The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1860-12-10
BALTIMORE.
MONDAY, DECEMBER 10, 1860

ment VIII DE aWalteu WIN PAINFUL and teverlsh
anxiety. Many good men and patriots will,
doubtless cling with desperate tenacity to the hope
that something may yet be devised, at the Cap
itol, to avert the shipwreck of the Republic. Re-
luctantly, and with grief which we are unable to
express, we feel bound 10 say that we regard such
hope as idle Nothing that we have seen or heard
since the reassembling of the National Legislature
has inspired US with any confidence in its distract
ed counses. It's members seem to have brought
back to Washington, nothing but an aggravation
of the animosities and foles with which they left
it. The terrible catastrophe, towards which the
nation is hurrying, has neither elevated their
minds nor touched their hearts. Sectional and
party interests and hatred and personal ambition,
appear to have obliterated among them, almost
altogether the majestic idea of the grandest and
most glorious Republic upon which the hand of
God ever showered down privileges and blessings
In the awful presence Of its impending ruin, they
are unable, for the most part, to rise above the
dead and petty level Of cross-road wrangling and
local subserviency. Among all the Senators and
Representatives, assembled there is not a solitary
man, with voice potent enough to bid The nation
halt upon the brink of the precipice which yawns
before it. There is not one sturdy shoulder on
which the Union may lean-not an arm strong
enough to win The glory of its championship The
degeneracy Of the hour seems to have swept away
from the Halls of Congress almost every vestigc of
the large and manly patriotism which heretofore
in times Of trial, has ruled the pulses of the
great American heart With few noble and hon
orable exceptons-alas too few-the representa-
tives of the Republic, each in his way, appear
to be working all together, wilfully or blindly,
to bring it to ruin and shame. The hands that
are willing, for good, are few and powerless. The
voices that are true are lost in the din. Whether
silent and logged, or passionate and loud, the
spirit which rules is of the madness that goes be-
fore destruction. The people of the Union, who
love the Union have therefore nothing, we repeat
to hope from the action of Congress. We had as
well look the fact in the face-snce fact it is
that disunion, speedy and inevitable, is directly
before us. Nay, more-reyng upon information
which we cannot doubt-we are constrained to
add, that compromise, in the present aspect of
affairs is not only in our judgment mpracticable,
but is not even desired by those who control the
movements Of the contending extremists. We be-
heye that the Cotton States have reached the
covet no arrangement that would now redress
their grievances. We believe that the leading
anti-slavery States desire to goad the Cotton
States out of the Union, at every hazard, and will
make no compromise to keep them in it. 1t is not
worth while to inquire whether the feeling which
thus governs, upon both sides, is to be regarded
as fairly representing the deliberate Judgment
which either section would pass in calmer hour,
upon the direct issue Of national disruption 1t is
enough that the feeling which we have indicated
does in fact CONTROL and will shape the action of
both sections, now and at once. Every day seems
to make it more bitter and more confirmed We
have no alternative therefore but to treat as hope
lessly foregone the melancholy conclusion towards
which we are fastening, and wisdom, and man
hood, and self-preservation, alike command US to
grapple with the instant and fearful realities of
our position. What is to be done?
Two remarkable things have characterized the
present crisis: the one is the Indifference with
which the North and the South have both regarded
the interests and cooperation of the Middle slave
holding States the other is the still more asonish-
ing Indifference with which these States. them
selves, have allowed their destiny to be shaped for
always believed that early, vigorous and united
action on the part of the Middle slave-hodng
States, might have brought the North and the
South to terms. We advocated the election of
Mr.. BRECKENRIDGE most earnestly and to the best
otour ability, expressly and chiefly on the ground
that his choice by Maryland, as a border State,
would give her weight and influence in the coun-
sells of the South, on the side of forbearance and
moderation We took the lead in endeavoring to
impress upon our citizens and to enforce upon the
Governor the necessity of calling the Legislature
of Maryland together, in order that our State
might have some authoritative voice to speak for
her, in her own behalf as save-holiing State and
in behalf Of the rights of the South and the desti-
MES OF tho Union. Our cOunsels were denounced
rs rash and worthless-the action we advised as
precpitate and unnecessary. Public opinion, and
tue opinions of our mporaries-tardy, though
we trust not all too iate-have now turned in the
direction 10 which we would have guided them,
and we believe that the judgment of every man
among us, who has sense enough to see our dam
ger and courage enough to meet it, is on the side
OF immediate action, of some sort, the part of the
constituted authorities and people of Maryland.
the appointment of tIr. HENRY WINTER DAVIS, as
Its representative upon the Committee, ostensbly
framed by the Speaker of the House of Representa-
tives for Cancellation and compromise, makes it
more than ever due TO our self-respect, that we
should place ourselves in position, in which the
rights, the dignity and the will of our people may
asserted and maintained. We are persuaded that
the Indifference with which the central body of
slave-holding States have been treated on both
sides, has been one Of calculation. The Cotton
States, believing their interests and policy and
ours not to be identical, and yet believing that
they have our sympathies as shareholders, and
that our interests, as such, will preclude our uni
ting with the North, quite willing to leave us
to ourselves, barrier between them and the ag-
gressors who assail their institutions. The North
ern States, upon the other hand, not entirely con-
WINGED of our Southern ailiation and trusting to a
separation from the principal slave-holding States to
demoralize and eradicate slavery among us, are
satisfied that sooner or later, our future will be
united with that of the North and that we shall
De their allies in crushing out the institution
winch they so desperately and fanatically hate
Contemplated in this entirely polite point of view,
by both Sides the Middle slaveholdingS States mipht
perhaps be justfed-were the circumstances les,
solemn and perilons-in merely taking care of them
selves. Happily, their interests, not less than
their wishes and affections, all tend towards that
policy ofunion and reconciliation, upon the basis
OF justice and right which is the true policy of all
sections and about which only demagogues and
ultraists can differ
In speaking of the Middle slave-holding States,
we include North Carolina, Virginia, MARYLAND.
Kentucky and Tennessee. We have not space to
discuss their position, resources and Importance.
A glance at the map and moments reflection,
will enable any one to appreciate those things for
himself That these States are wholly and de-
cidedly with the South, upon the questions which
are brandishing disunion in our faces is not open
to doubt. They are so, not only because it is
their interest to be So and because the grievances
of the South, in that regard are their grievances
likewise, but for the higher and the nobler reason
that the South is right and the North is wrong
With secession for the sake of secession they have
no sympathy; with determined and uncompro-
missing resistance, in every shape, to unconsttu-
tional aggression and finatical insult and out
rage, they will make common cause, to the last
extremity. Bound to both sections, by ties much
closer and interests more direct than those which
have united those sections to each other hereto