Semi-weekly standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1853-18??, 1863-09-04
For the Standard,
Tue OLAnuaTu.
THE MEETING IN FORSYTH-GEN LEACH.

THE MEETING IN FORSYTH-GEN. LEACH.
Mr.. EDITOR The meeting in Forsyth county,
on Wednesday, the 26th of August was the largest
and most harmonious body of people l have seen
collected since the commencement of the war, there
having been not less than 200 persons, many of
whom were from the surrounding counties.
Speeches were made in response to loud calls, by
d. h. Starbuck, ESQ, Hon. j. NJ. Leach, and Col
W. w. Wheeler.
Gen. Leach delivered an able and we'll considered
speech of moro than an hour in length, which was
received with marks of decided appreciation by all,
except few who take extreme positions, on one
side or the other either destructive SeceSSiOnst
or as unconditional re- e-cOnstructiOnists.
took notes Of his speech, and will glance briefly
at the leading points discussed He set out by say
ing that but for the fact that his position had been
so often and in so many places misrepresented, he
should have remained silent, but that, being thrown
among so large assemblage of his friends, he
should take occasion to define his position in the
course of his remarks, and to express his views,
and what he believed to be the views of an over
whelming majority Of the people Of the State. He
reviewed the causes, both remote and immediate,
that had led to the breaking up of the Union-the
natural fruits of d6olitoRism and seceSsioniSm-and
declared that bad men, both North and South, had
united for it required united action, in destroying
the best government, and in well-nigh running the
happiest people that the sun of Heaven had ever
Shone upon.
He then enforced the great principle that ours is
a government of the people, and that it was the
right of the people to assemble and discuss and
canvass public men and measures that all the off,
GERS, whether civil military, of the State or Con-
federate governments, were but the agents of the
people and ought to be held accountable for the
manner in which they may discharge the duties of
their several agencies, not only in times of peace,
but more especially in the midst Of terrific revo
luton, such we are now engaged in; that MAJ
jority had the right to govern in all public af
fairs, and that the minority must yield and be made
to submit; that whenever the people failed to as
sert and maintain these great fundamental princi
ples that they would soon become SLdUeS.
He declared it as his opinion that while the South
could never be subjugated, yet to say nothing of
general bankruptcy and ruin, that hundreds of
thousands of most precious lives might be saved by
proper and well directed efforts for an armistice,
with the view of instituting proposals for an honor
able pe1ce-such peace as would secure the prop
erty and rights of the South, and at the same time
save the further effusion of blood. That ajor-
ty of the people of the North, uninfuenced by
the military, were for peace, and SO, by overWhelm-
ing majorities in the South that this most unnat-
ural war never would and never could be ended,
except by taking this step that therefore such ne
gotiation must precede peace. That the idea was
mere nonsense that proposals for peace would nerve
the North to greater exertionS-that the Yankees
had been dong their best all the tlme-that he was
for fighting with the sword in one hand, and hold
ing out the olive branch Of peace in the other that
in his opinion if a united effort were made, and it
ought to be made by our Conservative men and
abiest statesmen, the men with whom he had acted
in endeavoring to save the country from this most
desolating and bloody war, and with whom, in the
main, he agreed-such men as William A. Graham,
Alfred Dockery, Gov. Vance, Bedford Brown, John
A. Gmer, Lewis Thompson, Bartholomew F. Moore
Edward Warren, Richard S Donnell, William ".
Holden, Rufus K. Speed, Thomas Settle, Robert P
Dick, and others-if these men and their friends
would with determined effort urge upon the whole
country, the United States and Southern Confed
eracy, the necessity and wisdom of an honorable