The River Falls journal. (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1857-1861, 1857-12-23


Not SO, however, with the stranger pine
nomenon to be discerned inextricably con
nected with this anomaly, but not, ap-
parently, naturally and inevitably flowing
from it. That the denial Of his natural
and civil rights to the laborer who SONS
and reaps the harvests of the Southern
country should he avenged upon his en-
SLAYER in the scanty yielding of the earth,
and in the unthrift, the vices, and the
wretcbedness which are the only crops
that spring spontaneously from soil blast
ed by slavery, is nothing strange. 1t is
only tne statement Of the truism i'll moral
and In political economy, that true pros
perity can never grow up from wrong
and wickedness. That pauperism, and
ignorance, and vice, that reckless habits.
and debasing customs, and harbarous
manners should como of an organized
degradation of labor, and of cruelty and
injustice crystall:zed into an institution, is
an inevitable necessity, and strictly ac-
cording to the nature of things. But that
the stronger half of the nation should suf-
fer the weaker to rule over it III virtue of
its weakness, that the richer region should
submit to the political tyranny Of its i'm
poverished moiety because Of that very
poverty, is indeed a marvel and a mystic
ry. That the intelligent, educated, and
civilized portion of a race should consent
to the sway of their ignorant, illiteratc,
and barbarian companions in the common
wealth, and this by reason of that uncouth
barbalism, is an establishment, and should
be Kissing to all beholders everywhere.
It would be so to ourselves, were we not
used to the fact, had it not 50 grown into
our essence and ingrained itself with our
nature as to seem a vital organism Of our
being. Of all the anomalies i'll morals
and in politics which the history of civil
lized man affords, this IS surely the most
abnormous and the most unreasonable.
The entire history Of the United States
is but the record of the evidence of this
fact. What event in our annals is there
that Slavery has not set her brand upon
it to mark 1t as her own! In the very
moment of the nations birth, Ike the
evil fairy of the nur. cry tale, she was
present to curse it with her evil Words
The spell then wound up has gone on in
creas;ng in power, until the soanty formu-
as which seemed in those days Of infancy,
as if they would fade out Of the parch-
mont into which they had been fo;stod,
and leave no trace that they. ever were,
have blotted out all beside, and statesmen
and Judges read nothing there but the
awful and all-pervading name Of Slavery.
Once entrenched among the Institutions
of the country, this baleful power has adj
vanced from one position to another,ney
er losing ground, but establishing itself
at each successive point more impregna-
bly than before, until it has us at an ad-
vantage that encourages it to demand the
surrender of our rights, our se!f-respect,
and our honor. What was once wlis-
pered in the secret chamber Of council is
now proclai1nod upon the housctops =
what was once done by indirection and
guile is now carried with the high hand,
i'll the face Of day, at the cannon and by
the edge of the sabre OF the nation. Doc
trnos and designs which a few years since
could find no mouth-piece out Of a bar
room, or the piratical den of a flllibuster,
are now clothed with power by the au-
thentic response of the bench Of the high
est judicatory, and obsequiously iterated
from the oracular recesses of the National
Palace.
And the events which now fill the scene
are but due Successors III the train that
has swept over the stage ever since the
nineteenth century opened the procession
with the purchase Of Louisiana. The ac-
QUESTION Of that vast territory, important
as it was in national point Of siew,-
but coveted by the South mainly as the
fruitful mother of slave-lolding States,
and for the precedent it established, that
the Constitution was barrier only to
what should impede, never to what might
promote, the interests OF Slavery,--was the
first great stride she made as she stalked
to her design The admission Of Nilsson
ri as slaveholding State, granted after
struggle that shook American society to
the center, and then only on the memora-
bic promises now broken to the ear as
well as to the hope, was the next vantage
ground seized and maintained. The near
" contemporary purchase Of Florida,
though in design and in effect as revolu-
tionary an act as that Of Louisiana, excit-
cd comparatively little opposition. II was