who, on the 2nd of March, as his excellency has been un-officially informed, took their seats in the Congress of the Confederate States, by virtue of which Texas was declared one of he Confederate States. Leaving out of question the fact that on the 2nd of March the said delegates had no information as to the withdrawal of Texas from the Federal Union, there is no evidence that they had received any warrant from the people of Texas for the act. The Contention which elected them as delegates represented but a minority of the people of Texas. The legislature delegated to it the power to submit the question of secession to a vet of the people. Neither by the terms of the call under which the delegates wee elected, the vote they received, nor the act of the legislature recognizing them to perform the function assigned, were they empowered to elect delegates to aid in the formation of a provisional government with other States, who, after creating the same should constitute themselves members of Congress.

The object of the Convention was declared to be to provide the mode by which the people of Texas should reassume their complete sovereignty. Yet, judging from the tenor of your communication, Texas was on the day provided for declaring her independence of the United States, and before any considerable portion of her people knew the result of the vote, again deprived of her sovereignty, and, instead of an independent nation, became one of the Confederate States, subject to a government which her people had no share in making, and a constitution which but few of them had ever seen.

Admitting even that the Convention had power to elect delegates and members of Congress to the Provisional Government of the Confederate States, the facts show that even in its estimation the delegates elected were not empowered to annex Texas to said Provisional Government on the 2nd day of March, and that, until official information is received that Texas has been independent position resulting from the vote of her people ont eh 23rd of February. The confection itself did not, until the 5th day of March, pass an ordinance ratifying the constitution of the Provisional Government of the Confederate States and instructing its delegates to apply for the admission of Texas. There can be no other conclusion, therefore, than that, at the time your communication was addressed to his excellency, Texas was not, even in the estimation of the Convention, one of the Confederate States, and, therefore, not subject to the Provisional Government or in any way under the "control" off its President. Until, therefore, his excellency is informed from some official source that the people of Texas have parted with their sovereignty and become a part of the Government on whose part you write, I am instructed to say he cannot recognize any obligation to the same. The people alone have the right to say what form of government they will have; and while his excellency fully appreciates the fact that your communication has been addressed him with a conviction arising from the presence of delegates from Texas in the councils of the Provisional Government that the people have acted, but frankly assures you that such, in his opinion, is not the case.

It also becomes my duty to inform you that his excellency has notified the Convention, whose delegates are accredited to Montgomery, that he does not recognize it as a convention of the people of Texas, its powers having terminated with the reference of the question of secession to a vote of the people of Texas. Since the submission of the ordinance he has had no correspondence with the Contention other than to deny their authority.