The weekly pioneer and Democrat. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1855-1865, 1860-11-09
THE QUESTION OF DISUNION.
VIII tho South Secede 3.-.Views OF
Fire.eaters- - Reasonable Secret Cir.
culars.

The Charleston Mercury bitterly laments
the apathy Of the South for lending no en-
couragement to newspaper enterprise. It
draws in this matter, as it might draw in
others, q strong contrast between the energy
and activity displayed ct the North and the
sluggishness manifested at the South, and
complains that even a journal conducted
with such marked ability as the Mercury
finds few supporters. We might explain
this by the absence Of that great middle
class which cannot exist in country where
the population is divided into lords of the
soil and serfs !; for it is this same middle
class which gives the most valuable support
to Northern journals. Without such q
class it would be impossible for one of our
newspapers to live at the price at which it
is published. But we let the Mercury give
utterance to its own over-truthful remarks
upon subject so suggestive:
How is it with Southern Presses, faithful
TO the rights and institutions of the South :?
Take the Charleston Mercury, which, for
thirty-fve years, has been a prominent
press in the SOuth-what has been the fate
Of its editors? The first ruined, the second
barely earned a narrow subsistence, the third
injured, but sold out in time, the fourth died
a ruined man. The fifth is our humble
selves, of whom We will say nothing. What
paper at the North has brought to the pub
lie understanding, more ability. eloquence
or fidelity, than the Charleston Mercuru
1--WE speak not of ourselves)? There have
been brains and labor enough in it to have
amassed dozen fortunes. Yet how meagre
has been the patronage conferred upon it.,
compared with its Northern contemporaries?
How many tens of thousands of dollars due
to it have been lost, uncollectable and un-
paid? How many tens of thousands OF
dollars are now due to it-and chiefly by the
very men-the planters-the shareholders of
the South-whose property and institutions
whose liberties and lives it has labored to
protect? If its principles and policy were
for sale tomorrow, in Wall street, in New
York, it could with ease realize hundred
thousand dollars. We know what we say.
Elwood Fisher sunk a fortune of forty
thousand dollars in the contest of l850-52,
by his press in Washington, in the perilous
enterprise of defending the rights and insti.
buttons of the South. Are the defenders of
the South by the public press, in the great
er contest of 1860, to be Elwood Fishers?
Let the shareholders of the South initiate,
at least, the enlightened sel6shness of the
people OF the North, and support, with a
becoming energy, those presses which are
faithful to their interests and institutions.
The public press is said to be the fourth es-
tate in England. In this country it is the
sole estate. Kings, Lords and Commons,
we have none; for no man in the South re-
cognizes in Congress, or in the Executive
Administration at Washington, soon to pass
into the hsnds of our enemies, any power
for good to the South. Our cause is naked
for support, at Washington or in the North;
but we have the press, and that may be all
potent for our defence. 1t can inform and
counsel our people, arouse resistance to our
fierce enemies, and bring to the South de.
liverance and safety.
Our readers, we trust, will pardon the
disagreeable truths contained in this article,
but we live in times when ignorance and
error may be ruin, and truth salvation.
A sECEss1oN1sT SPEAKS.
In the course of an address delivered at
Anderson, (South Carolina,) on the 10th,
Gen. s. MCGOWAN, of Abbeville, remarked:
"That African slavery is peculiar insti-
tuition. The world does not understand it
their sentiment is against it. and it cannot
live in any government which is inimical to
it. Slavery must be governed by slave
holders, or at least by government in
which shareholders have protective voice.
He took for granted that we are resolved to
maintain the institution at any and all
hazards.
Mr.. Seward was egregiously mistaken,
when he lately declared that we would soon
give it up peaceably. Let the fanatics Of
the world rave and rant as they may, we
have settled this question for ourselves.
We declare in the face of the world, that
this institution is our concern, and so help
US God we mean to maintain it !! Taking
this for granted, it follows that this is no
government for shareholders, when the ad.
ministration of that which should be CON-
mon government has passed permanently
into the hands of that geographical section,
which is animated by an Internal hatred of
the institution. Ill
1t has been said that the election of Mr..
Lincoln will be constitutional and there.
fore, there is no cause of alarm. He denied
it. He said it would not be constitutional
in any just sense. 1t is true that the out
rageiwould be perpetrated under the forms
of the Constitution; but it will not be the
first time in the history of the world when
oppression, in order to accomplish its pur-
pose, has put on constitutional forms. If
they can elect a President constitutionally
now, they may do it four years hence, and
eight years hence, and so on for all time to
come. In this way the government will
have passed under the exclusive control of
a geographical fanatical party, and the
South be literally disfranchised in their own
government. Can this perversion of the
constitution be justly claimed as constitu.
tiOnal? 1t would be the grossest TYRANNY
under the lifeless form of freedom. he de-
clared that in that case, we would be taxed
and governed, and goaded by government
in which we would, practically and in effect,
have no voice. 1t would be another exem-
pli6cation of the old principle of taxation
without representation in opposition to
which our forefathers incurred all the dread
hazards of the revolution, and waged a
DO e.,