This is also the same sort of passive aggressive tone as from before, since he is coupling negotiations from a position of power and basically drawing a hard line that he will not come back unless the Colonel Anderson can guarantee his daughters' safety. But he couples it with a sort of innocent question about schooling as well. It's surprisingly educated in its delivery, since everytime it takes something or delivers a devastating statement, it also balances it with either an outright compliment or a mundane question to dilute the previous blow. It as a whole seems to be establishing a sort of idea that, yes, he's willing to return, but he's actually not, as he's demanding many things that the Colonel can't provide. It's basically a soft rejection of his offer by making it look instead of as a personal decision off of just a refusal to work for him, but by disguising it as a logical decision based on just common working conditions and employment, such as differing wages and benefits. Again, it seems surprisingly well put together and educated, which likely is also intentionally done to undermine the Colonel's position.

I feel like this is almost an attempt at flattery, trying to get a good feeling for the Colonel Anderson's reaction. Seeing as it would be a more positive comment, since he's blatantly saying that he was proud to have been owned by a Colonel, but it also shows a level of passive aggressive education as well. This is because he's asking to hear about the wages, basically challenging Colonel Anderson to actually offer better than anybody else can, as he had said. It makes the situation interesting simply because It's a subservient tone that then shifts into this demanding and negotiating tone, since he's basically acting as if he is still a slave before moving on to discuss wages and other benefits.

I find this statement interesting. There was, amongst many people, a high regard for civilisations like Rome and Greece, indeed, the Parthenon in Nashville would be built just 30 odd years after the war. In this statement, Stephens is claiming that civilisations such as Rome and Greece, who enslaved white people more often than not, were against nature. Given the fact that Antebellum architecture also features prominant pillars and collumns, something taken directly from Greco-Roman influence, this also makes me curious as to why they would be attempting to imitate the architecture of empires, kingdoms, and city states that they claim to be against nature and their principles. I would be curious if this was something they genuinely thought about, that this statement is against general trends of their own society's influence. It also makes me, along with the previous annotation about their claims that the government had fallen, and the context of the speech, begin to suspect that this is not in fact a genuine display of Stephen's thoughts, but rather a propaganda piece meant to drum support for their cause from the masses. An educated "gentleman" may be aware that Rome and Greece enslaved white people, but the common farmer who would do majority of the fighting, and nearly all the dying, would likely not make those connections. I feel as if this reads as an "all is well, and we have nothing to worry about in the coming war because we're right, so go enlist and fight for the right and natural way of life" that one expects from typically authoritarian and extremist governments.

I feel like this is a disingenuous statement. The government didn't fall, nor did it struggle. Rather, the various states that would secede chose to leave the government then act as though it fell because there was a chance, perceived or otherwise, that the government may make a decision they personally disagree with. As others have pointed out, they make it clear that it's about slavery, and how it's not that the idea of equality causing the government to collapse in on itself, but rather the government is leaning towards possible banning of slavery. The government is still standing, and still quite strong, that's why they chose to leave it, since if they remained they feared that their slaves would be taken and freed. Additionally, we can see in hindsight that it most certainly remained functional as the North won. I wonder if this was something that weighed on the minds of various legislators in the Confederacy, since surely they were aware that the North wasn't dysfunctional, but rather well equipped and more than capable of out producing them in industrial goods. Certainly, this was known by Lee and other generals, as they attempted to push for a quick and lightning war to avoid the inevitable attritional warfare that all conflicts devolve to. If it was something they were aware of, then I wonder why they were bother saying this, to give legitimacy to their cause? Garner support for their new government? Or simply to make them feel better about their actions?