The national Republican., 1861-03-23
DANGEROUS SCHEME.

'hS 'Oho"'"b 'io'ii buO
Wbg:
thorough examination, the Convention will
indicate by resolutions the constitutional
amendments and guarantees which, in the
judgment Of Virginia, are necessary for the
security Of her rights and institutions. When
these are agreed on, she will invite con.
ference Of the non.seceded slave States, at
Frankfort or Nashville, to consider our pro.
positions, and to make common cause with her.
She will not offer her propositions as an uhi.
mdtum, but merely as her contribution to the
general stock Of suggestions on the subject.
Some Of her wisest and most patriotic citizens
will be sent by the Convention to this con.
ference, and her propositions will there be con.
sidered, and, it may be, modified in some re.
spects-though not in any essential particulars.
When harmony and concurrence shall have
been secured among the border States, the
propositions, as agreed on by them, will be
submitted as an ultimdfum to the Northern
States. This ultindtun,, we feel assured, will
embrace no unreasonable features-nothing
which is not in strict conformity with the prin.
ciples of the Constitution, us understood and
acted on by the fathers of the Republic. lfit
should be accepted by the North, the Union
will be preserved and harmony restored. If,
vi OtHtT HhHu, IL Dc TtJcCtcut tutH tue
border States will, in a body, withdraw from
the Union, and unite with such States. both
slaveholding and non.slaveholding, as may be
willing to adopt them. In the event of rejec.
ton, we believe that New York, New Jersey,
Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, will
unite with the border States. The result may
be to throw off the New England States and
the extreme Northwestern States. The Gulf
States will soon find it to their interest 10 re-
unite themselves to this conservative Confedera-
cy, and ultimately the exscinded Northern
States, having learned q lesson Of wisdom and
humility, will knock at our doors for readmis.
sion into the family mansion.
To carry out this programme, it will be
necessary for the Convention to have an ad-
journed session at some remote day-say in
October. In the mean time, the other States
will have acted on the ultimatum submitted by
the border Conference, and when the Conven.
tion comes together in adjourned session, it will
take such final action as circumstances may
require.
This line of policy will, we feel assured,
meet the appreciation of Virginia. The con.
servatives proper approve it, and the wiser and
more considerate OF those who are not regarded
as altogether conservative-such as ex-Presi-
dent Tyler and Governor Wise-have favored
something very nearly akin to it."
We have so little confidence in the good
sense of many Union men at the South, that
we know it is not safe to argue that they intend
disunion, even when they adopt measures look
ing directly to it. The Southern opposition to
the Democratic party, have been so long cowed
down, so long accustomed to tremble at the
snap of the slave whip, and so thoroughly
trained to second every ridiculous pretension
made in behalf Of slavery by the Democratic
leaders, that it will take them some time yet,
to learn to act upon any sound and independent
judgment of their own.
1t is undoubtedly safer course for the cause
of the Union, that the Convention now sitting
at Richmond should pass an ordinance Of
secession, which must 60 to the people, and
which would be voted down by them, than that
this scheme of the Richmond Wing should pre-.
vail. Itsdirect tendency is to commit the Dor.
der States to impracticable ulGmatums, and
thus render possible, that secession of Virginia
which is impossible without some such device
The men in Virginia, who are really in favor
Of the Union, ought to see, that they can dc
nothing more directly calculated to overthrow
it, than to endorse the Democratic position that
the institution of slavery is not safe in the
Union, without guarantees which everybody
knows cannot be obtained for it.
The Union men in Congress from the South
enacted that same folly last winter, in commit.
ting themselves to the propositions of Mr.. Crit
tenden.
And if we may judge from the Richmond
Wig, too many of them in Virginia, untaught
by experience, intend to repeat it again.
We notice that Mr.. Carlisle opposes this Dor
der State Hartford Convention, which is goot
sign.
If the alternative is really such Conven
ton, or an ordinance of secession, let us have
the latter by all means. Secession can be
easier killed now in its naked deformity, thar
when cloaked under specious border. State
ultimatum, such as is foreshadowed by the
Richmond Wing.
Ray. The Baltimore american of yesterday
says:
"Over one hundred recruits for the regua
army of the Confederate States left here in tn,
| Norfolk boat yesterday, en- route for Charleston
South Carolina. Some few of the party ar,
young men of respectable connections, who
have been bitten by desire for military glory
but the majority of the detachment is made W
Of the worst class OF our population. If th,
Coniederacy can put them to any seryceabl,
purpose, it will achieve what society has failed
to accomplish here"
De1" A recent number of the Richmond
Wing, has the following paragraph:
ave understand that Myers W. Fisher, Esq.
secession member OF the Convention, from
Northampton, deliberately proposed to the