Saint Paul weekly Minnesotian. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1858-1859, 1859-10-29

The Harper's Ferry Insurrection.


The Harper's Ferry Insurrection.
In Saturdays MINNEsoTIAN, we gave at
some length the extraordinary affair at Har-
per's Ferry, in which q. fanatics, ATTEMPTED
the crazy feat of revolutionizing the govern
ment-of which fifteen have been killed, ten
mortally wounded, two are unhurt and three
have escaped. We copy few of the opin-
ions of the press, on this affair.
From the Chicago Journal. -~ .
HARPERs FERRY RIor.-It appears to have
been crazy attempt of crazy men, to over
throw the Government! Upon the persons
of the dead fanatics were found commissions |
as ''oficers of the Provisional Government"
and signed by "a. w. Brown, Commander.
in-Chief of the Provisional Government of
the U. 81!
1t appears that the instigator and prime
mover in the affair, was one "Ossawottomie
Brown" formerly of Kansas. In the troubles
in that Territory, one of his sons was murder
dered at his side by the Missouri ruffians, his
home devastated, and the accumulations of
lifetime swept away, which rendered the old
man monomaniac. He became a religious
fanatic, and believed he was especially COM
missioned from Heaven to rid the earth of
slavery. In this delusion he enlisted one of
his sons and eighteen or twenty others, as it
appears, who seized the Arsenal at Harper's
Ferry, bid defiance to the Government and
shot down indiscriminately all who opposed
them, citizens as well as soldiers.
The swift vengeance that followed by the
proper authorizes, was just and righteous
1t is only to be regretted that all the partici-
pators IN the bloody drama did not atone for
their crimes with their lives, and thus at once
rid society of such dangerous members of it.
Such insanity would be unsafe even in mad
house.
We see our neighbor of the Times in endeav
oring to sustain the failing fortunes of the
Democracy, by seeking to turn this affair to
political account. When We find any party
upholding it, we will join it in its condemna-
ton. Whenever our neighbOr shall learn Of
any political organization advocating the right
to interfere with slaves OF slavery where they
lawfully exist, it will find the Republican par
ty arrayed against it.
| We shal. be as ready to dcnounce such Or
ganizations as we do now the acts of those
whom the border rufiian Democracy have ,'e-
prived of their reason, by the devastating of
their homes and numbering of their children.
From the Chicago Press and Tribune.
WHERE THE RESPONSIBILITY BELONGs.-
The attempt of the Chicago Times to place
the responsibility of the Harper's Ferry affair
upon the Republican party, is resort to the
rogue's trick of crying "stop thief, stop thief"
for the purpose of diverting attention from the
really guilty party.
Holding to the doctrines of the Revolution
ary fathers and the earlier statesman of this
country on the subject Of slavery-that it is a
MORAL, SOCIAL and POLITICAL EVIL; that it is
a creature of LOCAL LAW, to be controlled ex-
clusively by the States in which it exists, and
that its area ought NOT to be EXTENDED, or its
accompanying evils be fastened upon our new
frontier communities-the REPUBLICAN party
DEPRECATEs, no less than those worthie
would have done, everything looking towards
VIOLENT measures for the enfranchisement O
the slaves of the South
Its opposition to slavery is based upor
MORAL and ECONOMIC considerations, and tht
only action it proposes or that it would coun
tenance, with respect to the institution, is t.
confne it to its present limits, leaving thu
problem of "what will they do with ?" tt
the solution of the people of the slaveholdin:
States.
The DEMOCRATIC party, however, propose
to increase the chances for insurrcction, blood
shed and all the horrors of servile war, by ex
tending the area of slavery indefinitely and b.
; re-opening the African slave trade. 1t woult
have the bloody scenes Of Harper's Ferry re
+; enacted in the new States to be carved out o
our territories, and it would transmit to gen
:, eratons yet unborn the ur.speakable drea,
arising from constant exposure to midnigh
carnage and the accompanying nameless hol
rors of insurrection.
As respects the attempt of an insane oil
man and his handful of confcderates to eXcit
a negro insurrectionin Virginia and Maryland
it is easy to determine where the responsibit
= really belongs.
= The act is but part of the legitimate fru
y of the repeal Of the Missouri Comhromise
In another part of this paper, in sketc
of the life of the leader of the attempted insu
u rection, will be found statement of some
!" the wrongs heaped upon old Brown by ii
minions of that power at whose command al
for whose benefit the compromise was broke
down-wrongs which entered his soul az
," made him what he is-a MoNoMANIAC vi
y believes himself to be God-appointed age
IL to set the enSlaved free.
III Upon the heads of those who repealed til
y ccmprolnise and who sanctioned the lawie
violence ard bloodshed which grew out OF
on the plains of Kansas, rests the blood
rk those who fell at Ilarper's Ferry.
a Through chain Of events, the one inser
e. rably connected with the other, the last-nam
no tragedy goes back to the first-named violati
is. of plighted faith as its cause, including amo
OH the intermediate steps series of outrae
and wrongs which, taken together, make
A.. bJ.ol,oet ,,ooo of ,,r National history