Des Moines courier. ([Ottumwa] Iowa) 1848-1854, 1850-11-22
The Fugitiyc Slave BAN.

Our worthy contemporary of the sole
Democratic organ is never happy unless
he can be fussing and foaming about
slavery. It's only few weeks since
that he assured us the bow Of peace span
ned the horrizon--and now il is all storm
and tempest, and fire and sword, and
civil and servle war; aud the Union is to
be dissolved because there has been some
little excitement at the North about the
Fugitive Slave law. lie rants over an
incendiary dispatch or newspaper para.
graph, as if the world was coi.iing to an
end; and this, though there has been
law-abiding and conrersaiive spirit ex-
hibited by the people of the non-slave-
holding States that ought to disarm all
apprehension. He is sure that Mr..
Fillmore is not the man he took him for,
and calsupon him TO rome nut and threa-
ten half dozen vetoes, under The penalty
of the displeasure Of Mr.. Richie, and
the destruction Of the Union and the
Constitution.
This manner Of rhetoric is all fudge
stuff--nonsense. Does our worthy friend
imagine that people are not TO talk a.
bout the Fugitive Slave law, and discuss
it just as freely as they do the Tariff or
the Internal Improvement question:
Who is TO close their mouths? Does
the Union propose the panacea of sedi-
ton laws! The law in question:, being
the law, will be executed faithfully, firm
ly, and efficiently In SO far as il may
be necessary for carrying out the provis-
ions of the Constitution, honest and pat
riotic citizens, and lovers of the Union,
will be in favor of preserving il as it is.
Ii, in this parctical operation, il should
be found not only TO operate upon fugI-
tive slaves, butte cndanger the liberty Of
the freeman. all good, patriotic and just
citizens, North and South, will call for
its modification. We have not yet found
the first Southern man in the circle Of
our acquaintance who hesitates upon
this subject.
Whether the law so operates or not,
is question for statesmen to discuss and
decide. 1t will not be settled in mob
meetings, whether held in lecture-rooms
or bar-rooms. The decision will no, DE
affected by newspaper paragraphs indict-
ed in mob spirit, and crowded with
taunts and menaces, from whichever side
of Mason aud Dixon's line they may
come. We have House o. Represent
tatlves and Senate fully competent 10
legislate upon this or any other subject.
The whose organ the u
Mon claims 10 be--is in majority in
both branches; and the Union certainly
pays but poor compliment to his friends,
when il announces that The country will
be ruined when Mr.. Fillmore menaces a
Democratic Congress with his veto!
Our contemporaries pyramid rests on
its apex-it is turned upside down.
The Wuse pyramid stands on its base.
The present Executive looks to the peo-
pie as the source of power. 1t usurps
no functions that belong to the represent
tatives of the States. Ii will enforce the
law which the people have made. II
will not sanction the violation of an ex-
isting enactment, nor insult the legisla-
tire by the menace of veto, nor promul-
gate an Executive sedition law 10 meet
the case Of the Rhetts and the Qa,tmans,
or that of the Garrisons and the Gid
Observation-Disclosures Republic.