Litchfield enquirer., 1861-02-07
9tttbfel6 Gnanlter.
THURSDAY. FEB. T. 1861.
The Present and the Future.

Ae FFeSeNG ana the F utuFes
 The march of events between now and the fourth of March, must be so rapid and momen- tous, that weekly paper, like ours, can hardly be apt to keep pace with the times, when every day may change the aspect of events, andpevery hour drift us nearer the harbor of settlement and peace, or the broad sea of war and confusion.
 But from our position, and in our time, we can survey the field of conflict, and looking back upon the past and taking the present attitude of affairs, as it presents itself to us, we can form each week an estimate of what we have to ex- pect, and on what safe ground we may stand for future belief, and future determination. Taking what is past it certainly cannot but seem strange and unreasonable to any candid mind, that upon the mere pretence of the election of Republi can President and Vice President to administer the affairs of this Republic for the next four years-in constitutional way and by constitu tional method, six of the States of the Union should declare that election null and void, not obligatory upoa themselves, and ground for withdrawing themselves from the Federal Union wEich they are bound to respect, and bound by oaths of fealty to uphold and foster. No one is such fool as to suppose that if Stephen 4. Douglas or John c. Breckenridge had been the successful Candidates for the Presidency, that those States which did not cast their suffraees for them, would consider their election a suffi- cient cause for seeding from the rest that had elected then,-especially when such secession is plainly acknowledged as treason, and is held as such by the whole civilized world.
 Plainly then these States cannot sec or recognize the right or the propriety of these other States in the minority, to secede upon the ground that they have elected their own nominee.
 Nor, on the other hand is the ground taken that the hostile attitude of the North toward the South, as exhibited in the triumph of the Repub- lican party, considered sufficient cause for the secession of Southern States from the Union j; because ill the first place, the charge is utterly and wholly tazse, and in the second place, the Republican party has never yet been in power in the General Government for a moment, and will not be even nominally responsible for the ad minstration of its affairs for a month to come. Secession then can only be considered by the great body of the people as treason pure and simple-without eaeuse-without palliation- and without authorized right. 1nd treason must De put domn et rAatecer cost This is the ground We must take-boldly, uncompromisingly, and unyieldingy. It is the sentiment of the great and strong conviction of the people, and it must prevail, in thought and word and actiou- and acM preraI now and hereafter.
 We cannot tell what the events of the next thirty days may put before us, but whatever they may be, and in whatever state of affairs the country may be on the fourth of March, when ABRAHAM LINCOLN is inaugurated President of the United States-the President will meet the emergency, and peaccably if he can, forcibly if must we may be sure he will put an end, with tke strong arm of Executive power, to all this miserable, traitorous anarchy which now pervades the land, and the ship of state shall again sail peacefully on-not plank of its hull lost, or a star of it's pcnaant erased And tie people shall say .tmen