The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1855-11-01
WAR BETWEEN THE OCEANS.
Free Laborers-slaves-Na tional-soctional-
&C. &C.

"''"IteSeS.-1o Duly ana DrOWDeat the North
ern Representative-tO operate upon the timid
ana time serving amongst the citizens of the
iree States-to alarm the covetousness of trade,
and purchase the venal by largesses of Office
these are the instruments by which the South
ern taskmasters have hitherto succeeded in
bending the course of Government into sub
serviency to their behests. ALBANY AHas.
The Washington Union, having assigned us
a station outside of the Administration ring is
not content to leave US there unmolested, but
proceeds In a subsequent issue to separate the
| sentence above given from one of our editorials
| and then to hang upon it nearly two columns
OF twaddle about the noble sacrifices made by
those Northern Representatives who Scope
rate with the South in maintaining the compro.
misses of the Constitution" and the abuse to
which they are subjected in consequence. We
| should not deem the subject worthy of notice,
did not the article furnish several notable Illus
| tratlons of that astuteness which presides over
| the columns OF the Government organ, and rem
ders IT so eminently worthy of the admiration
| of all classes.
The article opens with declaration of the
| exceeding difficulty there is in making South
ern men appreciate either the extent of the
| Anti-Siavery excitement at the North or the
peculiar trials which the Northern Representa-
| tive Is called upon to endure, when he ignores
the feelings and wishes of his own constituents,
to serve the interests of Slavery: or, as the
Union delicatey phrases ii, "co-operates with
| the South in maintaining the compromises of
the Constitution" They cannot see why a
Northern man "should take on so historically
| about an institution which is a thousand miles
away from him, does not threaten to come any
nearer, and in which he has no interest, direct
| or indirect, present or contingent" There is
great coSency, undoubtedly, in the assumption
| that man should never be moved by an evil.
| unless 1t is present at his own door, or within
the precincts of his own family. An evil in
filcted upon humanity under the segis of his
own Government-which stamps the character
OF his country in the eyes of the civilized
world-which is directly at variance with the
fundamental principles upon which our repub-
iican institutions are based, ought not to move
him, because It's field of operation is "thou-
sand miles away" May we not, with quite as
much pertinency, reverse the inquiry, and ask,
why should Southern men stake On so hysteri.
cally" about the movements in favor of Free
dom, seeing they are "a thousand miles away
from them," and do not affect their hold upon
their slaves, SO long as they remain under the
protection of State laws? Surely, if" distance
lends enchantment to the view" in the one
case, the advocacy of Freedom, and the appli
cation of true Democratic principles ought not
to stir the bile of our Southern brethren, even |
TO the extent of threatening the dissolution of |
the Union.
Again, the Union inquiries, on behalf of the |
stakeholder:
How does it concern the Northern men,
whether we at the South hire the white man to |
labor all his life by the day. or week. or year, |
and merely pay him his food and clothing, or |
whether we purchase black man "a slave to |
do our work and give him his food and cloth |
ing all his life? If we prefer to use bought |
labor, and it is wrong, either morally socially.
or pohucally, the responsibility is on us, and |
not on the Northern people. Why, then, should |
they take such All interest in matter that con- |
Germs us alone? As 10 satisfactory answer can |
be given to such interrogatories the Southern |
man Is too apt TO conclude that there is a great
deal OF exaggeration and misrepresentation as |
to the amount and extent of the Anti-Slavery |
feeling and the fana,ical agitation at the North.
The Consequence is, that we fail sometimes to |
estimate at Its true value that high moral cour- |
age which Northern statesmen display in
breasting the storm of fanaticism, and stand |
ing firmly by the rights guaranteed by the Con-
stitution to Southern men,"
This is another of those assumptions peculiar
ly characteristic of the Administration organs,
as embodying high compliment to the free
laboring man of the North. The editor of the
Union can see no difference between the con-
dition of the man who supports himself and
those dependent upon him, by his industry
free to labor or abstain from toll, rs shall suit
his own convenience; to change his location or
pursuits, shall best comport with his in
terests; to enjoy the fruits of his perseverance,
and economy in his own way-and the condi-
ton of a slave, subjec to the caprices or cruel
| ties OF master, for whom he labors without
other reward than scanty supply of food and
clothing; controlling neither his own time, his
own person, nor the results of his toll with no
incentives TO exerttion but the lash of the over
seer and with no hopes of release from servitude
no future Of rest, but that which he NAV hope
to find within the grave. In its anxiety to serve
the South and deprociate the condition of free
labor, the Union overlooks the fact that at the
North the laboring man of today becomes the
employer of to morrow that the North is made
up of men who are the architects of their own
fortunes, and who have risen from obscurity
| and poverty, under the genial influences of free
institutions, TO stations of honor and response
bility, and the enjoyment of happiness and the
diffusion of benevolence through wealth created
by their own industry and enterprise. The
Publisher of the Government organ himself
living upon the largesses of Congress purchased
by traducing the character and motives of
Northern men, forgets, in his anxiety to degrade
free labor to the level of Slavery, that there is
scarcely free laboring man amongst US, who
does not provide directly or indirectly for the
education of his children, who does not succeed
in placing them in situations in life above his
own, and who does not look forward with hope
and confidence to the time when they shall be-
come the soace of his later years and the en-
joyers of his own frugality and sacrifices But
is there any such solace in store for the Stare,
to whose level the Union degrades the white
laborer of the North? Is he master of his own
person, of his wife, or of his children? Can he
feel secure in the enjoyment of his domestic re-
lations, can he better the prospects of his
children, can he look forward to the fruition of
his labors, in raising himself or his offspring to
a better condition than that In which they were
mutually born, and in which they must continue
through a life of toll and an existence of bond
age, terminating only at that bourne beyond
which the lash of the taskmaster cannot follow
them? Yet this is the condition to which the
Administration organ compares that of the
| tree white laborer, and between whose EMPLOY
ment and that of the slave he can see no diff.
| ference.
1t is this degrading estimation in which labor
is held at the South-this placing all who toll
| on the same level-which forbds the North from
asserting to the introduction of Slavery into
the Territories. 1t is because free and servie
labor cannot subsist on the same soil-because
we will not consent to place the hardy pioneer
| upon the same footing with the negro slave
because the introduction of Slavery operates to
| the practical exclusion of free white popula-
tion-that the North asks to protect the Terri
tories from the blasting inroads of this "pecu-
liar institution" In so doing, they seek to
violate no principle of the Constitution, thew
ask no measure of Government which has not