New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1861-04-16
WAR IL UPON US /.

We are involved in War. The Country even
yet does not fairly realize the fact 1t was sur
prised-bewildered- stupefed-by the tidngs that
the Rebels were actually cannonading Fort Sum-
ter. Probably majority of the citizens of the
Free States have not, until within week past,
believed that there would be any boodshed.
They had been 80 accustomed to hear rumbings
and grumblDgs Of discomfort from Southern
quarters-Direct Trade Observation-Disclosures
of Observation-Disclosures Of DisuDion-windy
talk of Brutus and bis dngger-nofy swash
about Hogping all creaton-that most Of
them regarded Secession as but recast
Of the old play with new scenery and dec
oratons-and supposed it would end as its
predecessors had done. Good, easy souls, i'm
mersed in business and intent profit, cried
out half drowsily. 40 yes, We must concede-
"let US make any concessions they want but
they did not want concessions, and spurned the
suggestion. They wanted Civil War and Dis.
union.
Thousands testify exclaim-" Here is another
precious row about Slavery and Niggers"-
which remark will be only specifically true II
the matter could have been lel TO the I'M
prompted action Of the slaveholding class, we
should never have had Gag.Law in Congress,
nor u repeal Of the Missouri Compromise, nor
anything like Lecompton Constitution. Prop
erty of all kinds is conservatives it loves routine,
quiet, security. Probably a majority Of the
Members of Congress who originally voted that
Slavery should never cross the Ohio River were
themselves shareholders. Many Of the heaviest
shareholders in Congress in 1854 spoke and voted
against the Nebraska bill. The most extensive
STAKEHOLDER that South Carolina ever sent to Con-
gress was the most conservative and least ultra
man she has so sent within twenty years. Gov.
Hammond, though he sustained the LecomptOn
bib ut every stage and in every shape in the
Senate, when no returned TO his constituents
openly declared that it ought to have been kicked
out of Congress. 1T would be doing injustice to
Slavery to hold that the slaveholding class, as
such, got up this most monstrous Rebellion and
Civil War.
But it is one of the inevitable incidents, or
rather penalties, Of the radically vicious system
of Southern Society, that it creates or insures q
large class of capable and ambitious persons
without habitual employment or assured means
of subsistence. They "cannot Dig" while " to
&" beg they are ashamed" Slavery renders
manual labor disreputable-at best, o half-caste
afair-whie intellectual vacations are scarce
and prefer meager recOmpense. For every
STAKEHOLDER there are ten whites who cannot be
shareholders, and will not be drudges. Law and
Physic employ very few of them; Trade and
Theology few more 1.-THE Of the whole num-
Der find q loathed subsistence as Oyerseers;
while the great majority are unplaced, unpro-
vided for, and habitually on the lookout for
something to turn up. Accustomed from child
hood to the use of arms, at odds with fortune,
brave, imprOyident passionate reckless, and
often quarrelsome quiet is their bane and con-
vulson their star of hope. 1t was this class,
mainly, who fought so CALAMITY under the lead
of Jackson at New Orleans and on fields less
famous, who seized Texas and wrested her from
Mexico, who for years menaced and disquieted
Mexico and Cuba, and who for eighteen months
past have been secretly organizing and mastering
for a grand stroke, under the designation of
" Knights of the Golden Circle" OK. G. CT 1t
was this mystic brotherhood that swept Texas
SO suddenly into the gulf Of Secession, and ito
influence has been powerful for evil throughout
the Southwest. Emboldened by recent events,
it has organized openly under tho name of
Precipitators," and now rules whole States
with rod of iron suppressing all avowals Of
opinion hostile TO its purposes, and committing
outfages at will on Northerners merely suspected
of not sympathzing with its views.
The loyal States are taken by surprise. Silent
ly robbed by the traitor Floyd, they are unarmed
to-day. Not Eve regiments 10 all the Free States
have been raised and drilled with any reference
to collision at hand. The bombaEdmant end