Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1854-01-12
SIGNS IN THE SOUTH.

There is no one assertion, perhaps, which has
so often been made and repeated among the op-
posers of the Anti-Slavery movements of the
North, asthat the agitation of the Slavery ques-
ton has injured the cause it was intended to
serve, rveted the letters Of the Slave closer than
before, and efsctually put a stop to the work
of emancipation. But the assertion is, and
ever was, essentially false one; and, in all ex-
cept perhaps the first ebulition of wounded
pride, and the stingings of rebuked conscience,
the facts clearly show it to be SO. So as well
might parents and Others fear to rebuke erring
sons or friends, with the object Of retaining
and saving them from ruin, lest it make them
worse. Such rebukes might, perhaps, for the
moment, arouse their anger, but knowing the
consures to be deserved and the counsel to be
wise and kindly intended, they soon soften, con-
science does her work, and, in nine cases out Of
ten, reformation is begun. 1t is so, and so
will it continue to be with the South, under the
rebukes of the Anti-Slavery mem Of the North
who ara, in reality thousand times more the
friends Of the former, than the selfish and hyp-.
ocritical Doughfaces of the latter. The Slave
holders may buster and threaten at first, but
their outpourings are of short duration, the re-
Election, W ich has thus been brought home to
them, will inevitably ensue, conscience will have
her pleading, and the Slaves, whose condition,
after all, has never, in reality been made "a whit
worse by the agitation, will soon reap the beni-
fit, in an amendment of their situation, and,
eventually, if not before freed by some sudden
outbreak, by their entire emancipation. Indeed
the evidences that such amendment is already
in progress at the South, are becoming unmis-
tlkable and frequent in several portions of the
South. The wrongs Of Slavery and its evils on
their community have the last year been adj
mitted, and the remedies candidly and rational
ly discussed by many of the most influential of
the Southern presses. The Governors of both
albania and Georgia, have recommended meas
ur}s to prevent the separation of Slave families,
anl their respective Legislatures are now engag-
e'l in discussing the subject.
And now Governor johnson Of Tennessee,
in his recent Message, comes out nobly in favor
Vi Education as a means of the elevation of Ia
''r, of giving homestead of 100 acres on con-
dition Of settlement and cultivation, and of the
sill more significant measure of SO altering the
Constitution, that the President may be elected
by the direct votes of the people, the former, if
carried out, being a sure means to detariorate
and weaken the Slavery system, and the latter
leprving the South, in the presidential elections,
Of their threo-ffths vote now received on the
Slave basis established by the Constitution.
In view of these encouraging signs, then,
should it be said that there is NJ, progress max
ing at the South9 And, in the same view have
;he friends Of Freedom at the North, any reason
10 relax their exertionsl Mo- On the contrary,
they have every reason to perseyere, and every
reason to hope that those exertons will cycntu-
a'ly be crowned with success.