The Hillsdale standard. [volume] (Hillsdale, Mich.) 1851-1909, 1864-08-23

most inexhaustible, owing to lmmlgra
ltion; that ofmen in the South limited
quantity. The the Southerners, W.
are told, are Invading Maryland and
going to capture Baltimore. So they
were last year, only they did not leave
a vast army in sight of their own capi
tol, they had 100000 men instead o.
10000, and they were. commanded by
Lee instead of Ewell. That was true
invasion, this is only raid; that army
might have captured Baltimore, this
could not take Fort McHcnry, which
commands the city, or the gunboats
which could lay the port in ashes; that
required the sudden return of the whole
Army of the Potomac. this can be met
and defeated by calling out the loca
and neighboring militia. The struggle
is hot enough, no doubt, for these
Southerners are good soldiers, they are
fighting from the inside, and they have
most audacious leaders, but, taking the
campaign as whole, which is as we,
the victor2
Then take the political situation. In
what is it worse than it was last year
Three more States have been reduced
if not into hearty obedience to Wash.
ngton, at least into a sullen acquies-
cence, which is comparatively almost
as favorable. Two more have altered
their constitutions, SO as to abolish
slavery forever, and so establish com.
munity of interests between themselves
and the free States which allow of,im.
migration. The President has given
up his last lingering hope Of compror
mise, and accepts q platform which, as
regards slavery, is in effect though not
in theory, abolitionist. His new Con
gress, which was to have been SO Dem
ocratic, and to have controlled him in
the direction ofpeace, turns out on al
questions connected with war or slave
ry, an ultra-republican body. The CO.
aiition of governors which tried last
year to dictate terms to the President
has disappeared, and if Ohio is violen,
now, Illinois last year openly resisted
the troops sent to enforce the draft
The 7,mes has story that Governor
Seymour has refused to send the militia
to Washington. This is one OF the in.
ventions Of the Times correspondent.
But the rise in the value of gold? Is
no doubt the very worst symptom in
the whole aspect Of Northern politics,
for it signifies that the war is becoming
crushing gly expensive. Prices rise with
the fail in the currency, until, ifthe pro
cess continues, "A soldiers ration may
cost next year as much as turtle soup
and champagne cost last. But what is
the premium on gold throughout the
great cities Of the South? There is no
fact better ascertained in modern poll.
ties than that when people is once
determined finance viii not stop war.
The Convention had | 100000 men in
the field when assignats were 1000 per
cent, and Russia drove out Napoleon
and raised n new army to traverse Ger
many when they were almost valueless.
The only effect OF the rise on the war
is to compel the government to take
the taxes in kind, and in the end to sub
stitute acquisitions for taxation. For
the few articles required from abroad,
such, for INSTANCE, as saltpetre, the
North can always pay, just rs the South
can pay, for it can use its store of corn
as the South uses its store of cotton.
The rise in wages may derapge labor,
or even suspend it, but then the effect
of suspension may be, as in France, to
hurl the laboiing class into the ranks,
where alone they are secure of food.
The North, if reduced to a state of bar
ter, with its industry suspended and its
commerce paralyseo, its finances nom
existent, and its private fortunes disap-
pearing-can, if 1t will, while seed pro-
duces harvest, fight on to the end. The
single question for politicians is now, as
it was a year ago, the willingness of
the northern people to endure all rath-
er than see the South depart"
If they are unwilling the question
ends, but where are the signs OF unwil-
lingness
But for the hundredth time weropeat
the one fact of American politics which
our countrymen will never perceive,
that substantial power in the United
States rests with the country freehold
ers, that they are when combined and
excited more absolutely masters o the
policy of their country than the middle
classes are of the policy of ours. The
electors in England could not defy the
non-electors in arms, t. G northern free.
holders have complete supremacy in
physical force, could if so inclined re
duce the great cities to ashes, and send
all friends of compromise to serve
against their will in the ranks. There
is no power which Gan control this
class, and IL is one of al others on sohich
ths 90 re"cy d:6s uiiy falls Nth iea.t vis-
ID = weiyM Whatever is wanting, corn
will not be done without. Whatever
can be given by the rich will be given
to these men first and last of all. If
gold be at one thousand premium bread
will still support farmers, and the land
ploughed by father and sons does not
obey Mr.. Fessenden; wooden will still
warm them, and sheep yield their fleeces
without asking leave of Wall street;
meat will still fatten them, and pigs
can be fed on peaches, though gold be
buried out of mems sight. As a matter
of fact, these men look on specie only
as means of accumulating their small
savings, and the suspension of saving
one year or ten, no more means ruin to
them than it does to the non-slavehold-
ing whites of the South. Till they give
up, nothing is given up, and what mo-