Report of the Joint select committee appointed to inquire into the condition of affairs in the late insurrectionary states, so far as regards the execution of laws, and the safety of the lives and property of the citizens of the United States and Testimony taken.

ALABAMA-SUB-COMMITTEE. 1865
Answer. No, sir; I never have said that. I have said that there are a good many
good democrats-a good many good conscientious democrats, I have no doubt.
Question. You think they were all of them very ready to injure you?
Answer. No, sir; I have never said that. I have said that there was a class that
would.
Question. You state that you were entirely avoided by the people here, and treated
with contumely?
Answer. I did not say entirely. I had some personal friends who have known me for
a long time, and they did not, as I told you, want to see an old man like myself injured.
I believe I owe the escape with my life to that feeling among my personal friends, who
were democrats. I honestly believe I would have been sacrificed, if it had not been
for this influence that operated in my favor.
Question. There were a great many just such men as you are, and none of them were
sacrificed?
Answer. I do not know that there were a great many such as I was.
Question. There are some in this town?
Answer. There were. They were comparatively few, and they were very quiet like
myself, and said very little.
Question. Through the northern portion of this State it was an almost universal Union
party?
Answer. We had very little information of the condition of North Alabama. I was
not there during the history of the war. After I went to the supreme court iu Montgomery-I got there a few days after the act of secession passed, and I attended that
term of the supreme court, and went home and never left the corporate limrlits of
Tuscaloosa from that time until the war was over. I staid at home quietly and peacefully; went from my house to my office and back. I rarely went out on the street. I
had very little to say or do with the people. I knew that my feelings were not in
harmony with theirs, and they knew it. I tried to live as quietly as possible; to live
as I could.
Question. Now, I ask you again the question, whether you have not mistaken the
feeling of hostility towards the administration of the General Government, and the
administration of the State government for hostility to the principles of our Government, and the Government itself?
Answer. Every man, General Blair, is liable to be mistaken. I do not believe that I
am mistaken when I say that, as a body, I believe, the democratic party to this dayQuestion. That includes nearly the entire body of the white people in this State.
Answer. I mean of those who are leaders, and were leaders, because, in my opinion,
there was comparatively a very large majority of the white people of Alabama who
were opposed to secession; and if they could have had an opportunity to have voted upon
that ordinance, would have voted it down by a very large majority-if they could
have had that vote free from outside influences. It was forced upon them, without
having an opportunity to say " yea " or " nay." They refused to submit it to the people.
Question. In that view of the case, in which I concur entirely with you, that a majority of the people, not only of Alabama, but of every one of the Southern States, probably with the exception of South Carolina, if this ordinance of secession had been submitted to them, and if they had been adequately protected by the General Government,
would have rejected itAnswer. Yes, sir; if they could have been protected, there is no doubt about that.
Question. The General Government was very efficient if it had chosen to employ its
forces i
Answer. In the first place I do not believe the General Government was very anxious
to do it.
Question. At what time?
Answer. Immediately before Mr. Lincoln went into power.
Question. Mr. Lincoln was not in a very great hurry for it, either?
Aswser. I do not know anything about that. I never had the pleasure of seeing
Mr. Lincoln.
Question. I want to refer to the question in which you interrupted me before I concluded it, that the majority of the people of this State, and, as I believe, a large portion of the seceding States, were against secession and in favor of the Union.
Answer. I believe they were, taking the common people. It was mostly composed
of the poorer class of people.
Question. But a de facto government was established over them by force of arms,
and the General Government did not interfere with its establishment?
Answer. I do not know that I apprehend what you mean by " force of arms." Do
you mean that the rebel portion of the community forced a government upon them?
Question. Unquestionably I mean that; and it must be true, if, as you say, the majority of the people of this State were against secession.
Answer. There was no force of Snrms nsod, ftli I am aware of, even by them at tbe
time; there was moral force, perhaps more than moral force, but no actual military