Mayor Wood's Recommendation of the Secession of New York City, January 6, 1861
Many may be unaware that Mayor Fernando Wood of New York City recommended that the the city secede from the State of New York and declare itself a free city so as to carry on its profitable trade with the South. New York's shipping and commerce were in a large part dependent on Southern cotton; consequently, he felt that secession would release the city from the strictures of both the State of New York and the Union.
On January 6, 1861, Mayor Wood wrote a recommendation. This post is not a verbatim account of the recommendation; rather, it is a collection of interesting assertions and quotes from the recommendation. Among other subjects addressed by Wood, local self-government and the relationship of a city and county to the rest of the state and Union is a topic of interest.
Contextually, it is important to note that this address was given prior the Lincoln's inauguration or open hostilities at Fort Sumter.
August Glen-James, editor
Introduction
To the Honorable the Common Council:
Gentlemen: We are entering upon the public duties of the year under circumstances as unprecedented as they are gloomy and painful to contemplate. The great trading and producing interests of not only the city of New York, but of the entire country, are prostrated by a monetary crisis; and although similar calamities have before befallen us, it is the first time that they have emanated from causes having no other origin than that which may be traced to political disturbances.
Selection 1
It would seem that a dissolution of the Federal Union is inevitable. Having been formed originally on a basis of general and natural protection, but separate local independence--each state reserving the entire and absolute control of its own domestic affairs, it is evidently impossible to keep them together longer than they deem themselves fairly treated by each other, or longer than the interests, honor and fraternity of the people of the several States are satisfied. Being a Government created by opinion, its continuance is dependent upon the continuance of the sentiment which formed it. It cannot be preserved by coercion or held together by force. A resort to this last dreadful alternative would of itself destroy not only the Government, but the lives and property of the people.
Selection 2
It is, however, folly to disguise the fact that, judging from the past, New York may have more cause of apprehension from the aggressive legislation of our own State than from external dangers. We have already largely suffered from this cause. For the past five years, our interests and corporate rights have been repeatedly trampled upon. Being an integral portion of the State, it has been assumed, and in effect tacitly admitted on our part by nonresistance, that all political and governmental power over us rested in the State Legislature. Even the common right of taxing ourselves for our own government has been yielded, and we are not permitted to do so without this authority
Thus it will be seen that the political connection between the people of the city and the State has been used by the latter to our injury. The Legislature, in which the present partizan majority has the power, has become the instrument by which we are plundered to enrich their speculators, lobby agents, and Abolition politicians. Laws are passed through their malign influence by which, under forms of legal enactment, our burdens have been increased, our sustance eaten out, and our municipal liberties destroyed. Self-government, though guaranteed by the State Constitution, and left to every other county and city, has been taken from us by this foreign power, whose dependents have been sent among us to destroy our liberties by subverting our political system.
How we shall rid ourselves of this odious and oppressive connection, it is not for me to determine. It is certain that a dissolution cannot be peacefully accomplished, except by the consent of the Legislature itself. Whether this can be obtained or not, is, in my judgment, doubtful. Deriving so much advantage from its power over the city, it is not probable that a partizan majority will consent to a separation--and to resort to force by violence and revolution must not be thought of for an instant.
Selection 3
Much, no doubt, can be said in favor of the justice and policy of separation. It may be said that secession or revolution in any of the United States would be subversive of all Federal authority, and, so far as the Central Government is concerned, the resolving of the community into its original elements--that, if part of the States frorm new combinations and Governments, other States may do the same. California and her sisters of the Pacific will no doubt se up an independent Republic and husband their own rich mineral resources. The Western States, equally rich in cereals and other agricultural products will probably do the same. Then it may be said, why should not New York city, instead of supporting by her contributions in revenue two-thirds of the expenses of the United States, becomealso equally independent? As a free city, with but nominal duty on imports, her local Government could be supported without taxation upon her people. Thus we could live free from taxes, and have cheap goods nearly duty free. In this she would have the whole and united support of the Southern States, as well as all the other States to whose interests and rights under the Constitution she has always been true. . . .
When Disunion has become a fixed and certain fact, why may not New York disrupt the bands which bind her to a venal and corrupt master--to a people and a party that have plundered her revenues, attempted to ruin her commerce, taken away the power of self-government, and destroyed the confederacy of which she was the proud Empire City? New York, as a Free City, may shed the only light and hope of a future reconstruction of our once blessed Confederacy.
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Source: McPhereson, Edward, The Political History of the United States of America, During the Great Rebellion, From November 6, 1860, to July 4 1864. Philip & Solomons. New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1864. Pages 42-44