Alexander Stephens Cornerstone Speech

¶ … Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens' "Cornerstone Speech"

The Civil War was by far the most costly war in terms of human life ever fought by the United States, and the events that precipitated this conflict on U.S. soil included the succession of seven Southern states by March 1861 to form the Confederate States of America. With President Jefferson Davis leading the way, his vice president, Alexander Stephens, delivered a speech in support of the Southern cause including assurances that the new constitution was an improvement on the old, and that commercial enterprises were free to engage in interstate and international commerce at their discretion. Citing concerns over Northern superiority in infrastructure that would make prosecuting the war challenging, the vice president also assured his audience that enormous investments had already been made throughout the South and that more would be made in the future. In sum, this speech was a drum-beater designed to persuade fence-sitters and encourage Southern believers in their cause. This paper provides an analysis and evaluation of Stephens' "Cornerstone Speech," followed by a summary of the research and important findings in the conclusion.

Analysis and Evaluation

Anything was possible on March 21, 1861 when Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens delivered his "Cornerstone Speech" in Savannah, Georgia. The mindset of the intended audience of this speech ranged from unwavering and unbridled enthusiasm for the Southern cause to skepticism concerning the Southern state's chances against the economically and militarily superior North. As the Confederate vice president, Stephens was in a good position to officially outline the fledgling government's policies and intentions as codified as the South's new constitution. In this regard, the vice president's language is consistent with respect to optimism and reassurances for his intended audience, which he emphasizes includes not only the persons in attendance, but people throughout the South and indeed the world.

The vice president manages to make several good points in support of his thesis that the Confederate States of America qualified for a nation on several counts, including most especially geographic territory and a burgeoning infrastructure. It is clear that the vice president is assuming that the intended audience is familiar with the Southern cause and recent events, but he also assumes that they do not fully understand the extent to which the new country is prepared to defend its interests irrespective of what the North brings to bear against it. Although the vice president makes several good points, some of the points he uses in support of the new country's constitution likely troubled some in attendance as well as other stakeholders because of the reduced transparency of governmental operations and the clear disdain for the press evinced in the speech. For instance, despite the insistence on a free press by the Founding Fathers, the vice president states, "In the new constitution, provision has been made by which our heads of departments can speak for themselves and the administration, in behalf of its entire policy, without resorting to the indirect and highly objectionable medium of a newspaper."

Left unspoken in this speech was the legitimacy of the underlying ideology that made slavery an acceptable yet "peculiar institution." What was articulated, though, made it clear that the South's position was that African-Americans were inferior by nature and that slavery was the proper institution for them since it improved their character and saved their souls through their introduction to Christianity. Arguing that all men are not created equal, Stephens emphasized that, "Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. . . . Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man." Absent this fundamental ideological difference, it is reasonable to suggest that the Southern states would never have seceded in the first place, rationalized by the vice president in this speech by pointing out that "slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition." Although many modern observers might be incredulous at this type of racist rhetoric, it is clear that this was the gospel accepted by many of the member of the intended audience for this speech. Indeed, the vice president concluded that the superiority of the white race would become apparent to the entire world as the Confederacy gained legitimacy and credibility through its future successes. In this regard, Stephens' concluded that, "It is upon this [white superiority] our social fabric is firmly planted; and I cannot permit myself to doubt the ultimate success of a full recognition of this principle throughout the civilized and enlightened world."