Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1854-02-11
THE BEDINI oUTRAGEs.

Our readers have, IN more ways lhau ohc, pcen
made painfully aware that we have recently had IN
our midst distinguished stranger, who, during his
short soiourn in our country, has been made the
subject not only of much derogatory animadversion
but Also in certain of our cities, the object of popu
lar outrage and attempted violence. An instance
50 extraordinary in kind, so contrary to public
manners, and so hostile to the genius of our insttu-
tions, may well claim closer examination at our
hands, in order that we may inquire whether this
recent violation Of the national hospitality is either
justable in itself or may be considered in the line
Of what are called safe prccedents
In order to place this matter in its proper light
we do not hold it to be at all necessary to inquire
into the antecedents of Monsignor Bedni; neither
do we care for present purpose to ascertain in
exactly what capacity he came to our country.
Whether he is "a traitor, murderer, and savage,
the bitterest foe of liberty in the Roman States,
as is charged by certain of his countrymen and other
resident Europeans among US, or whether he actu-
ally is the Introductory letter Of the Pope accre-
dts him, ca venerable brother, man eminently
distinguished for the sterling qualities of mind and
heart which characterize him" questions which,
however german to the subject in certain of its
ations, may be left in abeyancs for what more i'm
mediately concerns our present inquiry Whether,
moreover, the character in which M. Bedini pre-
sented himself among us was that of public func-
tionary whose distinguished commission from the
Holy Father" entitled him to diplomatic honors and
courtesies or whether it was that of private gen
tleman and prelate merely deputed to visit the
churches of his faith in our country, and with no
better claim to official distinction than that which
attached to him the incumbent of high ecclesias-
tical place. whether in Short he represented among
us the secular or the sacerdotal power of Plus TX
are also questions not essential to the ends proposed
in the present discussion. These are topics quite
extrinsic to the main point at issue, and which,
though not without their Importance in certain as
poets, would tend unnecessarily to compicate that
which forms the real subject in dispute.
In order more strikingly to vindicate the princi-
Piles of law and order as well as of equal liberty
which have been violated in the person of NJ. Be
DIM, we may concede all that his accusers have al
legged against him, and yet convict them of most
fragrant wrong doing. Before approaching the ques-
ton, however, we may be pardoned in expressing
our qualification at two mitigating circumstances
which tend somewhat to relieve the citizens of our
country from what would otherwise impart still
deeper turptude to these popular ebullitions. The
first Of these mitigating circumstances we find in the
motive which seems to have prompted these out
RACES, and the other in the character of those who
have been the prime movers in these disgraceful
transactions. AS to the motive of these misguided
men, we are glad to believe that it should be refer
red to exaggerated sentiment of hostility against
what they conceived to be "man's inh1manity to
man J" and, however dangerous such an instinct may
be when not regulated by reason land Justice, We
may yet rejoice that the fell spirit of religious ha
tired has not been the impeling cause to these dis
orders The actors, moreover, in these same dis
creditabe scenes, have been chiefly Europeans, resi-
dent foreigners, or at best, we may hope, no more
than inchoate citizens, "clothed with American ma
tionality without being in the right mind, as yet,
to appreciate their obligations to it. But yet while
the bitter waters Of sectarian strife have not been
permitted to rise and surge in our streets con-
sequence of these popular outbreaks agains. dis
tnglshed ecclesiastic, it becomes us none the less
to condemn them as violations Of social order and
national hospitality; and, while it may be true that
foreigners have fomented and executed these dis
turbances of the peace our own citizens cannot
wholly escape all completely in the matter. And
in far as the national honor may be furnished by
such occurrences, it becomes us to make reparaton
by providing as far as lies in our power, against
their repetition.
In plain terms, it must come to be generally un-
derstood and admitted that this is land of liberty
for other than regicides and refugee patriots. As
we do not permit the tyrant to modest the subject
who has once reached our shores, so neither we
permit the "rghts of man" to be invaded in the
person Of the most execrabe despot whom the vcis-
STUDIES Of time and place may cast upon national
hospitality. And, least of ALL should they who are
themselves indebted to this hospitality be the first
to violate it. To expect that the oppressed should
here forget the wrongs of their oppressors would be-
perhaps, to ask too much for doubtless it true
now as when the Roman poet first said it, that they
who run across the sea change their sky, not their
mind. But, if they can neither forget nor forgive
their wrongs, let them know at least that this is
not the place in which to avengc them. The "great
Republic" would soon cease to be an "asylum for
the oppressed" if twere turned into battle-ground
for European feuds and struggles The equality of
American liberty and law does not demand that we
should love and admire alike the generous defender
of a rational freedom with him who seeks remorse-
lessly to quench its every spark in blood; but it
does demand that the life and eace and prospery of