The southern press. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1850-1852, 1850-09-26
Last Words of the Senior Editor of the
Union

Last WORDS OF the Senior Editor OF the
Union.
The senior editor of the Union has capped
the climax of his faulty and inconsistency in
his article of yesterday on the proclamation of
Gov. Towns
We like to exhibit full length portraits of our
opponents, even when peneilled by themselves.
We therefore insert all the article that follows
in the Union the proclamation
'We frankly say, at once, that the fanatics of
the North have made the most unjustitiable ag-
gressons upon the rights OF the South; but we
cannot believe that the great body of the North
ern community are lending all their force, and
aiming with all their might at SHE consun-
nation of one object-the abolition of slavery"
Ii such were our own convictions, We should
not eensure Gov. Towns for the complaints
which he is urging and the course which he is
pursuing. But we cannot subscribe to the ac-
curacy of his statements. On the contrary, we
see around us some evidences of better state
OF feeling, and more conciliatory policy on the
part of our Northern countrymen The Wmot
PrOviso is Frustrated in the Territories of New
Mexico and Utah, after tremendous excitement
of three years The 'Free-sol encroachment'
is thus arrested. California it is true, is admit
ted by Congress into the Union, aud with con-
stituton inhibiting slavery; but it is California
herself, not Congress, who has adopted it-she,
that has the same right to determine her own
destiny for herself, as Missouri enjoyed in 1920,
as several of the sovereign States have since ex-
erted, and as Utah and New Mexico will pos
sess when they pass from the chrysalis condi-
ton into the organization of State govern
ment. The present day, too is marked by
ounthpr mr. i'm f., IF tho Snuth-In the
fugitive BILL which promises to be so stringent
and effectual in its provisions, that the Adolf
tionists are already raising the cry of repeal
We will not criticise, however, all the posi-
tons of Governor Towns, for whose character
we entertain sincere regard. But we cannot
exactly understand the measures which he would
propose to the people Of Georgia. He talks of
'redressing wrongs and avoiding dangers" In
what form! Does he insist upon California re-
turning to her territorial condition? The Con-
stitution forbids it; for California is as much a
sovereign State of this Union no,o as Georgia
herself. Will he propose to rescind the boun-
daries of Texas There, too, the flaming sword
OF the Constitution GU rds her rights. Is he for
destroying the great principle OF non-nteryen-
ton, which prostrates the Wmot Provso, and
for running the Mis- ouri boundary line across
their Territories Would it be more consistent
Will tic AOlStLutl II, OF WOulu IL Dc pTdClicdDlc.
The Southern organ, as its friends affect to
call it, assumes to speak for the South. 1t takes
for granted that Georgia will rush to the stand
ard Of the Governor. 1t goes so far as to pro-
nounce oracularly that all the saveholding States
viii unite with Georgia" We have strong
doubts about the truth of all these statements.
The Georgia convention will meet. That dis
tnguished State will pass through severe or
deal and violent struggle But we are advised
that majority of friends to the Union will be
sent to the convention, And who believes that
the Southern States Gone only perhaps excepted)
would fall into the furious footsteps of the Ill
traists? One State certainly will not, unless we
are grossly deceived-and she has always been
the ballnce-whee of the South, if not of the
Union. She, wise in her course, moderate yet
firm in her counsels, has not ingrafted in her
resolutions the admission of California as one of
the categories of her opposition.
Or, are we to understand that the convention
of Georgia is to recommend Southern Con-
yention to carry out the doctrines Of secession
and disunion, and establish Southern confede
racy upon the ruins of the Union
Let us venture, with all possible respect to
call the attention of our readers to another re-
markable period of American history. The most
remarkable crisis which we have ever seen, ex-
cept the one we have just passed, arose out Of
similar elements, and tended to the same results
We mean, Of course, the Missouri Compromise.
May we take the liberty of showing in what
spirit we treated that question thirty years ago
and how, notwithstanding our strong impress
sions of a violated Constitution, we initiated the
course which Mr.. Jefferson pursued in 1899, and
also in the same memorable period of the Mis-
souri, controversy? With this view, we venture
to lay before our readers the following extracts
from a long editorial which we prepared for the
Richmond Enquirer of March Z, 1890 The
declaration about Texas (Which was made thirty
years ago) is amusing enough.
Now, after reading these extracts, will any
man believe that we would not eagerly have
caught at non-intervention at that DAY. which
now prevails in our new Territories, in prefer
ence to the Missouri Compromise!
.MIssouRI QUESTION SETrLED-Strip this
Compromise of all it's CLOSES and pretexts, and
what is it' We do not address ourselves TO the
race of quibblers and sophists, but to men Of
plain common sense. What is this Compromise
Missouri was called upon, when she knocked at
the doors Of Congress, to pay the price of her
admission; and this price was to strip herself of
portion of her sovereign rights: the right Of choos-
ing the fundamental rules by which she would be
governed, and of changing those rules whenever
the interest of her people should require the
change. If this inquitOus demand is not to be
obtained what is required of Congress nexti
That they should make similar surrender for all
those who may hereafter mhabit a much larger
extent of country. In plain language, that Con-
gress should forever take from them the privilege
of selfgovernment under the pretence that it is
&C needful regulation for country in which not
single human being exists that Is subject to the
laws of the United States!"
&c 1t has indeed been contended that the word
forever imports only a few years-so long only
any part of this territory remains under the
territorial grade of governments and that it is not
meant to restrict the territory, when it throws off
the chrysallis shape to assume that. of State.
Those who are the authors of this Compromise
will best know it's intention. We confess we do
not admire the language in which it is couched.
Why that expressive word "forever'' Why
copy it from the ordinance of 81, if it be not in
tended to pursue the precedent set in the north
western territory, and to subject the future States
across the Mississippi to the same terms which
have been dictated to Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois :
Have we not even heard some of the Eastern
friends of the Compromise speak of 1t as { COM
pact' and this section Of ii the article Of the
al Il 4 r