The author, a Bostonian, was in a unique position to expose and criticize the actions of his own State, beginning with her earliest threats of secession immediately following the ratification of the Constitution and up to the outbreak of hostilities between North and South in the 1860s. Also discussed are the disastrous effects of a premature emancipation upon the Negro population of the South, including the shockingly high death toll of the former slaves due to starvation and disease, as well as the indifference of their alleged Northern benefactors to their desperate plight.