The Laws of Texas, 1822-1897 Volume 5 Page: 4
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4
Address to the People of Texas.
To attain the objects, and under the necessity before stated, the
people rose in their sovereignty and constituted a Convention to be
the representation and instrumentality of their will. At the election
of delegates, although held under utmost disadvantages, the
aggregate of votes for secession candidates, according to best information,
was over thirty-two thousand. The proceeding w,as extraordinarv,
and returns were irregular and incomplete, of necessity,
from such an election; but reliable information showed for
secession, over 32,000, more than half of the largest poll ever given
at an election in this State. In opposition there were comparatively
few votes. And many other circumstances concurred in establishing
the certainty, that the secession sentiment was far in the
ascendancy.
Thus elected, and for such purposes, the delegates assembled in
Convention, at Austin, the twenty-eighth of January. Although
at the time of the election. South Caroiina was the only State that
had completed secession, and many persons were deterred from
voting by apprehension that she might not be sufficiently imitated,
yet the secession voters expected co-operation. Before the meeting
of the Convention, Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Mlississippi and
Louisiana had seceded, and Texas was the only exception among all
the Gulf States. Encouraged by such examples, Texas felt sustained
in her convictions of the propriety of secession before
the commencement of the Abolition administration of the
general government. Admonished by the same circumstances,
of her peculiar dangers, to arise out of, even,
delay in cooperation with those States. Texas had just
fears as well as natural sympathies, to prompt the earliest
practicable association with the seceded States. They had appointed
delegates to meet at Montgomery, Alabama, on
the fourth of February, to form a provisional government, as a first
necessity, and afterwards to prepare and submit a constitution for
the government of a permanent confederacy. It would be out of
place and time, in this address, to recite the causes, justifying secession.
They have been heretofore published by the Convention.
But, they must ever be most prominent in considering the current
of causes and effects.
Under such circumstances, the Convention was not recreant to
its mission. On the first day of February, the fourth after its
meeting, the Convention, by a vote of one hundred and sixty-six
affirmatives to eight negatives, adopted an ordinance for withdrawing
this State from the Union, to take effect on the second of
March, unless rejected by the people at an election to be held on
the twenty-third of February. The Legislature and the Executive
had previously recognized the Convention as a representation of the
people, and were in a formal attendance, on invitation, at the adoption
of the ordinance. Such recognition was gratifying to the pubiv
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Gammel, Hans Peter Mareus Neilsen. The Laws of Texas, 1822-1897 Volume 5, book, 1898; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth6727/m1/8/?rotate=270: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .