Arkansas true Democrat., 1861-05-16

and shipping classes ol .ilo N"i'n " expense of the South, there has existed l for nearly halfa century another sunlect of 1 discord. involving interests of such trans cendent magnitude, as at all times to create the apprehension in the mndS of many devoted lovers of the Umon, that its permanence was impossible.
 When the several States delegated cer- tain powers to the United States Congress, large portion of the laboring population consisted of African slaves imported into the colonies by the mother country. in twelve, out of thirteen States, negro slavery existed, and the right of property in slaves was protected by law This property was recognized in the constitution, and pro- vision was made against its loss by the escape of the slvae. The increase Tn the number of slaves by further importation from Africa was also secured by a clause forbidding Congress to prohibit the slave trade anterior to certain date; and ln no clause can there be found any delegation of power to the Congress authorizing 1t in any manner to legislate to the prejudice, detriment or Encouragement ot the owners of that species of property, or excluding 1t from the protection of the government.
 The climate and soil of the northern States soon proved unpropitious to the continuance of slave labor, while the con- verse was the case at the South. Under the unrestricted free intercourse between 1 the two sections, the northern States con suited their own interest by selling their slaves to the South, and prohibiting .sa- very within their limits The South were willing purchasers of property suitable to their wants, and paid the price of the acquisition without harboring suspicion that their quiet possession was to be dlS- turbed by those who were inhibited, not only by want of constitutional authority, bnt by good faith as vendors, from disquiet- ing title emanating from themselves.
 As soon, however, as the northern States that prohibited African slavery within their limits had reached number sufficient give to their representatives controlling voice in the Congress, persistent and organized system of hostile measures against the rights of the owners of slaves in the south ern States was inaugurated, and gradually extended. A continuous series of measures was devised and prosecuted for the purpose of rendering insecure the tenure of proper tv in slaves: fanatical organizations, sup piled with money by voluntary subscrip- tions, were assiduously engaged in exciting amongst the slaves spirit of discontent and revolt; means were furnished for thelr escape from their owners. and agents secret lv employed to entice them to abscond; the constitutional provision for their rendition to their owners was first envaded, then open lg denounced as a violation of conscientious obligation and religious duty: men were taught that it was merit to elude, disobey, and violently oppose the execution Of the laws enacted to secure the performance of the promise contained in the constitutional compact: owners of slaves were mObbed and even murdered in open day, solely for applying to a magistrate for the arrest of a fugitive slave; the dogmas of these voun- tarv organizations soon obtained control of the legislatures of many of the northern l States and laws were passed providing for the punishment by ruinous fines and long continued imprisonment in iails and peni- | tentiares, ofcitizens of the southern States, who should dare to ask aid of the officers of the law for the recovery of their proper | ty. Emboldened by success, the theater of l agitation and aggression against the clear | ly expressed constitutional rights of the southern States was transferred to the Congress; Senators and Representatives were sent to the common councils of the nation, whose chief title to this distinction consisted in the display of a spirit of ultra | fanaticism, and whose business was, not C to promote the general welfare or insure domestic tranquility" but to awaken the l bittcrest hatred against the citizens of sister States by violent denunc;ation of public affairs, was impeded by repeated efforts to usurp powers not delegated by the consti- tuition. for the purpose of imparing the security of property in slaves, and reducing those States which held slaves to a condi ton of inferiority. Finally, great party was organized for the purpose of obtaining the administration of the government, with the avowed object of using it's power for the total exclusion of the slave States from all participation in the benefit of the public lomain, acquired by all the States in com mon, whether by conquest or purchase; of surrounding them entirely by States in which slavery should be prohibited of thus rendering the property in slaves so insecure as to be comparatively worthless, and there by annihilating in effect property worth thousands of millions of dollars. This party, thus organized, succeeded in the month of November last, in the election of its candidate for the Presidency of the United States.
 In the meantime, under the mild and ge nial climate of the southern states and the increasing care and attention for the we'll being and comfort of the laboring class, dictated alike by interest ani humanity, the African slaves had augmented in mum Der from about COG, ,000 at the date of the adoption of the constitutional compact, to upward of 1 900, 900. In moral and social condition they had been elevated from bru- tai savages into docile, intelligent and civil ized agricultural laborers, and supplied not only with bodily comforts, but with care ful religious instruction. Under the super vision of q superior race, their labor had been so directed as not only to allow gra- dual and marked amelioratiOn of their own condition, but to convert hundreds of thou- | sands of square miles of the Wilderness into cultivated lands, covered with pros porous people; towns and cities had sprung into existence, and had rapidly increased in wealth and population under the social system of the South; the white population of the southern States had augmented from about ,250, GOO at the date of the adop- tion of the constitution, to more than $500, 900 in 1860; and the productions of the South in cotton, rice, sugar and to- bacco, for the full development and con tinuance of which the labor of African slaves was, and is, indispensable, had swol- len to an amount which formed nearly three fourths of the exports of the whole United States, and had become absolutely necessa- rv to the wants of civilized man.
 With interests of such overwhelming magnitude imperiled, the people of the southern States were driven by the conduct