The southern press., 1851-08-06
From he LaursnsviIis Is. CO. Herald.
To Henry clay Of X Kentueky--Ne. 1,

| From TIE LatireRsUiuc (S. C.) Herald.
! To Henry Clay Of Kcntucky--Ne. 4.
Sir--More than forty years Of your life have
been spent in the public service, and as states
man and party leader your name has filled nc
inconsiderable space in the public view. Already
your biographers, emulous of the distinction Of
recording the deeds which have given you such
an unenyiable notoriety, have entered the arena
and have We'd with each other in the task OF
pampering your inordinate vanity, by spreading
upon the historic page gilded pictures OF your
public acts. la their efforts to make you Presl-
dent, they have given you credit for patriotism,
which you never possessed, and disinterested-
ness of purpose Of which you never had any
conception. They have deceived the public, as
well as yourself You are now old, sir, and your
career is drawing to close. The unsel with
| which your partisans have CLOSED over II long
public career of selfish ambition, cannot much
longer conceal from wronged and indignant
people, whose rights you have violated, the
dangerous and detestable deformities of your
public character Soon posterity will demand
more truthful and impartial chroniclers OF the
public life and character ofa politician and cabi-
net minister, who, under the specious garb OF a
| pretended patriotism, has contributed so much
to change the character of the government, and
| to PROSTATE the Constitution OF the country.
When you shall have disappeared from the stage
of action, those who have ministered to your
ambition and your vanity, to escape your coarse
denunciations, SO derogatory to the American
Senate, and to the rank and character OF an
American Senator, and the hungry expectants
who have fawned upon you, with the hope OF
profting by your influence and elevation, will
no longer have. q motive to praise you, or to
conceal the vices OF your pubic character.-
Justice and truth will then demand an exposure
Of the crimes you have committed against the
Constitution, which you have 80 often sworn to
preserve inviolate; and the judgment which a
coming age will pronounce upon you, will be
so whitening, that could you be conscious OF it.,
even your unparalleled effrontery could not
sustain you under the scathing infiction.
A Southern man and stakeholder, your first
public act in the State Of your adoption to
| whose people you looked for patronage and
| support, and among whom you sought retreat
| from poverty and obscurity in your native land,
was an incendiary assault upon its slave institu-
tions, and upon the social and political rights OF
the South, which you have since so fatally be-
trayed, for the purpose of placing upon your
| ,ead the Presidential diadem, as the reward of
your treachery. In the arts of the demagogue.
which abilities of high order have enabled you
/
competition, in an age SO fruitful in the produc-
ton of that dangerous and despicable character.
| An avowed friend of the abolition of slavery
| a pretended enthusiast in the cause of liberty
| a distinguished disciple of the Incompatible
schools of Mirabeau and Danton-the most con-
sistent emancipationist of the age-a protessed
republican, and practical consolidationist, by
your unequalled skill in the arts of deceit and
discrimination, like an actor on the stage, by as
suming costume and a set Of principles adapted
| to the time, circumstance and place, you have
succeeded to an unprecedented degree in de-
ceiving coniding people into the belief that
| the fictitious part you played was real, and that
| you are patriot and republican. So we'll, sir,
have you played the part of political magician,
that at the moment the Constitution is expiring
from the blows you inflicted upon it with your
dagger, you are eloquently pronouncing eulo-
| gums upon the blessings of freedom, and at the
same moment laying the foundations, broad and
deep, of consolidated despotism upon the ruins
| of republican liberty. Unscrupulous about the
| means of reaching the object of your ambition,
| few statesmen of modern times have combined
in one character so many elements calculated to
inhict incurable wounds upon the institutions of
the State.
The equal of Catalne in courage, his superior
in expedent and resource, you have by your
countenance and encouragement, aided, with all
the influence of your example, the incendiaries
of the North, whose leader in the work ofeman
cipation You are to assassinate the public peace,
and who only await your bidding, TO light up
the fire of a servie war; And yet your agency
in the internal plot, by your skill in political
egerdemain, is concealed from public view. A
statesman thus gifted with such extraordinary
qualities for stratagem and mischief, whose po-
litical code imposes no restraints upon his ex-
cesses, and who, upon every great question
which has agitated the public mind during his
whole political life, has been found advocating g
with plausible but untruthful eloquonce, first
one side and then the other, and who has been
consistent only in his ambitious thirst for power,
and his ceaseless desire TO see the abolition Of
our Southern institutions accomplished, could
not fail to achieve for himself an unenviable dis
tinction. And, sir, of all your extraordinary
qualities, that one which has tnabled you for so
long period Of time, through the many impor-
tant political epochs, in which you have borne
distinguished part, TO conceal from the Southern
mind your selfish ambition, and your agency in
bringing upon the country 30 many fearful evils,
is not the least remarkable. II shows, sir, the
perfection TO which you have carried the arts Of
political knavery. At all times ready to offer up
the South as a sacrifice, the victim OF your ambi-
ton, to make yourself popular at the North,
thrice have you, by your intrigues for the Presi-
dency, brought the country to the verge Of civil
war; And Notwithstanding your American sys-
TEN has plundered the South, under color oflaw,
sf thousand millions, for the benefit of your
Northern nalles--notwithstanding your "compro-
misses" have put in jeopardy fifteen hundred mil
lions smore--notwithstandin your last "compro-
mise" confiscated fer your abolition associates
an immense territory, the rightful property Of
the South, and as consequence, the Southern
horizon presents 10 your gaze now only one un-
broken line Of storms, fast thickening into o
sweeping tempest, and with the glare Of the
lightning of civil war in your face, still you effect
moi 10 see the peril rohich you hare brought upon
that Union ,ohich you profess 10 loue much, and
still true to your instincts, and standing upon
the brink Of the grave, your thirst for power Is
yet unappeased.
1t may he worth your while, sir, to pause and
enquire why you have so long labored in vain
why your ambition is not yet grati6ed, in q