The Express.
London, England, 1861-05-22 00:00:00

2
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LONDON, WEDNZBDAY, MAY 22.

"THE United States have accepted this civil
" war as an inevitable necessity." Such is the
declaration of Mr. sew sae in his despatch to the
American Minister at Paris. The Secretary of
the United states Government must have pon-
dered well those words before he consigned them
in • document to be laid before the first power of
continental Europe. But they express • fact,
one which has not received sufficient attention in
England. It is often lightly asked here why the
two sections of the American Union cannot sepa-
rate, and live peaceably side by side. Those who
thus speak have bestowed but • slight and super-
ficial attention upon the nature of the causes
of disagreement. The question may be met by
another,—if nothing hinders them living peace-
ably aide by side, why should they separate
and sacrifice the Union, which is their common
strength and glory T The statesmen of the North
know full well that, however quietly they might
acquiesce in the separation of the South, there
could he no peace between Governments founded
on principles so radically antagonistic as those em-
bodied in the respective Constitutions of the Con-
federacy and of the United States. The promise,
if seriously given, would not and could not
be kept. We have heard • good deal of the
Morisiot doctrine, and the determination of the
citizens of the United States never to allow any
European Government to transfer its institutions
to a fresh portion of the American continent; but
the United States Government might with much less
danger to its tranquillity allow this than permit
the formation of • great Slave Power stretching
from the Ohio to the Gulf. There is nothing in
the forms of European governments more
inimical to the peace and freedom of the
non-slaveholding States than the political doctrines
openly proclaimed by the Secession leaders. If
the Confederacy could establish itself it would
manifest itself to the world on the very morrow as
a propagandist, aggressive, freebooting State, per-
petually menacing its neighbours, and embroiling
them in hostilities. Its large idle population of
poor and turbulent whites form the appropriate
material of filibustering forces, and would
be ever annexing somebody. The extension of
the area of slavery, it should be remembered, was
the very question on which the present rupture
has taken place. Severed from the Union, the
South would send out its bands in all directions,
and carry slavery far and wide. The acquisition
of Mexico is one of the commonest promises made
to their adherents by the Secession leaders. Is
the first nation of the American continent to per-
mit that T Certainly it could not; it is therefore
better to meet the mischief in its early stage.
The only object the South have in separating is,
that Slavery, hitherto limited by counteracting
principles, may henceforth become sovereign,
expanding itself, and pervading and moulding every
institution of government. And experience
proves that the growth of Negro Slavery is the
measure of the decrease of the white man's free-
dom. Where the black man is held in bondage
the white man is deprived of the commonest liber-
ties, and must neither speak his mind nor exercise
his industry.
If President LIWOOLN prevents the execution of
the Southern programme, preserving the abundant
constitutional rights of the Southern States as
members of the Union, we shall say that he hes
defended the cause of liberty, and not a whit the
less because the dominant party in the South
has its own projects for rearing an empire
of tyranny and oppression. If it becomes
necessary for that primes° to draw the sword, we
shall say that until the millennial day come when the
sword shall be beaten into the ploughshare and the
spear into the pruning hook, war can bo waged for
no higher object than to maintain the Constitution
of the United States over the length and bread.h
of the Union. From the first Mr. LINCOLN has
uniformly declared that he will do this. Every
new declaration he has made has illustrated his
consistency and steadfastness. It seems to be
maintained in some quarters that because the Go-
vernment of the United States is so free, its Head
ought not to defend it. We do not see why a good
Government should have denied to it rights of self-
defence which are couceded as • matter of course
to a bad one. The general common Government
of the United States was created for this purpose
—to maintain and defend the Union. The notion
that a minority of • nation is to be allowed to secede
when it cannot have its way, although its rights
have been respected, is destructive of every prin-
ciple of government, and has never been recog-
nised by any statesman. The States that now
pretend a right to go out of the Union have seve-
rally relinquished their claim to independent
existence, in order to share the sovereignty of
their own territories and of those of the Union
with the other States compacted in one collective
body under the general government. They can-
not resume their full sovereignty as of right. If any
of them could do it, it would be, not States which,
like Louisiana, Arkansas, and Missouri, mi.
copy territory acquired by the diplomacy
of the Union, without reference to the
wishes of the inhabitants, but States like Virgi-
ma, for instance, which helped to form the Union.
Vet Virginia, in the articles by which she ratified
the Union, used language which implicitly dis-
claimed the right of secession. Her words are, that
" the powers granted under the Constitution are
" derived from the people of the United States."
It is this sovereign body, the people of the United
States, and not the Governors or Legislatures of
the separate States, who have to decide on the
question of union or disunion. And with them
also rests the question of peace or war. If the
vast majority of tbo people decide that the Union