Last edited Mon Aug 18, 2025, 09:08 AM - Edit history (3)
Stephens never said the US Constitution rested upon the equality of the races....which what he was actually arguing was the North's view of what was meant by the Founders (that the Constitution rested upon the equality of races) was wrong.
But not to be tedious in enumerating the numerous changes for the better, allow me to allude to one other though last, not least. The new constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution African slavery as it exists amongst us the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the "rock upon which the old Union would split." He was right. What was conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old constitution, were that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally, and politically. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal with, but the general opinion of the men of that day was that, somehow or other in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and pass away. This idea, though not incorporated in the constitution, was the prevailing idea at that time. The constitution, it is true, secured every essential guarantee to the institution while it should last, and hence no argument can be justly urged against the constitutional guarantees thus secured, because of the common sentiment of the day. Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the government built upon it fell when the "storm came and the wind blew.
Obviously I'm not defending Stephens. However, in trying to use his words to prove what the Confederacy meant, they actually didn't give the full context of what he was saying and in fact seemed to be saying that he was arguing since the Constitution was about equality, the Confederacy had to break away...whereas he was arguing the Constitution was about equality of white people, but also inequality of other races races, and since the northerners were making waves about changing the relationship between races, the South had the right to break away to be true to its original intent.
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