Daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1859-1865, 1862-04-18
Friday Morning, April 10, 1852.

sim saake II lad our r4nk.ia VA,
Sui Scat above each pAtEsot's grave
BsafFa Se The HFait1r thA4 would GErs
E' TOtrAI1 il fhr5zsh TIE dEst Of shame.
An boassr 4sArts I;I lot Gil share
Ard foII0u II TO Dsash OF FHus-
The People of the South and the Pol.
ItIetnnS OF Ghe South.
The biograpbers of Thomas H. Benton,
record it to bis eternal honor that he herer
in his lite felt or expressed doubt either
in tue integrity or the capacity of The peo-
pie foE self Government. OF all men tba;
this eouutEy ever produced, not excepting
Thomas Jefferson. himself, be believed
deepest and strongest in the people It is
said that the firmest bond of sympathy be-
tween General Jackson and Benton was
the fact that ,hey both believed in the peo-
pie, and both rested their political claims
and hopes viii the people When Benton
solitary saI alone" moved the celebrated
'e1puugiug7 resolutions, be ook his APP
peal from the Senate then before him to
the constituents of a future Senate. and he
felt prOpbesicalIy confident ike the good
martyr Bishop that shy the grace of
God be had that day lit candle that
would not go out His appeal WAS them
as It alTays was, to the people for vindica-
lion.
There can be no nobler intellectual
OF moe4l feature ia a Statesman's ebarac-
ter, than this fidelity to ana confidence in
the source Of all political power. 1t has
been, however, the paradox of American
politics, that American politicians have as
rule discredited the people. and have en-
deavOred 10 compass and perpetuate sys-
ten of power outside OF the people, one
which should intrieateIy necessitate the
popular acquieseence, just as is the case
il the involved systems of Europe This
WAS Mr.. Cdhoun's idea. he iusiu-
uared it in A.. ,he speeches of lis
latte. life. and in his conversations he
elaboratedtt With allths specioRs ingenuity
OF his minute mind. II is said that there
WAS nor youth Of any promise or of any
great expectations in the South, whom
he did not, directly or indirectly, ap-
proscn on this subject He fascinated
them with the picture of Southern feud-
aiism-a great agricultural Laronial sys-
tenn Curfew era remodeled and inn
proved Roman Republic, ssch as it Was in
IT'S earlier history. How congeniaI we're his
ideas tO the Southern mind the history of
1928, aud of ls6I-62 Abuudantly shows.
For the twenty years last past, all govern
ment in the South has been con-
ceuIasing into the hands of the Southern
politicians, and the people have lost their
liberties faster than the Italians lost theirs.
Their power has become almost Laronial.-
Blood and caste have been everywhere
gaining footbold. Labor Of every kind,
almost, including many Intellectual sorts,
has been steadily sinking in the social
scale. A school teacher ia the South has
become person to be Extensively patron
izedi while mechanics are simply a for
eign element, that have been held to be
agrarian and dangerous in their influence
on the serf system, and competitors with
it. They have been excluded from voting
and all political privileges years ago in
one or two Of the Southern States, unless,
like the '.freed man" of the middle ages,
they had gained a landed or negro in
terest. The tone of the press has been
one OF constant sneering at the me-
chanical skill, the mechanical production
and the mechanical wealth of the North.
This tone was struck many years ago by
the Charleston Mercury, the Southsrn Quar-
terly RerieV aud one or two other infiuen-
tial prints 1t found gradual response all
over the Sonth. The Richmond EnOuiyer
and the Ezamiaer actively took it up oflAte
years, and they have filled Eastern Virginia
with the idea. They filled also the small pol.
ittcisns of Western Virginia with it, a prom
ineut example of whom was Chas. W. Rus
sell UfythiS city, who, With all his cold and
crafty policy, could not suppress his intaoc-
triuatiou. The late Judge Thompson, in a
still smaller way, was another example,
Among his last Judicial extravaganzas aud
fantasies was a descanting contrast of the
happy, primitive way in which people used
to live in these parts. before railroads aud
mechanic sFts had Invaded them, with what
they were nowadays. They used to have
log ire.pEaees. and their Iatch-strings were
always out, and society was hospitable and
crime was rare. Russell, in his Atheueun.
speech, just before the Presidential cleo
ttOn, took great credit to himself, that he
had generously laid aside his preIudiees
and advocated an industrial policy for
Wheeling = that is. that he had exerted
himself to procure legislation favoring the
establishment of manufaetories, &c., here,
when he knew, as he expressed it, he was
introducing an element that might turn out
to be anti-virginian in sentiment. The
expression showed how chock-fnll of this