The weekly pioneer and Democrat. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1855-1865, 1863-11-27

rial appendages to the Federal Govern.
ment, or, as it is popularity termed
State Suicide, lately invented and sus.
tanned by the more crazy of the radi.
Gals, is the most absurd, illogical, and
destructive, of any of the preposterou.
theories that owe their birth to these re-
evolutionary times. 1t is absurd, because
the constitution and government of the
United States does not operate primarily
upon the States as sovereignties or corpo-
rations, but upon the people, and upon the
States only through the individual mass
The individual may commit treason against
the Federal Government, and render HIM
self liable to death, but the State Of which
he is citizen cannot, by any possibility,
kill itself. The State is perpetual It
does not, under our system of government,
contain within itself the seeds of disselu-
ton, nor is there any power outside of the
State which can work its destruction. So
far as it can be said Of anything temporal,
it is everything and indestractible.
The doctrine is illogical. tits clearly 80,
or the Federal Government is wrong in
its prosecution of this war against the
South. A State can only commit suicide
by Withdrawing itself in fact, as well as in
form, from the Union, and by releasing
itself from all obligations to, as well as
all rights in, such Union. But, if the
State can thus vacate its rights and can
eel its obligations, then its participation
in hostilities against the Federal Govern
ment places such State in the attitude of a
foreign power, and its citizens in the cate
CORY of alien enemies. And if they are
alien enemies, they have certainly no OBJ
legations to fulfill towards the Federal
Government, and owe it no allegiance.
And if they owe it NO allegiance, it
is a monstrous and murderous ininstice
to fight them and kill them in the attempt
to make them acknowledge such ALE
glance. The only basis on which or war
against the rebels can be justified, is, that
no State, nor any citizen, within the limits
of the Union, can surrender the rights
which the Union bestows, or disregard
the obligations which the Union imposes.
Grant the reverse, and you logically sus-
tain the rebellion as intrinsically right,
and make patriots of the rebels, and OPP
pressors Of the Federal authorities and
people.
The doctrine is destructive, because un-
der its operation no stable government can
ever be maintained. This is SO plain, from
the considerations already advanced, that
it need not be argued or illustrated.
Above all, the doctrine is useless. tits
set forth by those whose hate for slavery
is more intense than their love for the
Union. They want to see slavery die, and
themselves to drive the nails into its cof-
fin. We find no fault with tho desire.
But, there is no need, in the effort to kill
slavery, to kill the government as it is,
and to destroy all chance for government
hereafter. Slavery is being disposed Of.
under the present, and the certain future,
operation Of events, as rapidly as the
moral and physical condition of things will
permit. Everywhere our armies go, sla-
very withers and dies. 1t will be 80 to
the end of this rebellion. 1t is not 50 by
virtue of any political theory, but By force
Of military necessity, and its own inherent
weakness and rottenness. What was at
first believed, but afterwards doubtsd, is
now proving true. Slavery cannot stand
up against public disorder. It can only
live where there is peace. War is its de-
struction. And from the wind which the
rebels have sown, they are righteously
roaping the whirlwind, which tears up and
destroys with every step of its advance,
tho very system which they would have
strengthened and made perpetual. Provi-
dence and the Federal armies are working
out this negro problem better and more eff
fectually than any crazy theorist can and
in their hands it will be wise to leave it.
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