Fremont journal. [volume] (Fremont, Sandusky County [Ohio]) 1853-1866, 1861-12-27
The Vanguard of Buffers Expedition at
ship Island.
PROCLAMATION OF GENERAL PHELPS.

PROCLAMATION OF GENERAL PHELPS.
Ship Island belongs TO the state of Mis-
sissipi, and is sixty miles from New Orleans
ninety-five miles from the Southwest Pass
of the Mississippi delta, ninety-fivo miles
from Fort Pickons, seventy miles from No
bile, and ten miles from Mississippi City.
Its length is seven miles.
The federal troops landed on tho 4th in
slant, and General Phelps Immediately is
sued tht following proclamation:
PROCLAMATION OF BRIGADIER-oEN'L PHELPS,
TO THE PEOPLE OF THE SOUTHWEST.
HEADeUARTERs MIDDLEsEx BRIGADE,
SHIP ISLAND, Miss, Dec. A. 1861. (
To the Loyal Citizens of the Southeast:
Without any desire of my own, but con-
trary to my private inclination again find
myselfamong you as military officer of
the government. A proper respect for my
fellow countrymen renders it not out Of
place that should make known TO you
the motives and principles by which my
command will be governed.
We believe that every state that has
been admitted as a slave state into the Un-
ion since the adoption of the constitution
has been so admitted in direct violation of
that constitution.
We believe that the slave states which
existed as such at the adoption of our con-
constitution are, by becoming parties to
that compact, under the highest obligations
of honor and morality to abolish slavery.
1t is our conviction that monopolies are
as destructive as competition is conserya-
tive of the principles and vitalities of re-
publican government; that slave labor is a
monopoly which excludes free labor and
competition; that slaves arc kept in com
parative idleness and ease in a fertile half
Of our arabic national territory, while free
white laborers, constantly agumenting in
numbers from Europe, are confined to the
other half, and are often distressed by want !;
that the free labor of the North has more
need of expansion into the Southern states,
from which it is virtually excluded, than
slavery had into Texas in 1916; that free
labor is essential to free institutions; that
these institutions are naturally better adapt
ed and more eongenial TO the Anglo-Saxou
race than are the despotic tendencies of
slavery and finally, that the dominant po-
litical principal Of this North American
continent, so long as the Caucasian race
continues TO flow in upon US from Europe,
must needs be that of free institutions and
free government.
Any obstruction to the progress of that
form of government in the United States
must inevitably be attended with discord
and war.
Slavery, from the condition of uniVer-
sally recognized social and moral evil, has
become at length political institution, de-
manding political recognition. II demands
rights to the exclusion and annihilaLion Of
those rights which are insured to us by the
constitution, and we must chose between
them which We will have, for we cannot
have both.
The constitution was made for freemen,
not for slaves. Slavery as a social evil
might for time be tolerated and endured,
but as political institution it becomes i'm
perious and exactiDg, controlling like
dread necessity, all whom circumstances
have compelled to live under its sway, ham
periDg their action, and thus impeding our
national progress.
AS political Institution il could exist as
a coordinate part only of two forms Of Gov
ernment, viz. the despOtic and the free
and it could exist under free government
only where public sentiment 10 the most
unrestricted exercise Of robust freedom,
leading to extravaganza and licentiousness,
has swayed the thoughts and habits Of the
people beyond the bonds and limits Of their
own moderate constitutional provisions. Ii
coald exist under free government only
where the people in period Of aureasouing
extravagance, bad permitted popular elamoT
TO overcome public reason, and had attempt
ed the impossibiity of setting up perma-
ueutly, as a political Institution, social
evil which is opposed to moral law. I.ius
J By revertiBg 10 the history Of the past
we find that one of the most destructive
wars on record, that Of the French Regolu-
ton was originated by the attempt to give
political character to an institution which
was ootsHsceptible Of political oharacter.a
The church, by being endowed with po-
litical power with ia oOnveHts, its schools,
lis immense landed wealth, its associations,