The weekly north Iowa times. [volume] (McGregor, Iowa) 1857-1867, 1860-12-19
The Right Spirit.

The Right Spirit.
Rev. Samuel Prime, well known author
and clergyman, preached Thanksgiving
sermon in New York city, which is model
of patriotism. We give few extracts:
If the people of any one Of the covenant
ing States, by their municipal laws, nullify
or evade the provisions of the Constitution,
they show their want of that integrity which
is vital to the capacity of free people to
govern themselves. 1t is political corrup-
ton, and that is moral dishonesty. 1t is a
breach of covenant before God and man.
The legislators who devise, and frame, and
enact laws to set aside the requirements OF
the Federal Constitution, are prostituting
their souls on the altar of faction, and
breaking in pieces the bonds of this heav-
en-born Union. They may be men of the
North, who hate slavery, and because they
hate it are determined to nullify the pro
visions of the Constitution, the laws of the
United States, and the decisions of the Su.
premc Court; but they have not the virtue
to stand by a bargain they have made, and
are unfit to be the guardians of the public
liberty. They may be men of the South
who love slavery, and for the sake Of pre-
serving and extending it arc willing to break
the bonds of the Union, trample on the
Constitutional compact by which the Gov.
erment was established, and, by revolution
and secession, rend it into fragments the
''goodly heritage our fathers left us.
Integrity, national, public, political integ
rity, is what we want. Is there virtue
enorgh in the men Of the North and the
of fhn Snnth fn to,, thn c,,r,k <
the Constitution Of the United States?-
That is the question now to be answered.
If it be replied that all will stand by the
Constitution as they understand it, | re-
mark again, that the Constitution provides
its own expounder, and submission to the
Interpretation given to the Constitution by
the Supreme Court is rs essential to our ma
tional integrity as submission to the letter
of tbs instrument itself To this very pur.
pose great central tribunal was constitut.
ed to which Interstate disputes might be
carried and finally adjudicated, and by this
last resort putting at res: all questions o!
controversy, for better or worse, for right
or wrong, but still to be submitted to, and
patiently borne, as a part of the price OF
liberty.
The intenscSt abolitionist and the strong
secessionist, those two extremists who have
at last joined parricidal hands in the work
of destroying the Union, have neither of
them any ground for saying that this gov
ernment has not yielded far more Of the
fruits of liberty, prosperity and happiness,
than it promised in its infancy, and that it
con(ers on it's citizens the greatest amount
ofpesitive good with the least amount of evil,
of any government in the world.
Such government no man has moral
right to disturb. With the motives of the
man have nothing to do, but however sin-
cere he may he in his convictions of duty,
he takes upon himself the peril of destroy
ing the government that God gave to this
people, his last and best work for the ma
tons. The ruin once accomplished, there is
no remedy, no hope The voice of ma
tons blood shall cry from the ground
against the destroyers of their country, and
their names shall live in the tears and exc
crations Of the friends of freedom in all the
ages Of the future fruitless longings for some
other sun like this to rise on the hopes Of
an oppressed and helpless world"
There is much more of the same character
in the sermon, which for want of space we
are compelled to omit The extracts given,
however, will serve as specimen chips, and
we commend them to the careful inspection
Of the Profession of which he is not the
least humble member.