The Evansville daily journal. [volume] (Evansville, Ia. [i.e. Ind.]) 1848-1862, 1855-06-07
.sThc Forcirn EIement.',

Under this head, Mr.. Editor, we had in the
Enquirer the other day, quite as bold an
illustration, as we have yet seen, of that
happy confidence in the ignorance Of their
readers which the anti-American organs are
so wont in these days to rejoice in exhibiting.
The writer starts out with the promise "to
adduce historical proof of the propriety of
admitting all the world and his wife to the
rights of American citizenship. For the pur-
poses of his argument he compares the merits
of the ancient Republics, and in the science
of Government awards the palm to that of
Rome. Then, after furnishing US from "the
most profound and eloquent of modern
historians" Gibbon, with very Know
Nothing definition of patriotism, he proceeds
to extract from his "decline and fall of the
Roman Empire" the "historical proofs''
afore promised in the shape of certain frag-
mentary passages which he alleges demon
strate the good policy Of the course pursued
by Rome in admitting the people of all the
conquered territories to the rights of Roman
citizenship. To make it do this he cuts and
carves and disjoints the text of his author
after manner which clearly shows that he
has not the fear of his readers before his
eyes--that, in fact, he has not single mis-
giving that he has reader in the world who
ever read forty pages in Gibbon.
The passage, so fraudulently misquoted, is
one of very many in which the historian of
the decline and fall of Rome attributes that
decline and fall, in a great measure, to the
unwise innovation, made by Rome's tyrante
upon the policy of the Republic and the first
Cesars, by which the once sacred and most
prudently guarded privilege OTTOMAN citizen
ship was extended beyond the Italian States,
(Which were "one great nation, united by
language, manners, and civil institutions'')
to all the inhabitants of the provinces. You
will confess that it must have required some
little skill as well effrontery to distort such
a passage into an "historcal proof" of the
reverse of this meaning, and to make it "com-
mend" instead of condemn the policy of admit
ing foreigners to the rights of citizenship.
propose sir, more for the purpose of vim
dcating history, than to refute the Enquirer,
(Which, after the recent labors of yourself
and other good citizens, is certainly work
of supererogation) that you shall restore the
eviscerated portion of the context. The
entire passage will then read as follows
that between brackets being the very i'm
portant part of which the Enquirer man
SO cunningly disembowels it:
"The narrow policy of preserving, without
any foreign mixture, the pure blood of the
ancient citizens, had checked the fortune,
and FASTENED the ruin of Athens and Sparta.
The aspiring genius of Rome sacrificed vaai-
tv to ambition, and deemed it more prudent,
as we'll as honorable, to adopt Uirtue and
merit for her own wheresoever they were
found, among slaves or strangers, enemies
or barbarians. During the most fourishing
era of the Athenlan commonwealth, the num-
Der of citizens gradually decreased from about
thirty to twenty thousand. If on the contra
nv, we study the growth of the Roman re-
public, we may discover, that notwithstand-
| ing the incessant demands of wars and colo
MES, the citizens, who in the first census of
Servius Tullius, amounted to no more than
eighty three thousand, were multiplied, be-
! fore the commencement of the social war, to
the number of four hundred sixty-three thou
sand men, able to bear arms in the service oil
| their country. When the allies of Rome
claimed an equal share of honours and privil-
eyes, the senate indeed preferred the chance
of arms to an tgie0nl1t0us concession. The
Samnites and the Lucanians paid the severe
penalty of their rashness; but the rest of the
Italian states, as they successfully returned
to their duty, were admitted into the bosom
of the republic, and soon contributed TO TIKI
ruin of public freedom Under democrat.
ical government, the citizens exercise the
powers of sovereignty; and those powers will
be first abused, and afterwards lost if they
are committed to an unwieldy multitude
But when the popular assemblies had beer
suppressed by the administration of the EN-
perors, and conquerors were distinguished
from the vanqnished nations only as the frs
and most honorable order of subjects
their increase, however rapid, was no longer
exposed to the same dangers. Yet the loiSes
princes, aoho adopted the md.rims of Angus
tus, guarded loub the strictest care the dignitl
, ofthe Roman name. and difused the freedom
Of the city l1ith q prudent hberaItty.
Till the privileges of the Romans had beer
progressively extended to all the inhabitant
OF the empire, al Important QlSlncllOH wa
preserved between Italy and the provinces
F.! The former was esteemed the centre of pub
lie unity, and the firm basis of the constitu
ton. Italy claimed the birth, or at least tn
residence of the emperors and the senate
The estates of the Italians were exemp
= from taxes, their persons from the arbitrar
jurisdiction of governors. Their municipa
corporations, formed after the perfect mode
: of the capital. were intrusted under the i'm