. The contest for California in 1861; how Colonel Baker saved the Pacific states to the Union . isarmy of oflBce-holders and returned to the nationalcapital. Speaking in the Senate, on the thir-teenth of December, 1859, shortly after his arrival,he said: — I believe that the slaveholding states of thisconfederacy can establish a separate and independ-ent government that will be impregnable to theassaults of all foreign enemies. They have the ele-ments of power within their own boundaries andthe elements of strength in those very institutionswhich are supposed in the North to be their weak
. The contest for California in 1861; how Colonel Baker saved the Pacific states to the Union . isarmy of oflBce-holders and returned to the nationalcapital. Speaking in the Senate, on the thir-teenth of December, 1859, shortly after his arrival,he said: — I believe that the slaveholding states of thisconfederacy can establish a separate and independ-ent government that will be impregnable to theassaults of all foreign enemies. They have the ele-ments of power within their own boundaries andthe elements of strength in those very institutionswhich are supposed in the North to be their weak-ness. ... I say that a dissolution of the Union isnot impossible, that it is not impracticable, andthat the Northern States are laboring under a delu-sion if they think that the Southern States cannotseparate from them either violently or peaceably;violently if necessary. They can take possession ofall the public property within their limits and pre-pare against any aggression from the non-slave-holding states or any power that may choose toinfringe upon what they conceive to be their DAVID COLBRITH BRODERICK INKLINGS OF SECESSION 65 It is because I believe they can separate, and thatthey will separate in the event to which I havealluded, that I have referred to the speech of theSenator from Alabama as a warning to every manwho loves this Union that now is the time to presentthe question in its true form, and that the electionof a Republican President is the inevitable destruc-tion of this confederacy. Doctor Gwin reminded the Senate that althoughthe recent elections had been favorable to theRepublican Party in every state on the Atlanticborder (a careless error, oblivious of the Caro-linas, Georgia, and Florida), the Pacific States hadnot fallen in with that trend. Looking back uponthe larceny of United States Government proper-ties by the seceding states, it is obvious that Gwinwas fully aware of the purpose of the secessionleaders and came near making an indiscre
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