The Potter journal. [volume] (Coudersport, Pa.) 1857-1872, 1862-12-10
The PRESIDENTS Message.

ca lculating devotion TO the nobleSt en- Is, all
may and do confde. That man is Abraham
Lincoln. To disparage his abilities, erlticise
his rhetoric, pronounce him too fast here or
too slow there. may not be difficult but there
lives no loyal American who distrusts his ear
nest desire to serve and to save the Union
When faction, meaning to stop just short of
treason, afiirms that the war lor the Union is
only prosecuted for the aggrandizement of
contractors and jobbers-that those who
most earnestly support the Federal Govern
ment are quite as responsible for, the Rebellion
as those who fomented, inaugurated, and still
uphold tit is confronted by the presence in
the foreground of one man who refused to the
last to believe Treason Disunion and Civil
War to be seriously purposed-who, in his
Inaugural, condescended to plead with the
architects of ruin and entreat them to pause
in their mad career-who hesitated to shed
blood, even in vindidation of. rightful essen
tial authority, until absolutely forced to do so
by the couspirators for Disunion commencing
the fray-and who, from that moment to the
present, has been anxious onlyto securea re-
turn, at the earliest possible moment, to the
mild sway of Law Order, and Peace.
Mr. Lincoln's Message discusses many topics
of grave interest and embOdies many impor-
tant suggestions but the interest of one sub
iect therein discussed Overrides all others, and
his expose will be hailed with hearty approval
or spurned with execration as the reader sub
stantially agrees with or dissepts from his
Judgment on this point, Essentially the Pres
ident sees and proclalms that Slavery has be-
come the implacable foe of the American Uni
on, and that the Slave Power must die in or
der that lhe Republic may live. And this is
so obvou,ly, so garingly true, that the his
in rEali ipC
was ever gnvely disputed.
It seems Incredible that human audacity
should be equal to the task Of misrepresenting
the Presidents position. 'Is he not pledged
to prosecute tie war to the sole end of restor-
/ ing the legitimate authority of the Constitu-
! ton and Union~ Most certainly he is; and
/ that is Just whathe is doing. 1t is precisely
and only because the Slave Power is the chief,
/ the fundamental OBSTACLE to such restoration,
/ that he is compelled to grapple with it in NOR
/ tai encounter. 1t is Slavery-nothing under
! heaven Ju SlaVery--that uniteS the lower
! countries of Maryland--yes, and of Delaware
/ also-in bonds of living sympathy with the
/ Confederate traitors, while a great majority of
/ the people Of those State living urcursed by
the daily clank Of human 1etterS are and ever
have been loyal 1t is Slavery, and nothing
/ else. that makes the Old Dominion den OF
treason, while Vest Virginia on the contrary.
having few slaves, is staunlhly loyal 1t IS
/ Slavery which reVcrses the poeE Of fTennesSee,
making her eastern diyisioa eita del of Uni
ouism, while Middle and WestTennessee are
cankered with treason, So in Missouri every
/ county wherein Slavery was Predominant has
swarmcd with gucrillas and sent ns youth to-
swell the Rebel armies, while its F,ee-Labor
communities rally instinctively upde' the old
/ a hoe Of II;
! in Northern Alabama and Mississippi, but
none is perccptible in Southern; hence WHOM
! ism outspoken in New Orleans, Memphis, Nash
vile, but none to speak of (among Whites)on
/ the great plantations whereby those cities are
surrounded. Who can misread these uudeni-
able facts?
! Were Slavery dead to-day, we might to-
morrow muster out Of service every Ulion
soldier, and still the Union would be certainly
and speedily restored. Leave Slavery where
/ this Rebellion found it, and You may kill and
| bury every man ROW in the Confederate ocmie
with every one who could be induced to serve
| in those armies, and still the Union would
soon be again assailed, and must ultimately
! fall unless its mortal foe should be killed first
( Secession ia in the blood Of the slaveholding
caste, and will never be expelled while Slavery
remains.
| "Shall not the self-Same mold
Produce the self-same men ?"
| Slavery has been thirty years reaching the
conclusion that she is unequally and injuri-
ousiy voked with Free Labor in our Republic
that her interests suffer, and must suffer
/ from the partnership. She has summoned all
/ her resources for a Iite-and-death struggle
she has violently severed the ligament that
bound her to the Free States-she may be
temporarily COerced into submission, but never
rcconcied to loyalty. The South may easily
be reclaimed to sincere Unolism the Slave
Power never can be- To it, the Union must
ever be a lothed memory, a symbol Of huml-
iaton while by the renovated South it will
be cherished as her benefcent deIverer from
the hideCus nightmare that so long fettered
and paralyzed her The Union may and will
be saved; the Slave Power mis- ght be !: both
together never can be.
Why is it that the opponents of the Presi-
dents policy do not meet the real issue, in
stead Of inventing and interposing another
He would gladly have restored the Union as it
was but that was not possible. He might as
we'll be required now to fill a-bushel basket
with the dew of last Fourth of-July morning.
He can only save the Union by throttling its
arch-enemy; and they who insist that he shall
not 40 liS really OeSLFS ludl he Sn OulQ 1all let
the country go to pieces, and trust to their
future incantations to resurrect it from the
witches caldron into which its mangled re-
mains will haEe been cast. The question is
not between saving the Union in one way and
another, but between saving it in the practical
BILE way pointed out by the President, or not
saving it at all. He urges Emancipation that
the Nation may be saved he does not and
never did seek to divert the War for the Union
into a War for Emancipation. He simply pro-
poses to save the country by the shortest,
easiest, surest way, and let Slavery abide the
consequences. ,.. ....-
Heartily agreeing with him on the main
question,we differ on subordinate points with
out reserve and without feeling. We know
that he believes Gradualism with Negro Ex-
portation calculated to commend Emancipa-
ton to the South we believe. ON the other