Daily Nashville patriot. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1860-1862, 1861-01-01
abolished b. caussfnctIonsi bnt

slavery issues. was in the Obvious course of
things
The Constitution OF the United States was
an experiment. The experiment consisted
in uniting under one government different
peoples. living in different climates, and hav-
ing different pursuits of Industry and insti-
tutions. It matters not how carefully the
limita tons of such a government be laid
down in ihe Constituencies saccess must
at least depend upon the good faith OF the
parties to the Constitutional compact in en-
| forcing them. 1t is not in the power of hu-
| man language to exclude false inferences.
constructions and perversions in any Con-
stitution; and when vast sectional interests
! are to be suhserved, Involving the appro-
! prIation OF countless millions of money, il
has not been the usual experience of man
| kidd that words on parchment can arrest
| plwer The Constitution of the United
States. irrespective of the Interposition of
| the States, rested on the assumption that
power would yield 20 faith-that integrity
would be st.oaeer IMAM Interest; aud that
mus the limitations of the Constitution
would be observed. The experiment has
| been fairly made. The Southern States from
the commencement of the Government have
| strigen to keep it within the orbit prescribed
! by the Constitution. The experiment has
failed The whole Constitution, by the con-
structions of the Northern people, has been
| absorbed by its preamble. In their reckless
| lust for power, they seem unable to compre-
head that seeming paIadox-that the more
power is given TO The General Government
the weaker it becomes. It's strength con-
sists in the Limitation of its powers to objects
of common interest To extend the scope Of
lis power over sectional or local interests. is
TO raise up against il opposition and resis-
taBce. In all such matters, the General
Government must necessarily be a despot-
ism, because all sectional or local interests
must ever be represented by minority in
the councils of the General Government,
having 40 power to protect itself against the
rule of the majority. The majority, consti-
tuted from those who do not represent these
sectional or local interests, will control and
govern them. A free people canhot submit
to such government, And the more it en-
larges the sphere of its power, the greater
must be the dissatisfaction it must produce,
and the weaker it must become. On the
contrary, the more it abstains from usurped
powers, and the more faithfully it adberes 20
tie limitations of the Consultation, fhe
stronger 1t is made The Northern people
have had ffsitller the wisdom nor the fIth to
perceive. that to observe The limitation OF
The Constitution was the only way to its per-
p tuity.
Under such a Government, there must, of
course, be many and endless .'irrepressibie
Conflicts between the two great sections of
the Union. The same faithlessness which has
abolished the Consultation of the Uuited
States, will not fail to carry out the sectional
purposes for which IL has been abolished.
There must ke conflict; and the weaker Sec
ton OF the Union can only find peace and
liberty in an Independence of the North.
The repeated efforts made By South Carolina
ia q wise conservatism, to arrest the progress
of the General Government in its fatal pro-
gress TO consolidation. have been unsupport-
ed, aud she has been denounced as faithless
to the obligations OF the Constitution. by the
very men and States who were destroying it
by their usurpaions. 1t is now too late to
reform or restore the Government of the
United States. All confidence in the North
is lost by the South. The faithlessness of the
North for a half century has opened gulf of
separation between the North and the South
which no promises nor engagements can
fill.
1t cannot be believed that our ancestors
would have assented to any union whatever
with the people of the North ii the feelings
and opinions now existing amongst them had
existed when the Constitution was framed.
There was then no qarff--no ianaticism
concerning negroes It was Ire Delegates
from New England who proposed in the Con-
svenlion which framed the Constitution to the
Delegates from South Carolina and Georgia,
that if they would agree to give Congress the
power of regulating commerce bya majority,
that they would support the extension of the
African slave trade for twenty years. Afri-
can slavery existed in all the States but one
The idea that the Southern States would be
made to pay that tribute to their Northern
confederates, which they had refused to pay
to Great Britain; or that the institution of
African slavery would be made the grand
basis OF a sectional organization of the North
to rule the South, never crossed the magma
ton of our ancestors. The Union of the
Constitution was a union of slaveholding
States. 1t rests on slavery, by prescribing a
representation in Congress for three ffths of
oar slaves. There Is nothing in the proceed
ings OF the Convention which framed the Con-
stitution 10 show that the Southern States
would have formed any other Union; and
still less, that they would have formed
Unien with more powerful non-sIareholding
States. having a majority in both branches of
the Le5islatare of tho.l.avc-arz-ent-zzTh They
were guilty of no such folly. Time, and ..be
progress of things, have totally altered the
relations between the Northern and Southern
States since the Union was established. That
identity Of feelings. interests and institutions,
which once existed, is gone. They are now
divided, between agricultural and mannfac-
turing, and commercial States; between slave
holding aud non-slayehoiding States. Their
institutions audindustrial pursuits have made
them totally different peoples. That equali-
~ ia the Government between the two sec
tioas of the Union which once existed, no
longer exists. We but initiate the policy OF
our fathers in dissolving Union with nom
slavehOlding confederates, and seeking con-
federation with slavehoding States.
Experience has proved that slaveholding
States cannot be safe in subsection to non-
slayeholding States. Indeed, no people can
ever expect TO preserve its rights and liber-
ties, unless these be in its own custody. To