Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1854-07-19
prownson OH Native Amerloanism.

The July number of Brownson's Quarterly Re-
view, the leading organ of the Catholic Church in
this country, contains remarkable article on the
subject of Native Americanism. Mr.. Brownson
has acquired considerable fame as champion of
his religious faith, and as vigorous writer
He objects to the Native American party on ac-
count of their indscriminate hostility TO Roman
Catholics, but otherwise is quite favorably dis
posed towards them. He does not advocate any
change in our naturalization laws, yet, he says, If
Native Americanism chooses to repealthese laws,
"and enact that hereafter no person not born in
the country, or of American parents temporarily
resident abroad, shall have the right to vote in
our elections, or be eligible to any office, but con-
ceding the full rights of citizens to all born in the
country, without regard to the nationality of their
parents, we shall ourselves offer no opposition"
After remarking that it is not from Catholic, but
from anti Catholic foreigners, that comes the
principal danger to our institutions, the writer
says:
Chow, without the elements furnished us by for
egn immigration, we should never have had
population Of character which could have given
occasion TO the demagogc and radical spIitto rise
TO its present alarming height. When this 10 con
sidered. and also that our country has become, as
it were, a refugi,n peccatorum of all nations, to
which all the miscreants of Europe may flock and
carry on their war against the peace of nations
and social order, mnge fore ign politics with our
own, and make the merits of candidates depend
on their views of O'Connell, Kossuth, Smith o.
d. III -. 4 II. III. \
poeon or Francis Joseph, Nicholas of Russia or
the Sultan of Turkey, it can surprise no one that
there should be in our midst a powerful Native A.
merican party, filled with hostility to foreigners
1t ia no more than what we saw in England her
self with regard to French Protestant refugees in
the time of Queen Anne. Wien we consider that
foreign population at the rate of quarter of a
million or more is annually poured in upon us,
with foreign manners, foreign tastes, usages and
habits, and by far the larger part of them inlbued
with erroneous notions of our Institutions and pre-
pared to push democracy to extreme radcalism,
few of us can deny that there is at least some
cause for apprehension, especially since our natu-
ral-born citizens are already to fearful extent an
imated by an utra-d democratic spirit. There is
real danger that it will not do either to deny or to
disguise but which must be bravely met in some
way, if we are to remain modeRepublic, a we'll
ordered republic, and not degenerate into the gov
eminent Of the mob.'
Further on he gives the following advice to nat
uralized foreigners:
.'They must study to avoid, as far as possible,
wounding the national sensibility, or adopting
modes of action or expression likely to offend it..
Let them not make their new homes an arena for
fighting the battles of the country they have left
let them organize no military companies composed
exclusively of foreign-born citizens let them pub
lsh no journals, and organize no associations for
political purposes to be effected in foreign coun-
tries. These things give offence, and not unrea-
sonably, to the national feeling they not right,
and may at a critical moment prove most embar-
RAISING to the Government"
John Mitchell, whom Mr.. Brownson styles "that
Protestant RADICAL" has replied to the article
through his paper, The Citizen.