The daily Evansville journal. (Evansville, Ind.) 1862-1863, 1862-12-03
NUMBER 53.

pOutiii III CohlhOH prudence, MAINTAIN
ali along that endless border-line an
armed slave police? Are we to consent
to this? And if we o,shalI we escape
border raids after fleeing fugitives? No
sane man viii expect it. Are we to suf
fer these? We are disgraced. Are we
to resent them? 1t is renewal of hos
tilities.
State elections may go as they will.
Their results can never change the fact
that any party obtaining the control of
the Government and adopting the poliev
that the settlement of the emancipation
question is to be postponed till the war
shall be closed, will never. while il mr.
sues that policy, see the war permanent
ly closed-not even by accepting a
shameful disruption of our country.
But If emancipation is to avail us as a
peace measure, we must adopt it boldly.
resolutely, effectually 1t must be gen
eral, not partial; extending not to the
slaves of rebels only, but to every slave
on this continent. Even if it were prae-
tlcable, which it is not, with Slavery non
existent in the Northern States and to
abolish it in those which persist in rebel.
hon, to maintain it in the narrow border
strip, 1T is precisely there, where negro
fugitives can the most readily escape.
that Its maintenance would the most GER
tainly lead to war.
Can this great peace measure be con-
stitutionally enacted?
a proclamation or (the more appropri-
ate form an act of general emancipa-
ton, should, IN Its preamble, set forth, in
substance, that the claims to service or
labor of which it itdeprives certain persons
having been proved, by recent events, to
be OF character endangering the su-
premacy of the law, jeopardising the in
tegrity of the Union. and incompatible
with the permanent peace of the country,
are taken by the Government, with inst
compensation made Under circum-
stances far less urgent than these, the
law or custom of civilized nations, based
on considerations of public utility, au-
thorizeS such taking of private property
for public use. We ourselves are famil-
lar with its Of erations. When a confla-
grafton in city threatens to spread far,
houses in the line of its progress may le-
gally be seized and destroyed by the au-
thoriues IN order TO arrest it, and the
owners are not held to have been wrong
edit they are paid for such losses under
an equitable appraisement But it is
not the existence of part of city that is
now endangered 1t is the integrity of
one among the first powers of the world
that is menaced with destruction. a7N
The truth Of the preamble suggested
has become, in my Judgment, incontro-
vertible. 1t will receive the assent of
an overwhelming majority of the people
of the loyal States The public senti-
ment of Europe will admit its truth a
Let us confess that such a preamble,
as preface to act or proclamation, could
not have commanded the assent of more
than small fraction of our people, only
two short years ago-two years, as we
reckon timei a generation, if we calcu-
late by the stirring events and far-reach-
ing upheayals that have been crowded
into the eventful months In such DAYS
rs these abuses ripen rapidly Their
consequences mature Their ultimate
tendencies become apparent We are
reminded of their transitory character.
We are reminded that although for the
time, and in certain stage of human
progress some abuses may have their
temporary use, and for this, under Gods
economy, may have been suffered to con-
tinue; yet all abuses have but limited
life The right only is eternal.
The rebellion, teacher and creator as
well as scourge and destroyer, by stern
ly laying bare the imminent dangers of
Slavery, has created the constitutionalty
Emancipation 1t has done more 1t
IL :.
cal duty, as well as strictly constitutional
right .....t
Can we, in declaring emancipation,
legally avoid the payment, say of two
hundred millions, in the shape Of com
pensation to loyal Shareholders?
Not if a Shareholders right to service
and labor from his slave, when not for
feited by treason, is legal. On humani-
tartan grounds the legality of that right
has been denied. But a construction
of the constitution adverse to such de-
NAL, and acquiesced in by the nation
throughout more than two generations,
is held by most men to be reason suffi-
cient why the right in question should be
regarded as private property. If it be
private property, then, except by violat-
Ing the fifth article of the amendments
to the Constitution, it cannot be taken
for public use without just compensation.
To violate any articles of the Constitu-
ton is revolutionary act; but such acts
cost a nation more than few hundred
millions of dollars
The risk that future decision of the
Supreme Court might declare emancipa-
ton without compensation to be uncon-
stitutional, is, of itself, sufficient justi6-
cation of the Presidents policy, cores
ponding to the above suggestions, in this
matter.
Such compensation will be unpopular
with many. Wise and just acts, when
they involve sacrifices, frequently are.
A wrong long tolerated commonly en-
tails penalty, which is seldom cheer
fully paid Yet, even on other grounds,
we ought not, in this case, to begrudge
the money Who deserves better of
their country than those brave men who,
in the border and other Slave States have
clung to their loyalty through all the
dark hours of peril even to life? rf
Precautions naturally suggest them
selves against false pretenses of loyalty.
1t seems expedient that he who shall
have proved that he is the legal owner of