Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1855-10-13

efit proposed by the bargain-lnasmuch as Its con
tnuance involved, to u considerable extent, the
good faith of the South, clear, that the dis
turbance of it by the South was neither honorable
nor wise. In accepting the responsibility of the
deed it has, far those interests are concerned
which led TO it, both lost an opportunity and com
mtted fatal error. Had it spurned the offer Of
the territories, when il was made, it would have
achieved moral triumph far more valuable to il
than any other immediate success can be. But
the virtue of its representatives was not equal to
the occason-the spirit of Henry, Wytbe, Macon,
Jefferson not theirs. Or had it, after the act
was consummated in Congress, withheld its APP
proval, and manifested disposition to allow the
North fair chance in the appropriation of land,
50 long consecrated to freedom by its consent,
there would have been color of equity in its pro-
ceedings, which would have gone far in tempering
the horror ard reprobaton which the original of.
1 fense provoked. But here again the South proved
unworthy of its opportunities. 1t has sustained
and abetted the lawless invasion of Kansas, by
the armed marauders of Missouri. 1t has sent
thither its agents. or allowed them to go-which
is the same thng-in order to subjugate the peace
ful settlers and to impose peculiar social system
on them against their will. The Kansas Legisla-
ture, acting in the name of the South, is usurp-
ing body. The people of Kansas, overruled by
violence at the elections not its constituents.
1t reflects no popular sovereignty, only the sway
of the mob; and they who support its cause, sup
port the ascendancy of the bowie-knife and the
/
Under this condition of facts and events, it was
very natural that public opinion at the North
should be stung into keen and vivid resentment
Ayerse as it may have been, as a whole, to any
interference with the internal relations Of the
South willing, as it had shown itself, to accept
any settlement of difficulties which did not involve
an actual approval of the Southern system-hOp-
! ing that under geographical demarcaton of the
respective regions of freedom and slavery the
causes of dispute would be gradually supplanted
by the advancing enterprise, if not the Christianity
| and democracy, of the nation--or be reduced, at
least, to the smallest surface of conact-it has yet
been able to discover in that repeal, and in the
conduct by which it has been followed up, nothing
less than rooted determination to extend the pc
culiar social usages of the South, over the whole
West, in the face of contracts aud laws, and to the
exclusion of freedom. But how, in the name of
humanity. could the North listen to the ayowal, or
witness the ncipent steps in the execution Of such
n scheme, without loudly and earnestly protesting
against it, and resolving to resist it to tie
end?
| The immediate effect of this repeal, grounded
as it was the absurd doctrine which ascrbed full
sovereignty and independence to inchoate po-
litcal body, and invested remote dependency Of
the organism with the most vital functions of the
brain and heart, has been to introduce confusion
and civil war into the whole system. But the his
tory Of this part of its operation is so well and
honestly, though rudely told by the editor of the
1
Of trouble, and who is himself friend of slavery,
that We reproduce it. Writing in the latter part
Of August, he says;
"The emigration to Kansas has been entirely
checked. Emigrants from the northern free
States have ceased to 60 to Kansas, because they
can find good land elsewhere, not cursed by mob
| law nor ruled by nonresident bulles. Emigrants
from the Southern States do not 60 to Kansas, be-
cause they will not put their slave property in
peril, by taking it to Territory where there is a
strong free soil clement threatening the security
of slaves. Any man Of sense might have foreseen
tho result. Alabama and Georgia may hold pub
lie meetings and resolve to sustain the Shareholders
in Missouri in making Kansas slave State. But
their resolutions comprise all their aid-which is
not material enough for the crisis. When slave
holders of Alabama and Georgia emigrate, they
so to Louisiann. Arkansas, and Texas. They do
not come with their slaves to Missouri or to Kan
sas. Call they that backing their friends? Thus
the matter stands. The northern emigrants shun
Missouri and Kansas es plague spots of the nation.
The southern onligrants shun Missouri and Kan
sas, because here is the battle-ground between sa.
very and free soil The result is Kansas, the
fairest land under the sun, is neglected and idle
occupied only by q few honest and earnest, but
disheartened pioneers and lorded over by dozen
or two feudal tyrants of Missouri, who curse by
their presence the land they have desolatcd. In
May last the editor Of the MelIigencer was in Ken
lucky, and he met numerous of the most wealthy
and respectable farmers Of that State, such as
form SO large a portion of the population of Mis-
souri,, who inquired earnestly about the condition
OF things In Kansas and in western Missouri.
They spoke of the intention they had of removing
to Kansas or western Missouri, but said they had
abandoned it utterly for the reason that they
would never think Of taking their families to q
region where law was set aside, presses mobbed,
and men driven from the country by an unknown
and irresponsible band Of regulators. They pre-
ferred the rule of law to anarchy. In a recent
trip through several northwestern States we found
that the same circumstances were most industri-
ously and fatally used to divert emigration to those
States, and to prejudice Missouri and Kansas with
every class of people. The most aggrayating
stories ofinsults and outrages committed by Mis-
sourians upon the persons of emigrants from the
old world or from the free States, who are found
ascending the Missouri river, are circulated in the
newspapers all through the free States; and it is
impossible TO conceive of the deep hatred thus gene
rated towards our whole State in the northern half
of the Union.
Between these fires, Missouri is leading on her
langud existence. ST. Louis is retarded in most
woeful way. Our railroads creep at snal's pace.
We build ten miles while other western States
build one hundred. In every department of life
we feel the paralysis. Instead Of bounding for.
ward, buoyant, strong and rejoicing, we sit with
dull eyes and heavy spirits, and listen to the tick
of death-watch These are the bitter fruits of
the repeal of the Missouri Compromised wicked
ana wrongful deed-that VIII yet bring hell oil
bitter selfreproach to its authors Missouri did
not demand that repeal. The South never asked
it. Atchison solicited it--aDd, in moment Of po-
)itcal insanity the South consented to the wrong,
and made the wrong her own. This was the sui
eide of slavery. Every step since taken has deep
pened the wrong and enhanced the danger The
free States organized Aid Societies, and sent their
men to make Kansas free. 1t had been free soil
by solemn compact for thirty-fve years. and they
naturally were incensed to its character chang
ed The South would have been far more indig
nant if slave Territory had been thus, by an
unexpected act of Congress, converted into free
soil. The free States had right to be indignant
that lifelong compromise had been repealed
and they hao right to keep Kansas free as it had
been, by peaceful colonization. They attempted
nothing else but portion of the citizens of Mis-
souri,. headed by Atcbison and Stringfellow, de-
nounced the northern emigrants as 'paupers and
hirelings,' because they were sent west with the
money Of q society aud 50 they had county meet
ings in Missouri and raised money. and sent Mis-