American telegraph. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1851-1851, 1851-05-16

SEcEssIoN.-From an article by "CINCIN-
NATus," in the Charleston Courier, we extract
the following:
If we could feel assured that this convention
fairly represented-by its vote upon the report
and resolutions of the majority of the commit
tee OF 2l-the sense and feeling Of the State
upon the precise point of this matter the pro-
priety and expediency of State action as unit !;
If we believed the masses of the people-the
merchants, mechanics, planters and farmers
were as thoroughly imbued with the spirit of
secession as was the late convention, we should
make no effort to point out the peculiar dangers
to which this action will expose, not only our
industrial interests, but also the very institution
we are most anxious to defend. We do not be-
heoe that this condition of things does e1ist IN The
pu6tsc mind, but that the supineness and indif-
ference which is so manifest throughout the
State arises from the fact that the people--the
masses-have so far had no idea Of the true
bearings of the excitement that has been fostered
and trumpeted throughout the State, and do
not now hnoW the terrible results which must
follow in the train of consummation of the
movement now agitating our statesmen.
The right Of secession we place with that of rep-
otution, only to be exercised in extreme cases,
and when all other modes of redress have failed.
The South has been triumphant in many we'll
fought battle, as the archives of Congress can
attest, and we believe she is destined to be the
conqueror in many more. But to be successful
now she must present an unbroken front to the
enemy. She must measure the evil she has to
meet by a true standard, and having discovered
the length and breadth, the height and depth of
the elements at work for her injury, she must
organize system of defence equal to the emer-
gency. What, then, is our danger? We an
swer in a word. The increasing power of pub
lie opinion in the free States Of this country
and in the enlightened kingdoms of Europe,
concentrated against the institution of slavery,
as it exists in the southern States of this Con-
federacy.
The great fundamental principle upon which
the South must place herself in this battle, is
MORAL RIGHT, and, standing on this, the COM
bined assaults of the world will be utterly pow
erless. Unless we take this ground as our
strong position, we shall not benefit ourselves
by any act of secession, or of separation from
the North by all the slave States The pres
sure Of opinion from abroad will always be upon
us, and, unless we are fortified upon the strong
foundation of moral right, we shall find the
fabric Of either a State or Southern Republic
constantly undermined. Having made our de-
claration before the world that our institutions
are founded upon correct principles, as con-
nected with the wants and happiness of Afri-
can and Caucasian, we are led to an inquiry of
deep Importance How, under the present state
of opinion upon human slavery, are our institu
tions to be preserved? 1t will be our effort, in
a few short articles, to show how State seces-
sion will inevitably destroy all hope of perpe-
tulty of the relation of master and slave, and
how completely every other interest in South
Carolina viii be utterly ruined by this desperate
measure.