Weekly national intelligencer., 1851-02-15


expression 10 have resor.ed to the press of neigh
boring State for this exposition of facts of great
consequence in this inquiry. The same facts are
admitted by the Secessonists themselves just
pride in them would not allow their suppression,
though fatal to their object. Of enumeration of the
advantages which South Carolina actually enjoys
in the Union, in the exordum of article intended
to establish the necessity of secession. We copy
the passage, as we find it, in the paper.
"FoR TELEGRAPH.
"THE STATE CoNvENTIoN.-If the Convention
means any thing, it is intended 10 do that which
no existing authority of the State perform.
I" For sirty gears the Legislative, Executive, and
official authorities have conducted the affairs of
" State safely and successfully. The State has
adpanced IN prosperity, character, and po,cer--
!" the rde their fathers prescribed. For moral
" weight South Carolina owns no superior in this
/" Confederaton--in physical poVer and ,oealh
" she has advanced steadily and rapidly. An
exigency has now occurred which," &c.
II is on the face of such confessions as these that
the admission of California into the Union, upon
principle laid doun Jy South Carolina herself, is
proclaimed to be " an exigency" which requires
that State to bend all her energies to the overthrow
Of Government under which she has, by her own
showing, for sixty years, steadily advanced in
prosperity, character, and power
In more recent number of the paper from
which the above quotation is made, and, under its
editorial head, we find, by the way, the following
other important admission
We often hear the remark in conversation that
i L.. -
great question of the day-we would add,
" and our young n,en-and we refer to the fol-
lowing extract* from the address above men,
toned" &c.
II any thing could have suggested to the writer Of
this sentence doubt whether he himself, in advo-
eating secession and revolution, was not off the
track" of right reasoning and sound conclusion, it
would be that the classes to which he alludes are
precisely those upon whose Judgment in matters of
political Government, practical men would least
rely. We speak with Difference, Of course, when
we include in this category the clergy but we con-
ess conviction from the efforts made by preachers
from the pulpit to encourage and stimulate opposi
ton, in another quarter of the country, to the
execution of laws demanded by the public peace
and welfare, that they are, in many cases, by educa
ton, and by recluse habits, disqualified rather than
fitted for the exercise of sound judgment in mat
ters of purely political concern. We have the as
surance Of the Telegraph that the Preachers
all right on the great question of the day."
What! All! Truly this, were it literally true,
would be melancholy tale of human infrmity and
clerical subservience Happily, we have before US
the proof that however general may be the spirit of
disaffection among the Reverend Clergy of South
Carolina, there is at least oneb brave exception, and
we trust that there are many others. We refer to
the Letter of Bishop CAPERs, published in the
Charleston Mercury three days before the late
election, which we cannot refuse ourselves the
pleasure Of placing before readers as we'll for
the value Of the information which it imparts, as Of
the principles which it inculcates.
lit will be found in of the subsequent columns Of this
days paper.
But it is not to the reason Of man, woman, or
child, that the Disunonists appealed, when press
ing the Convention project with alr sheir powers
upon the Legislature of the State. They would
not wait for cooperation by other States in their
projected revolution. In the language of their own
vehement addresses, through their public journals,
to the Legislature, ridculing the eloquent pleas"
as they sneeringly termed them, for cooperation,
they addressed any but reason, in such terms
as these: That all ordinary rules of conduct fail
in great crises of national convulson, and that to
be successful, revolutions must neUer pause for
'preparation-since such pauses are fatal to their
progress: that the happy audacty Of unfnching
resolve and fixed purpose-of high and holy en-
thusiasm not Of calculating prudence, must ride the
'whirl,Dind Of popular indignation, and direct the
storm that sweeps a,cay all opposing barriers, and
topples do,cn institutions, venerable from usage,
and chose foundations are both deep and strong !:
that it was beyond question that the South, by
Conventions or Congresses, could not be rallied to
the overthrow of the General Government: that
some other mode must be adopted to move them
some other stimuant must be given them to break
the letters of the strange torpor that had seized
hold of their understandings and made senseless
their feelings: that mode, that stimuant, was the
firm action of sister State, who braueiy cuts the
knot, and thus dissoves the integrity, the CHARM
Of the Union: that one State cut asunder would
. be the signal of general disruption" &c.
II was under the influence of morbid excite
ment, produced by such appeals as these, that the
Convention Act was passed by the Legislature of
the State; and, under pitiless storm Of similar
addresses to the worst passions of the People, that
Delegates have been chosen to the Convention
Without the Intervention of some Provdential act
by which the People may in the intervening time
be restored to their Senses the prosecution of the