The weekly Anglo-African., 1859-11-19
BREAKING INTO A STATE.

Burglary is common, but State breaking
is a new species of crime ; and in the case
to which we shall make reference some
have been bold enough to term it a virtue.
Men generally build, bolt and bar their
houses so strongly that access is had with
great difficulty and it is only in extreme
cases, or by the most expert operators, that
it is at all accomplished. But the business
of State breaking, it seems, is less difficult,
though we fear far more hazardous
John Brown, with twenty-one other men,
few days ago threw himself against the
State of Virginia, and in less time than it
has taken to record the fact, the partition
gave way, and he had and held possession
Of the Ancient Dominion and the terror
stricken chivalry, chattels and all, and
might have continued possession but for
the interference of Uncle Sans troops.
But the idea of State breaking for the
purpose of winning what might be won, is,
considering the hazard, novel indeed, The
burglar breaks into your house that he may
despoil you of your goods but if we were
asked why John Brown broke into Vir-
ginia we would answer that it was to bring
stolen goods out Of the State goods and
chattels that had been stolen and pent up
there for past centuries. Surprising as it
may seem, it is, nevertheless, true.
Here in the North we spend annually
thousands Of dollars in catching and pun
ishing thieves and robbers and preventing
theft and robbery, but John Brown and his
few surviving followers, on the other hand,
are to forfeit their lives for simply endeav-
oring to obtain and restore stolen chattels
to their proper owners-to restore the slave
to himself.
What right has Virginia to protect theft
and punish with death him who, from hon.
est conviction, attempts to do just what ev-
cry law of right, humanity and true relig-
ion prompted him to do? What is done
with every other species Of interest? But
it may be claimed that the law stands in
the way of all such attempts. What right
has Virginia to legalize theft in the bodies
and souls of men?
1t was a mercy to the property holders
that the stolen goods-the chattels-did
not tumble out of the State through the
breach made by Brown; and as one step
makes way for another, it may occur to the
chattel some day to make breach for it.
self With an eye to this possibility, and
to the future John Browns who may take
it into their heads to again break into the
State of Presidents, or some other of her
sister States, it is now proposed that the
whole South wheel out Of the Union, and
build strong barrier against future in
roads, and set up for itself. Out of what
materials this barrier is to be erected, does
not appear.
Whatever may have been the mistakes
Of the South on the subject Of Slavery, and
the sentiments of the North upon it, we
scarcely think it will be guilty and blind
enough to add the fatal error of disunion
to the already fearful list, or accept from
their Northern toadies advice leading to
that end
For a State like Virginia, whose par
tition gives way at the slightest touch of
the arm of an aged man, whose inhabitants
become frantic before the face of twenty
two men, whose military find it impossible
to collect their scattered senses sufficiently
to make even semblance of resistance,
whose authorities loose all dignity, and
the sleep of whose inhabitants has been
murdered-to talk of wheeling out of the
Union, is one of the thinnest and meanest
scarecrows ever set up before the eyes of
sensible men.