Howell Cobb’s Address to the People of
Georgia, December 6th 1860
Does the election of Lincoln to the
Presidency, in the usual and constitutional mode, justify the Southern States
in dissolving the Union?
The constitutional rights and guarantees
claimed by the Southern States are briefly:
1. That
the Constitution of the United States recognizes the institution of slavery as
it exists in the fifteen Southern States.
2. That
the citizens of the South have the right to go with their slave property into
the common territories of the Union, and are entitled to the protection for
both their persons and property from the General Government during its
territorial condition.
3. That
by the plain letter of the Constitution the owner of a slave is entitled to
reclaim his property in any state into which the slave may escape, and that
both the General and State governments are bound by the Constitution to the
enforcement of this provision.
The antagonism between these recognized
rights and the doctrines and principles of the Black Republican party is plain,
direct and irreconcilable. The one or the other must give away.
On the 4th day of March 1861 the
Federal Government will pass into the hands of the Abolitionists.
I entertain no doubt either of your right or
duty to secede from the Union.