRODUCTION.

. 11 revise their sentiments to harmonize with it. Thus it was, long after the war closed, that the real Union was reetablished, and this not by solving the questions of law, for they were unable to do that, but by closing the question of fact. The logical as well as chronological beginning of the history of reconstruction was the appointment of a Military Governor for Tennessee. In the work of Governor Johnson one sees not only the first military government of an American state, but what is more important, the work of the man, who, as President, resumed the work of reconstruction as it fell from the hands of President Lincoln. In the military government and the Military Governor of Tennessee one sees the future of reconstruction and the policy of the future "reconstruction President." This fact makes the re construction of Tennessee of greater importance than it would other wise be, and gives additional weight to every word and act of Gov ernor Johnson.

In the "Address to the People of Tennessee" of March 12, 1862, Governor Johnson declared that he was appointed as "military" governor, in "absence of the regular and established state author ities," for the purpose of "restoring her government to the same condition as before the existing rebellion." ' More than three years afterwards, in the summer of 1865, he, as President, appointed provisional governors for the states "deprived of all civil government" for the purpose of enabling "the loyal people of said state to organize a state government." In the proclamations of 1865, we see President Johnson pursuing a policy of reconstruction of which his own appointment as Military Governor of Tennessee was the inception. There were other respects in which Tennessee held a unique position during the period of her reconstruction.

She was the last state to secede and the first one to succumb to federal arms — only eight months intervening between the "Declaration of Inde pendence" and the appointment of Governor Johnson. For this reason she was less attached to the Confederacy and less affected by Confederate administration than any other of the seceded states. She was the only seceded state not mentioned in the Emancipation Proclamation and the only one which had the nominal honor of 1. See "Appeal" Union, April 10, 1862.

INTRODUCTION.

. freeing the slaves. Her geographical position and the direction of her rivers gave easy entrance to both armies and made her soil little else than a camping-ground or a battlefield. Four hundred engagements were fought within the state/ Every able-bodied man was compelled to enter one or the other army in order to secure protection. The result of this is seen in the number of troops fur nished by the state, which was greater than that furnished by any other state, either North or South. From a male population, which cast 145,000 votes at the presidential election of 1860, came 115,000 troops for the Confederate army, and 31,000 for the Union army.2 Tennessee was the only one of the seceded states which had so considerable a body of citizens who remained constantly loyal to the Union. As a consequence she was the only one which escaped military reconstruction, and the only one in which the battle for political power was fought out between factions of native whites.

She escaped the ignominy and burdens of "carpet-bag govern ment" and military reconstruction, but the strife between her own people, the effects of which may be seen at the present time, was the penalty which she paid for the privilege. Because the people were so nearly equally divided, the struggle was the more intense, but for the same reason it was the sooner ended. In one other respect Tennessee held an exceptional position. The re-organization of the state was in the strictest sense a voluntary movement, which fact, apparent to all, won for her many friends in the North, especially in Congress, and gained her early readmission to the Union. The history of the reconstruction of Tennessee is a drama in three acts and a prologue. The prologue deals with the secession movement, a knowledge of which is necessary to an adequate under standing of the subsequent history, for it was in the secession movement that the division of the people into parties began.

The first act begins with the appointment of Governor Johnson and deals with the military administration. The second act begins with the re-organization of the state government in April, 1865, and gives the history of that government to July, 1866, when the state was 1. Miller's Manual, p. 93. 2. Miller's Manual, p. 132.

INTRODUCTION.

. 13 formally readmitted to the Union. The third act gives the history of federal reconstruction to the last-named date. To each of these divisions a chapter has been given in the following pages. As has been said, Tennessee was the last state to secede. The genuine patriotism of a majority of her people was sufficient to prevent secession until after the war had begun. Her commercial and economic relations bound her to both sections. Her geo graphical situation caused her to dread war, for she foresaw that her soil must become the field of battle. She, therefore, assumed what she called an attitude of neutrality and tried to maintain the peace and to reestablish the Union. The failure of the Peace Conference on which she had counted so much, and the attack on Fort Sumter drove her from her nominal neutrality into co-operation with the South.

The life of the secession government in Tennessee was short, for it abdicated as the result of the first battle in the state/ The chapter on this period is in no sense a discussion of the question of secession, which was settled once and for always by the arbitra ment of the sword, but it is merely a narrative of the events by which the state was carried into the Confederacy, and the inevit able consequences of these events upon the people. The overthrow of the secession government, made necessary the appointment of a military governor. Governor Johnson made attempts immediately and at several times thereafter to re-organize the civil government of the state, but all these attempts failed, until the people of East Tennessee undertook the task in the summer of 1864. The movement started by them at this time led, by suc cessive steps to the inauguration of the Brownlow government in April, 1865.

Having refused to secede, and having taken the leading part in the re-organization of the state, East Tennessee naturally thought she had a right to conduct the affairs of the state after re-organization, as a reward for her faithfulness and sufferings. With the inauguration of the Brownlow administration she undertook the task and the next five years were filled with the history of that government. The present treatise covers only a portion of the period. A very interesting chapter including the Ku Klux move- 1. Ft. Donelson, Feb. 16, '62.

INTRODUCTION.

. ment, the economic history of reconstruction and the coup de main by which the Democrats gained control of the state government in 1869, is still to be written. From the very inauguration of the Brownlow government, the great question before it was how to prolong the rule of the Radical Party in the state, for upon that depended not only the interests of the party, but also the reconstruction of the state. The Federal Government began the war with the theory that the states were in the Union and pledged itself to restore them at the close of the war with all their equality, rights and dignities unim paired. But long before the close of the war, largely owing to the spirit enkindled by the severity of the conflict and the desire to interfere in the states in behalf of the negroes, the theory of simple restoration was given up, and the theory substituted that the federal government had a right to impose conditions upon the states prec edent to their readmission to participation in the government of the Union.

This was the reconstruction theory of reestablishing the Union. The question of the nature of the conditions fo be imposed and what department of the government should impo»e them led to a long and bitter contest among the different factions in Congress, and between Congress and the President. This contest had already been waged for two years, when, in December, 1865, the Senators and Representatives from Tennessee appeared in Washington and asked to be admitted to seats in the national councils. Congress refused to admit them until the state had been declared a member of the Union by a formal act of the legislative power of the United States. For almost eight months they were kept waiting, when, July 23, 1866, the state was declared by joint resolution to be thereby restored to the Union. The next day the entire delegation was admitted to seats, and the state was restored to all her rights under the Constitution.

Chapter I. Secession

The first attitude of Tennessee on the questions dividing the North and the South immediately before the outbreak of the Civil War was one of nominal neutrality. This attitude was fore shadowed by the action of her delegates in the Charles ton Convention of 1860. They voted against the South ern proposition to give slavery carte blanche in the territories, and met afterwards with the Northern delegates at Baltimore, but when the Baltimore convention refused to readmit the delegates who withdrew at Charleston, the Tennessee delegates, believing a compromise no longer possible, withdrew and joined the other Southern delegates in nominating Breckinridge, thus forecasting the attitude and action of their state in the secession movement. In the Presidential election which followed, the state gave another example of her neutral attitude by casting her electoral vote for her own son, John Bell, the National Union candidate, who stood for the Constitution and the laws as they then existed and opposed alike the doctrines of the Democrats and Republicans.

This electoral vote fitly represented the sentiments of the people. They were in fact neutral because opposed to both the extreme parties, and not merely because they were unable to agree among them selves. Although Lincoln had not received a single vote in the state there was no cause to fear any opposition from her citizens. They had expected his election and were prepared to do their duty under the Constitution. When the Legislature of South Carolina took the first steps toward secession the people of Tennessee, though inclined to ridi cule its action, were disgusted and indignant. The following quo tations from the leading papers of the state correctly represent the prevailing sentiment: "We take it to be certain that Abraham Lincoln has received the majority of the electoral votes required by the Constitution to make him president-elect of the United States.

However much we may deplore such a result we accept it as the result of our system of free government in which it is our duty to acquiesce. The South, in giving him a fair trial, will but discharge her duty to the founders of the Republic, and exhibit to the world the dignity of a brave and gallant people who, while asking only what is right, are calmly self-reliant in their ability to repel whatever is wrong." ' "We entertain no doubt as to where the people of Tennessee now stand and will continue to stand with reference to the results of the Presidential election. The prevalent sentiment in Tennessee is that disunion is no remedy for existing evils — if evils really do exist, peculiarly and exclusively Southern — or for evils threatened as likely to result from the constitutional election of any man to the Presidency, though he were ten times as hostile to the Southern Institutions as Abraham Lincoln is represented to be." !

"Let every man put his foot on disunion. It is no remedy for Southern wrong, or it is only the madman's remedy." 3 An open letter from ex-Governor Neil Brown, published in all the journals of the state, exhorted the people to stand by the Union, since there was every reason to believe that President Lincoln would administer the government in a conservative manner, and would do the South no injustice in the matter of slavery in the territories because there were no territories belonging to the Union where a Southern man would care to take his slaves/ The newspapers of the state were full of such addresses from influential men. The fact that ex-Governor Johnson, one of the United States Senators, and a majority of the Representatives were uncompromising Union men, further served to steady public senti ment.

The strong Union sentiment in Tennessee, although not the result of, was in a large degree dependent upon, the attitude and acts of the other Southern States. A few days after the election of Lincoln were sufficient to show that South Carolina would, with out doubt, execute her threat of secession, and the spread of the I. Memphis Bulletin, Nov. 12. 2. Nashville Banner, Nov. 13. 3. Memphis Enquirer, Nov. 13. 4. McPherson, War of Rebellion, p. 86. contagion southward and westward depended upon the action of Georgia. So long as Georgia and Tennessee upheld the federal Constitution South Carolina was isolated, for the Gulf states would hardly dare to move without the assurance that Georgia at least would go out with them. Thus it was that Tennessee, feeling that the destinies of the Union were largely in her keeping, with a confident air held to her neutral policy, hoping to act as peace maker between the hostile parties.

The safety and success of this policy depended not upon Tennessee, however, but upon Georgia, and when the Legislature of the latter state November 18th, de cided to call a state convention to take action on the question of secession, and appropriated $1,000,000 to arm the state, the neutral policy of Tennessee was materially weakened. This policy was further weakened when the Legislature of Georgia adopted, De cember 3, a resolution proposing a conference of all the slave holding states. This action of the Legislature of Georgia played into the hands of the secessionists in Tennessee. Under pretext of advocating this conference, meetings were held in various parts of the state for the purpose of creating and organizing secession sentiment. A large meeting in Memphis declared that Tennessee would stand by the convention of the Southern states for weal or woe.

Petitions were signed at these meetings asking the Governor to convene the Legislature to appoint delegates to the proposed con ference. Governor Harris, warmly sympathizing with the secession movement, and maintaining an active correspondence with its leaders in other states, was not slow to act on these petitions, for he hoped by convening the Legislature to commit the state to some plan of co-operation with the other Southern states. Accord ingly, on the 8th of December he issued his proclamation calling the General Assembly to meet in extra session, January 7, 1861. The purpose of the session as expressed in the proclamation was "to consider the present condition of the country," a phrase sufficiently indefinite to cover secession or any measures less radical/ The proclamation of the Governor was regarded as a victory by the secessionists, and they were further encouraged by President 1.

House Journal, Jan. 7, 1861. Buchanan's message denying the power of the Federal Government to coerce seceded states. The secession of South Carolina, De cember 20th, and the manifesto of Robert Toombs to the citizens of Georgia two days later, announcing the failure of the Crittenden compromise, were to them occasions of great rejoicing, and evidences of ultimate success. Ratification meetings were held in all the larger towns of Middle and West Tennessee. Speeches were made en dorsing the action of South Carolina and recommending Tennessee to do likewise, newspaper offices were illuminated, and fifteen guns were fired indicating that the slave-holding states would all follow the example of South Carolina. This was the usual program/ It was hoped by this course to create a public sentiment in favor of secession which would influence the Legislature, then about to meet, to submit an ordinance of secession to the popular vote.

The Legislature convened January 7, and, by the election of Breckinridge Democrats to all the offices in both houses, gave evi dence of the change of sentiment in the state. The Governor, in his message, advised that the question of calling a convention be sub mitted to a vote of the people, although he thought the remedy for the present evils lay in amendments to the Federal Constitution. As suitable amendments, he suggested that the Missouri Com promise be reenacted and that the line be extended to the Pacific ocean; that any state refusing to return fugitive slaves should pay the owner twice their value; that security to masters in traveling with slaves through a free state be guaranteed, and slaves lost in transit be paid for by the state in which the loss occurs; that the abolition of slavery in places where the United States have exlusive jurisdiction be prohibited; and, finally, that these provisions be unalterable except by the unanimous consent of all the slave-holding states/ In the event that the amendments failed to pass, Tennessee, he said, must maintain her equality in the Union or her independ ence out of it."

In order that the state might be prepared for any event he recommended the organization of the militia and the immediate purchase of arms. The course of events in other states tended greatly to strengthen 1. Memphis Daily Avalanche, Dec. 23. 2. Message Acts, ex. sess., 1861. 3. Ibid. the cause of the secessionists in Tennessee. Before the Legislature met, Governor Ellis of North Carolina had already taken charge of certain forts and arsenals in that state. Governor Harris' mes sage had scarcely been read, when the news came that The Star of the West had been driven from Fort Sumter by order of the state of South Carolina. The next day Mississippi seceded. The next day and the day following added Florida and Alabama to the list. When the convention of Georgia on the 17th, after a few hours discussion, adopted an ordinance of secession by a vote of 208 to 89, the Unionists in the Legislature of Tennessee could no longer hold out against the secessionists, and on the 19th an act was passed submitting the questions of secession and of calling a convention to a vote of the people, February 9th.1 After appointing delegates to a convention of the Southern States, the Legislature adjourned to await 'the action of the people.

The ready compliance of the Legislature with the recommenda tions of the Governor alarmed the Union people. The Nashville Daily Banner, of January 26th, warned every citizen to be aware of a treacherous conspiracy to break up the government, and de manded that every man should rise in his might and put down the political tricksters. Whatever occasion there may have been for alarm, it must be admitted that a certain controlling conservatism manifested itself in the work of the Legislature. It is true that it endorsed the position of the Governor that additional guarantees to the South should be made a condition of Tennessee's remaining in the Union, but it determined that the state should not be pre cipitated into secession by a mere faction. The people were to have an opportunity to choose delegates to the convention with respect to their attitude on the question of secession/ Then if the convention decided to make any change in the relations of the state to the Union, the people were to have another opportunity to vote against secession.

Finally, to make secession valid, it must be carried by a vote equal to the majority vote at the gubernatorial election of 1. Acts, ex. sess., 1861, p. 15. 2. See ordinance, Acts, p. 15- 1859. These provisions were intended as safe-guards against hasty and thoughtless revolution. Before the day set for the election arrived the Peace Conference met at Washington and in the hope that some compromise would yet be adopted the people cast their votes in favor of the Union and against the calling of a convention. They were too strongly attached to the Union to vote to leave it so long as there was any hope of peace. The proposition to call a convention was negatived by a vote of 69,675 to 57,798/ East Tennessee voted against it 5 to 1, Middle Tennessee by a majority of 1,382, while West Tennessee gave a majority of 15,118 for it/ It was thus decided that a convention was not necessary to de termine the status of Tennessee.

The people were afraid that a convention might, as in other states, carry the state out of the Union, contrary to their instructions. On the plain question of secession, the vote stood 24,749 for and 91,803 against, even'Mem phis giving a majority of 400 against it/ Thus did the people em phatically rebuke the action of the Governor and Legislature and justify the statement already made that they were overwhelmingly for the Union. This result is surprising in view of the fact that seven of the states had already seceded and had organized a Pro visional Government at Montgomery. From this time the loyal people thought that they had effectually killed the secession movement in the state, and were doubtless lulled into inactivity and a sense of security by their success. For two months after the election nothing occurred to change their sentiments, or to cause the state to alter its relations with the Union.

If the vote had been taken sixty days after the first election, the result would, unquestionably, have been the same. The Governor and Legislature were still a minority and they would have remained so, but for the attack on Fort Sumter. If there had been no war, Tennessee would never have left the Union/ The first news of the attack on Fort Sumter came with the i. Brownlow, 219. 2. Ibid, 220. 3.' Ibid. 4. Herbert, noted men of the South, p. 169. force and suddenness of an electric shock, and spread over the state with the rapidity of the telegraph. On that same day a vigi lance committee expelled Judge Catron from Nashville, because he would not resign his place on the federal supreme bench/ Every city and town in Middle and West Tennessee was the scene of en thusiastic demonstrations. Petitions and resolutions from all quar ters, unanimous in their demand for co-operation with the South, came pouring in upon the Governor.

The newspapers were full of flaming editorials, and letters and addresses from influential citizens/ So great was the sympathy for the Confederacy, that, when the call came from President Lincoln for two regiments to aid in suppressing the rebellion, Governor Harris felt that he voiced the sentiments of a large majority of the people in refusing to send the troops/ The bombardment of Fort Sumter settled the status of Tennessee. The first gun-shot drove her from her neutral attitude to that of cooperation with the Confederacy. The change in Tennessee is exemplified by the change that took place in Arkansas at the same time. The state convention of Arkansas had met the very last of March and had voted against secession 39 to 35, but as a compromise measure had agreed to submit the question to the popular vote at the state election in August.