The Sun.
London, England, 1863-10-05 00:00:00

Democrats as believe that the Constitution is still a
valid document declare that all Mr. Chase's issue of
greenbacks and legal tender notes are illegal on this
ground, and that they not only will bat ought to
be repudiated. When peace comes, this is the first
great question that will have to be settled, and
though Northern politicians affect virtuous indig-
nation whenever the name of Mr. Jefferson Davis
is mentioned in connexion with the repudiation of
the State debt of Mississippi, it is evident from the
whole tone and temper of the public mind that the
repudiation of the enormous war debt alreadyll over
in-
curred will be a highly popular measurel
conscience of
little opposition from the scruples
the North and West, and will notoofny meeta with
hut will be
any considerable number of people,leath at the debt was
vehemently supported by th.
cleatdy a breach of
The conscription was Congress, just
by the 12th clause of
wrongfully and unconstsit.uutsietonpally contracted.
the Constitution.
Legislature, has power to raise
functions of the ,
the Bth section of the Ist
,article defining the
and.but not to make any app.ro-
a longer period
priato that use for
and, as if to prove conclusively that
t jon supports
of moneyarm i armies," ,'
than two years ;
the framers of that document meant only such a
small and moderate army as was sufficient for all
purposes until the unhappy day when Mr. Lincoln
became President, the 15th clause of the same sec-
tion provides that in the serious case of insurrection
and invasion, when the ordinary army would not
suffice for the purpose, Congress should have "power
to call for the militia to execute the laws of the
Union." Thus, if the Southern people be not a fo-
reign nation, if they be in insurrectionjand rebellion
against the laws of the Union, it was the duty of
Congress to call out the militia of the several States,
which militia, by the 10th clause, was not to be
under the command or control of officers appointed
either by Congress or by the President, but by the
Governors of the several States. Thusit did not per-
form its duty, but acted in flagrant violation of it,
when it ordered a conscription.
Equally positive is the unconstitutionality of the
suspension of the writ of habeas corpus. Congress
itself has power to suspend it, when in case of re-
beliion or invasion the public safety may require it;
hut even Congress cannot suspend it in States where
there is neither rebellion nor invasion. More than
this, whatever power Congress itself may exercise,
it has no authority for delegating the duty to Mr.
Lincoln or any other person.
There remains but one other stab to be inflicted
upon the dead body of the Censtitution—the abroga-
tion of State rights. This is the openly avowed and
cherished purpose of the administration, which it
will certainly effect before the war is many
months older, if the Democratic party will permit.
That it will permit is highly probable, if not certain.
It has no leaders who will assume the post of
danger. It has no "pluck." It prates all the day
and all the night, and does nothing. Upon the
principle that the man who can prevent a murder
and will not is as bad as the actual assassin, im-
p irtial history will have hereafter to record that
the Republican party destroyed American liberty
while the Democrats looked on, using strong words
perhaps, but with their hands behind their backs,
afraid to deliver a blow lest they as well as liberty
should be struca down in the encounter.
Amid all this excitement of home politics, the
anti-English feeling continues to be sedulously cul-
tivated by the leaders of opinion. If there be at
this time any Englishman (out of Birmingham or
Rochdale] who hates his own country ; who, when
England is at war, invariably assert that England
is wrong ; who would pull down the Church, ruin
the aristocracy, Americanise the Government, esta-
blish universal suffrage and the ballot, shorten the
duration of Parliaments, divide the country into
electoral districts, and open the doors of Parlia-
ment to the election of needy members by the pay-
ment of members; an Englishman, in short, to
whose prejudiced mind all that is British is bad,
and all that is American is pre-eminently good—
let him come to America and stay in it for three
months, miaing all the while with the people. If
he do, he will see sights and hear soands that will
tend to make him a sadder and a wiser man.
And with sentiments such as these, honestly
entertained, he could not be otherwise than of
a naturally pugnacious disposition, ho would of
necessity be exposed to rubs and rebuffs in this
country that would sorely try his patience and for-
bearance, and inflict some severe wounds upon his
self-love. In the first place, if he knew anything of
his native England and its history, he would find
the densest ignorance on the suhkct prevailing in
the new land to which he had bent his willing foot-
steps. He would discover that the prevalent opinion
among the Yankee was that the three British Isles
were miserable, "God-forsaken" corners of the
world, and that if any good existed among them it
was to be found in oppressed and " down-trodden"
Ireland ; that English society from the highest to
the lowest was so rotten and corrupt that it only
needed a word and a blow for the Emperor of the
French to annex them to the empire, and pension off
Queen Victoria with a suitable income, and a wing
of the Chateau de Fontainebleau for her residence :
that the United States—if such a paltry object were
worth the while—could forestall the Emperor of the
French at any moment in this praiseworthy design;
that Lord Nelson was not worthy to brush the boots
of Admiral Farragut ; that the battle of Waterloo
was but chiid's play compared with Antietam and
Federal armies at this moment
Gettysburg; that the
contain 50 generals batter than Wellington, and at
least half a dozen as good as Napoleon; that the
siege of Sebastopol made it evident that England
had neither pluck, nor skill, nor money, nor men ;
that Great Britain is a "one-horse" nation; that :he
English people cannot speak their own language;
that every one, from the duke to the caster meager,
misplaces the aspirates and talks a jargon that is a
mere antiquated provincial dialect, compared with
the "well of English undefiled" that flews from the
lips of Mr. Charles Sumner and Mr. Henry Ward
Beecher; that Englishmen are dull, slow, and with-
out a particle of energy or enterprise; that English
women have invariably large feet and large hands,
drink beer for breakfast, and laugh louder than
grooms or coachmen; that whenever England and
America were at war, England always puts forth her
whole strength, had no other wars on hand, and
was always ignominiously " whipped ;" that to
Americans alone is due the merit of every great and
useful invention of the ago; that England does not
possess a single hotel fit to lodge an American
citizen ; and that, as soon as the great and glorious
union between North:and South is restored, Eng-
land will be converted into a penal settlement for
American thieves, and Ireland elevated into a re-
public, under the presidency of General Corcoran
or Mr. Kickham, and the protection of Mr. Abra-
ham Lincoln. If, disgusted with all this ignorant
and conceited bosh, he were to admit once for all
that the Americans really knew nothing about
England, and were to commence the study of
American character, and endeavour to trace the
workings of their political system, he would find
that he himself had been no ignorant of America
as the Americans were of England; that he had
to uproot his prejudices, unlearn his polities, dis-
card his preconceived ideas, and study his new and
singular people as he would study a now language.
He would find, as he made a little progress in his
task, that everything in the character of American
institutions which he had been accustomed to ad-
mire was a proved evil ; and the absence of an aris-
tocracy of high rank and ancient lineage was sup-
plied by a "codfish aristocracy," a "shoddy
aristocracy," and an aristocracy of money; that if
a State Church were an evil, a Church uncon-
nected with the State, of which the preachers pan-
dered to the prejudices and the ignorance of the
stowd, and touted for custom like the traders of the
street, was au evil at least as great ; that universal
suffrage was but another name for universal corrup-
tion; that the frequency of popular elections pre-
ventedlawrespectable men from leaving thepursuits of
literatureliterature, and commerce to solicit the votes
Pe
for seerecyople that the ballot was no security
putable a trae:t politics had become so disre-
wore
0,,,nr0t,_,
us that the people could find no
man
than :',7pulietei;eit..het to bestow upon a public
lawyer would coneentatuo;''a that no really eminent
of the Supreme Csurt, eajuOge, unless it were
where he might hold his
position for life, irrespective of the favour of the