Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1851-05-31
WASHINGTON.
SENATOR BUTLER's SPEECH.

OfSenator BUTLER, of South Carolina on the pro-
position for the separate secession of that State
from the Union, We comply with promise made
to our readers soon after its delivery.
Were we disposed to pursue further the inqui-
~ into the reality Of the grievances of the State
which the honorable Senator with so much ability
represents, the Speech before us contains enough
of assertion and affirmation on that point to afford
wide field for comment and reply. Enough has,
however been already said in this journal on that
head to anticipate such arguments of his as would
seem to justify the secession of any State from the
Union, or the formation of Southern Confede.
ration OF seeding States, because of alleged in
durable disaffection to the Union, or indispensable
resentment Of the legislation, positive negative,
of the General Government.
We shall not, therefore, fatigue the reader with
a repetition of our denial OF the assertions of de-
signed oppression of the South by the Government;
of pretended combinations by the majority OF the
States to destroy the value of its peculiar property;
or of alleged reduction Of the equality in the
Union Of the rights of South Carolina and other
Southern States. These are fruitful themes of de-
clamation by aspiring demagogues, who in truth
make the most of them, but not for argument, IN
less by ambitious sophomores in the public schools
the unsettling of whose notions of right and wrong
las exhibited in recent addresses issued from the
Universities Of the States Of Virginia and South
Carolina are the worst consequences to be at pre-
sent feared from their agitation.
II must be obvious, indeed to any intelligent
reader that the worthy Senator himself would have
forborne no small portion of the whole of this
before he could expect his grave and wise counsel
to be received with decent respect-which, accord
ing to the newspaper accounts, it hardly was, not
wilhstanding-to deprecate the displeasure of his
hearers by faterng their foibles and soothing their
prejudices.
With regard to the alleged right Of Secession by
any State, nothing is more clear than inot
only has no place countenance in any part of
the Constitution, but that, when as well in the for
nation as the ratification of that charter the recog
milton of such right was proposed by the Anti
Federalsts, twas treated proposition to retain
in the new Constitution the separate independence
Of the States and the consequent imbecility of The
General Government under the old Confederation,
and was decisively rejected.
The assertion of such right, to be maintained
by arms against the Government las is proposed
by the Secessonsts of South Carolina,) is no more
than the assertion of the right Of Revolution, the
extreme remedy Of the People for extreme oppres-
sion by any Government. This right, of course,
as natural right, we do not deny. But we do
denyy cbolI that roara discontant n port
of people, is sufficient to justify this extreme re-
sort, especially in Government in which, as in
this, the Sovereignty is in the body Of the People
Not to press this point any further, we invoke
the attention of our readers to the lessons of wisdom
to be found in the speech of Mr.. BUTLER, which,
though addressed only to the People of his own
State, deserve the attention of his fellow citizens
every where who have ever allowed themselves to
parley with those who have pretended to discover,
in the process of separate secession, mode of
resentng or redressing the grievances under which
they have been persuaded to believe that they are
suffering. The demonstration by the Senator is
irresistible both of the absurdity of the proposed
attempt at separate secession, and of the ruin ant
desoation which await success in such an attempt
happily impossible.
Whilst preparing for our columns the Speech o
Senator BUTLER, we remark in the newspapers o
South Carolina sundry indications which leave
little doubt in mind that the consequence of TIL
late " State Rights Convention held in the city o
Charleston, (the same TO which the Speech of Mr.
BUTLER was addressed, instead Of giving fresl
activity to the designs of the enemies of the Union
will be to invgorate its friends and confound thos
who, for number of years past have been plottin
its destruction, and, with it, their own.
Among these indications, the most gratifying
portents Of the discontinue Of the Disorganizer
are the increased violence, just now, of the fire
eaters"-the immediate secessonists, for example
the ordnance-and- the rabid pro
scriptionists of all opinion but their own-and TIL
concentrated bitterness with which they turn upol
the true friends of the South, who advise delibera
ton before proceeding to action upon the wildes
and most impracticable of all schemes, separate
State secession. Of this spirit growing more ant
more vindctive, we might exhibit, from the paper
before us-and may at some future day have occa
sion to do so--a variety of examples. But let on
suffice for to-day. In the Columbia Telegraph o
Thursday the following paragraph met our eye:
The Abbevile Banner reached us las, evening with
letter from Hon. A. BURr, defining his position. He
against doing any thing rahy, but we are not able to So
whether Mr. BURT considers any action as rash and
ture or The Banner says concerning we pubs