Loudon free press. (Loudon, Tenn.) 1852-1855, 1853-01-15
AHAt

I =
Philadelphia, and Boston, of the action OF the
Convention recently assembled at BALTIMORE
would be enough to dispel all hesitation, and to
inspire every one with zeal and energy in the
cause of Southern development of Southern re-
sources There need be no better proof asked
that the South and West ought to persevere in
this effort, than the bare fact that New York
exhibits unmistakable hostility to it. Why is
New York opposed to this revival of Southern
Trade, through Southern Seaports and Southern
Railroads? Simply because it will take away
from her the custom upon which she has grown
fail Simply because it will retain the profits of
Southern Labor to fertilize Southern Soil, and
to beautify and adorn Southern Homes instead of
being appropriated to stimulate and nourish
Northern industry, and build up princely man
sions on Manhattan island and along the banks
of the Hudson. Simply because New York
knows how great her profit has been from the
| South and Southwest pursuing q course of do
nestle policy as stupid and short-sighted as it
was tame ana spirtless because she fears the loss
of that immense profit from this waking up to
sense of their capabihty to emerge from state
of pupiage, not to say vassalage New York
sees and knows this. She sees and knows what
a glorious land this Southern land of ours could
be made, if its people would only put forth the
same intelligent energy, practise the same selfre
lance, pursue the same sound domestic policy,
which at the North has struggled with and con-
quered barren soil and rigorous climate, I'M
til it has made New England one cultivated and
smiling garden; and she fears that this move
ment may lead our people to see and know these
advantages also. She fears that the good natur
ed BOBBY that her wit has made do all the rough
work, is about to break his leading strings and
set up for himself as a thinking, acting, indie
pendent man.
| New York, and all the North sees, and with
alarm, that the Southern people are beginning
to think that it will be well for them TO take
some care of themselves as well as of the North
| For long, long years, Southern pride and vanity
has been 1attered and caioled with the idea, that
upon ''the South, and her guardianship of ''the
Constitution" depended the fate of the Republicl
Oh, she has had such an anxious time of it, lest
something Or other should 90 wrongl Dear,
| patriotic creaturel-the task has been sorespon-
| sible, has occupied so much of her time so
wholly all her time, that she has had absolutely
no leisure to give attention to her own private,
| domestic concerns. Her roads needed mend
ing, her gates were getting rusty in their hinges,
the fences were rotting down and neighbor's
cattle were breaking in and carrying off the
crop; but what could she do, dear soul, under
the circumstances? She felt in her inmost soul
Nation and she had an awful presentiment that
| if she stopped, even for moment, to bridge
gGlv to apply a little oil and tighten screw, or
put up as much as one gap" in the fence, that
| some one of the Resolutions of '99" might run
risk of being forgotten, or that some audacious
| thinker might stumble into hersey from the Or
thodox metaphysical faith as regards the "rights
of the States" Besides, she was rich enough,
and could afford to give her time, and throw
away her crops for the public veal. She was
no poor Northern devil, obliged to work, and
take care of the annual earnings, planting them,
year after year, so that they, too might grow and
multiply. No-not she! She could pick up
from the ground, enough for herself and the
''rest of mankind"
Meanwhile, how all toiling frugal, pains-tak
ING Yankeedom laughed in its sleeve to see
these airs! How New York, enlightened by the
genius of Dewitt Clinton, smiled to himself, as
he dug away with true Dutch perseverance and
good sense, at his big ditch to Lake Erie, and
thought of the "good time coming" when he
would make this proud southern beauty with
all her fine airs, with all her patronizing eonde-
scention, his very vassal and drudgel
And in good sooth, Mynheer Knickerbocker
has very nearly seen the realization of his men,
tai predictions 'The South finds that devot-
IN herself to taking care of the nation, don't
payl She finds, further, that it not only don't
pay, but that her sublime disinterestedness has
absolutely impoverished her;-has consumed
her revenues-has shOrn her fair homestead of
its beauty, its comfort and its luxury-has scat
tered her beggared children into distant wilder
nesses-and has made her a thing of sufferance,
if not of contemptuOus pity. In short, Madame,
"The South" discovers that she has been max
ing a fool of herself and that the poor neigh
bors she once "patronized" with the best feel
ings of condescending benevOlence, grown into
wealthy and purse proud miiouaires, are turn
ing up their noses at her, with squint in the
eye which denotes that they are revolving in
their minds whether will they allow her to keep
even the poor remnant of her once princeiy for
tune and domain, or convert into a mere appen-
dage, a sort of kitchen garden, for their uses.
But though much reduced, there is enough of
the fire of the old spirit left, not to "give it up
So.' Sustained by her sons who, driven by pen
ury to struggle in the wilds of the West have
grown stalwart and strong, and animated by
that latent good sense which change of fortune
often brings out and exhibits in the fine lady
transferred by circumstances from the parlOr 20
the washtub 'the South has determined to re-
trieve her fortunes by following the example of
the snobs who have grown rich upon her folly
The convention at Baltimore, and which is to
assemble here in June next, is an earnest of this
determination. With energy and union in the
family, she will do it; and no one knows it so
well as Mynheer knickerbocker, whose supplies
threaten to be diminished if she does. Hence
his remonstrance and protest against the at
tempt. Hence the conjuration by the n York
press of the Observation-Disclosures -bones of this
Commercial Convention" being another disun-
ion convention in disguise. BAIL The people
Of this section of the Union have been humbug-
ed long enough, and this desperate grab at the
reins won't do. If the "Union' won't hold to-
gether without the plaster of an eternal self
sacrice of the obvious best interests of the
Southern people, let it crumble at once. But it
will hold-now and forever. 1t can't be broken,
any more than Mississippi can be damned up;
for there is current of warm life-blOod in the
hearts of our people, everywhere, which beats
for its perpetuity, strong and reSistless as the
flow of the "Father of Waters But the growth
of huge giant monopoly of all the profits of
all the trade, industry and enterprise of the
whole country-the spreading of great cancer
into baleful ramifcations through all the mem
berS of the body-may be checked, and the
Union be all the better for it; for it is not to the
interest of republican freedom that there should
be, here, any Paris that may become France"
1t is to make the Union more firm and solid to
develope the resources of all parts, and to so
direct them as to stimulate the prosperity of