The weekly Mississippian. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1859-1864, 1860-02-22

abuses, and to resist the enforcement Of jus
tice, and not against the weakest classes and
interests in the Stats-the poor-the bersft-
the minister Of religion, and religious objects
in general.
We have seen in our time, powerful cor
poraton regulating prices in two hemispheres,
expanding and depressing the great commodi-
ties Of nations, depreciating the currency, de-
stroying State securities, controlling the cleo
tons, aspiring to rule the government, and
insolently defying public opinion and the laws
We have seen the laws publicly ignored by
individuals and associations, and the preroga-
tves of justice assumed with IMMUNITY. We
have seen corporations violating their char
ters, plumber the public, their members exult-
ing and rampant over their ill-got riches
and their victims plunged in poverty without
redress. We have seen the splendid bankrupt
q in his pride Of place" the evidence of his
wealth and the record OF his perjury alike
unnoticed We note, on all sides, and every
day, distinguished examples Of evasion or
non-enforcement Of your statutes. Reversing
the noble Roman maxim, spare the humble
and reduce the proud" this great common
wealth searches for its victims not in the tenn
pies of the money changers and in the dens Of
iniquity, but in the asylums for the helpless,
and in the pulpits of the living God Itgives
an indirect license to the audacious and pow
erful, but proscribes the preacher who aSpires
to no political influence, and the sister Of
charity, who devotes her life to the sick and
the needy. It.depriyes the death bed of its
consolation, and disregards what even barbara
ans hold in reverence, the last dispositions Of
the dead
If these obnoxious provisions of our code.
are based on the obsolete prejudices against
Mortmains, they stand on superstructure Of
| shadows. The monasteries of the middle
ages were often the recipients of large dona-
tons, and were, PROFESSIONALLY, the source
of some evils. But they were, at the same
time, the retreat of learning and the refuge of
the oppressed. They interposed almost the
only barrier between the peasant and the
noble, afforded sanctuary for the prosecuted,
and shed the benifcent light Of christianity
over that age of ignorance and crime. They
clothed and fed the naked and hungry they
administered to the sick; they employed the
divine sacraments as we employ them now,
and they preached moderation and mercy
when men battered blood for gold.
Even in England where the evils Of mort
main were most complained, of and where
public opinion and the laws are slow to change,
the statutes on this subject have been greatly
modified. Under our institutions, where the
ruling principle of society is freedom of trade,
free and untrammeled exchange and disposi-
ton of property, mortmains need not be
dreaded and legislation founded on such pleas
must be deduced from very circumscribed
and incredulous view of our conservative sys-
TEN of checks and balances.
Let US hope, then, that discarding the ap'
prehensions of cobwebbed centuries, these por
tons of our code, SO foreign to young, gen
erous and enlightened commonwealth, may bt
repealed.