Who is alexander stephens

One of his greatest victories in this respect came in , when Stephens helped pass Senator Stephen A. This allowed settlers in these new territories to choose whether or not to permit slavery. Stephens continued to argue against secession during the lead-up to the Civil War. Despite these misgivings, he was chosen to be the first vice president of the Confederate States of America during the Confederate Congress in February He then introduced the new government during a stump speech in Savannah on March 21, After the beginning of the Civil War in April , Stephens moved to the new Confederate capital in Richmond, Virginia , and took part in administrative preparations for the war effort.

During this time he repeatedly advocated that the Confederacy delay large-scale military action in order to properly plan and equip itself for prolonged war. Stephens was unenthusiastic about his position as vice president, which granted him little power and largely relegated him to the role of passive observer over the Confederate Congress.

Nevertheless, he was reelected to his post in February after his one-year provisional appointment expired. Starting in Stephens began the first of many arguments with President Jefferson Davis over the management of the war effort.

In September he published an unsigned letter in a Georgia newspaper condemning the policy of conscription, which gave the Confederate government the power to draft troops ahead of their state militias. He would later clash with Davis over both impressment and the Confederate combat strategy.

In July Stephens was sent to Washington , D. Anxious to end the war, Stephens also hoped to broach the subject of reaching a peace agreement. His journey only took him as far as Newport News, Virginia, where—following the crucial Union victory at the Battle of Gettysburg—he was informed that the U. Stephens next redoubled his efforts to oppose Davis, who he believed had become too powerful. In March he gave a speech to the Georgia state legislature outlining his criticisms of Davis, and was denounced by many Southerners as a traitor.

His opposition to Davis became so pronounced that in late he received a letter from Union General William T. Stephens refused the invitation, but his relationship with Davis remained strained for the rest of the war.

Stephens' role as Vice President was marked by increasingly disillusionment with the Confederacy. In March of , he gave his famous Cornerstone Speech in which he argued that slavery was a natural condition and served as the foundation of the Confederacy. However, by , Stephens was publically expressing his opposition to Confederate President Jefferson Davis' administration. In , he gave a speech to the Georgia Legislature which strongly criticized the Davis administrations support of conscription and the suspension of habeas corpus.

Until the end of the war, Stephens continued to act with the aim of bringing peace between the North and the South. After the war, Stephens was arrested and imprisoned in Fort Warren for five months until October IN , he was elected to the US Senate, but was not allowed to take his position because of a restriction on former Confederates. In , Stephens was elected Governor of Georgia. He died on March 4, , only four months after taking office.

The Alexander H. Stephens Collection includes three letters written between and and a banknote. Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races.

This was an error. Our new Government is founded upon exactly the opposite ideas; its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and moral condition. This truth has been slow in the process of its development, like all other truths in the various departments of science. It is so even amongst us. Many who hear me, perhaps, can recollect well that this truth was not generally admitted, even within their day.

The errors of the past generation still clung to many as late as twenty years ago. Those at the North who still cling to these errors with a zeal above knowledge, we justly denominate fanatics. All fanaticism springs from an aberration of the mind; from a defect in reasoning. It is a species of insanity.

One of the most striking characteristics of insanity, in many instances, is, forming correct conclusions from fancied or erroneous premises; so with the anti-slavery fanatics: their conclusions are right if their premises are. Pendleton, Louis.

Philadelphia: G. Rabun, James Z. Stephens: A Biography. Stephens and Jefferson Davis. Richardson, Eudora Ramsay. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, Robb, James. A Southern Confederacy. Stephens, of Georgia. Chicago: Press of J. Thompson, Schott, Thomas E. Stephens: Antebellum Statesman. Stephens of Georgia: A Biography. Stephens, Alexander H. Address of Hon. Milledgeville, Ga. Admission of Oregon. Speech of Hon. Stephens, of Georgia, in the House of Representatives, February 12, Stephens's Diary, Georgia Historical Quarterly 36 March : ; June : Stephens on the study of the law.

Atlanta, Ga. The assertions of a secessionist. From the speech of A. Stephens, of Georgia, November 14, New York: Loyal Publication Society, A campaign tract for Carpenter's picture, Lincoln and emancipation. A compendium of the history of the United States from the earliest settlements to New York: E. Hale, Reprint, New York: E. A comprehensive and popular history of the United States, embracing a full account of the discovery and settlement of the country By Alexander H.