The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1861-07-19


If those 'Union men, who are honestly what
they call themselves have not had their ewes
opened by the recent course of the Executive and
Congress- it is because the seal npon their eyelids
Is thousand-told more death-like than the sleep
OF the Seven Sleepers. Any man, acting in good
faith, who can now really believe that it is the
desire or purpose of the Government to "recou-
"struct the Union,' ''enforce the laws" and do
nothing more, must be beyond the power Of both
reason and medicine. He is candidate for the
Hospital of lncurables, and is entitled TO his en-
trance without further proof of qualification
When Mr.. LINCOLN called out seventy-fye thou-
sand men, and protested publicly and privately.
that they were intended for t'the defence of the
capital alone, and for no purpose of invasion
or subJugation or even coercion, we can under
stand how some persons were facie enough to
believe him, although we could do nothing of the
sort ourselves. When he suspended the habeas
corpus act-established military rule-plundered
the telegraph offces-ncreased the army-ey-
panded the navy-spent money at the rate of n
million day, without appropriation by Congress
in fne assumed absolute and dctatorial power-
we were willing TO recognize the existence of some
mysterious intellectual and moral process, by
which persons, otherwise sane, arrived at the
conclusion that he patriotic in doing all these
things, and was urged on by the paramount ne
cessity Of saving the Republic from shipwreck.
We could not understand the process ourselves:
but still we beheld it, and were compelled
to admit its occurrence as n phenomenon,
like the appearance of the comet, or the spread of
MorInonism. We assumed it be natural, because
occurred in naturewe tried 10 regard it as hon
est, because weknew honest people who were its SUBJ
Jects or victims. But there are limits TO all thinps
ana we think no man, who supports the Admins
trahon now, has any right to ask that he should
be classified otherwise than with the malignans
The lniquity is too palpable and certain-the hor-
rors OF its proposed accomplishment r,l
and too manifest-for doubt or mistake ANY
man who sins now, sins with knowledge.
We do not propose, at this moment, to discuss
all the matters and measures involved in the gen
eral conclusion that we have just stated The oc-
currences in our own midst ought, we think, to
supply all need of demonstration. A State Gov
eminent substantially "wiped out''-as is the cur
rent and appropriate phrase--is laws suspended;
It's authorities superseded; its civil functions
assumed by the military power; its tribunals and
processes laughed to scorn and all the guarantees
of TIE Constitution abolished, for the subiugation
and degradation of its people-these things in
themselves, if there were nothing else, ought for
ever to settle the question to the purposes of the
Government which is capable of their perpetration
After such things it is dissertation to talk about
the Union in any such connexions; for the Union
and the Constitution live and die together, and
down into the abyss where the Constitution per-
lshes, the dishonored fragments of the Union must
sink, in ruin and sorrow, likewise r........-
But what has already taken place in MARYLAND
is scarce q shadow of the wrath and oppression
which the dominant party is gathering, in omen
day, to launch upon the South, should its armies
be triumphant. Behind the advancing column of
hre and death and desolation, is to march tyranny
IN all Its hateful and bloody shapes Cenfsca-
ton; Judicial murder; the obliteratiou of State
lines and State governments; the liberation and
armng OF slaves; the delivering I'D of the whole
1ated territory as possession TO the bordes Of s
lnvaders-all these are things not only hinted at
Out puohcly and openly declared in the House
ana ID the Senate. Some brave and solitary voice
Is hopeessly lifted up, it may be, to denounce them
but they are still hailed with general reclamation
on the floor and in the galleries and are presented
accepably in the shape of formal legislation.
"na' 10 UNION men, in Maryland think of
THESE 'hlngs! Is the Union which such war, so
prosecuted, will secure, if it be successful, the
Union which they love and are willing to FIGHT
ioff Is 1t TO the cohorts of such cause that thew
are willing TO deliver the flag which thew rover
ence and under which their fathers bled2 1sMr
LINCOLN war, their war, when waped for onob
ends, to be consummated by such meansp No t,o,
oeileVe patriotism. or the love of the law or tho
constitution or the Union, to be the moving
spii' Oh Such strife? Can they see any,
thlng but horror, while it lasts. and shame.
repentance, ruin, despotism or anarchy at IFS
end? When Mr.. STEVENS of Pennsvlvsnis snoal,,
Vi converting the seeded States into territories
uosS hc spessk the sense of the sUnion mem of
-. ianuf surely Mr. BAKER, Of Oregon, is not
,nelr interpreter, when he says "nobody is so
good Tor this war as a dictator" and promises
70 govern the South, as province, by Governors
rom Massachusetts and Illinois. Mr. Secretary
CAMERON can hardly represent their feelings when
ne says we shall come out of this struggle, so
that no man will be Virginian or q Carolinian
any more but only citizen of the United States
1t cannot be possible that Mr.. PoMERoy can be
their organ, when he proposes to liberate all the
slaves in the seeded States by Presidential
proclamation, and let them loose upon con
quered men and helpless and hopeless women
and children. 1t cannot be that confisca-
ton, rapine, the gallows and seryile revolt, are
the ideas entertained by men of Maryla as
to the mode in which brethren, when sub
dued, are to be brought back 10 brother
hood, and Union of consent and fellowship-of
common affection and common accord-is to be
re-es'aoiished among US. If we are mistaken; if
enes mean all this; approve all this; make war
'or az o ,nis' and hope to seeit triumph 5si.1a
And men haSs thou art fed to british beasts
mi i ID Bra e-p7 |
The American, of yesterday, undertook +, s,.-
isfy the Mayor and City Council If tho = s,,
of complying with General BAsxs, Noptieiyc