The Sun.
London, England, 1861-02-25 00:00:00

TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.

Stu,—Your noble and unwearied advocacy of the prin-
ciples of justice and equity in your spirited indignation of
that monstrous "legal robbery" of the numberless class,
whose name is legion, out of whose hard worked hands and
heads is extorted an extortionate Income Tax, deserves, and
has, the warmest thanks of the patient sufferers; and your
remarks in your leader of the 20th so singularly harmonise
with my own cogitations on the subject, wherein you say
"it was the glimmering, at last, of the first auspicious
break in those dull clouds which have so long covered the
whole political (I may say social) welkin under the influ-
ence of that unlucky and most malignant magician of
Finance, our present Chancellor of the Exchequer." And
truly do you say that last night's division will carry an
exquisite sense of satisfaction, arid a thrill of hope and joy,
through all the ranks and mases of the community exist-
ing upon pi ecarious incomes, inasmuch as a majority in the
House of Commons have at last denounced the cruelty and
injustice of that grinding tax which is a premium on
roguery, and that there is a consolatory prospect of preca •
rious incomes being taxed in future upon sonic mere equit-
able principle. Hoping, as you have kindly done before,
you will favour me with a corner in your enlightened
paper.--I am, sir, yours truly,
A SMALL TRADESMAN.,
Boston, July 23.

On Tuesday last the Royal Academicians agreed
to an increase in the number of visitors from eight to
twelve-=so as to insure- closer attention and additional
variety 'in rhn instruction given. The meeting'then' ad-
journed for a week.

AMERICA.

---~-_

QUEENSTOWN, FEB, 23.
The following is a fuller summary of the news
by the Arabia, which left New York on the 13th
inst., and arrived here this evening :
On the 9th inst. the Senate passed the Nasal
Appropriation bill, and discharged the Conference
committee on the Deficiency bill, they being unable
to agree upon the amendments. The Indian Ap-
propriation bill was discussed, and a large number
of memorials on the crisis were presented.
In the House of Representatives Mr. John
Cochrane offered a resolution directing the Secretary
of the Treasury to inform the House whether any
information had been received by the department
relative to the recent alleged seizure of New York
vessels at the port of Savannah, and if seized, by
whom and by what authority. An amendment ex-
tending the inquiry so as to include the facts rela-
tive to the seizure of arms in New York was accepted
—the remainder of the session was devoted to de-
bate on the crisis. A vote on the report of the
Committee of 33 would be taken on the 14th inst.
In the Senate on the 11th inst. Mr. Green, of
Missouri, offered a resolution which was laid over,
asking the President to communicate any corres-
pondence which may have occurred relative to the
extradition of the fugitive slave Anderson.

Another conference committee on the Deficiency
Bill was appointed. A petition for a territorial
Government in Nevada was presented. The Naval
Appropriation was then taken up, and occupied
attention during the remainder of the day. The
appropriations for the Pensacola naval yard were
struck out. Mr. Hale, of New Hampshire, offered
an amendment providing for the building of seven
steam sloops of war. Mr. Hunter, of Virginia,
opposed it, as it looked too much like an intention
to coerce seceding States. It was advocated by
Messrs. Grimes of lowa, Fessenden of Maine, and
King of New York. The debate was not closed.
In the House of Representatives a preamble and
resolution were offered by Mr. Craig, of North Caro-
lina, and referred to the Committee on Foreign
Relation, instructing the President to recognise the
existence of a Southern Confederacy, and to receive,
in their official capacity, such Commissioners as
may be sent by the Government of that Confede-
racy to Washington.
A resolution, offered by Mr. M'Clernand, of
Illinois, was adopted, calling upon the President
for information relative to the seizure of the Mint
and Customhouse at New Orleans.

Mr. Ferry, of Connecticut, offered a resolution,
which was objected to by Mr, Winslow of North
Carolina, instructing the Judiciary Committee to
inquire into the expediency of amending the Con-
stitution, so as to make it'impossible for any State
to secede without the consent of all the States.

Mr. Sickles, of New York, offered a resolution,
which was adopted, recommending the celebration
of the anniversary of the birth of Washington, the
22d 'of February, as a national holiday.
Mr. Palmer, of New York, introduced two reso-
Ittionsi—the first declaring that neither the Federal
Government nor the people of the Northern States
have a purpose or .constitutional right to interfere
with slavery, in any State of the Union ; and the
other asserting that the number of people in the
North not subscribing to the sentiments of the first
were too insignificant in number to be worthy of
notice.

These resolutions excited a very lively debate.
The first one finally passed by a vote of 106 to 4
.not a quorum. Further debate and explanations
ensued, and it was finally passed-116 to 4.
A reconsideration was carried, and, after still
further debate, Mr. Sherman, of Ohio, offered a
substitute declaring that neither Congress nor the
Legislature of non-slaveholding States have the
right to legislate upon the subject of slavery in the
slaveholding States. This was passed unanimously.
Mr. Palmer's second resolution was not consi-
dered, it being superseded by that of Mr. Sherman.
Mr. Sickles offered a resolution, calling upon
the Secretary of the Treasury, for information
relative to interference with the enforcement of the
revenue laws in the seceded States.
It was amended on the motion of Mr. Burnett,
of Kentucky, by adding an inquiry relative to the
concentration of troops at Washington, and passed.
The New York Herald of the 13th says :
The President had received intelligence from
Charleston stating that Governor Pickens has re-
ferred the question of Fort Sumter—it having now
become a national question—to the Government of
the Southern Confederacy at Montgomery, and
that no movement would be made looking to an
attack until action had been taken by the Southern
Republic. But ox the heels of this intelligence in-
formation has been received to the effect that the
republic had decided at once to invest Forts Pickens
and Sumter. The latter intelligence was received
by Secession Senators. Every effect possible is
making here by the secessionists to prevent an,
attack on Fort Sumter.
Secretary Dix, on receiving letters of resignation
from revenue officers, refused to accept their
resignation, but addressed them letters dismissing
them from the service. Captain Morrison, of the
revenue cutter Lewis Cass, had also sent in his

resignation, and acknowledged that he had surren-
dered his vessel to the State authorities of Alabama.
Secretary Dix immediately issued an order direct-
ing that his name be struck from the rolls of the
service for violating his official oath and his duty
to Government.

The Kentucky Legislature, without doing any-
thing of a national character, had adjourned to the
20th March, to await and consider the action of
the Peace Commissioners at Washington.

Mr. Jefferson Davis, the President of the South-
ern Confederacy, arrived at Jackson, Miss., on the
evening of the 1 lth instant, on his way to Mont-
gomery. He was received with grand military
and civic honours.

The news of the election of a President and
Vice-President for the Southern Colifederacy
caused great rejoicing at New Orleans. A salute
of one hundred guns was fired.
The Convention at New Orleans had unani-
mously adopted a new flag for Louisiana. It consists

of a yellow star in a red field, with thirteen stripes,
alternate blue, white: and red, emblematic of the
origin of the State—France, Spain, and America.
It was hoisted in the Convention amid cheers and
plaudits of approval. The ordinance making it
a penal offence for pilots at Belize to bring over the
bar any United States war vessel has passed. A
resolution was passed inviting Messrs. Slidell and
Benjamin to seats upon the floor of the Convention.
• The-Texas-Convention' had passed an ordinance
favouring the formation of a Southern Confederacy,
and elected seven delegates to the Southern Con-
gress.

On the 11th inst. the Governor of Virginia

transmitted to the Legislature a communication
from George Robertson to the seceding States,

dated Montgomery, Feb. 3. He says the Governor
of Georgia accepts the mediation of Virginia, and
gives authentic assurance that Georgia would
abstain during the period contemplated from
all acts calculated to produce a collision
of arms between that State and the gene-
ral Government. The Commissioner believed
that the Governor of Alabama would give
a favcurable answer, and that South Carolina
would conform her course to the action or recom-
mendation of the Southern Confederation.
The New York Herald, of 13th inst., says :—The
seizure on the 22d ult. of 28 cases containing 950
muskets, from on board the steamship MontieellO,
for Savannah, and consigned to a citizen of that
State, has assumed an importance—probably
greater than was antic,pated by its authors, for we
learned by telegraph on the 9th instant that the
Government of Georgia had taken retaliator
mea-
sures by the seizure of five vesselsNienwttpiOrt,snl'
Savannah, belonging to citizens of
W. It. Bibby vessels seized were the barques Adjuster".di he
Colden Murray, the brigs and Goldepand
Lead, and the schooner Julia A. Ilall k. Th
were released by the Governorof oc 'They
Georgia on
the 9th, immediately on receiving a despatch from
New York of the surrender of the muskets seized
by, the police.
Mr. Lincoln had arrived
at Indianopolis, and
delivered the folio
wing speech from the balcony of
the Bates House to an assemblage of at least 2QOOO
people:—

"Fellow-citizens of the State of Indiana,—l tkjll

here to thank you much for this magnificent wel-
come, and still more for the very generous support
given by your State to that political cause which,
I think, is the true and just cause of the whole
country and the whole world. Solomon says,
There is a. time to keep silence ;' and when men
wi angle by the mouth with no certainty
that they mean the same thing while using the
same word, it perhaps were as we!l if they would
keep silence. The words " coercion" and " inva-
sion" arc much used in these clays, and often with
some temper and hot blood. Let us make sure if
we can that we do not misunderstand the meaning
of those who use them. Let us get the exact
definitions of these words, not from dictionaries but
from the mot themselves, who certainly deprecate ,
the things they would represent by the
use of the words. What then is " coercion ?"
What is " invasion ?" Would the march-
ing of an army into South Carolina
without the consent of her people, and with hostile
intent towards them, be invasion ? I certainly
think it would be coercion also if the South Caro-
linians were forced to submit. But if the United
States should merely hold and retake its own forts
and other property, and collect the duties on foreign
importations, or even withhold the mails from
places where they were habitually violated,
would any or all* these things be " invasion"
or " coercion ?" Do our professed lovers of the
Union, but who spitefully resolve that
they will resist coercion and invasion,
understand that such things as these on
the part of the United States would be coercion or
invasion of a State ? If so, their idea of means to
preserve the object of this great affection would
seem to be exceedingly thin and airy. If sick, the
little pills of the homeopathist would be much too
large for it to swallow. In their view the Union
as a family relation would be no regular marriage,
but rather a sort of " tree love" arrangement to be
maintained on passional attraction. By the way, in.
what consists the special sacredness of a State ? I
speak not of the position assigned to a Stak,n the
Union by the Constitution—for that by the bond
we all recognise—that position, however, a
state cannot carry out of the Union with it.
I speak of that primary right of a State to rule all
which is less than itself. If a State and a county
in a given case should be equal in extent of terri-
tory and equal in number of inhabitants, in what,
as a matter of principle, is the State better than the
county ? Would an exchange of names be
an exchange of rights ? Upon principle,
on what rightful principle may a State,
being no more than one - fiftieth part of
the nation in soil and population, break up the
nation, and then coerce a proportionably larger
subdivision of itself in the most arbitrary way
What mysterious right to play tyrant is conferred
on a district of country with its people by merely
calling it a State ? Fellow-citizens, lam not
asserting anything. lam merely asking questions
for you to consider. And now allow me to bid you,
farewell."

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