Richmond Daily Times

From the South Carolinian.

S. CAROLINA STATE CONVENTION.

COLUMBIA, April 30, 1852.

The Convention was opened by prayer yesterday, by Rev. T. R. English.

Mr. Cheves, from the Committee of Twenty-One, made the following report:

The Committee of Twenty-One, to whom was referred an act to provide for the election of deputies to a Southern Congress and the call of a Convention, with instruction to consider and report thereon, respectfully report—

That they have considered the subject referred to them, and have concluded to recommend to the Convention the adoption of the accompanying resolution and ordinance:

Resolved, by the people of South Carolina in Convention assembled, That the frequent violations of the Constitution of the United States by the Federal Government, and its encroachments upon the reserved rights of the sovereign States of this Union, especially in relation to slavery, amply justify this State, so far as any duty or obligation to her confederates is involved, in dissolving at once all political connection with her co-States, and that she forbears the exercise of that manifest right of self-government from considerations of expediency only.

An ordinance to declare the right of this State to secede from the Federal Union.

We, the people of the State of South Carolina, in Convention assembled, do declare and ordain, and it is hereby declared and ordained,

That South Carolina, in the exercise of her sovereign will, as an independent State, acceded to the Federal Union, known as the United States of America, and that in the exercise of the same sovereign will, it is her right, without let, hindrance, or molestation from any power whatsoever, to secede from the said Federal Union; and that for the sufficiency of the causes which may impel her to such separation, she is responsible alone, under God, to the tribunal of public opinion among the nations of the earth.

The report was ordered to be printed, and made the special order for to-day.

Dr. John Bellinger offered the following amendment to the report, which was also ordered for consideration to-day;

"Be it ordained by this Convention, That the Legislature of the State shall have the power, by a vote of two-thirds, (accompanied with a notification to the other States,) to withdraw the State of South Carolina from the Federal Union."

Mr. B. F. Perry, from the same Committee, made a report on his own behalf. This gentleman's report states that the other Southern States, identified with South Carolina, having declined to meet South Carolina in a Southern Congress, it would be unwise and inexpedient for South Carolina to take any decisive separate action under existing circumstances. One of the resolutions presented by Mr. P. pledges South Carolina to resist with the other Southern States, on certain contingencies. The report was ordered to be printed, and made the order for to-day.

Mr. Gregg, from the same Committee, also submitted a report on his own behalf, stating his reasons for not concurring in the report of the Committee, which, on his motion, was laid on the table, and ordered to be printed.

Mr. Dantzler, announced that he had prepared, as an individual member of the Co-operation party, an ordinance of prospective secession, but was restrained from offering it, lest it might distract the deliberations of the Convention.

The Convention then adjourned.

From the Charleston Mercury, May 1st.

Adjournment of the State Convention.

The Convention adjourned finally at a quarter past six yesterday evening. Its whole action is embodied in the Report of the Committee of Twenty-one, which we publish this morning in the regular proceedings. That report, the telegraph informs us, was adopted, by yeas 136, nays 19. It embraces, 1st, a resolution to the effect that the State has good cause to secede from the Union, and forbears to do so only from motives of expediency; and 2d, an Ordinance, declaring and ordaining the right of secession as a prerogative of the State, for the exercise of which at any time she is accountable only to God and the public opinion of the world.

To many, this may seem but a barren result of a session which has been so long looked forward to with solicitude, and which was once thought to involve the disruption of the Confederacy. Let us not, however, too hastily decide that the Convention has not done all that was in its power to do effectually. For no one will say that there would have been wisdom or patriotism in enacting measures that either aimed at no defined result, or that carried within them the seeds of their own sure decay. We do not say that this was the character of one or all the measures that had been suggested. But we know that it was the settled conviction of many of the most earnest among those who had advocated secession, that any half-way measures would effect no valuable object, and would bear the appearance of an attempt to hide the retreat of the State. It is clear now that such was the conviction of a large majority of the party; or at least, that they believed more could be gained for S. Carolina by a reconciliation of parties on the broad basis of a solemn enactment, looking to her protection in the future, than by any imperfect measures of redress for past wrongs. A decision made with so near an approach to unanimity by the representatives of our party, carries with it too much respectable authority, that we should oppose it. This act of the Convention is now the supreme law, for us and for all, and we bow before its authority.

In regard to the past, then, the Convention has done nothing, save only to make it the starting point,—the occasion and the justification of its provision for the future. But in regard to the latter, we look upon its action as full of import. It has ordained and enacted the right of State Secession; and though this ordinance does not invest the State with a power which it had not before, yet it gives a new character and efficiency to it by putting it in the form of a declaratory enactment, and thus clearly making it a part of the supreme law of the State. It is now one of the parts of our Constitution, the guardianship and enforcement of which is entrusted to the Legislature.

Not only is this a great step towards making the action of the State free, speedy and effectual in the event of future aggressions, but it might even be doubted whether, in thus leaving the action of the Legislature so absolutely unrestricted, prudence has not been slightly at fault. We take it for granted here that the amendment of Dr. Bellinger, which both required a two-thirds vote of the Legislature and a previous notice to the other States, was not adopted, although we have no positive information. We think that amendment was a desirable restriction on the exercise of so momentous a power as that of seceding from the Union; but we must rest in the conviction that so grave a responsibility will never be used.