The southern press. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1850-1852, 1850-10-24
Texas.
THE ALTERNATIVE.

VI
Texas.
. THE ALTERNATIVE.
The Marshall (Texas) Republican thus con-
cludes an editorial: esa
Georgia is pledged to resist these measures,
and as such has appeared to be the feeling in
Alabama and South Carolina, these States
must recede from their previous declarations, or
the days Of the Union are numbered. On the
other hand should they be submitted to, the
power, and prosperity, and safety of the South
ton under foot, and yield up all that political
fanaticism claims. If submitted to the abolition
of slavery is inevitable.
From the same paper we add two short edi-
toral notices of the partition project which
show the sentiment in that section
The Republican is one Of the ablest papers
in that State: @.~
PEARoE's Bill Pearce's bill, which has just
passed Congress, proposes to surrender up about
ninety millions Of acres of our territory to Free
soism enough with New Mexico added, to
make three States 1t will open upon us
frontier of nearly seven hundred miles in extent,
portion of which, l65 miles in breadth, is
thirty miles farther south than Marshall Let
any man open his map and contemplate this vast
sacrifice and its consequences. What will that
territory remaining between the 32d and 36th
degrees of latitude be worth to Texas when
this surrender is made Slaves cannot be held
within it; it is necessarily bound to be Free-soi
When this bill is received by Texas she will be
hemmed in on all sides except the Louisiana
and Arkansas portions of her boundary by a
border of Free-sol States.
Gen. Houston in his speech here, in June
l8i9, said that the territory above 80, en-
braced one half of Texas; yet he has added as
much more to it in the proposal to sell to the
United States He said he had planted himself
on the Missouri Comprehensive he stood
with one foot on the North and the other on
the South Yet he managed to extend his
stride so rs to take in the whole Of California,
and to step over forty millions of acres in his
State below that line!
The South Western Teran also speaks boldly
out as follows: .'
The fact that before many years elapse the
two oceans will be connected by rail road can
not be doubted, and if the people of Texas &C
cept this bill of Pearce, will they not have parted
with the great depot on the Rio Grande! Our
State having this depot, with her climate, there
is nothing to prevent this rail road from passing
through her most fertile regions. Does not this
simple fact warrant us in saying that posterity
will indeed curse the acts Of those who framed
this bill! The influence which the fact of our
senator's voting for this bill, had on other men,
bers of Congress, has been considerable That
nj III nnp ,har H..
speeches, should at least have been thrown on the
other side
Let the people of Texas consent to this bill,
and the next proposition which will affect US that
will be made in Congress, will be The enaancipa.
lion Of all slares in the Union. We are already
told that nothing else will satisfy large and
growing party, and if our people are willing TO
establish this precedent of interference on the
part OF the Federal Government it will be used
to their disadvantage on this very question. it
is OF no use to tell us that that will be an en-
croachment of such magnitude that it will be re-
sisted the principle is the same, and we have
no hesitation in saying that if our people submit
to this proposition, slavery is doomed institu-
on ; it will be too late then to talk Of dsunion
because the precedent is set which can be fol-
lowed; and unless opposed at this time, Con-
gress will feel that the people will support any
of their acts; and while we are free TO admit
that we believe that this measure dooms slavery,
we are equally willing to admit that a severance
cannot take place that the Union of States
will exist always, no matter into what sort of
Government we may degenerate.
All constitutional guarantees are departed
from, and the compact of annexation has been
sighted rs thing of no consequence, and it is
said that our people will submit to it. This we
cannot believe unless we are to apply the words
Of the Honorable Guy NJ Bryan in his late
speech in the House OF Representatives on the
Santa Fe question -" Farewell to the glories
of the past; let a dark line be drawn between
the State and republic of Texas all the splen-
doris which encircle the Lone Star, belong to the
past; nothing will be left to the present, but
dishonor and shame and base submission Speak
not of Texas--her galantry in the field, or her
wisdom in the Cabinet; they belong to another
day and another people. Let her fame--all her
worth attach to where they belong-to the past !;
or be blotted out from history, and never again
spoken of but in terms of sorrow and reproach
to the living bury them in the graves of those
patriot martyrs who won them-a fit winding
sheet for the glorious dead, who gave their 1ires
to give them birth. Trail your banner and re-
verse your arms, for you are no longer worthy
of a freeman's name-the name of gallant
Texans"