The Chattanooga Daily Rebel. [volume] (Chattanooga, Tenn.) 1862-1864, 1863-03-08
trust I have made myself perfectly clea

I trust I have made myself perfectly clear
on this point.
Its highly idiotic to suppose that oolored
people can displace any more white labor by
being free than remaining slaves. Ifthey stop
in their old places-which they wont--they
joste no white laborers. If they leave their
old places, they leave them open to white lsb.
orers; and as it is physical impossibility for
white laborers to do the work of the negroes
in the rice, the Gotten or the sugar fields Of
the South, this would be highly liberal and
wholesome arrangement
Again, as practice proves more than theory
in any case, has there been any eruption Of
colored people northward, because of the abol
ishment of slavery in the District of Columbia
last spring? ] answer proudly-No! 1t was
quite the contrary, for the slave,owners of the
|circumjacent counties in Maryland made an
exceedingly good thing out of it by bringing
all their lame, blind, halt and generally de-
crepit negroes into the Washington market,
and there getting compensated for them at
fabulous rates.
II may not, perhaps, be out of place to state
here, that this place in no wise affects the
restoration of the national authority, the con-
tinuance of the war, nor proceeding under the
Emancipation Proclamation Of September %,
1862 by which all slaves of rebels are declar-
ed free on and after January /, 1868, and no
United States bonds offered in compensation.
The sagacity displayed in giving up the main
part of my message to it will thus be apparent
at a glance.
The idea have labored to covey is, that if
we buy the slaves of rebels and set them free,
paying in United States bonds due January l.
2035, that they will Immediately lay down
their arms and fall upon our bosoms in fra
ternal embrace; for this is all our Southern
brethren have been fighting for. 1t was, the
hope of "compensated emancipation" even in
the dim distance, that nerved them to the enor-
nous expenditures of blood and treasure
that they have made in the past two years.
the "irrepressible conflict" that
exists between free labor and slave labor, and
fearful lest the former should gain the suprema-
cy, they resolved on securing good price for
their negroes, and accordingly inaugurated the
Pay them for their negroes A. D..
2035 and they will stop rebelling.
do not forget the" gravity which should
paper addressed TO the Con-
gress of the nation by the Chief Magistrate of
the nation; nor do forget that some of you
are considerably older than j am, and know a
great deal more. trust therefore, that you
will excuse the apparent idiocy Of these re-
marks. tur
In conclusion, fellow citizens, | beg to state
that we can not hope to escape history, who
will be after us with very sharp stick
No personal Significance or insignifeanoe
can spare one or another of us. My own hopes
of being spared on the latter count are, conse-
quently, dashed, in which share disappoint
ment common to nearly all of you.
We say that we are for the Union. The
world will not forget that while we say this,
we do know how to save it. The Union knows
what the world is about What the world
doesn't know isn't worth knowing
I'have repeatedly shown, in the course Of
this message, that by the enforcement of the
Proclamation on the 1st of Jan
nary next, my plan of Compensated emanci.
patton" in A, d. 2O35 could stand no possible
chance Of being successful. Iclose in the firm
that it could not fail. 81 iG.10
tl.at A. LINCOLN.
z WASHINGTON, December |, 1868,