Bedford inquirer. [volume] (Bedford, Pa.) 1857-1884, 1858-05-07
Senator Wilson's Vindication Of Free
Labor.

Senator 1tannlonQsS Denlocratlc speech de-
nouncing the laboring men of the North as the
mere mudsitls Of society, has elected noble re-
/ sponses from Senator BRoDERIeK, of Califor-
MIA, ard Senator WILsoN,of Massachusetts, both
of whom passed their youth and early manhood
at hard and honest toll. We have given ex-
tracts from the reply of The former, and now
publish few from that of the latter
But the Senator, filed with magnificent vis-
ions of Southern power, crowns cotton s'king,"
and tells US that If they should stop supplying
cotton for three years, ssEngland would topple
headong, and carry the whole civilized world
with her, save the South" What presump-
| ton. The South--which own lands and slaves
the price fuctuating with the production, use
and price of cotton having no other resource
or means of support would 20 harmless, while
the great commercial centres Of the world, with
the East accumulations of capital, tile products
of ages Of accumulation with varied pursuits
and skilled industry, would 'stopple" to their
| fall. Sir, suppose the cofee-planters of Bra
zi, the tca-growers Of the Celestial Empire,
| aud the wheat growers on the shores of the
Black Sea and on the banks of the Don and the
Volga, indulge in the samc magnificent illusion,
world is not governed by the cotton n-planfsrs
of the South, the cofree-planters of Brazil, the
tea-growers of China, nor the wheat lf7ra1cers
of Eastern Europe. | tell the Senator that
/ England, France, Germany, Western Europe
and the Northern States Of this Union, are the
commercial manufacturing business aud Rone-
tary centres Of the world; that their merchants
manufacturers and capitalists grasp the globe;
that cotton and sugar, and tea aud coffee, and
wheat, and the spices of the isles of the Orien-
tai seas, are grown for them Sir, the cotton
planters of the Sonth are simply their agents,
aud they perform their task under necessity
quite as great AZ their own slaves perfotm theirs
under the tasSmaster's eye. l would remind
the Senator That the free States, in 1850, pro-
duced $3.50 900 900 of manufactures, and that
only S52,000,000 of that vast production -
only about one-seventeenth part n twas
made up of cotton. Our manufactures and me-
chaGic arts now must exceed twelve hundred
million dollars, and cotton does not make up
more than seventy million dollars. Does the
Senator think the free States would ''topple'
down if they shield lose one-seyenteenth part
of their productive industry
The productive Industry Of Massachusetts,,
State that manufactures more than one-third
/ of all the cottnn manufactured in the country,
was in 1875, $3.50, 100000: only S26.000,-
GOO, one-thirteenth part Of it, couon.f h
Does The gentleman believe that State SO, =
| has productive industry of $3.50 ,00fE s
about $3.50 per head for each person, . III
| perish if she should lose 26,000,000, q unat
vast productien
! Ii is no matter of surprise that gentlemen
who live away off on crossroads, where cotton
blooms, should como to believe that cotton rules
the world; but few months association with
the great worll would cure that delusion.--
"You are our factors," cxclaiiHs the Senator.
"Iou bring and carry for Us. Suppose we were
10 discharge you? Suppose We were to take
our business out of your hands, we should con-
sign you to anarchy and poverty" SIR, sup
pose, when the Senator returns from this cham
Der to the coIton-feds, bis slaves should in
their simplicity, say TO him 'Afassa, You only
sell de cotton; we plant; we hoes; we picks de
cottonl 'Spose we discharge you" The un-
sophisticated "mud sills'' would be quite as
reasonable as is the Senator. The Senator
seems to think the cottoH-planters hold us in
| the hollow of their hands; it they shake them,
we ,renlble, if they close them, We perish.
But the Senator from South Carolina, after
crowning cotton as king, with power to briug
England and all the civilized world ''toppling"
down into the yawning CULTS of bankruptcy and
ruin, complaeently tells the Senate and the
trembling subjects of bis cotton King that ''the
greatest strength of the South arises from the
harmony of her political institution that her
! forms of society the best in the world; that
sEshc has an extent of political freedom combined
with entire security, seen nowhere on earth."-
The South, he tells US sis satisfied, harmonius,
and prosperous and he asked us if we shave
heard that the ghosts of Mendoza and Tor
quemada are stalking ap- the streets Of our
great cities; that the inquisitions IS at hand;
and that there are fearful rumofs of consulta-
ti3hs for vigilance committees!' Sir, this self
complacency is siblihe! No son of the Gelcs-
tial Empire can approach the Senator III self
complacency. That "society is the best in the
world'' where more than three millions of bciugs
created in the image of their God, are held as
chattles-sunk from the lofty level Of humanity
down TO the abiect condition of unreasoning
beasts of burden. The "society is tho best in
; the world" where are manacles, chains and
whips, auction blocks, prisons, bloodhounds,
I scourgingsi yHchings and burnings, laws to tor
) tuIe the bcdyj shrivel the mind and debase the
soul; where labor is dishonored aud laborers
despiseJ! .'Folitical freedom in a land where
woman is imprisoned for teaching little children
W leau you Iioly hordi Where professors
are deposed and banished for opposing the ex-
tension OF slavery; where public men exiled for
quoting in a national cDn7ention the words of
Jefferson; where voters are mobbed for appear
ing to vote for free territory; and where book
sellers are driven from the country for selling
a copy of that master work of genius, ssUncle
Toms Cabin a land of 'scertan security,"
where patrols, costing, in Old Virginia, more
than Is exnen,iad IN ndueatn heF naar childrau:
stalk the country to catch the fanest ruinor
of discomfort. where the bay of tla bloodhound
never ceases; where but little more than one
unnr ano xnsn tha startlinn crv of irs,lrrontinn.