[E.S. Dargan was a delegate to the secession convention from Mobile County. After secession, he was elected to a term in the Confederate Congress. Source: William R. Smith, The History and Debates of the Convention of the People of Alabama, (1861; reprint 1975), pp. 93-94.]

I wish, Mr. President, to express the feelings with which I vote for the secession of Alabama from the Government of the United States; and to
state, in a few words, the reasons that impel me to this act.

I feel impelled, Mr. President, to vote for this Ordinance by an overruling necessity. Years ago I was convinced that the Southern States would
be compelled either to separate from the North, by dissolving the Federal Government, or they would be compelled to abolish the institution of
African Slavery. This, in my judgment, was the only alternative; and I foresaw that the South would be compelled, at some day, to make her
selection. The day is now come, and Alabama must make her selection, either to secede from the Union, and assume the position of a sovereign,
independent State, or she must submit to a system of policy on the part of the Federal Government that, in a short time, will compel her to
abolish African Slavery.

Mr. President, if pecuniary loss alone were involved in the abolition of slavery, I should hesitate long before I would give the vote I now intend
to give. If the destruction of slavery entailed on us poverty alone, I could bear it, for I have seen poverty and felt its sting. But poverty, Mr.
President, would be one of the least of the evils that would befall us from the abolition of African slavery. There are now in the slaveholding
States over four millions of slaves; dissolve the relation of master and slave, and what, I ask, would become of that race? To remove them from
amongst us is impossible. History gives us no account of the exodus of such a number of persons. We neither have a place to which to remove
them, nor the means of such removal. They therefore must remain with us; and if the relation of master and slave be dissolved, and our slaves
turned loose amongst us without restraint, they would either be destroyed by our own hands-- the hands to which they look, and look with
confidence, for protection-- or we ourselves would become demoralized and degraded. The former result would take place, and we ourselves
would become the executioners of our own slaves. To this extent would the policy of our Northern enemies drive us; and thus would we not only
be reduced to poverty, but what is still worse, we should be driven to crime, to the commission of sin; and we must, therefore, this day elect
between the Government formed by our fathers (the whole spirit of which has been perverted), and POVERTY AND CRIME! This being the
alternative, I cannot hesitate for a moment what my duty is. I must separate from the Government of my fathers, the one under which I have
lived, and under which I wished to die. But I must do my duty to my country and my fellow beings; and humanity, in my judgment, demands that
Alabama should separate herself from the Government of the United States.

If I am wrong in this responsible act, I hope my God may forgive me; for I am not actuated, as I think, from any motive save that of justice and
philanthropy!

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