The Sun.
London, England, 1863-03-26 00:00:00

THE CIVIL WAR IN AMERICA.

(From the Vines' Correspondent.)
NEW YORK, March 13.
Tb'e question of the conscription begins to occupy
alt men's minds. The exempt and the non-exempt
are equally interested. The exempt are anxious
because if the conscription fail, or be wisely re-
sisted, the Government will be without an available
army in three months ; the non-exempt, especially
that large class who have not 300 dols. to pay for a
substitute, not only dread the draft, but condemn it
on principle, and threaten to resist it. The wealthy j
non-exempt take the matter easily, and are ready
with their money whenever it may be called for;
but, as they will fcrm a comparatively small mino-
rity, unless the Government can so arrange aff•sirs
as to pick them out for first duty and leave the
-working men alone, the question is one that cannot
but excite as much uneasiness in Washington as it
does among thoughtful men is this and other cities
who note the course of public events and watch the
temper of the people. The President must have an
army, or the Southern Generals will occupy Washing-
ton and dictate peace from the Capitol. The volun-
tary system is an admitted failure. The compulsory
system must therefore be resorted to, or the war
must end in a manner humiliating to the pride of
the North. But whether the North and North-
West wi.l submit to the conscreption in any shape
is a question that will speedily be decided by events.
The working population all over the country are
forming themselves into secret societies to resist it,
unless the Government shall compel the rich to
serve as well as the poor. But how this is to be
done in the face of the law just passed and without
The authority of Congress is not stated. The whole
subject is full of peril. To draft the working classes
may excite commotions difficult to allay ; and to
force the rich to serve when the law allows any man
to procure a substitute for a prescribed and not one-
rous payment may excite an equally dangerous dis-
affection on the part of the trading and professional
classes, to whom a small money payment is a matter
of no importance; but who will not run the risk of
ruining their business or their professional prospects
by personal service in the battle-field. The Polish
insurrection has inopportunely aggravated the per-
plexities of the Government ; and many Democratic
journals which have not yet pronounced against the
conscription in their own country are making the
Polish Revolution and the ruthless conscriptio❑
which drove the people to violence the text of com-
ments which cannot be pleasant or consolatory to
the President and his Ministers.

Another difficulty exists in the notorious cooling
down of the once overboiling enthusiasm of the
Irish and Germans. These people have had enough
of fighting, and have lost heart in the cause. The
Administration, governed by political and personal
influence, and appointing Generals to command
for other than military reasons, has not had sense
to see that it was unwise at such a moment
to throw slights on the Irish and German
officers whom it bad thrust into the heat of
battle at a time when its need was the sorest. Of
the three leading German generals who offered their
services to the Government at the outbreak of the
war, end were gratefully accepted, not one remains
available. General Sigel, the best and bravest of
the trio, has resigned in disgust. A lei ge number of
his men have followed his example. General Schurz
lies dangerously ill, of disease contracted in the field,
aggravated by vexation of spirit at the treatment
he received from the Government, Gen, Blenker's
case is different. His savage notions of " beauty
and booty" were derived from the traditions of a
past age, and disgraced the cause he defended. He
is to be brought to trial for his offences against dis-
cipline and prop iety, and will probably be cashiered.
In a case so scandalous the Government could not
act n a different manner ; but the result on the
Teutonic mind is none the less fatal to any hope of
much further successful recruiting among the Ger-
man population. The Irish generals are not in
greater favour at head-quarters than the German.
General Meagher, whose brigade is reduced to little
more than 1,000 men, has always been placed in
positions where the escape with life of a single bat-
talion was all but miraculous, yet he has in vain
memorialised the Secretary at War that his little
force might be relieved from duty in the front, and
sent for a time into quarters where it might have
an opportunity to recruit the health and strength
of its survivors. His request remains totally un-
heeded. His memorial is published in the Irish
America newspaper, with the indignant commen-
tary of the editors—" that it is an eternal disgrace
to the War Department to keep gallant men who have
served the country well and truly in such a position as
Meagher's Brigade now occupies—especially in view
of the unmistakable favouritism exhibited towards
other corps in no way more deserving; and that
there is a strong feeling in the public mind that if
this brigade were not so distinctively Irish it would
not have been treated with such injustice and ne-
glect." Gen. Corcoran's brigade is not yet in so bad
a plight, but neither Corcoran nor Meagher can
calculate on the favour of the War-office. American
born generals are alone to be intrusted with the
duty of saving the republic. When the Govern-
ment next appeals to the patriotism of the Irish
Americans to march against the South it is likely
to be reminded of this fact in a manner more em-
phatic than agreeable, the more especially if poor
men be compelled to fight when rich men are
allowed to stay at home.

The probability that Mr. Lincoln will enforce the
conscription has alarmed vast numbers of people. An
exodus to Canada has already commenced, com-
posed of peaceful and peaceable citizens, who hate
the smell of gunpowder, have no relish for the
mouldy bread, the putrid bacon, the shoddy clothes,
and the fever and malaria of the Rappahannock or
the Mississippi, and who perhaps would rather the
South than the North should win the victory. It
is probable for these reasons that every steamer
bound for Europe during the next two or three
months will carry a much fuller complement of pas-
sengers than it would have done under other circum-
stances, though, as exemption may be procured for
money, the number may not be so considerable as it
would have been if the conscription were more strin-
gent and more equitable. The greatest alarm pre-
vails among the poorer classes of English, Scotch,
Irish, and Germans, to whom the payment of 300
dols. would be ruin. There are thousands of these
people in New York,Philadelphia, Boston, and other
great cities, who expressed their intention immedi
ately on arriving in America to become American
citizens, who took out what are called their "first
papers" with this object, but who, not having com-
pleted the full term of residence required to give
validity to their claim of citizenship, are still quasi-
aliens in the eyes of the law. Congress has decided
that for military purposes under the new act these
persons are to be considered full citizens, and there-
fore liable to serve. But these persons themselves
are of a different opinion. They are determined
neither to fight nor to pay ; and are in great crowds
claiming the protection of the Consuls and Ambas-
sadors of their native countries. Thereis, however,
but
to
thesm all hope for them. If they desire to return
allegiance they have expressed an inten-
tion to abandon,—and which, but for the war, they
would, no doubt, have abandoned—let them leave
the United States and go back to Great Britain or
Germany, which will call them to no account for
their abortive attempt to denationalize themselves.
That is the only chance left for them. If they re-
main here they must either serve, if drafted, or pay
the exemption money. There is, however, another
alternative,—that of joining the secret societies
which arc springing up among the mechanics and
the working population to oppose an organised re-
sistance to the law. But this may be dangerous to
resort to in any case, and especially in the case of
hybrid citizens, neither Europeans or Americans,
and wl.o may be caught on the horns of a dilemma,
of which either horn may be fatal. Whatever hard-
ships may result to them personally, their native
Governments owe them no protection on American
soil, and are not likely to disturb the existing re-
lations of amity with the Government of the United
States for the sake of sneaks and deserters who
have virtually committed treason against their
native land by taking preliminary steps to become
citizens of another. Those natives of the British
Isles who have come here as foreigners, re-
mained as foreigners, and made no application

for citizenship, are in a different position. They
are not liable to the conscription, and, if
drafted, must be released on proof of their nationa-
lity.

While the white men of the South and North are
cutting each other's throats on behalf ostensibly of
negro slavery, but really of independence on the one
side, and of negro emancipation and centralised des-
potism on the other, it is remarkable that the
black men of the North take very slight interest in
the struggle. The slaves of the South range them-
selves for the most part on the side of their masters,
and the free coloured men in the Middle, Northern,
and Western States act as if they knew but too well
that no good would result, or was intended to result,
to them ; and that if there were not a single slave
left bete een the Rio Grande and the Potomac the
condition of the race between the Potomac and the
St. Lawrence would be no better than before,
that they would still be paupers and pariahs, an
oppressed and degraded people, tolerated but de-
spised, and threatened with wholesale expatriation
by their pretended friends, as the best solution of
the difficulties that their presence has entailed
upon the country. A month ago, when Frederick
Doug-Ass, the most eloquent coloured man in
existence, spoke publicly in the city of New
York on behalf of his maligned and injured race—
more maligned and injured in the North and West
than in the South—and explained to the negroes
their interest in the war, and their duty to the
Government, he could not attract 150 negroes and
mulattoes to listen to him. Of the comparatively
slender audience that gathered to the sound of his
voice, considerably more than one-half were white
women, young and old, deputed by the churches.
The balance was composed of preachers of the
various denominations which in England would be
called Dissenters ; and of those stray lovers of
oratory whose taste, education, and prejudices lead
them to prefer speeches and lectures to concerts of
music and theatrical representations. On Wednes-
day night last, when Mr. Wendell Phillips was ad-
vertised to deliver at the Cooper Institute his cele-
brated lecture on Toussaint L'Ouverture, it might
have been expected that the free negroes and mu-
lattoes would have congregated in large numbers
to hear a noble vindication of the character and
patriotism of the most illustrious man of their race,
made by an orator whose heart is in the subject and
who handles it with the skill of a master and all the
fervour of an apostle. But such was not the case.
From twelve to fifteen hundred persons assembled
to hear the discourse of the most intellectual speaker
in America on the theme most congenial to his mind.
The platform was chicly occupied by ladies and
preachers. There was not one coloured man among
them. In the body of the hall there were but four
negroes, and two of these were mulattoes; and, as
on the platform, a full half of the audience was com-
posed of women. The lecture, as a literary compo-
sition, was in a high degree eloquent, pointed, and
concise; and if it did not convince every woman
present, and most of the men, that on the whole it
was rather better to be a black than to be a white
man, it was not the fault of the orator. He com-
pared his hero with Hampden, Cromwell, Napoleon,
and Washington, and declared him to be superior to
them all. Toussaint L'Ouverture established reli-
gious liberty in San Domingo when England and
America were alike intolerant of religious diversity
of faith. He knew more of political economy
and the true principles of the wealth of nations
than Adam Smith, and anticipated the free trade
measures of Sir Robert Peel by 60 years. In com-
parison with Toussaint L'Ouverture, Napoleon
Bonaparte was a mean and vulgar tyrant, and the
present Emperor of the French, if he had lived in
that day, would not have been worthy to tie his
shoe-latchet. Oliver Cromwell was a good soldier,
but no statesman ; Toussaint L'Ouverture, the
full-blooded negro, without a drop of white blood
in his veins, was both soldier and politician, hero
and statesman. Washington—the Great Washing-
ton—at the mention of whose name there was a
cheer, which was speedily checked as Mr. Phillips
proceeded, kept slaves, and therefore stood on a
lower pinnacle of genius and virtue than the noble
African who proclaimed freedom to all men, irre-
spective of race or colour, and administered justice
with mercy in a mode that might have shamed the
greatest and wisest monarchs of the earth. It was
clear that Washington was not such 'a hero as Mr.
Phillips could thoroughly admire. Ho admitted him
to be the best growth of the infant mind of America,
but asserted that Gen. Fremont was the best growth
of its maturity and prime. This sentiment was re-
ceived with fervent and prolonged applause. But, if
applause be the true criterion of popular apprecia-
tion and sympathy, no praise of Toussaint L'Oaver-
ture, or of General Fremont, was so much to the
taste of the audience as a spiteful hit at England.
" English neutrality," said the orator, " we all know
what that means. English neutrality sneers at
freedom, and sends arms to tyrants." This little
sentence, delivered with great animation, seemed to
drive the assemblage frantic with delight. The wo-
men waved their handkerchiefs and the men cheered
so lustily and heartily as to prove that, though they
loved the negro much, they hated England more,
The assertion that England sends arms to tyrants,
because a few English merchants and adventurers
run the blockade for sake of gain and accept the risks,
was mere claptrap, unworthy of so logical a speaker,
who knows as well as any man in America that there
is an immorality as well as a morality of trade in all
nations, and that if a government is to be judged by
the acts of its commercial citizens, the record against
the American Union would be black indeed at this
moment, when knavish contractors are imperilling
the existence of the army by their shameful robbery
of the aoldiers, and when no form of corruption and
venality is too mean, base, and vile to be practised
by people who call themselves patriots, and talk of
exterminating the South with as much flippancy and
nonchalance as they would talk of exterminating the
rats in a barn. Mr. Phillips ought to look at his
own American glasshouse before throwing stones at
the Crystal Palace of Great Britain. At the con-
clusion of the lecture there was a loud call for Mr.
Horace Greeley, who was observed on the platform.
He responded with becoming modesty, and said but
little; but the little was to the point. He disagreed
with some things to which Mr. Phillips had lent the
weight of his eloquence, though he agreed with him
that there were heroes in past ages and that Tons_
saint L'Ouverture was one of them. He could not
see, however, that there were any heroes in the
present day, delighted as he would be to recognise,
if he could but discover, them.
Mr. Phillips's apotheosis of the negro merits the
respect which is due to sincerity, but nothing more.
It is out of place, out of time, and far more fitted
for Exeter-hall than for any part of America. The
women and the churches go along with him. But
both the white men and the black keep aloof, or
only listen from curiosity. The four negroes who
alone of their race listened to his beautifully rounded
and elegant periods and neat antitheses on -Wednes-
day night might well have asked themselves of
what avail it was to proclaim that a negro was so
much better than a white man if scores of innocent
black men, women, and children could be maltreated
or murdered in a free city like Detroit by an infu-
riated mob of white people because one black man
had committed a crime for which none of them were
responsible; and if in "Washington it is utterly
impossible for a free black man to obtain legal re-
dress for any injury or wrong he may have suffered
from a white. The negroes know that the hands
of the Northern people are not clean on this ques-
tion. They admit the fine words of Mr. Phillips and
others; but as these " butter no parsnips," they at-
tend to such business, generally of the meanest sort,
as the white rac3 condescends to allow them to per-
form, and bear their lot with patient equanimity.
Though quiescent, they detect the hypocrisy that
has made them and their cause the pretext of a
st
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at the same time manly enough to dab isye'it.
The full details of the last desperate attack up on
Fort Mac Allister by the whole fleet of iron•clads
and
gunboats which will reach Europe by this mail will
be, read with universal interest. Had the fort been of
stone it would have been battered into dust and
splinters by the tremendous fire to which it was ex-
posed ; but being an earthwork, the damage done to