Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1863-06-26

There is great reason to fear that the policy
of dealing tenderly with slavery in the border
states, will ere long produce disastrous re-
suits. Kentucky, Missouri and Maryland are
still debateable ground. Any disaster to Grant
at Vicksburg, any appearance of rebel force
near the Ohio river would probably place
Rosecrans on the defensive, and throw Ken
lucky into the arms of the southern traitors.
Maryland is constantly threatened by Lees
army, and Missouri by Price or Marmaduke.
All these states might have been made safe by
emancipation on the first of January, that is
to say, provided emancipation had been fol-
lowed by drilling the freed negroes. The
exemption of these states, while it has kept.
them defenceless except by the continual
presence of the forces of the United States in
large numbers, has also tended in powerful
degree to prevent the full frution of the
hopes which the country has entertained
from the edct of freedom issued ON
the first day of the year. Kentucky has
seized and sold hundreds of men legally made
free by the proclamation, and the president
has not dared, or has not chosen to interfere.
So audacious has Kentucky slavery become,
by reason of this exemption from the fate
which was its rightful due, that the Louisville
journal threatens that any emancipation
movement, like that which is so successfully
initiated in Missouri and Maryland, shall be
trampled out like the fuse of lighted bomb
shell. We trust that the presidential error
will not be eXpiated by Il rebel invasion of
Kentucky, and the conquest of that state by
the armies of the confederacy, aided by tens
of thousands of traitors within its borders, but
we are by no means sure.
Ex-Gov. King of Missouri has gwen an &C.
count OF recent raid made by him upon the
president. 1t is evident that King only wants
opportunity to become as base a rebel
Price. Yet the president defers to him rather
than to the progressive men of the state, and
the old semi-secessionist goes home and
chuckles over his success in speech which
gives delight to all the enemies of the coun-
try. The President told Mr.. King that slavery
was rattlesnake. If found a rattlesnake
in my path l should kill it, but if it were in
the cradle with my child should hesitate, lest
1 might kill the child. The president is quite
fond of arguing by illustration. 1t is dam
gerous process, and in this case he is not quite
successful in his aim. There is danger to the
shareholders or to the non-slaveholders of the
border states in the death of slavery, but only in
its continued life. This is a world of COM
pensations," said Mr.. Lincoln in letter writ.
ten and printed before his election to the pres
idency, "and he who would be no slave must
hare no slave Kentucky and Missouri can
never be free from internal discussions and
confederate danger, so long as the serpent of
slavery is tolerated within their borders.
Slavery in these border states is not rattle
snake which has crept into the cradle of the
innocent and unconscious child, and which
must be disposed of according to circum-
stances, but rather resembles the snake which
has been adopted by the child as a toy and
playmate, and the destruction of which is nee
essary for the preservation Of health and life.
Opportunities are not wanting to crush it be-
meath the iron heel OF military power, but the
child must not be deprived of its playmate
lest it should put its finger in the corner of its
eye, and pout, and Sob and make up faces,
and threaten to do something very desperate.
Old Mr.. King and old Mr.. Crittenden have been
playing with slavery so long that they think
it hardship to have their sport interrupted,
and Mr. Lincoln is willing to crafty these
"children" at the greatest risk to the public
welfare. Such kindness is cruelty. We hope
the day is not far distant when this policy is to
be changed, for we prefer that it should be
voluntarily changed rather than made to yield
through the stern and pitiless logico disgrace
and disaster.