The southern press. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1850-1852, 1851-10-14

Our readers will be interested in the account
oil the late transactions at Syracuse which We
to'dly publish. The history Of the outbreak,
written by friend OF the lawess parties, is
doubtless as favorable to them as facts would
authorize. Yet what recc I'd does il contain
Read IT, And then recall The Christiana tragedy,
the news of which had scarcely traversed the
country, before IL was followed by this which
we now publish. And such is the working of
the only Southern measure of the glorious"
compromises compromise, the support of
which IT seems has made the fortunes of ia
Southern supporters-securng to one the guber-
Material chair of Georgia, to another that of
slississppi-to all great glory and high public
Iavor. The comproinlsers sacrificed all else and
obtained this Fugitive i'll, under the admirable.
working OF which masters are killed while slaves
escape; agents attempting to make it available
are arrested, and subjected to all sorts of insults
and indignities.
| One thing, of which We are assured upon
good authority, is worthy of remark II is the
high character which the two communities, where
these outbreaks occurred, have sustained for
morality and religious principles. Says one Of
our exchanges tlt
IF we were asked to name the place in nil
this Union where crimes against person and
against property We're most rare where a res
pect for order and subo dination to the moral as
well as penal sanctions OF the law were most
liver7a', ana where deeds of violence of every
klnd received the least countenance from the
people, we might well have hesitated in onr de-
ci-ion, between tn, village of Christians in
Pennsylvania and the city of Syracuse. Both
are secluded places, exposed to few or nong Of
The irritating excitements Of large cities, nhabi
ted by a homogeneous population, Of rural and
quiet habits, contented with their employments.
prosperous and happy. We might well ma, q
doubted IN which Of those two places it would
nave been most difficult to provoke any act Of
violence against public officer"
! Is there not here food for reflection This ia
the very symptom which has long since con-
WINGED us that the anii.sl very NAL DIV is hope
lessly lncurable. Were the uoter,es Of abolition
1--WE mean not the politicians who trade in fanaii-
clsm) base and unprncipled, low and degraded,
we should have little to fearfrom their hostility.
Public opinion, or at worst civil power, might
crush them. But this is not the fact. The strong
holds of abolition not the OF es with the vie
which generally characterize cities; they are the
| rural Districts with their sober, serious, moral,
ana religious population. 1t is among this class
that anti slavery finatcism is running wild and
| rampant. And sad to say, the little conserva-
tlsm" which remains in the North, is found in her
commercial marts, and is kept alive by the profits
OF Southern trade. Northern anti.abolition
mobs, when they do occur, are usually composed
OF the rabble of the towns and cities. On the
other hand, lind community in the hireling
states remarkable for quiet, dec rum ndustri-
GUS habits and religious devotion, and the proba
bllily is, that there will be found, not perhaps
anti-savery clainor, but anti slavery feeling in
It's worst ard deepest intensity. These are the
men who hate slavery, because they believe it
sinful AM they are whose opinions,
denunclation will not change, and whose preu-
dlces penal laws will not eradicate. Thor
oughly opposed to the execution of the Fugi-
tive slave law, every example of its foroible exc.
cution only inensifes their hate towards the
law, and the institution which it was designed to
protect
what then Is to prevent the recurrence among
such people, of exactly such outrages, as those
which have lately been committed! Nothing.
The only hope of enforcing this law, without an
expense OF time, money and peace more valuable
than the slaves which will De captured, is TO be
found in change, thorough and RADICAL of the
principles and convictions of the Northern people
IN relation to slavery. Is there any probability 4
OF such change. None whatever For the very
conservatives Of the North are by their teachings
and preachings, Strengthening the feeling from
which hostility to the fugitive bill springs
These men admit and proclaim the evils and
sinfuness OF slavery, but say that while the law
exists it must be enforced. Their nearer differ
rom them as TO their conclusion, believing that
II an institution be sinful, in maintaining it, lin
any wise) they make themselves sinners. Ave.
on the contrary these pretended conservatives
would content themselves with so low a code of
morals as the B Bile, and taking that as authority,
assert that slavery is sanctioned by God himself
Then we might expect such change in North
ern feeling as would permit the enforcement of
Southern rights. Without this change. of which
there Is no more probability than of the change
of The Elhespians skin or of the leopard's spots,
the Fugitive slave law must remain, as il is, a
dead law. And such il will remain-utterly
worthless to the South.
Yet this law is the crowning glory of the
ompromise- without which even the federalsts
admits that the South would have had cause of
complaint.