Cincinnati daily press. [volume] (Cincinnati [Ohio]) 1860-1862, 1861-10-31
British Views OF American Politics The
Gazette.

British Views OF American Politics The
Gazette.
British journals, inspired by the events |
that are transpiring upon this continent, are
discussing the nature of our Government;
and so is the Gazette. The former pronounce
popular institutions to be failure in our
hands, and draw moral from it which they
seek to apply to their own atfairs. AS British
journals are party machines, just like Ameri-
can journals, they take party--which is
always partial-view of the case; and their
deductions are consequently neither very
correct nor very valuable. They are simply
designed to answer British purpose; and
as we have not, at this moment any mission
to enlighten the world or to remove the po-
litical errors OF the rest of mankind-in con-
sequence Of having pretty heavy contract
of our own upon our hsnds-we are really
not invited to enter the arena of dispute.
The great American nation has become
little like the Holy Scriptures-pr profitable for
doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for in
struction, and for illustrations and if it is
made use of for all these purposes nay, if
the American Eagle, like some fillibustering
bird of prey caught y7agrante delicto, should
find itself incontineutly nailed against the
door of Mr.. Bulls stable, to stand as solemn
warning to all wild fowl gifted with SINH.
lar propensities, what particular right have
we to complain of the infliction?
1t is really not of much consequence just
now whether, in theory, the United States is
a nation or a confederacy; but it is fact of
some significance that, from thedag fhe Con
stitution was signed and prepared to be sub
mitted TO the States for their acceptance, up
totbe last issue Of the Cincinnati Gazette, the
question whether it was one or the other has
never been out of the field of controversy
Every politician, stump-speaker and public
writer, from General Washington down to
the last candidate for constable, has tried his
hand at it; and the fact that the oldest and
ablest journal of this city is now going ex-
tensively into the business, implies that, in
spite of all our declarations of assurance,
there are still lingering doubts, which, in the
mind of the writer, ought, if possible, to be
removed.
The Gazette falls into substantially the
same error into which the British journals
lave fallen, when it says that popular in-
stitutions are working out their destiny in
England the same as in America" 1t is to
be hoped that the Gazette means popular
ideas. Popular institutions work out no
destiny, either of their own or of the people:
it is the people who work out the destiny of
the institutions. Popular progress is always
n ade over the ruins of institutions. The
real human movement is upon path strewed
with the fragments of Babelitish edifces,
built to scale the heavens, and which their
foolish architects thought were destined to
last to eternity.
The British journals assume that the
popular freedom of the United States is in
volved in its institutions, and that the de-
struction of the one is the extinguishment of
the other; and this idea the Gazette accepts.
It is the popular one in the United States
just at present; and to urge that humanity
here is any thing else than parasite upon
body of written rules and regulations, to
nothingness, oOscurity and barbarism when
they fall, is to 90 far to earn the reputation
of q Secessionist. If however, it is true
that our freedom is dependent upon our in
stitutions, then the former, so far from being
a right, is simply en- accident. We have no
original and unalienable title to it, nor any
real capacity for its enjoyment.
The Gazette ought to have seen, what is the
plainest thing upon the face of British poll
tics, that the issue is ideas versus Institutions
and had it not been a little blinded-just like
the British journals-by its own party ext
gencies, it would undoubtedly have done So.
Taking institutions and administration
together, we have probably the poorest
weakest, least dignifed, and least efficient
Government in the world. If we we're to
judge of the value of popular freedom by
either, we should inevitably be obliged to
pronounce against it. Our Union, whatever
it may be on paper, is not an Union in fact.
We may demonstrate our theoretical nation
ality until the world will not contain the
books that are written; bat the inexorabl'
actualities will laugh at the futile logic as il
overrides its labored conclusions. A nation
is a thing which is kept together not by com
pact DOr by constitution; but by thespontane
ous cohesion of its parts. That cohesion mus
be strong enough to resist the force of loca
and fractional efforts to dissolve it and this
irrespective of defective institutions and veal
administrations.
No nation that depends upon either g
formal compact or the employment of force
for its territorial integrity will long preserve
that integrity. Compacts will be disregarded
by those who believe them to operate ad
versely to their interests or their liberties
and weak administrations are too common
70 leave it safe to rely upon Executive
power to preserve that against which there
Is any thing that resembles a persistent and