The Sumter banner. [volume] (Sumterville, S.C.) 1846-1855, 1855-01-24
Mr.. Soule and Cvba.

MIR. S0uale nnd Cuba.
The country has been taken by
surprise by the rapid change in our
diplomatic relations with SPAIN
Without any hcralding of the move
. ment Mr.. SoULE rctircs and immedi
ate!y his successor is nominated aid
approved of by the Senate. The
change has been announced by the
press rs indicating tho aband donment
or postponement of our designs upon
Cuba. We'hope this will prove to be
the case. Under present auspices the
acquisition of Cuba would not be I'D
vantageous: even peaceful negotiation
is, we think, detrimental to US. The
political world is in perturbed state:
Every great power, in Europe,
Asia and South America, and hfexi.
co on our own Northern Hemisphere,
. is embroiled in war or revolution, or
threatened with one or the other of
: those calamities. Such is an appro.
pirate time for piratical attacks 1--WE
see that inc occasion is seized upon
along the coasts of China) but a ma.
ton which desires no blot upon its his
tory should choose another time for
accomplishing designs which the whole
world will say were for its own az.
grandizement. The imputation would
be cast upon US that We chose such
time to fall upon weak and tottering
dynasty and wrest from it its E,irest
possession, knowing that all the encr-
gIes of the powers that would have
rallied to its aid are cxcrted elsewhere.
Europe is jealous Of our territorial
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT. 1t may be quicscent
while we confine our expansive powers
to our own continent; but when we
would stretch out our arms beyond
the solid earth and establish ourselves
where we would command the Wes
tern waters also, we cannot expect
charity from our transatlantic friends.
No generous desire to rescue that
beautiful island from misgovernmcnt
and oppression will be attributed to
as; but we would be stigmatised as
desPoilers. And our own consciences
could not entirely acquit us. Who Of
US could say that the Black Warrior
difficulty would have assumed such
magnitude, if we had not longed for
Cuba? And so with the long list of
insults and injuries which pressed
heavily upon President Pierce's mind,
when he penned his excited message
to Congress upon that subject. Cuba,
Spain's-we have forborne until for
bearance ceases to be magnanimity;-
Cuba, ours-and we have no quarrel
with The Grandce kingdom.-We dis.
like the procedures Of our govern.
ment upon this matter. If our object
is to obtain reparalion for injuries, let
US lift up clean hands in our appeals
for justice-yield up Cuba to her own.
( ers; show them that we are willing
they should possess what belongs to
them, and that they must equally re
{; spect our rights: or, if Cuba be the
Z real object and end of all the diplom-
acy. let us avow it, and give up to OBJ
3liyion the other causes of i'll feeling
4 Either course would he more manly
than what would be charged upon US
as a hypocritical trnmping Of claims
! for reparation, intended, not to obtain
i redress, but to cover our designs, and
Fintimidate q weak, disordered govern
Z ment into submission to them.-
Whatever may have been our past
derelictions, let our acts for the future
be worthy ofaa nation of freemen; be
-defensible when impure motives may