The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1860-07-31

Our readers nave prOpapIy hot.eu 'i0 eN'ioe1'
which we have several times in the last few weeks
taken from the Southern papers, announcing the
arrival at various places in Louisiana, Alabama
and Georgia of small odes of native Africans.
1t is undoubtedly the fact, that within the last
three years the number of negroes who have been
clandestinely brought into the UNITED STATES,
largely exceeds the aggregate of those who have
been introduced into the country during the
twenty or thirty preceding years. From the
time when the owner of the Wdnderer showed
how safely the State and Federal laws could be
violated, and demonstrated the compatibility of a
Georgia gentemans position with a slavetraders
occupation, persistent efforts have been made to
reopen in the South a traffic which was long ago
abandoned and denounced by all right-minded
men. That these attempts have been in any
measure successful, is a matter to be deeply re-
GREETED; but tits perhaps still more to be depored
that the journals to which we have alluded
should have commented with such complacency
upon acts which are so disgraceful in themselves,
and fraught with such dangerous consequences.
The direct importation of African slaves has been
heretofore prevented, not so much by the prohl-
billions of the law as by the force of public opin-
ion. 1t is a difficult if not an impossible thing
for the government to guard the creeks and bays
of thinly settled coast which stretches from Cape
Hatteras to the Rio del Norte. Nine times
out of ten a SLAYER which has escaped the
cruisers on the coast of Africa can land her
captives upon the shores of almost any of
the Southern States of the seaboard and what
can be done now could have been done with
equal facility at any previous period. 1t is owing
altogether to the honest disposition which the
South has steadily manifested to put an end for
ever 10 the debasing trade, that the slavers have
seldom or never until lately sought to dispose of
their cargoes in the UNITED STATES. Those who
may have been willing to engage in so disgraceful
business were we'll aware of the hostility of the
Southern people to it, and they knew that even if
they brought any considerable number of Africans
safely into the country, the hazard of detection
and punishment was far greater on land than at
sea. The dangers OF a slave voyage were over
when ship touched the shores of Cuba, but the
risks incurred by such a vessel were multiplied
and aggravated the instant she cast anchor in our
waters ANY endeavor to sell the uncouth savages
would, short time ago, have exposed the owner to
incensed at the attempt to revive trade so abhor-
rent TO the people, and as much earnestness and
alacrity for its suppression would have been dis
played at the South as in the North. 1t is to be
feared that public opinion has latterly, in the Cot
ton States at all events undergone great change,
and that the re-opening of the slave trade would
not be opposed now with the same unanmity that it
would have been ten or even five years since. The
tone in which the subject is treated by the
press and by public men in that section, rather
than any direct advocacy of such proposition
on their part, forces this conclusion upon us. If
we are not mistaken upon this point, then the
consequences of such state of things can be read
lily predicted. He need not be prophet to fore
tell the result of Il general and open liberation
of the slave trade in any of the Southern States.
When men can participate as VIGOROUSLY as La
mar did in a slave expedition, and still escape con-
viction; and when slave dealers can travel, I'M
questioned and unmoested on Southern railways
and rivers with gangs of uncivilized negroes, we
may assume that the slave trade with Africa will
be re-opened and as freely prosecuted as if it was
legalized by an act of Congress. How ruinous to
the Conederacy, and how disastrous to the South
itself, the Inauguration of such policy would
prove, it is unnecessary to point out. The Middle
States would oppose it as bitterly as those of the
extreme North. Maryland would, undoubtedly,
manifest as Incorporating hostility to the re-
vival of the slave trade as Maine and in out of
the Union, the States which regard the traffic with
such just adherence, would combine with the civ
ilized world to demand and enforce its suppress
sion. If the Southern people are true to them
selves and to the country, they will check at once,
and with spirit and determination, the miserable
adventures who, for sordid gains, are compromis-
ing their honor and their safety. If the Southern
press is wise it will refrain from recording so tr.
umphantly, occurrences which move the indigna-
ton and disgust of the vast majority of Southern
ers themselves. To defend the institution of sa-
very as it exists and always has existed among US,
is one thing but to countenance the slave trade,
directly or indirectly is totally different matter;
and we sincerely hope that those who seem dis
posed to advocate such proposition will be so
promptly repudiated in every quarter, that we may
never be called on TO discuss the measure as one
which is seriously contemplated