The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1859-12-06

acceptance Of fanatical idea that would be
utterly destructive to the material interests Of
both. But long before We should come to suoh
conflict the necessary presidents would in
volve us in commercial ruin that would give
every man practical taste Of the effects OF
disunion, and produce q reaction in Northern
sentiment that would drive its fanaticism back
TO the uncharitable homes Of New England
puritanism which have produced it.
The first effect which would follow the step
contemplated by the Southern men in Congress
would be the immediate countermanding Of all
orders for Northern goods. This would b
soon followed by q cessation of all payments
from the South and the practical if not the
open reputation of all Southern debts 70
Northern creditors. The active preparation
which would at once be put on foot in the
slave States to meet a hostile invasion
would seriously interrupt all industrial enter
prises there, and if the cotton, sugar and tobac-
CO crops should not be entirely lost, they would
be diminished to such an extent as seriously to
shake the commercial fabric of the world. The
loss of million Of bales of cotton, which Ia
only about one-fourth of the coming crop.
would Immediately close one half Of the manu-
factories in England and America. Not only
would the cotton mills be shut, but thousands
of other industrial establishments whose ex-
istence is vitality linked in with the great existing
scheme of manufacture and exchange. This
would bring bankruptcy upon every merchant
and trader, North and South, in America and in
Europe.
These efforts would be far more widely felt
at the North than at the South. The social edi-
flee in the Northern States is based upon man
ufacturing industry and trade. 1t has ceased
to be great exporter of the products of the
earth Take away or diminish to any great ex-
tent its commerce and manufactures, and the
whole social fabric would be shaken to its CEN
tire, or fall in one universal ruin. In the South
this is not the case. There society is built
upon an agricultural basis and the patriarchal
institution of family servitude Its chief en-
ployment is tillage and the surplus of its pro-
duct exported to foreign markets, brings it in re-
turn not the necessaries but the luxuries of life
and the means for its own further advancement
In the event which we are told is contemplated
in Washington, these logical results will be evil
dent to every mind not heated with fanaticism,
and their effect can be foretold without any
gift of prophecy. The Middle and portion of
the Western States would 60 with the seeding
South Pennsylvania and New Jersey would
never cling to the ruined social edifce of the
North. Ohio, Indiana and Illinois would find
safer Industrial and social relations with the
Southwest than with the Northeast New York
city, the commercial metropolis of America,
would fling the puritanical fanatics out of its
borders, and look to that industrial fellowship
with the South which is the feeder of its great
ness and its glory. New England would be
left alone to brood over her silent marts, to
burn her ships, and to nurse that fanaticism
which would send every man to hell who does
not walk in the paths which her self righteous
pharisees have marked out as the only road to
future bliss.
From these few observations the reader will
see that we are at this moment on the verge Of
political rupture which will produce O COM
mercial and industrial crisis more widespread
and more permanent in its results than any
that has hitherto swept its thousands of mer-
chants to bankruptcy, and its hundreds of
thousands Of artisans and laborers to hunger
and the brink of pauperism. We shall watch
the coming political movements in Washington
with an anxious eye, for the aggressions Of
fanaticism in the North, and the deliberate
resolutions Of selfdefence in the South, are
sweeping this Union rapidly into the vortex of
dissolution and ruin.