The weekly Ottumwa courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1857-1872, 1861-07-24
= >. oTrUMWA, IOWA, WEDNESDAY JULY "a, 1861

cession; that was to inaugurate for us gold
en- age. Attempted only, it has destroyed
credit, paralyzed commerce, blocked up your
rivers and railroads, burned your bridges,
driven your peaceful and INDUSTRIOUS popu-
lation into exile, distracted and poisoned So
ciety, perturbed and distressed it with ru.
mors and alarms. II is this that is sending
armies through your territories, and is threat.
ening to make your rich lands battlefield,
and to swallow up your riches and honor,
and prosperity and purity Of manners with
the strength of your youth, in the gulf of
civil war. Look at it narrowly; mark Il
well, that you may know it forever.
This is Secession. Does it keep its word
Of promise to the ear even, This is Seces-
sion, with which our fast young men and
misses were wont to coquette, with Haunting
ofcockades and colors, and bravery Of gossip
and small talk. You can now see what it
was they toyed with. How is the pet, sleek
kitten, a full grown tiger. Here is the pref.
ty egg, Matched to the basilisk. Here, in
this common disaster of every interest is
its Interpretation. Let us not mistake it.
Without Secession these things would not
have been. All would have been reversed.
Every interest aside from this looked to a
most golden prosperity. Had the people
continued loyal to the Constitution and the
Laws, these calamities could not have hap
pened. n
"But we might haye let the Seeded States
go IN peace. They only asked to be let alone.'
Go IN peace 2 They inaugHra.ed war! Seiz-
ing our forts and custom-houses was war
RobbinS our treasures. mints and arsenals
was war. FIRING on our unar,ned vessels
was war. The seige and bombardment of
our gsrrisons was war. 1t takes two to keep
the peace. Could we have kept the peace
in parting, or after parting, with men doing
such things who had betrayed the holiest
trusts, the most honored and sacred offices,
in order to para,yze, plunder and disorganize
the Government on whose favors they were
feeding and who were unscrupulously waging
upon US the acts of the meancst, most treach-
erous aad cruel war war harrying with
forced loans, coniiscation, conscription, exile,
mob violence and military execution. loyal
citizens among them? Could we hope for
peace with such neighbors?
Beside, did the Government owe nothing
to the loyal citizens 1t was bound to protect
Above all, could it have admitted such an
assertion of the right Of Secession without
suicide To do so were to renounce its ex-
istence as a Government. It's act could, af
terward, bind nobody. Any State could with
draw from its authority at pleasure. Such a
Government could not make treaties, borrow
money, regulate commerce, or, in short,
make binding laws or perform any of the
proper functions Of government. To let
them alone, in the violent and triumphant
assertion ofthe right to secede, was simply
to let them alone in destroying us.
Let us stop, then, the miserable cant apd
drivel of the Government masking the uar--
1t made the war as the traveller, holding his
purse from the highwayman, makes the
quarrel Treason, rebellion, robbery, fraud,
falsehood, and insolent, unprovoked attacks
with cannonade and thousands ofarmed men,
ON peaceful and trusting Government, made
the war. And al these are hu' the venom
Gus brood hatchcd from that yiper's egg
Secession This was their "going in peace ?
Could the Government abandon the duty Of
protecting its own existence |? Could it have
answered at the bar of God or History, or OF
the millions entrusted to it, for such an aban-
donment Where would the verdict Of
History have ranked men who could have
surrendered such Government without
striking blow
A good government is Heavens rarest gift
to man-one latest gained, and, if lost, slow
est to return one not capable Of being rep
resented or valued by treasure, or even by
blood. A government like ours. were cheaply
purchased by the national debt of England
or the lives of a million of men. Imagina
ton, aided by History and Philosophy, car
hardly portray the benefits of its perpetuity
or the disasters Of its fall. The question o
its life, is that ola continent and Of centuries
Of the destinies of the vast millions that il
our magnificent territorial theatre shall here
after behold the sun. What name, darkes
in the catalogue Of portentous and unnatura
crime, could we apply to the act Of those t.
whom such a government was committed
and who. in disregard Of the hottest trus
and most solemn oaths, could. without tn,
most agonizing effort, surrender it up to con
spirators that sought its life? Could tn
world. or yourselves, or God have forgiven
! them Let US stop then the fatuous twaddl
about ''LINcoN's war; LINCOLN did not max
the war. Nor is the war his. Nor is it waget
j in his behalf more than in yours or mine. O
that of every American citizen. The ques
ton is not now Of the policy or platform o
the party that raised him to Office, but O
the very life of the Government-the life q
your Government and my Government TIL
vital principle--the right Of constitutions
majorities to rule and the supremacy of tn
Constitution and the laws-is assaled. IF Sc
cession can beat that down, we have no prin
ciple Of order left. We have nothing befor
us but anarchy, ending in military despotism
Shall we, from ogr dislke Of the pilot. allo,