Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1856-01-26
From the A. S. Standard.
LETTING THE UNION SLIDE"

. LIZA 41NO 1uE UN1UN SLlUE,
We are often asked why we don't act with III,
: Liberty party, or the Free Soil party or the Whil
r party, or the Republican party, or with whateve
| form of politics mixes up the most Anti-Slavery
with the other ingredients of the mess they desir,
to be permitted to set before the Sovereign People
| People can't see what we would be at. when th'
leaders of the latest pattern of party going
about the country making strong Anti-Slavery
Speeches, and we stand back from the movemen
and criticise instead of falling in with it. Mr.
> Banks the foremost man in the country lust a
this moment, has been good enough to furnish u.
with an answer His enemies desirous of giving
him his coup-de-grace and putting him out Of the
pain he must have been in for the last four weeks
demanded of him whether not ho had ever said
that, under some possible circumstances, he would
'let the Union slide" lie did not deny that he
had said that if Slavery should be made the para.
mount interest of the country,and all others should
be made to yield to it, he should then be willing
to ''let the Union Slide" rather than be made the
instrument of slaveholdng tyranny-adding, as
another accoun. says, that he loves the Union il
now stands, and is well contented to maintain and
defend it. We do not profess TO give his language
of which, indeed, we have no authentic report,
only the laconic 5revity of the telegraphic wires
and the more difuse rendering of the Washington
correspondent. But that this statement is sub
stantially correct is clear from internal evidence
and from the necessities Of the case. ..
Mr.. Banks, having just sworn to support the
Constitution of the United States, could not very
well have expressed any present purpose of knock
ing away the stocks Of the Union and letting her
slide into the uncertain waters of an untred sea.
His oath sufficiently defined his position. 1t was
a pro-savcry impertnence to ask him whether he
intended to break his oath. Of course he could
not stand where he did, with his eye and his hope
fastened the Speakers Chair, unless he was
prepared to sustain the status quo, on which that
Chair together with all our Federal Institstions,
rested.
But it is just here that we part company with
Mr.. Banks and the Republican party. He thinks
the Union, as it is, is sufficiently good thing to
be stood by Though he can imagine state of
things which would change his loyalty into dis
trust and affect with jealousy the sweetness Of
this Alliance, still he does not think the occasion
has yet arisen. He is not ready, just yet to cut
the moorings and let the piratical old hulk float
down the stream of time, among other historical
monstrosities, in which men believed once, but
which they have long since sent weltering to per-
dition. He thinks, we suppose, that she can be
| cleaned and reftted and rigged anew, and that,
| with fresh crew ana fresh hand at the helm,
she may be made wholesome and seaworthy. More
blood must run out at her scuppers, more of the
crew must be put in irons or dangle from the yard
arm, more of the most precious things We have,
which we have received as heir-looms from our
fathers, must be trampled under foot and kicked
overheard, before Mr.. Banks can be brought to see
that the only thing to be done with the bloody old
craft is to scutte her, and then to build honest
raft, if nothing better, and try to save something
from the wreck.
Now, we differ very materially from Mr.. Banks,
and those he stands for, to this matter, and SO
we cannot be found at Washington trying to make
him Speaker. We cannot share with him the love
he feels for the Union as it is. nor yet the willing
ness he expresses to help hold it up. We are sat
isfed with the experiment at this present time, and
think that nothing further is needed to signaze
its utter failure. When we see that under the
form OF q Democracy, it has made politically ON
nipotent the closest and smallest of all oligarches
an olgarchy resting not on descent from benefac-
tors of the public, or on personal merit, or serv
ces towards the common veal, but solely on own
ership of human beings-when we see that prero-
gatives given to these odious oligarchs in vir
tue of their dealings in flesh and blood, and that
the whole machine is con.rived as to give them
the controlling power over it-and when we see
that this power has been used solely for its own
increase and perpetuity, and all the Offices and
functions of government set up for sale to the high
est bidders in servilty--and when see that the
actual effect has been, what morally and philo.
sophically it must have been, to set the whole
weight of the Union on the hearts of the Slaves
as the mountains were piled on the giants by the
victorious gods, so as to keep them forever under
when we have seen such things, and more of
which these are but the types the natural, neces-
sary, logical consequences of the Union as it is,
we think the experiment has been tried long
enough, that it has utterly failed, and that the
ly thing to be done is to try again in the light of
the former failure. Yes, we think that the sooner
the Union is let slide the better; that its influences
are evil only evil, and that continually; and that
what civil and social rights we have saved out of
the fire, we hold in despite and not because Of the
Union.
These are our deliberate opinions We believe
that Slavery exists in this country, at the present
moment solely through the aid; comfort and pro-
Il thA a,,1 thn
Union. We believe that it is the physical, politi-
cal, social, moral and religious support that Sla-
i very derives from the Union of the Slave States
with the Free States that enables it to withstand
the influences of the Age which, without this fos'
} tering care, would soon doom it to the destruction
which has overtaken all past Crimes and Cruelties.
and will yet reach and overwhelm those that yet
survive. We believe that this makes out sufi-
cient case for Revolution; that government with
these original and inherent vices in its very Consti-
tuition, and which has, by the natural and necessa-
ry course of events, been growing worse and worse
is fit only to be destroyed and trampled under the
feet of men fastening to build up a better in its
stead. We see, too that, by Just consequence
/ of the SINS our fathers and our own, which this
Union has made necessary, we have been curtalied
OF all the rights the Constitution was intended to
0 secure to white men, that we possess none by its
! grace or protection, and that we are threatened
with the loss of all that in anywise Interfere with
t the supremacy of Slavery. Though we confess
: that this is but just chastisement for our guilt
in thus casting in lot with the worst of tyrants
and consentng to be made the tools of their cruel
S ties and abomnations, still we think that these
Q very fruits of our crime are meant as Divine
warning to put it away from US, that we may free
ourselves from its punshments. Look at it in any
Q light, and from any point of view, cannot see
y in the Union anything to love- anything to revere
anything that promises is even possible of good
Let the cable be cut. Let her drift out to and
I founder, and be accursed to all generations W.
believe there is safety good only in escape from
: her. There is timber enough, and men enough, u
!. build and man another, from whose top.mast nc
black flag shall fly, and whose thunder shall be fo
# the terror and net the comfort of tyrants