The Burlington weekly hawk-eye. [volume] (Burlington [Iowa]) 1860-1876, 1861-01-19
August BELMONT.
To Hon. JOHN FORSYTH, Mobile, Ala.

HENRY WINTER DAVIS ON SECESsION.-In his
recent letter to the people of Maryland, Mr..
Davis thus forcibly shows the inevitable effect
o! secession upon the slave interests in that State:
If the present government be DESTROYED, Ma
ryland shareholders lose their only guaranty for
the return OF their slaves. Every commercial
line OF communication is severed Custom
House barriers arrest her merchants at every
frontier. Her commerce the ocean is the
prey OF every pirate or the sport of every mari
time power. Her great railroad loses every con-
nection which m ,keS it valuable. If two repub-
lies divide the Territory of the United States,
Maryland is ruined whichever she joins. If the
South, her slaves will walk over the PENNSYLVANIA
line unmoested. The African Slave trade will
reduce their market value below the cost of raj
sing supporting them; and if they did not
nbScond they would be abandoned by their mas
tiers.
Free trade will open every port, and cotton
and WOODEN factories, and the iron and machine
works of Maryani would be PROSTATE before
European competition. The expenses Of Gov
eminent must be doubled by the instant necessi-
ty of larg. standing army; for all the condi-
tons of present security will be gone, and
great Northern power divided from US by an
air line, will be an ever impending danger. In
the war OF separation, and even after, Maryland
will be an out going province, without fortiti,
cation or natural boundary, always Orerrun at
the first sound of arms incapable Of being de-
Tended by the weaker power of which she will
be a part, whose natural line of defense must be
the Potomac, ard on this side of which no Sou
thern army would venture decisive battle.
The hope that Baltimore will be the empori
UNI of such Republic is delusion too ridicu-
lous 10 need reutation. Nothing intended for
the South will ever pass Norfolk; and from the
West Indies We will be severed BY Gus ON houses,
duties, and political antipathies in favor of New
York.
Is not Southern Republic new to Maryland?
Joining Northern one is equally so, il stated
lines define the limits of the two Republics
The slave interest will be instantly DESTROYED;
the great railroad to the West is cut off at Har
pers Ferry, and Baltimore becomes a tributary
to the Central Pennsylvania road All her Sou
thein and South western trade is gone, and her
foreign commerce can seek the ocean only by the
favor of Virginia or under the guns Of II power.
full navy. In war still the frontier, and
our soil will be desoIated by the contcndlng ar
mics.
Our manufacturing industry will be better Sc
cured our military frontier will he better pro.
tected BY the Potomac our foreign commerce
will have the protection Of a maritime power
and We shall be free from the humiliation of
European protectorate; but the sudden and ab.
soiutr destruction of the slaveholding interest,
and the radical change in the relations Of our
population will give shock to our internal quiet
and prosperity, that neither this nor the next
generation will recover from.
peaceful Secession" is illustrated and exem-
plifed by the recent action of the extreme
Southern States In South Carolina Castle
Pinckney has been taken by storm, Fort Moultrie
captured, the Charlesto- arsenal seized, Fort
Sumpter beseged, and the revenue cutter s'o
len. In Georgia, Alabama, and Florida. all the
federal forts, arsenals, and barracks have been
occupied by State troops. Thus We find that
armed rehelon and overt acts OF war against
the United States, and insults to our flag hypull.
ing it down and substituting other ensigns, are
the practical workings OF peaceful, constitu-
tionul secession. louisville journal.