The Permanency of Typewritten Records, 1899

From the Omaha Daily Bee on July 23, 1899:

Typewritten Records.

The permanency of typewritten records is a subject of no little importance says the Albany Law Journal, and it is worthy of note that a series of experiments is being conducted in Boston with a view of establishing the relative value of the leading brands of typewriter ribbons.  Robert T. Swan, the state commissioner of public records for the state of Massachusetts, is doing some good work in this direction.  He finds that of the different colors used for typewriter ribbons, the red, green, blue and purple are not permanent, black being the only one that will stand the test to which he subjects the writing.

The legislature of Massachusetts, which recently adjourned, passed an act permitting typewritten records to be accepted as official when approved by the commissioner of public records, New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey having previously taken similar action.  In other words, no such records will be accepted unless the materials used are up to the standard and the commissioner is expressly authorized by the statute referred to withdraw his approval at any time when he shall find that the articles used fall below such standard.  This is a very important matter which should be acted upon in every state, for the fading of public records so as to become illegible is something that ought to be carefully provided against, otherwise it were much better to keep in force the provision that legal records shall be written only with pen and ink.

It is possible, we think, to produce typewritten records that are quite as permanent as any produced by writing with a pen and in view of the greater legibility of the former, as well as their economy of production, it is desirable that this should be done.  While the states generally have no official corresponding to the commissioner of public records in Massachusetts, it out to be made somebody's business to supervise the matter of permanency of public records.

Pension Bill for Mexican War Veterans Stirred Sectional Emnity

In the below article, Senator Chandler states he was present at Jefferson Davis' Farewell to Congress, and accuses Davis of meticulously scheming to overthrow the U.S. government throughout his career.  So after you read this article, I encourage you to read my previous post containing Jefferson Davis' farewell speech, and think about whether you think that is a fair assessment.

"A Famous Feud." Omaha Daily Bee, Omaha, NE. July 23, 1899.

A Famous Feud.

Senator Chandler of New Hampshire, who has just had a warm controversy with his colleague, Senator Gallinger, over civil service reform, was the central figure in a famous controversy in the senate of 1879, of which ex-Senator Ingalls writes in the Saturday Evening Post of Philadelphia.  The pending question was a bill pensioning Mexican soldiers.  As this would include all southerners who fought in that war, the bill provoked a sectional debate.  Senator Hoar offered an amendment excluding Jefferson Davis from the operation of the act.  This precipitated a crisis.  Senator Garland eulogized the president of the confederacy and Senator Hoar retorted, "Two of the bravest officers of our revolutionary war were Aaron Burr and Benedict Arnold."

Senator Lamar jumped into the breach with an impassioned speech, concluding with these words: "When Prometheus was bound to the rock, it was not an eagle, it was a vulture that buried his beak in the tortured vitals of the victim!"

During this eulogy and exculpation of Jefferson Davis the northern senators sat in silence; the boldness of the performance was paralyzing; such an emergency had not been anticipated.  No one was ready.  The passionate and excited spectators in the galleries wondered why no champion of the north took up the glove.

Toward the close of the debate a note fluttered over the balustrade of the northeast gallery, and, wavering in the hot air, was caught in its descent by a page, who carried it to Senator Chandler of Michigan, to whom it was addressed.  It was written on a leaf torn from a memorandum book, without signature, and begging him in God's name to say something for the union soldiers and for the north.

He read the anonymous note brought from the gallery.  The black fury of his eyes blazed from the pallor of his face.  At the first opportunity he obtained the floor and delivered a tremendous philippic against Jefferson Davis.  It was evidently wholly unpremeditated, and therefore the more effective.

He said: "Mr. President, twenty-two years ago tomorrow, in the old hall of the senate now occupied by the supreme court of the United States, I, in company with Mr. Jefferson Davis, stood up and swore before Almighty God that I would support the constitution of the United States.  Mr. Jefferson Davis came from the cabinet of Franklin Pierce into the senate of the United States and took the oath with me to be faithful to this government.  During four years I sat in this body with Mr. Jefferson Davis and saw the preparations going on from day to day for the overthrow of this government.  With treason in his heart and perjury upon his lips he took the oath to sustain the government that he meant to overthrow.

"Sir, there was method in that madness.  He, in cooperation with other men from his section and in the cabinet of Mr. Buchanan, made careful preparation for the event that was to follow.  Your armies were scattered all over this broad land, where they could not be used in an emergency; your fleets were scattered wherever the winds blew and water was found to float them, where they could not be used to put down rebellion; your treasury was depleted until your bonds, bearing 6 per cent, principal and interest payable in coin, were offered for 88 cents on the dollar for current expenses, and no buyers.  Preparations were carefully made.  Your arms were sold under an apparently innocent clause in an army bill providing that the secretary of war might, at his discretion, sell such arms as he deemed it for the interest of the government to sell.

"Sir, eighteen years ago last moth I sat in these halls and listened to Jefferson Davis delivering his farewell address, informing us what our constitutional duties to this government were, and then left and entered into the rebellion to overthrow the government that he had sworn to support!  I remained here, sir, during the whole of that terrible rebellion.  I saw our brave soldiers by thousands and hundreds of thousands, aye, I might say millions, pass through to the theater of war, and I saw their shattered ranks return.  I saw steamboat and railroad train after railroad train arrive with the maimed and the wounded; I was with my friend from Rhode Island (General Burnside) when he commanded the Army of the Potomac and saw piles of legs and arms that made humanity shudder; I saw the widow and orphan in their homes and heard the weeping and wailing of those who had lost their dearest and their best.  Mr. President, I little thought at that time that I should live to hear in the senate of the United States eulogies upon Jefferson Davis living--a living rebel eulogized on the floor of the senate of the United States!  Sir, I am amazed to hear it and I can tell the gentleman on the other side that they little know the spirit of the north when they come here at this day and with bravado on their lips utter eulogies upon a man whom every man, woman and child in the north believes to be a double-dyed traitor to his government."

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Jefferson Davis' Farewell Address to the U.S. Senate

Today's post comes from The Great Parliamentary Battle and Farewell Addresses of the Southern Senators on the Eve of the Civil War by Thomas Ricauld Martin, published in 1905.  It is available on Google Books, here. 

Farewell Speech of Senator Jefferson Davis, U.S. Senator From Mississippi, on the Occasion of His Withdrawal From the U.S. Senate, January 21, 1861

Mr. Davis. "I rise, Mr. President, for the purpose of announcing to the Senate that I have satisfactory evidence that the State of Mississippi, by a solemn ordinance of her people, in convention assembled, has declared her separation from the United States. Under these circumstances, of course my functions are terminated here. It has seemed to me proper, however, that I should appear in the Senate to announce that fact to my associates, and I will say but very little more. The occasion does not invite me to go into argument; and my physical condition would not permit me to do so, if it were otherwise; and yet it seems to become me to say something on the part of the State I here represent on an occasion as solemn as this.

"It is known to Senators who have served with me here, that I have for many years advocated, as an essential attribute of State sovereignty, the right of a State to secede from the Union. Therefore, if I had not believed there was justifiable cause; if I had thought that Mississippi was acting without sufficient provocation, or without an existing necessity, I should still, under my theory of the Government, because of my allegiance to the State of which I am a citizen, have been bound by her action.  I, however, may be permitted to say that I do think she has justifiable cause, and I approve of her act. I conferred with her people before that act was taken, counseled them then that if the state of things which they apprehended should exist when the convention met, they should take the action which they have now adopted.

I hope none who hear me will confound this expression of mine with the advocacy of the right of a State to remain in the Union, and to disregard its constitutional obligations by the nullification of the law. Such is not my theory. Nullification and secession, so often confounded, are, indeed antagonistic principles. Nullification is a remedy which it is sought to apply within the Union, against the agent of the States. It is only to be justified when the agent has violated his constitutional obligation, and a State, assuming to judge for itself, denies the right of the agent thus to act, and appeals to the other states of the Union for a decision; but when the States themselves, and when the people of the States, have so acted as to convince us that they will not regard our constitutional rights, then, and then for the first time, arises the doctrine of secession in its practical application.

"A great man who now reposes with his fathers, and who has often been arraigned for a want of fealty to the Union, advocated the doctrine of nullification, because it preserved the Union. It was because of his deep-seated attachment to the Union, his determination to find some remedy for existing ills short of a severance of the ties which bound South Carolina to the other States, that Mr. Calhoun advocated the doctrine of nullification, which he proclaimed to be peaceful, to be within the limits of State power, not to disturb the Union, but only to be a means of bringing the agent before the tribunal of the States for their judgement.

"Secession belongs to a different class of remedies. It is to be justified upon the basis that the States are sovereign. There was a time when none denied it. I hope the time may come again when a better comprehension of the theory of our Government, and the inalienable rights of the people of the States, will prevent any one from denying that each State is a sovereign, and thus may reclaim the grants which it has made to any agent whomsoever.

"I, therefore, say I concur in the action of the people of Mississippi, believing it to be necessary and proper, and should have been bound by their action if my belief had been otherwise; and this brings me to the important point which I wish on this last occasion to present to the Senate. It is by this confounding of nullification and secession that the name of a great man, whose ashes now mingle with his mother earth, has been invoked to justify coercion against a seceded State. The phrase "to execute the laws," was an expression which General Jackson applied to the case of a State refusing to obey the laws while yet a member of the Union.  That is not the case which is now presented.  The laws are to be executed over the United States, and upon the people of the United States. They have no relation to any foreign country. It is a perversion of terms, at least it is a great misapprehension of the case, which cites that expression for application to a State which has withdrawn from the Union. You may make war on a foreign State.  If it be the purpose of gentlemen, they may make war against a State which has withdrawn from the Union; but there are no laws of the United States to be executed within the limits of a seceded State. A State finding herself in the condition in which Mississippi has judged she is, in which her safety requires that she should provide for the maintenance of her rights out of the Union, surrenders all the benefits (and they are known to be many), deprives herself of the advantages (and they are known to be great), severs all the ties of affection (and they are close and enduring), which have bound her to the Union; and thus divesting herself of every benefit, taking upon herself every burden, she claims to be exempt from any power to execute the laws of the United States within her limits.

"I well remember an occasion when Massachusetts was arraigned before the bar of the Senate, and when then the doctrine of coercion was rife and to be applied against her because of the rescue of a fugitive slave in Boston. My opinion then was the same that it is now. Not in a spirit of egotism, but to show that I am not influenced in my opinions because the case is my own, I refer to that time and that occasion as containing the opinion which I then entertained, and on which my present conduct is based. I then said that if Massachusetts, following her purpose through a stated line of conduct, chose to take the last step which separates her from the Union, it is her right to go, and I will neither vote one dollar nor one man to coerce her back; but I will say to her, God speed, in memory of the kind associations which once existed between her and the other States.

"It has been a conviction of pressing necessity, it has been a belief that we are to be deprived in the Union of the rights which our fathers bequeathed to us, which has brought Mississippi to her present decision. She has heard proclaimed the theory that all men are created free and equal, and this made the basis of an attack upon her social institutions; and the sacred Declaration of Independence has been invoked to maintain the position of the equality of the races. That Declaration of Independence is to be construed by the circumstances and purposes for which it was made. The communities were declaring their independence; the people of those communities were asserting that no man was born—-to use the language of Mr. Jefferson—-booted and spurred to ride over the rest of mankind; that men were created equal-—meaning the men of the political community; that there was no divine right to rule; that no man inherited the right to govern; that there were no classes by which power and place descended to families, but that all stations were equally within the grasp of each member of the body-politic. These were the great principles they announced; these were the purposes for which they made their declaration; these were the ends to which their enunciation was directed. They have no reference to the slave; else, how happened it that among the items of arraignment made against George III was that he endeavored to do just what the North has been endeavoring of late to do, to stir up insurrection among our slaves?  Had the Declaration announced that the negroes were free and equal, how was the Prince to be arraigned for stirring up insurrection among them? And how was this to be enumerated among the high crimes which caused the Colonies to sever their connection with the Mother Country? When our Constitution was formed, the same idea was rendered more palpable, for there we find provision made for that very class of persons as property; they were not put upon the footing of equality with white men-—not even upon that of paupers and convicts; but, so far as representation was concerned, were discriminated against as a lower caste, only to be represented in the numerical proportion of three-fifths.

"Then, Senators, we recur to the compact which binds us together; we recur to the principles upon which our Government was founded; and when you deny them, and when you deny us the right to withdraw from a Government which thus perverted threatens to be destructive of our rights, we but tread in the path of our fathers when we proclaim our independence and take the hazard. This is done not in hostility to others, not to injure any section of the country, not even for our own pecuniary benefit; but from the high and solemn motive of defending and protecting the rights we inherited, and which it is our sacred duty to transmit unshorn to our children.

"I find in myself perhaps, a type of the general feeling of my constituents towards yours. I am sure I feel no hostility toward you, Senators from the North. I am sure there is not one of you, whatever sharp discussion there may have been between us, to whom I cannot now say, in the presence of my God, I wish you well; and such, I am sure, is the feeling of the people whom I represent toward those whom you represent. I therefore feel that I but express their desire when I say I hope, and they hope, for peaceable relations with you, though we must part. They may be mutually beneficial to us in the future, as they have been in the past, if you so will it. The reverse may bring disaster on every portion of the country; and, if you will have it thus, we will invoke the God of our fathers, who delivered them from the power of the lion, to protect us from the ravages of the bear; and thus, putting our trust in God and in our firm hearts and strong arms, we will vindicate the right as best we may.

"In the course of my service here, associated at different times with a variety of Senators, I see now around me some with whom I have served long; there have been points of collision; but whatever of offense there has been to me, I leave here; I carry with me no hostile remembrance. Whatever offense I have given which has not been redressed, or for which satisfaction has not been demanded, I have, Senators, in this hour of our parting, to offer you my apology for any pain which, in the heat of discussion, I have inflicted. I go hence unencumbered of the remembrance of any injury received, and having discharged the duty of making the only reparation in my power for any injury offered.

"Mr. President, and Senators, having made the announcement which the occasion seemed to me to require, it only remains for me to bid you a final adieu."

Life in Lake Superior Copper Mines, 1861

From the Philadelphia Inquirer on April 15, 1861...

Savannah's Colonial Park Cemetery

My boyfriend, sister and I traveled to Savannah last month, and one place we visited was Colonial Park Cemetery.  Located in Savannah's Historic District, the burial ground dates back to the 1820 Yellow Fever outbreak in the South....

 From the Baltimore Patriot on September 27, 1820:

Charleston, Sept. 19.

Yellow Fever! -- We sincerely regret to inform the Public that several cases of this dreadful disorder have appeared in our City.  Three interments have already been made, the subjects of which died of it, and there are two more persons now ill of the same disorder.-- These persons are all strangers to the climate.--Times.

Accounts from Savannah, represent that place to be in a dreadful situation, from the prevalence of Yellow Fever--200 persons left the City on the 15th inst.--from 12 to 15 die daily--19 persons were buried on the 14th inst. and it was supposed there were then from 2 to 300 lying sick.  It is said "from Tuesday afternoon, at 9 o'clock, till Wednesday morning, 8 o'clock (a space of 29 hours) 49 persons were taken sick, and (on Friday) many of them were silently reposing in the grave"--City Gaz.

Yellow Fever in Newbern--A gentleman from Newbern yesterday, (says the Washington, N.C. paper of the 8th inst.) brings the melancholy intelligence of this dreadful malady having been introduced into that place by a vessel from the West Indies.--Ib.

BOARD OF HEALTH.

Charleston, Sept. 19th, 1820.

The Board of Health sincerely regret that they are compelled to announce to their fellow citizens, that YELLOW FEVER does exist within the city.-- Three deaths have occurred within the last few days, and there are three new cases reported.  The persons who have died were strangers to the climate as are those who are sick of the disease.  By order of the Board,

DANIEL STEVENS, Chairman.

Most of the graves are no longer marked because the headstones have broken.  The broken markers have been placed upon a nearby wall...

Very cool cemetery, I highly recommend it if you like this sort of thing.  I hope one day we'll get to tour Bonaventure, but we didn't have the money to spend on that this time...

Some Georgia Newspapers That Folded in 1860