Ashtabula weekly telegraph. [volume] (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1853-1873, 1859-12-31

FIOm the New York Tribune.
Who are the GUILTY.
The guilt Of John Brown, In the estima-
tion of the shareholders, does not lie in the
act Of invading Virginia, but in the pur-
pose for which he made the INVASION
They do not denouhce the invasion of an
independent state II only the object Of it
suits them, A large body Of Missourans
broke into United States arsenal, stole
the arms and ammunition and marched
with them into the territory Of Kansas, to
murder or drive ont the settlers from the
free states. They wonld have succeeded if
there had not been brave men like John
Brown to resist them. Nobody has been
called to account for the pillage of the
government arsenal in Missouri on the
contrary, some Of the men who did it have
been rewarded by Offices, as if It were a
meriiorious deed, and the United States
Senate has just voted approval Of it by re-
fusing TO have it investigated. What is
the difference between this affair and John
Browns John Brown did not steal
United States gun or an ounce of powders
he simply used the Harper's Ferry armory
as place of defense but his object was
to free slaves, and that of the MssouriaDs
was to murder white men that they might
extend slavery over territory whose in
habitants rejected it. So far as the inva-
sion itself is looked at, the latter was inf
nitely more violent and murderous than the
former.
Expeditions have been fitted out by
the Shareholders to invade and conquer Gu
ba the South still avows that as one of
its great schemes, only delayed for a fitting
opportunity President Buchanan got the
vote of the South because of his published
opinion in favor of that project, and he has
since declared it itjustfable. What is the
difference between the invasion of Cuba
and the late invasion of Virginia 2 One
is in the interest of slavery and the other
against it one violates the rights of a
state in the Union-the other that of o
foreign government. Yet John Brown is
hung, and Mr.. Buchanan sits quietly in the
presidential chair at Washington, and ro-
body calls him hard names or proposes to
strangle him with Kentucky hemp.
The shareholders have encouraged and
sustained the invasions of Nicaragua by
Walker and his freebooters, and southern
courts refuse to punish these violations of
neutrality laws. Walkers avowed object
is to conquer more territory for slavery
The South encourages schemes for the in
vasion of Mexico and the seizure of her
territory, with the same design. In fact,
the great lesson taught by the policy Of
the Shareholders, in the last quarter of
century more particularly, is that any
amount of violence and outrage upon the
rights of other states is to be tolerated and
encouraged, if it only be designed to ex-
tend and strengthen the institution of slave
ry. All that John Brown did was to ap-
ply the policy of the Shareholders against
their institution. If it is right to invade
foreign state, subvert its government and
steal its territory, for the benefit of slave
~, by those who consider slavery good
thing, why is it not right for those who be-
lieve slavery an evil thing to use the same
means against it
John Browns invasion Of Virginia is not
to be defended by any man who believes in
government at all, But it is capable of
better defense than any Of the great
schemes of violence we have noticed, and
which the slave propagandists and their
northern indorsers have sanctioned aud do
still boldly sustain. The South has been
teaching the country the lesson that lawless
violence and outrage in support Of slavery
is right. 1t is a strong evidence Of the
wisdom and forbearance of the enemies of
slavery that only one John Brown has
arisen to turn the chosen weapons of the
slave power against itself If that power
would secure undisturbed possession in its
own domain hereafter, let it abandon its
freebotng policy. Let it respect the rights
of others if it would escape attacks upon
its own wrongs And let those northern
men who have sustained the lawless vio-
lence of the slave power be little modest
in their exultation over the hanging of John
Brown, lest they hear the verdict of the
popular conscience against them, "Out of
thine own mouth art though condemned" D."