New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1857-06-12

wholly eDgrOssed in their own private affairs and
interests class which doubtless constitutes the
majority of the population of this city and of most
other of our Northern towns and cties-to imag-
inc, as so many Of them do, that the pending pollti
cal contest between slayeholding and free labor is
only question relating to the interests and social
position of the coored population; and one, there
fore in which they have no personal interest and
with which it will be safe and polite for them to
have nothing to do leaving fanatics and enthusiasts
on both sides to fight it out while they go on
making money TO their hearts content-in fact as
they fater Themselves, appropriating all the meat
while they leave the shells and husk' OF political
systems and predominance to fall to Which'over
party is able to possess itself of them.
The great object of contention at the present mo-
ment between the Sham Democracy on the one
hand and the Republicans on the other, is some
thing much nearer home to the business and bosoms
Of the most selfish Of US all than any question of
the abolition of Slavery either speedy or distant or
even Of the prevention of the spread of that moral
curse, religious eyesore, economical drawback and
political calamity into new States and Territories
question in which the pecuniary interests and
social comforts of the North are not less deeply and
Immediately involved than those of the South.
The Government of this Union, for the first
twelve years under the Federal Constitution
weak and sickly infant which the Southern States
used constantly to threaten to strangle in its cradle
the famous Virginia resolution of l79o and Ken
lucky resolutions of 1899 having been twisted and
twined under the secret supervision of Mr.. Jeffer-
son himself if not absolutely for that purpose, at
least with the design to frighten its nurses into de-
liyering up the child into their hands-this then
weak and pulling infant has i'll sixty years grown so
strong as to have reduced the State Governments
and their whole organization into its mere servitors
the whole politics of those State Governments,
down even to the management Of the local affairs
of the most insignificant village in them, being regu-
lated for less with an eye to their particular and
special interests, than with view to the bearing
they may have on Federal elections and the dstribu
tion of Federal patronage. 1t follows that the
decision Of the grand pending controversy between
the slave drivers and ayebreeders on the one hand
and Free Labor the other, will not merely de-
termine the character and policy of the Federal
Government, it will determine also the character
and policy Of all our State and local adminstra-
tions. down even TO those of the most inconside-
rabe village.
From this standpoint we beg leave to cal the at
tenton Of our thrifty money making friends, who
are either disposed TO keep entirely aloof from the
present contest, who, regarding the shareholders
merely in the light Of persons threatened with 'po-
ston of their property, are inclined to sympathlze
and take sides with them-we beg leave, we say, to
call the attention of these worthy citizens, whose
thoughts are too much absorbed in their business to
leave them much time for the study Of politics, to
the sort of domestic rule which, in case Of the tri-
umph Of the slaveholders they preparing for
Us and themselves. Attention has of late been
good deal attracted to remarkable change in the
distribution of population now rapidly going on
throughout the North. Population is being fast
concentrated in cities and towns. We are rapidly
approaching to that state of things which existed
among the ancient Greek republics, and in the
middle-sge free-cty period of Belgium and
Northern Italy-that Of a very marked preiomi-
nance of the town over the rural population.
Hitherto in the United States it has been altogether
the other way. The rural population have been
everything almOst-the towns comparatively no.
thing: and il is to this fact that many thoughtful
spectators have ascribed the success thus far of
our republican experiment. This state OF things,
however, is fast changing aud with the crowding
Of our population into towns and cities are seen hs
phenomena which ever attend ia more marked
distinction Of rich and pOor-the clustering together
of large masses dependent solely on the wages Of
daily labor, and easily stimulated to look with envy
and hatred on the rich-and, what is still more
alarming the growth of class of capitalists keep
ers Of grog and gambling saloons dealers in lottery
tickets, and many others, whose direct vocation it
is to barbarze and brualize the labOring population.
Now, Tie policy of the shareholders for ruling
the North, and the sort Of persons whom, in case
of their triumph in the pending contest, they will
make their vceroys over US, are already perfectly
apparent Desperate, reckless and daring political
adyenturers, closely connected by mental and moral
snities with all the worst and most dangerous part
of our population-.uch men as Mayor Wood
will be put forward to rule Us by means Of the
worst, the most Ignorant, the most deprayed.
part Of our people, their own dems-
gceical arts and influence being backed up
by the whole Federal patronage placed at
tier disposal. As al tho South the most de-
graded snd miserable Of the white population. too
pnnr ever 10 (pn a slave themselves are relied