The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1862-01-09

W - SOAstAiAlIR OEhtililB lit OECuSIOD
think you will permit me, If indeed you dc
not regard it as my essential province, to speak
frankly OF our present duty to say some
thing OF the great theme which engrosses
the nation of which We think when we rise
IN the morning and when we retire at night,
as we 90 to our work and return to our
meals, when we open the morning paper for
news and close it for reflection, when we
kneel at the family altar and by our own
bedsIdes-the one great overwhelming SUBJ
Iject, the issue of this rebellion, the destiny of
our country. =
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS OF SECESSION.
You are familiar with the history of our
Constitution, and with those marked lines
OF distinction between the authority of the
states and that of the Federal Government,
which to some Of the statesmen and authors
of England seem so difficult of comprehen-
sion, and in regard to which, perhaps naturally
enough, they occasionally fall into blunders,
which unfortunately are not always as harm
less as the droll Liberties they are accustomed
TO take with our history, our geography, and
our nomenclature.
If ever the constitutional history of Amer
lea shall receive in the education of English
gentlemen a 1.-THE of the attention bestowed
on the constitutions of Greece and Rome, of
a share of that devoted to the fabulous heroes,
the gods, and goddesses of classic mythology,
the British senate may occasionally find a ia
miliarity with our institutions of no slight
value, especially if it shall save them from
rashiy interrupting the cordial friendship ofa
kindred people.
The universally of such knowledge here,
makes us perhaps more ready to remark the
want of it in foreign critics. DIR. franklin
said during the last century, and the progress
Of education and Improvements in our news
papers have made the remark more true of
the present than of the past-sWe are more
thoroughly an enlightened people with regard
to our political interests, than prehaps any
other under heaven"
You remember that in TIA the members
OF the first Congress at Philadelphia, on be-
half OF the colonies which they represented,
entered into certain articles Of association
"under the sacred ties of virtue, honor, and
love Of country" That in IT'S the states
united in a confederacy, or what they called
"a firm league of friendship with each other"
under the title of the United States, and that
under this league made by the states they
continued until 11S9, when, sin order to form
a more perfect union"-not tee states-but
ave the people of the United States" or
dained and established the present Federal
Constitution. You remember that from the
date of the peace in SO, when we were a
mere league of petty sovereignties, we sank
rapidly, in the words of Mr.. Motley, whose
conclusive essay in The London Times has en-
lightened Europe, "into a condition of utter
impotence, imbecility, and anarchy" which
continued until we were rescued from it by
1.-The Constitution of the United States"
which made us in every sense, one nation
with one supreme Government, although for
convenience, we retained the plural title I'M
der which we had achieved our independence
of "The United States"
Any argument, therefore, addressed to you
upon the constitutional right, alleged by the
rebels, of a state to secede from the Union,
would DC quite superfluous. Men have been
allowed to talk of state sovereignty as it liked
them, because ours is a free country, and, in
ordinary times, the utmost liberty of speech
is permissible, but the doctrine has not even
n respectable foothold. Washington, as if
foreseeing the evil it has assisted to bring
forth, denounced it as 'that monster, state
sovereignty" Webster and jackson success
lively demolished it, and the argument now
insolently advanced by leaders of the rebel
states, that, in seeding from the Union and
Selling its property, they are only exercising
their reserved rights under the Constitution,
is one which to every intelligent and loyal
carries with it its own refutation.
IL uldu VIII dlEtCueS 10 IL tDS weight OIL 1
a feather, Is either singularly ignorant of
history, or his reasoning powers are
hopelessly perverted.
FALSE PRETENcEs OF THE REBELS.
The rebels, despite their pretended plea of
Constitutional right, virtually admit its ground
essness, and fall back on the right of revo- ,
ution. That is a right which no American !
an deny, when the causes of justification ,
Ire sufficient. The simple cry of rebel
md revolutionist has no terror for us who
that Washington and our ances- :
ors occupied the position Of both the one and /
he other.
All then depends upon the reality and suf- :
of the assigned causes of this attempt :.
( revolution. Are they such as to justify :.
he effort to break in pieces the American :.
Union ? to destroy this last experiment of :
opular government? =
The argument offered by the insurrection- II
SITS and their friends to show that the Fed a
raj Government and the loyal states should v
uietly allow them to depart and form a sep :
rate confederacy are these:- :
That the rebellion or revolution is the act +
{ the people of those states exercising their L
overeign will. tn
That they have been compelled to this step e
] self defence by the election of Mr.. LIN vi
Din. and the refusal of certain Northern &C.
tates, to fulfil the constitutional obligation of Pr
fugitive slaves. u
That the present position of the rebels, and
lie fact of their having ousted the Federal 81
overnment from its forts and other property, u
thibit their strength, make the revolution ~
4 accomplished fact, and render the attempt p
subjugate the Southern people utterly =,
ac
That even if they were ~subjugated, harmo- "a
feeling could never be restored, and that her
r these reasons, and especially the last, a lea
ar 70 maintain the ,n,arr;t, of ,ba IJo;oo