Daily Nashville patriot. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1860-1862, 1861-06-05
For the Patriot.
Letter. to a CIslzen.-No. i.

the enforcement of the Laws" and you are
especially addressed, because in the time
that is passing, you hesitate as to the proper
course to be pursued by yourself, until and
on the 9Th of June. -.--.----.-
You have been urged to throw your infu-
ence in favor of the measures proposed for
the approval anG ratification of the citizens
of our State on that day. and in persistently
declining to do this, you have assigned sever
al reasons. which now propose to consider,
in regular order and with all respect.
While declaring that you cherish no SYM
patty whatever for those who dare to assail
popular right, you claim that you cannot yet
understand that you are fully absolved from
that allegiance so lately due the Federal
Government. Let us now examine the Sc
cond member of this proposition, and observe
the tendency of such sentiment. 1t has
long been the declaration of the wisest and
purest sages, that in times OF revolution, men
are released without reservation from their
political obligations, because every revolt at
all justifable, has been based upon some
great change of policy in the management of
public affairs When English Charles changed
his policy so as to endanger some of the
dearest rights of his once loyal subjects, they
did not stop to mince such dainty words
about ':full dissolution from late allegiance"
&c. Their course was prompt The sover-
eign, once 20 naughty and so regardless OF
their welfare, suffered on the scaffold the
dread penalty of his criminal negligence, and
subsequent generations have approved the
conduct of the brave Roundheads who fought
so nobly and conquered so well in the cause
of liberty of thought.
Washington once owed allegiance to the
British crown, but when rule became misrule
and taxation was changed to extortion, he
as loyal citizen as you can possibly be, SO
long as loyalty was virtue-he did not falter
a moment in throwing off tie. submission to
which, under the circumstances would have
stamped his name with deepest infamy.
1t is true now, that our religious liberties
have not been threatened by the Federal
Government, and taxation under it was ae-
companied by all its essential concomitants.
But the denial of these does not exhaust the
list of misdeeds which men in office may
commit. To prove that the murderer has
never been an incendiary, will not secure his
acquittal, and because the power located for
has not erred in some particulars, it does not
follow of necessity that its course throughout
is unimpeachabe and immaculate. The I'M
derlying principle of our national fabric is,
that the people rule. But the people cannot
90 in body to examine witnesses-to adju-
dictate upon disputed points-to serve legal
processes. &c. Hence the law-making and
the law administering powers by the popular
voice have been delegated to certain indi-
yiduals, who are not the rulers of the people
but their servants. Now you have pledged
support to certain principles. Your servant
acts as agent for you in establishing and car
rying out those principles. He transcends
your directions and you are at once released
from that responsibility which rested upon
you before released so far as the consequent
ces of his transgresson lead. But he goes
farther than this. He dares to abuse his pri-
vileges-to make violent assault upon your
rights and your welfare. He breaks through
every promise he has made-tramples upon
his own solemn pledges, and menaces the
very hearth-stone at which you sit with actu-
al invasion. And all this time what are you
doing, o deluded Citizen? You pausel On
dangerous perhaps" you wreck your
own prosperity. A fiimsey contingency en-
meshes you, till from your hardness its weak
ness grows to strength, and thus bound hand
and foot, and voice and heart, you can nei
their aid the right nor defeat the wrong.
This is no exaggerated picture, Sir, for you
know or most certainly you ought to krOw. that
Mr.. Lincoln, a sectional candidate and in the |
worst sense Of the word strict party man, !
has openly and shamelessly violated the Sd
cred obligation, which on the 4th of March |
he gave you and every other citizen of the |
an obligation given on the Holy |
Oracles of our blessed religion, in the most |
impressive ceremony of the nation, and sur |
rounded by the most awe-inspiring circum-
stances. When he gave it in the style and |
Of an honest man, thrill of Joy |
passed through the hearts of the Union-lov-
ing and conservative people OF the South
But his subsequent course has caused those |
good impressions to pass away as lightly as
''the waves of shadow that run over the !
wheat" Instead of preserving, protecting
and defending your constitutional rights, he |
has ruthlessly raised his own hand to shat
Ter them forever, and 80 terrible has been his
onslaught, that already the work is nearly
accomplished. His walk amid the precepts |
Of our far-seeing and patriotic fathers has i
been as polluting as the tread of his own
and mental bands through the
halls and galleries of our once beautiful Capt.
toll. His journey in Office thus far, instead
Of being guided by the principles laid down
IN the Magma Charta of our liberties, has
been rather the rude career of a mailman
among the Powered sweets of garden, who
PUSHES forth not to Gull and enjoy, but to
oruise and to crush.
The immortal LincolnI Yes, immortal in
he wounded hearts of those who loved their
country well, until he stripped it of its glo-
y! 1mmortal-in the prayers of the stricken
poor-into whose home already squalid, he
has brought such fearful increase of bitter
less and woe! Immortal, in the bloody and
brutal strife which he has inaugurated
against the peaceful and unoffending people |
Of the South, in the tremendous and unmea-
ured load of debt which he is placing like
huge incubus upon the enfeebled form of the
nee powerful North
You, Sir, may seek to give your humble
mite for the sustenance of such a creature,
'ut after all is over, and the scales have fall
N from your abused sight, life for you will
'e bereft of every pleasure, and the pillow of
leath itself be spread with thorns. Enough,
Sir, for the present
Very respectfully, &c. W.S.H.