The Burlington weekly hawk-eye. [volume] (Burlington [Iowa]) 1860-1876, 1861-06-22


tenance Of that large standing army which will
be indispensable at once for her safety, and for
imparting to the new Government that strong
military character which, il has been openly
avowed, the peculiar institutions of the South
will inexorably demand.
Kentucky now enjoys for her peculiar institu
ton the protection. of the Fugitive Slave Law,
Loyalty enforced By the Government and il IL
ths law, effective in its power of recaptnre, put
infinitely more potent in its moral agency in pre-
venting the escape Of slaves, that alone saves
that institution in the Border States from utter
extinction. She cannot carry this law with her
into the new Confederacy. She will virtually
have Canada brought to her doors in the form Of
Free States, whose population, relieved of all
moral and constitutional obligations 10 deliver
up fugitive slaves, will stand with open arms in
wiling and welcoming them, ii need be, at the
point of the bayonet. Under such influences,
Slavery will perish rapidly away in Kentucky,
as ball Of snow would melt in Summers sun.
Kentucky, in her SOUL abhors the African
slave trade, and turns away with unspeakable
horror and loathing from the red affairs OF King
Dahomey But although this traffic has been
temporarily interdicted by the seeded States, II
is well understood that this step has been taken
as a mere measure Of policy for the purpose of
impressing the Border States, and of conciliat
ing the European powers The ultimate legal.
zation Of this trade by Republic protesting to
be BASED upon African servitude, must follow
as certainly as does the conclusion from the prem
ises of mathematical proposition. Is Kentucky
prepared to see the hand upon the dial plate of
her civilization rudely thrust back a century,
and to stand before the world the confessed
champion of the African slavc-hunter? Is she,
with her unsuied fame, ready TO become pan.
der to the rapacity Of the African slave trader,
who burdens the very winds of the sea with the
means of the wretched captives whose limbs he
has loaded with chains, and whose hearts he has
broken? do not, connot believe it.
For this catalogue OF what Kentucky must
suffer in abandoning her present honored and Sc
cure position, and becoming member OF the
Southern Confederacy, what will be her indem
nifty? Nothing, absolutely nothing. The Ill
woven ambition of some of her sous may posi-
bly, reach the Presidency Of the new Republic;
that is ALL Alas alas for the dream of the
Presidency Of Southern Republic, which has
disturbed so many pillows in the South and per.
haps some in the West. also, and whose lurdlight
like demons torch, is leading nation to per-
dition. -
The cfamor that is insisting upon the South
obeying the laws, the great principle that our
popular Governments rest upon the consent of
the governed is violated, should not receive a
moments consideration. Popular government
does, indeed rest upon the consent of the gov.
erned, but it is upon the consent not of all, but
of a majority of The gorerned Criminals are ey.
cry day punished and made to obey the laws,
certainly against their will, and no man suppos-
es that the principle referred to is thereby in
vaded. bill passed by Legislature, by the
majority of single vote only, though the con-
stituents of all who voted against il should be
in fact, as they held to be in theory, opposed
to its provisions, still is not the operative as
law, and no right OF self government is thereby |
trampled upon. The clamor alluded to assumes |
that the States are separate and independent |
governments, and that laws enacted under the |
authority Of all may be resisted and repealed ut
the pleasure of each. The people of the United |
States, so far as the powers of the General Gov
crnment are concerned, are unit, and laws pass
cd By majority OF all are binding upon all
The!aws and Constitution, however which the
South now resists have been adopted BY her
sanction, and the right she Row claims is that of
a feeble minority TO repeal whit majority has
adopted. Nothing could be more fallacious.
Civil war, under all circumstances, Is a terri
bic calamity, and yet, from the selfish ambition
and wickednets of men, the best Governments
have not been able to escape it, In regarding
that which has been forced upon the Govern.
ment OF the United States, Kentucky should not |
look so much at the means which may be neces- !
sary employed in its prosecution as the mach- |
nations by which this national tragedy has been !
brought upon Us. When | look upon this bright |
land, few months since so prosperous, so tran !
quill, and so free, and now behold it desolated by |
war, and the fresides of its thirty millions Of |
people darkened, and their bosoms wrung with |
anguish, and know, as do, that all this is the |
work of a score or two of men, who, over all
this national ruin and despair, are preparing to
carve with the sword their way to seats of per
manent power, | cannot but feel that they are
accommodating upon their souls an amount of guilt |
hardly cqualed in all the atrocities of treason |
and of homicide that have degraded the annals |
of our race from the foundations of the world |
Kentucky may rest well assured that this con-
fct, which is one Of self.defence, will he pur-
sued on the part of the Government in the pa
ternal spirit in which a father seeks to reclaim |
his erliug offspring. No conquest, no effuson
OF blood, is sought In sorrow, not in anger,
the prayer of all is that the end may be reached |
without loss of life waste of property Among
the most powerful instrumentalities relied on for
re-establishing the authority Of the Government,
is that OF the Union sentiment of the South.
sustained by liberated press 1t is now trod-
den to the earth under reign of terrorism which
has no parallel but in the worst DAYS of the
French Revolution. The presence of the Gov
err ment will enable it to rebound, and look its
oppressors in the face. At present we are as
sured that in the seeded States no man express
es an opinion opposed to the revolution but
Mt the hazard Of life and property. The only
light which is admitted into political discussion
is that which flashes from the sword or CLEANS
from glistenng havonets. A few days since one
OF the United States Senators from Virginia
published manifest, in which he ANNOUNCES
with oracnlar solemnity and severity that all
citizens who would not vote for Secession but
were in favor Of the Union-uot should or ought
.o-but MUST leave the State" These words
have in them decidedly the crac. of the over
seer's whip. The Senator evidently treats Vir-
ginia as great negro quarter, in which the lash
is the appropriate emblem of Authority, and the
only argument he will condescend to use. How
ever the freemen of os,er parts of the State
may abase themselves under the exercise of this
insolent and proscriptive tyranny, should the
Senator, with this scourge of slaves, endeavor
TO drive the people of Western Virginia from
their homes, | will ONLY say, il The language of
the narrative of GilpinI ride:
"M,y be there to see,"
It would certainly prove deeply interesting
spectacle
1t is true that before this delverance of the
popular mind of the South from the threaten.
nss and alarm which have subdued it, can be
accomplished, the remorseless agitators who
have made this revolution, and nov hold its
reigns, must be discarded alike from the public
confidence and the public service. The country
IN its agony is feeling their power, and we well
understand how difficult. win be the task of over
throwing the aseendancy they have secured
but the Union men Of the South-believed to
be in the majority in every seeded State, ex-
cept, perhaps South Carolina--Gidei by the
presence of the GOVERNMENT, will be fully equal
to the emergency. Let these agitators perish,
if need be, by score:
"A breath can unmake them what a breath has
made"
out destroy this Republic and
"Where is that Promethean heart
That can its light relume 2"
Once entombed, when will the Angel of the
Resurrection descend to the portals of its sepul
'hre! There is not a voice which comes to us
rom the cemetery of nations that does not an.
'wer: Never, never." Amid the torments of