The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1861-01-15


wise to SUR ender their posts at once.
Is Secession to be Permitted, or Shall
There be Civil Wars
The policy which Mr.. Stewards speech of
Saturday insinuates, rather than avows, fore
shadowing, as it does, some germs of good cor
rectly indicates to what extent republican ia
naticism has begun to recoil before the ava
lanche of destruction which is tottering over
the country. Louis XII bows low, in his craft,
before the stirrup of his cherished, victorious
brother of Burgundy" and humbly begs for
time. little delay, only, and he will grant
everything. True, if he cannot gain the sought
for truce he must yield everything; instead of
promises he must, if required, hand over his
crown. Mr. Seward emulates his prototype,
and will consent to any concessions "after the
eccentric. movements of secession and dis
union shall have ended-one, two or three
years hence" While he may, he reiterates
'not now;" only "when calmness shall have
resumed its accustomed sway over the public
mind, then, and not until them" is he prepared
to yield those qualifications which the changes
of society and alterations of empire require"
Sagacious Seward, whose manifesto, like the
proffers of Louis XII. in his imprisonment ends
with a gigantic, indispensable He
says that we are Gin the midst of alarms, and
somewhat exposed to accidents, unavoidable
in seasons Of tempestuous passions" 'and,
therefore, although he would prefer above all
things such procrastination as may yet insure
that "the cotton and rice fields Of South Caro-
lima and the sugar plantations of Louisiana
shall ultimately be titled with free labor"
"yet'-and this is his most significant
utterance, as the mouthpiece of Mr. Lin
coln-"whatever sacrifices, private or pub
lie, shall be needful for the Union,
they will be made" And with foresight
as to what those sacrifices, instigated by him
self as Premier Of the incoming administration,
may be, he adds:-"The Union shall continue
and endure; and men in after times shall de-
clare that this generation, which Saved the
Union from such sudden and unlocked for
dangers, surpassed in magnanimity even that
one which laid its foundations in the eternal
principles Of liberty, justice and humanity"
Mr.. Stewards programme for the future is,
nevertheless, unbloody and compromising
enough to be infinitely displeasing to the Wades,
Summers, Giddingses, Washburnes, Lovejoys,
Hales and Garrisons of the republican party.
They have adopted the motto that "the victors
must dictate to the vanquished" unwilling to
comprehend that, although they have elected
President on an abolition platform, he is far
yet from having been inaugurated, and that his
chances are small Of ever becoming chief
magistrate of the whole thirty-three States
united. They are unprepared to abandon so
soon the chance of the fulilment of Mr.. Gree
eys aspiration-"Let the epitaphs of John
Brown and his compatriots remain unwritten
until the not distant day when no slave shall
clank his chains in the shades of Monticello, or
by the grave of Mount Vernon" Such let
ting down from his old positions was the
Wade exclaimed:-"Great was the fall there
Of" OF course the radical Southern party are
equally dissatisfied. They ridicule the awk-
ward absurdity that the disease of to-day can
be cured years hence; that acknowledgment of
the need of immediate change should be
simultaneous with the declaration that change
must be postponed; that avowal of the immi-
hence Of the emergency is accompanied by
demand that il shall not be met until IL il too
late; that the country should be called upon to
sleep quietly on the edge of the crater,
while the volcano is rumbling with the elements
of inevitable explosion.
Meanwhile the huge, hideous, jagged mass Of
revolution tumbles downward, in its irregular,
UNEMPLOYED track with constantly accelerating
rapidity. "Irrepressible conflict" has deve-
Hoped itself into such outlines of civil war that
sober minded, patriotic citizens tremble from
day to day lest the next news should be the ca
lamity of bloodshed somewhere, and the be-
ginning of internecine strife which may spread
like pail over the prosperity of the Union.
The populations of South Carolina, Alabama,
Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, North Carolina,
Arkansas, Virginia, Maryland, Florida and
Georgia have virtually broken the links alrea-
dy that bind them to the confederation. Ten.
nessee has called for State Convention in
February for the purpose of seeding, aud
Kentucky cannot long remain in the back
ground. The occupation Of the arsenal at st.
Louis by United States troops shows how strong
the anti-Northern feeling is there. The excited
sectional feeling which opened the mouths of
the cannon Of Fort Moultrie upon steamer
chartered by the United States government
finds its re-ccho and response from Cape Henlo-
pen to the Rio Grande. The Notifications which
have been seized upon by State authorities on
the Atlantic seaboard and on the Gulf of Mexi-
co render the approach to most Of the South
ern ports impossible. Fort Pulaski in the
hands of Georgia, is impregnable; the defences
Of the Belize could not be retaken by the en-
tire United States Navy; Pensacola, in tho
hands Of Alabama, and forts Monroe and Nc
Henry, occupied by Virginia and Maryland,
defy attack. In face of such a critical state of
things the time has passed to reason that the
President or the government has the right to