Stephens, Alexander H. (1812–1883)

• Author: Paul Finkelman
• Pages: 2527-2528

Page 2527

A successful self-taught Georgia lawyer, Alexander Hamilton Stephens was a congressman (1843?1859, 1873?1882), vice-president of the Confederacy (1861?1865), and a lifelong defender of STATES ' RIGHTS. As a southern Whig, Stephens sought to protect state SOVEREIGNTY and preserve the Union. These objectives led to apparent inconsistencies. Thus, he opposed JOHN C. CALHOUN and NULLIFICATION while arguing for the abstract right of SECESSION. Similarly, Stephens was a slaveowner who declared that "I am no defender of slavery in the abstract." He supported ANNEXATION OF TEXAS to preserve the balance of free and slave states, but he did not support slave extension generally. He opposed the Mexican War because of his unrelenting hatred of President JAMES K. POLK, his honest belief that the war was unjust, and his fear that it would reopen the divisive issue of SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES. But once the war was over he advocated opening the Mexican Cession to slavery. Ironically, he successfully moved to table the Clayton Compromise (1848), even though he supported its purpose, because he believed the Supreme Court would declare that existing Mexican law prohibited SLAVERY in the new territories.

Stephens opposed the COMPROMISE OF 1850, warning: "Whenever this Government is brought in hostile array against me and mine, I am for disunion?openly, boldly and fearlessly for revolution. " Nevertheless, once the compromise passed, Stephens supported it in Georgia, and at the state's secession convention of 1850 he helped write the Georgia Platform which denounced disunion. Stephens then joined ROBERT TOOMBS and Howell Cobb in organizing a Union Party in Georgia.

In 1854 Stephens became a Democrat. He was the floor manager for the KANSAS-NEBRASKA ACT (1854) and worked closely with STEPHEN A. DOUGLAS. As chairman of the House Committee on the Territories Stephens supported the LECOMPTON CONSTITUTION, unlike his Senate counterpart (Douglas). Despite Douglas's apostacy on this issue, Stephens supported his presidential nomination in 1860 and futilely campaigned for Douglas in Georgia.

In November 1860 Stephens opposed secession in Georgia, arguing that Southerners and northern Democrats could block any bill that threatened slavery or the South. His pro-Union speech, reprinted throughout the North, led to a brief correspondence with President-elect ABRAHAM LINCOLN. As a delegate to the Georgia secession convention (January 1861)...