FROM EDWIN CROSWELL, Esq., oF NEW-YORK.

DEAR SIR: I have read with interest and profit your "Introductory Compend" to your proposed work on the nature and character of our Government, "Our Federal Union: State Rights and Wrongs." While I do not concur in all your positions, or their application, I bear willing testimony to the ability, research, and candor with which you treat and elucidate the deep questions of Government, Sovereignty, the Right of Command, and International Law. In the present disturbed and disintegrated condition of the nation, when thought and argument must give place to action, it will be, perhaps, too much to expect a wide-spread and earnest inquiry into the elementary principles and forms of Government, or a discriminating study of the theory and substance of our own system of Sovereignties and Nationality. But if you succeed in directing the popular mind to a subject so material to the well-being of all Peoples, and to the cause of good Government, (of which your zeal, devotion, and untiring application of thought and talent afford the assurance,) you will accomplish a benign result, which the present generation and after-times will acknowledge, in a manner at once flattering to your pride as an author, and your devotion as a thinker and patriot.

I am glad to believe, that in your enumeration of the powers of a Constitutional State Sovereignty, you do not recognize the right of Secession. It is among the errors of these disastrous times, that many superficial politicians, and some fair-minded persons, consider Secession the legitimate offspring of the State Rights principle. In my judgment the State Rights doctrine consists in the maintenance, as Mr. Jefferson said, of "the rights of the States in all their original vigor" under the Constitution, not of an imaginary Sovereignty, in defiance or violation of that instrument. This was the doctrine of Jefferson, John Taylor of Caroline, and the authors of the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions in 1798. It implies the defense and vindication of the Constitutional rights of the States against the tendency to encroachment by the Federal power; and any tendency of either to consolidation; and by no means to sanction that violation of Constitutional rights of the State and National Governments which is the essence of Secessionism. That dogma is the antagonism of the State Rights doctrine. It is a libel on that doctrine to consider them synonyms. Secession is the overthrow of the Constitution. For a series of years prior to this civil war, the South had much cause of complaint, but none for rebellion; for such I must characterize their treasonable course, notwithstanding your definition on page 83 of the "Compend." In all the annals of the world, a more causeless rebellion never darkened the page of history. While, therefore, we would vindicate the Constitution, maintain the rights of the States, and correct the abuses of Government, it is the incumbent duty of every loyal Citizen to sustain the Constitutional arm of Government, in all its efforts to restore and preserve the integrity of the Union. I am, very truly, your obedient servant,

EDWIN CROSWELL,

The work being especially designed for business men, it is gratifying to find it meets their approbation.

FROM FRANKLIN TOWNSEND, ESQ., OF ALBANY, N. Y.

MY DEAR SIR: I have the pleasure of acknowledging the reception of your favors of the —, and also the copy of Citizenship, Sovereignty, which you were so kind as to send to me. In the midst of my pressing business engagements, I have not had time, until within a day or two, to look over the book; but even with the little attention I have been able to give it, I am forcibly struck with the importance of the work in which you are engaged, and strongly impressed with the truthfulness of the position you have assumed, and the manner in which you have treated the subject in your introduction. The need of such a clear and comprehensive description and history of our Government, and explanation of its character, as you propose, with a view to its perpetuation and improvement, is evident; and I am confident, judging from what you have already done, that your work will supply that want, and go far to influence our people in restoring the Union on a permanent and happier basis.

[In a subsequent letter, which in some unaccountable way has disappeared, Mr. Townsend remarks that in his first perusal of the Compend, he did not observe my remarks on pp. 82 and 83, and he coincides with Mr. Croswell that the South are in rebellion. This is no place to discuss the point, but I think legal principles and facts will establish the correctness of my conclusion.]

FROM HON. ERASTUS CORNING, OF ALBANY, N. Y.

MY DEAR SIR: In acknowledging the receipt of your work, entitled Citizenship, Sovereignty, I must state that, owing to a great press of business, I have not been able to give your work that amount of attention which your treatment of the subject demands.

It is of the utmost importance that such books as yours should be widely disseminated through the country, and thoroughly read by our citizens. Argument and discussion on such subjects can not fail to be of use and profit to all of us, and even those who are opposed to your views must acknowledge its sound logic; and the copious extracts and references from high authority give additional importance to your treatise. Hoping and expecting that it will work much good to our cause, I remain, yours very truly,

ERASTUS CORNING.

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FROM WILLIAM B. ASTOR, Esq., OF NEW-YORK.

DEAR SIR: I thank you for the copy of your "Introductory Compend," which I hope to peruse with much pleasure and instruction, although I have only had an opportunity to glance at parts of it. The high importance of the subjects of which it treats, and the copious extracts it contains from writers of high authority, commend it strongly to general attention, and I doubt not it will soon be found in the hands of all readers.

I am, dear sir, very respectfully and truly yours,

FROM WILLIAM CHAUNCEY, Esq., OF NEW-YORK.

WILLIAM B. ASTOR.

J. & WRIGHT, ESQ.: DEAR SIR: It is with no small degree of satisfaction that I have read the "Introductory Compend" to your work, to be entitled, "Our Federal Union: State Rights and Wrongs."

It appears to me to be a work peculiarly appropriate to the present time, and the present circumstances in which these once united States are now placed; and I think it not too much to say that much of the difficulties of our present Governmental affairs grow out of ignorance of the true theory and meaning of our novel system of Government.

This being a Government of the People, there is nothing more important to its rightful Administration, than that the people should be fully and thoroughly instructed in its true meaning. But instead of this, all other branches of learning have had the preference in the studies of our youth in the schools, and in the reading of those of more mature age. I think I may safely say, that not one person in four, if even one in twenty, ever read our Constitution, much less understood the system of Government under which we live.

One reason of this neglect has been the poverty of works on this subject. Although there have been writers on Government, and the Laws of Nations generally, such as Grotius, Pufendorf, Vattel, and others, there have been very few, so far as I am aware, that have published any elaborate work on our system of Government. This deficiency your work is well calculated to supply. Many of the facts you recite, such as our treaty in acquiring Louisiana, although bearing directly upon the present controversy, seem to have escaped the attention, or not been within the knowledge, of any of our statesmen.

Although many of the positions and doctrines you assume are different from those commonly received, they seem to be so well supported by sound argument, founded upon the best authorities, as to carry conviction to my mind of the value of your work, and therefore I most cheerfully recommend it to the attention and study of all who wish to be well instructed in our system of Government. Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

WILLIAM CHAUNCEY.

Not at all surprising is it, that these more learned, more experienced, and wiser men should dissent from the writer in some of his deductions and conclusions. But if war Democrats, peace Democrats, and conservative Republicans can assent to the fairness and correctness of the writer's views and arguments as to State Sovereignty, the proof that the Right of Command is in the possession of these States, these free Peoples, the minor points are comparatively immaterial. Let us of all parties, all professions, all pursuits, every one who enjoys the high dignity of Citizenship in these free States, Fellow-Citizenship in this Federal Union of sovereign nations, study into the truths of International Law as taught by Hooker, Grotius, and other established authorities of that school down to Vattel, and know the characteristics and rights of Sovereign States, and how these free Peoples can and do exercise their Sovereignty by their subordinate Agencies, State and Federal, and we shall not differ widely in our conclusions; and until we do examine and are agreed as to where our Sovereignty, our Right of Command, is located, we can never agree upon minor topics.

War

More from conversation with various individuals than from letters, the writer has ascertained that peace Democrats are delighted with the arguments affirming State rights, but reject what seems to the writer a natural, inevitable conclusion, that. the North, notwithstanding the errors of, Federal Administration, is fighting for State rights, and is in a just, defensive war. Democrats are pleased to find that the much-misunderstood question of State Sovereignty can be used to prove the South wrong in its present secession and war, but discard the conclusion that we are not in a war to subdue "rebels." They disapprove what seems to be a common-sense view, that a true war of defense, as this is, can not be one of subjugation and conquest. Re publicans seem unprepared as yet to express a written opinion of the book until it is more thoroughly considered. Many of them, however, particularly they of the Jeffersonian school

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are gratified with the arguments for State Sovereignty, while they fully believe there is some sort of Sovereignty in the Federal Government against which the South is in "rebellion," and think the writer unjustly characterizes some of the acts of the Administration as usurpations, which the Republicans deem proper and legitimate measures to crush out this "wicked rebellion."

Now the fair, reasonable men of all these parties, whose views and determination are solidly established on the basis of State rights, are to have their plans and wishes much assimilated by examining principles, and ascertaining what is right and expedient. Peace Democrats will meet with defiance the efforts of the South to dispossess us, by force of arms, of the rights of these Sovereign States in what has been and yet is their common territory, notwithstanding our fellow-Citizens, the people there inhabiting, have been allowed to organize themselves into States for the purpose of admission into this Federal Union. War Democrats and conservative Republicans will insist that this war, on our part, shall be conducted in all respects as one of justice and in defense of State rights, and will heartily further the adoption of all measures to assure the South of our earnest desire, not only to have the war cease as soon as we can be secure in our State rights, but also to form a new Union on the true Federal basis of our Fathers, to which the South can accede on terms equally honorable as the North.

Let Peace Democrats consider the demands of the Southern extremists, as presented in a recent number of the Richmond Enquirer :

Save on our own terms we can accept no peace whatever, and must fight until doomsday rather than yield an iota of them, and our terms are:

Recognition by the enemy of the independence of the Confederate States.

Withdrawal of the Yankee forces from every foot of Confederate ground, including Kentucky and Missouri. Withdrawal of the Yankee soldiers from Maryland, until that State shall decide by a free vote whether she shall remain in the old Union, or ask admission into the Confederacy.

Consent on the part of the Federal Government to give up to the Confederacy its proportion of the navy as it stood at the time of secession, or to pay for the same.

Yielding up of all pretension on the part of the Federal Government to that portion of the old Territories which lies west of the Confederate States.

An equitable settlement, on the basis of our absolute independence and equal rights, of all accounts of the pub lic debt and public lands, and the advantages accruing from foreign treaties.

These provisions, we apprehend, comprise the minimum of what we must require before we lay down our arms. That is to say, the North must yield all-we nothing. The whole pretension of that country to prevent by force the separation of the States must be abandoned, which will be equivalent to an avowal that our enemies were wrong from the first, and, of course, as they waged a causeless and wicked war upon us, they ought, in strict justice, to be required, according to usage in such cases, to reimburse to us the whole of our expenses and losses in the course of that war. Whether this last proviso is to be insisted upon or not, certain we are that we can not have any peace at all until we shall be in a position not only to demand and exact, but also to enforce and collect, treasure for our own reïmbursement out of the wealthy cities in the enemy's country. In other words, unless we can destroy or scatter their armies, and break up their government, we can have no peace; and if we can do that then we ought not only to extort from them our own full terms and ample acknowledgment of their wrong, but also a handsome indemnity for the trouble and expense caused to us by their crime.

Is any man in the North such a dastardly wretch, such a pusillanimous recreant, as that he will advocate peace upon such demands, the surrender of the rights of these Sovereign States upon such claims and terms, to be transferred in part back to France? These Sovereign States, through their Federal Agency, received the grants of surplus territory from several of the original Thirteen; these Sovereign States bought from the Sovereignty of France the Louisiana territory, and from Spain that of Florida. We have permitted our fellow-Citizens therein inhabiting to organize themselves into States, to be admitted into our Federal Union, with a full equality of rights with the old States in that Union. Now by what process have these Sovereign States divested themselves of their rights in what has been, and still is, their common territory? Where has been the conveyance of our rights that enables the seceded States, or their Confederate Agency, to reconvey to France a part of the Louisiana purchase, as

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is threatened, and as they can do if they maintain their claims? Study into principles, and there will be no such mistaken sentiment in the North, as to advocate peace, until we know what is to become of our State rights.

An article from the Richmond Whig, of August twenty-fourth, foreshadows the means and ways by which alone the rights of these Sovereign States are to be perpetuated, though we trust the resorting to blood-shedding in resisting the radicals of the North will not be necessary. It is, however, a result that has been considered in the Compend, p. 195, as among the possibilities. The following is from the Whig

The Duration of the War.-We adverted, the other day, to two expedients for bringing the war to an early and satisfactory close: French assistance, or cooperation with the conservative party of the North. We incidentally alluded to a third-our own victories achieved over the Yankee armies. Notwithstanding Gettysburgh, or, to speak more correctly, in virtue of Gettysburgh, we still believe in the wholesome effects of the policy of invasion. But for the merest accident the army of Meade had been routed and dispersed that day, and the whole North would have been at our mercy. Luck was against us then; it may be with us another time. We should concentrate-direct all our material resources to a renewal of that grand enterprise, and hope for a happier result. In the mean time we must seek, with all possible diligence, the other means within our reach. France should be plied with every argument that can touch her pride, her feelings, or her interests. We should not for a moment forget that we have abundant resources for winning her speedy, active, and powerful assistance. The more prompt our action, the more probable the success. Delay alone may prove fatal to our efforts. But while exerting every effort to obtain a European alliance, we should not neglect any means for securing a still more important alliance on this continent-we mean that with the Conservatives of the North. However separated we may be from the North, we can not cease to be affected by the good or bad government of that country. We lie too close to it not to feel more or less its prosperity or adversity. In our present just abhorrence of its Government, we may invoke upon its hated head bankruptcy, anarchy, despotism, and every curse under heaven; but this is passion, amply justified, no doubt, by the atrocious character of its present rulers; but still it will be our interest, when peace and separation come, that our nearest neighbors should enjoy free government, and be prosperous and happy. The present rulers of the Yankee nation are a faction, elected by a minority, and striving, by the subversion of the existing institutions, to establish a permanent ascendency. They hate a large portion of their own people, and are in turn intensely hated by them. No man of intelligence among the Conservative party of the North doubts for a moment but that, if the rebels are crushed, they will be the next victims. Their rights of person and property are threatened, and are held by a very feeble tenure. This state of facts constitutes these people our natural allies. With them, we have a common enemy-the Black Republican party-which threaten them equally with us with subjugation and ruin. No one doubts but that a thorough understanding and combination between the rebels and the Northern Conservatives could extinguish that faction, in blood, if need be, in sixty days. That such an extermination is to the interest, material, political and moral, of both parties, is equally certain.

Nobody has any interest in the continuance of the war but the Abolition faction, who are plundering the property and striving to reduce the respectability of both sections to their own degraded level. Let the word then go forth, in an authentic form, to all the Conservatives of the North, that we desire, in conjunction with them, to put an end to this war, which is waged only in the interest and for the benefit of our common enemies. Let them aid us in crushing and exterminating this hateful faction-an indispensable preliminary to peace and to any possibility of reunion—and we will then meet them, and discuss frankly and fully all the advantages and disadvantages of a common government. It may be, that after the extinction of the Abolitionists, and with new bases, we may be able to frame such a system of Confederate Government as may be an improvement on the old, and satisfactory to us all. But if that be impossible, we can agree to disagree, and be content to live apart and in peace.

Let our authorities give the necessary assurance to the Northern Conservatives. Strengthened by it at home, they will be able to carry an armistice, suspend hostilities, and give us all an opportunity to come to an understanding. It will, at the same time, break the backbone of the common enemy, whose blood is a necessary cement to any future peace or fraternal relations between the sections.

While the North will not, for fear of aggressions upon our territory by Southern armies, or on account of France or any other power, budge an inch from its course in vigorously maintaining this war to defend State rights, we will of our own accord endeavor to do right. Studying into principles, we shall know the rights of Sovereign States, the measures that are right and wrong in a just, defensive war. The wrongs done by those in authority, through ignorance or malevolence, shall be corrected; and if those now in power refuse to do this, we shall ere long place those in power who will.

The two chief dangers to both South and North are, a premature peace, establishing dis

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union, and that evil much dreaded by our Fathers- consolidation. If our Federal Administration can by any means be restrained from the former, till the fourth of March, 1865, it will be well; and the tocsin has already begun to sound its peals, that will save us from the latter. The article in the October number of the Atlantic Monthly, said to be from the pen of a chief leader of the Abolition wing of the Republican party-Hon. Charles Sumner-scouting the doctrine of State rights, has been at once responded to by another leader of the Republican party, Hon. Montgomery Blair, who nobly comes to the defense of State rights.

The question of consolidation is to be the main battle-ground, and if left to the defense of conservative Republicans alone, the issue would not be doubtful. Of even ardent Abolitionists, many would be stern defenders of the means whereby slavery has been extinguished in so many of our States. That slavery falls in the present calamity, is by no means so certain as many imagine; indeed, if State Sovereignty is maintained, slavery surely will be for the time being ; and the true anti-slavery man will seek to protect the means which, in the future as in the past, will increase the number of free States, as each Sovereign State shall come to consider and determine for itself, that freedom is best for either or both races. But the conservative Republicans will not be a third part of the patriotic host who will rally as Federal Republicans to restore our Union and our institutions to the basis of our fathers.

When this shall be accomplished in the North, the patriots of the South, in rapidly multiplying numbers, will adopt the above sentiments of the Richmond Whig, and soon have power to take measures which will result in peace and reünion, not as subjugated Peoples, conquered Territories, but as Sovereign States, our equals and our brethren. A squad of fanatics there will oppose it, as will a few Abolitionists in the North; but Union on the Federal basis, and with the preservation of State Sovereignty, will triumph; and it would seem that when State rights come to be understood, we shall discover that, under Providential direction, in the cession and in the purchase of territory for these Sovereign States united, they have become possessed of joint rights, in the severance of which the sovereign right of secession can never be rightfully exercised, except under circumstances that would justify revolution, the right of which to resist oppression, no American will deny. The right of secession in these States means revolution, and nothing less.

But the doctrine of State rights will have little potency, unless its advocates, both in the South and in the North, whether of high or low degree, in the exercise of delegated authority permit it to be carried to its legitimate conclusions, however far astray it shall prove either party, or any of the individual subjects of their respective States, to have gone. Let the principles of State Sovereignty be strictly adhered to, wherever they lead. No one can, with justice and reason, adopt them in part, and barely so far as they tally with past actions or present aims and hopes. As a whole, as the basis of the Law of Nations, are they to be received or rejected. Let us on both sides understand and practise State rights; yield where we are wrong; insist where we are right; and we shall soon have a new Union on the old foundation and firmer than

ever.

Had this protracted delay in the distribution of copies of this Compend been anticipated, efforts would have been made to obtain letters from parties other than those residing in New-York, or who happened to be there. But from week to week the writer has expected to complete the list, and make the distribution, and, with few exceptions, copies have not been sent from the city. These letters, however, will suffice to attract the attention of the recipient, and commend the Compend to his perusal. The writer only desired, in this connection, sufficient testimonials to satisfy the reader that the book was worthy of his attention, and bring to it an immediate examination.