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Supreme law of the Confederate States of America From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Constitution of the Confederate States was the supreme law of the Confederate States of America. It superseded the Provisional Constitution of the Confederate States, the Confederate State's first constitution, in 1862.[1] It remained in effect until the end of the American Civil War in 1865.
Constitution of the Confederate States | |
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![]() Page one of the original copy of the Constitution | |
Overview | |
Jurisdiction | Confederate States of America |
Created | March 11, 1861 |
Ratified | March 29, 1861 |
Date effective | February 22, 1862 |
System | Constitutional presidential republic |
Government structure | |
Branches | 3 |
Chambers | Bicameral |
Executive | President |
Judiciary | Supreme, Circuits, Districts |
Federalism | Federation |
Electoral college | Yes |
First legislature | February 18, 1862 |
First executive | February 22, 1862 |
Location | Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library, University of Georgia |
Commissioned by | Provisional Congress of the Confederate States |
Author(s) | Montgomery Convention |
Signatories | 50 of the 50 deputies to the Provisional Congress of the Confederate States |
Media type | Parchment |
Supersedes | Provisional Constitution of the Confederate States |
The original Provisional Constitution is located at the American Civil War Museum in Richmond, Virginia,[2] and differs slightly from the version later adopted. The final, handwritten Constitution is located in the Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library at the University of Georgia.[2] Most of its provisions are word-for-word duplicates from the United States Constitution; however, there are crucial differences between the two documents in tone and legal content, primarily regarding slavery.
The Confederate Constitution followed the U.S. Constitution for the most part in the main body of the text but with some changes:
But Congress may, by law, grant to the principal officer in each of the Executive Departments a seat upon the floor of either House, with the privilege of discussing any measures appertaining to his department.[10]
The Congress shall have power – To lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises for revenue, necessary to pay the debts, provide for the common defense, and carry on the Government of the Confederate States; but no bounties shall be granted from the Treasury; nor shall any duties or taxes on importations from foreign nations be laid to promote or foster any branch of industry; and all duties, imposts, and excises shall be uniform throughout the Confederate States.[11]
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;[12]
Article I Section 8(3) added quite a bit to the U.S. Constitution in an attempt to block the Confederate Congress from appropriating money to build "internal improvements" to "facilitate commerce,"[11] with some exceptions allowing for safety and improvement to waterways.
To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes.[12]
To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian tribes; but neither this, nor any other clause contained in the constitution, shall ever be construed to delegate the power to Congress to appropriate money for any internal improvement intended to facilitate commerce; except for the purpose of furnishing lights, beacons, and buoys, and other aids to navigation upon the coasts, and the improvement of harbors and the removing of obstructions in river navigation, in all which cases, such duties shall be laid on the navigation facilitated thereby, as may be necessary to pay the costs and expenses thereof.[11]
Congress shall appropriate no money from the treasury except by a vote of two-thirds of both Houses, taken by yeas and nays, unless it be asked and estimated for by some one of the heads of Department, and submitted to Congress by the President; or for the purpose of paying its own expenses and contingencies; or for the payment of claims against the Confederate States, the justice of which shall have been judicially declared by a tribunal for the investigation of claims against the government, which it is hereby made the duty of Congress to establish.
All bills appropriating money shall specify in federal currency the exact amount of each appropriation and the purposes for which it is made; and Congress shall grant no extra compensation to any public contractor, officer, agent or servant, after such contract shall have been made or such service rendered.
Every law or resolution having the force of law, shall relate to but one subject, and that shall be expressed in the title.[13]
Then in Section 10:
No State shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any duty on tonnage, except on sea-going vessels, for the improvement of its rivers and harbors navigated by the said vessels; but such duties shall not conflict with any treaties of the Confederate States with foreign nations; and any surplus revenue, thus derived, shall, after making such improvement, be paid into the common treasury. Nor shall any state keep troops or ships of war in time of peace, enter into any agreement or compact with another state, or with a foreign power, or engage in war, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent danger as will not admit of delay. But when any river divides or flows through two or more States, they may enter into compacts with each other to improve the navigation thereof.[15]
Changes to Article III
Changes to Article IV
Other states may be admitted into this Confederacy by a vote of two-thirds of the whole House of Representatives, and two-thirds of the Senate, the Senate voting by states; but no new state shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other state; nor any state be formed by the junction of two or more states, or parts of states, without the consent of the legislatures of the states concerned as well as of the Congress.[19]
Changes to Article V
Changes to Article VI
Article VI Section 1(1) The Government established by this Constitution is the successor of the Provisional Government of the Confederate States of America, and all the laws passed by the latter shall continue in force until the same shall be repealed or modified; and all the officers appointed by the same shall remain in office until their successors are appointed and qualified, or the offices abolished.[21]
Changes to Article VII
When five states shall have ratified this Constitution, in the manner before specified, the Congress under the Provisional Constitution, shall prescribe the time for holding the election of President and Vice President; and, for the meeting of the Electoral College; and, for counting the votes, and inaugurating the President. They shall, also, prescribe the time for holding the first election of members of Congress under this Constitution, and the time for assembling the same. Until the assembling of such Congress, the Congress under the Provisional Constitution shall continue to exercise the legislative powers granted them; not extending beyond the time limited by the Constitution of the Provisional Government.[25]
There were several major differences between the constitutions concerning slavery.
Article I Section 9(1) The importation of Negroes of the African race from any foreign country, other than the slave-holding States or Territories of the United States of America, is hereby forbidden; and Congress is required to pass such laws as shall effectually prevent the same.[13]
The Migration or Importation of such Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the Year one thousand eight hundred and eight, but a tax or duty may be imposed on such Importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each Person.[30]
Article I Section 9(2) Congress shall also have power to prohibit the introduction of slaves from any State not a member of, or Territory not belonging to, this Confederacy.[13]
Article I Section 9(4) No bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves shall be passed.[13]
Article IV Section 2(1) The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States; and shall have the right of transit and sojourn in any State of this Confederacy, with their slaves and other property; and the right of property in said slaves shall not be thereby impaired.[31]
Article IV Section 3(3) The Confederate States may acquire new territory; and Congress shall have power to legislate and provide governments for the inhabitants of all territory belonging to the Confederate States, lying without the limits of the several states; and may permit them, at such times, and in such manner as it may by law provide, to form states to be admitted into the Confederacy. In all such territory, the institution of negro slavery as it now exists in the Confederate States, shall be recognized and protected by Congress, and by the territorial government: and the inhabitants of the several Confederate States and Territories, shall have the right to take to such territory any slaves lawfully held by them in any of the states or territories of the Confederate states.[32]
The Confederate Constitution's preamble included the phrase "each State acting in its sovereign and independent character," which focused the new constitution on the rights of the individual states.
States of the Confederacy gained several rights that states of the Union do not have, such as the right to impeach federal judges and other federal officers if they worked or lived solely in their state.
Article I Section 2(5) The House of Representatives shall choose their speaker and other officers; and shall have the sole power of impeachment; except that any judicial or other federal officer, resident and acting solely within the limits of any state, may be impeached by a vote of two-thirds of both branches of the Legislature thereof. [6]
Article I Section 10(1) No State shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation; grant letters of marque and reprisal; coin money; make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts; pass any bill of attainder, or ex post facto law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts; or grant any title of nobility. [15]
No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.[33]
Article I Section 9(7) No preference shall be given by any regulation of commerce or revenue to the ports of one State over those of another.[13]
No Preference shall be given by any Regulation of Commerce or Revenue to the Ports of one State over those of another: nor shall Vessels bound to, or from, one State, be obliged to enter, clear, or pay Duties in another. [30]
Article I Section 10(3) No State shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any duty on tonnage, except on seagoing vessels, for the improvement of its rivers and harbors navigated by the said vessels; but such duties shall not conflict with any treaties of the Confederate States with foreign nations; and any surplus revenue thus derived shall, after making such improvement, be paid into the common treasury.[15]
The Confederate States lost a few rights that the Union states retained.
Article I Section 9(6) No tax or duty shall be laid on articles exported from any State, except by a vote of two-thirds of both Houses.[13]
The signers and the states they represented were:
Congress began to move for ratification of the Confederate States Constitution on March 11, 1861:
Although the Confederate States Supreme Court was never constituted, the supreme courts of the various Confederate states issued numerous decisions interpreting the Confederate Constitution. Unsurprisingly, since the Confederate Constitution was based on the United States Constitution, the Confederate State Supreme Courts often used U.S. Supreme Court precedents. The jurisprudence of the Marshall Court thus influenced the interpretation of the Confederate Constitution. The state courts repeatedly upheld robust powers of the Confederate Congress, especially on matters of military necessity.[42]
Contemporary historians overwhelmingly agree that secession was motivated by the preservation of slavery. There were numerous causes for secession, but the preservation and the expansion of slavery were easily the most important of them. The confusion may come from blending the causes of secession with the causes of the war, which are separate but related issues. (Lincoln entered a military conflict not to free the slaves but to put down a rebellion.) According to historian Kenneth M. Stampp, each side supported states' rights or federal power only when it was convenient to do so.[43] Stampp also cited Confederate Vice President Alexander H. Stephens's A Constitutional View of the Late War Between the States as an example of a Southern leader who said that slavery was the "cornerstone of the Confederacy" when the war began but, after the Southern defeat, said that the war had been instead about states' rights.[44]
According to an 1861 speech delivered by Alabama politician Robert Hardy Smith, the State of Alabama declared its secession from the United States to preserve and to perpetuate the practice of slavery, the debate over which he referred to as the "Negro quarrel." In his speech, Smith praised the Confederate constitution for its lack of euphemisms and its succinct protections of the right to own "Negro" slaves:
We have dissolved the late Union chiefly because of the negro quarrel. Now, is there any man who wished to reproduce that strife among ourselves? And yet does not he, who wished the slave trade left for the action of Congress, see that he proposed to open a Pandora's box among us and to cause our political arena again to resound with this discussion. Had we left the question unsettled, we should, in my opinion, have sown broadcast the seeds of discord and death in our Constitution. I congratulate the country that the strife has been put to rest forever, and that American slavery is to stand before the world as it is, and on its own merits. We have now placed our domestic institution, and secured its rights unmistakably, in the Constitution. We have sought by no euphony to hide its name. We have called our negroes 'slaves', and we have recognized and protected them as persons and our rights to them as property.
— Robert Hardy Smith, An Address to the Citizens of Alabama on the Constitution and Laws of the Confederate States of America, 1861.[45][46][47]
Georgia Democrat Alexander H. Stephens, who would become the Confederate vice president, stated within his Cornerstone Speech that the Confederate constitution was "decidedly better than" the American one, as the former "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."[48]
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