Congress of the Confederate States the Confederate government. The permanent Confederate Constitution served for the duration of the government with only one Amendment on May 21, 1861, when Congress was given the right to draw multiple federal judicial districts in the large states. The reservations of the South Carolina secession convention ratification were never taken up by any other state legislatures. Sitting as the Provisional Congress, the gathering elected Jefferson Davis President of the Confederate States of America on February 9, the day after the Provisional Constitution had been adopted and five days after initially convening in Montgomery. On February 21, a week before it
Confederate States of America of the Confederacy, and Alexander H. Stephens, its former Vice-President, both wrote postwar arguments in favor of secession's legality and the international legitimacy of the Government of the Confederate States of America, most notably Davis' "The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government". Once war with the United States began, the Confederacy pinned its hopes for survival on military intervention by Great Britain and France. The Confederates who had believed that "cotton is king" – that is, that Britain had to support the Confederacy to obtain cotton – proved mistaken. The British had stocks to last over a year and