Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1860-03-08


mln is more able to help the laboring SIDE.
You see, Sir, that whether We go for or
against slavery anywhere, We must follow
Southern guides. You may change your pilots
with the winds or the currents; but we, whose
nativity, reokoned under the North Star, has
rendered us somewhat superstitious, must be
excused for ccnstancy in following the guidance
OF those who framed the national ship, and gave
US the chart for it's noble voyage.
A profound respect and friendly regard for
the Vice President Of the United States has in
duced me to weigh carefully the testimony he
has given on the subject Of the hostility against
the South imputed to the Republican party AZ
derived from the relations of the representatives
OF the two parties at this capital Hesays that
he has seen here, in the representatives OF the
lower Southern States most rcsolute and ear
nest spirit of resistance to the Republican par
ty that he perceves a sensible loss of that spir
it of brotherhood and that feeling Of loyalty,
together with that love for IL common country,
which are at last the surest cement of tile
Union so that, in the present unhappy condi-
ton OF affairs, he IS almos5 tempted to exclalm,
that we are dlssolving week by week and month
by month that the threads are gradually fret
ting themselves asunder and stranger might
suppose that the Executive of the United States
was the President of the two hostile republics
1t is not for me to raise doubt upon the cor
RICHNESS of this dark picture, 80 far as the South
ern groups upon the canvas are concerned, but
l must be INDUCED in the opinion that can
pronounce as accurately concerning the North
ern or Republican representatives here as any
one. know their public haunts and their
private ways. We are not hostile republic,
or representatives OF one. We confer together,
but only as the organs Of every party do and
must do in political system which obliges US
to act sometimes as partisans, while it requires
us always to be patriots and statesmen. Diff
ferences of opinion, even on the subject of slave
ry, with us are political, not social or personal
differences. There is not one disunionist or dis
loyalist among us ALL We are altogether I'M
conscious of any process of dissolution going on
among us OF around us. We have never been
more patient, and never loved the representa-
tives of other sections more than now. We
hear the same testimony for the people around
us here, who, though in the very centre where
the bolt of disunion must fall first and be most
fearful in its effects, seem never less disturbed
than now. We bear the same testimony for all
the districts and States we represent. The peo-
pie of the North are not enemies, but friends
and brethren of the South, faithful and true as
in the days when death has dealt his arrows
promiscuously among them on common battle
fields of freedom.
We will not suffer ourselves here to dwell on
any evidences of different temper in the
South but we shall be content with expressing
our belief that hostility that is not designedly
provoked, and that cannot provoke retaliation,
is an anomaly that must be traced to casual ex-
elements, which cannot perpetuate alienation.
A canvas for presidential election, in some
respects more important, perhaps, than any
since 1900 has recently begun. The House of
Rep esentatives was to be organized by ma
jority while no party could cast more than a
plurality Of votes. The gloom Of the late trag
edy in Virginia rested on the Capitol from the
day when Congress assembled While the two
great political parties were peacefully, lawfully
and constitutiOnally. though zealOusly, conduct
ing the great national issue between free labor
and capital labor for the Territories to its prop
er solu ton, through the trials of the ballot op
Grating directly or indirectly on the various de-
paItmentS OF the Government, band OF ex-
ceptional men. cOntemptuous equally of that
great QUESTION and OF the parties to the cOntrO-
versy. and impatient Of the constitutional sys-
TEN which confines the citizens of every State
to political action by suffrage in organized par
ties within their own borders, inspired by an
enthusiasm peculiar to themselves, and exas-
perated by grievances and wrongs that some of
them had suffered by inrOAds OF armed propa
gandists of slavery in Kansas, unlawful Us
their own retaliation was, at empted to subvert
slavery in Virginia by conspiracy, ambush. in
vasion, and force. The method We have adopt
ed, of appealing 10 the reason and judgment of
the people, to be pronounced by suffrage, isthe
only one by which free government can be main
tanned anywhere, and the only one us yet de-
vised which is in harmony with the Christian
religion. While generous and charitable ma
lures will probably cOncede that John Brown
and his associates acted on earnest though IA
tally erroneous convictions, yet oil good citi-
Gems will nevertheless agree that this attempt to
execute an unlawful purpose in Virginia by in
vasion, involving servlle war, was an act OF Sc
dition and treason, and criminal in just the ex-
tent that it affected the public peace, and was
destructive Of human happiness and human
life.
1t is painful reflection that, after so long
an experience of tho bene6cent working OF our
system as we have enjoyed, we have these new
illustrations in Kansas and Virginia OF the ex-
istence among US of class of men so misguid-
ed and desperate as to seek to enforce their Pc
culior principles by the sword. drawing after it
a need of the furthe: use, by their punishment,
of that great moral truth, especially applicable
in republic, that they who take up the sword
as weapon of controversy shall perish by the
sword. In the latter case, the lamented deaths
of so many citizens, slain from an ambush and
BY surprise-all the more lamentable because
they were innocent victims of frenzy kindled
without their agency, in far distant 6res-the
deaths even of the offenders themselves, pitia-