The New York herald., 1862-01-09


Washington correspondence yesterday there
was suggestive paragraph in connection with
the probable transfer of the traitor Slidell's
property in Louisiana to London bankers, with
q view to saving it from confscation in the
event of the South being restored to the Union.
Under the constitution of the United States
there can be no blood attainder, all the punish
ment that government can inflict upon rebel
being confined to his personal accountability.
Thus, though his estates may be sequestrated
during his life, they must revert to his family
at his death. Toprevent however, this limited
application of the pains and penalties of trea-
son, the evasions suggested by our correspon-
dent will undoubtedly be resorted to by many
engaged in the rebellion Any act of confsca-
property would of course be illegal, and any
attempt to enforce it would bring us into fresh
trouble with England. To anticipate the diff
Guilty, Congress should at once pass a law de-
claring null and void all transfers of real or
personal estate made from the present time by
rebels in arms against the government. This
will put an estopel upon reclamations based
on the fraudulent conveyance of property, and
will save us from complications into which the
disappointed ambition of the leaders of the re-
bellion would be but too happy to plunge us.
GREAT DISCOVERIES BY GREELEY-The Hon.
Massa Greeley has just made some very re-
markable discoveries. He has found out
through our soldiers, returned from their long
Imprisonment at Richmond, that the Union
sentiment in that city, "however smothered, is
very strong;" that the "white mechanics, arti-
sans and laborers of Richmond are mainly
Unionists;" that "the hereditary aristocracy,
most of the Shareholders, and all the negro
traders, are vehement secessionists;" that if we
"take away the pressure exerted by the pre-
sence of many thousands of rabid secessionists
from the Gulf States, our informant is conf
dent that Virginia would soon declare for the
Union;' that Virginia never deliberately
sought the overthrow of the Union;" that her
State Convention, elected on the issue of Union
an overwhelming popular vote; and that 'it
required the utmost violence and terrorism on
the part of the negro traders, who rendezvous
in Richmond, to force o secession vote in that
Convention;" and so on to the end of the
chapter.
Now, all this may be news to those readers of
the Tribune who read no other paper; but to
the readers of the HERALD all these SUBJ
stantial facts, and many more concern
ing the popular sentiment of Virginia,
and the devices and terrorism of the
fighting secessionists in that quarter, are an
old story. Over and over again, since Febru-
ary last, we have ventilated these facts, and in
support of Honest Abe Lincoln's" policy
of conciliating the Union party of the South
We are sure that such party exists in every
one of our revolted States, excepting South
Carolina, and we hold that it is better to have
the true men of this party as our friends than to
make them our enemies by crusade for the
indiscriminate confscation of Southern slave
property. But what now is the opinion of Massa
Greeley upon this point, since these wonderful
discoveries of his in relation to Virginia We
should like to know.