The weekly pioneer and Democrat. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1855-1865, 1863-02-13
Wendell Phillips OH 'Olir Country's
Euturc.,,


WENDELL PHILLIPS addressed a large
audience last week at the Beecher's church
in Brooklyn, on "Our Country's Future. -
J Alluding to the progress of the world in
free speech and free thought, he presented
this illustration
Do You remember the boyish legend of
the young man that went out to seek his
fortune, and some favored fairy gave him
a mill, by which, when he entered into
trade, he could procure any amount of any
product he needed? He was only to wind
it up, pronounce the charm,
Grind, mill grind, say.
Grind, mill! grind away
and instantly, whether he asked salt Or
sweet, cotton or silk, everything he asked.
he had them. So he fixes up a large ware
house, places it in his private room, and
commences business in the far-otf East or
South, where such events occur. But a
neighbor watched the process and stole the
mill You recollect that is the way the
legend explains the sadness of the sea.
He got it on board his sloop, the thief
weighed anchor, to carry to some other
land the gift of the gods. Needing salt
one day he set the mill on his quarterback
and repeated the charm. 1t ground out
salt. 1t ground and ground and ground,
sinking the ship with salt, and sailing the
sea, and is grinding to-day. Now free
speech is that mill 1t began to grind
when the Puritans landed on the rock of
Plymouth. 1t ground out Massachusetts;
it ground out the Revolution it ground
out the Declaration of Independence it
ground out the Constitution; it ground
out the Missouri agitation, that nearly
broke the Union in halves; it ground out
Kansas; it ground ont Sumter; it ground
out Fremont's proclamation on the plains
of Missouri; it ground ont Abraham Lin
coins proclamation on the LIST day of JAN
uary. He means to stop the salt in the
bucket, but he cannot stop it. 1t is grind
ing to-day-it will grind forever; and
Davis knows, and the whole South knows
that it will grind out a Union. making bond
age and an aristOcracy-musti in the nature
Of things. Now, it is between those in
herent and uncomfortable elements that
the war goes on to-day. The ultimate flu
ture, therefore, is safe, safe for freedom,
safe for Union.
OF General BUTLER and his war policy,
Mr.. PHILLIPS said:
Hell; the only General, in my mind, who
has comprehended his office. From the
first moment that he put on the shoulder
strap he has been convinced of this one
thing: | am the government, and those
are traitors. l am all right, and they are
all wrong. Now our other Generals have
acted on this principle: We are half wrong;
they are half right. But Butler went
down to New Orleans, and alone, alone of
all Major Generals, ifhe should die tonight,
he can have it carved on his tombstone; |
am the only American who has yet dared
to hang a traitor You see that act has
great significance. 81 do not marshal my
troops in the field to meet belligerent
That is not government; that is battle
But /, standing in New Orleans as the gov
eminent of the United States, say to this
adverse party: England may recognise you,
France may recognise you, the whole
world may recognize you, but to me you
are felon and traitor, and the gallows
is your proper doom. In the same spirit
he said to natives of New Orleans: Every
one of you deserve the gallOws. Anything
short of it is the pre-eminent grace of the
government Now, this is not severity,
this is not barbarism, this is not cruelty
this is law. If the government exist, this
is common sense. Either we are the gov
eminent and they are traitors, or they are
another nation, and the war assumes other
proportions and relations. The merit of
Butler is, that never for moment has he
forgotten that he is the government. Any
thing else is nothing but criminal. No for
eigners and foreign ambassadors, no inter-
national law, no chicanery, no confusion
for moment. When he said to a party
of shareholders in the St. Charles Hotel:
Gentlemen, you think there is party in
the North building you bridge to 60 back
to Washington upon; they cannot dot. l
am democrat, came out of the most hun
ker wing of the democracy; / am still a
democrat, but tell you here privately, in
the honesty of my heart, l tell you that 1
will burn every house in Louisiana, will
put every black mans hand ON every white
mans throat, before / pull down that ban
ner and carry it back to Boston" he showed
that he understood the problem.
Mr.. Phillips criticised severely the course
of Governor Stanly in North Carolina:
But who is there to put in his place ?
Why, we have one in that city, (pointing
to New York, } the proclamation in boots,
a man whose name is sainted one in every
howell from the Rappahannock to the Rio
Grande, and has been so ever since 1866,
whose footsteps at Newbern would make
thrill that would be felt to New Orleans:
and his name is Fremont.
Of do-nothing generals Mr.. Phillips said:
Why, we are so hungry in Boston that