New Oregon plaindealer. (New Oregon, Iowa) 1859-1866, 1862-04-18


this movement ask in any way to inter
tere with or break up the Government
of the other States: but simply, as they
declared, to save themselves from de-
struction. In the past history of man
kind, there is no parallal to enable us
to compare the actions of these men and
determine whether they are patriots or
traitors, for this can only be determined
by the extent and character Of the dan
gers that threatened their existence.
Let us then see what these dangers
were, what were the "principles" and
what the ''policy" Of the party which
getting the control of the Government
endangered (as they hcld) the safety Of
the people of the Southern States. This
party assumed that Southern society
was wrong AMI criminal, as one Of its
'principlcs,* and its 'policy' was to
reyoutionize it, not forcibly or violent
ly: but to use the Government "peaca-
bly, to accomplish results that the
South held involved their destruction.
This assumption, was certainly griev-
Gus insult, unaccompanicd with threat
cncd change; for to assert that eight
millions Of men and women, living
under the same general Government
with themselves and with the same
chances of Christian enlightenment,
was living in the daily practice of crime
and immortality, was perhaps the gray
est insult ever inflicted upon civilized
people.
But this party went still further. 1t
maintained that the 100000 of ne
groes in the South were naturally emit
tied to the same liberties as the white
citizen and that to abolish the white
supremacy. and give impartial freedom
to these mongrels and negroes would be
a national good 1t further held that
within the federal jurisdiction the ne
gro was entitled to freedom, and it
pledged itself to institute a policy that
should ultimately put this race upon an
equality with Gods nobler creation.
Practically, this party was pledged by
its ayowea "principles' to inco,pol e
all the subordinate races into our polit-
ical system and make this a moncrel
Republic. This Flea Of impartial free
dom" actually carried cut would ami
hilate the white race of the South,
blight its civilization, deyastate its
plantations, depopulate it's cities, ma
king it only question of time when
the society of the South would be I'M
derminea and destroyed by universal
ANAL gamation, like the mongrel Re-
publics of South America and of the
Islands Of the Gulf.
Here, then, is the cause Of secession,
of a disruption Of the Union, and of
this civil war with the stupendous train
of calamities of every conceivable COM
plcxion that follows in its wake. 1t has
been assumed that the negro is blach-
white man, or like ourselves except in
the color Of his skin, and the attempt
to make him 50 in fact, to secure to him
s:impar.ial freedom has arrayel mill
ion of brothers in arms. If the half
million of these men from the North
believed they were in the field to fight
for the negro they would lay down their
arms in twenty four hours, or what is
even more likely, turn them against the
Summers and Greelys of the North that
had betrayed them into SO impious and
deyilish a work. Our men now in arms
are in favor Of the Constitution and the
Union-the Constitution and the Union
Of Washington and Of Jacksonville
Constitution aud the Union that for
eighty years has been productive Of
such boundless blessings. IF the OBJ
jcct of this war is to make this I'm
ion il future with Southern negroes, in
stead of their masters, we believe our
gallant army upon being assured Of the
fact would turn its bayonets upon the
Beechers, the Greelys and the Ray
monas of the North as greater traitors
than the Rhetts, the Floyds, and the
Davis of the South. The negro must