The Sun.
London, England, 1863-07-30 00:00:00

THE CIVIL WAR IN AMERICA.

(From the Times' Correspondent.)
NEW YORK, July 17.

The ancient saying, that the gods in granting the
prayers of the wicked always accompany the boon
with something which deprives it of its value, has
received a modern exemplification in the case of Mr.
Lincoln and the revolutionary party by whose aid
he governs. They prayed for military success, and
they have got it, and ordered a general thanksgiving
for it But it has come upon them amid scenes of
cruelty, arson, and bloodshed which have had no
parallel in the history of the country. Their cup of
joy has a drop of poison in it. Their triumph is
marred by the outburst of a peril which they were
too self-sufficient and conceited even to dream of.
In the day of their glory the judgment of the
greatest city on the continent—the city that has
done more than any dozen cities to support, by men
and money, a war for the restoration of the Union
and the Constitution—has declared itself against a
war for the destruction of the Constitution, the abo-
lition of State rights, and the establishment of a Fe-
deral despotism. It has declared by the voice of its
most numerous, if its humblest, citizens, that it will
not fight upon compulsion; that it has no faith in vic-
tories that are but fine words for useless slaughter and
resultless massacres; and that, although it loves the
Union and would be very glad if it could be re-
stored, it loves its own constitutional liberties and
its permanent exemption from enforced military
duty a great deal more. This is the meaning of the
formidable insurrection that has now entered upon
its fifth day, and sympathy with the original ob-
jects of which has paralysed the arm of authority
in endeavouring to suppress it. Had the insurgents
contented themselves with the destruction of the
enrolment papers and the forcible seizure of the con-
scription offices, and themselves executed summary
vengeance upon the cowardly ruffians and assassins
who took advantage of a political outbreak to in-
dulge in arson and murder, it is probable that the
insurrection would gradually have grown into the
respectability of a revolution ; that men of influence,
position, and character would have placed them•
selves at its head, and compelled the Central Govern-
ment to adopt a new, or rather a return to the old,
policy of conciliation towards the South, to a with-
drawal of the proclamation of emancipation, and to
an armistice between the contending forces. But
this is not to be. Mr. Lincoln has taught the
people that there is a power above the law and the
Constitution. They have so far profited by the
teaching as to set the law at defiance, and to inter-
pret it according to the prompting of their own
passion or caprice, or the requirements of a neces-
sity, of which they declare themselves to be the
sole judges.
Had Mr. Lincoln frankly authorised Governor
Seymour to announce to the people that the con-
scription in N.,-w Yurk would not be enforced until
the question of its constitutionality had been de•
tided, it is likely that the only mob remaining in
the city after the first day's riot would have been
mobs of thieves, whose violence would speedily
have been suppressed by the police and the special
constabulary. A notification that he had done so
sensibly thinned the ranks of the insurgents on
Wednesday ; but when it was discove-ed that the
announcement was not cfficiac—that Mr. Lincoln
had not spoken, and that at the best the draught
was only to be suspended until the restoration of
order, the crowds increased ; the half appeased mul-
titude broke out into fresh riot, and in their blind
fury committed outrages so shocking as to alienate
from them all the support that the educated and
wealthy classes might otherwise have been inclined
to afford them.

As yet, brutal as the mob has shown itself in its
murder of inoffensive negroes, no less than seven
of whom were hung from the lamp posts in different
parts of the city on Wednesday night, in addition
to ten or twelve who were beaten to death or
thrown into the river, it is hard to say whether the
cold-blooded brutality of the leading Republican
journals was not the direct provocation of their
fury. At the very outbreak of the riots, when a
few words of conciliation from men in whose judg-
ment the public confided, and whose personal cha-
racter and social position were entitled to respect,
might have stormed the calm of discontent—or, at
all events, prevented bloodshed—these journals
display a feorocity that is never found except in the
hearts of people who are tyrants alike by nature
and by training. There was to be no parley with
men who resisted the draught. The draught was
the only hope and salvation of the country. For
every negro killed a hundred white men were to be
executed. Every rioter was to be remorselessly
shot down. An officer who wished to save the
effusion of blood, and fired blank cartridge over the
heads of the people to alarm them, was declared to
be "no man," but a " cowardly ruffian, who
deserved instant death. " Grapeshot, and plenty
of it," was the sole remedy for popular dis-
content. Such were but a few of the phrases
with which they influenced the angry passions of
the crowd, and manifested how little competent
they were to advise in the crisis of the national mis-
fortunes. Their columns did not contain a single
expression calculated to allay irritation. Blood!
more blood ! was the sole burden of their objurga-
tions ; the blood of the only men from whose ranks
the Government can expect to draw defenders,
however imminent its peril: the blood of men,
whose original complaint against the Administra-
tion was its disregard of the law and constitution ;
the blood of the classes that bear upon their shoul-
ders the weight of all the work of peace and of all
the cost and hardship of war ; blood—blood unli-
mited, and the more the better. Such was their
morning cry and their evening recommendation ;
and if the popular passion was thus exasperated
into a fiercer fever than it might have otherwise
reached, these were the men who were guilty of
Piling up the fuel and throwing oil upon the flames.
The leaders of the Republican party were to the
full as rabid as their press. Though Governor
Seymour, with a rare admixture of conciliation and
firmness, contrived to allay the anger of the crowd,
and reduce the insurrection within such limits as
might render it easily repressible by the strong arm
of the local authority, civic as well as military,
these persons, seeing as they imagined an opportu-
nity for dealing a blow at a State sovereignty which
they rightlyholdto be incompatible with the ex-
tension and consolidation of the Federal power, did
their utmostbsyrr;,s personal remonstrance and by
alarmist telegr to Washington to induce the
President to declare martial law over the State and
and
city of New York,
appointth General Butler to
enforce it. Fortunatheilsy ePresident was, in this
respect, wiser than
stru and did not choose
to run the risk ee a party,
the then tem-
per of the people, and wingideef minan like Governor
Seymour to use it
enough to Sweepstrictlypresenthtehlies
belief
f Federalth
of a revolution strong
Government before it. The
people is that the draught will be abandoned. Thee
design of the Republican party is that it shall be
suspended for a month or six weeks, until a
new
enrolment has been made in districts where the lists
have been destroyed; and that, in the meantime, the
cities of the North shall be submitted to the
opera-
tion of martial law under such administrators a
Butler, Schenck, Haseall, and Milroy. But as it
would take all the armies of Rosecrans, Grant,
Meade, Dix, Banks, Gilmour, and Corcoran, even
were each cf them double,l in numbers, to accom-
plish this purpose, the probability is that the Go-
vernrnee t will not be so insane as to make the at-
tempt. The insurrection in New York has been
quelled, not so much by the exertions of the police
and the military as by the faith of the insurgents
that they have elestreyed all chance of the draught.
If that faith be shaken the multitude will be again
in arms, and scenes more frightful than those of the
present week will be enacted •; but, this time, under
the leadership of daring men, who will rather ',eke
New York out of the Union than consent to any
form of conscription, however much it may be
modified or sweetened to the popular palate.
The Republican party may say what it will ; it
may hurl its denunciations against the Irish
" rowdies," the French and German Red Republi-
cans, and the thieves who swelled the ranks of the
multitude ; but the riots cannot be explained away
by any arguments based upon the fact that all the