Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1856-11-29
REV. S. MAY ON THE DISSOLUTION or THE
AMERICAN UNION.
BosroN, October Sd, 1856.


The argument that we are not to press disunion
because the vast majority of tho people deem ii
lmpracticabe and impossible would have
been equally good against establishing the
Liberator in lS30;against forming theAmericanAn
tslavery Society in 1885, against Clarkson's deter
mined effort to get decree from the British ma
ton against the slave trade and finally, against al
most every good and righteous work ever conceiv.
ed and set On foot by men This is one part, and
great par, Of work-to convince the heart
hardened stf-necked, selfglorying Americas ueo-
pie that dissolution of their union with slave
holders slave breeders, slave traders, is perfectly
practicable as every great act Of right must be
and that it is their imperative duty to bring il
about. Their prejudices are very strong and very
deep, we know; but pre- judices will give way in
honest minds, and there is a large element Of good
sense and of honesty still existing in the Ameri
can character, which will cause them to repent OF
and annul their completely with the slave holder
as soon they it in its true light. The at.
tachment to the Union now is nothing less that
Holqtry. 1t involves and necessitates the most ex-
tensfve and systematic overthrow of the laws and
commands Of God ever attempted by any nation
protesting to be civilized, and the setting up in
their place of an idol more hdeous bloody, and
cruel than the world has ever seen in the most
darkened and heathenish lands. This is no fiction.
1t is figure Of speech. Ii is the literal, simple
truth. Look at the slave laws the slave usages
the slavery despotism, aggression, usurpation.-
Witness its destructive work to body mind and
morals Witness the political and ecclesiastical
an'oH which the north now has with these high
handed robbers, these unconscionable tyrunts
these cold-blooded murderers, these wicked men
who doom their victims to u life Of enforced impu-
rity adultery, and of all Imaginable moral depra-
vaton Are we to be silent about such a uaioa
because the northern people SO besotted
and blind to think this union necessary? because
they think to break its criminal bonds is lmpracti-
cable? No man or body of men can ever tie them
solves up to any such necessity The Union is
the sole strength, the only preservative power,
Of slavery. By its means slavery hourishes, is
strong, and spreads itself south and NORTH and
will eventually swallow up the whole country, if
the Union continue; or else fill the land with the
bitterest war of determination. BY means of the
national treasury, lull TO overHowing, and filled
five parts in six by the north; by means of the ar,
my and navy, manned, equipped, and subsisted,
and paid almost wholly by the north; the slave
power is supplied with abundant means Of prose-
cutting its designs; and the obligations Of the Union
tie up the hands of the northern people and par
alyse their strength. Take away these obligations
take away these vast largesses and helps to sla-
very-take away from slavery the immense power
which the United States Constitution gives it in
the halls of Congress-take away the great moral
force it derives from the fact that every north
ern bayonet is pledged to subdue the rebellious
slave to his slavery agan-let the northern people
to be pdlticepS cr,atnS partakers OF the sin
of the enslavement of four millions of men and
it is ust as physically morally and philosophical
ly certain that slavery will die it is that heavy
weight will come to the ground when the cord
which holds it suspended in air is sundered.--
There would be no lasting question of the naviga-
ton of the Mississippi, some intimate, for the
Southern States would be very much the greater
sufferers from any obstruction to its navigation
and commerce. Have not England and our slave
bolding States most intimate commercial
without any governmental union p
Would not the north have equally all she desired
of this, after separation as before? Most certain
ly. The south will not destroy itself out of spite
to the north But what have we to anticipate from
a continuance of the union ? In my judgment,
one of these two conditions VIA constant state
Of and bloodshed. growing out Of feelings CON
tinually and more exasperated, on both sides,
making the nation great burlesque and mock
cry of the name of union; a scottish, craven sub
mission on the part of the north to the already in
sufferable demands f the south, which must grow
more numerous, and mere oppressive and insult
ing with every new success. Between slavery and
freedom there can be no union,-mark that! 1t is
On attempt to harmonic and join together what