The Potter journal. [volume] (Coudersport, Pa.) 1857-1872, 1861-09-25
FEOEV WEE.g. RI END
BY RICHARD UILDRETH.

No rejecting person can fail 10 per-
ceYe that the civil war In which We aye
now engaged must form an important
epoch in Anelo-A American hiSiory-an
epoch not 1T all less marked than the fa-
nous revolution which, in separating US
from the mother country, eXtingul>hed
among US the ide2 Of hereditary privilege
and monarehiai rule, and established the
elective principle as the sole basis Of our
Government
The revolution then accomplished fail
ed, however, to be complete. Mon.rchy
and privilege, so far as the white popuia-
ton was concerned, were set aside but
the holding Of negroes In slavery still re
maincd The patriots aud philosophers
indeed the great mass Of the iutelii
gent men of the revolutionary era, were
not so blind as net to see that Slavehoid-
ing was wholly Incompatible with that
system of republican equality which they
sought to make the basis Of their Gov
ernmeut; aad under the Impulse of this
conviction the abolition of slavery was
decreed in all the Northern states, and
was made the fundamental law Of the new
states to be erected northwest Of the Ohio
but in the planting states the pecunlary
interSts involved in this institution were
too great TO allow it to be thus summarily
disposed Of; and the Washingtous, the
JeifersCns, the MadiSons, the Henrys, the
Pinckncys of that day were obliged to
content themselves with the hope that
time and the growing wisdom and con
Sci9ntiousness OF the people would bHng
the Southern states into harmony. IN this
respect, with their Northern sisters.
1t was in this hope aud with this trust
on the part at least Of a great majority OF
its trainers. that the Federal Constitution
though obliged to wink at it, and even to
grant it a large portion of political infu
ence, avoided an open mention of it, aud
referred to it only by vailed periphrasis
For the thirty years that the attention
of the nation was fixed almost entirely
upon foreign affairs and the maintaiuance
Of those maratime and commercial rights
in which slaveholding and free labor had
a common interest, these two ineOmpati-
bic elements got on tolerably we'll togeth-
er. Rut no sooner did domestic affairs
begin to be the chiefsubject of attention,
than the Missouri controversy gave the
first warning of that incomatibllity which
now approaches it final solution. Both
parties started back in terror and alarm
from the desperate struggle which opened
before them; and that generation, by a
compromise such as was still possible, put
off the evil time beyond their day But
by the eternal law of providence and na-
ture, the duty which the fathers ehirked
devolves upon the sons. Slaveholding
and free labor, as we all DOW see and feel,
cannot coexist together as the joint basis
of common society aud a united gov
ernment. 1t therefore only remains for
US to complete the work which our faith
ers left unfinished, and in completing it,
to thank God that he has given Us the
strength and the grace to do that Of which
our grandtathers and fathers, memorable
and great men as they were, did not prove
capable or worthy Into that Canaan
which they only saw afar with the eyes
OF faith from the top Of Pisgah it is for US