[the following paragraphs are excerpts from his Farewell Address to the U.S. Senate, January 21, 1861]
". . . I have, for many years, advocated, as an essential attribute of State sovereignty, the right of a State to secede from the Union."
"Nullification and secession, so often confounded, are, indeed, antagnostic principles. Nullification is a remedy which it is sought to apply within the Union, and against the agent of the States. It is only to be justified when the agent has violated his constitutional obligations, and a State, assuming to judge for itself, denies the right of the agent thus to act, and appeals to the other States of the Union for a decision; but when the States themselves, and when the people of the States, have so acted as to convince us that they will not regard our constitutional rights, then, and then for the first time, arises the doctrine of secession in its practical appplication."
"She [Mississippi] has heard proclaimed the theory that all men are created free and equal, and this made the basis of an attack upon her social institutions; and the sacred Declaration of Independence has been invoked to maintain the position of the equality of the races. The Declaration of Independence is to be construed by the circumstances and purposes for which it was made. The communities were declaring their independence; the people of those communities were asserting that no man was born, to use the language of Mr. Jefferson, booted and spurred, to ride over the rest of mankind; that men were created equal — meaning the men of the political community; that there was no divine right to rule; that no man inherited the right to govern …"
[the following paragraphs are excerpts from his first Inaugural Address at Montgomery, Alabama, February 18, 1861]
"Our present political position has been achieved in a manner unprecedented in the history of nations. It illustrates the American idea that governments rest on the consent of the governed, and that it is the right of the people to alter or abolish them at will whenever they become destructive of the ends for which they were established. …"
"Sustained by the consiousness that the transition from the former Union to the present Confederacy has not proceeded from a disregard on our part of just obligations, or any failure to perform every constitutional duty, moved by no interest or passion to invade the rights of others, anxious to cultivate peace and commerce with all nations, if we may not hope to avoid war, we may at least expect that posterity will acquit us of having needlessly engaged in it."
"We have changed the constituent parts, but not the system of government. The Constitution framed by our fathers is that of these Confederate States. …"
[the following paragraphs are excerpts from his February 22, 1862 Inaugural Address at Richmond, Virginia (that was the inaugural for the formal government, supplanting the provisional government established in 1861)]
". . . under the favor of Divine Providence, we hope to perpetuate the principles of our revolutionary fathers."
". . . For proof of the sincerity of our purpose to maintain our ancient institutions, we may point to the Constitution of the Confederacy and the laws enacted under it, as well as to the fact that through all the necesssities of an unequal struggle there has been no act on our part to impair personal liberty or the freedom of speech, of thought or the press. The courts have been open, the judicial functions fully executed, and every right of the peaceful citizen maintained as securely as if a war of invasion had not disturbed the land."
"The experiment instituted by our revolutionary fathers, of a voluntary Union of sovereign States for purpose specified in a solemn compact, had been perverted by those who, feeling power and forgetting right, were determined to respect no law but their own will."…
". . . True to our traditions of peace and our love of justice, we sent commissioners to the United States to propose a fair and amicable settlement … But the Government at Washington, denying our right to self-government, refused even to listen to any proposals for peaceful separation. Nothing was then left to do but to prepare for war. …"
". . . After a series of successes and victories, which covered our arms with glory, we have recently met with serious disasters. But in the heart of a people resolved to be free these disasters tend but to stimulate to increased resistance."